Tide vs Enigma

As far as professional play goes, Enigma just has more weaknesses to exploit. The most pronounced one is the channeled ult, which is a problem throughout the game. Tidehunter is always the safest pick, and doesn't have that many hard counters. The ones he does have are more or less shared with Enigma anyway. You also have to be a much more well-rounded player, imo, to play Enigma well.

Enigma is several playstyles in one, really:

-Pusher
-Jungler
-Utility
-Semi-support
-Initiator/Counter-Initiator

Tidehunter, on the other hand, is almost purely an initiator. Semi-support if nobody can fill the support role on their own.

With Enigma you have to worry about your GPM a lot more so that you can actually get the blink, BKB, Linken's, etc that you NEED to do what you're supposed to. Tide just needs blink and he's nearly set. I don't want to say Tide takes less skill to play, per se, but he does take fewer skills to play. He's the safer hero, can do the job really well, and recovers from a bad start a lot better than Engima. Enigma, however, can be incredibly rewarding for the entire team if you manage to play him well, and the entire enemy team will have to adjust their strategy accordingly.

As far as lanes go, they have nearly opposite effects. Tidehunter does wonders for the lane. He's just about impossible to kill, he can set up kills, he reduces damage making it harder for enemies to farm.. he does it all. Meanwhile Enigma is in the jungle farming for the first 10 mins, MAYBE popping out for a gank here and there (at the cost of farm, thus a slower blink). Just depends what your team needs.

TL;DR - Enigma can do more but you have to know what you're doing. Tidehunter has one job and does it well, and can recover from a bad start, but is kind of a one-trick pony.

I just wanna say, I think Mekanism is built more often as a first item on Enigma in pro play than Blink Dagger, because he's valued more for the early pushing than Black Hole, and a Mek supports that better.

If anything, from what I've seen Blink Daggers tend to be like 3rd or 4th item on him in many pro matches.

lets face it ...neiter Enigma nor Tidehunter are picked for anything else but their huge fight-changing ultimates ...sure its nice that enigma is a decent pusher and tide a solid frontliner / tank but what makes teams pick them, is their immense teamfight impact ccs.

As much as i like enigma, he simply is losing to tide in terms of flexibility. Engima has to worry about so many factors to acutally set up a good ultimate where as tide can only go in, ult and die happily (he is much like Venomancer in that regard). Also tide is a rather team-independant hero, fitting in a far wider variety of lineups. TBH i also kinda miss Magnus in competitive play...just because you cant insta-gib heroes once you reach level 6 anymore doenst seem like a valid reason 2 me.

I don't really agree with that - Enigma is much more similar to a Chen or Enchantress pick - he can't gank the lane quite as early as they can (at least without delaying your items due to mana issues), but he's a very strong pusher, and can gank effectively. He also is more vulnerable to roamers/offlaners. However, he offers you a lot more teamfight and late.

Landing a good Black Hole is difficult against competent players without setup or waiting for counter-initiation - I'd almost argue the threat of it is often better. Ravage is much easier.

So I'd pick him on that basis rather than as a walking ult. Get a mek, push/gank safe and mid - if they don't have good AOE nukes you can take towers.

Tidehunter is a tank, an offlaner, with good recovery from ancient farming. He's less item dependent - but they have quite different roles. Enigma should generally be picked up as a jungler unless you have a very specific 1v1 matchup in mind.

I would agree about Magnus though - I think it has many of the advantages of Black Hole without the channelling or need for BKB/Linkens. He can be pretty effective offlane as well as mid.

Reverse Polarity or Black Hole?

^ Heard that. Nothing like blinking in, hitting a 5-man Reverse Polarity, then charging everyone straight into a Black Hole. It's one of the most satisfying things in Dota 2.

This can also turn into a "MAGNUS NOOOOOO" situation tho.