Heroes like zephyr and tree benefit from every aspect of it, and are generally one of the lowest priority heroes to focus in a team fight, since they're both super survivable and resilient.

Its not a very good item for most heroes, though, especially bean curd like blood hunter. In that situation a satanic would have probably benefited you much more, though it would be more expensive. Most blood hunters go for hp to survive the early-midgame where they farm a lot, since their primary role is to rupture silence chase flee. So your early game should be focused on surviving and farming and hp items.

In that particular situation, you were screwed once jereziah dropped. Lifesteal is a terrible idea in general until after your wingbow is farmed. Once your wingbow finishes, a lifesteal item becomes viable because your dps is high enough that it becomes worthwhile. A carry on a team where everyone else is notably should take up satanic as opposed to elder parasite. Against that particular team, I might have passed on lifesteal entirely, trying for shrunken head instead. Abyssal is indeed a relatively "cheap" lifesteal item but I consider it trash for 99% of the heroes in dota - for agil, its a distraction from farming your wingbow. For melee, its a distraction from farming your shrunken/heart/whatever. The thing about dota is that team fights are the most critical parts of the game, and getting 50 health every hit doesn't really help when you only have time for 3-4 hits before you're blasted with multiple disables. Its almost always better to get pure hp or a shrunken head or a shaman headdress to increase your direct survivability, rather than relying on being able to hit opponents the dozens of times it takes to make the lifesteal worth the cost of not getting a different item.