* Heroes who rely on damage over time as Spiked Carapace can block and reflect only one instance of damage: Jakiro, Viper, Venomancer, Huskar, Ember Spirit, Dark Seer, Sand King, Doom, Dawnbreaker. However, this also means they are easily stunned.

* Any hero with teleport abilities (e.g. Ember Spirit, Storm Spirit) can easily break Static Link.

* Enemies that possess high defenses through magic resistance, damage reduction, or high regeneration will make it difficult to whittle their health down to get to Reaper's Scythe's threshold. Such heroes include Bristleback (although only from behind), Spectre, Ursa, and Dragon Knight.

* Bristleback's tankiness and damage reduction from the rear makes him very hard for Phantom Lancer to chase and finish off, due to his lack of burst damage.
* Quill Spray quickly destroys Phantom Lancer's illusions.
* Bristleback's passive costs no mana, meaning that it will continue to trigger even if Phantom Lancer drains Bristleback's mana with Diffusal Blade.
Additional:
* Bristleback's tankiness and damage reduction from the rear makes him very hard for Phantom Lancer to chase and finish off, due to his lack of burst damage.
* Quill Spray destroys Phantom Lancer's illusions.
* Bristleback's passive costs no mana, meaning that it will continue to trigger even if Phantom Lancer drains Bristleback's mana with Diffusal Blade.

* Sleight of Fist is the natural counter to Phantom Lancer's army of illusions, especially when combined with Battle Fury.
Additional:
* Sleight of Fist, allows Ember Spirit to destroy all of Phantom Lancer's illusions.
* Flame Guard also deals significant damage to illusions, and protects against Spirit Lance.
* Phantom Rush is unable to catch Ember Spirit when he teleports to his Fire Remnants.

* Viscous Nasal Goo can hinder Crystal Maiden's already abysmal mobility, which allows Bristleback (or his teammates) to run her down and kill her.
* Bristleback frequently builds Blade Mail, which can quickly kill Crystal Maiden if her ultimate is used while he is under its effect.
* The passive part of Bristleback will trigger many, many times under the damage from Freezing Field, and as the stacks increase, the damage output from each successive cast (or proc) will eat away at Crystal Maiden's small HP pool.

* Crystal Maiden is extremely fragile and she's an easy target for him. She has no real disables that can lock Ember Spirit down, and all of her skill damage can be negated with Flame Guard. The damage from Searing Chains, Flame Guard, and Sleigh of Fist can easily take her down.

* Quill Spray's constant AoE damage will hit Dark Willow even in Shadow Realm. Its automatic damage will hurt her if she tries to get close and use Bedlam.

* Flame Guard blocks Dark Willow's magical burst damage, and harms her if she tries to get close to attack with Bedlam.
* Sleight of Fist and Fire Remnant makes it hard for Dark Willow to fully disable Ember Spirit.

* Combo Quill Spray and items Blade Mail can easily trigger from Focus Fire damage.
Additional:
* Using Focus Fire on Bristleback tends to fare badly for Windranger, as he can trigger passive Quill Sprays many times, especially when she attacks him from behind. In addition, Windrun does not protect her from both Viscous Nasal Goo and Quill Spray, rendering her helpless.
* Bristleback's natural tankiness makes it hard for Windranger to effectively burst her down throughout the game.
* Bristleback tends to continuously spam Viscous Nasal Goo to slow down Windranger when she uses Windrun to escape, potentially allowing him to outrun her with his Warpath stacks.
* Bristleback can build Lotus Orb to reflect Shackleshot and Focus Fire back at Windranger.

* The high mobility provided by Fire Remnant makes it hard for Windranger to find a good position to land Shackleshot or a full duration of Focus Fire.
* Flame Guard and Searing Chains deal considerable magical damage to Windranger which she cannot avoid with Windrun.
* Searing chains also negates the mobility from Windrun.

* Quill Spray destroys spiderlings, and hits Broodmother even when she's regenerating in her webs. This makes Bristleback one of her hardest counters in lane.
Additional:
* Bristleback reduces most of Broodmother's and her spiderlings' damage.
* Quill Spray will hit any spiders in its proximity, hindering Broodmother's fighting and farming capabilities.

* Sleight of Fist keeps Ember Spirit invulnerable until he hits every unit in its area of effect allowing him to stall for large amounts of time against Broodmother and her large amounts of spiderlings, or potentially damaging them enough if equipped with an item to improve wave clearing such as Battle Fury or Maelstrom to prevent her pushes entirely.
* Flame Guard will damage any of Broodmother's spiders in an area, deterring her from attempting to kill him. It can also be used during Sleight of Fist to amplify damage done.
* Fire Remnant allows Ember Spirit an escape from Broodmother that is unaffected by her Incapacitating Bite.

* Heroes that have AoE damage: Lina, Keeper of the Light, Timbersaw, Leshrac, Bristleback, Axe.

* Ember Spirit can easily deal with Nature's Call by using his Flame Guard and with Battle Fury. He also has multiple ways of escaping Sprout. Additionally, Ember Spirit can break Sprout's trees with Activate Fire Remnant and interrupt Teleportation with Searing Chains.
Additional:
* Sleight of Fist with Battle Fury deals a lot of damage to Nature's Prophet's team if they stand close to his Treants, as well as killing all the Treants with ease.
* Ember Spirit with Fire Remnant and Boots of Travel can be very active around the map, which enables him to quickly teleport and defend the objective Nature's Prophet is attacking whenever he tries to push.

* Quill Spray quickly destroys Chaos Knight's Phantasms.

* Heroes with strong area damage to destroy Phantasm illusions: Axe, Ember Spirit, Legion Commander, Phoenix

Additional:
* Ember Spirit is evasive and can dodge close encounters with melee heroes like Chaos Knight. Ember Spirit can't be caught with the slow from Reality Rift, and Flame Guard and Sleight of Fist can bring Phantasm's illusions down quickly.

* Lycan's wolves deal little damage to Bristleback, and are easily killed by Quill Spray, even when they're invisible.
* Lycan's lack of burst damage makes it very hard for him to kill Bristleback, especially when his back is turned.
Additional:
* Quill Spray can be used to kill Lycan's summons.
* Bristleback allows him to stay alive against Lycan while dishing out counter attacks
* He can overpower Lycan with his Warpath instead.

* Heroes that heavily depend on illusions or summons, (Naga Siren, Terrorblade, Phantom Lancer, Lycan,...) are vulnerable to Sleight of Fist and even more so if Ember Spirit has Battle Fury.

* Bristleback's abilities are nearly useless for Rubick to Spell Steal, as he does not gain the bonuses from Warpath.
Additional:
* Rubick deals little damage on his own, and Bristleback can simply shrug off all his spells and chase Rubick down with his Quill Spray and the damage bonus from Warpath.
* Rubick does not tend to charge forward in teamfights, stay in the front lines under most circumstances, yet effective casts of Quill Spray and Viscous Nasal Goo requires the opposite as they require multiple casts and close range to add up stacks.
* Rubick does not benefit from Warpath through casting the stolen spell.

* Certain Hero's potential lies on the combo of their abilities. As an example, Ember Spirit can cast Sleight of Fist and Searing Chains together to root and damage enemies from a far distance. Yet for Rubick, casting Searing Chains can only catch enemies at a close distance, and Sleight of Fist does little more than a scratch of right click.
* It is arguably possible to group spells together after getting Aghanim's Scepter, but stealing two separate spells from one single enemy is somewhat luxurious in an intense fight.

* Bristleback is one of the hardest heroes to gank with a Meat Hook and Dismember combo, and attempts to do so sometimes backfire on Pudge.
Additional:
* Pudge is particularly susceptible to Bristleback's Viscous Nasal Goo and Quill Spray due to his naturally low armor and poor agility gain.
* Bristleback, in combination with his strength gain, high health, common itemization for magic resistance and damage reduction from Bristleback makes him a poor target for Pudge.

* Heroes with a high degree of mobility and invisibility are hard to catch with Meat Hook: Ember Spirit, Riki, Clinkz, Queen of Pain.

* Quill Spray is very effective against Io, as it has very low armor and has to stay close to the fight to not break its Tether.

* Heroes with either magical, physical or pure damage burst: Bane, Ember Spirit, Leshrac, Lina, Luna, Nyx Assassin, Phantom Assassin, Skywrath Mage, Tinker, Ursa, Void Spirit.

* Quill Spray usually hits Meepo's clones, although Bristleback cannot turn his back when rooted with Earthbind.

* Meepo is quite fragile in the early game and can be easily taken down by Flame Guard's and Searing Chains' damage. Later on, Meepo is very vulnerable to Sleight of Fist's damage due to Battle Fury's cleave on multiple Meepos.
Additional:
* Sleight of Fist combined with Battle Fury, Maelstrom and Daedalus will allow Ember Spirit to make a quick work of Meepo if his clones are crowded around each other.
* Searing Chains interrupts Meepo's initiating because Meepo's clones do not have spell immunity.

* Searing Chains and Flame Guard quickly burn through Refraction instances exposing her low health pool.
* Templar Assassin has no inherent way to prevent Ember Spirit from escaping, a good Ember player also will be able to dodge her meld attack
* Ember Spirit`s Searing chains give true sight into invisibility, why Templar Assassin can't hide from it in Meld and get out of the fight using Blink Dagger
Additional:
* Flame Guard burns quickly through Refraction charges, which is why it can interrupt Templar Assassin, giving his team the opportunity to kill her.
* Ember Spirit can dodge a blow from Meld with Sleight of fist, providing him an advantage in a 1v1 situation.
* Searing Chains give true sight into invisibility, why Templar Assassin can't hide from it in Meld and get out of the fight using Blink Dagger.

* Viscous Nasal Goo slows down Dragon Knight and lowers armor, locking him down and making him more vulnerable.

* Ember Spirit can close the distance between Sniper easily with his Activate Fire Remnant and further keep Sniper in place with Searing Chains.
* With the help of Aghanim's Scepter, Sniper cannot outrun Ember Spirit or chase him, even if Sniper builds mobility items.

* Zeus laneing against Ember is going to be punished with Sleight of Fist due to his low health pool
* Zeus's chip damage from Arc Lightning and other spells is nullified from Ember's Flame Guard.
Additional:
* Ember Spirit has a built-in antimagic shield, and Zeus has nothing but this magical damage, because of this, their confrontation on the center line can turn out to be sad for Zeus. If on such a line Ember Spirit will finish off all creeps under its Flame Guard, and Zeus with the help of Arc Lightning, then eventually Zeus will lose mana faster, and will be forced to look for ways to replenish it
* Ember Spirit can interrupt Zeus with his "jumping" abilities, the fact is that Zeus deals damage from his abilities directly, while Ember Spirit disappears for milliseconds from the battlefield when flying during the Sleight of Fist action or when flying into Fire Remnant

* Tiny's nonexistent armor in the early game makes him very vulnerable to Quill Spray's large amounts of physical damage.
* Bristleback decreases Tiny's high burst damage against Bristleback.
* Viscous Nasal Goo can slow Tiny to a crawl and allows Bristleback to easily kite him with his high movement speed and Quill Spray's long range, as Tiny has no ability to escape.

* Quill Spray will hit Riki even when he is invisible.
* Cloak and Dagger's bonus backstab damage is rendered irrelevant against Bristleback.
* Smoke Screen does not stop Bristleback's passive from activating.
* Due to Bristleback's natural tankiness, he is an ideal Gem of True Sight carrier, directly countering Riki's invisibility.
Additional:
* The bonus Backstab damage from Cloak and Dagger is rendered irrelevant with Bristleback and hurts Riki more than him because of the passive Quill Spray.
* Riki can still get damaged by Bristleback's Quill Spray while invisible, and it can be hard to deal with in lane.
* Bristleback is not too bothered by Smoke Screen. Though he cannot use Quill Spray manually inside it, it still procs passively when he takes damage from the back. The movement speed from Warpath allows him to get out of the area easily.
* Due to Bristleback's natural tankiness, he is an ideal Gem of True Sight carrier.
* Riki rarely buys Silver Edge to break Bristleback's passive because the invisibility aspect of it is redundant.

* Heroes who can continue dealing damage even while being stunned: Luna, Razor, Axe, Bristleback, Leshrac, Death Prophet, Jakiro.

* Searing Chains can stop Charge of Darkness if timed correctly.
* Activate Fire Remnant can be used to escape an approaching Spirit Breaker, or lead Spirit Breaker into a bad situation.
* Fire Remnant and Sleight of Fist allows Ember Spirit to dodge Charge of Darkness if timed correctly.

* Ember Spirit has much higher mobility in Fire Remnant than Void Spirit.
* Ember's Flame Guard is effective against Void Spirit's spells, as most of them deal magical damage.
* The root from Searing Chains prevents Void Spirit from using Dissimilate or Astral Step.

* Ember's magic damage build is able to burst down Alchemist due to his low strength gain and Alchemist's normal item pick up.

* Ember Spirit easily finishes off all creeps on the line against Earth Sprit, exchanging health with him under his Flame Guard, which is why Earth Spirit can leave the line for ganks very early and without the necessary amount of gold and levels, which will give the Ember Spirit team an advantage to fight off such ganks
* The Sleight of Fist ability helps Ember Spirit dodge all of Earth Spirit's abilities, which makes his gank potential practically useless against Ember Spirit, and with the purchase of Black King Bar, Ember Spirit can use Sleight of Fist to combine with Searing Chains to catch and kill Earth Spirit.
Additional:
* Ember Spirit easily finishes off all creeps on the line against Earth Sprit, exchanging health with him under his Flame Guard, which is why Earth Spirit can leave the line for ganks very early and without the necessary amount of gold and levels, which will give the Ember Spirit team an advantage to fight off such ganks
* The Sleight of Fist ability helps Ember Spirit dodge all of Earth Spirit's abilities, which makes his gank potential practically useless against Ember Spirit, and with the purchase of Black King Bar, Ember Spirit can use Sleight of Fist to combine with Searing Chains to catch and kill Earth Spirit.

* A pre-placed Fire Remnant allows Ember Spirit to escape Upheaval.
* Flame Guard blocks Shadow Word's damage.
* Sleight of Fist allows Ember Spirit to attack from outside of Upheaval's range, and Searing Chains lets him interrupt it.

* Ember Spirit absorbs quite a large amount of magical damage with its Flame Guard, and in addition dodges the abilities of Dragon Slave and Light Strike Array with its Sleight of Fist
Additional:
* Ember Spirit absorbs quite a large amount of magical damage with its Flame Guard, and in addition dodges the abilities of Dragon Slave and Light Strike Array with its Sleight of Fist.

* Ember Spirit's Fire Remnant is an easy way to escape from Clockwerk's Power Cogs.
* Flame Guard blocks most of the magical damage Clockwerk does.

* Quill Spray will hit Sand King inside Sand Storm, damaging him and putting Sand King's Blink Dagger on cooldown, preventing him from escaping.
* Epicenter's numerous damage ticks will trigger Bristleback's passive repeatedly during teamfights.

* Bristleback's constant harass from Quill Spray will greatly hurt Enigma's laning and kill his Eidolons.
* However, Bristleback has no way of canceling Black Hole at all. And Bristleback is not a hero that goes for disabling items to counter that problem.

* Fire Remnant allows Ember Spirit to escape while Ruptured.
Additional:
* Fire Remnant allows Ember Spirit to escape Bloodseeker while Ruptured.

* Flame Guard makes Dark Seer not deal any damage with his skills to Ember Spirit.

* Arc Warden has relatively lower armor and mobility, which makes him an easy target to apply Quill Spray and Viscous Nasal Goo stacks.
* Arc Warden also does not like to build a Silver Edge as it takes a long time to build up and may slow down the timings for other important items needed in the game like Gleipnir.
* However, do note that in a game where Arc Warden's team has many jumping capabilities or good passives, like a Tidehunter or Spectre, a Silver Edge becomes incredibly valuable on Arc Warden as not only can he run away from the jumps, he effectively gets 2 breaks, and Bristleback may not be the best pick.

* Heroes that can easily bypass Chen's creeps to get to Chen: Riki, Tusk, Clinkz, Sniper, Slark, Phantom Assassin, Void Spirit, Storm Spirit, Ember Spirit, Earth Spirit, Spirit Breaker.

* Heroes with high physical and magical damage alike are a huge hazard for Muerta, as they can deal serious damage to her even if she has Pierce the Veil active: Luna, Lina, Tusk, Broodmother, Shadow Fiend, Ember Spirit, Gyrocopter, Vengeful Spirit, Arc Warden, Medusa, Shadow Shaman.

* Heroes with damage-over-time abilities easily allow Bristleback to turn his back in order to proc Bristleback continuously and to massively reduce to damage dealt to him: Arc Warden, Venomancer, Luna.

* Heroes with considerable mobility can easily escape from a rolling Pangolier: Anti-Mage, Queen of Pain, Void Spirit, Storm Spirit, Ember Spirit, Earth Spirit, moreover, if a player is familiar with how Rolling Thunder works, they can adjust their movement to avoid it entirely and of course outplay the Pangolier player.

* Heroes that heavily depend on illusions or summons, (Naga Siren, Terrorblade, Phantom Lancer, Lycan,...) are vulnerable to Sleight of Fist and even more so if Ember Spirit has Battle Fury.

* Heroes with high mobility will be able to avoid Gyrocopter's area attacks: Storm Spirit, Morphling, Ember Spirit

* Heroes with damage-over-time abilities easily allow Bristleback to turn his back in order to proc Bristleback continuously and to massively reduce to damage dealt to him: Arc Warden, Venomancer, Luna.

Additional:
* Quill Spray and Bristleback harass Luna more efficiently than she does with Lucent Beam.
* Bristleback helps return a lot of damage to Luna’s team if she uses her nukes on him and he has his back to her.
* Viscous Nasal Goo and Warpath are enough to outrun a speedy Luna.
* Bristleback tends to be a frequent carrier of Crimson Guard and Eternal Shroud, which are good protection from Moon Glaives and Eclipse.
* For the same reasons, Bristleback makes a very powerful ally for Luna when they are in the same team.

* Macropyre's frequent damage ticks causes Bristleback to activate repeatedly, resulting in free damage as long as Bristleback faces away from Jakiro.

* Heroes with good mobility to avoid Jakiro's abilities and with good chase to punish Jakiro from pushing a tower: Bloodseeker, Ember Spirit, Juggernaut, Phantom Assassin, Weaver.

* Ember Spirit with Sleight of Fist and Activate Fire Remnant
* Heroes that can dodge Glimpse:
* Puck with Phase Shift
* Riki with Tricks of the Trade
* Phantom Lancer with Doppelganger
* Ember Spirit with Sleight of Fist and Activate Fire Remnant
* Chaos Knight with Phantasm
* Naga Siren with Mirror Image
* Tusk with Snowball
* Juggernaut with Omnislash
* Brewmaster with Primal Split
* Lifestealer with Infest
* Phoenix with Supernova

* Heroes with escaping and disjointing abilities can be good against Juggernaut:Anti-Mage Riki, Queen of Pain, Puck, Storm Spirit, Ember Spirit, Slark etc.

* Heroes that can reliably kite out Dispose, Unleash and dodge Rebound, like Ember Spirit, Void Spirit, Storm Spirit, Anti-Mage, Faceless Void, Puck or always build items like Blink Dagger and Force Staff.

* Heroes who commonly buy Linken's Sphere: Luna, Weaver, Morphling, Queen of Pain, Ember Spirit.

* Bristleback's Viscous Nasal Goo can catch and slow Bounty Hunter. Warpath and Quill Spray can defeat him quickly due to his small HP pool when compared to Bristleback's.

* Heroes with high physical damage can damage Lifestealer more than he can heal: Bristleback, Clinkz, Luna,Shadow Fiend, Slardar, Terrorblade

* Heroes with strong area-of-effect damaging and/or disabling abilities will be able to intercept Underlord and his team when they exit from Fiend's Gate: Luna's Aghanim's Scepter upgraded Eclipse, Dawnbreaker's Solar Guardian, Axe's Berserker's Call, Mars's Arena of Blood, Jakiro's Macropyre, Dual Breath and Ice Path, Naga Siren's Song of the Siren, Razor's Eye of the Storm and Plasma Field, Lina's Light Strike Array, Broodmother's Spinner's Snare from Aghanim's Scepter, Elder Titan's Earth Splitter and Echo Stomp, Alchemist's Unstable Concoction and Acid Spray, Queen of Pain's Sonic Wave, Dark Seer's Wall of Replica and Vacuum, Venomancer's Noxious Plague and Poison Nova from Aghanim's Scepter, Oracle's Fortune's End and Rain of Destiny from Aghanim's Shard, Bloodseeker's Blood Rite, Enigma's Black Hole and Midnight Pulse, Shadow Fiend's Requiem of Souls, Batrider's Aghanim's Scepter upgraded Flaming Lasso, Firefly, Flamebreak and Sticky Napalm, Ancient Apparition's Ice Blast, Sand King's Epicenter, Sand Storm and Burrowstrike, Gyrocopter's Call Down, Ember Spirit's Sleight of Fist, Death Prophet's Exorcism and Silence, Monkey King's Wukong's Command, Crystal Maiden's Freezing Field, Muerta's The Calling, Medusa's Stone Gaze, Zeus's Nimbus from Aghanim's Scepter. Dark Willow's Bramble Maze, Pangolier's Swashbuckle, Grimstroke's Soulbind, Ink Swell and Stroke of Fate, Earthshaker's Echo Slam and Fissure, Puck's Dream Coil and Waning Rift, Winter Wyvern's Winter's Curse, Magnus's Reverse Polarity.

* Other heroes who has armor and slow debuffs won't allow Medusa to disengage from combat: Tidehunter, Bristleback, Slardar.

* Ember Spirit can deal devastating damage to illusion heroes like Terrorblade with Sleight of Fist. Terrorblade also has no way of preventing Ember Spirit from getting Activate Fire Remnant off. Additionally, Ember Spirit's ability to fight from long range as well as his wide skill set won't give many opportunities for Terrorblade to get Sunder off.
Additional:
* Ember Spirit can deal devastating damage to Terrorblade and his illusions with Sleight of Fist, Flame Guard and Fire Remnant.
* Terrorblade has no disable to lock down Ember Spirit and prevent him from escaping with Fire Remnant. In addition, he doesn't like purchasing disabling items like Scythe of Vyse or Abyssal Blade, which are the only solutions to deal with Ember Spirit.

* Disruption is not reliable enough to catch an Ember Spirit with a backup Fire Remnant.
* Sleight of Fist will also make quick work of the spawned illusions.
* The best you can do against an Ember Spirit is to dispel his Flame Guard with your Demonic Purge.

* Axe, Bristleback, Centaur Warrunner, Spirit Breaker, Pudge, Huskar, Wraith King, Doom: These heroes are too tanky for Puck to burst down. Also, all of them have spells which can deal with and shut Puck down reliably.

* The damage from Burning Spear can be reduced by turning away from Huskar.
* Bristleback can bait Huskar into using Life Break on him, then turn around and receive very little damage.
Additional:
* Bristleback's tankiness and Bristleback allow him to outlast Burning Spears' damage-over-time at almost any point in the game. In addition, if Huskar chooses to cast Life Break on Bristleback, Bristleback can simply turn around before it hits and receive little damage.
* Viscous Nasal Goo will reduce Huskar's low armor even further, and Quill Spray and Warpath will tear him down extremely quickly.

* Flame Guard absorbs up to 500 magical damage (700 with Level 10 talents), which helps Ember Spirit survive against Storm Spirit's high magical damage.
* Searing Chains can root enemies up to 3 seconds, making Storm Spirit unable to escape with Ball Lightning.
* Fire Remnant deals high magical damage when casting multiple instances at once, granting Ember Spirit the damage to burst Storm Spirit down in the early to mid game.

* Searing Chains prevents usage of Timber Chain.
* Timbersaw is vulnerable to magical burst damage, which Ember Spirit provides with Fire Remnant and Flame Guard.
* Timbersaw's abilities deal pure damage, thus they cannot remove Flame Guard.

* Lone Druid and The Spirit Bear cannot burst down Bristleback due to Bristleback
* Bristleback can easily run to Lone Druid without any hesitation, with Viscous Nasal Goo to reduce armor and slow the Spirit Bear or Lone Druid and Quill Spray can deal damage to both Lone Druid and the Spirit Bear at the same time

* Heroes who can stop Axe from getting close will severely inhibit his presence in fights: Bristleback, Crystal Maiden, Batrider, Arc Warden, Winter Wyvern, Clockwerk

* Fortune's End cannot dispel Warpath stacks on Bristleback or Quill Spray stacks on allies.
* Bristleback can heavily reduce Oracle's damage output. With it, Oracle may accidentally heal Bristleback with Purifying Flames, especially if Bristleback has bonus magic resistance.