* Magic Missile is a solid damage source and lockdown that fits nicely with Rubick's kit.
* Rubick also acquires the secondary Magic Missile with Aghanim's Shard.
* Wave of Terror can be used to scout an area to prevent juking or initiate with Telekinesis, as well as reducing the armor of enemy team during a teamfight.
* Nether Swap does what it does - saving an ally from danger, initiating on an enemy, or helping with caughting a fleeing hero.
* With Aghanim's Shard, Rubick can lift himself up and drop quickly to a place of safety after the swap. Note that Rubick can only choose to either disable the enemy or save himself at one time with Telekinesis.
Additional:
* All of Vengeful Spirit abilities are very good for Rubick to Spell Steal:
* Magic Missile provides an additional nuke/disable to pair with Fade Bolt and Telekinesis, respectively.
* Wave of Terror serves as a good scouting/armor reduction skill that Rubick and his team can benefit from.
* Nether Swap complements Rubick's mobility and pairs well with other mobility items he usually builds. He can also use it to save an ally from danger.
* If Rubick can use Spell Steal to take Nethertoxin, he will be able to disable Corrosive Skin, reducing much of Viper's durability.
* He can also steal Viper Strike, which can be used to hinder a hero on your team (or multiple heroes, if Rubick has Aghanim's Scepter).
* Vengeful Spirit has no strong AoE nuke or disable against Phantom Lancer's Illusions.
* Phantom Lancer is a natural Diffusal Blade carrier, which reduces Vengeful Spirit's low mana pool very quickly, leaving her defenseless.
* Doppelganger can dodge Vengeful Spirit's abilites.
* Phantom Rush with his illusions can chase Vengeful Spirit efficiently.
* Although Viper Strike cannot be dispelled by Doppelganger, Viper's lack of mobility and AoE damage makes him an easy target for Phantom Lancer.
* Viper's various slows do not work against Phantom Rush.
* Although Phantom Lancer should be wary due to Nethertoxin applying Break.
Additional:
* Phantom Lancer can overwhelm Viper with spawned illusions from Spirit Lance and Doppelganger. In addition, Diffusal Blade, a core item on Phantom Lancer, burns Viper's limited mana pool, reducing his potential poison damage.
* Viper's various slows do not work against Phantom Rush. Additionally, it is almost impossible to keep Lancer inside Nethertoxin's radius in order to disable the passive.
* Heroes who relies on illusions and summons (Beastmaster, Chaos Knight, etc.).
* Illusion or summon-based heroes can be a problem to Viper due to his lack of AoE damage: Naga Siren, Phantom Lancer, Beastmaster
* Viper is an agility hero, and his item build mostly includes agility items, so Natural Order can be devastating, removing all armor and greatly decreasing the effectiveness of Corrosive Skin, weakening Viper's magic resistance. Additionally, Echo Stomp and Earth Splitter deal both magical and physical damage, and can help bringing Viper down fast.
* Aghanim's Scepter may be necessary to take Viper down due to Nethertoxin's break.
* Viper's lack of escape and durability means he can be ran over in a laning stage by Spawn Spiderlings.
* Broodmother can bring Viper down quickly with Insatiable Hunger activated.
* Viper's frailty and low mobility make him an enticing Duel target and Corrosive Skin doesn't protect him against Legion Commander physical attacks.
* Press the Attack can dispel Poison Attack.
* Viper slows can easily negate by Overwhelming Odds movement speed.
* Even though Luna has a hard time laning against Viper due to Nethertoxin being able to disable Moon Glaives and Lunar Blessing, Luna can take out Viper once she builds either Black King Bar or Silver Edge which will allow her to attack Viper freely.
* Eclipse can often finish off Viper from early-to-mid stages of the game before he can retaliate as Corrosive Skin gives little magic resistance to him early on.
* Manta Style is an item that Luna commonly buys in most of the games, which lets her disjoint Viper Strike. Additionally, illusions from Manta Style can make Viper waste time attacking them.
Additional:
* Even though Luna has a hard time laning against Viper due to Nethertoxin being able to disable Moon Glaives and Lunar Blessing, Luna can take out Viper once she builds either Black King Bar or Silver Edge which will allow her to attack Viper freely.
* Eclipse can often finish off Viper from early-to-mid stages of the game before he can retaliate as Corrosive Skin gives little magic resistance to him early on.
* Manta Style is an item that Luna commonly buys in most of the games, which lets her disjoint Viper Strike. Additionally, illusions from Manta Style can make Viper waste time attacking them.
* Nether Swap triggers extra damage from Rupture.
* Blood Rite sets up while Vengeful Spirit using her Nether Swap within a timed correctly.
* Clinkz does not have any passive abilities at all, making Nethertoxin nearly useless.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin provides no protection against Clinkz's physical damage output.
* Skywrath Mage should have the upper hand against Vengeful Spirit with Ancient Seal.
* Vengeful is highly dependant on her abilities and has no natural means to deal against silences.
* Her low attack range allows Skywrath Mage to easily bully her out of the lane.
* The Keeper of the Light easily farms on the line against the Viper, due to the fact that it has a long-range Illuminate, and the Viper, in turn, cannot use its advantage of dominance on the center line, due to the fact that it does not reach the Keeper of the Light
Additional:
* The Keeper of the Light easily farms on the line against the Viper, due to the fact that it has a long-range Illuminate, and the Viper, in turn, cannot use its advantage of dominance on the center line, due to the fact that it does not reach the Keeper of the Light
* Pugna's Decrepify allows him to save allies from being ganked by Viper, since Viper mostly relies on direct attacks in order to deal damage.
* Nether Ward can discourage Viper from spamming his abilities.
* Viper's damage over time is not enough to kill Pugna as he will have more than enough time to save himself (or his allies) with Life Drain and Viper has no solutions to cancel it.
* Pugna has no passive abilities, which renders Nethertoxin nearly useless.
* Shukuchi ignores slows and allows Weaver to escape Viper's onslaught.
* Time Lapse dispels Poison Attack and Corrosive Skin and undoes poison damage.
* Weaver's high burst damage allows him to kill Viper before being killed.
* Naga Siren can easily disjoint, and dispel Corrosive Skin with Mirror Image.
* Since Viper is mostly a single-target hero, he will not have almost any chance against Naga Siren because she is an illusion based hero.
* Viper has no burst damage, so Naga Siren will have plenty of time to use Aghanim's Shard upgraded Song of the Siren heal her allies before Viper can finish them off.
* Heroes who relies on illusions and summons (Beastmaster, Chaos Knight, etc.).
* As Viper focuses on single-target damage, he has trouble fighting off Phantasm illusions.
* Reality Rift counteracts Viper's slows and reduces his already low durability against physical damage.
Additional:
* Viper has no response to the standard initiation combo of Reality Rift into Chaos Bolt.
* Phantasm and Chaos Strike can eliminate Viper almost instantly with it's damage output.
* Besides Nethertoxin, Viper has no other ways of dealing with Phantasm.
* Heroes with Attack speed decreasing skills: Jakiro, Viper Lich
* Viper Strike can be countered through Snowball, wasting Viper's mana through his ultimate. It's Viper Strike's break is also useless because he has no passive abilties at all. And to make things worse, Viper Strike cannot disable Walrus PUNCH! because it's an auto-cast ability
* As Tusk is a natural Silver Edge wielder, he can use it to disable Viper's magic resistance from Corrosive Skin, and make him vulnreable to his other allies.
* Viper has no disable, which means he has no way of preventing Morphling from escaping from any of his abilities or keep him inside Nethertoxin.
* Viper is almost exclusively damage over time, which is weak against Morphling due to Attribute Shift (Strength Gain). Additionally, Morphling has no passive abilities, reducing Nethertoxin's effectiveness against him even further.
* Morphling can turn into Viper himself, allowing him to use any of Viper's abilities against him (excluding Viper Strike). This is particularly bad due to the fact that Viper is already a very slow hero, making Poison Attack and Corrosive Skin's slows especially difficult to deal with.
* Ranged heroes will have a hard time hitting enemies inside Magnetic Field: Silencer, Viper.
* Viper cannot interrupt heroes with powerful channeling abilities: Bane, Enigma, Shadow Shaman, Warlock
* Viper cannot interrupt heroes with powerful channeling abilities: Bane, Enigma, Shadow Shaman, Warlock
* Heroes who do not have nor rely on passive abilities make Nethertoxin much less effective: Clinkz, Pugna, Nature's Prophet, Dark Seer, Lycan, Tusk
* Heroes who do not have nor rely on passive abilities make Nethertoxin much less effective: Clinkz, Pugna, Nature's Prophet, Dark Seer, Lycan, Tusk
* Heroes who have a high mobility (Queen of Pain, Storm Spirit, Slark, etc.).
* Heroes that can drain mana negatively affect Viper's ability to use Poison Attack, Nethertoxin and Viper Strike: Lion, Anti-Mage
* Past the mid game, an isolated Vengeful Spirit makes for an easy kill for Anti-Mage.
* Magic Missile is the only disable Vengeful Spirit has against Anti-Mage, but he can either Blink away to disjoint the stun or reflect it back against Vengeful Spirit with Counterspell.
* Nether Swap isn't very effective against Anti-Mage - if used offensively, Anti-Mage can simply blink away to safety, and if used defensively, Blink's low cooldown allows him to persistently chase as well.
* Heroes that can drain mana negatively affect Viper's ability to use Poison Attack, Nethertoxin and Viper Strike: Lion, Anti-Mage
* Viper's skill set makes him an effective early game ganker against Anti-Mage before he is sufficiently farmed.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin and low mana pool causes him to take little damage from Mana Void.
* Nethertoxin disables Mana Break and Counterspell, weakening both his offense and defense.
* Heroes who do not have nor rely on passive abilities make Nethertoxin much less effective: Clinkz, Pugna, Nature's Prophet, Dark Seer, Lycan, Tusk
* Rage ignores all of Viper's magical damage, although Viper Strike can pierce spell immunity and slows him down.
* Feast and Open Wounds from Aghanim's Shard can be combined to heal through Viper's physical damage.
* Aghanim's Scepter upgraded Infest can be used to disarm Viper, preventing him from using Poison Attack on Lifestealer's allies.
* With the exception of Magic Missile (unless the player takes the Level 25 Talent "Magic Missile Pierces Spell Immunity"), all of Vengeful Spirit's spells ignore Spell Immunity. This also makes her good against heroes with built-in Spell Immunity like Lifestealer or Juggernaut or heroes that tend to pick up Black King Bar, like Sven.
* Viper's Nethertoxin cannot disable Reincarnation, which could put him in disadvantage against Wraith King if his whole team is with him.
* In addition, Viper doesn't like buying Diffusal Blade, which is the only item that can help him against Wraith King.
* Wraith King's high burst damage allows him to kill Viper before being killed.
* Melee heroes with low mobility can be kited and killed by Viper: Treant Protector, Kunkka, Alchemist, Troll Warlord, Wraith King, Tiny, Sven.
* Enfeeble weakens Viper's attack damage, any healing he receives and his cast range, which makes him unable to harass enemy heroes with Nethertoxin, Poison Attack and Viper Strike.
* Brain Sap allows Bane to heavily harass Viper, damaging him while healing Bane, which allows Bane to fight back against Viper's damage over time output, even through debuff immunity from Black King Bar.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin is useless against Bane as all of his damaging abilities deal Pure damage.
* Viper has no solutions to cancel Fiend's Grip and in addition, he hates buying disabling items like Eul's Scepter of Divinity.
Additional:
* Enfeeble weakens Viper's attack damage, any healing he receives and his cast range, which makes him unable to harass enemy heroes with Nethertoxin, Poison Attack and Viper Strike.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin is useless against Bane as all of his damaging abilities deal Pure damage.
* Viper has no solutions to cancel Fiend's Grip and in addition, he hates buying disabling items like Eul's Scepter of Divinity.
* Heroes with strong channeling spells like Crystal Maiden's Freezing Field, Bane's Fiend's Grip, and Enigma's Black Hole can easily be interrupted from a long range by Nether Swap, assuming they don't have a Linken's Sphere.
* Windrun evades Poison Attack and counteracts the slow.
* Viper's low mobility makes him an easy Shackleshot target.
* Focus Fire grants Windranger significant physical damage output to quickly wear Viper down.
* Powershot is a strong harassment and zoning tool against Viper in lane.
* Since Windranger is bad against magical damage, heroes with continuous magical damage or magical nukes can blast her: Zeus, Tinker, Leshrac, Viper, Skywrath Mage, Lion, Lina, Venomancer.
* Magic Missile has a considerably long cast time, making it difficult to stop Charge of Darkness with it.
* Other than Magic Missile, Vengeful Spirit has no way of canceling Nether Strike.
* Heroes that can slow Charge of Darkness by a huge amount: Venomancer, Viper, Dazzle, Arc Warden, Lion, Huskar, Shadow Shaman, Visage, Undying, Jakiro.
* Almost all of Viper's damage revolves exclusively around single-target damage-over-time effects. Furthermore, without any hard disables, Terrorblade can almost always get a Sunder off.
* Viper has low mobility and Corrosive Skin doesn't protect against physical damage, which means that Terrorblade under Metamorphosis can quickly kill Viper.
Additional:
* Viper's damage over time and lack of disables makes him easy to Sunder.
* Viper's physical damage is mitigated by Terrorblade's high armor.
* Terrorblade under Metamorphosis can quickly kill Viper with heavy physical damage.
* Heroes with abilities that can lock down Terrorblade and prevent him from using Sunder: Bane, Batrider, Earthshaker, Elder Titan, Faceless Void, Invoker, Legion Commander, Mars, Primal Beast, Riki, Shadow Shaman, Silencer, Vengeful Spirit, Void Spirit.
* Wave of Terror grants flying vision over trees, and its wide effect can hit Monkey King and end Mischief.
* Nether Swap can easily cancel Wukong's Command by swapping him out of the circle.
Additional:
* She can easily cancel Wukong's Command with Nether Swap.
* Wave of Terror can also detect him while he's on the trees.
* Nethertoxin prevents the buildup of Jingu Mastery stacks.
* Viper's poison magical damage-over-time stops Monkey King from using Tree Dance. It also ignores the extra armor bestowed by Wukong's Command.
Additional:
* Viper STrike prevents the buildup of Jingu Mastery stacks.
* Monkey King's high base movement speed is of little worth against the array of slows Viper possesses.
* All of Viper's magical damage over time stops Monkey King from using Tree Dance. It also ignores the extra armor bestowed by Wukong's Command.
* With Nether Swap, Vengeful Spirit can isolate one of the Meepos, making him an easier kill for the team.
* Her Magic Missile gives her an easy way to cancel Meepo's Poof, preventing isolated Meepos from fleeing.
* Viper Strike prevents the lifesteal from Ransack.
* Meepo and his clones have a lack of magic resistance, so they're vulnerable to Poison Attack & Viper Strike directed onto one clone.
* Magic Missile can stun Chen and deal heavy damage to him.
* Wave of Terror weakens durability of Chen and his creeps.
* Nether Swap can be used to separate Chen away from his creeps, often to certain death from Vengeful Spirit's allies.
* Hand of God has a long cooldown, so damage over time spells can be hazardous for Chen, forcing him to use it prematurely: Jakiro, Venomancer, Viper, Dazzle, Phoenix.
* Heroes with catch to disrupt Sniper's positioning and deliver him into the enemies: Batrider, Disruptor, Pudge, Vengeful Spirit.
* Viper Strike breaks Sniper's passives.
* Corrosive Skin allows Viper to deal more damage to Sniper than Sniper deals to him when laning, especially by briefly stepping into Shrapnel.
* Nethertoxin together with Poison Attack can slow Sniper and tears through his low health and mobility.
* Heroes with abilities that reduce armor will make Huskar very vulnerable: Weaver, Dazzle, Bristleback, Vengeful Spirit.
Additional:
* Huskar struggles against heroes that output high physical damage due to his low armor. Vengeful Spirit's Wave of Terror and Vengeance Aura help increase the physical damage of her team.
* His Poison Attack is very useful against Huskar, since he tends to stay at low health.
* Nethertoxin disables passive skills like Berserker's Blood.
* It is dangerous for Huskar to jump on Viper because Corrosive Skin and Viper Strike with the slowdown of movement and attack speed which usually will be deadly for Huskar.
Additional:
* Viper Strike can disable Berserker's Blood, which Huskar relies upon for attack speed and healing.
* The damage from Burning Spear and Life Break is largely absorbed by Corrosive Skin. It also will return some damage, making it risky to use Burning Spears in the laning stage.
* Because Huskar wants to be on low health for Berserker's Blood, he is particularly vulnerable to Poison Attack.
* Heroes with strong channeling spells like Crystal Maiden's Freezing Field, Bane's Fiend's Grip, and Enigma's Black Hole can easily be interrupted from a long range by Nether Swap, assuming they don't have a Linken's Sphere.
* Heroes who can easily harass Crystal Maiden out of lane in the early game (Clinkz, Viper) can prevent Crystal Maiden from being able to level effectively, and can ultimately slow down her level 6, 12, and 18 to a point where enemy carries already have items to address her ultimate.
* Heroes with disables that ignore spell immunity will render Phantom Assassin completely useless in teamfights throughout the game: Axe, Enigma, Vengeful Spirit, Doom, Bane, Beastmaster, Pudge, Medusa, Warlock.
* Heroes that can apply early pressure before Phantom Assassin has farm are massive threats: Axe, Viper, Meepo, Jakiro, Pugna, Slark, Venomancer etc.
* Nether Swap breaks Flaming Lasso when used on ally and can break if used on Batrider.
* Vengeful Spirit can disable Batrider's Blink Dagger before a fight with Wave of Terror.
Additional:
* With her Nether Swap, Vengeful Spirit can save the life of an ally who gets caught with Flaming Lasso. Nether Swap also makes it highly dangerous for Batrider to attempt a lasso, as it can lead to his own demise far behind enemy lines.
* Wave of Terror's flying vision allows Vengeful Spirit to spot Batrider trying to close in on his target with Firefly.
* The slow applied from Corrosive Skin offsets the movement speed bonus granted by Scorched Earth and the tick-based damage from Infernal Blade and Doom will continually slow Doom down. This allows Viper, much like Sniper, to 'kite' Doom and keep him at a safe distance between the two. Additionally, Corrosive Skin applies an attack-speed slow which is fairly crippling to a hero such as Doom that, naturally, has a high base attack-time, poor agility gain and builds little attack-speed items.
* Since Doom does not disable auto-cast abilities, Viper's Poison Attack will continue to work. Doom may find it hard to close the distance between himself and Viper, and thusly difficult to effectively lockdown and continually deal damage through his abilities.
* Nether Swap can forcibly reposition Sharpshooter.
* Corrosive Skin will protect Viper from Techies' magical damage.
* Even though Reactive Tazer will disarm Viper if he attacks Techies with Poison Attack, he does lots of damage with his other abilities that can still kill Techies.
* Nether Swap can save an ally from the Chronosphere.
Additional:
* With her Nether Swap, a well positioned Vengeful Spirit can save the life of a more important ally who gets caught in Chronosphere.
* The damage over time from Viper's Poison Attack and Viper Strike rapidly wear down Refraction charges, allowing Templar Assassin to be damaged. Additionally, Corrosive Skin causes her attacks to apply damage overtime on her as well.
* Nethertoxin is a big threat to Templar Assassin. Her initially low range making it very hard to deal against Nethertoxin in the laning phase. At any stage of the game, a Nethertoxin can always force her to undo her Meld.
Additional:
* All of Viper's abilities quickly burn through Refraction charges.
* Templar Assassin's short range, aside from Psi Blades' spill damage, makes her vulnerable to Poison Attack harassment.
* Templar Assassin usually buys health and armor items for damage. Outside of Black King Bar, Viper will almost always be able to kill her when Refraction is down.
* Nethertoxin breaks the damage block from Bulwark.
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike's slows make it difficult for Mars to contribute to fights due to his low mobility.
Additional:
* Viper Strike can disable Bulwark entirely, making Mars far less tanky. Using Nethertoxin inside Arena of Blood may discourage enemies from following up with Mars's initiation.
* Rod of Atos is currently common on Viper and keeps Mars in position long enough to be killed.
* However, Viper is not very tanky earlier in the game, so positioning against Mars is important for Viper since a well-timed Spear of Mars can be the end of Viper.
* Nether Swap breaks one ally out of Soulbind, and can be used to redistribute the shared damage to Vengeful Spirit herself.
* Nethertoxin disables Bristleback's passive.
* Viper Strike and Poison Attack slow down Bristleback's movement speed, making him unable to get out from Nethertoxin.
Additional:
* Viper Strike can disable Bristleback and prevents Warpath from building stacks. Besides losing his defensive passive, Bristleback also loses his ability to build up damage over lengthy battles.
* Viper can perpetually kite Bristleback with Poison Attack and Viper Strike.
* Tiny has low movement speed and attack speed, making him vulnerable to Viper's slows.
* Corrosive Skin provides magic resistance to lower Tiny's magic burst damage.
* In the early game, a Dragon Knight without Black King Bar is basically defenseless against Viper.
* Viper can harass Dragon Knight at any time with his Poison Attack and Nethertoxin.
* Corrosive Skin reduces damage from Dragon Fire and inflicts damage to him.
* Viper Strike disables Dragon Blood, negating his main survivability.
* Viper Strike and Poison Attack can severely slow him down even with his Elder Dragon Form.
Additional:
* Dragon Knight is easily harassed by Poison Attack after the laning stage ends.
* Corrosive Skin protects Viper from Breathe Fire and returns damage.
* Viper Strike can disable Dragon Blood, Dragon's Knight main source of armor and health regeneration.
* Between Poison Attack and Viper Strike, Viper can keep Dragon Knight permanently slowed even in Elder Dragon Form.
* Viper's Poison Attack and Viper Strike that can slow Razor, and is one of the few heroes that can keep him immobile.
* Altogether, Viper's skills reduce Razor's attack speed, heavily reducing the benefit of the damage drain from Static Link.
Additional:
* Storm Surge is counteracted by Viper Strike, leaving Razor without his extra movement speed.
* Static Link's damage drain doesn't bother Viper a lot as most of his early to mid game damage is magical.
* Viper Strike prevents Timbersaw from gaining stacks on Reactive Armor.
* Viper wins on the central line of Puck, because he has a huge damage from the Poison Attack ability, which Puck is not able to constantly avoid using Phase Shift, which will give Viper an advantage in the possible damage inflicted on each other
* Puck takes more damage than it does due to the passive Corrosive Skin ability of the Viper, which makes it unprofitable for the Puck to fight against the Viper at an early stage of the game, when the Puck has a very small pool of health.
Additional:
* Viper wins on the central line of Puck, because he has a huge damage from the Poison Attack ability, which Puck is not able to constantly avoid using Phase Shift, which will give Viper an advantage in the possible damage inflicted on each other
* Puck takes more damage than it does due to the passive Corrosive Skin ability of the Viper, which makes it unprofitable for the Puck to fight against the Viper at an early stage of the game, when the Puck has a very small pool of health
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike allowing to kite and slow Earthshaker significally, putting Blink Dagger on cooldown and preventing him from initiating or re-initiating.
* Nethertoxin breaks Aftershock. The silence from Level 25 talent also prevents Earthshaker from initiating or re-initiating.
Additional:
* Being a melee hero, Earthshaker's movement is liable to suppression by Poison Attack and Viper Strike.
* Earthshaker's kit, with the exception of Enchant Totem, deals magic damage. Corrosive Skin effectively blunts his killing potential with a standard Blink combo among other things.
* Viper Strike can disable Aftershock, which removes the stun and bonus damage from Enchant Totem and Echo Slam.
* Corrosive Skin minimizes the damage Viper takes from all of Disruptor's skills.
* Nethertoxin disable passives, negating Spectre's damage and survivability by removing both Dispersion and Desolate.
* Due to Haunt and Radiance's burn, Spectre is heavily susceptible to being persistently slowed and damaged by Corrosive Skin without even directly attacking Viper.
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike further slow Spectre's movement speed to a crawl, while his improved magic resistance means he can easily shrug off Radiance's burn.
Additional:
* Viper Strike can disable Desolate and Dispersion, leaving Spectre with far less damage output and damage mitigation in engagements.
* Spectre is one of the weakest heroes at early levels. Viper can stifle her farm with early fights before Spectre purchases any major items.
* Viper does large amounts of magic damage over time, meaning that if a Necrophos uses Ghost Shroud, Viper's abilities will greatly reduce Necrophos survivability, and may actually kill him.
* By the same token, Viper can use his Viper Strike on Necrophos if he attempts to heal himself with Ghost Shroud, and depending on any other effects Necrophos may have from him, (IE:Poison Attack,Corrosive Skin), Viper can often kill Necrophos while he is in his Ghost Shroud.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin helps him take reduced damage from all of Necrophos spells that deal magical damage, which is his only source of damage.
Additional:
* Viper Strike prevents Heartstopper Aura from dealing damage or healing Necrophos.
* Viper's magic damage is amplified whenever Ghost Shroud is used.
* Corrosive Skin makes Viper tankier against Death Pulse and Reaper's Scythe.
* Corrosive Skin means Viper can often outlast Venomancer in a battle of attrition.
* Venomancer has no mobility without items, which makes him vulnerable to constant slows.
* Nethertoxin both Necromastery and Presence of the Dark Lord, reducing his damage massively.
* Corrosive Skin gives Viper bonus Magic Resistance against Shadowraze and Requiem of Souls.
* Viper can easily take advantage of Shadow Fiend's lack of escape and mobility spells with Viper Strike breaks and Poison Attack. Poison Attack also serves as a great way to harass Shadow Fiend.
* Corrosive Skin severely reduces Zeus's damage output throughout the game.
* During the laning stage, Viper can abuse Zeus' reliance on spells by hugging the creep wave. Zeus will take constant damage over time from Corrosive Skin unless he drives Viper from the lane or returns to farming in his absence.
* Prior to buying Blink Dagger or Force Staff, Zeus is fragile and possesses low mobility. Any of Viper's numerous slows can set up an easy kill.
Additional:
* Corrosive Skin counters Zeus in lane by canceling the effects of Clarity as Zeus relies on Arc Lightning to farm and secure last hits.
* Corrosive Skin also increases Viper's magic resistance to shrug off Zeus's magical nukes.
* Nethertoxin breaks Static Field.
* Due to Zeus' poor mobility, Viper Strike will cripple Zeus and will allow Viper and his teammates to land a lot of attacks.
* Corrosive Skin gives Viper additional resistance to Phoenix's magical damage, and since they deal damage over time, Phoenix would be constantly afflicted by his passive's own debuff, making him not an ideal target for Phoenix's harassment. Phoenix's abilities also constantly drain its own health away, becoming more vulnerable to Poison Attack.
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike slows Axe significantly, and puts his Blink Dagger on cooldown, preventing him from initiating. Viper Strike can also break from Counter Helix.
Additional:
* Viper Strike prevents Counter Helix from triggering, which significantly lowers Axe's damage output in the early to mid game.
* Viper's various slows and damage over time prevents Axe from initiating as well as putting his Blink Dagger on cooldown.
* Nethertoxin disables Dawnbreaker's Luminosity. Since she's a melee hero, she needs to close gap to attack and Nethertoxin will be bad for her since she cannot heal.
* Viper Strike and Poison Attack will severely slow her down and combined with Nethertoxin, it will be her death sentence (unless her Celestial Hammer or Solar Guardian are off cooldown). Besides that, chasing her down will be easy due to the slow.
* Viper Strike is a strong and breaks Fury Swipes, undispellable slow, making it much easier to kite Ursa for everyone.
* Corrosive Skin minimizes the damage Viper takes from all of Ancient Apparition's abilities.
* Ancient Apparition's slow movement speed, squishy nature, and lack of escape abilities can easily be taken advantage of through Poison Attack and Viper Strike.
* Viper Strike breaks Multicast.
* Corrosive Skin minimizes the damage from Ignite and Fireblast.
* Poison Attack makes it hard for Void Spirit to lane against him.
* Corrosive Skin reduces the magical damage from Void Spirit's spells.
* Viper Strike can disable Gravekeeper's Cloak, Visage's primary defense mechanism.
* Viper can ignore Grave Chill's attack speed slow with his magic damage output.
Additional:
* Since Visage is a slow hero, Viper can easily kite him with Poison Attack and Viper Strike while successfully chipping away at Gravekeeper's Cloak.
* Nethertoxin removes all layers of Gravekeeper's Cloak, leaving Visage exposed.
* Corrosive Skin makes Viper highly resistant to Soul Assumption.
* Viper's poison abilities can slow Bounty Hunter's movement speed and allows to chase him with True Sight items.
* Nethertoxin can break Jinada, and the silence from level 25 prevents Bounty Hunter from using all of his spells.
* Because Poison Attack has almost no cooldown, Aphotic Shield is ineffective as a hard dispel.
* Viper Strike can prevent Borrowed Time from activating passively and block Curse of Avernus.
Additional:
* Because Poison Attack has almost no cooldown, Aphotic Shield is ineffective as a hard dispel.
* Viper Strike can prevent Borrowed Time from activating passively and block Curse of Avernus.
* Heroes with break can disable Untouchable for a while: Doom and Shadow Demon (via Aghanim's Scepter), Viper, Shadow Shaman with Hex Breaks talent.
* 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.
* Fragile supports who die in a few hits against Sven's high physical damage: Crystal Maiden, Vengeful Spirit, Dark Willow.
* With the exception of Magic Missile (unless the player takes the Level 25 Talent "Magic Missile Pierces Spell Immunity"), all of Vengeful Spirit's spells ignore Spell Immunity. This also makes her good against heroes with built-in Spell Immunity like Lifestealer or Juggernaut or heroes that tend to pick up Black King Bar, like Sven.
* Melee heroes with low mobility can be kited and killed by Viper: Treant Protector, Kunkka, Alchemist, Troll Warlord, Wraith King, Tiny, Sven.
* Melee heroes with low mobility can be kited and killed by Viper: Treant Protector, Kunkka, Alchemist, Troll Warlord, Wraith King, Tiny, Sven.
* Lina can burst Vengeful Spirit down, provided she can land Light Strike Array before Vengeful Spirit lands her Magic Missile.
* Laguna Blade deals massive damage, often being enough to kill a squishy Vengeful Spirit.
* Heroes with abilities that can pull Lina out of position can easily bring her to their team mates, like Batrider with Flaming Lasso, Pudge with Meat Hook and Vengeful Spirit with Nether Swap.
* Viper Strike prevents buildup of Fiery Soul stacks.
* Corrosive Skin provides magic resistance against Lina's spells. However, Lina can counter this with Silver Edge, a common item on Lina.
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike can burn away Lina's small health pool.
* Certain heroes can mess up with Pangolier's positioning and timing (especially if he intends to use Rolling Thunder during combat): Vengeful Spirit, Keeper of the Light, Huskar, Dark Seer
* Any hero who can survive Magnus's initiations and manfight him: Huskar, Faceless Void, Weaver, Abaddon, Troll Warlord, Alchemist, Dragon Knight, Night Stalker, Viper.
Additional:
* Most of Magnus's abilities except Empower will trigger damage through Corrosive Skin.
* Poison Attack and Viper Strike can slow Magnus during Skewer, as well as putting his Blink Dagger on cooldown, preventing him from initiating or re-initiating.
* Viper can bully Alchemist out of mid lane quite easily, forcing him to either retreat into jungle, or stay harassed in lane, and get very few last hits. Vipers break also completely disables Greevil's greed which prevents Alchemist to earn his amazing amounts of money.
* Heroes with damage-increasing passive abilities, such as Viper and Riki, will usually kill Silencer in a short time before he even has time to set up his abilities.
* With the exception of Magic Missile (unless the player takes the Level 25 Talent "Magic Missile Pierces Spell Immunity"), all of Vengeful Spirit's spells ignore Spell Immunity. This also makes her good against heroes with built-in Spell Immunity like Lifestealer or Juggernaut or heroes that tend to pick up Black King Bar, like Sven.
* Vengeful Spirit can Nether Swap enemies out of Power Cogs.
Additional:
* Nether Swap gives Vengeful Spirit a way to save an ally from Clockwerk's Power Cogs.
* Magic Missile will interrupt Clockwerk trying to run down Vengeful Spirit's allies with Battery Assault.
* Melee heroes with low mobility can be kited and killed by Viper: Treant Protector, Kunkka, Alchemist, Troll Warlord, Wraith King, Tiny, Sven.
* Melee heroes with low mobility can be kited and killed by Viper: Treant Protector, Kunkka, Alchemist, Troll Warlord, Wraith King, Tiny, Sven.
* Heroes who can harass Omniknight out of lane will keep him weak in the mid game: Viper, Venomancer, Clinkz.
* Frail heroes who lacks mobility: Crystal Maiden, Enigma, Dark Willow, Vengeful Spirit.
* Viper's Nethertoxin disables Cloak and Dagger, negating Riki's invisibility and much of his damage. It also makes him more vulnerable to magic damage, which does not go well with Riki's low health pool. With the talent applied, he can't even blink to safety or hide with Tricks of the Trade.
* Corrosive Skin makes it hard for Riki to chase Viper and attack him due to the attack speed slow.
* Viper Strike stays on Riki even after he goes invisible.
* Poison Attack makes it risky for Riki to get last hits and can make the laning phase difficult for him.
* Viper cannot interrupt heroes with powerful channeling abilities: Bane, Enigma, Shadow Shaman, Warlock
* Vengeful Spirit can interrupt Black Hole's channeling through Black King Bar by using Nether Swap from a safe distance.
* Vengeful Spirit's Level 25 Talent can make her Magic Missile pierce spell immunity, giving her another option to use in conjunction with Nether Swap to cancel Enigma's Black Hole channeling even through both, Black King Bar and Linken's Sphere.
* Heroes who have a high mobility (Queen of Pain, Storm Spirit, Slark, etc.).
* Heroes with Break abilities will prevent Slark from regenerating and gaining Essence Shift stacks: Viper, Shadow Demon, etc.
Additional:
* Viper Strike can disable Essence Shift and the regeneration aspect of Shadow Dance.
* Dark Pact doesn't mean a lot against Viper's ubiquitous slows.
* Viper becomes a relevant presence in team fights before Slark can procure his standard items (e.g. Shadow Blade).
* Vengeful Spirit should carefully consider whether to use her Nether Swap on Tidehunter, as it can easily position him for a Ravage on Vengeful Spirit and her allies.
* Due to Magic Missile's high damage, Kraken Shell will often proc and clear Tidehunter's debuffs.
* Viper STrike cancels out Kraken Shell and stops the hard dispel from passively activating, preventing Tidehunter from functioning as a frontline tank.
* Anchor Smash is mostly irrelevant against a ranged hero like Viper.
* Tidehunter relies on the threat of Ravage, which has an obscenely long cooldown. Viper can exploit the downtime with his short cooldowns.
* Ice Wall and Ghost Walk can be used to kite and escape from Viper.
* Chaos Meteor and Sun Strike deal heavy damage and can quickly bring Viper down.
* Cold Snap, Tornado, and Deafening Blast are powerful disables that reduce Viper's effectiveness.
* E.M.P. burns Viper's limited mana pool, reducing his potential poison damage.
* Forge Spirits can melt Viper's armor and reduce his durability.
* Corrosive Skin makes Viper receive less damage from Invoker's spells
* Viper can harass Invoker with his Poison Attack in the early game.
* Viper Strike and Poison Attack can kill Invoker easily if Ghost Walk is on cooldown.
* Voodoo Restoration heals to counter damage over time of Viper abilities.
* Viper has no way to cancel Death Ward, even through Rod of Atos.
* Vengeful Spirit has two abilities to interrupt Death Ward, even through Black King Bar.
* Vendetta disables Vengeance Aura and allows him to attack Vengeful Spirit with Impale and Mind Flare.
* Spiked Carapace is easy to use against a Wave of Terror or Magic Missile.
* Corrosive Skin minimizes the damage from Impale and Mind Flare, and anything else Nyx Assassin tries to throw at Viper.
* Nyx Assassin cannot survive several poison damage-over-time output from Poison Attack, Nethertoxin, Corrosive Skin and Viper Strike, not even while he has Spiked Carapace active. And to make things worse, Nyx Assassin is not a common Silver Edge wielder to counter this problem at all.
Additional:
* Corrosive Skin minimizes the damage from Impale and Mind Flare, and anything else Nyx Assassin tries to throw at Viper.
* Nyx Assassin cannot survive several poison damage-over-time output from Poison Attack, Nethertoxin, Corrosive Skin and Viper Strike, not even while he has Spiked Carapace active. And to make things worse, Nyx Assassin is not a common Silver Edge wielder to counter this problem at all.
* Viper is kind of a mixed package. Tinker is very good against him. but stands a better chance against him than most heroes.
* Viper has a high innate magic resistance, but relies on his primary attacks to really deal damage. making Laser an effective way to save allies from him, and deal damage. Keep in mind that his Corrosive Skin will prevent Tinker from blinking.
* Viper's Viper Strike and Poison Attack will also have a hard time damaging allies through Tinker's constant casting of Defense Matrix.
* Viper has no solutions to cancel Rearm nor any of Tinker's escape attempts with Boots of Travel
* However, if Viper gets a jump on Tinker first. Tinker will unlikely survive versus Viper.
* Wave of Terror can reveal a Tinker attempting to hide in the trees and then Nether Swap and Magic Missile will both serve to interrupt/lock him down, should he attempt to town portal or reload.
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Vengeful Spirit
* Ball Lightning disjoints an incoming Magic Missile, avoids Wave Of Terror, and allows Storm Spirit to easily escape if he ever gets Nether Swapped.
Viper
* Ball Lightning allows Storm Spirit to escape through Viper Strike, wasting Viper's mana.
* It's also very easy to wait out the duration of Nethertoxin's break.