History Characters / Dota2AgilityNToZ

** Black King Bar and Monkey King Bar, which negate her bonus attack speed from ''Phantom Strike'' and 75% of her ''Blur'' evasion, respectively.

* CooldownManipulation: With Aghanim's Scepter, killing an enemy hero refreshes Phantom Assassin's ability cooldowns, while ''Blur'' gets a reduced cooldown.
* CoupDeGrace: Mortred's ultimate, named exactly this, gives her a 15% chance on each attack to deal critical hits, and applies the same chance and multiplier to her ''Stifling Dagger''. The more you skill her ulti, the more damage the crit does, up to ''four and a half times her attack damage''.

* HoistByHisOwnPetard: ''Blur'' also affects allies, so if she is affected by poison and is in low HP, they'll sometimes miss their attack when they try to deny her, letting the enemy score the kill.

** ''Storm Surge'' gives Razor an immense amount of movement speed to stay on top of his enemies.

* LightningBruiser: Due to the nature of his kit, which promotes staying alive as long as possible to take advantage of ''Static Link'' and ''Eye of the Storm'', many Razor players choose to focus on durability items instead of damage items, which, coupled with the damage stolen by ''Static Link'' and movement speed from ''Storm Surge'', turn him into this trope. The literal take on the concept is just a bonus.

* BackStab: ''Cloak and Dagger'' allows Riki to deal bonus damage based on his Agility when attacking a target from its rear arc. At level 3 or higher, it essentially amounts to a permanent Double Damage that stacks multiplicatively with any percentage-based damage increases.

* FlashStep: ''Blink Strike'' teleports Riki behind the target, inflicting bonus damage on top of proccing backstab from ''Cloak and Dagger''. It can even be targeted on allies to escape from enemies.

* SkillGateCharacters: As an invisible hero and especially good at picking off heroes out of position, he tends to be an absolute terror in the lowest brackets, being able to snowball out of control and 1v5 whole teams by himself. ''Cloak and Dagger'' turns him permanently invisible and allows him to deal absurd amounts of damage to a single target, since stacking Agility items will give him extra base damage, attack speed, armor, AND increased backstab damage. In low-level games where heroes are frequently out of position and the items that counter him (sentries, dust and Force Staff) are infrequent, he can jump on his victims at any time with the invisibility from ''Cloak and Dagger'', drop a ''Smoke Screen'' on them, slow them down with Diffusal Blade, then backstab a lot as they try to crawl away from the smoke in panic, and finally use ''Blink Strike'' to chase down and finish them off. The other team usually doesn't realise Riki's danger until he's extremely fat, at which point even sentries and a Gem can't do anything to him. As soon as you reach a bracket where people know what invisibility means, Riki needs to play much more carefully.

* MageMarksman: Shadow Fiend has significant nuking power from ''Shadowraze'' and ''Requiem of Souls'' along with powerful right-clicks thanks to ''Necromastery'' and ''Presence of the Dark Lord'', making him an offensive powerhouse at all stages of the game.

* SoulPower: Collecting souls and using them to augment his power is Nevermore's specialty, using them to empower his basic attacks and ''Requiem of Souls''. Aghanim's Shard also lets him consume souls to make his next attack a guaranteed critical hit.

* AchillesHeel: Since Slark relies on ''Shadow Dance'''s passive to keep him alive between teamfights (as well as during teamfights when using the active), he's very vulnerable to anything that allows the enemy to keep vision on him or that prevents him from healing. This makes both Bloodseeker and Ancient Apparition strong counters to Slark since ''Thirst'' ensures that he can't escape or regenerate once he falls below 30% health (or at least forces him to use his ultimate), while ''Ice Blast'' prevents him from healing even during ''Shadow Dance''.

* DefogOfWar: Inverted. The passive element of ''Shadow Dance'' allows Slark to know if the enemy can see him or not, as it disappears from his [[StatusLine status bar]] whenever he's under enemy vision. Since this most often means that the enemy has an Observer Ward in the area (or he's being ganked by an invisible hero), it allows his team to easily de-ward.

* HealingFactor: The passive component of Slark's ultimate lets him regenerate a percentage of his health every second while he's invisible to the enemy.
* HitAndRunTactics: Slark can't survive in teamfights for very long, but he excels in one-on-one combat and shaking off any pursuers with his skills. His general MO is to jump on somebody, stab them a couple times, run away and regenerate with ''Shadow Dance'' when he gets targeted, rinse and repeat until the enemy's out of steam.

* SkillGateCharacters: In low-level play, Slark is one of the most hated heroes due to his elusiveness and powerful ganking ability (the fact that his kit and playstyle encourages Slark to work alone, or run from teamfights when they start to turn bad rather than fighting it out and maybe turning the tide, doesn't help). ''Pounce'' allows him to pin down an opponent for several seconds, preventing them from fleeing while he repeatedly hits them to gain lots of ''Essence Shift'' stacks, and can also be used for mobility in order to escape over impassable terrain. The passive aspect of ''Shadow Dance'' means that he can rapidly heal up after a fight while moving towards his next target at increased speed, and the active makes him temporarily immune to any non-[=AoE=] ability, allowing him to take a breather even in the middle of a chaotic teamfight. This is compounded by Slark's tendency to buy ''Shadow Blade'', allowing him to roam around the map with impunity and easily escape from bad situations due to low-level players' distaste for buying detection, making him extremely difficult for uncoordinated players to kill. Better players can take advantage of Slark's weakness to burst damage, especially [=AoE=] abilities which can hit him during ''Shadow Dance'', though he's still DifficultButAwesome enough to see high-level play thanks to his self-dispel and mobility.

* SurprisinglySuddenDeath: Many support players absolutely loathe Slark for a reason. Shadow Blade is a core item for him, due to its synergy with ''Shadow Dance'', and once he gets it he can suddenly jump on a squishy support, ''Pounce'' to prevent them from escaping, then pop ''Dark Pact'' and his ultimate if needed, killing his victim in seconds - most supports are defenseless against being ganked by a Slark with Shadow Blade except for spending lots and lots of gold on Sentry Wards.

* BoringButPractical: ''Take Aim'' does nothing more than increase Sniper's range, which doesn't sound very exciting. However, since Sniper's greatest strength lies in his basic attacks, this increased range becomes invaluable. At level 2, his range exceeds that of towers, enabling him to safely push very early in the game.

* HitAndRunTactics: Sniper is one of the best kiters in the game thanks to the extreme range from ''Take Aim'' and two slows, combined with his commonly-built items including things like Hurricane Pike (extends his range even further and lets him push enemies away) and Eye of Skadi (slows his attack targets).

* LongRangeFighter: Sniper has the longest attack range in the game with ''Take Aim'' and can extend it even further with Dragon Lance (and talent)[[note]]he can easily be walking around with roughly 1200 attack range, almost double that of the next highest in the game and longer than most spells' cast range[[/note]], ''Shrapnel'' can be cast from 1800 range (equal to daytime vision), and ''Assassinate'' has its absurd 3000 range. Of course, Sniper lacks escapes, is incredibly vulnerable, rarely invests in durability, and doesn't have the most potent attack in terms of raw damage, so he's as good as food if the enemy can get close to him. Hurricane Pike and the occasional Aghanim's Shard are picked up on Sniper for this very reason, giving him a way to keep enemies at a comfortable distance and either shoot them down or run away.

* YouShallNotPass: A plethora of slows including (but not limited to) a triple ''Shrapnel'', ''Headshot'', and potentially Eye of Skadi combined with an extreme range from ''Take Aim'' and constant pressure from ''Assassinate'' (and, more often than not, constant chain lightning from Mjollnir to decimate creep waves) makes Sniper one of the best high ground defenders in the game: he can simply stay behind the tier 3 tower and shoot while the enemy team has difficulty breaching the tower from the constant slows. Combined with the rubberband gold mechanics, it is especially disastrous for the enemy team if Sniper can manage to finish their carry off with ''Assassinate''.

* AchillesHeel: ''Refraction'' blocks her from harm based on how many separate ''instances'' of damage are applied. So, it can absorb ludicrous amounts of burst damage, but weak damage-over-time abilities can destroy the shield almost instantly. ''Meld'' invisibility requires her to stand still, making her only more vulnerable to area-of-effect abilities and True Sight. Jakiro and Venomancer in particular counter her well for both skills, and on top of that, limit her damage output ''and'' her blink dagger usage (a common item for Lanaya) with the combined, continuous use of [[PowerLimiter multiple damage-over-time spells.]]

* DeflectorShields: ''Refraction'', Lanaya's first ability, creates a shield around her that completely blocks a certain number of damage instances, while simultaneously giving her bonus damage for the same number of attack instances. This makes her extremely durable against burst damage and spells, though it's easily broken by damage over time and repeated right-clicks.

* CastFromHitPoints: ''Demon Zeal'' costs 25% of Terrorblade's current HP to cast.

Phantom Assassin is a carry hero known mostly for her ability to inflict enormous damage in a single critical hit. Her first spell is ''Stifling Dagger'', a throwing knife which inflicts damage based on Phantom Assassin's attack as well as slowing the target, all on a short cooldown and small mana cost. This effectively allows her to attack foes from afar despite being a melee hero. ''Phantom Strike'', her second skill, causes Phantom Assassin to teleport to an allied or enemy unit: this is useful for retreating to safety, but also for jumping on unsuspecting targets as targeting an enemy will cause Phantom Assassin to attack with increased speed. Her next ability is ''Blur'', a passive skill which grants Phantom Assassin a chance to dodge enemy attacks, up to 50%. On top of this, it can also be activated to make her invisible and undetectable until she's near an enemy hero or non-Shrine building, allowing her to walk past wards without being seen. Finally, her ultimate, ''Coup de Grace'', is the ability that makes Phantom Assassin as deadly as she is: this passive skill grants her a chance to inflict a critical hit with each attack, multiplying the damage of her strike by up to 450%. Once she obtains several damage-increasing items, Phantom Assassin can inflict damage numbers in the four-digit range, potentially eliminating squishy targets with a single blow. Be prepared when going up against this elusive assassin, or her dagger will be the last thing you see.\\