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Many hands make light work.
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Bad against...
- Due to Pugna's incredible intelligence growth and terrible strength growth, Nyx should always be able to take you out with his combo, with or without an added Dagon. Lua error in Module:Ability_ID at line 61: Could not find Cargo data for "Mana Burn". will deal a large amount of damage in particular, especially in the late game.
- Spiked Carapace is also a great tool versus Pugna. A good player will wait for you in Vendetta until you farm a creep wave with Nether Blast and reflect it back at you as their initiation and setup for Impale.
- Clockwerk loves to Hookshot low health, immobile targets like Pugna.
- Pugna's Life Drain gets immediately and repeatedly (if an Aghanim's Scepter was purchased) cancelled due to Battery Assault, especially if Pugna is trapped inside Power Cogs.
- Clockwerk also loves to build Blade Mail, which will deal more damage to Pugna than Clockwork due to Pugna's low health pool.
- Finally, both Hookshot and Rocket Flare can allow him to finish off Pugna out of range of his Nether Ward.
- Sniper's huge range makes him an unviable target to use Life Drain on, forcing Pugna to risk playing out of position to use it on Sniper.
- Sniper's Shrapnel can be used to provide vision on Nether Ward, and his range allows him to easily take it out.
- A clumsy Pugna may accidentally boost Sniper's Shrapnel and Assassinate damages if he recklessly uses Decrepify on himself or his allies.
- Though Life Drain instantly destroys illusions, Phantom Lancer creates way too many for Pugna to handle.
- A good Phantom Lancer will also dodge your Nether Blast with Doppelganger.
- Phantom Lancer is the most natural Diffusal Blade carrier to burn Pugna's very large pool of mana away and deal a large amount of damage in the process.
- Since Pugna relies on his teammates for protection, it is fairly common for Anti-Mage to get multiple kills with a single use of his Mana Void on Pugna if he's missing a considerable portion of his mana.
- Pugna's massive mana pool will result in Anti-Mage's Mana Break almost always dealing the bonus damage from the mana burn.
- Counterspell negates a large amount of Pugna's damage, as most of Pugna's damage comes from his spells.
- Blink can be used to get out of a bad situation, and Pugna has no way to prevent him from casting it.
- Luna can shrug off most damage taken from Nether Ward as she only has two castable skills with average mana cost.
- Luna can deal constant damage to Pugna through the low-cooldown Lucent Beam and her right clicks.
- Lucent Beam's considerable range can reliably cancel Pugna's Life Drain.
- Luna is a common Black King Bar carrier, which totally nullifies Pugna's damage output.
- If Pugna uses Decrepify on himself to avoid Luna's right click, she can burst him down with Lucent Beam and Eclipse.
- Most of Pugna's damage is magical, which can get blocked by Fate's Edict's 100% magic resistance.
- Oracle has two abilities that apply a dispel, which can easily remove Decrepify on his ally or Oracle.
- Oracle has a very long Attack Range and a very low Base Attack Time, which enables him to take down Nether Ward swiftly from long distance.
- Pugna is a very fragile hero who can easily get caught and killed by Storm Spirit's long range initiation.
- This is especially true if he has Orchid Malevolence or Scythe of Vyse.
- Pugna has no disables that can prevent Storm Spirit from escaping.
- Even though Ball Lightning requires high amount of mana, Nether Ward is ineffective since Storm Spirit is invulnerable while using it.
- Storm Spirit's other abilities cost very insignificant amount of mana for Nether Ward to be effective.
Others
- Any hero that can blink on top of him makes a good threat to Pugna.
- Special mention goes to Queen of Pain as she could kill herself with Sonic Wave if your Nether Ward is up.
- Similarly, any hero that will sneak up on you could kill you before you have time to react.
Items
- Force Staff allows for someone to quickly escape a Life Drain for a very small mana cost. With quick fingers, you can also dodge Nether Blast.
- Glimmer Cape and Pipe of Insight both reduces Pugna's damage output considerably.
- Pugna's only tool against Black King Bar is a defensive Decrepify.
- Blink Dagger is great versus Pugna as he hates being jumped on because of his extremely fragile nature.
- Linken's Sphere can block Life Drain and Decrepify.
- Lotus Orb reflects Life Drain and Decrepify.
Good against...
- Amazingly, Enchantress has even lower health than Pugna. Though she does pack quite a punch through Impetus, she can't use it if she is under Decrepify.
- Pugna's Magical DPS is way greater than the heal from Nature's Attendants, which will also harm her quite a bit if she's next to Nether Ward.
- Decrepify is the perfect tool against Omnislash until he gets a Nullifier, and even then he will probably waste a couple of slashes before he uses it.
- Without an extra disable, Pugna's high movement speed makes it impossible to chase him with Blade Fury.
- Unlike some other carries like Slark or Phantom Assassin, Juggernaut's spells cost a hefty amount of mana and he will seriously get hurt by Nether Ward. Don't forget the damage from the ward is inflicted before the spell immunity is provided by Blade Fury.
- For the better part of the game, he will take more damage from your ward than he deals to you with Lua error in Module:Ability_ID at line 61: Could not find Cargo data for "Arcane Orb"..
- It will take a huge difference in farm or itemization between you for him to deal any damage to you with Lua error in Module:Ability_ID at line 61: Could not find Cargo data for "Sanity's Eclipse"., provided he doesn't die first from casting it next to your ward.
- Nether Ward can punish Timbersaw, as Timbersaw is a spell-caster with low cooldowns. Furthermore, Timbersaw usually appears in the midst of battle, placing himself in range of Nether Ward's Mana Flares.
- Timbersaw has no stuns or silences to stop Life Drain. Since all of Pugna's Spells are magical, the damage can be devastating to Timbersaw.
- Decrepify can further increase all the magical damage done to Timbersaw, bypassing the enhanced physical resistance he can get from Reactive Armor.
- Leshrac needs to be close to target in order to do damage, Pugna can outrun Leshrac with ease due to his superior movement speed.
- Split Earth can also be hard to land on Pugna for the same reason.
- Leshrac uses huge amounts of mana to do damage, Nether Ward forces him to either not contribute in a fight or kill himself in the process.
- Decrepify prevents Legion Commander from attacking allies during Duel, regardless if it's used on her or on the ally .
- Pugna can easily cast Decrepify, Nether Blast and Life Drain on Legion during the 4/4.75/5.5/8 seconds of duel
- His Phantasm army will die in a heartbeat once you've farmed up an Aghanim's Scepter since Life Drain instantly deals with illusions.
- You can also protect whoever he chooses to Reality Rift with a timely Decrepify.
- Decrepify prevents Shadow Fiend from attacking for its duration, potentially preventing him from getting a kill.
- Nether Ward can do heavy damage to Shadow Fiend if he tries to cast his Requiem of Souls and his Shadowraze.
- Decrepify prevents Faceless Void from attacking trapped allies inside Chronosphere, wasting a large portion of its duration if Faceless Void can't dispel it.
- Because Invoker relies on casting a large amount of spells to contribute to fights, Nether Ward can force him to not cast anything at all or take a large amount of damage to cast spells.
- Due to the high mana cost of his spells and the low cool down of them, Nether Ward can seriously damage Skywrath Mage if he isn't careful.
- Skywrath Mage's fragility makes him very susceptible to Pugna's high burst damage.
- Troll Warlord can't switch targets at will, in order to build Fervor stacks, which makes it easy to use Decrepify in order to save allies
- During Battle Trance, Pugna can easily use Nether Blast, Decrepify and Life Drain on him
Others
- Up to a certain extent, Decrepify can make life miserable for a ton of right-clicking carries. With an Octarine Core you will have 78% up-time on it (minus cast times), and if you take the lvl 20 talent +2s Decrepify Duration, it increases to 100% up-time(minus cast times).
- Special mention goes to Phantom Assassin who simply loves to Phantom Strike on top of you. If you're not already dead, just decrepify her and suck the life out of her.
- Nether Ward will be problematic for heavy nukers and spammers like Skywrath Mage, Lina, Lion and Invoker, but don't use Decrepify defensively against them as you'll be helping them out more than anything.
- Since Life drain takes out illusions instantly, Pugna with a scepter is decent versus plenty of illusion heroes, most notably Naga Siren and Terrorblade and the aforementioned Chaos Knight. Phantom Lancer is an exception.
Works well with...
- Phantom's Embrace cannot be removed if Pugna casts Decrepifyon the target, making a very dangerous and potentially fatal combo.
- Stroke of Fate and Soulbind also have extremely deadly synergy with Pugna due to the slows and double casting.
- Io and Pugna can Relocate gank easily for Decrepify provides a boost to his other spells, as well as Io's Spirits.
- If Io is healing an ally with Tether, you can cast Life Drain on Io to give it health, so Tether will heal its target for an absurd amount of health, useful to save an important ally.
- Duel holds an enemy hero long enough for Pugna to cast his spells. If she is losing a Duel, he can Decrepify the target or heal her with Life Drain.
- A good opponent will always try to focus a Necrophos. Here's another ally who will take the enemy's initiation for you in order to help you get your spells off. Don't forget to help him out in return through a friendly Life drain, and hugely amping up the damage from Reaper's Scythe, or at least protecting him from right clicks.
- Here's an ally who will soak up the damage for you. Don't forget you can also restore her mana with Life Drain once she's back to full hp.
- If your mana allows it, don't forget to spam Nether Blast while she tanks the tower for your team.
- Both Skywrath Mage and Pugna do very high magic damage and they both have ability to amplify each others damage by Ancient Seal and Decrepify.
- Hex and Shackles hold enemy heroes in place just enough for Nether Blast and Life Drain to finish them off.
- Decrepify lowers enemies' magic resistance, increasing the potency of Ether Shock.
Others
- Heroes that can make good use of Decrepify for they possess huge amount of magical burst: Invoker, Lina, Lion, Tinker, Zeus
- Heroes with abilities that can keep targets in range of Nether Blast and Life Drain: Clockwerk, Disruptor, Magnus, Tusk, Warlock
Items
- Glimmer Cape grants Pugna invisibility so the enemy cannot easily interrupt Life Drain.
- Dagon's magical damage increases thanks to Decrepify's magic resistance reduction.
