Shiv vs Dynamo

Do

• Plan for Unstoppable Unstoppable 6,400 souls Tier 4ArmorInstantCast +60s Cooldown +5.5s Duration +125 Bonus Health +25% Debuff Resist Builds from Debuff Reducer — know which tier it sits in so you are not improvising at the shop.
• Know what Kinetic Pulse looks like. It is the cooldown this lane revolves around.

Avoid

• Walking to lane on the same path every wave against a hero with Dynamo's engage range.

Do

• Very low raw weapon DPS (48) means he cannot actually kill a healthy laner on his own
• Quantum Entanglement Quantum Entanglement 10m Range1.4s Duration20s Cooldown Dynamo briefly stops being a valid target as he teleports to a nearby point, refilling stamina on arrival. Mobility 10m teleport base, +6m at Tier 1. Defensive The untargetable window dodges projectiles and incoming ultimates outright; 1 +6m cast range 2 -6s cooldown (from a 20s base) 5 reduces non-ultimate debuffs by 50% and replenishes one ability charge 's 10m base range is not enough to escape a real gank
• Serrated Knives Serrated Knives 16s Cooldown Shiv throws a knife that damages and bleeds the target. Crowd Control Applies a movement slow with the bleed; Damage 32 impact damage plus 10 bleed DPS per knife stack over a 5s debuff; 1 1 AP: +2s debuff duration 2 2 AP: +2 charges (four knives available for a full stack dump) 5 5 AP: +7 bleed DPS per stack, and +0.01 spirit scaling on the full-Rage impact damage give him free chip at range with 2 charges on a 16s cooldown, which wins the health-bar war without him ever entering shotgun range

Avoid

• Kinetic Pulse is long-range, hits the whole wave and pokes the enemy laner at the same time, giving him safe pressure without stepping forward
• Rejuvenating Aurora Rejuvenating Aurora 48s Cooldown Dynamo channels a restorative field that heals himself and every nearby ally over several seconds. Mobility Tier 1 grants +4m move speed during the channel; Defensive Heals 30 health per second base across the area; 1 +4m move speed during the channel 2 -20s cooldown and +1s channel duration 5 removes the channel requirement and heals an additional 2.5% of max health per second lets him and his lane partner stay in lane far past the point another duo would have to back

Do

• Their first real spike is ult unlock — respect it from that point, not before.
• Your spike is ult unlock: Killing Blow makes every low-health enemy within 12m a guaranteed kill and turns on the Rage passive that upgrades all three basic abilities

Avoid

• Taking an even fight against Dynamo on their spike timing when you could take the same fight ten minutes later on yours.

Do

• Watch for Kinetic Pulse. It is a visible ground wave with travel time — jump or dash over it rather than trying to outrun it sideways
• Focus him during the Singularity channel — he stands completely still for 2.75s and any Stun, Knockup or Silence ends the ultimate and burns the 250s cooldown

Avoid

• Spending your own escape before Kinetic Pulse is on cooldown.

• Kinetic Pulse Ability 1

  Dynamo decides where you are standing for the next second or two — Knockup, brief airborne loss of control.

  • It is a visible ground wave with travel time — jump or dash over it rather than trying to outrun it sideways
  • Fight him from elevation or across a gap; the wave hugs the floor and does not climb ledges cleanly
  • Bait both charges (he gets two at T1) before committing a dive; the Knockup is what cancels your engage
• Singularity Ultimate

  The one cooldown worth tracking on its own timer: AoE Stun plus a continuous vacuum pull for the full channel duration — the longest and widest Hard CC among these eight heroes.

  • Kill or CC him during the channel — he is stationary and undefended for 2.75s and any Stun ends the ultimate immediately
  • Spread out before objective fights; the vacuum radius is finite and a spread formation means he catches one hero instead of four
  • Carry a cleanse or CC-immunity item and save it specifically for this ability, not for lesser stuns
• Quantum Entanglement Ability 2

  His only real mobility, a dodge for incoming burst, and — via the ally cast — a genuine group escape or repositioning tool.

  • The teleport is very short — 10m base — so a hero with real mobility simply re-closes the gap immediately
  • Delay your burst by half a second past his obvious panic point; once the untargetable window ends he has 14-20s with no dodge
  • Cut off the destination rather than chasing the origin; he can only land within roughly 10-16m
• Rejuvenating Aurora Ability 3

  A team-sustain ability. It resets a whole team between fights and can win an ongoing brawl outright if it is not interrupted.

  • Apply healing reduction before you commit — this ability is why a Dynamo team survives a fight they lost on damage
  • Hard CC still breaks the channel below Tier 3; a Stun or Knockup on Dynamo mid-Aurora wipes the remaining ticks
  • Force the fight to move — he can dash during the channel but the field is anchored around him, so pulling his allies away from him drops them out of it

1. 1 Kinetic Pulse

   Kinetic Pulse charges first — with both spent he loses his interrupt and his anti-dive, and a dive on his carry goes uncontested for the next several seconds

2. 2 Quantum Entanglement

   Quantum Entanglement second — force it with a feint of burst, then commit for real; he has 14-20s with no dodge and only a 10m reposition afterwards

3. 3 Rejuvenating Aurora

   Rejuvenating Aurora third — making him spend it between fights rather than during one removes his team's reset

• Almost no solo kill pressure — 48 weapon DPS and no burst combo Strong evidence
• Completely defenceless during the Singularity channel Strong evidence
• Quantum Entanglement's 10m base range is a reposition, not an escape Strong evidence
• Neither of you deletes the other, so this matchup is decided by multipliers rather than damage. Resists stack multiplicatively, which means your fourth resist item buys much less percentage than your first; shred is subtracted from the total afterward, which means it is worth more the tankier they get; and healing reduction stacks multiplicatively too, so a second anti-heal source on top of a first is worth far less than the first. The efficient build against Dynamo is one anti-heal, one shred, and damage after that. Strong evidence

• Singularity stuns and vacuums a whole group for roughly 2.75s (3.5s at T2) — that is long enough for his entire team to unload a full combo on you with no counterplay once it lands Documented
• Kinetic Pulse knocks you up from long range and cancels whatever you were doing: a dash, a channel, a dive, an ultimate wind-up Documented
• Rejuvenating Aurora undoes damage you spent an entire fight applying; at T3 he does it without even standing still Documented
• Once he has Kinetic Pulse T2, the wave also strips 15% Bullet Resist and slows you 30% for 4s, which converts his poke into his team's kill setup Documented
• Quantum Entanglement's untargetable frames can eat a single-target ultimate you spent on him, then his ally-cast version pulls his whole team out of your collapse Documented

• Focus him during the Singularity channel — he stands completely still for 2.75s and any Stun, Knockup or Silence ends the ultimate and burns the 250s cooldown Strong evidence
• Spread your formation before every objective contest; the vacuum has a finite radius and a spread team gives him one target instead of four Strong evidence
• Buy healing reduction specifically for Rejuvenating Aurora — after his T3 upgrade, interrupting the heal is no longer possible and anti-heal is the only answer Strong evidence
• Bait both Kinetic Pulse charges before you commit a dive; the Knockup is the interrupt that makes his team's anti-dive work Strong evidence
• Fight him from elevation or across gaps — Kinetic Pulse travels along the ground and does not cleanly climb ledges Strong evidence
• Punish his 48 DPS weapon directly: he cannot duel, so isolating him away from allies is close to a free kill Strong evidence
• You do not have the CC to reliably break Singularity out of your own kit, so buy the cheapest thing that does: Silence Wave Silence Wave 3,200 souls Tier 3TechInstantCast +42s Cooldown +3s Duration +0.1s Cast Delay +90 Bonus Health is the only area Silence in the shop and the standard answer to channelled ultimates. Area matters because you do not have to win the aim duel — you have to cover the spot they cast from. Note the alternative, Counterspell Counterspell 3,200 souls Tier 3ArmorPassive +23s Cooldown +20 Spirit Power +6s Buff Duration +0.8s Spell Parry Duration +50 Bonus Health +5 Spirit Power , parries a single ability outright but requires a read; Silence Wave forgives a bad read, which is why it is the buy when interrupting is not your specialty. Strong evidence
• Dynamo contributes through abilities, which makes a hard Silence worth more against them than any amount of resist. Focus Lens Focus Lens 6,400 souls Tier 4TechPress +40s Cooldown +4.5s Duration +0.1s Cast Delay +35% Damage On Expire +10% Fire Rate -9% Spirit Resist -30 Spirit Power +12s Resist Reduction Duration Builds from Spirit Sap is the sharpest version: 4.5 seconds of single-target Silence at 20m, plus 30% of all damage dealt during the window applied when it expires, on a 45-second cooldown. Against a caster that is not a defensive purchase — it deletes their entire fight participation and then charges them for it. Strong evidence

• The entire 2.75s (or 3.5s at T2) Singularity channel — he is stationary, visible and cannot defend himself Documented
• The window after Quantum Entanglement's untargetable frames end: 14-20s of no escape on a hero with 48 weapon DPS Documented
• Below Rejuvenating Aurora T3, the moment he starts channelling the heal — a Stun cancels the remaining ticks Documented
• Any time he is separated from his team; he has no solo kill pressure and cannot outrun a committed chase with a 10m blink Documented
• The minutes following a spent Singularity — the 250s base cooldown means his team has no fight-starter and objectives should be forced immediately Documented
• Dynamo's pull is the whole matchup. Until it is on cooldown you are playing around it; once it misses you have a window that is worth committing into. Make it the first thing you bait — show a sliver of yourself from behind cover rather than walking a clean line they can lead. Strategic
• Being stunned by Dynamo now pauses your reload rather than restarting it, as of 09-16-2026. That quietly changes when it is safe to reload in this matchup: a reload caught by their Stun resumes where it left off instead of costing you the whole cycle, so the old rule of never reloading inside their engagement range is too conservative now. The compensating change is that parrying also pauses your reload, so a defensive parry no longer buys you free reload time. Documented

• Around 6:00 the Guardians become realistically contestable and players start leaving lane for Haunt camps Haunts Neutral camps Lanes and Districts across the map Haunts replace the old neutral camps. They are not a reskin: each type behaves differently, and the health bar now shows a camp's soul value and how hard it is, so you can decide whether a camp is worth your time before you start shooting. Three eye colours mark the tier — teal for tier I, yellow for tier II, red for tier III. Souls 41/68/181 souls tier I / II / III a creep +0.44 / +0.73 / +1.95 a minute — which for you means the map stops being a 1v1 and Dynamo gains the thing they are best at, the opening engagement onto a target with no way out. The last two minutes before that transition are your safest window to build a soul lead. After it, treat any position without a teammate in line of sight as a position they can start a fight in. Strategic
• You get value from moving around the map and Dynamo does not, but the 09-16-2026 patch made that harder to convert early: tunnel breakables Crates Breakable Streets, rooftops and tunnels — about 500 of them Ordinary breakables. Each has a 60% chance to drop souls; a Tough Crate always drops, for double. Souls 23 souls a crate, 60% of the time +2 a minute now spawn and respawn on 5 minutes rather than 3. The off-lane income that used to make a rotation pay for itself is roughly 40% less frequent, so before 6:00 a rotation has to be justified by pressure on Dynamo or on the Guardian, not by the breakables you pick up on the way. Documented

• The first Unstable Rift lands around 11:00 and then every 7 minutes, and Dynamo beats you in exactly the fight it creates. Use the telegraph: a world-only visual appears on a random side-lane bridge roughly 60 seconds before the global announcement and map marker, which is the single biggest piece of free information in the mid game. Spend those 60 seconds either grouping or deliberately taking something elsewhere — the one thing you cannot afford is arriving at a Rift bridge late and alone. Strong evidence

• Singularity is a channel, which means the fight is decided by whether you can break it. Hold one interrupt — a Stun, a Silence, or a displacement — specifically for that cast rather than spending it on the opening trade. If you have no interrupt, the answer is line of sight: leave the area entirely rather than trying to out-heal it. Strong evidence
• Against Dynamo's knockups, Debuff Reducer Debuff Reducer 1,600 souls Tier 2ArmorPassive +25% Debuff Resist +90 Bonus Health is a live answer where it used to be a dead one: Knockup durations were brought under debuff reduction on 05-22-2026, so the +25% from a 1,600 Tier II item genuinely shortens the airborne time. That matters more for you than for most, because you have no exit and the airborne window is when their follow-up lands. Worth pairing with the fact that Knockdown Knockdown 3,200 souls Tier 3TechPress +35s Cooldown +0.1s Cast Delay +2s Stun Delay +0.5s Stun Duration +75 Bonus Health +5% Ability Range +5% Radius -style effects going the other way still cannot be shortened at all. Documented
• Dynamo brings enough lockdown that Stun sequencing matters. Community reporting describes Stun diminishing returns of roughly 10% then 30% inside an 8-second window, applying to stuns only and not to silences, slows, disarms or hexes — so their follow-up chain may be shorter than the first one felt. Treat this as unconfirmed, but it is worth knowing before you burn a cleanse on the opening Stun. Uncertain

• Dynamo decides where you stand, not you. The practical rule is to never hold a position whose failure case is being moved — stand so that being yanked or knocked puts you somewhere survivable rather than inside their whole team. Cover at your back is worth more than cover in front. Strong evidence
• Dynamo wins by choosing where the fight happens. Take your position before the zoning goes down, not after — once the area is committed you are fighting on their terms, and walking in to contest it is exactly the mistake the kit is built to farm. Strategic

• Dynamo heals through damage, so healing reduction is not optional here — but pick the right application route. Anti-heal arrives two ways: bullet-applied (Toxic Bullets Toxic Bullets 3,200 souls Tier 3WeaponPassive -40% Incoming Healing , T3) builds up through gunfire, and spirit-applied (Healbane Healbane 1,600 souls Tier 2ArmorPassive +8s Duration +7 Spirit Power -35% Incoming Healing , T2) lands off Spirit Damage. Buy the one that matches how you actually deal damage, or it will never apply. Documented
• Do not assume Dynamo shrugs off your anti-heal by going immune. Unstoppable explicitly does not suppress healing reduction — if you have the debuff on them before they pop it, they are still healing at the reduced rate through the whole window. Documented
• Against Dynamo's crowd control, understand what Debuff Resist actually buys you: it shortens duration, never magnitude. It is excellent against long disables and close to worthless against a short hard slow. Two things it explicitly does not shorten at all are the parry Stun and the Knockdown item's Stun. Documented
• You have no reliable interrupt in your own kit, so against Singularity you are buying one. A Silence or a displacement active is worth more to your team here than another damage item, because nobody else may be holding one either. Strategic
• If Dynamo buys Dispel Magic Dispel Magic 3,200 souls Tier 3ArmorInstantCast +45s Cooldown +10% Spirit Resist +3s Buff Duration +250 Heal Amount to purge your anti-heal, bullet-applied reduction re-lands on your very next shot, while spirit-applied reduction has to wait for your next ability. That asymmetry is a real argument for the bullet route against a hero who will buy a purge. Strong evidence
• Unstoppable (vitality T4) — Buy when enemy lockdown is the reason you lose fights — it lets you walk through a full CC chain and still deal damage. In this game that means Dynamo's Singularity. Documented
• Knockdown (spirit T3) — Dynamo creates that through Dynamo's Quantum Entanglement. Buy whenever an enemy fights from the sky — it answers flying and airborne heroes and channelled aerial ultimates. Documented
• Counterspell (vitality T3) — Dynamo's Singularity is what you are buying against here. Buy against telegraphed single-target ultimates and hex-style point-and-click abilities you can read and parry. Documented

• The instinct here is to buy Dispel Magic as your answer to Dynamo and then find it greyed out at the exact moment you need it. Dispel Magic cannot be cast while you are stunned or asleep, and it cannot remove a Stun at all — it purges what comes with the Stun, not the Stun itself. Against Dynamo the item you actually want is the pre-cast kind (Unstoppable, which also cannot be activated once you are already stunned) or the automatic kind (Indomitable Indomitable 6,400 souls Tier 4ArmorPassive +55s Cooldown +10s Duration +10% Bullet Resist +10% Spirit Resist +20s Cooldown On Apply +2 Out of Combat Regen Builds from Reactive Barrier , which cleanses the next Hard CC with no input from you). Documented
• Anti-heal against Dynamo is bought correctly and applied at the wrong moment. Healbane's reduction runs for 8 seconds from your Spirit Damage and Toxic Bullets' runs while the bleed is up — both are windows, and re-applying the same source before it expires does not stack a second instance. The mistake is opening the fight clean and reaching for anti-heal once they start healing; by then you have spent the fight. Land it before they commit, then keep the window refreshed rather than re-triggering it. Strong evidence
• The losing pattern against Dynamo is deciding to leave, walking to the zipline and finding you cannot attach. Any damage from an enemy hero or objective blocks zipline attachment for 3 seconds, and Dynamo has the chip range to keep that 3-second timer rolling indefinitely. Break line of sight first, wait out the lockout, then attach — do not walk to the rope while still taking fire. Documented
• Players buy Dispel Magic for Dynamo and then discover it does nothing about Singularity. Dispel Magic purges non-ultimate negative effects only — anything sourced from an ultimate is outside its scope entirely. Work out which of Dynamo's disables come off abilities and which come off the ult before you spend 3,200: the ability-sourced ones are purgeable, the ult is not, and for the ult you need either Unstoppable pre-cast or the discipline not to be there. Documented
• Your instinct is to jump on Dynamo's backline the moment you see an opening, and the mistake is not checking what is above you. A Walker's Stomp is 350 damage + 15% of your max health inside 15m with a 2-second Stun on a 7-second cooldown — a 2-second Stun handed to a team with peel is a death. Dive under their Walker only with Unstoppable pre-cast or after the Stomp has just gone off. Strong evidence
• The Unstable Rift capture point is a 20m circle on a bridge, capture only progresses when no enemy is inside it, and everyone standing in it is revealed on the minimap. That is a purpose-built trap for Dynamo. The mistake is treating the circle as the objective: you do not need to stand in it, you need them not to. Contest from outside the radius, deny with a single body at the edge, and let their Area Damage land on empty bridge. Strategic