Sinclair vs Mo & Krill
Sinclair's team wins 47.7% Mo & Krill's team wins 52.3%, across 8,753 games
Written for the Sinclair player. Playing Mo & Krill? See Mo & Krill vs Sinclair →
Sinclair has the edge
Sinclair usually wins 45.0% of games. Against Mo & Krill that is 2.7% higher, over 8,753 games.
- Whole match 47.7% +2.7% vs usual 8,753 games
- Sharing a lane 48.8% +3.8% vs usual 2,702 games
"Sharing a lane" counts only games where both were assigned the same lane — the laning matchup itself.
The fight at a glance
If you're Sinclair
Has the edgeWait out Burrow 40s cooldown
WhyIt is their only engage and their only real escape; force it on a trooper wave or a fake overextend and they are a slow-approaching shotgun hero for the next 20-40 seconds.
- Watch out
- Burrow lets them travel to you underground with bullet and spirit armour, then surface directly under your feet with a Knockup you cannot dash out of.
- Your edge
- Sinclair has more reach than Mo & Krill, so you can trade from range.
- Buy
Unstoppable
Unstoppable +60s Cooldown +5.5s Duration +125 Bonus Health +25% Debuff Resist Buy it against Mo & Krill's
Combo
Combo Mo & Krill grab a single enemy, hold them in place stunned while chewing through them for the duration of the channel. Crowd Control Full stun for the 2.4s channel (+0.7s at T3). Damage 35 damage per second over the 2.4s channel; Mobility None — both parties are locked in place, which is the risk. 1 +100% lifesteal. 2 -30s cooldown, +50% bullet resist. 5 +0.7s duration, +35 damage per second with increased scaling. .
If you're Mo & Krill
Wait out Rabbit Hex 26s cooldown
ThenAt 26s base (16s at 1 AP), baiting it with a durable body opens a clean dive window on a 730 HP mage.
- Watch out
- Vexing Bolt is redirectable mid-flight, so dodging it early does nothing.
- Your edge
- Mo & Krill has more healing than Sinclair, so you recover between fights and they do not.
- Buy
Knockdown
Knockdown +35s Cooldown +0.1s Cast Delay +2s Stun Delay +0.5s Stun Duration +75 Bonus Health +5% Ability Range +5% Radius Buy it against Sinclair's
Spectral Assistant
Spectral Assistant Sinclair summons an Assistant at a targeted location. Damage 15 damage per Assistant attack, +14 at 5 AP. Mobility The swap is a functional blink to a pre-chosen location, usable twice per… Defensive His only escape tool — placing the Assistant behind cover and swapping is… 1 1 AP: -10s cooldown (40s to 30s) 2 2 AP: +7s duration and +5m placement range 5 5 AP: +60% Assistant fire rate and +14 Assistant damage .
The full plan for Sinclair, phase by phase, is below. Mo & Krill's side in full →
What should I do right now?
Do
- Plan for
Unstoppable
Unstoppable +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
Burrow looks like. It is the cooldown this lane revolves around.
Avoid
- Walking to lane on the same path every wave against a hero with Mo & Krill's engage range.
Do
- Zero ranged presence — 2.8 damage per pellet means they contribute essentially nothing outside a few metres.
- Every one of their damage tools requires being close, so a mid- or long-range laning duo can simply refuse to engage.
- 16.5 damage per bullet with falloff not starting until 20m gives him a long comfortable poke range
Avoid
- 930 base health gives them a large health pool that is hard to push out of lane.
Scorn
Scorn A burst of damage to everything close by that converts a portion of the damage dealt into healing, with a substantially larger return when the damage lands on enemy heroes. Crowd Control None at base. T3 adds a stacking 15% damage debuff on enemies hit, lasting… Damage 45 damage base, scaling with spirit at 0.675, with a 13s base cooldown. Defensive The heal is the main defensive layer. 1 +30 damage. 2 -5s cooldown, +1m radius. 5 applies a stacking 15% damage debuff to enemies hit for 16s. clears troopers and heals off them simultaneously, so they sustain and farm from the same button.
Do
- Their first real spike is
Scorn first two points (laning 0-10min) — respect it from that point, not before. - Your spike is 1 AP into
Rabbit Hex: -10s cooldown (26s to 16s) makes the hard disable available in nearly every skirmish instead of once per fight
Avoid
- Taking an even fight against Mo & Krill on their spike timing when you could take the same fight ten minutes later on yours.
Do
- Watch for
Burrow. Shoot the burrow mound. Hero damage directly reduces the speed bonus, so contesting the approach turns a fast dive into a slow one you can walk away from. - Kite. Their entire damage output requires close range and their spreadshot does 2.8 per pellet — holding 20m+ with a mid- or long-range hero keeps them past the point where their damage starts falling off.
Avoid
- Spending your own escape before
Burrow is on cooldown.
Mo & Krill’s abilities
-
Burrow Ability 2 It puts you somewhere you did not choose to be — slow plus a Knockup on everyone near the emergence point.
- Shoot the burrow mound. Hero damage directly reduces the speed bonus, so contesting the approach turns a fast dive into a slow one you can walk away from.
- Spread out. The emergence Knockup is AoE, so standing apart means it catches one person instead of three.
- The travel path is visible on the ground — reposition to a spot with no cover for them to surface behind, or back onto high ground they must climb to.
-
Combo Ultimate Once this lands the fight is usually already decided — full Stun for the 2.4s channel (+0.7s at T3).
- Interrupt it. Any Stun, Knockup, Silence or displacement on Mo & Krill breaks the channel and wastes a 150s ultimate.
- Both participants are stationary and grouped for the 2.4s channel — that is a free AoE target for your own ultimate.
- Do not let them finish the kill: a Debuff Remover or a heal on the held target denies the permanent max-health reward entirely, since the target has to actually die.
-
Sand Blast
Sand Blast A spray of sand in a cone ahead that deals damage and disarms everyone it catches, preventing them from using their weapon. Crowd Control Disarm, roughly 2.5s. T2 adds a 28% slow and a 28% dash distance reduction… Damage 35 damage base; T1 adds +45 damage and +5m range. 25m range with a 2.5s… Defensive Disarming the biggest gun in the fight is a defensive cooldown in practice. 1 +45 damage, +5m range. 2 24% slow and 26% dash distance reduction. 5 +1.5s duration, -25s cooldown. Ability 3 More lockdown on its own cooldown — Disarm, roughly 2.5s.
- It is a cone in front of them — strafe wide or get behind them and it applies nothing.
- Disarm blocks weapons, not abilities. If you are ability-based (Paige, Paradox, Pocket) you can keep fighting through it; if you are gun-based, use the window to reposition instead of trying to shoot.
- Debuff Remover clears the Disarm and is worth holding specifically for the moment before they commit
Combo.
-
Scorn Ability 1 Their sustain and their farming button in one. It lets them sit in a trooper wave and stay topped up.
- Anti-heal (
Healbane
Healbane +8s Duration +7 Spirit Power -35% Incoming Healing /
Toxic Bullets
Toxic Bullets -40% Incoming Healing ) applied before the engage removes the sustain that makes the whole hero work. - It is a short-radius point-blank pulse — staying more than a few metres away denies it entirely, and their spreadshot cannot punish you at that distance either.
- Do not feed it multiple bodies. Scorn heals per target hit, so a clumped team is what makes them unkillable.
- Anti-heal (
- 1
Burrow Burrow first. It is their only engage and their only real escape; force it on a trooper wave or a fake overextend and they are a slow-approaching shotgun hero for the next 20-40 seconds.
- 2
Sand Blast Sand Blast second — bait the Disarm from behind cover or with a summon, then engage when your gun is safe for the next window.
- 3
Scorn Scorn third: make them use it as wave clear rather than as a heal in a fight, since its cooldown is short and its impact in a brawl is large.
The matchup in detail
-
Burrow lets them travel to you underground with bullet and spirit armour, then surface directly under your feet with a Knockup you cannot dash out of. Strong evidence -
Sand Blast disarms you for around 2.5s (longer at T3) in a 25m cone — your gun stops working for the exact seconds they need to set up. Strong evidence -
Combo holds you stunned in place for 2.4 seconds while grinding through your health, with +50% Bullet Resist at T2 so shooting them off is unreliable. Strong evidence -
Scorn heals them off every body in radius, with a stacking 15% damage debuff on you at T3 — the longer the brawl runs, the more the numbers move their way. Strong evidence - Every kill secured inside
Combo permanently raises their max health, so the same hero is harder to kill in minute 40 than in minute 20. Strong evidence
- Kite. Their entire damage output requires close range and their spreadshot does 2.8 per pellet — holding 20m+ with a mid- or long-range hero keeps them past the point where their damage starts falling off. Strong evidence
- Shoot the burrow mound as it approaches. Hero damage reduces the
Burrow speed bonus directly, so contesting the travel converts their dive into a walk. Strong evidence - Hold one interrupt specifically for the
Combo channel. Any Stun, Silence, Knockup or displacement on them cancels a 150-second ultimate and denies the permanent health stack. Strong evidence - Buy anti-heal before mid game.
Healbane /
Toxic Bullets cut
Scorn's healing and
Combo T1's Lifesteal at the same time. Strong evidence - Spread out so the
Burrow emergence Knockup and
Scorn each hit one person instead of three — their sustain scales with the number of bodies in radius. Strong evidence -
Sand Blast is a frontal cone: circle behind them rather than backing straight up, and if you are ability-based, keep fighting through the Disarm since it only blocks weapons. Strong evidence - You do not have the CC to reliably break
Combo out of your own kit, so buy the cheapest thing that does:
Silence Wave
Silence Wave +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 +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 -
Combo is one cast aimed at one person and that person is likely you, which changes the shape of the answer. Effective health is the wrong axis — a hero who can pick you out of a fight will simply wait until the number is beatable.
Counterspell negates a single ability outright, which against a one-cast threat is a hundred percent mitigation for 3,200, and the read is easier than it sounds because a single-target ultimate has to be aimed at you to work. Strategic
- During the
Combo channel — they are stationary, locked to one target, and any Hard CC cancels it. Strong evidence - While burrowed and being shot: hero damage strips the speed bonus, so a contested approach leaves them arriving late and out of position. Strong evidence
- Immediately after the
Burrow emergence Knockup, with
Burrow on cooldown — they have no escape and are standing inside your team. Strong evidence - Any time they are further than ~20m from a target: their spreadshot starts falling off at 20m and
Scorn only reaches 9m, so they deal little damage at that range. Strong evidence - Their 2.82s spreadshot reload at close range, which is a long window for a hero with no ranged fallback. Strong evidence
- You out-range Mo & Krill and that is the entire matchup. Every trade you take at your range is free; every trade you take at theirs is lost. The discipline is refusing the second kind even when the first kind is slow — you do not need to finish them, you need them to never reach you. Strong evidence
- Parry is your best tool against Mo & Krill's arrival and it is now a commitment rather than a hedge. Since 09-16-2026, parrying during a dash cancels the dash and its momentum, so you cannot both reposition and hold F. The cooldown maths makes the decision for you: a successful parry costs 0.5 seconds and stuns them for 3 with no Debuff Resist reduction possible, while a whiff costs 4.5 seconds — against a hero who arrives on a cooldown, that whiff is the entire window they needed. Documented
- 930 base health gives them a large health pool that is hard to push out of lane. Strong evidence
-
Scorn clears troopers and heals off them simultaneously, so they sustain and farm from the same button. Strong evidence - Zero ranged presence — 2.8 damage per pellet means they contribute essentially nothing outside a few metres. Strong evidence
- Every one of their damage tools requires being close, so a mid- or long-range laning duo can simply refuse to engage. Strong evidence
- 16.5 damage per bullet with falloff not starting until 20m gives him a long comfortable poke range Strong evidence
-
Scorn first two points (laning 0-10min) — The
Scorn/
Scorn opener front-loads their sustain and wave clear. Strong evidence -
Combo unlock — They gain
Combo, a single-target removal, and the permanent max-health stacking mechanic starts. Strong evidence -
Combo T2 (mid game) — -30s cooldown and +50% Bullet Resist make the ultimate both repeatable and much harder to break with gunfire. Strong evidence -
Burrow T3 (late) — -20s cooldown and +4 m/s make them a rotating map threat who can arrive at any fight under armour. Strong evidence
- 1 AP into
Rabbit Hex — -10s cooldown (26s to 16s) makes the hard disable available in nearly every skirmish instead of once per fight Strong evidence - 2 AP into
Vexing Bolt — -13s cooldown (24s to ~11s) turns his poke from a punctuation mark into continuous pressure Strong evidence
-
Combo 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 - You are not going to kill Mo & Krill in a normal teamfight and trying to is how fights are lost. Treat them as terrain: fight around them, spend your damage on whoever is behind them, and only commit to killing them once anti-heal and shred are actually online. Strategic
- You have peel and Mo & Krill is the dive threat, so your job in the fight is not damage — it is being in range of whoever they are jumping on. Position between their entry point and your squishiest teammate and hold your peel tool for the moment they commit, not for the moment they appear. Strategic
- Mo & Krill 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
- Being knocked up against Mo & Krill is worse than being slowed because it removes your inputs and, since 09-16-2026, slows now bite in the air at 35% value so even the landing is compromised. Your mobility is your defence, so position with the airborne failure case in mind: stand where being launched leaves you above your own team rather than above theirs, and keep a dash in reserve for the landing rather than spending both on the approach. Strategic
- You deal Spirit Damage, so
Healbane is the cheaper and more reliable anti-heal against Mo & Krill — it lands off your abilities at T2 rather than asking you to sustain gunfire you are not built for. Strong evidence - Against Mo & Krill'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
Knockdown +35s Cooldown +0.1s Cast Delay +2s Stun Delay +0.5s Stun Duration +75 Bonus Health +5% Ability Range +5% Radius item's Stun. Documented - Mo & Krill is a durability check, and the maths favours shred over raw damage here. Resistances stack multiplicatively, but shred is pooled and then subtracted from total resist — so the higher their resist climbs, the more each point of shred is worth. Against a stacked tank, resist reduction outperforms another flat damage item. Documented
-
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 Mo & Krill's
Combo. Documented -
Ethereal Shift
Ethereal Shift +37s Cooldown +4s Duration +5s Buff Duration +30% Spirit Resist +20 Spirit Power (spirit T4) — Buy to survive a telegraphed assassination combo or ultimate — you cannot be hurt for four seconds. That matters here because of the channelled ultimates from Mo & Krill. Documented -
Knockdown (spirit T3) — Mo & Krill creates that through Mo & Krill's
Burrow. Buy whenever an enemy fights from the sky — it answers flying and airborne heroes and channelled aerial ultimates. Documented
- Anti-heal against Mo & Krill 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 reflex buy against a hero who keeps deleting you is
Metal Skin
Metal Skin +24s Cooldown +5s Duration +12% Bullet Resist -20% Dash Distance +20% Gravity Scale , and against Mo & Krill it does nothing.
Metal Skin is bullet-damage immunity only — Spirit Damage, abilities and every status effect pass straight through it, and you pay −1.5 m/s move speed and −20% dash distance for the privilege. The three big defensive actives are deliberately orthogonal:
Metal Skin stops bullets,
Unstoppable stops statuses,
Ethereal Shift stops everything but disables you. Mo & Krill is a spirit threat, so it is the last two you are choosing between. Documented - If you learned to play this matchup before 09-16-2026 you probably dash away from Mo & Krill and parry on the way out. That no longer works: parrying during a regular dash now cancels the dash and its momentum, so you parry standing still exactly where they wanted you. Parry first and dash second, or accept that the parry is a commitment to hold ground. Note also that a whiffed parry is a 4.5-second cooldown against a hero who only needs one window. Documented
- The finishing heavy melee on Mo & Krill is worse than it feels. Melee Damage is mitigated twice — once by Bullet Resist and again by Melee Resist — so it is the single worst damage channel to point at a stacked-resist target, and the wind-up is long enough for a parry that stuns you for 3 seconds with no Debuff Resist reduction available. Finish with your gun or an ability, not with melee. Strong evidence
- Players buy
Dispel Magic
Dispel Magic +45s Cooldown +10% Spirit Resist +3s Buff Duration +250 Heal Amount for Mo & Krill and then discover it does nothing about
Combo.
Dispel Magic purges non-ultimate negative effects only — anything sourced from an ultimate is outside its scope entirely. Work out which of Mo & Krill'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
Next
Sinclair’s other hard matchups
All of Mo & Krill
Who beats Mo & Krill, the items that shut Mo & Krill down, and every ability.
Facing more than Mo & Krill?
Add the other five enemies: who to focus first and what to buy against the whole team.
Sources and method for this page
Everything on this page is generated for Deadlock patch 10-30-2026 from Mo & Krill's current kit, measured match results and a mechanics rule base. Each line carries its own confidence label.
Data-supported Measured: you win 47.7% of these, which is 2.7% above your overall win rate (8,753 matches). The kit-based model reads this as moderate instead — treat the measured number as primary and the gap as a sign this matchup is more about execution than kit.
Mo & Krill's kit and counterplay were compiled from 7 sources, cross-checked for patch 10-30-2026. Threat ratings compare this pairing against Sinclair's own baseline win rate rather than a flat 50%, because ranking by raw win rate produces the wrong answer for heroes whose overall win rate is not 50%.
- https://deadlock.one/en/heroes/mo-krill
- https://metabot.gg/en/deadlock/hero/18/abilities
- https://deadlocklabs.gg/heroes/mo-and-krill/
- https://deadlock.io/en/heroes/mo-and-krill
- https://dramalock.org/guides/mo-and-krill-deadlock-guide-build-abilities/
- https://tracklock.gg/articles/deadlock-update-09-16-26-patch-notes