Venator

Lobs a grenade that bounces once or twice before detonating in a roughly 4.5m area. The blast does weapon-scaling damage and ignites everyone caught, and burning enemies bleed pure damage into the space around them while their incoming healing is cut.

What it is for: His anti-heal and area-denial button. Venator throws it into a contested choke or onto a sustain hero before his team commits, so the enemy cannot regen or lifesteal their way out of the fight.

Damage

35 impact (about 1.0x weapon scaling) plus roughly 10 burn DPS (about 1.6x scaling) over 3.5s; T2 extends burn by 1s

How to play against it

• The grenade bounces before it explodes, so step back through the bounce arc rather than sprinting forward into the detonation point
• Burning spreads damage to allies standing next to you, so break formation the instant one teammate ignites instead of grouping for a heal
• Do not pop a big heal (Restorative Shot, Healing Rite, Colossus) while burning; hold it until the 3.5s burn expires or the anti-heal is wasted
• Fight him in open ground where the 4.5m radius is easy to walk out of, not in a lane choke or a stairwell

Interactions

• Stacks multiplicatively with item anti-heal such as Healbane or Toxic Bullets, which can take a lifesteal bruiser from sustainable to killable
• Because the burn is pure damage, armor and spirit-resist items do not blunt the damage-over-time portion the way they blunt his bolts
• The bounce means it can be thrown around a corner or off a ceiling to hit a defender behind cover

A point-blank shotgun burst within about 10m that shoves everyone hit backwards. If the shove drives a target into a wall or other geometry, that target eats bonus damage and is stunned briefly.

What it is for: Self-peel and a terrain-dependent hard-CC setup. Venator uses it to shove a diver off him, or in tight corridors to pin someone against a wall for a stun his team can convert on.

Damage

60 base (about 0.7x weapon scaling) plus 30 bonus (about 0.8x scaling) when the target is slammed into geometry; T1 adds +25

Crowd control

knockback on everyone hit; 0.6s stun on targets driven into a wall (T2 adds +0.4s, so up to 1.0s)

Mobility

none for Venator himself

Defensive

The knockback creates separation from melee and gap-closers

How to play against it

• Fight Venator away from walls and railings — in open ground Gutshot is a 10m nudge with no stun attached
• Divers with Unstoppable (Warden's T3 Last Stand, Abrams' Siege, Yamato's Shadow Transformation status immunity) walk through the shove and the stun
• Do not back yourself into a corner while pressuring him; the shove has no value if there is nothing behind you
• It is a short 10m cone — an Assassinate, a Card Trick or any mid-range poke never triggers it

Interactions

• Wall stun range is about 7m, so it only converts when the target is already close to a surface — in open mid-lane it is pure knockback
• The knockback can push an enemy out of a friendly zone ability or, badly used, shove a target out of your own team's follow-up
• Displacement resistance and Unstoppable effects negate the shove and therefore the wall stun entirely

Kicks out a trap that arms after a short delay and then sits on the ground for up to 30 seconds. The first enemy to walk into its roughly 2m footprint takes spirit damage, is locked in place, and is revealed to Venator's team for several seconds afterwards.

What it is for: Flank denial and pick setup. Traps go on the doorways, zip-line landings and jungle entrances the enemy must path through, turning a rotation into a free root plus wallhack for his team.

Damage

80 spirit (about 2.2x spirit scaling); T3 adds +30% damage against revealed targets

Crowd control

1.25s immobilize (T2 pushes it to 2.25s)

Defensive

Acts as a tripwire behind Venator so flankers cannot reach him unpunished

How to play against it

• Push a minion wave, a Seven stormcloud drone, an Ivy ally or any summon down a choke first — the trap springs on the first thing through
• Vary your rotation path; traps cover fixed geometry, so take the zipline or the roof instead of the same jungle door twice
• Buy or hold a cleanse-style active (Debuff Remover / Unstoppable timing) for the 1.25-2.25s immobilize, because that lock is what turns into a Gutshot or Ira Domini stake
• Once revealed you have 6 seconds of being tracked — retreat immediately rather than trying to reposition for a re-engage

Interactions

• Two charges on an 8s recharge means he can cover two entrances at once; a third charge comes at T3
• Reveal persists through cover and stealth-adjacent effects, which is why it doubles as a ward on objectives like the Urn route and Patron approaches
• The trap is a physical object on the ground — it is visible if you are looking for it and it triggers on the first body through, so a minion or a summon soaks it

For a limited window Venator loads three heavy stakes instead of normal bolts. Each stake hits for massively increased weapon damage, and the third and final stake is blessed, adding pure damage and outright executing enemies under a low health threshold.

What it is for: His kill-confirm. After a root, a wall stun or an anti-heal burn he loads up and converts, and the blessed final stake takes a target that thinks it has escaped at low HP.

Damage

120 per stake (about 1.5x weapon scaling); blessed stake adds 115 bonus pure damage (about 3x scaling), with T2 adding +65; execute triggers at 8% max health

Mobility

T1 grants +1.2 m/s move speed while active

How to play against it

• Ira Domini is a loud, visible transformation — the moment you see him load stakes, break line of sight for the 15s window instead of trading
• Bullet resist items (Enduring Speed line, Metal Skin, Bullet Armor) cut the 120-per-stake body damage, though not the blessed pure-damage portion
• At low HP, the 8% execute means a Restorative Shot or Colossus that puts you over the threshold is worth more than a damage item
• He only has three stakes and a long 145-160s cooldown; forcing him to dump them on a tanky frontliner or a Viscous Cube wastes the whole ultimate
• Post 09-16-2026 he can Ricochet and split stakes, so do NOT stand in a line behind a teammate he is aiming at

Interactions

• Changed in the 09-16-2026 patch: Ira Domini now works with Ricochet, so every stake bounces, and it can split-shot (one extra bolt to each side, three total per trigger) — this is the first patch where the ultimate scales off weapon modifier items
• Because stakes scale off weapon damage, weapon-damage items (Headhunter, Sharpshooter, Glass Cannon) inflate the ultimate far more than spirit items do
• Only three stakes exist per cast and the window is about 15s, so every miss is a large fraction of the ultimate
• Pure damage on the blessed stake is not reduced by bullet or spirit resist