[Top 10] Dota 2 Dawnbreaker Counters That Are Powerful (Best Heroes Against Dawnbreaker in Dota 2, Ranked)



Valora the Dawnbreaker is a new addition to the game but she is one of the most powerful heroes in the current meta, this is evident in the ongoing Arlington Major. Part of the reason why she is picked heavily is due to her flexibility as well as the buffs she has been bestowed upon by the mighty IceFrog, making her extremely lethal in both the early and the late game.

We bring you the Best 10 Heroes against Dawnbreaker, these heroes can give her the run for her money and make sure she is nipped in the bud!

10. Razor

Dawnbreaker may be a strong melee hero but against Razor, she is just a melee hero! Razor is famous for being a counter pick to melee heroes as he can harass and bully them out of the lane, and Dawn is no exception. Static Link ruins Dawn’s laning phase as her attack damage is constantly being stolen by Razor, which is hard to escape from as he has a high movement speed to maintain in the radius. The mid and late game can also turn nightmarish for Dawn if she fails her laning phase, lagging behind Razor. His ultimate also discourages her from initiating onto him, making her choose different less significant targets!

Why is Razor Great against Dawnbreaker? 

  • Static Link greatly lowers Dawnbreaker's damage output right from the laning phase.
  • Eye of the Storm strikes cannot miss, Dawnbreaker has a hard time against most of Razor’s spells.

Items to Buy Against Dawnbreaker

  • Assault Cuirass - Immense armor gain, also reduces Dawnbreaker’s armor at the same time
  • Refresher’s Orb - Can refresh spells and items and use them again in quick succession to delete Drow from the fight
  • Shiva’s Guard - Can effortlessly push lanes and provides increased armor which is essential against Wind
  • Aghanim’s Shard - Ultimate affects buildings and deals immense damage to heroes as well
  • Heaven’s Halberd - Can disarm Dawnbreaker, making her unable to attack for a few seconds
  • Blademail - Reflects back Wind’s damage upon activation

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Razor 

9. Winter Wyvern

The bone-chilling threat of Wyvern’s curse ensures Dawnbreaker does not stick around. She is the perfect first pick material if you want to hit off with immense crowd control against Dawnbreaker. She can’t withstand the heavy damage dealt by Wyvern as her spells are all AoE. Wyvern is known to be a great pick in any situation as she can heal her allies in case Dawn jumps on them with her ultimate. But the prominent reason for picking her is Winter’s Curse, her ultimate. It ensures the initiating hero (which is Dawn in most cases) is disabled and forces her allies to hit her. 

Why is Winter Wyvern a great counter to Dawnbreaker? 

  • Winter’s Curse makes it hard for Dawnbreaker to initiate as she fear getting deleted!
  • Heals that can protect teammates with Cold Embrace
  • Natural counter for Winter's Curse like Linken's Sphere or Lotus Orb is meaningless to her if she can land it on Dawnbreaker’s allies.

Items to Buy on Winter Wyvern

  • Aether Lens - Increased cast range, can catch Dawnbreaker off-guard
  • Glimmer Cape - Provides invisibility, can also be used on allies to escape or to initiate on Dawnbreaker
  • Holy Locket - Heals allies or yourself on usage, glorified Magic Stick
  • Ghost Scepter - Prevents Dawnbreaker from attacking her
  • Force Staff - Another great tool to close gaps or escape from Dawnbreaker

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Winter_Wyvern

8. Bloodseeker

Bloodseeker is a cold-blooded hunter, known for his mania and vigor, which ensures he decimates squishy heroes like Dawnbreaker easily. His blades cut deep into her, and he leaves her bleeding and wounded. Bloodseeker can effortlessly jungle or lane, as he is blessed with high base armor. Though his laning phase against Dawn can break even, he effortlessly outfarms her in the mid and late game. His passive sustains him in the lane, allowing him to play aggressively and accumulate items as soon as he can. He can gank Dawn’s lane with the availability of his ultimate, often removing Dawnbreaker from a team fight. 

Why is Bloodseeker a great counter to Dawnbreaker?

  • Flexible item build.
  • Thirst provides increased movement speed and vision to hunt and kill low HP enemies.
  • Rupture deals extra damage to Dawnbreaker during Celestial Hammer or Force Staff usage, preventing her from escaping or counter-initiating, forcing her to invest in a Linken's Sphere.

Items to buy on Bloodseeker

  • Black King Bar - Provides spell immunity, making you invulnerable in the fight
  • Monkey King Bar - Increased physical damage, also provides true strike 
  • Mjolnir - Exceptional for pushing lanes and farming quickly
  • Sange and Yasha - Provides decent stats and physical damage
  • Abyssal Blade - Can be used to quickly lock down Dawnbreaker after getting on top of her, allowing you to beat him down with the physical damage

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Bloodseeker 

7. Viper

The venomous Viper knows no bounds and is hated by all the Dawnbreaker mains. Viper benefits heavily from his range advantage, he can strike Dawn from a distance and as she is a melee hero, she is often forced to stay back and soak XP, lagging behind in the farm department. His immense magical and physical damage makes him extremely flexible when it comes to itemization against Dawnbreaker. His Nethertoxin also applies break which disables her lifesteal passive, making it hard for her to sustain in teamfights and essentially removing her from the fight altogether.

Why is Viper great against Dawnbreaker? 

  • Nethertoxin disables Dawnbreaker's Luminosity|Dawnbreaker. Since she's a melee hero, she needs to close the gap to attack and Nethertoxin will be bad for her since she cannot heal.
  • Viper Strike and Poison Attack will severely slow her down and combined with Nethertoxin, it will be her death sentence (unless her Celestial Hammer or Solar Guardian are off cooldown). Besides that, chasing her down will be easy due to the slow.

Items to Buy on Viper

  • Kaya and Sange - Increased stats and movement speed gain
  • Aghanim’s Scepter - Reduces ultimate’s cooldown, allowing him to be more offensive on Dawnbreaker, also pierces spell immunity.
  • Rod of Atos - Helpful to lock Dawnbreaker down, can also be upgraded into Glepnir later on.
  • Dragon Lance - Increased stats gain, Hurricane Pike can also be a viable upgrade
  • Blade Mail - Reflects back damage to Dawnbreaker if used on time

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Viper 

6. Silencer

Silence is one aspect that counters most spell-casting heroes in the game, disabling Dawnbreaker’s spells, and as mostly she is not physical damage reliant, she is effectively a creep for the duration of her silence. Having spells that silence or prevent Dawnbreaker from using any items makes him very powerful. The best part is that laning is not fun for Dawnbreaker against a Silencer, frequent right-click damage, and low CD spells shove her out of the lane! Global Silence disables all the power he has and renders Dawn useless even with BKB.

Why is Silencer a great counter to Dawnbreaker?

  • Last Word and Global Silence will render Dawnbreaker largely useless.
  • Arcane Curse effectively prevents Dawn from casting spells during its duration, as she will otherwise suffer heavy damage.

Items to buy against Dawnbreaker

  • Glimmer Cape - Provides invisibility, can also be used on allies to escape or to initiate Dawnbreaker
  • Rod of Atos - Great for locking Dawnbreaker down
  • Scythe of Vyse - Disables Dawnbreaker and removes him from the fight
  • Aeon Disk - Saves him from getting burst quickly from Dawnbreaker and also applies a basic dispel
  • Force Staff - Another great tool to close gaps or escape from Dawnbreaker
  • Aghanim’s Scepter and Shard - Global Silence pierces spell immunity, making it impossible for Dawnbreaker to escape alive from teamfights

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Silencer 

5. Kunkka

Kunkka can effortlessly counter Dawnbreaker with all of his spells as well as the immense physical damage that he also dishes out. He can X-Mark Dawn as she is using her ult or disable her with the Torrent and Ship combo. The Ship can also be used passively to save himself or his allies in teamfights from Dawn’s damage, turning the fight in his favor. The tanky nature of Kunkka is only amplified further by high armor and high HP items. Dawn on the other hand does not farm effectively to buy armor or HP items quickly.

Why is Kunkka such a great hero against Dawnbreaker?

  • Tidebringer will deal lots of damage to Dawnbreaker before she builds physical survivability items.
  • Torrent and X Marks the Spot can control Dawnbreaker at all stages of the game
  • Ghostship's rum buff will greatly reduce the Dawnbreaker’s damage output in teamfights.

Items to buy on Kunnka

  • Daedalus - Immense critical damage
  • Assault Cuirass - Immense armor gain, also reduces Dawnbreaker’s armor at the same time
  • Armlet of Mordiggian - Increased damage and HP, can toggle through Dawnbreaker’s damage
  • Aghanim’s Scepter - Ghostship creates a fleet of ships that crash at the same spot
  • Black King Bar - Provides spell immunity

 

4. Nyx Assassin

Nyx is passionately hated by all Dawnbreaker mains due to his first pick potential. Nyx Assassin is known to be one of the most effective roaming heroes in the game against Dawnbreaker, regardless of the patch. Nyx can burn off all of Dawn’s mana and render her useless. He can also use Spiked Carapace to stop her spells without breaking the invisibility from his ultimate. Dawnbreaker mains consider him to be a nightmare to play against due to her AoE damage which can be used against her. She stands no chance in the late game against this menacing pesky bug!

Why is Nyx Assassin a great counter to Dawnbreaker? 

  • Mana Burn is capable of removing most of Dawnbreaker's large mana pool, along with dealing heavy damage and quickly depleting his chances of escaping a gank or fight.
  • Spiked Carapace can stop Dawnbreaker's Solar Guardian which will eliminate her global presence and limits her movement around the map.

Items to buy against Dawnbreaker 

  • Blink Dagger - Great for gap closing or initiating 
  • Force Staff - Another great tool to close gaps or escape from Dawnbreaker 
  • Aghanim’s Scepter - Allows Nyx to burrow beneath the ground, increasing his cast range and making him invulnerable
  • Aether Lens - Increased cast range, can catch Dawnbreaker off-guard
  • Lotus Orb - Reflects targetted spells hence can also be used to dispel the silence
  • Spirit Vessel - Immense DPS and heal reduction to Dawnbreaker when used

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Nyx_Assassin 

3. Drow Ranger

Drow, the skilled markswoman is very precise and deadly against the squishy Dawnbreaker. Her damage is unmatchable by Dawn and on top of that, she can heavily disable Dawn with her silence. Drow might be a passive laner but her mid-game potential is unparalleled. She can deal heavy damage with just a few items in her inventory. She can destroy Daawnbreaker effortlessly as she acquires items and gains levels. Having a high attack range provides her with an edge over the latter as Dawn can’t close the gap easily due to Gust.

What makes Drow Ranger a great counter to Dawnbreaker? 

  • Gust can shut down most of Dawnbreaker's abilities, rendering her useless.
  • Frost Arrows followed by a high attack speed, make it hard for Dawnbreaker to escape.

Items to buy on Drow Ranger

  • Hurricane Pike - Allows her to close the gap and deal immense damage to Dawnbreaker, also provides decent stats 
  • Silver Edge - Provides invisibility and damage on the first hit, which can be used to escape or set up on Dawnbreaker
  • Satanic - Can quickly heal up on physical attacks upon activation, also provides basic dispel from the latter.
  • Butterfly - Increased evasion, agility, and movement speed
  • Manta Style - Dodge Dawnbreaker’s spells can be used to push lanes

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Drow_Ranger 

2. Disruptor

Disruptor barrages into the battlefield to decimate Dawnbreaker and change the trajectory of the battle! DIsruptor is one of the most picked support heroes against the menacing Dawnbreaker in the current meta, as he provides insane disable in the form of Static Storm which further is amplified by Aghanim’s Scepter that mutes her items. Dawnbreaker can easily be caught off guard by Disruptor if she wanders in without suspecting anything, the aftermath can be in the favor of the Disruptor. She can be Glimpsed after she lands from her ultimate, sending her halfway through the map and isolating her from her teammates.

Why is Disruptor a great counter to Dawnbreaker? 

  • Kinetic Field prevents Dawnbreaker from escaping with Celestial Hammer.
  • Kinetic Field and Static Storm can pin down Dawnbreaker after she jumps in with Solar Guardian.
  • Glimpse can force Dawnbreaker out of a fight right after she uses Solar Guardian.

Items to Buy on Disruptor

  • Aghanim’s Scepter - Mutes Dawnbreaker’s items.
  • Aeon Disk - Saves him from getting burst quickly from Dawnbreaker and also applies a basic dispel
  • Glimmer Cape - Invisibility can be used to escape or set up to gank Dawnbreaker
  • Eul’s Scepter - Can be used to set up for Lighting Storm ultimate.
  • Force Staff - Great gap closer and can also be used to escape.

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Disruptor 

1. Faceless Void

Not all can master Faceless Void the way he has mastered manipulating time and using it against foes, including the devastating Dawnbreaker. His ultimate can quickly turn the game around for good if used on time as the  Dawnbreaker jaunts in with her ultimate. The hero requires a decent amount of farm to come online but it does not take him much time as he is as mobile as the Dawnbreaker. Void is heavily picked in the high-ranked games against Dawn as she can’t match his efficient and fast-paced farming skills. His mid-game potential is unmatched because all he needs to brawl is his ultimate and a few items.

What makes Faceless Void a great counter to Dawnbreaker?

  • Time Dilation can prevent Dawnbreaker from using her abilities after initiating and slowing her down severely.
  • Time Lock combined with his high attack speed can lock Dawnbreaker in place, preventing her escape with Celestial Hammer.
  • Chronosphere locks down Dawnbreaker in place right after she uses Solar Guardian.
  • On the other hand, if Solar Guardian is cast beforehand from afar, it may discourage Faceless Void from casting Chronosphere in its location

Items to buy on Faceless Void

  • Mjolnir - Mjolnir - Exceptional for pushing lanes and farming quickly
  • Black King Bar - Provides spell immunity from all of Dawnbreaker’s magic damage spells, making you invulnerable in the fight
  • Butterfly - Increased evasion, agility, and movement speed
  • Eye of Skadi - Great for reducing Dawnbreaker’s regen while also providing stats. 
  • Monkey King Bar - Increased physical damage, also provides true strike
  • Satanic - Can quickly heal up on physical attacks upon activation, also provides basic dispel from the latter.

https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Faceless_Void

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After spending 11,352 hours, slaying Eldwurms and winning the mid lane, Sid is still awfully bad at Dota 2
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