Rubick/Counters

Bad against...

 * While many of Silencer's spells are a great steal for Rubick (in particular, Global Silence), Silencer effectively neuters Rubick's excellent counter-initiation potential thanks to Global Silence. Also, while his spells are all good to steal, the nature of Silencer means it's very difficult to steal spells from him (especially Global) if the Silencer is anywhere near competent. Furthermore, Rubick's relatively low intelligence for such a heavy caster means that losing Intelligence to Silencer's passive is an absolute killer. While this matchup can go the other way, on an even playing field Silencer shuts Rubick down.


 * OD liquefies Rubick in a very short time thanks to the pure damage of Arcane Orb, cutting straight through his Null Field, and has basically nothing worth stealing, so long as there's literally anybody else on the other team that uses spells. Much like Void's Chronosphere, Astral Imprisonment can be as much of a hindrance to your team as an aid, and is a marginal pickup at best, though it can work somewhat nicely. Meanwhile, Outworld's ult is basically useless to Rubick, given his relatively low Intelligence. Additionally, Orb and Essence Aura cannot be stolen.


 * Phantom Assassin is perhaps the single biggest threat in the game to Rubick. Her ability to completely destroy a squishy in the space of a second makes her terrifying to every low-strength hero in the game, and Rubick is no exception. While her two spells make for pretty good pickups - Stifling Dagger is a great, low-mana slow, and Blink Strike is a good juking and escaping tool as well as a marginal kill tool - her other two abilities are passives that therefore cannot be stolen, and her ability to jump on you and completely destroy you makes her somebody to be avoided. Before she gets a Black King Bar, she can be held at bay by your Q, but after that point, you're food for her until you get a Ghost Scepter - which is often a fairly late pickup on Rubick.


 * Much like Phantom Assassin, Tresdin is capable of murdering you with little counterplay in short order, and every time she does so, she gets stronger. Her spells are generally mediocre for theft as well; Overwhelming Odds is a fairly underwhelming and expensive nuke in most situations. Press the Attack is an expensive (if effective) heal and steroid, and probably your best pickup. Duel is... a situational grab at best. You're not well-suited for winning duels and bonus damage does next to nothing for you. Duel is best used for the long-duration lockdown, but its potential for backfiring is very, very high. Of course, while the spell pickups may be poor, by far the biggest problem with playing Rubick into Legion is that you're exactly the kind of prey that Legion thrives on farming damage with. She prevents you from casting your spells during a fight while eating you alive and snowballing off of it, and you will probably be her prime target, unless there's somebody squishier on your team like a Crystal Maiden.


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Items

 * Linken Sphere can prevent Spell Steal
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Good against...

 * Virtually all of Engima's spells, in particular his ultimate, Black Hole, can turn a teamfight around if stolen and used by Rubick. Black Hole in particular is an incredible pickup, because Rubick doesn't particularly care about ultimate cooldowns (he can, after all, just steal another one). In addition, Rubick has a very reliable stun in his Telekinesis to break Enigma's channeling, and Fade Bolt is reasonably effective at dealing with Enigma's waves of Eidolons. Furthermore, it should be mentioned that if need be, Black Hole can be used to cancel Engima's channeling if the latter has a Black King Bar. Rubick is about as hard of a counterpick to Enigma as you can get; the only downside is that Rubick's Null Field passive does nothing against Enigma's pure damage.


 * All of Magnus' spells are good candidates for theft by Rubick. Shockwave is a relatively decent nuke with a good range. Empower is an excellent buff to your team's melee carry, and, if you have an Aghanim's Scepter, is nearly as good of a pickup as Reverse Polarity. Skewer provides much-needed mobility for Rubick and excellent crowd control and initiation. And of course RP remains one of the most effective ultimates in the game, and, thanks to Rubick's special quality of having no cast delay on stolen spells, is more or less impossible to counter on a Blink initiation. Meanwhile, Magnus has relatively little kill potential on Rubick by himself (though his spells in combination with a melee carry such as Phantom Assassin are very, very scary).


 * Much like the above two, everything Lion has is great in Rubick's kit. Earth Spike adds a second bit of crowd control and some damage. Mana Drain solves a lot of Rubick's mana woes. Hex is one of the strongest pieces of hard CC in the game. And of course Finger of Death is, well, Finger of Death, although its mana cost is fairly high. Rubick's Null Field passive is also great against Lion's massive magic damage nukes, essentially demoting Finger of Death to Thumb of Pain, and, if you're feeling cheeky, Telekinesis can be used to interrupt Mana Drain.


 * Lich provides Rubick with several major goodies - a powerful teamfight ult, a good lane nuke, and massive mana sustain, on top of a decent self/ally buff and pushing/counterpushing tool, while being relatively easy to kill and reliant on magic damage which Rubick blunts somewhat with his passive. His Q is relatively spammable, makes for a good slow, and deals a respectable amount of damage. Ice Armor can be used for clutch saves on an ally who's being all-in'd by a melee right click hero, and can be cast on towers for easy counterpush. Sacrifice solves Rubick's mana woes in much the same way that Lion's Mana Drain does. And of course, Chain Frost remains one of the most potentially devastating ultimates around. The downside is that the laning phase can be a little rough, but a value point in Null Field helps.


 * Though Invoker happens to scale very well into the lategame, with Aghanim's Scepter's buff, Rubick has the potential to steal spells as fast as Invoker can invoke. This sort of matchup is quite the dual of wits, and it's quite likely that Rubick needs to purchase similar items to Invoker himself in order to match his mobility or disable potential, either in a fight or to survive pickoffs.

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Works well with...

 * Rubick has fantastic synergy with Rylai for two main reasons. Firstly, Arcane Aura is one of the best solutions out there to Rubick's constant mana issues, especially after he expands his mana pool with Arcane Boots and a Eul's or Aghanim's Scepter. Second, Rubick has some very good hard crowd control - in an AOE! - in Telekinesis, something that benefits CM greatly; it's invaluable in saving the incredibly squishy Rylai from ganks and other such nonsense, and keeps enemies off of her while she's channeling her ultimate.


 * The Aghanim's Scepter buff of Rubick turns him into a far more potent, active, and safer teamfighter; and having a hero that is much better at farming for it like Alchemist build it for him can be a blessing. With Aghanim's out of the way, Rubick has the freedom to buy many other helpful items like Eul's or Blink and would have the slots to do it, as the gifted Aghanim's Scepter Synth is simply a buff rather than an item slot. Their roles on a team are also complimentary, on top of being synergistic laning partners: Rubick can support Alchemist by providing harass and not requiring lane farm, and Telekinesis is a great setup for a solid-timed Concoction stun.


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List of heroes that counter Rubick, and list of heroes that work well with Rubick.