Bad against...[]
- Troll Warlord has significant attack speed due to Fervor and Battle Trance, giving Axe a higher chance to proc Counter Helix and seriously injure Troll Warlord due to his relatively low maximum health.
- Axe often purchases Blade Mail, which can help Axe turn Troll Warlord's farm and high physical damage against him. The bonus armor provided by Berserker's Call means that Troll Warlord will take a lot more damage than Axe.
- Culling Blade is still capable of killing Troll Warlord during Battle Trance if his HP is low enough.
- Nightmare and Fiend's Grip help to control/disable Troll Warlord in team-fights.
- Shadow Shaman's long disables are effective at kiting and wasting the duration of Battle Trance.
- Mass Serpent Ward are especially effective against Troll Warlord during Battle Trance, as trapping him inside them during the duration is effectively another hard disable, as Troll cannot attack the wards or use Phase Boots to escape.
- Chaos Knight's tanky illusions easily take advantage of Troll Warlord's lack of AoE damage.
- Chaos Bolt can stun Troll for up to 4 seconds and Reality Rift prevents Troll Warlord from chasing down foes.
- Phantasm increases Chaos Knight's physical damage output up to 4 times and can easily kill Troll Warlord before he has a chance to use Battle Trance or a Black King Bar.
- Frostbite can disarm and root Troll Warlord if he doesn't have a Black King Bar or a Manta Style to dispel it.
- Crystal Nova and Freezing Field both significantly slow Troll Warlord, making him much more vulnerable to ganks or stuns.
- The magical damage from Freezing Field does a large amount of AoE damage, and Troll Warlord is not capable of cancelling Crystal Maiden's channel.
- Frost Blast and Chain Frost can kite Troll Warlord effectively.
- Frost Shield can single-handedly waste most of the duration of Battle Trance, due to the extreme resistance to physical damage Frost Shield provides. In addition, Troll Warlord is incapable of switching targets during Battle Trance, so he cannot pick an easier target.
- Troll Warlord has little to no ability to regenerate HP, so Frost Blast together with Frost Shield can harass him effectively.
- Fate's Edict can disarm Troll, rendering him useless in a teamfight, especially if he has already used Battle Trance.
- Fortune's End and Purifying Flames can provide ample magic damage to help burst down Troll Warlord quickly in the early to mid game.
- False Promise can save an ally from Troll Warlord's initiation, forcing him to switch targets and lose his Fervor stacks, or waste time during Battle Trance.
- Outworld Destroyer's pure damage from Arcane Orb is very effective at killing Troll Warlord quickly.
- Astral Imprisonment removes Troll Warlord from a fight for four seconds, minimizing his contribution to a teamfight, and potentially wasting over half of Battle Trance's duration.
- Troll Warlord gains a measly 1 intelligence point per level, meaning Sanity's Eclipse is especially effective, often instantly killing him.
- Static Link can drain most or all of Troll Warlord's damage, making him useless in a teamfight or unable to last hit in lane. This is especially effective during Battle Trance, because Troll has no option to cancel the link.
- Storm Surge allows Razor to chase after or run away from Troll Warlord while doing damage with Eye of the Storm.
- Shrapnel and Headshot allows Sniper to kite Troll Warlord effectively.
- Take Aim together with certain items such as Hurricane Pike allow Sniper to sit and fire at Troll Warlord from a safe distance.
- Timber Chain can kite Troll Warlord extremely effectively.
- Whirling Death and Chakram deals lots of damage to Troll Warlord.
- Reactive Armor makes Timbersaw extremely resilient to Troll's attack damage and extreme attack speed, especially during Battle Trance.
- Atrophy Aura decreases Troll Warlord's damage.
- Pit of Malice helps lock down Troll Warlord.
- Battle Trance disallows Troll from running out of both Firestorm and Pit of Malice.
- Cold Embrace can protect Troll Warlord's target, especially during Battle Trance.
- Winter's Curse can turn Troll Warlord's high physical damage and attack speed against his allies.
Items[]
- Blade Mail is especially effective against Troll Warlord, due to Troll Warlord's high physical damage and low health pool.
- Silver Edge can break Troll Warlord's Fervor and passive root, mitigating most of Troll Warlord's threat.
- Heaven's Halberd disarms Troll Warlord, negating all of his attack damage and root. Heaven's Halberd is especially effective if Troll Warlord is in ranged form, due to the increased duration of the disarm.
- Bloodthorn can be effective against Troll Warlord, as all attacks on the Bloodthorn silenced target will have True Strike.
- Scythe of Vyse can be useful both offensively and defensively - disabling and preventing him from either killing or running away.
Good against...[]
- Whirling Axes (Melee) provides a 60% miss chance, preventing Anti-Mage from burning Troll Warlord's small mana pool.
- Troll Warlord's passive root allows him to very effectively fight an Anti-Mage by preventing Anti-Mage from Blinking away. This is even more effective when combined with a Skull Basher or Abyssal Blade.
- Counterspell will do nothing to prevent Troll Warlord's high physical damage.
- Due to Troll Warlord's abysmal base intelligence and intelligence gain, he is one of the worst targets to use Mana Void on.
- Untouchable's attack speed slow is easily remedied by Fervor stacks and Battle Trance.
- Troll Warlord is a natural Silver Edge carrier, disabling Enchantress' Untouchable.
- Whirling Axes (Melee) provides a 60% miss chance, resulting in Huskar's attacks missing a lot of the time if it isn't dispelled.
- Troll Warlord's Fervor ramps up in a very similar way as Huskar's Berserker's Blood: as soon as Huskar has high enough health regeneration, Troll Warlord has a high enough attack speed to negate it.
- Troll Warlord's ability to attack as a ranged hero allows him to destroy Juggernaut's Healing Ward from afar.
- Battle Trance, when activated during Omnislash, allows Troll Warlord to survive the full duration of Omnislash and retaliate once it is over.
- The passive armor provided by Berserker's Rage makes Troll Warlord resilient to Feast in early game.
- The 60% miss chance given by Whirling Axes (Melee) is useful when Rage is not active.
- Battle Trance can purge Open Wounds, negating a large amount of Lifestealer's sustain in fights.
- Troll Warlord can build a Silver Edge or a Monkey King Bar to completely ignore Blur.
- Whirling Axes (Melee) provides a 60% miss chance, making a Coup de Grace critical strike very hard to land.
- Battle Trance negates Coup de Grace, preventing Troll Warlord from dying to her critical hits.
- Due to Fervor and Battle Trance, Troll Warlord is one of the best heroes to deal with Supernova.
- Berserker's Rage together with Troll Warlord's high attack speed gives Troll a high chance of rooting enemies, which allows Troll Warlord to man-fight Sven.
- Whirling Axes (Melee) provides a 60% miss chance, and the passive armor provided by Berserker's Rage makes Troll resilient to physical damage in early game. Sven's God's Strength is much less effective as a result.
- Beware that Sven can farm much faster than Troll Warlord by stacking ancients and clearing them with Great Cleave.
- Terrorblade cannot go one on one against Troll Warlord as Troll Warlord will overwhelm him faster than the other way around thanks to Whirling Axes (Melee) that will cause his attacks to miss, and Fervor that can give Troll Warlord huge amounts of attack speed to outmatch Terrorblade, even during Metamorphosis.
- Troll Warlord's high attack speed from Fervor combined with Skull Basher and Abyssal Blade means that Terrorblade will have almost no chance to use Sunder to save himself.
- Even if Terroblade manages to use Sunder on Troll Warlord, Troll Warlord will simply be able to nullify it's effect with Battle Trance.
- Due to Fervor and Battle Trance, Troll Warlord has a significant attack speed, enabling him to crush Tombstone quickly.
- Undying usually stays at the front line with no disables, making him an easy target for Troll Warlord.
Others[]
- Heroes with a low attack speed or are fragile will find themselves unable to deal with Troll Warlord's high physical damage and attack speed, like Crystal Maiden or Sven.
- Mobility heroes will often be rooted by Troll Warlord and unable to escape, like Storm Spirit.
- Heroes that rely on right-clicks will find that their attacks will miss a lot, due to Whirling Axes (Melee)'s miss chance. Such heroes include Phantom Assassin, Terrorblade, and Morphling.
Works well with...[]
- Surge allows Troll Warlord to close combat enemies for longer, which is his strongest advantage over them. Ion Shell adds extra damage.
- May get Troll safely into the middle of the Warzone while disabling opponents, and preventing them from escaping, respectively due to Snowball and Ice Shards, allowing Troll Warlord to chop them as much as he should.
- Bloodlust provides Troll Warlord with additional attack and movement speed to easily chase foes.
- Corrosive Haze enables Troll Warlord to hit harder than usual.
- Wave of Terror allows Troll Warlord to deal more physical damage against the enemies.
- Nether Swap and Magic Missile prevents the enemy hero from escaping from Troll Warlord.
Others[]
- Heroes that manipulate physical damage (either by increasing the damage enemies take or by increasing allies' dealt) will drastically increase Troll Warlord's effectiveness, since it's roughly physical, plus it's auto-attack based, which may be further buffed with Attack Speed buffs: Dazzle, Alchemist, Magnus, Ogre Magi, Slardar, etc.
- Troll Warlord's biggest weakness is his inability to get into fights and keep enemies within his melee range by his own (refered to as kiting), plus he lacks AoE control, being entirely focused on a single target. Any Hero with crowd control or mobility granting abilities allows Troll Warlord to keep hitting the same target for longer and eventually rooting them (with ensnare): Tusk, Dark Seer, Io, Disruptor, etc.
