Shadow Fiend vs Weaver

How this matchup plays

Farming the map becomes a race between two different philosophies. Shadow Fiend can accelerate his economy much faster by clearing creep waves and jungle camps with Shadowraze. This lets him hit his core item timings earlier and start applying pressure. Weaver can't match this raw farming speed and instead relies on Shukuchi to create chaos, looking for pickoffs to stay relevant. The core of the matchup is Shadow Fiend's area-of-effect burst damage against Weaver's elusiveness. If SF can land his spells, he has more than enough damage to kill Weaver, but that's a big "if".

Later in the game, the dynamic pivots around vision and initiation. Shadow Fiend needs his team to provide lockdown and detection to have any hope of landing a Requiem of Souls on a hero who can go invisible or simply rewind damage with Time Lapse. In turn, Weaver has to respect SF's damage output and can't afford to get caught out of position. Weaver wants to skirmish and play the edges of a fight, while Shadow Fiend wants a full-on teamfight. The hero who gets to dictate the terms of the engagement usually comes out ahead.