Wraith King vs Slardar

How this matchup plays

Committing Corrosive Haze to kill Wraith King is a trap. His Reincarnation effectively cleanses the armor reduction and resets the engagement, forcing Slardar’s team to fight him all over again with key spells on cooldown. Slardar is built around creating a short, decisive window to burst down a single hero. Wraith King’s entire design punishes this kind of all-in commitment on himself, turning Slardar's primary strength into a huge waste of time and resources. The second life makes the initial kill almost meaningless.

This problem defines the mid-game. Slardar wants to find pickoffs to create map pressure, but initiating on Wraith King is often the worst possible choice. It baits Slardar into a bad position after using his abilities for a kill that doesn't stick. As a result, Slardar is forced to try and navigate around the frontline to reach more fragile backline heroes, which is risky and often allows Wraith King to get free hits on him or his teammates. Wraith King can farm and push aggressively, knowing Slardar's initiation is far less of a threat to him than to almost any other core.