* Crippling Fear prevents Keeper of the Light from using his spells to keep his team alive during team-fights.
* Dark Ascension is very strong against Keeper of the Light, who relies on daytime to be effective.
Additional:
* Keeper of the Light's Aghanim's Scepter upgrade loses much of its power, due to Night Stalker being able to reduce the duration of daytime by a lot.

* Heroes that can jump and kill him: Meepo, Clinkz, Templar Assassin

* Night Stalker can easily find Pudge's location during Dark Ascension.
* Void's mini-stun and silence from Crippling Fear at night will stop Dismember, Meat Hook and Rot and preventing Pudge from fighting back.
* Night Stalker has naturally high health, strength gain and common itemization for survivability through magic resistance, making Night Stalker a poor target for Pudge.

* Heroes with a high degree of mobility and invisibility are hard to catch with Meat Hook: Ember Spirit, Riki, Clinkz, Queen of Pain.

* Searing Arrows makes Clinkz one of the hardest heroes for Clockwerk to lane against.

* Heroes that have a weak laning stage: Spectre, Nyx Assassin, Clockwerk, Spirit Breaker, Omniknight, Pudge.

* Careful not to blink into Riki's Smoke Screen or Night Stalker's Crippling Fear, as these field effects will instantly silence Earthshaker and prevent him from initiating.

Additional:
* Fissure has a short stun and creates an impassable ridge. However, Night Stalker can fly over it during Dark Ascension.
* Night Stalker can find Earthshaker, disable his Blink Dagger with Void, and then take him out with Crippling Fear.
* Earthshaker may fail his blink combo against Night Stalker's team if he is not careful, as he can blink into the silence.

* Heroes with invisibility and high mobility can jump on and focus down Earthshaker before he has a chance to initiate: Clinkz, Slark, Storm Spirit

* Heroes that have a weak laning stage: Spectre, Nyx Assassin, Clockwerk, Spirit Breaker, Omniknight, Pudge.

* Heroes who can harass Omniknight out of lane will keep him weak in the mid game: Viper, Venomancer, Clinkz

* Heroes who can take advantage of Oracle's low mobility or catch him out of position, such as Clinkz and Anti-Mage, can easily pick him off.

* Heroes with long disables, like Lion, Night Stalker, or Legion Commander, can prevent Oracle from using spells or items.

* Heroes with mobility/escape mechanisms to dodge Ancient Apparition abilites, or to easily jump on him: Riki, Queen of Pain, Phantom Assassin, Windranger, Bounty Hunter, Spirit Breaker, Night Stalker, Storm Spirit, Juggernaut, etc.

* Ancient Apparition has no escape or reliable control and is very fragile, which makes him an easy target for anyone who can get on top of him, like Phantom Assassin or Clinkz.

* Clinkz's high damage output and insane attack speed late-game can take Kunkka out of the fight before it begins.
* Strafe and Searing Arrows together can kill allies easily even under Ghostship's buff.
* Skeleton Walk can allow Clinkz to make a quick escape after Kunkka's combo, or even avoid it all together.

* Dark Ascension reduces vision for the enemy team, which makes it more difficult for Magnus to initiate with Blink Dagger and Reverse Polarity. It is also more likely that Night Stalker will scout out Magnus with Aghanim's Scepter and a Gem of True Sight, after which he can silence Magnus with Crippling Fear.

* Void can be used to cancel Requiem of Souls.
* Crippling Fear prevents Shadow Fiend from using Shadowraze or Requiem of Souls.
* With Dark Ascension and Gem of True Sight, Night Stalker can find and kill Shadow Fiend easily. He is also a tanky hero that can fight Shadow Fiend at any stage of the game.

* Ember Spirit's Flame Guard provides no protection against Clinkz's physical damage output.
* Ember Spirit's low armor and health make him easy to kill quickly if a teammate can hold him down.
* If Clinkz has farmed an item that can disable, he can sneak up to and hunt down Ember Spirit while he farms or split pushes alone.

* Considering Rubick's abysmal armor, Rubick is a squishy target for Clinkz to gank. None of his spells are useful except for Skeleton Walk.
* Clinkz usually builds Orchid Malevolence, which disables Rubick's ability to retaliate.
* Vast numbers of Sentry Wards are needed to deal with Clinkz because of Skeleton Walk, making it harder for Rubick to buy more expensive and more useful support items like Glimmer Cape or Mekansm.

* With Dark Ascension he can keep vision on Slark, disabling his Shadow Dance regeneration. Slark is also too weak to seriously threaten Night Stalker in lane.

* Night Stalker has a huge, almost instant silence through Crippling Fear. The main problem is that he can get it off while Queen of Pain barely has any vision of him if he creeps up to her during Dark Ascension. She'll have to play very carefully before she gets a Black King Bar or a Eul's Scepter of Divinity.

* Crippling Fear makes Night Stalker one of the best early game gankers to shut down Anti-Mage.
* Night Stalker's low mana pool causes him to take little damage from Mana Void.

* Heroes with abilities or items that can silence or disable Anti-Mage for long periods of time will prevent him from Blinking away: Silencer, Shadow Shaman, Grimstroke, Clinkz, Riki, Faceless Void, Skywrath Mage, Puck

Additional:
* Anti-Mage's Counterspell provides no protection against Clinkz's physical damage output.
* Clinkz can easily rush an Orchid Malevolence to prevent Blinking, although Anti-Mage can easily dispel it via Manta Style.
* Clinkz does heavy damage to towers, and can take map control away from Anti-Mage to limit the space he has to farm early game. If Clinkz is ahead he is capable of ending the game before Anti-Mage becomes a threat. He can also match Anti-Mage's ability to split push.

* With Dark Ascension Night Stalker gains unobstructed vision during night-time allowing him to easily detect mines if he has a Gem of True Sight, but Night Stalker is a melee hero so he has to use Quelling Blade to safely defuse Remote Mines and Stasis Trap.
* Dark Ascension also allows Night Stalker to fly over Proximity Mines without triggering them.
* Crippling Fear is effective in stopping Techies from using Blast Off! and Void is effective in stopping them from running to the safety of their mines.

* Strafe and Searing Arrows allow Clinkz to quickly kill Io due to its low armor.

* Clinkz relies heavily on the physical damage provided by Searing Arrows, which completely overrides the capabilities of Rage.
* Open Wounds is near worthless against Clinkz as he can instantly run away with Skeleton Walk before returning later on.
* Clinkz, by nature will often build items that Lifestealer hates dealing with such as physical damage items like Desolator or Daedalus and instant silences or hexes from Bloodthorn and Scythe of Vyse.

* Crippling Fear is a good way to shut down and gank Invoker in the early game..
* Void deals good damage to Invoker and makes escaping harder.
* With Hunter in the Night and Void, Invoker can't get away from Night Stalker and won't be able to catch him with Sun Strike during the night.

* Crippling Fear is a silence that can last up to 8 seconds during night, rendering Storm Spirit tied limited to his items in a fight.
* Dark Ascension allows Night Stalker to initiate on Storm Spirit across the impassable terrain around the middle lane, rendering Storm vulnerable in the early game and prevent him from snowballing.
Additional:
* Storm Spirit is absolutely helpless if caught within Night Stalker's silence range.
* Common items a Storm Spirit will build will not remove the AoE silence.

* Huskar's Berserker's Blood provides no protection against Clinkz's physical damage output.
* Huskar has no way to disrupt Clinkz's attacks and no way to kill Clinkz alone, as Clinkz can easily go invisible, teleport away, or even fight back.
* Clinkz will often build the items that counter Huskar and the items he usually builds. These include Black King Bar or Monkey King Bar for Heaven's Halberd, or a disable item like Scythe of Vyse or Bloodthorn to prevent him from using Inner Fire to disarm.

* Void can interrupt Icarus Dive.
* His Crippling Fear's silence will shutdown a spell caster Phoenix.
* However, Phoenix punishes Night Stalker with Supernova because it will turn night into day, and it has a higher priority than Dark Ascension, effectively canceling the passive bonuses Night Stalker gets from Hunter in the Night.

* Any hero with high attack speed will be a threat to Phoenix when it initiates, as they can easily tear down a Supernova, perhaps even while debuffed by Fire Spirits: Juggernaut, Clinkz, Troll Warlord, Beastmaster, Lina.

* The long silence of Crippling Fear at night prevents Weaver from using his Shukuchi or Time Lapse.
* With Dark Ascension and Gem of True Sight, Night Stalker can easily find and probably kill Weaver.
* Hunter In the Night's attack speed bonus removes The Swarm's beetles very quickly.

* Clinkz's item build often counters Hoodwink, including Black King Bar, Monkey King Bar, Heaven's Halberd, and Scythe of Vyse.
* Skeleton Walk can quickly escape Hoodwink abilities.

* The long silence of Crippling Fear at night prevents Mirana from escaping with Moonlight Shadow and Leap. She also has really low base health, so Night Stalker can usually kill her during one cast of Crippling Fear at night.
* With Dark Ascension and Gem of True Sight, Night Stalker can find and kill Mirana, and he is a tanky hero capable of fighting Mirana any stage of the game.

* Void is a potent nuke that is devastating to his low health pool.
* Crippling Fear silence can prevent Puck from casting spells, leaving him vulnerable.
Additional:
* Puck cannot use any of its normal means to survive should Night Stalker catch it within Crippling Fear, and goes down quickly.

* Despite Clinkz's fragility, his harassment in the early game can be devastating; as he can kite Enigma and his Eidolons and claim their bounty.

* Heroes that can instantly kill creeps greatly reduce the effectiveness of Chen's converted army: Lifestealer, Doom, Mirana, Clinkz.

* Due to Tiny's non-existent agility gain, high physical damage heroes are more effective against him (Clinkz, Phantom Assassin, Templar Assassin, Ursa, Wraith King etc).

* Heroes with invisibility: (Riki, Clinkz, Nyx Assassin

Additional:
* Nature's Prophet is often by himself. Clinkz can use invisibility to hunt him down and kill him, although a Quelling Blade may be needed to cut through his Sprout. Orchid Malevolence may also be needed if 3-4 seconds are not enough time to kill him, as he can teleport away.
* Clinkz can match Nature's Prophet's ability to split push.

* Heroes who do not have nor rely on passive abilities make Nethertoxin much less effective: Clinkz, Pugna, Nature's Prophet, Dark Seer, Lycan, Tusk

Additional:
* Clinkz does not have any passive abilities at all, making Nethertoxin nearly useless.
* Viper's Corrosive Skin provides no protection against Clinkz's physical damage output.

* Heroes with weaker mobility will struggle to keep up with Night Stalker: Gyrocopter, Ursa, Drow Ranger

* Durable heroes can fight with stand against Tusk during 1v1: Axe, Dragon Knight, Night Stalker, Centaur Warrunner, Wraith King and more.

* Heroes that can pick you off: Clinkz, Nyx Assassin, Puck, Riki.

* Heroes with low health: Lich, Crystal Maiden, Lion.

* Any hero that can outrange Plague Ward can neutralize them without putting themselves at risk of receiving Poison Sting: Arc Warden, Chen, Clinkz, Drow Ranger, Lina, Mirana, Nature's Prophet, Pugna and Sniper.
* Special mention to heroes has attack range talent can also outrange Plague Ward.

* Heroes who can easily harass Crystal Maiden out of lane in the early game (Clinkz, Viper) can prevent Crystal Maiden from being able to level effectively, and can ultimately slow down her level 6, 12, and 18 to a point where enemy carries already have items to address her ultimate.

* Heroes with low mobility that rely on spells: Zeus, Lina, Crystal Maiden.

* With Bloodthorn, Clinkz becomes a strong counter to heroes who rely on evasion and blind such as Windranger, Phantom Assassin, Troll Warlord and Keeper of the Light.

* Any heroes with silences can negate the majority of Outworld Devourer's damage output: Death Prophet, Night Stalker, Drow Ranger, Doom .

* Heroes that have long silences, such as Night Stalker and Silencer, will prevent Abaddon from saving his allies effectively and disable the active component of Borrowed Time.

* Clinkz can use Burning Army in teamfights which will cause a problem for Alchemist.

* Heroes that have a weak laning stage: Spectre, Nyx Assassin, Clockwerk, Spirit Breaker, Omniknight, Pudge.

* Crippling Fear can silence Faceless Void for a long time, preventing him from using his Time Walk and Chronosphere.

* Night Stalker can easily find Tinker in the trees during Dark Ascension.
* Void's mini-stun will stop Rearm and Boots of Travel.
* Crippling Fear's silence will prevent Tinker from fighting back, as Tinker relies on his spells.
Additional:
* Night Stalker is one of the best heroes to find (and silence) Tinker in the trees during Dark Ascension.

* Heroes that have a weak laning stage: Spectre, Nyx Assassin, Clockwerk, Spirit Breaker, Omniknight, Pudge.

* Heroes with good escapes can usually outmaneuver and escape from Spectre: Slark, Clinkz, Weaver

* With Bloodthorn, Clinkz becomes a strong counter to heroes who rely on evasion and blind such as Windranger, Phantom Assassin, Troll Warlord and Keeper of the Light.

* Heroes with weaker mobility will struggle to keep up with Night Stalker: Gyrocopter, Ursa, Drow Ranger

* With Dark Ascension and Gem of True Sight, Night Stalker can easily find and kill Riki. Riki will also find it harder to kill the tanky Night Stalker than he would many other heroes.

* Heroes with silence such as Riki, Silencer, or Night Stalker prevents Skywrath Mage from using his spells.

* Heroes with weaker mobility will struggle to keep up with Night Stalker: Gyrocopter, Ursa, Drow Ranger

* Night Stalker's Crippling Fear at night prevents Shadow Walk for an extended period of time and his Void will make Phase Boots useless. If Night Stalker has True Sight, he can shutdown Bounty Hunter's sneak kill.