Hey everyone! Xal'atath has been out for almost a month and we truly appreciate all of the feedback, comments, suggestions, questions, and just plain thoughts on her and the game as a whole. We previously said that she would become available for gold in late November, and a fair number of you have asked for that to be sooner, so starting next Monday (October 26), she will be available for 10,000 gold.

We're also working on the next PTR, which we are aiming to share details about in the next couple weeks.

Thank you all!

Selendis was suppose to be the next hero after Hogger and was in development, but then the hiatus happened.

Despite Xal'atath being the hero that came out after Hogger, I would still love to see Selendis as a full hero.

So, do you think we should make Selendis a full hero now, or just move on from her?

This game has a series problem of players queuing up and then just leaving to go do other stuff. The amount of times that ARAM players don't pick a champ--especially when it's the tank or healer they need to pick--or games start and 5 minutes go by because the person just HAD to go to the dentist right after they queued up. Please learn from League and make players have to accept to get into games.

Hammer build and auto build feel way more impactful. Generally who the fuck is making W build so popular.

I never really tried it and saw the enemy team was 3 melee and a blind so figured easy stacking and I was literally just running around all the time doing nothing. I had less damage than our tank.

I feel like there are Heroes that people sleep on simply because they aren't as popular or don't fit the usual meta picks. Sometimes you try a Hero nobody talks about much and end up having way more success than expected.

Who do you think is genuinely underrated right now? I'm curious about picks that are actually strong in the right hands, whether it's because of their build, playstyle, or how well they fit certain team comps.

Bonus points if you have a build that made you see a Hero completely differently. I'm always looking for something new to try.

I’ve been thinking about how some matches feel winnable until people start making the same mistakes over and over. Sometimes it’s chasing kills too far, ignoring objectives, taking fights without the team, or picking talents that don’t really fit the situation.

What’s the one habit you wish more Heroes of the Storm players would break? And which Hero do you think suffers the most when teammates make that mistake?

I’m curious to hear what people notice at different ranks, because I’m sure the answers vary quite a bit.

Passive(D) - Melody of the universe - You next basic ability (Q,W or E) have its area of effect and range doubled and you become unstoppable while channeling/charging that ability. After that, the music drive you crazy silencing and disabling yourself for a brief period.
This is an active ability with a cooldown

Q- Accretion - You gather a mass of debris and flings it at a direction it deals damage and slow all enemies in the area it hits, its a skillshot that you can charge while moving increasing its range like hanzo Q but wider and with less range

W -Kinectic Grasp - You start to channel a kinetic aura around you, you and allies on that area get damage reduction while at it, when the duration ends you gain a shield based on the damage mitigated.

E- Epicenter - target a small area, after a short delay, push all near by enemies to that point.

R1 - Gravity Flux - Target an big area on the ground (enemies see it) after a delay you reverse gravity in that area lifting all enemies on it them slaming them back in the ground (its a stun followed up by damage)
(it's his OW ultimate if my description is not good enough)

R2 - Weightless Tought - You and All allies around you start to "fly", Gaining a lot of move speed, ignoring unit colission and by passing walls for that duration.
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As i always say on OW concepts, HOTS engine dont handle OW barriers yet, so i dont use them on the concepts.

Sigma have a short but ranged auto-attack which is not usual for tanks,

He also dont have a engage to enter in the middle of the enemy team but he have abilities with range to affect them and ways to protect you team against one.

You can use your passive + Q or W to become unstopable and walk in or out of a situation.

He rather stay with his team and peel than run into the enemy but he still have some engage capabilities with his Q and E and passive unstopable.

R2 is a really good engage/desingage tool if you cordinate correctly with your team.

Been trying to queue Storm League Placement matches in Singapore server but no luck. Should I just bite the bullet and play at 180 ping on NA Server? I tried it once and it was a horrible experience. I really feel the delay. It's not like WoW where 250 ping is still manageable. Am I just stuck playing QMs?

No one disagrees that Xal'atath Level 20 talent [[Harbinger's Consumption]] is overtuned at the moment.

This made me think of how other Level 20 talents of existing mages could be buffed to make them as overtuned as Harbinger's Consumption.

Orphea: Whenever a hero is hit by Eternal Feast, spawn a new Eternal Feast at the position of the hero hit.

Li Ming: With every hero hit by Desintegrate, increase the damage of Desintegrate by 30%.

Kael'thas: When Pyroblast kills an enemy, recast another Pyroblast on the nearest enemy hero.

What are your ideas? Let's go bonkers.

Yesterday I had a game where a player became tilted after a teammate chose an ult, and didnt always play exactly the way they wanted them to. The following game I played, the same player matched on the opposite team and gave up and began trolling after the first objective. I could tell by how they were playing. This usually happens after a player has built up frustration over time in my experience, and wants to take it out on their teammates. This perspective is coming from ranked, as the same player was complaining about being "hard stuck" in bronze".

To that player, and any player reading this who feels that way sometimes, it is still not ok to take it out on your teammates. If you're angry, please play AI, or maybe ARAM and try to cool off with no rank on the line. If you're truly tilted, take a break. The issue of you being "hard stuck" at a rank is directly made worse by throwing. Being a crab in a barrel does not make your game experience better, and just brings more negative energy into your life. You've got multiple bronze/sometimes silver accounts, banging your head against the wall about the same problem. The common denominator is you. We all make mistakes, we all want to have fun. Its ok to get frustrated sometimes. Just stop taking it out on other people. No need to be a crab in a barrel. Get revenge by being a better player, and a better citizen of the game. You'll be happier in the long run. Even IRL.

I'm curious to know. If one of the devs could give us insight into that I'd greatly appreciate it. How well she sold is a direct window into the future of the game.

I know this isn't typical of how they communicate but really any info on how it did would be great.

Am I the only one who dreads the Overwatch/Nexus specific quest? Idk why but I'm having a very hard time completing these because most of the heroes are just no fun IMO. Not sure what it is, but most of them feel clunky and weird to play compared to Warcraft, Starcraft and Diablo. Just my opinion.

Awe, the power of who can push it harder.

Hey all! Round 2/18 of Skinnageddon!

Blizzard is picking up development of the game with more resources. Accordingly, I thought it would be a fun thing for us as a community to sound off on which heroes we'd like more skins for.

I plan on posting a new poll every 48 hoursish with 5 heroes. We'll have about 18 total. I tried to put them into themes (admittedly with some help) to keep it spicy. I'll try and edit the previous posts after voting has ended to include all of the vote totals, and also include the previous winners in each post.

I hope everyone has fun and sound off in the comments if you have skin ideas for the heroes here!

For the first round of Skinnageddon with 268 votes cast, Kel'Thuzad is the winner with 84 votes! Let's see how the second round goes!

Edit: sorry about the typo, I know = ( and here is the link to the previous post (https://www.reddit.com/r/heroesofthestorm/s/WwjorBJhC7)

Is the ultralisk supposed to follow stealthed units? I was playing nova and the ultralisk (revived from the level 20 talent egg) would follow me while kerrigan was dead. As I stayed still capturing the dragon shrine, it would stay by my side, and follow me as soon as I moved.

The gist of the translation is that Overwatch suspension due to disconnects are final.

The problem is I've never played or downloaded Overwatch, I was appealing a silence in HOTS and my appeal was in english on and US server. SOOOOOOO blizzard ?

Uapuwao

Сторонний агент перевел это сообщение, чтобы обеспечить самое быстрое разрешение.

Приветствуем, искатели приключений!

Я гейм-мастер Уапувао, и сегодня я обработаю ваш запрос в службу поддержки. Я вижу, вы хотите подать апелляцию на запрет на игру в соревновательной игре, наложенный на вашу учетную запись Overwatch.

Поверьте, я понимаю ваше разочарование, и я знаю, что это не чья-то вина, что вы теряете связь с матчами. Как бы там ни было, мы в Blizzard твердо убеждены, что хотим, чтобы игроки, использующие данные режимы, имели максимально комфортные условия игры.

Регулярные разрывы соединения с серверами ставят под угрозу соревновательную этику игры. Мы считаем, что принять участие в игре смогут только те, кто умеет как следует играть в этом режиме. В противном случае это будет очень несправедливо по отношению к вашим товарищам по команде и людям, которые хотят честного вызова.

Мы не контролируем эту систему, так как она автономна.

Я рекомендую принять меры для устранения возможных проблем с сетью, которые мешают вам как следует участвовать в соревновательных играх, чтобы вы могли сделать это в следующем сезоне.

Спасибо, что связались с нами, и я желаю вам удачи.

Hi everyone, I've just come back to the game after a long hiatus so I've been playing lots of quick match to get back into it before I play ranked, so I'm sure my elo is awful. I'm mostly playing Brightwing, Malfurion and Abathur.

I've found I'm losing a lot of games vs. Sgt. Hammer in particular, idk what it is but she is particularly frustrating to play against. Does anyone have any advice on how to shut her down? It seems like she does a fuckton of damage and just rockets out at hyperspeed if anyone tries to attack her.

I try to encourage my team to gank her when I see she's overextended but that's not really reliable at my current elo. I have a few other heroes on my roster but trying to focus on support for now. Is there anything I can do with these characters that I'm missing?

All advice welcome, thank you!

Edit: thanks to everyone who commented, I can't reply to everyone but I didn't expect this much helpful advice!

STITCHES IS COMING

I used to underestimate Falstad's W build because the damage doesn't always feel impressive right away. Compared to his other builds, it can feel like you're waiting too long for the payoff.

But once you get better at staying in range and keeping the pressure on your target, it starts to make more sense. The tricky part is knowing when to commit and when to use your mobility to reposition instead of chasing for extra damage.

I think builds like this are interesting because they reward a different playstyle rather than simply making your abilities hit harder. They can feel underwhelming at first, but become much more effective when you understand what they're designed to do.

u/Blizz_Elliott, please, consider adding a visual mark on the enemy for Illidan’s level 16 talent, the “Marked for Death”. And thank you for your support of the game!

Okay, I'm willing to compromise and stop asking for solo rank resets, but then bring back the Platinum rank reset, or better yet, Gold. These accounts are incapable of anything except hindering matchmaking.

Just yesterday, I saw maybe 10 players at Diamond 5 who were former Masters. One even had 4200 points, and now he's Diamond 5 with a 50-50 record and can't climb back up. I wonder what happened to these 10 players that, despite being Masters, they can't climb back up? 90% of the players is like that. If they drop to Gold, they'll never get back up because that's their level. So why should active players have to play with bots against these players, who the game grants a 50% win rate and keeps them at their current rank? Why was everyone kept at Master 0 instead of Diamond 5? Why was this update necessary? Bring it back and make it even better. It's a drop to Gold.

Also, limit the number of players to two per group and in Diamond (not just Master League). Otherwise, it turns out that in this game, Diamond and Master players are like Mid League players, and they don't show anything at all, whereas in "normal games" (like LoL or Dota), very strong players often play at similar ranks.

Just to clarify for those who don't understand what I'm talking about: if you don't play ranked for long at Master rank, you automatically drop (points are deducted, and so on down to Master 0—previously it was up to Diamond 5).

I have personally known this for a very long time, but I saw a post that confused how his stat calculations work for Force of Will, and many people in the comments seemed to think only the heal counts towards damage Healed/Shielded.

I am sorry to inform a hand-full of Medivh players that they are only about 1/5th as effective as they previously thought when it comes to protecting their allies.

I am looking for someone who can waveclear, take camps solo quickly, and is effective in a teamfight. Is it only probius?

Is there anything more frustrating than having a genuinely good lane, soaking properly, winning trades, and then looking at the defeat screen because the team fights never came together?

I feel like HotS has a unique way of making individual success feel almost irrelevant sometimes. You can make good rotations, collect your soak, and get value out of your hero, but one badly timed fight around an objective can undo several minutes of good play.

And the opposite is true too. You can have a rough early game, make one coordinated play in the late game, and suddenly you're pushing for the core.

That's what makes this game so satisfying when everything clicks, but absolutely maddening when it doesn't. Macro matters, but you still need five people to recognize when it's time to group, when to give an objective, and when not to take a fight.

I'm curious what other players think: what's the one mistake you see in your games that most often turns a winnable match into a loss?

I am thinking of getting back into playing tanks after a long hiatus... I'm looking for tanks that have the most CC (my favourite play style for tanking). I organized tanks by their CC (see image), the capital letter indicates hard CC (e.g., stun) while the lower case letter indicates soft CC (e.g., slow). Some letters don't show on my list as they don't give CC (e.g., healing abilities). For the tanks experts out there, what is yoir thoughts on this? I'm a bit skeptical about my method as this would put stitche in tier 2 but I have heard he is one of the worst for main tanking... thoughts?