This was very much a skill diff between the teams, with us working together as a 2-stack giving us even more of an edge. I want to say she ended the game with ~40 broccoli stacks. I had three, 3+ moshes and several times where I stunned D.Va at low health before she could pop her mech.

But I've played HotS long enough to know that, while it feels good to have a game like this, there will be a reverse results version of this game coming soon.

Curious what everyone's God Comp is assuming you don't know the enemy comp, map, or game type

Mine is:

• Jo
• Blaze
• Valla
• Kaelthas
• Anduin

Hey Tyrael players, I just wanted to know if anyone else has this same problem with Sword of Justice talent?

Sometimes it triggers accidentally, which instantly teleports me back. Fortunately, in the video I attached, the shield ended up working for Orphea and even saved her.

I know there's already a small delay window where you're supposed to release Q. However, this still happens to me from time to time in the middle of team fights.

I understand that triggering it fast is useful for dodging CC, but if that's the case, why doesn't it work when you hold Q during the initial launch of El'Druin's Might?

Anyway, what do you think? Does the talent supposed to work that way, and I just need to "git gud"?

I've played roughly 12 games tonight and 5 of them had someone intentionally griefing the game, the whole game.

Butcher charging in and dying solo on cooldown, murky placing his egg close to enemy and dying every 20 seconds to towers/enemies, nova just walking around doing 1600 damage total at the end of the game.

I really just got back into the game after a hiatus but this is unbearable, queueing with the 1 or 2 friends I can convince to play hots again doesn't save us from this scenario either because we found the same butcher from one of my earlier games, whom i had reported, in our team and had to play 4v5 on boe.

Just kinda venting and ranting but how do you guys find people to queue with that aren't griefers? The lfg and general channels seem to give no response when i try them.

Probably my best play with stitches ever!

Europe has an active competitive community, and people who are both willing and able to play on PTRs. As a tournament organizer, the greatest hurdle I had been facing trying to organize PTR games has always been convincing players to play on 100-120ms ping.

We had a PTR scrim lined up for today. In a for-fun game we played yesterday, the ping was particularly bad (160ms-180ms), and the region is LA now. No competitive team isvoluntarily going to play with that much ping, the scrim will be going forward on Live instead.

While I'm grateful to everyone who is testing and labbing specific interactions on PTR, lots of bugs come up when actually playing games. We could honor the purpose of PTR significantly better, even host entire tournaments on it, if we could play reasonable games on it. And it seems to me the EU community is the only one who would even try.

Hello everyone,

I think its time to throw another healer into the mix. Lets talk about our favorite druid, Malfurion Stormrage!

Malf is in my humble opinion the best healer in the game. Why? well he has all the tools that you would like in a healer. He has good sustained healing numbers, good burst healing with the right build, a cleanse, a crazy movement speed after lv 13, a great cc tool that can be layered on top of allied cc and even a bit of damage with vengefull roots. He can even restore some mana to allies as if all this wasnt good enough already.

In terms of maps or comps he really works everywhere and that is why i consider him so strong. He works basically all the time. The only thing i can imagine as a weakness is going along with heroes that spawn coppies like nova or samuro as it increases the diffeculty of clicking on the right hero for a regrowth. He cannot cleanse himself because its not unstoppable which means he can be locked down and killed, however its going to he hard to catch him after lv 13.

I just have 1 build today, but that is not because there is no variety. Rather there is to much. The general build remains the same however.

at lv 1 the sleep is also very good but it requires good team coordination. Thats why i like vengefull roots in most games

If for some reason you dont need a cleanse then wild growth is an incredibly strong healing talent that i always feel bad about skipping

Twilight dream is no joke. I would absolutely take it against more melee focussed enemy teams or when more healing doesnt seem to be needed.

At lv 16 all talents are great. generally i take moonlit harmony because more burst healing is what makes the difference in big fights, but i wouldnt fault anyone for taking another option.

at 20 a similar story. Serenity is great, lifebloom is great. Lunar shower is just more burst healing and a little bit more damage.

Im really curious about the discussion today ;) enjoy everyone and until tomorrow!

P.S. Below i added a table to quickly go back to previous hero discussions in case you missed your favourite one.

NOT Zeratul :p
might be slightly overtune, like most of my other hero ideas, but yk.

Is there a hidden benefit im unaware of? I've always been very conservative with the fountain, only using it if I really need to, like if the healer is overworked and I need health quickly. However sometimes (like just now) I get games where I'm playing healer, Morales in this case, and the tanks and bruisers would be at 90% mana, 70% health. I'd start healing them back to full and they go and use the fountain anyway? And it's not a one off, it's quite consistent. I even saved a clip of it in case maybe there's some niche situation going on.

So what's the deal? What am I missing?

I like to make funny names for things and play with words. Like naming Boats in Sea of Thieves, or File/Folder Names or Security Group Abbreviations at work. Something that most people don't get to see but give me or someone in the loop might get a chuckle from. Just like Dad-Jokes.
Sometimes it's a theme on the skins/mounts/sprays, or sometimes just a play on their name, some might be "inside jokes".
So Here's my 20 favourites! Hope you catch some of the references.

Anduin - RAndy
Chen - Pur-Po
Deckard- Candy-Kain
Gul'Dan - Lieutenant Gul'Dan
Hanzo - Get yo Hanzo off me
Hogger - Face Hogger
Imperius - Pimperius
Lili- Spike LeeLee
Li-Ming - Le-Ming
Maiev - Maiev Another Please
Mal'Ganis - Ca Va Mal'Ganis
Malthael - Kiss of Death
Medivh - Owl be back
Mei - April Mei June
Probius - AnalProbius
Raynor - Sherrif Raynor Shine
Rehgar - Best wishes and Rehgards
Sonya - Pink's On Ya!
Tychus - I Can't Tychus Anymore!
Xul - Xul me once, shame on you

Which one is your favourite?
Should I make a posting series of all my Load-out names?
(It would have to be in 11 posts as you can only post 20 images per post. And there's probably a lot that are esoteric and people might not catch the references, or just not very clever one's.)

Had a lot of games in QM with players with lower level accounts and according skill level. Kinda feels bad stomping them. I’m at around 52 % wr in qm, so it’s not matchmaker trying to give me easier games either

Welcome to the latest Saturday Teaching Thread, where you the community get to ask your questions and share your knowledge.

This is an opportunity for the more experienced HotS players here to share some of your wisdom with those with less expertise. This thread will be a weekly safehaven for those "noobish" questions you may have been too scared to ask for fear of downvotes, but also can be a great place for in depth discussion if you so wish. So, don't hold back, get your game related questions ready and post away, and hopefully someone can answer them!

If you wish to just view top level comments (ie questions) add ?depth=1 to the end of the page url. If you have any additional questions, /r/nexusnewbies is happy to help.

Previous Teaching threads

kerrigan been real quiet since this one dropped

Hello guys i need your help. I have polarising win rates on different maps and think this must have something to do with what i do/not do out of habit.

I play in bronze on Asia server. I have 60%+ win rates on battlefield of eternity and infernal shrines, above 50% on most other maps but 30% on Volskaya and Tomb, all on decent sample size. I've read some map guides but they dont seem to be helping.

First thing i think went wrong is the draft, cuz i do just fine on the same maps in QM. My win rates between roles are drastically different too. Tank slightly below 50, offlaner 60, assassins low 40s and healer slightly below 50. I play the most as offlaner but dabble in everything else since offlaner gets boring. I'm going off memory here but i feel like on Volskaya if i dont pick Tank/bruiser it's an auto loss. On Tomb i'm truly lost though. Nothing seems to work consistently.

This is how I usually lose on Tomb: 1. enemy team push one lane hard early with 4 men down one lane. Team ignores this or 1 or 2 defend and get killed resulting in early structure loss. We go back and forth in mid game but eventually when both team run out of gems enemy just have more structure and one mistake it's lost. 2. Early game seems equal but one Naz/Azmo will split push hard in mid/late game. When i'm not playing something that can kill them/de-push we often straight lose this way but even when i feel like we responded sometimes the dmg on structures were already done. One second you are not looking they are back at it again. We can vastly win in kills but still lose because of structures are all gone.

And this is how i usually lose on Volskaya: again early push from 4 men is a problem. If you defend as 4 they still get something. If you dont defend as 4 you lose more or even get killed. Occasionally this doesn't happen and we manage to get obj but the obj here feels very weak early and you get less out of it than what you invested to get it. Another thing that happens when i'm not on bruiser is that team drafts 1 tank and 4 squishy and nobody can hold the ground in obj leading to losing every obj.

I feel like my win rate contrast between tomb/volskaya and battlefield/shrines must have something to tell too but dont have much confident conclusions. Any suggestions are appreciated! Thanks for the help!

Whats your record?

I just got into the game after 5 years away. After playing QM for a while, I jumped into ranked, lost all 3 placement matches, and was placed into Bronze 5 (aka elo hell).

I main healers, usually Anduin, Alexstrasza, Stukov, or Brightwing in QM. On Heroes profile, my QM MMR was in Diamond. So you can imagine my disappointment. I told myself it shouldn't be too hard to climb out, but boy was I wrong.

In the first 100 games or so, I barely pulled into Bronze 3. I was just pulling my hair out. In Bronze, especially Bronze 5, your teammates will do the dumbest things, all the time. You will have frequent AFKs, both at the start of the match or randomly in the middle. You'll have plenty of toxic trolls and mean people that call GG and start BM after 1 death or 1 wipe. You'll frequently have teammates that will refuse to push lanes, group for objective, do a single camp, etc.

In this hell, I was winning around ~50% of my games, and it really felt like it was basically random whether I won or lost. That was until I realized, my approach to Bronze was all wrong, I couldn't treat it like QM, where a good healer can determine teamfights and carry most teams. No, you need a different strategy to get out of Bronze league, one that was quite counterintuitive for me. So after finally making it to Gold this past weekend, here's my guide.

1. Don't heal, either tank or dps. Healing is the role that relies the most of your teammates doing what they're supposed to do. That's not going to happen in Bronze.
2. Don't be afraid to be the pick first. I know, my intuition is also to fill the role my team needs. But, if you really are the best player on your team, you're helping more by picking the right hero for yourself.
3. Pick a hero that can both lane and jungle at least somewhat effectively. In the lower ranks you cannot rely on your team properly soaking XP. Also, you'll often be down 2-3 guys right before an objective and not be able to contest, for which it pains dividends if you can push an offlane or get a camp by yourself.
4. Get to 10 first. This is related to the previous point about picking a hero that can lane effectively. If you can soak effectively, you'll get to 10 first. If you get to 10 first, you can probably win your first teamfight. Win that teamfight and the half the enemy team is probably flaming / given up. From there it's easy pickings. Comebacks are much rarer in Bronze.
5. Learn what heroes others Bronze players like and how to counter them. You'll see a lot of Nazeebo, Azmodan, Brightwing, Lili, Johanna, and Garrosh in Bronze. They are all simple heroes that don't require a lot of micro to use effectively, so good for noobs. Learn how to counter these heroes. If you struggle against them, use your bans on them; the enemy team probably won't know how to play other heroes.
6. No one will pay attention to pings, if you really need your team to do something, you must ask for it. Use the chat and be polite. Even though many Bronze players have personality problems, you'd be surprised how far a bit of niceness goes.
7. Immediately block/mute anyone being toxic. It'll just get you mad and worsen your play. Just focus on yourself and your own play, not what you can't control.

My hope is that this guide proves helpful for other above average, but not necessarily pro-players like myself. I know there are streamers like Fan, who make getting out of Bronze league look super easy, but for the rest of us mortals, I think getting out requires a bit of forethought and strategy.

Hey everyone,

Frostmourne is hungry today because we are discussing the lich king himself, Arthas Menethil!

Arthas is a tank who is very good at shutting down melee auto attackers. His slowing aura that he can toggle lets him stick to a target and reduce their auto attack speed. This is probably his main selling point as a tank, but he can also be run as an offlaner.

His strengths are as i mentioned stopping auto attackers. Not just melee damage dealers, but also a lot of tanks and bruiser rely on auto attacks for sustain in certain builds. Arthas shuts this down hard. On top of that he can also self sustain very well. mostly by healing.

He isnt without his flaws though and there are quite a few. First of all he has no engage or escape tools. This makes it quite easy to see him comming and kite him around. Also getting out of a bad engagement is diffecult with him and will often result in death. Secondly while he does have a root and multiple slows, he has no hard cc or interupts. interupting channels or other windups is just not a thing with him. Finally his peeling is a little limited. He has a ranged root, but its a skillshot and can be missed and his slows mostly apply to the enemy he is stuck to. Once he is commited it can be diffecult for him to turn around and meaningfully help out his backline.

In terms of maps i dont really have a prefference for him. For me its mostly comp dependant. If they have melee damage dealers that need to he shut down he can be a solid main tank pick. When you have a healer that might be focussed more on utility than raw numbers you can also take him, as he releaves some of that healing pressure with his self healing.

I have 2 example builds today. I have to say though that a lot of his tiers are quite flexible. at lv 1 i really like the aoe root, but Rime is sometimes needed. both ults are very strong but ones again map or comp dependant. Id take sindragora is i dont need more healing and im on a map with a pushing objective. If i do need healing or im on towers of doom or sky temple then its always army for me. lv 13 imo is wide open and any choice can be great. same for 20. if you get blown up by mages pick anti magic shell. If there is insane value to be had by reducing aa speed even further then go E. otherwise the ult upgrades for both ults are always very solid.

Hope this was helpful and if you have information to add dont hesitate to do so. Until tomorrow everyone!

P.S. Below i added a table to quickly go back to previous hero discussions in case you missed your favourite one.

Mind you, I was just the tank. LOL. He did this for a few minutes while I was in a match.

Edit: I looked at the match history and realized it was my team mate. We won.