Explaining hero types, recommended starter heroes and general tips to help you get started

Heroes of the Storm is a five on five team based game where fast paced intense battles revolve around key objectives. Each team will have similar defensive structures, a core and low health minions streaming along paths across the map called ‘lanes’.

Classes

First off, you will need to pick between 4 different classes – Warrior, Assassin, Support or Specialist. A Warrior has a large health pool but does not inflict a lot of damage and is usually found on the front lines of team fights to absorb damage while the rest of the team wreaks havoc. Assassins are damage dealers with a fragile health pool, making them an easy target to take down while a support shields the team from damage and/or are healers. Specialists are siege damage dealers in charge of bringing down defensive structures quickly to bring minions nearer to the enemy’s core.

Abilities, Ultimates, Traits and Talents

After you’ve settled on a class to explore, each hero will have their own unique set of basic abilities, ultimates and traits, pick them carefully to capitalize on the enemies’ weaknesses. Each hero will start off with 3 basic abilities and at level 10, will unlock one of two powerful ultimates that could very well turn the tide of the game. There are also hero traits that are passive or active bonuses depending on the hero selected.

As you level throughout each map, team mates will level with you and you’ll learn talents at level 1, 4, 7, 10 (Ultimate), 13, 16 and 20. Each talent tier will have a few options to choose from that could empower basic abilities or unlock new ones. With such a system in place, a hero can be built in different ways to counter the enemy or synergize with the team.

Recommended Heroes for beginners

Warrior : Muradin

Muradin is a melee warrior and one sturdy dwarf packed with large health pool that allows him to take a lot of hits for his team. His passive gives him extremely high health regeneration, making him a great warrior and one where you can get away with mistakes without paying the ultimate price of dying.

Assassin : Raynor.

Raynor is a powerful ranged assassin with straight forward abilities that makes him an easy hero to learn. Once you get used to his abilities, you’ll be taking down enemy heroes and structures with ease.

Support : Lili

The cutest panda in the team, Lili is a ranged support that throws cups of health to her teammates. She’s the easiest to learn as her skills does not require much targeting and her talents include fast feet which gives her a speed boost to get out of dangerous situations.

Specialist : Sylvanas

Sylvanas is a great all-rounder specialist that disables enemy structures, eliminate heroes with her poison and takes out armies of minions with ease. Her haunting wave provides mobility to get out of bad situations and serves to confuse the enemy when she is escaping.

Tips

• When you start each game, the team should split up to fight minions and collect experience in each lane. As you are weaker at lower levels, avoiding team fights at the start would prove advantageous.
• Try not to die repeatedly as this is called ‘feeding’ which gives a large chunk of experience to the enemy, levelling them up faster and making them stronger than your team.
• Always return to the healing well to get health when you take a considerable amount of damage or to refill your mana. If the healing well is on cooldown, hit ‘B’ to go back to base and restore both health and mana quickly. This will take you out of a fight so make sure you time it well.
• Remember to mount by pressing ‘Z’ when travelling across large portions of the map or when enemies are after you as this could spare your life.

Although team fights are important to give you an advantage, teams should prioritize objectives even more as the result of dominating one will give a significant boost taking down enemy’s defenses, bringing you closer to their core.