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http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/blog/20008204/heroes-of-the-storm-balance-update-notes-february-10-2016-2-10-2016
FALSTAD Hammerang (Q) BOOMerang (Talent) Damage increased from 121 (+4% per level) to 150 (+4% per level) Hinterland Blast (R) Base damage increased from 411 (+4.75% per level) to 475 (+4.75% per level) Developer Comments: We’re primarily seeing players run Basic Attack builds as Falstad, and would like to make ‘mage’ Falstad a bit more powerful. We also felt that Hinterland Blast isn’t doing enough damage with its higher cooldown, so we’re further increasing that damage.
JAINA Basic Attack damage reduced from 89 (+4% per level) to 60 (+4% per level) Frostbolt (Q) Damage increased from 160 (+4% per level) to 190 (+4% per level) Cone of Cold (E) Damage increased from 189 (+4% per level) to 200 (+4% per level) Developer Comments: We’re starting to pull Basic Attack damage out of characters who don’t rely upon it, namely Jaina and Kael’thas. For Jaina, this will make less of her damage guaranteed and allow for more advanced plays. Jaina’s win rate is also a little on the low end, so we want to offset the Basic Attack nerf and add to her overall power by buffing Frostbolt and Cone of Cold.
KAEL'THAS Basic Attack damage reduced from 87 (+4% per level) to 65 (+4% per level) Arcane Barrier (Talent) Shield amount decreased from 200% to 150% Duration reduced from 6 to 4 seconds Gravity Lapse (E) Stun duration reduced from 1.5 to 1.0 seconds Phoenix (R) Cooldown increased from 40 to 60 seconds Pyroblast (R) Damage increased from 730 (+4% per level) to 810 (+5% per level) Cooldown increased from 50 to 100 seconds Presence of Mind (Talent) Cooldown reduction for Pyroblast increased from 10 to 25 seconds per enemy hero hit Developer Comments: Kael’thas is a powerful hero with too few downsides. We’re nerfing several aspects of his kit, and are still planning a Talent overhaul coming soon™. The stun duration of Gravity Lapse is too long and guarantees kills more often than we would like. Reducing the stun duration makes it less frustrating to play against and adds a bit more counterplay for the enemy team. Phoenix is the drastically favored Heroic Ability right now, and it’s up far too often. By nerfing its cooldown, while also pushing Pyroblast to create more impactful moments, we expect there will be more situations where Pyroblast is the optimal pick.
NOVA Snipe (Q) Damage increased from 268 (+4% per level) to 295 (+4% per level) Snipe Master (Talent) Damage bonus increased from 5% to 12% per stack Maximum stack bonus increased from 50% to 60% Maximum stacks decreased from 10 to 5 Developer Comments: While we are happy with the variety of Talent options Nova has after the rework, her overall damage is too low. We like Snipe Master, and it encourages a different playstyle, but a single miss resets a ton of progress toward the Talent’s reward. With these changes, players will get more out of Snipe Master without having to rebuild so many stacks after a miss. We’ve heard a lot of community feedback and suggestions about not removing stacks as long as your Snipe hits something. We’ve discussed this, but feel that even if Snipe misses the intended target, it still hits something the majority of the time. By making this Talent sharp, with an obvious downside, it allows us to crank up the tuning and really celebrate flawless Nova play.
THRALL Basic Attack damage reduced from 173 (+4% per level) to 165 (+4% per level) Sundering (R) Cooldown increased from 70 to 80 seconds Developer Comments: Thrall sits near the top of our win charts, so we feel that small nerfs to his damage and most-picked Heroic Ability are necessary. We expect this to only slightly nudge Thrall down, as we’re otherwise happy with how he is currently being played.
REHGAR Ghost Wolf (Trait) (D) Basic Attack damage bonus reduced from 100% to 75% Lightning Shield (W) Damage reduced from 36 (+4% per level) to 30 (+4% per level) Developer Comments: Rehgar’s new Talents have opened up a number of different strategies and builds, which has been exciting to see. We like this more aggressive playstyle, but noticed that the majority of Lightning Shield Talents are now clear winners. Focusing nerfs primarily on Lightning Shield’s damage will help to reduce Rehgar’s win rate and open up even more Talent options.
DIABLO Fire Stomp (W) Fire Devil (Talent) Damage reduced from 23 (+4% per level) to 17 (+4% per level) Developer Comments: Diablo has hovered near the top of our win rate charts for a while. We wanted to see how the Tyrande nerfs would impact him first, as we know those characters have very strong synergy together. We haven’t seen much of a dip in Diablo’s win rate, so we’re targeting a ‘must pick’ Talent with this nerf.
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I like the changes with the exception of a change that makes LiMing harder. I think swapping the Ess of Johan talent to a later tier would do a lot, as well as making her reset only function on 100% kills (not Murky, TLV). I would also like to see changes to make TLV better in Teamfights and make Gazlowe, Tychus and the like more usable heroes.
For Falstad, this seems like quite a significant Q buff, but the utility of AutoStad and Gust seem hard to beat with more damage, especially when the Mages get more bursty.
For Jaina, I like the change. I feel like her DPS goes up if you go for a Frostbolt build on T(1)/2/3 GIVEN that you hit your Frostbolts. More skill required is a good thing in my book, and I thoroughly enjoy Machinegun Jaina.
As for Kael, these seem reasonable nerfs, albeit a bit late. They may have gone slightly overboard though, nerfing 4 aspects at once, but the main damage remains the same, he just loses the additional utility.
The Nova change is solid and I like it. I would have liked to see some modification to not kill the stacks when helping with bosses/mercs/buildings.
Thrall change seems fine.
For Reghar I would have liked to start with changing the T6 talent, but I guess this works as well...
Diablo, a ±33% nerf seems quite harsh, but I feel like he could do with some changes to his talenttiers.
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Sold changes, the small nudges on many heroes are good. Silly li ming goes unscathed but alright.
Curious if this is enough to tune back rehgar, my hunch sais no but 16% less damage on the shield is a large nerf.
Only kael change is ugly this way. He will be nerfed fairly hard and probably drop from high pick to situational. But his build diversity remains much the same I'm afraid, they should have tuned down chain bomb not just ruin his stun, which is fair for a no damage spell imo.
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Hnnng, where are my Artanis changes. Also, crazy that they aren't doing anything about Li Ming, but I suppose they want to give it more time since she was released to have some more solid data.
Overall good changes though, always happy to see constant slight nerfs and buffs and what have you!
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On February 11 2016 10:33 Markwerf wrote: Sold changes, the small nudges on many heroes are good. Silly li ming goes unscathed but alright.
Curious if this is enough to tune back rehgar, my hunch sais no but 16% less damage on the shield is a large nerf.
Only kael change is ugly this way. He will be nerfed fairly hard and probably drop from high pick to situational. But his build diversity remains much the same I'm afraid, they should have tuned down chain bomb not just ruin his stun, which is fair for a no damage spell imo. They are planning a rework on Kael'thas, for now a nerf is fair, ideally every hero is situational.
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No nerfs to Li Ming is fucking laughable.
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I'm glad to get some Nova love, although I'm almost always topping damage as the new Nova. If you play well you're roaming and participating in every fight, so you shell damage all the time. Free snipe damage is good.
Snipe Master is still trash. To quote Thezzy in the other thread with whom I fully agree :
On February 11 2016 04:13 Thezzy wrote: Blizzard logic: "We don't want people only playing Nova to bring Heroes from 100% to 0%, so here is a talent that buffs your Snipe damage by 50% as long as you only hit Heroes. But don't bring them down to 0% ok? Ok."
We don't complain that it wouldn't work well. It will work well, you can get to 3 stacks easily. But why boost the only all-in burst build if they want people to play differently ? I like being the new Nova, helping at camps, poking, dishing damage from the backline. Did you know the backline is actually a nice place full of friendly heroes ? Flanking is always full of mean red team people, it's really not a safe place for a lady.
I feel KT has been hit too late (now Li Ming's the biggest issue, she made his pickrate fall to 80% without even affecting him) and too strongly. But I'm happy we get to see him less.
Really happy about the big Jaina buff but she'll be too powerful imo, and happy about the small Diablo nerf, now that Mura's not OP anymore Diablo was too dominating. The nerf on Thrall seems fair.
I don't get why they buffed Falstad ? He seemed pretty broken in the right hands already. I played with a rank 1 Fals the other day, the guy was a magician, he was so good at him it felt unfair for the opponent. I'll buy him ASAP.
The nerf on Reghar seems way too little. The level 16 talent is broken, why not go for it ?
On February 11 2016 13:22 Larkin wrote: No nerfs to Li Ming is fucking laughable.
Indeed, this was more than necessary. They'll nerf her when she hits 10 000 gold and I buy her. ^^ They could do something, even if it's just lowering her overall DPS by 10%, or removing her TP. She'd be the best mage even without her TP at all.
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On February 11 2016 10:33 Markwerf wrote: Curious if this is enough to tune back rehgar, my hunch sais no but 16% less damage on the shield is a large nerf.
Agreed. I think the main issue with Rehgar right now is that even if he goes for pure dmg talents (minus Ancestral Healing), he just heals a lot. If taking the Storm Shield talents had some kind of downside I'd be totally fine with them being as strong as they are right now. For example if they nerfed the his Chain Healing thingy and made it so you need a talent to have it on the current level. I just think it's a bad idea to have a hero who can go for mostly dmg talents and still outheal most other supporters. (that's mostly also because the heal talents are just... not very good of course)
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hmmm guess the dodge blink will be sneak fixed ? Or they are really discussing to leave that in and nerf other parts.
Nice change on the snipe master. Still makes the whole rework look weird lol.
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In Try Mode I've found that going for the Pinning Shot build with One in the Chamber still beats Snipe Master handily. The immediate burst is lower but overall the damage output of double Crippling Shot with 80% bonus damage on your AA just beats the 60% boost on the one Snipe. And it doesn't have the major downside that you can't use Snipe on anything but a Hero.
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On February 12 2016 07:26 Thezzy wrote: In Try Mode I've found that going for the Pinning Shot build with One in the Chamber still beats Snipe Master handily. The immediate burst is lower but overall the damage output of double Crippling Shot with 80% bonus damage on your AA just beats the 60% boost on the one Snipe. And it doesn't have the major downside that you can't use Snipe on anything but a Hero.
Are you doing snipe master in conjunction with double tap and crippling shot?
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On February 11 2016 13:22 Larkin wrote: No nerfs to Li Ming is fucking laughable. In case anyone missed it, here are Blizzards comments regarding Li Ming and nerfs.
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On February 12 2016 08:54 karazax wrote:Show nested quote +On February 11 2016 13:22 Larkin wrote: No nerfs to Li Ming is fucking laughable. In case anyone missed it, here are Blizzards comments regarding Li Ming and nerfs.
Which is the polite way for them to say they'll want to sell her more first.
Like Leoric on release she leads to silly strategies which you can do so little about, losing your tower every game before objectives start if you don't have teammates who know how to counter it is just frustating. And it feels cheesy when doing it, but it's too good not to.
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On February 12 2016 10:37 Markwerf wrote:Show nested quote +On February 12 2016 08:54 karazax wrote:On February 11 2016 13:22 Larkin wrote: No nerfs to Li Ming is fucking laughable. In case anyone missed it, here are Blizzards comments regarding Li Ming and nerfs. Which is the polite way for them to say they'll want to sell her more first. Like Leoric on release she leads to silly strategies which you can do so little about, losing your tower every game before objectives start if you don't have teammates who know how to counter it is just frustating. And it feels cheesy when doing it, but it's too good not to.
Exactly. It's all about the $$$$ right now. She'll probably get nerfed right around the time Zul gets released and everyone starts spending money on him instead.
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Wow. I'm used to TeamLiquid forums being of higher quality...
As for the money grab part of the explanation. I think Li Ming might be the first hero since Leoric or possibly Kharazim that can be considered not underpowered at release. She deals huge damage at high range, but her health is extremely low. She requires a team to protect her and good map awareness. Whilst I doubt the skill floor, she has vulnerabilities which can be exploited.
As with any strategy game, the offensive strategy is developed before people start working on the counter strategy. With Li Ming, the strategy was fairly straight forward. Shoot stuff at high range, avoid minions/mercs/summons that soak your hits, and deal huge hero damage. She operates fairly similar to Kael Thas with Ignite, in that she requires this high range to defend herself. Li Ming, on the other hand, does not have selfpeel nor are her skillshots easy to hit nor huge burst on short range (W deals low damage; Q is impossible to hit) and is considerably weaker to dive oriented heroes like Tyrael, Thrall, Diablo, Zeratul, Kerrigan.
Pro teams haven't even really used Li Ming in competitive games, and because of this, we've not seen a proper counter strategy employed yet either. It's really hard to figure out a solid strategy in QM/Solo queue HL, because people are not on the same page and the coordination required is hard, to say the least.
She deals huge damage and competes with both Jaina and Kael Thas whilst having higher range, teleports and a reset ability. However, Kael and Jaina have things going for them as well, in the form of superior AOE damage/zoning on one hand, and high CC and stronger single target burst (and AOE vulnerable) on the other.
I find it only logical that Blizzard does not drop the nerf hammer within ONE week of her release, because of the aforementioned facts. They want to observe her a bit more, see what people come up with. FYI, Spyrian has already made note of possible changes to her and that they are very closely watching her:
Spyrian - Community ManagerLi-Ming has only been available for a week, and we want to take a little more time to see how she settles into the metagame as everyone gets more experience playing with and against her. We agree with the feedback we’re seeing that she’s a little too strong right now, and while there are adjustments we’d like to make, we want to be sure that the changes we do make are healthy for the game. We’re currently looking to adjust several Talents, including Astral Presence and Ess of Johan, but we haven’t finalized these changes just yet. Source: http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/forum/topic/20742124461#17
So saying it is all about the $$$ after half a dozen 'UP' releases and their new stance on balance, is quite uncalled for. It is impossible to release a hero at exactly 50% winrate and the one time a new release is above that the moneygrab whining starts. It's quite despicable.
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Caldeum1976 Posts
On February 12 2016 16:19 SC2Toastie wrote: Pro teams haven't even really used Li Ming in competitive games, and because of this, we've not seen a proper counter strategy employed yet either. It's really hard to figure out a solid strategy in QM/Solo queue HL, because people are not on the same page and the coordination required is hard, to say the least. I just want to point out that new heroes/maps are not allowed in competitive play for a short while after release, otherwise we'd see her (well in the ban phase at least).
I do agree with you though, saying it's about the money is beyond stupid.
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On February 12 2016 16:43 Valiver wrote:Show nested quote +On February 12 2016 16:19 SC2Toastie wrote: Pro teams haven't even really used Li Ming in competitive games, and because of this, we've not seen a proper counter strategy employed yet either. It's really hard to figure out a solid strategy in QM/Solo queue HL, because people are not on the same page and the coordination required is hard, to say the least. I just want to point out that new heroes/maps are not allowed in competitive play for a short while after release, otherwise we'd see her (well in the ban phase at least). I do agree with you though, saying it's about the money is beyond stupid. I know there are restirictions on new heroes in pro play, maybe I should have phrased that better.
What I ment to say is, we've not SEEN her pushed to her limits nor have we seen counter strategies to her, so we don't know how she operates in the professional environment.
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1. Blizzard is a company which goal is to make profit (and that's a good thing). They have to balance keeping interest up for the game and making profit out of it. It's only normal that it hurts the game from time to time. 2. We can't deny the fact Li Ming is in 90% master games and Reghar is in 100% right now, and it hurts the game. I think people are disappointed because of this, and it's understandable.
On February 12 2016 07:26 Thezzy wrote: In Try Mode I've found that going for the Pinning Shot build with One in the Chamber still beats Snipe Master handily. The immediate burst is lower but overall the damage output of double Crippling Shot with 80% bonus damage on your AA just beats the 60% boost on the one Snipe. And it doesn't have the major downside that you can't use Snipe on anything but a Hero.
I'm pretty sure both are viable now but pinning shot build is the most powerful, especially after level 16. If the game isn't lost already you'll win for sure, double vulnerability really hurts. I really don't want to play snipe build as 2x crippling shot is too good to pass but I'll try it in QM this week-end.
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On February 12 2016 19:07 SC2Toastie wrote:Show nested quote +On February 12 2016 16:43 Valiver wrote:On February 12 2016 16:19 SC2Toastie wrote: Pro teams haven't even really used Li Ming in competitive games, and because of this, we've not seen a proper counter strategy employed yet either. It's really hard to figure out a solid strategy in QM/Solo queue HL, because people are not on the same page and the coordination required is hard, to say the least. I just want to point out that new heroes/maps are not allowed in competitive play for a short while after release, otherwise we'd see her (well in the ban phase at least). I do agree with you though, saying it's about the money is beyond stupid. I know there are restirictions on new heroes in pro play, maybe I should have phrased that better. What I ment to say is, we've not SEEN her pushed to her limits nor have we seen counter strategies to her, so we don't know how she operates in the professional environment.
She was selected in pro play right away or better yet, first banned constantly. With Rehgar not being nerfed yet..
And sure the hero will develop, you don't know exactly for sure where a hero ends up. But every hero has always risen in performance after it's release, the gain you get from knowing how to play a hero better, how to talent etc. is bigger than what there is to be gained in counterplay.
Arguing it's a money grab is a bit of hyperbole of course but it's not far off I think and not such an outrageous statement. Li-ming is not just winning a lot, she has silly play. Her sieging capabilities especially are just highly annoying, it's like Leorky style Leoric on release just going for buildings. Sure you can counterplay it to some extent but it's very hard to stop in uncoordinated teams and she performs excellent without that abuse too. And it's not like swift changes are so hard, nova and rehgar got a fix now after just a week and leoric got a small fix within a week.
She is responsible for the worst HL metagame since Leoric release now because the gap with her and the second best hero (rehgar or zagara probably) is pretty damn big so first pick is huge in HL now. Tyrande was good but getting her and first pick wasn't as oppressive I feel. I also noticed a sharp increase in games just not starting now because someone disconnects, usually after stuff like first pick not taking li-ming.
They are just way too reluctant on doing quick fixes. They do nerf Kael into the ground while working on an overhaul, why not just nudge Li-ming down while assessing how to better fix her. For example just reduce range on W and Q by 10% and put astral presence from 100% to 75% and think about bigger structural changes in the meantime.
It's naive to think the hero being new and she being sold a lot still having nothing to do with this.
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They want to rework or remove Ess of Johan, which probably takes more than a week to either significantly change or come up with a replacement talent. They are looking into Astral Presence, but no word on what they are considering. They consider her teleport breaking targeting abilities to be a bug which significantly reduces the weakness of a low health pool. They apparently weren't able to fix that in a week. I suspect they want to fix those specific items all at once rather than do placeholder nerfs for a week or two. That being said I would not have been opposed if they just removed Ess of Johan with no replacement as a temporary fix to the problem, with a patch note that they will have a replacement talent in the near future. They have already admitted that she is too strong, but another week of data will give them an increased feel for just how much needs to be nerfed.
I don't think sales is much of a factor. Every weak new hero that has been released since Leoric has still been featured in virtually every game for the week or two after release. A more powerful hero will sell more, but if that was the primary goal, why not buff weak new heroes after a week of play? That would sell more. The trend is they wait, sometimes really long waits, to make changes whether a hero is too good or too weak.
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