Heroes of the Storm patch adds Kael’thas Sunstrider

Heroes of the Storm was updated today with a huge new patch.  The big news is the release of Kael’thas Sunstrider, a new ranged assassin hero.

The patch notes are quite lengthy, so at the end of the post will be a link to Blizzard’s official site and the full patch notes.  Here are some quick highlights.

Kael’thas Sunstrider

Trait

• Verdant Spheres (D)
  • Activate to make your next Basic Ability more powerful.

Basic Abilities

• Flamestrike (Q)
  • After a short delay, deal damage in an area.
  • Verdant Spheres (Trait) — Increases Flamestrike’s radius and damage.
• Living Bomb (W)
  • Damages an enemy over a short time, after which the target will explode, damaging all nearby enemies. Casting a second Living Bomb on an enemy causes the first to explode immediately.
  • Verdant Spheres (Trait) — Removes Living Bomb’s Mana cost and cooldown.
• Gravity Lapse (E)
  • Stuns the first enemy hit.
  • Verdant Spheres (Trait) — Causes Gravity Lapse to stun the first 3 enemies in its path.

Heroic Abilities

• Phoenix (R)
  • Launch a Phoenix to target area, dealing damage to enemies along the way. The Phoenix persists, attacking enemies, and dealing splash damage to those near its primary attack target.
• Pyroblast (R)
  • After a short delay, cast a slow-moving fireball that deals massive damage to an enemy, and medium damage to enemies near the target.

As a ranged assassin, Kael’thas will want to stay toward the back fights trying to pick off squishy heroes that are out of position.  Speaking of out of position, his basic kit has no added mobility, so once he gets caught, it is difficult for him to get away.  Managing his trait will be one of the keys to success with Kael’thas.  A well timed 3 person stun or a bigger flamestrike picking off an otherwise safe target can turn a fight in your favor.  Kael’thas is available for purchase in the Shop for 15,000 gold or $9.99 US Dollars (NA server).

There are also some significant balance changes in this patch.  Many melee warrior heroes have been adjusted with E.T.C. and Diablo getting heavily reworked.  The healing totem that several heroes have access to through talents also got a slight balance adjustment.  Instead of taking a direct attack to kill it, the totem is now affected by AOE attacks in addition to single target and has scaling health based on your hero’s level.

The other noteworthy change with this patch is that players with a player level of 25 (or above) will no longer have to get a hero to level 4 to unlock all talents and heroic abilities.  This is a nice quality of life improvement that should make it easier for players with some experience at the game to pick up new heroes.

There is a lot more too this patch so the full patch notes can be found at the official page here.

There is still time to try Heroes of the Storm before it officially launches on June 2nd.  If you are new to the game or just looking for some cool people to play with, come try it with us Agents.  Keep an eye out for AGRitterific in game, or PM me for a friend request.