Posted on by GameGnome

Heroes of the Storm, what’s new

At BlizzCon 2018, Blizzard  was excited to welcome an all-new Hero—the first ever Nexus-born Hero—as well as a number of exciting gameplay updates.

New Hero – Orphea: Heir to the mighty Raven Lord, our first Nexus-born Hero is a ranged Assassin who moves gracefully around the battlefield, brimming with youthful energy and powerful chaotic magic.

A deadly dance: When Orphea damages an enemy Hero with her Shadow Waltz ability, the cooldown is reduced and she’s able to execute a quick dash, allowing her to dance around the battlefield.

    • Master Ancestral Magic: Orphea’s trait, Overflowing Chaos, empowers her basic attack, causing it to heal her when it damages enemy Heroes, helping her stay in the fight.
  • 2019 Gameplay Update: The only thing that’s constant in the Nexus is change. This year we’re implementing updates to make matches consistently closer while still maintaining the action-packed gameplay that players have come to love so that  you’ll have to keep battling to the very end to emerge victorious!
    • Experience Updates: We’re refining the experience system to keep matches closer than ever. Destroying forts will now provide a strategic advantage, spawning a catapult every third minion wave.
    • Armor changes: Armor will no longer stack with the 2019 Gameplay Update, which makes this consistent with our movement speed buffs and debuffs. There will also be a brand-new armor UI to better communicate these effects, making the system much easier to process at a glance.
  • Answer the Call of the Nexus: Our goal is to improve the Quick Match experience for all players which is why we’re excited about our latest updates to Heroes of the Storm matchmaking:
    • Know your role: In Quick Match, the matchmaker will now prioritize including a Tank, Healer, and ranged Assassin on each team—unless you’re in a group of five, in which case, no restrictions will apply!
    • Call of the Nexus: Players who queue for roles that are in short supply will receive bonus XP for being team players.
  • Introducing Boost: The Stimpack is now called Boost, and in addition to buffing your XP and Gold gains, it’ll give all other players in that game a 5% bump in experience for each active Boost. That mean players can receive up to a 45% XP bonus if all 10 players in game have Boost active.

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