Heroes of the Storm is a free-to-play MOBA that defies genre conventions and reshapes how the battle arena is played. In the game, noble warriors and sinister villains from the Warcraft, StarCraft, Diablo, and Overwatch universes enter the Nexus, the crossroads of Blizzard’s multiverse, and compete in epic, no-holds-barred combat.
At BlizzCon 2018, we’re 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.
