Hero Updates

Base

• Quickcast Settings
  • Removed Double Up.
  • Removed Seasoned Soldier.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that caused Into the Fray to display as Lok-tar Ogar! in Quickcast menu.
• Lok-tar Ogar! now display as an active upgrade instead of a passive.

Bug Fixes

• Unrivaled Strength bonus is now additive.

Hero Updates

• Difficulty updated from Medium to Hard.

Abilities

• Wrecking Ball [E]
  • Wrecking Ball will now reveal targets hit by the landing for 2 seconds.
• Into the Fray [Active]
  • Into the Fray will now reveal targets hit by the landing for 2 seconds.
• Decimate [R2]
  • Decimate will now reveal targets hit for 2 seconds.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Into the Fray [Active]
  • Moved from Level 7.
  • Armor reduced from 25 to 20.

Talents

• Level 7
  • Intimidation [Q]
    • Attack Speed reduction reduced from 40% to 30%.
  • Oppressor [W]
    • Changed from a Passive talent to a Bloodthirst [W] talent.
    • Spell Power reduction reduced from 40% to 30%.
    • Additional functionality: Bloodthirst also applies the Spell Power reduction.
  • (New) Lok-tar Ogar! [Active]
    • Increase Into the Fray Armor by 20.
    • Into the Fray's cooldown is reduced by 12 seconds for each enemy Hero hit.

Developer Comment: Into the Fray has become a crucial part of what is expected from Garrosh, so we're just giving in to the mad Warchief. We're also mildly lowering the power of his level 7 talents to make up for this addition.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Bloodthirst [W]
  • Ability Effects now occur at the start of the Ability's cast, rather than at the end.

Talents

• Level 1
  • Body Check [Active]
    • Cooldown reduced from 16 to 15 seconds.
    • Slow duration increased from 2 to 3 seconds.
• Level 16
  • Mortal Combo has been reclassified as an [E] talent.
  • Rough Landing [Q]
    • Removed.
  • New Talent: Seasoned Soldier [Passive]
    • Gain 5% maximum Health, increase Groundbreaker's Slow duration by 1 second, and Bloodthirst gains an additional charge.
• Level 20
  • Death Wish [R1]
    • Additional functionality: Increase the duration of Warlord's Challenge by .5 seconds.
  • Deadly Calm [R2]
    • Damage reduction increased from 25% to 40%.
  • Inner Rage [Active]
    • No longer causes the cooldown of Body Check to recharge faster.
    • Additional functionality: Increase the healing reduction of Body Check by an additional 45%.

Developer Comment: We've had some feedback that many of Garrosh's late- game talents aren't impactful enough and we agreed, so we're making some improvements in this area.

Bug Fixes

• Helping Hand and Into the Fray no longer can be cast on Turrets placed by themselves or allies.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue where Garrosh would fail to throw moving targets.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Wrecking Ball [E]
  • Cooldown increased from 14 to 16 seconds

Talents

• Level 1
  • Unrivaled Strength [E]
    • Damage bonus increased from 75% to 125%
  • Body Check [Active]
    • Slow amount reduced from 40% to 35%
    • No longer deals bonus damage or Slow amount based on Armor Up's bonus
    • Additional functionality: Now causes enemies to receive 40% reduced Healing for the next 3 seconds
• Level 7
  • Brute Force [Active]
    • Removed
• Level 10
  • Decimate [R1]
    • Slow amount increased from 30% to 40%
• Level 16
  • Mortal Combo [Q]
    • Cooldown reduction increased from 9 to 10 seconds
    • Additional Functionality: Now also gives Garrosh cooldown reduction if an enemy Hero is hit by Groundbreaker within 3 seconds of being hit by Wrecking Ball.
• Level 20
  • Deadly Calm [R2]
    • Damage reduction increased from 20% to 25%

Developer Comment: While Garrosh is incredibly popular due to his ability to heavily displace enemy Heroes, he is not outperforming other Heroes in the game, sitting at a 48% win rate at higher levels of play in the hands of people who are skilled with him specifically. At lower levels of play his win rate drops to 47.2%, where he wins the award for being the second lowest win-rate Warrior in the game. We're slightly nerfing Wrecking Ball's cooldown to help address his high popularity and frustrations playing against him, and buffing some of his under-picked talents to better compete with their peers to help stabilize his talent tree.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Mana cost increased from 30 to 40

Developer Comment: As we promised in the past, we took a look at the overall Mana tension of all the Heroes in the game. We also have some philosophies about Mana that we want to keep going forward. They are:

1. Mana should be a meaningful part of the game, particularly in the early stages when wave clear is at a higher premium. We believe that as the game progresses, Mana tension should become less important as Heroes gain more base Mana and the game's focus shifts to team fighting.
2. Mana tension doesn't have to be the same for every Hero, but every Hero should feel it to some degree, otherwise it serves no purpose.
3. We like that some talents heavily mitigate Mana tension.

When we took a look at Mana tension in the game, we saw that, overall, things are in a fairly healthy spot, but could be fine-tuned and improved upon. We like the tension that the heroes who are closer to the middle of the spectrum have, with some examples being Malfurion, Tychus, and E.T.C. Our goal with these changes is to bring the outliers closer to the center. We are open to your feedback going forward if you think that the game needs to be stricter or more lenient in this area, or if you believe there are any outliers that we missed.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh is no longer able to throw Hanamura Temple's Payload

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 1
  • Body Check (Active)
    • Minimum Movement Speed Slow increased from 30 to 40%. Maximum Movement Speed Slow remains at 60%
• Level 13
  • Bloodcraze (W)
    • Healing increased from 10% to 15% maximum Health
  • Double Up (Active)
    • Cooldown reduced from 40 to 30 seconds

Bug Fixes

• Diablo: Fixed an issue that prevented Diablo from being thrown by Garrosh's Wrecking Ball if Diablo was casting Overpower.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Can now correctly cast Into the Fray on Unstoppable allied Heroes.

• Garrosh: Warlord's Challenge no longer cancels Abilities that end upon taking damage, like Muradin's Second Wind or Fenix's Shield Capacitor.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Can no longer use Into the Fray to throw an allied Boss.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Cooldown increased from 7 to 8 seconds.
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  • Cooldown increased from 12 to 14 seconds.

Talents

• Level 16
  • Mortal Combo (Q)
    • Cooldown reduction increased from 7 to 9 seconds.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Casting Into the Fray on Abathur now correctly interrupts Symbiote Channeling.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Stun duration reduced from 0.75 to 0.5 seconds.
  • Slow amount increased from 35% to 40%.

Talents

• Level 16
  • Rough Landing (Q)
    • Bonus Slow amount reduced from 15% to 10%.

Developer Comment: These changes are meant to make the immediate aftermath of being thrown by Wrecking Ball a little less punishing for Garrosh's opponents, particularly when he throws an enemy Hero and then Stuns them with Groundbreaker. We're slightly reducing Groundbreaker's Stun duration so that enemy Heroes can more quickly pop defensive cooldowns to try to survive. We're also compensating Garrosh with a slight increase to Groundbreaker's Slow. This way, he can still reliably catch enemies if he starts with Groundbreaker and wants to close in for a throw.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Enemies within line of sight blockers who are hit by Groundbreaker at maximum range are now correctly revealed.

Bug Fixes

• Stitches: Hook visual effects will no longer persist indefinitely if the target is thrown by Garrosh’s Wrecking Ball while being pulled toward Stitches.

Bug Fixes

• Movement Abilities: Certain movement-based Abilities, like Greymane’s Dark Flight or Chen’s Flying Kick, will no longer fail to move the Hero toward a target currently affected by Varian’s Taunt or Garrosh’s Warlord’s Challenge.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Slow amount increased from 30 to 35%
  • Cooldown decreased from 8 to 7 seconds
  • Mana cost decreased from 35 to 30
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  • Cooldown decreased from 14 to 12 seconds
  • Mana cost decreased from 65 to 60

Talents

• Level 1
  • Warbreaker (Q)
    • Cooldown reduction decreased from 3 to 2 seconds
    • Damage increased from 50 to 55
  • Unrivaled Strength (E)
    • Bonus damage reduced from 125 to 75%
• Level 7
  • Into the Fray (1)
    • Cooldown increased from 40 to 45 seconds
• Level 16
  • Earthshaker (E)
    • Stun duration reduced from .6 to .5 seconds
  • Mortal Combo (E)
    • Cooldown reduction decreased from 8 to 7 seconds
  • Rough Landing (Q)
    • Slow bonus amount decreased from 20 to 15%

Developer Comment: While the changes to Groundbreaker have helped Garrosh feel better to play against, we believe he can use some help with his ability to peel for his team and control the battlefield. We’re also making some tuning changes to his talents to help their pick and win rates.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Talent descriptions for Inner Rage and Brute Force will no longer swap when selecting either Talent.

Hero Updates

Stats

• Health increased from 1970 to 2060
• Health Regeneration increased from 4.102 to 4.293

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Groundbreaker no longer pulls enemy Heroes to Garrosh
    • Instead, Groundbreaker now knocks enemy Heroes into the air, Stunning them for 0.75 seconds, and then Slowing them by 30% for 2 seconds
  • Talent tooltips for Warbreaker, Defensive Measures, Rough Landing, and Mortal Combo have been updated to reflect this change
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  • Cooldown reduced from 16 to 14 seconds
  • Mana cost reduced from 70 to 65

Talents

• Level 16
  • Mortal Combo (Q)
    • Cooldown reduction granted to Wrecking Ball decreased from 10 to 8 seconds
    • Window of time to throw enemies increased from 2 to 3 seconds

Developer Comment: While he is well balanced with regard to his win- rate, Garrosh has been widely considered more punishing than other Warriors compared to the amount of counter-play he offers. While we love his playstyle and the epic moments he can create, we wanted to reduce the amount of frustration he can cause opponents. We’ve added a window of time between being hit by Groundbreaker and being thrown into the enemy team, which should help players have more opportunity to outplay him. We’re also looking at other Heroes who are lacking in counter-play, or are overly frustrating to play against, and are planning to make similar changes to them in the future.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Casting Wrecking Ball on Mercenaries will no longer cause them to leash while in combat.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Stukov’s Weighted Pustule will no longer be removed from targets hit by Wrecking Ball or Into the Fray.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 16
  • Earthshaker (E)
    • Stun duration decreased from .75 to .6 seconds

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Casting Body Check with the Brute Force Talent on a Boss will no longer cause a Healing debuff icon to appear next to its Health bar.

• Garrosh: Fixed an issue causing Body Check to receive less bonus damage than intended after casting Double Up to reach 50 Armor.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 20
  • Death Wish (R)
    • No longer increases the duration of Warlord’s Challenge

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Bloodthirst will no longer cause Garrosh to automatically retarget his Basic Attacks to the closest enemy.

• Garrosh: Into the Fray will no longer place targeting indicators on attacking Hydralisks on Braxis Holdout.

• Garrosh: Using Body Check with the Brute Force Talent on a Boss no longer causes the Healing debuff icon to appear next its Health bar.

• Garrosh: Wrecking Ball will no longer end Rehgar’s Ghost Wolf.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Mana cost increased from 30 to 35
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  • Mana cost increased from 60 to 70
• Decimate (R)
  • Mana cost decreased from 30 to 25

Talents

• Level 1
  • Body Check (Active)
    • Cooldown decreased from 20 to 16 seconds
• Level 7
  • Into the Fray (Active)
    • Cooldown increased from 30 to 40 seconds

Developer Comment: These changes are a response to community feedback about Garrosh’s Mana costs. We initially kept them relatively low, as he is a fairly low impact Warrior when his combo is not available to him, however we agreed with the feedback and felt that he could use more Mana management.

Bug Fixes

• Garrosh: Fixed an issue that could cause Wrecking Ball to fail to throw a target but go on a full cooldown.

• Garrosh: Intimidation will no longer slow non-Heroic enemies’ attack speeds.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Warlord's Challenge (R)
  • Taunt duration increased from 1.5 to 2 seconds

Talents

• Level 1
  • Unrivaled Strength (E) Updated
    • Increased throw range from 20 to 25% 30%, and bonus damage from 100 to 125%
• Level 4
  • In for the Kill (W)
    • Increased bonus damage from 60 to 70%
• Level 7
  • Into the Fray (Active)
    • No longer costs Mana

New Hero

As the new warchief of the Horde, Garrosh is a proud and vicious warrior who rules with an iron fist. His hatred for the Alliance burns like wildfire, and he will stop at nothing to destroy them. By his axe, the orcs will reclaim their rightful glory.

Trait

• Armor Up
  • Garrosh gains 1 Armor for every 2% of maximum Health missing.

Basic Abilities

• Groundbreaker (Q)
  • Deal damage to enemies in an area. Heroes hit on the outer edge are pulled toward Garrosh.
• Bloodthirst (W)
  • Deal damage to an enemy and Heal for 10% of Garrosh’s missing Health. Healing is increased by 100% against Heroes.
• Wrecking Ball (E)
  • Throw a nearby enemy Hero, Minion, or Mercenary to the target location, dealing damage enemies near the impact and slowing them by 30% for 2.5 seconds.

Heroic Abilities

• Warlord's Challenge (R)
  • Silence nearby Heroes and force them to attack Garrosh for 1.5 seconds.
• Decimate (R)
  • Deal damage to nearby enemies and Slow them by 30% for 1.5 seconds. Deals 100% more damage to Heroes, and each Hero hit reduces the cooldown by 1 second.
  • Stores up to 3 charges.