Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 20
  • Bulwark of Light [R1]
    • Added a radius indicator while targeting with Divine Shield.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that caused Divine Protection to be inconsistent in how it is applied to an already active Devotion Armor.

• Fixed an issue that caused Tyr's Deliverance to apply its bonus to the active Holy Radiance, instead of the next Holy Radiance.

• Fixed an issue that caused Wave of Light quest reward to revert Divine Protection's duration increase if completed after selecting Divine Protection.

• Fixed an issue that caused Wave of Light to not grant its full quest reward benefit to Armor granted to Uther if Divine Protection is selected.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 4
  • Holy Fire [Passive]
    • Added to the Buff Bar.
• Level 16
  • Beacon of Light [Q]
    • Added a health threshold indicator.

Bug Fixes

• Holy Radiance now displays as a crit when Uther has Spellpower bonuses.
• Beacon of Light now only causes Holy Light to display as a crit when under 50% health.

Hero Updates

• Difficulty updated from Easy to Hard.

Abilities

• Holy Radiance [W]
  • Holy Radiance will now reveal the effect area for 0.75 seconds.
  • Holy Radiance will now reveal enemy targets hit.
• Divine Storm [R2]
  • Divine Storm will now reveal the effect area for 0.75 seconds.
  • Divine Storm will reveal the target for 2 seconds.

Bug Fixes

• Uther's Heroics will no longer be hidden while Spirit Form is active. He will not be capable of casting them.
• Fixed an issue that caused Holy Fire's damage aura to display as a critical when damage was not increased.

Bug Fixes

• Resolved issues when the attacker is Blinded or the enemy is Evading with:
  • Uther's Hammer of the Lightbringer
  • Valeera's Slice and Dice and Rupture
  • Varian's Heroic Strike
  • Whitemane's Saintly Greatstaff and Scarlet Wrath
  • Zeratul's Master Warp-Blade, Psionic Strength, Shadow Hunter, and Unwavering Pressure
  • Zul'jin's Grievous Throw , Eye of Zul'jin, and Let the Killing Begin

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Devotion [Trait]
  • Adjusted Functionality: Uther's Basic Abilities grant 25 Armor to allied Heroes, and 15 to Uther, for 2 seconds.

Talents

• Level 16
  • Beacon of Light [Q]
    • Self-healing bonus increased from 100% to 125%.
    • Self-healing bonus at low Health increased from 200% to 250%.
  • Tyr's Deliverance [W]
    • Maximum stacks increased from 4 to 7.
• Level 20
  • Divine Protection [Trait]
    • Additional Functionality: Sets Devotion Armor for both allied Heroes and Uther to 50.

Developer Comment: We don't dislike Uther being capable of playing a frontline role, but we do believe he's doing so a little too freely. This should make it a little more expensive for Uther to rush into danger.

Bug Fixes

• Tyr's Deliverance no longer increases Uther's Holy Light self Healing.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 4
  • Holy Fire [Passive]
    • Now has Crit kickers when dealing bonus damage.
• Level 7
  • Guardian of Ancient Kings [Trait]
    • Adjusted functionality: Healing a Hero that is Stunned, Rooted, or Silenced grants them 50 Armor for 3 seconds.

Developer Comment: We're giving Guardian of Ancient Kings a needed buff and adding a better tuning knob to balance the talent in the future by unlinking the duration of its Armor bonus from Devotion.

Hero Updates

Stats

• Health reduced from 2000 to 1975.
• Health Regeneration reduced from 4.17 to 4.11.

Abilities

• Holy Radiance [W]
  • Cooldown reduced from 12 to 10 seconds.
  • Mana cost reduced from 70 to 55.
  • Healing amount increased from 177 to 194.

Talents

• Level 1
  • Wave of Light [W]
    • Cooldown reduction reduced from 1 to .75 seconds.
• Level 16
  • Beacon of Light [Q]
    • Adjusted functionality: Uther receives 100% bonus self-healing when healing others with Holy Light. This bonus is increased to 200% while he is below 50% Health.
  • Tyr's Deliverance [W]
    • New functionality: Increase the damage and healing of Holy Radiance by 10%. Basic Attacks against enemy Heroes cause Uther's next cast of Holy Radiance to have its damage and healing increased by an additional 10%, stacking up to 4 times.

Developer Comment: While Uther's weakness to Poke and persistent AoE damage is intended, we feel he's a little too sharp in this direction, which too often disincentivizes players from running him as a Healer on his team. We're making him a bit better in this regard while also improving a couple of his Level 16 talents.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 20
  • Bulwark of Light [R1]
    • Adjusted functionality: Divine Shield is also applied to all nearby Heroes near its initial target and lasts 1 second longer.
  • Divine Protection [Trait]
    • Armor amount increased from 40 to 50.

Developer Comment: Bulwark of Light's original planned change a few months ago was to give Divine Shield to all nearby Heroes. We thought that was too crazy, so we toned it down to only give 1 additional Hero the ability. The current iteration is not performing as well as we had hoped, so we're going back to our crazy idea. Hopefully this doesn't break the game.

Bug Fixes

• The following damage effects no longer activate tower aggro: Undocumented
  • Uther Holy Fire

Hero Updates

Stats

• Health reduced from 2075 to 2000.
• Health Regeneration reduced from 4.316 to 4.168.

Abilities

• Hammer of Justice [E]
  • Cooldown increased from 8 to 10 seconds.

Talents

• Level 4
  • Holy Shock [Q]
    • Damage reduced from 50% to 40% of Holy Light's Healing.

Developer Comment: Uther has recently risen to the top of the ranks as the most powerful Healer in the game. Whether he's played as a Healer or a Tank, he has proven to be a too effective at his role, so we're reducing some of his overall power.

Hero Updates

Stats

• Health reduced from 2156 to 2075.
• Health Regeneration reduced from 4.49 to 4.32.

Talents

• Level 20
  • Bulwark of Light [R1]
    • New functionality: Divine Shield is also applied to an allied Hero with the lowest Health near its initial target, and its duration is increased by 1 second.
  • Divine Hurricane [R2]
    • Cooldown reduction increased from 20 to 40 seconds.
  • Divine Protection [Trait]
    • New functionality: Increase Devotion's Armor to 40, and its duration by .5 seconds.

Developer Comment: Uther is in a bit of a strange spot at the moment, as he has recently had a spike in his win rate, and at higher level play we've been seeing him flexed into the main tank role. We think it's pretty cool that heroes can sometimes splash into other roles, but in general Uther is overperforming, so we're lowering his Health a bit. On an unrelated note, similar to Greymane, Uther's Level 20 talents have long been dominated by one choice, in this case Redemption. We're giving the other talents on the tier some significant buffs so that they can better compete. We hope that this won't increase his win rate significantly as Redemption has always been a fairly powerful talent, and are prepared to make adjustments if this ends up not being the case.

Bug Fixes

• Uther can now /dance and /taunt during Eternal Vanguard.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Holy Light (Q)
  • Mana cost reduced from 90 to 80

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.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 7
  • Armor of Faith (Q)
    • Now has a 20-second cooldown
    • Additional functionality:
      • Now also restores 90 Mana when Uther is Stunned, Rooted, or Silenced

Developer Comment: There was a large disparity of the value that Uther could receive when taking Armor of Faith against various heroes who have small stuns that proc often against enemies (such as Johanna.) While we still like the idea of this talent turning crowd control against Uther into a boon for him, we want to be able to control its frequency so that his output isn't drastically different when facing off against certain heroes. To compensate for the loss of uptime in these situations, we are giving him a fairly significant Mana return, which should offset the cooldown reduction that he receives on Holy Light when this talent activates.

Design & Gameplay

Armor

• Now, just like Movement Speed modifiers, the game will apply only the highest (or lowest) amount of Armor to a Hero at any given time. We've adjusted ability/talent Armor values on a per Hero basis to account for this change:
  • Uther
    • Devotion (Trait)
      • Armor increased from 15 to 25

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Hammer of Justice (E)
  • Stun duration increased from .75 to 1 second

Hero Updates

Support Heroes

• We've unified certain Support abilities to only work on Heroes (not Minions or Mercenaries):
  • Holy Light (Q)

Developer Comment: We're unifying the vast majority of our heals for their intended purpose: healing allied Heroes. We're maintaining the ability for a few heals to affected Minions still where we think it's an important part of their gameplay: Lt. Morales Healing Beam (so that she can heal herself), Rehgar's Chain Heal (to allow bounces travel across Minions), Tyrael's Righteousness (because shielding Minion waves is part of the lane interaction with the ability), and Uther's Holy Radiance (to unify expectations, since it can damage Minions).

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Fixed an issue where Holy Fire's damage was affected by Spell Power.

Bug Fixes

• Artanis: Purifier Beam is now correctly interrupted if its target is a Hero with a post death effect, like Leoric or Uther, who is killed while the Ability is being cast.

• Hero Interactions: Fixed an issue that prevented unique voiceover lines from playing when a clash between two specific Heroes, such as Arthas vs. Uther, resulted in a kill.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Fixed an issue in which Uther could briefly use activated Talents after death, but prior to entering Eternal Vanguard form.

• Uther: The Silver Touch Talent’s quest rewards no longer incorrectly benefit Flash of Light.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Devotion’s tooltip now more clearly communicates that allied Heroes affected by Uther’s Basic Abilities will gain Armor, rather than Heroes Healed by Uther’s Basic Abilities. This is a tooltip correction only; the Trait’s functionality has not been changed.

Bug Fixes

• Raynor: Cooldown reduction granted by A Card to Play will no longer trigger twice after killing Leoric or Uther.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: The Well Met talent will no longer affect non-Heroic units.

Hero Updates

Stats

• Basic Attack Damage reduced from 78 to 75

Abilities

• Holy Light (Q)
  • Heal amount reduced from 380 to 362
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Heal amount reduced from 185 to 177
  • Damage reduced from 185 to 177
• Flash of Light (Q)
  • Heal amount reduced from 242 to 230
• Hammer of Justice (E)
  • Damage reduced from 114 to 109
• Divine Storm (R)
  • Damage reduced from 178 to 170

Talents

• Level 4
  • Holy Fire (Passive)
    • Damage reduced from 14 to 13

Bug Fixes

• Uther: After learning Divine Protection, Devotion Armor will now stack correctly when Healing an allied Hero using Flash of Light during Eternal Vanguard.

• Uther: Will no longer be teleported back to the allied Hall of Storms if Redemption’s cooldown completes while in Eternal Vanguard form.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Fixed an issue causing Uther to gain extra damage and healing on consecutive casts of Wave of Light.

• Uther: Uther's Hammer of Justice will no longer apply a 30% slow after the Stun effect fades.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Eternal Vanguard (Trait)
  • Armor for healing allies with Basic Abilites reduced from 25 to 15
• Holy Light (Q)
  • Healing increased from 360 to 380
  • Self-healing increased from 180 to 190
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Healing and damage increased from 160 to 185

Talents

• Level 1
  • Wave of Light (W)
    • Bonus duration to Armor buff on Quest Completion reduced from 1 to .5 seconds
    • Mana return reduced from 8 to 5 per Hero hit
• Level 4
  • Holy Fire (Passive)
    • Damage reduced from 16 to 14 per second

Developer Comment: We’ve found that by increasing the niche of Uther, players could easily build teams with 2 Supports that were incredibly difficult to counter, thereby creating a slow gameplay trend that could be frustrating to play against. We think it’s great to see double support every once in a while, but Uther enabled it too well when paired with almost any other healer. By reducing the Armor he grants via his Trait and getting a little more healing throughput, Uther should feel slightly more well-rounded.

Bug Fixes

• Auriel: Resurrecting Uther before Eternal Vanguard expires will no longer prevent him from respawning.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Holy Light (Q)
  • Healing reduced from 380 to 360
  • Self-healing reduced from 190 to 180
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Mana cost increased from 60 to 70

Bug Fixes

• Uther – Fixed an issue with the Beacon of Light talent causing it to display the wrong icon.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 1
  • Hammer of the Lightbringer (E)
    • Cooldown reduction per Basic Attack increased from 1 to 1.5 seconds
• Level 4
  • Pursuit of Justice (E)
    • Movement Speed increased from 20% to 25%
• Level 7
  • Guardian of Ancient Kings (Trait)
    • Armor reduced from 75 to 50
• Level 16
  • Benediction (Active)
    • Cooldown increased from 40 to 60 seconds

Developer Comment: When we looked at how to nerf our Paladin, we knew that Uther was designed to be great at shutting down enemy teams with lockdown, and we want to continue with that as one of his major strengths, but Guardian of Ancient Kings negated these enemy plays too well. Statistically, it isn’t outperforming the other Talents on the tier by a significant margin unless you look at the highest levels of play, but at those levels the power of this talent could feel frustrating to play against. After these changes, we think it will be a situational pick against teams with a lot of hard disables, but may not be the best choice if the team only has 1 or 2 things that will provide the increased Armor.

Hero Updates

Talents

• Level 1
  • Wave of Light (W)
    • Mana return reduced from 10 to 8

Hero Updates

Stats

• Removed passive Armor
• Base maximum Health increased from 2054 to 2156
• Health Regeneration increased from 4.28 to 4.49

Abilities

• Holy Light (Q)
  • Healing amount reduced from 427 to 380
  • Now also heals Uther for 190 if cast on an ally
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Healing amount reduced from 219 to 160 (now matches damage)
  • Mana cost reduced from 65 to 60
• Eternal Devotion (Trait)
  • Added Functionality:
    • When Uther heals anyone with a Basic Ability, they gain 25 Armor for 2 seconds. This effect does not stack with itself.

Talents

• Level 1
  • Conjurer’s Pursuit (Passive)
    • Removed
  • Wave of Light (W)
    • No longer has a cap on the Mana return and Cooldown Reduction amounts
    • Now grants the benefits when enemy Heroes are damaged
    • Increased the amount of Mana returned from 8 to 10
    • Added a quest component:
      • !Quest: Heal or damage 60 Heroes with Holy Radiance
      • !Reward: Increase the duration of Eternal Devotion’s Armor effect to 3 seconds
  • Hammer of the Lightbringer (E)
    • New functionality:
      • Uther’s Basic Attacks restore 1.5% of his maximum Mana
      • !Quest: Hit 75 enemy Heroes with Basic Attacks
      • !Reward: Basic Attacks also reduce the cooldown of Hammer of Justice by 1 second
  • Fist of Justice (E)
    • Removed
  • (New) Silver Touch (Q)
    • !Quest: Reduce damage taken from Heroes using Eternal Devotion's Armor effect
    • !Reward: After reducing 40 sources of Hero damage, reduce the Mana cost of Holy Light by 20
    • !Reward: After reducing 80 sources of Hero damage, reduce the Mana cost of Holy Light by an additional 20 and increase the cast range by 50%
• Level 4
  • Beacon of Light (Q)
    • Moved to level 16
    • New functionality:
      • While below 50% Health, Uther receives 200% more self-healing when healing others with Holy Light
  • Boundless Conviction (W)
    • Removed
  • Protective Shield (Active)
    • Removed
  • (New) Pursuit of Justice (E)
    • Casting Hammer of Justice increases Uther's Movement Speed by 20% for 3 seconds
• Level 7
  • Burden of Guilt (E)
    • Removed
  • Holy Fire (Passive)
    • Moved to level 4
    • Damage reduced from 18 to 16 per second
  • Cleanse (Active)
    • Removed
  • (New) Armor of Faith (Trait)
    • Holy Light recharges 100% faster for 6 seconds when Uther is Stunned, Rooted, or Silenced
  • (New) Guardian of Ancient Kings (Trait)
    • Healing a Stunned, Rooted, or Silenced Hero with a Basic Ability increases the Armor bonus of Eternal Devotion from 25 to 75
  • (New) Hand of Protection (Active)
    • Activate to make target ally Unstoppable for 1 second. Cannot be cast on yourself. 90 second cooldown. Basic Attack reduce this cooldown by 5 seconds.
• Level 13
  • Blessed Champion (Q)
    • Healing from Basic Attacks reduced from 20% to 15% of Holy Light, but is calculated from the combined total of Holy Light’s Ally and self heal
  • Holy Shock (Q)
    • Moved to level 4
    • No longer increases the value of Uther’s next Holy Light, but instead refunds 45 Mana when cast on an enemy
      • Holy Shock still heals Uther for 200 if cast on an enemy
  • Shrink Ray (Active)
    • Removed
  • (New) Well Met (E)
    • Hammer of Justice also reduces enemy Hero Movement Speed by 25% and damage by 25% for 3 seconds
• Level 16
  • Hardened Focus (Passive)
    • Removed
  • Righteous Defense (Q)
    • Removed
  • Gathering Radiance (W)
    • Removed
  • (New) Tyr's Deliverance (W)
    • Hitting an allied Hero with Holy Radiance increases their healing received by 40% for 6 seconds
• Level 20
  • (New) Divine Protection (Trait)
    • Eternal Devotion's Armor can now stack twice. Each new application will refresh the duration of both armor effects

Developer Comment: With Uther’s rework, we want to play up his ability to be a disruptive frontline presence, keep his role as an anti-burst Healer, but maintain the weakness of not having great sustained healing. By making Holy Light always heal Uther, he doesn’t mind as much when he takes damage from being up there. Having his abilities apply Armor is a great way to make him an effective support against teams with predictable damage, while having lower healing per second compared to the other supports. Ideally, you’ll pick Uther when your team could use a stronger frontline, when your opponents are very reliant on disabling effects, or when the enemy team has predictable incoming damage.

• (!) indicates a Questing Talent.
• Italic text indicates a NEW Talent.
• Bold text indicates a MOVED Talent.

Bug Fixes

• Spell Shield: Toggling Spell Shield will no longer cancel an active Hearthstone channel.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Talent tooltips for Hammer of the Lightbringer, Beacon of Light, and Bulwark of Light, now display proper description text in localized game clients.

Design & Gameplay

Hero Radii

• The radius of many heroes in the game have been adjusted to better match their actual model size.
  • Increased Radius - Abathur, ETC, Gul'dan, Baleog, Muradin, Misha, Sgt. Hammer, Thrall, Uther, Varian, Zagara
  • Decreased Radius - Li Li, Tracer, Valeera

Hero Updates

Stats

• Now has 10 Armor

Developer Comments: This is the first of a few changes we want to make to Uther. We're attempting to ensure that he has a distinctive niche beyond bringing Divine Shield. This is the first step in the direction of making him a tankier healer.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Benediction can no longer reduce the cooldown of two abilities if used in rapid succession.

Bug Fixes

• Spell Shield: A cooldown timer will now properly appear when Spell Shield’s effects are triggered in the same moment that the Talent was activated.

• Uther: Uther’s Health bar will no longer disappear if he is revived via the Redemption Talent after being killed by Devouring Maw.

Bug Fixes

• Damage Reduction: When two damage reduction effects, such as Resistant (25%) and Hardened Shield (75%), are simultaneously applied to a Hero, the larger effect will no longer be overridden by the lesser effect.

• Greymane: The Go for the Throat indicator will no longer visually persist above Heroes who have post-death forms, such as Uther or Leoric, after they are killed.

Talents

Spell Shield (Passive)

• Added functionality:
  • Spell Shield can now be toggled on or off to allow for better control of which Abilities you want to mitigate

Bug Fixes

• Gul'dan: Learning the Health Funnel Talent and using Drain Life to kill a Hero with a post-death effect, such as Uther, will now properly reduce Drain Life’s cooldown.

• Uther: The tooltip for the Gathering Radiance Talent will now properly indicate the amount of bonus Healing and Damage earned after multiple nearby Allies are hit by Holy Radiance.

• Fixed an issue that could cause Tyrael, Uther, and Gall players to incorrectly receive AFK Warnings due to the combination of their post-death effects and lengthy death timers at later levels.

Hero Updates

Abilities

• Divine Shield (R)
  • Mana cost reduced from 100 to 80
• Divine Storm (R)
  • Mana cost reduced from 100 to 80

Talents

• Level 1
  • Block (Passive)
    • Removed
  • Reach (Q)
    • Removed
• Level 4
  • Hammer of the Lightbringer (Passive)
    • Moved to Level 1
  • Amplified Healing (Passive)
    • Removed
  • New Talent: Beacon of Light (Passive)
    • Uther Heals himself for 30% of all Healing done to allied Heroes
• Level 7
  • Wave of Light (W)
    • Moved to Level 1
    • Mana returned reduced from 10 to 8 per target hit
    • Maximum Mana returned reduced from 50 to 40
  • Holy Fire (Passive)
    • New functionality:
      • Deal 18 damage per second to nearby enemies. Auto-attacking an enemy Hero increases this damage by 20% for 3 seconds. This effect stacks up to 3 times
  • Clairvoyance (Active)
    • Removed
• Level 13
  • Holy Shock (Q)
    • Cooldown reduction when using Holy Light against enemies increased from 4 to 6 seconds.
    • New functionality:
      • After hitting an enemy, the next Holy Light Heals for an additional 50%
  • Blessed Champion (Q)
    • New functionality:
      • After casting Holy Light, all Basic Attacks for 5 seconds will Heal Uther and all nearby allies for 20% of the amount Healed by Holy Light.
• Level 16
  • Gathering Radiance (W)
    • Each Hero that Holy Radiance passes through increases the Healing and damage of your next Holy Radiance by 8%, up to a maximum increase of 80%.
  • Imposing Presence (Passive)
    • Removed
  • New Talent: Righteous Defense (Q)
    • Heroes healed by Holy Light take 50% less damage for 2 seconds

Developer Comments: The famous “Piano Uther” build (Uther with all Activated talents) has dominated his talent choices for a long time. While we understand that many players love this kind of a Support, we also want to give him more viable options for people who don’t like so many activated abilities. We didn’t touch the old build, but we have given him more options to choose from on various talent tiers.

Bug Fixes

• Uther: Can no longer use Healing Wells while in Eternal Devotion form.

• Valla: Using Rain of Vengeance to score a killing blow on Tyrael or Uther will no longer cause an extraordinarily long respawn timer to appear while in Eternal Devotion or Archangel’s Wrath form.

Talents

Conjurer's Pursuit

• A reward has been added to this Questing Talent.
  • Quest: Gather Regeneration Globes to permanently increase Mana Regeneration by 0.10 per second, up to a maximum of 2.5 per second.
  • Reward: After gathering 25 Regeneration Globes, also increases maximum Mana by 100.

Developer Comments: We’ve added a completion point to this Talent. Upon completing its quest, players will be provided with some additional power. This allows us to offer spikes of power in-between Talent levels, or even for a single player on a team. Now, simply picking the Talent and only partially completing it is worse, but finishing the quest will return a larger reward. Choosing the right Talents on the right Battleground or with the right team composition has always been an important goal for us, and this change pushes this Talent to closer align with that goal.

Hardened Focus

• The Health bar next to the Hero Portrait will now display a marker that indicates whether the Hero is above or below 80% Health.
• Will now display an icon in the Buff bar next to the Hero Portrait while its effects are active.

Hero Updates

• Hammer of Justice (E)
  • Stun duration reduced from 1 to 0.75 seconds.
  • Cooldown reduced from 10 to 8 seconds.
  • Mana cost reduced from 50 to 40.

Developer Comments: We’ve received a lot of feedback from players regarding the popular strategy of chaining movement impairing effects, like Stuns and Roots, on an enemy Hero. While we want this to be a viable way to play, we feel it’s currently too prominent and powerful at higher levels of play. As a result, we are reducing the duration of many of these effects in the game. In scenarios where this change nerfs a character we don’t otherwise want to nerf, we’re coupling it with a buff to help offset the difference. While this change hasn’t reduced all effects that might make you lose control of your Hero, we feel these are some of the more egregious ones. As always, we will make further changes if necessary.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that caused the Hardened Focus Talent to reduce cooldowns for Uther’s Holy Light and Holy Shock more quickly than intended.

• Fixed an issue that prevented Uther’s Holy Shock from revealing the target if it was cast just as they entered a Bush or Vent.

• Holy Radiance will no longer return Mana or have its cooldown reduced when cast on non-Heroic units after learning the Wave of Light Talent.

Hero Updates

• Divine Storm (R)
  • Stun duration increased from 1.5 to 1.75 seconds.

Developer Comments: We want to make some basic improvements to a lot of the lesser-picked/lower win-rate Heroic Abilities. Most of these are pretty simple changes to make them more enticing, like adding more damage, reducing cooldowns, or lowering Mana costs. We realize that the primary use case for Abilities like Li Li’s Water Dragon or E.T.C.’s Stage Dive is not damage, but having more of it might help them feel more effective. We’re trying to do something a little bit different with Brightwing’s Emerald Wind and Malfurion’s Twilight Dream by compensating for some of the Support capability you miss out on by picking these Heroics. We’re excited to see how these go! In Thrall’s case, Sundering was a little too strong, so we’re reducing its stun duration.

Talents

Block

• Damage reduction increased from 50% to 75%

Developer Comments: We want to improve counter-pick talents like Block that are meant to be strong against certain hero types. We’re hoping that these kinds of Talents will have a more meaningful impact in games in which they are picked, and that there are more situations where the enemy team’s composition drives intelligent Talent choices.

Other effects similar to Block have been evaluated on a case-by-case basis for all Heroes, with some gaining increased Block damage reduction, while others stayed at 50%.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that could cause Uther to become stuck in a death state if he was killed while the Redemption Talent’s cooldown expired.

Design & Gameplay

General

• Damage dealt by splash and cleave attacks will no longer trigger effects that would otherwise require a direct attack to trigger (ex: Block, Spell Shield, Imposing Presence, etc.)

Talents

Block

• Block charges are now tracked in the buff bar next to the Hero portrait, and a timer has been added to show the time remaining until a new charge is generated.

Hero Updates

• Hammer of Justice (E)
  • Can no longer be cast on Structures

Talents

Cleanse

• Tooltip updated to reflect that Cleanse cannot be self-cast

Talents

Cleanse

• This Talent’s functionality has changed significantly
• Target ally now becomes Unstoppable for 1 second. Cannot be self-cast. 60 second cooldown

Developer Comments: We want to give players more options to deal with the chain-stuns that have resurged after the scaling changes went into effect. We believe this increase in power to Cleanse should allow teams some counter- play against stun-heavy compositions.

Hero Updates

• Eternal Devotion (Trait)
  • Spirit form duration decreased from 10 to 8 seconds
• Divine Shield (R)
  • Cooldown increased from 70 to 90 seconds

Developer Comments: Uther is highly contested at high levels of competitive play, so we wanted to target a few nerfs that would have a larger impact at that level. We also wanted to focus our changes on two abilities that offer very little counterplay for the enemy team.

Design & Gameplay

Summoned Unit Attacks

• Summoned unit Basic Attacks will now miss if that Summon is Blinded or the target is Evading.
• Summoned unit Basic Attacks will no longer consume Block Talent stacks.

Bug Fixes

• Uther will no longer be teleported back to the Hall of Storms if his Redemption Talent cooldown expires while he is in Eternal Devotion form.

Talents

Cleanse

Developer Comments: We didn’t like the gameplay of casting Cleanse preemptively on a target that is about to be CC’ed. For example, you see Butcher charging your Valla, and right before impact you use Cleanse on Valla, allowing her to immediately Vault away. The change also prevents healers from cleansing themselves preemptively, providing a guaranteed target if the opposing team has only secured one Cleanse. As a side note, the original reason the Unstoppable functionality was available in the first place, was to help alleviate some persistent CC effects like Putrid Bile. We didn’t want you to cleanse a Putrid Bile only to have the slow immediately reapply.

• No longer makes the target Unstoppable for 1 second
• Now adds Relentless to the target for 2 seconds (50% shorter CC duration)

Imposing Presence

Developer Comments: Statistically, it was almost never wrong to choose Imposing Presence. With this nerf, it’s still a great counter in the right situation, and as a result, we’re hoping we’ll see more play from our Basic Attack assassins.

• Attack Speed slow reduced from 50% to 40%
• The Attack Speed slow will now be removed when attacking a target that has not learned the Imposing Presence Talent

Hero Updates

• Redemption (Talent) Undocumented
  • No longer revives Uther if talent picked after death

Talents

Protective Shield

• Now Shields for 15% of the target’s maximum Health

Spell Shield

• Duration increased from 2 to 3 seconds

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue that could cause the Mana costs for Uther’s Basic Abilities to permanently increase under certain circumstances.

• Uther’s Holy Radiance will now properly damage Abathur’s Toxic Nests and Zagara’s Creep Tumors.

Talents

Clairvoyance

• Now breaks units within its radius out of Stealth, rather than revealing them

Hero Updates

• Uther has received a significant Talent update.
• Burning Rage (Talent) removed
• Sprint (Talent) removed
• Block (Talent) added at Level 1
• Amplified Healing (Talent) added at Level 4
• New Talent (Level 7): Holy Fire
  • Deals 8 (+1.6 per level) damage per second to nearby enemies
• New Talent (Level 16): Benediction
  • Activate to reduce the cost of the next Basic Ability cast by 50 Mana, and its cooldown by 10 seconds.
• Basic Attack
  • Hammer of the Lightbringer (Talent)
    • Mana restored per hit increased from 5 to 8
• Eternal Devotion (Trait)
  • Holy Devotion (Talent) removed
  • The functionality of this Trait has changed significantly.
  • Uther can no longer use his Basic Attack or his Abilities while in Eternal Devotion form.
  • Instead, Uther gains a new Ability while in Eternal Devotion form:
    • Flash of Light (Q)
      • Heal an ally for 81 (+22.5 per level) Health. 1.5 second cooldown.
  • New Talent (Level 20): Redemption
    • After Eternal Devotion ends, Uther will resurrect at the location of his spirit with 50% Health. This effect has a 180 second cooldown.
• Holy Light (Q)
  • Range has been decreased by 12.5%
  • Protect the Weak (Talent) removed
  • Reach (Talent)
    • Now increases the range of Holy Light and Flash of Light by 40%
  • Blessed Champion (Talent) moved from Level 1 to Level 13
    • The functionality of this Talent has changed.
    • After casting Holy Light, the next Basic Attack heals nearby allied Heroes for 30% of Holy Light's healing amount.
  • Holy Shock (Talent) moved from Level 16 to Level 13
    • In addition to its previous effects, Holy Shock now also reduces the cooldown of Holy Light by 4 seconds when it is used to deal damage.
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Length reduced by 16%
  • New Talent (Level 4): Boundless Conviction
    • Increases the length and width by of Holy Radiance by 40%
• Hammer of Justice (E)
  • Dense Weightstone (Talent) removed
  • Rebuke (Talent) removed
  • Fist of Justice (Talent) moved from Level 4 to Level 1
  • New Talent (Level 7): Burden of Guilt
    • After Hammer of Justice's stun fades, the target's Movement Speed is slowed by 30% for 2 seconds.
• Divine Shield (R)
  • Bulwark of Light (Talent) functionality has changed.
    • Uther no longer gains a Divine Shield when using this Talent.
    • Now increases Divine Shield’s duration by 2 seconds and reduces its cooldown by 20 seconds
• Divine Storm (R)
  • Divine Hurricane (Talent)
    • Bonus to stun radius decreased from 100% to 50%

Hero Updates

• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Gathering Radiance (Talent)
    • No longer increases healing done, and instead increases damage dealt by 10% for each enemy hit up to a maximum of 100%.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue in which Shrink Ray could fail to apply its 50% damage reduction if the target had already begun casting an Ability prior to coming under Shrink Ray’s effects.

Talents

Resurgence of the Storm

• This Talent has been removed from the game.

Bug Fixes

• The Burning Rage Talent no longer deals double damage to towers affected by the Raven Lord’s Curse on the Cursed Hollow Battleground.

Talents

Conjurer's Pursuit

• Now also increases Mana regeneration by 0.5 per second in addition to its other effects

Imposing Presence

• Attack speed slow amount increased from 30% to 50%

Resurgence of the Storm

• Cooldown increased from 120 to 180 seconds

Hero Updates

• Holy Light (Q)
  • Heal amount reduced from 150 (+44 per level) to 135 (+40 per level)
• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Gathering Radiance (Talent)
    • The damage and healing bonuses for each target hit are no longer separate.
    • Now increases damage and healing by 5% for each target hit, retaining its previous 50% maximum.

Talents

Protective Shield

• Shield value changed from 300 (+30 per level) to 185 (+35 per level)

Bug Fixes

• Kerrigan can no longer become invulnerable for the duration of her Assimilation Shield buff after landing the killing blow on an enemy Tyrael or Uther.

Talents

Cleanse

• Cast range increased from 7 to 10

Storm Shield

• Target search radius increased from 5 to 8

Hero Updates

• Rewind (Talent) has been removed from Uther.
• Divine Shield (R)
  • Bulwark of Light (Talent)
    • No longer heals the target for 40% of its maximum Health
    • Uther now also gains Divine Shield when Divine Shield is cast on an ally.​

Bug Fixes

• AI-controlled Heroes that are attempting to cast Hearthstone will now react more appropriately to an attacking Uther ghost.

• Uther’s Holy Light Ability is now properly affected by the Rewind Activated Talent.

• Uther’s Holy Shock Talent no longer allows his Holy Light Ability to target allied Structures.

• Uther’s Protect the Weak Talent can no longer be triggered by casting Holy Shock on enemy Minions or Mercenaries.

Talents

Hardened Focus

• Has been moved from Level 13 to Level 16

Rewind

• Has been moved from Level 16 to Level 13

Spell Shield

• The functionality of this talent has changed.
• Upon taking Ability Damage, now gain a shield that reduces all Ability Damage taken by 50% for 2 seconds. This can only occur once every 30 seconds.

With the addition of Artifacts, the following generic Talents have been removed:

• Minion Killer
• Path of the Assassin
• Path of the Warrior
• Path of the Wizard

Hero Updates

• Holy Radiance (W)
  • Width reduced from 3 to 2.5

Talents

Cleanse

• Cooldown decreased from 60 to 30 seconds

Hardened Focus (Level 13)

• Ability cooldowns recharge 50% faster while above 80% Health.
• Currently only available on Uther

Path of the Wizard

• Mana regeneration per level decreased from 0.2 to 0.1.

Hero Updates

• Has received significant Talent changes
• New Talent (Level 1): Blessed Champion
  • Basic Attacks heal nearby allies for 25% of Uther’s damage dealt.
• Holy Light
  • Protect the Weak (Talent)
    • The bonus cooldown and mana reduction for healing mercenaries and minions has been increased from 50% to 75%.
• Holy Radiance
  • Wave of Light (Talent)
    • Returns 10 mana and reduces the cooldown of Holy Radiance by 1 second for each target healed, up to a maximum of 50 mana and 5 seconds
• Hammer of Justice
  • Base damage reduced from 50 to 40
  • Damage gained per level reduced from 10 to 8
  • New Talent (Level 7): Divine Hammer
    • Hammer of Justice now knocks the target back.
• Divine Shield
  • Cooldown decreased from 120 to 90 seconds

Bug Fixes

• A.I. heroes should now respond more appropriately to an enemy Uther in Eternal Devotion form.

Hero Updates

• Divine Storm cooldown increased from 45 to 70 seconds
• Divine Hurricane talent
  • Bonus stun duration removed
  • Now decreases Divine Storm cooldown from 70 to 50 seconds
• Eternal Devotion
  • Base duration increased from 7 to 10 seconds
  • Holy Devotion talent no longer increases Eternal Devotion duration
• Hammer of Justice damage gain per level decreased from 14 to 10
• The Regeneration Master talent has been replaced with Path of the Wizard