Greymane Abilities and Strategy

• Use Minions, Summons and Structures to trigger Gilnean Cocktail's increased cone damage against Heroes.
• Inner Beast's duration can be increased by attacking anything — not just Heroes.
• Razor Swipe is useful for quickly avoiding skillshots and area of effect Abilities.
• A marker appears above Heroes that would die to Go for the Throat's damage.
• Cursed Bullet should not be used as a poke tool. It is extremely important to have it ready to follow up an engage on any character, as its damage is essential for the kill.
• Darkflight's Cooldown runs while Greymane is in Worgen form. Cursed Bullet can be used during that form to become Human, allowing Greymane to instantly use Darkflight again.
• Greymane gets 10 Armor during Worgen form. Use it to take less damage from unavoidable spells, like Pyroblast.
• If you are not in Melee range from your target, Go for the Throat can be used to give you 1-4 frames of unstoppable, removing blinds affecting you.
• During a blind, you cannot refresh Inner Beast's duration through Basic Attacks. At that moment, you should use an Ability to not lose the Attack Speed buff (assuming you picked Viciousness at Level 1).

Although we typically list Hero Abilities in their in-game order, Greymane's Trait is quite unique in that it certainly impacts the rest of his Abilities. It is thus listed first, so as to provide a clearer context for everything else.

Curse of the Worgen passively causes Greymane's Basic Attacks to have a Range of 5.5 (the average for the majority of ranged Heroes) while in Human form, and to deal 40% more damage and gain 10 Armor while in Worgen form, at the cost of becoming melee. This effect also dictates which Abilities are currently available to Greymane; the Human form has access to Gilnean Cocktail and Darkflight, whereas the Worgen form has access to Razor Swipe and Disengage.

By default, Greymane assumes his ranged Human form. There are two ways of becoming Worgen: Darkflight and Go for the Throat. Becoming Human again is achieved through Disengage, Cursed Bullet, mounting, or dying. Although there is no inherent cooldown to transforming, the act is in of itself "gated" behind the base cooldown of the aforementioned Abilities.

Properly using Greymane's alternate forms is absolutely key to his mastering. For general Hero combat, one should associate the Human form with lower, safer damage. The Worgen form should be reserved for situations where burst damage is needed and relatively safe to carry out. This very basic breakdown, of course, fluctuates and is entirely dependent upon the current situation at hand. Variables such as strategic advantages (Cooldowns, Experience or numerical advantage, position, pressure), team compositions, and win condition must all be gauged to figure out exactly when to exploit either form. This comes with much practice... and many unjustifiable deaths.

For PvE purposes, such as razing Structures of claiming Mercenary Camps, the Worgen form is often preferred for its markedly higher sustained damage potential. It also allows Disengage to be used to withdraw from potential ganking attempts.

Gilnean Cocktail's high area of effect damage makes it a key component for Greymane's waveclear and Mercenary clear speed. Aside from that, it is a good addition to his teamfight damage.

Gilnean Cocktail is typically used in such a way that it will hit as many enemy Heroes as possible. One of your most important goals is to bring the Health of key targets down to or below 50% of their maximum so as to threaten a kill to jeopardise their ability to contribute to engagements. Consistency with Gilnean Cocktail hits goes a long way towards this goal.

It is important to always try and use Gilnean Cocktail before turning to Worgen so as to avoid leaving its cooldown unexploited. The Ability's near-instantaneous cast time makes it hard to justify anything less, unless your intended target would outright die to Go for the Throat to meet its on-kill clause.

Razor Swipe replaces Gilnean Cocktail while in Worgen form.

Razor Swipe provides Greymane with outstanding combat mobility which, in turn, translates into high uptime. Combined with the large Basic Attack increase provided by Curse of the Worgen and Inner Beast, Greymane becomes one of the most dangerous Heroes to have pressure any non-Tank, and particularly when defensive Abilities have been expended. With proper positioning, Razor Swipe can even be used to body block escaping or chasing foes. This becomes particularly obvious with the Level 13 Talent Unfettered Assault. Its speed also makes it useful for dodging impending delayed Abilities, such as Jaina's Blizzard.

For general PvE purposes, Razor Swipe can also provide a modest area of effect damage increase at a reasonable Mana cost, making the Ability particularly useful for waveclearing or rapidly claiming Mercenary Camps.

Inner Beast is what pushes Greymane's sustain damage to levels beyond that of most Assassins. Although the Ability is not particularly difficult to use, maintaining its effects over extended periods of time is what separates mediocre from strong Greymane players. It is worth noting that any hostile target can be used to refresh the Ability—from Heroes to Minions to Structures to Summons—making paying attention to your immediate environment for Basic Attack opportunities an important skill to develop. Inner Beast should absolutely be used to speed up any Mercenary Camp claiming or sieging process, granted that no potential PvP encounter is inbound.

Inner Beast's cooldown is reduced every time he hits someone while it is active, refunding it all after 40 Basic Attacks (20 with Wolfheart). For this reason, it is important to constantly attack Minions, Structures, or Mercenaries during it.

Darkflight is Greymane's main way of becoming Worgen, giving it an important double purpose beyond that of being a reliable gap closer. It is generally held onto until an important target is at 50% or less of their maximum Health, however, in dueling situations, it should be used earlier so as to benefit from the damage increase provided by Curse of the Worgen and opening up Disengage for escaping purposes. In a pinch, however, Darkflight itself can be used as an escape move by using it on a target directly away from whatever may be chasing you and following up with Razor Swipe for more distance.

Disengage is essentially the opposite of Darkflight. As its name implies, it is particularly useful for escaping, as unlike Darkflight, it does not require a target to be used. This does not mean, however, that it can not be used for chasing purposes as well; turning Human has some interesting implications, as escaping the ranged Basic Attacks and impending Gilnean Cocktail would be very difficult for any Hero.

Here we explain how this Heroic Ability works. If you are looking for more information about it, check the dedicated section in the Talent Build page.

Go for the Throat perfectly complements Greymane's playstyle by providing him with potent unavoidable burst damage and yet another gap closer. The Ability is almost the same as Darkflight in terms of functionality, with the usage consideration timing being the biggest differing factor. A best-case scenario is to work with your teammates so as to poke down one or several targets so that you may outright use Gilnean Cocktail, Darkflight, Razor Swipe, and Go for the Throat to almost instantly dispatch your intended target. It should be noted, however, that one should not obsess over the on-kill reset clause of the Ability; in a pinch, Go for the Throat is just a long-range gap closer that just deals a large amount of damage.

Here we explain how this Heroic Ability works. If you are looking for more information about it, check the dedicated section in the Talent Build page.

Cursed Bullet's power lies in its ability to deal some of the game's highest burst damage from range. The fact that Cursed Bullet's damage scales with how healthy the target is means that you should see to hit targets that are close to or at full Health in order to maximise the Ability's damage potential. This fact also justifies using the Ability against Tanks, something that is not generally recommendable. This is not to say, however, that Cursed Bullet should exclusively be used against such Heroes; 35% of any given target's current Health is enough to endanger any Hero, especially when chaining up with Gilnean Cocktail and Darkflight. Another important aspect of Cursed Bullet is that it allows you to become Human without the use of Disengage, permitting the use of Darkflight as a gap closer while maintaining the damage increase probided by Curse of the Worgen.

As with all skillshot Heroic Ability, it is important that you practice (in Try Mode or otherwise) to get a good feel of the Ability's projectile's flight speed. It should be noted that the projectile passes through anything that is not a Hero.

Despite Cursed Bullet being a fast projectile and having low cooldown, Greymane should avoid using it just to poke enemies, as they can be easily healed if his team cannot finish the target. Therefore, it is better to use it to follow up a team's engage. it should be used as soon as an enemy gets controlled, to quickly burst them.