Heroes of the Storm Blaze

[Vlad 415]

This thread is for comments about our Blaze build guide for Heroes of the Storm.

[xeonio 0]

 

homonymous? Did you mean harmonious?

[Oxygen 446]

31 minutes ago, xeonio said:

 

homonymous? Did you mean harmonious?

No!

Homonymous
adjective
1. of the nature of homonyms; having the same name.

[Trensicourt 5]

Can you explain to me why Fortified Bunker is a terrible talent? You mentioned that Bunker Drop is great for keeping squishy targets safe, e.g. Blaze goes out and damages enemies while squishies hide from the burst portion of the fights. If Blaze still finds his backline annihilated, then won't it be wise to acquire this talent rather than Burn Notice? It's easy to imagine the protection 50 armor for 3 seconds brings to the backline.

 

Let's say the opposing enemy has a dive comp, e.g. Greymane, Genji, whatever. You as Blaze can't stop the gap closer; all you can do is drop a bunker while you dive and harass their backline. Kael'thas, Malfurion, whatever hides in the bunker after nearing low health. Assume that Greymane and Genji both dives in this scenario and tries to break the bunker (relatively low health). These are precious seconds where Kael'thas and Malfurion are safe where they can retaliate with moderate damage and slow enemies by setting oil spills, allowing a swift retreat if needed. Bam! The bunker explodes but Kael'thas and Malfurion have amazingly high armor for 3 seconds and can escape through the oil spills they left behind. Heck, both Malfurion and Kael'thas can trade during that instance - Malf Twilights and Roots and Kael'thas combos or Pyroblasts, due to the huge armor bonus they receive. My only concern for this talent, which is also a boon, is the "ult me" scenario where the Bunker is seen as a place to be ulted. When you get Fortified Bunker, that ult could become useless since not only would the recipients receive minimal damage but the oil spills created by Fortified Bunker would make follow ups harder.

I have not played Blaze, but I'm sure there are scenarios where this is situationally useful.

Edited January 10, 2018 by Trensicourt

[Oxygen 446]

2 hours ago, Trensicourt said:

Can you explain to me why Fortified Bunker is a terrible talent? You mentioned that Bunker Drop is great for keeping squishy targets safe, e.g. Blaze goes out and damages enemies while squishies hide from the burst portion of the fights. If Blaze still finds his backline annihilated, then won't it be wise to acquire this talent rather than Burn Notice? It's easy to imagine the protection 50 armor for 3 seconds brings to the backline.

If anything, I feel like its main protection aspect lies in deterring heroes from continuing their attacks (besides dispelling stuff); however, if for some reason, they are in fact able to burn the Bunker down quickly, they're probably positioned to take out whatever's inside, regardless of the armor it provides. The more I play, and the more I realize how "meh-gimmicky" Bunker actually is as a heroic ability. I'll stand by my initial assessment about Fortified, but I won't hide the fact that we'll need more experience and data to make the right call. Fortunately, tournaments are coming shortly!

[ShadowerDerek 69]

48 minutes ago, Oxygen said:

If anything, I feel like its main protection aspect lies in deterring heroes from continuing their attacks (besides dispelling stuff); however, if for some reason, they are in fact able to burn the Bunker down quickly, they're probably positioned to take out whatever's inside, regardless of the armor it provides. The more I play, and the more I realize how "meh-gimmicky" Bunker actually is as a heroic ability. I'll stand by my initial assessment about Fortified, but I won't hide the fact that we'll need more experience and data to make the right call. Fortunately, tournaments are coming shortly!

Bunker is mainly used for:

1) Avoiding delayed damage (like Pulse Bomb, Pyroblast)

2) Dodging targeted abilities (like Judgement, The Hunt, etc)

3) Giving 25 armor (or 50) when your teammates need it

4) Cleansing CC and DoT damage

You shouldn't hide in the Bunker like forever. Instead, enter it for the aformentioned purposes, and get out from a safe direction immediately. Don't expect much from a 40s cd heroic.

Also, your Ignite build ...... is CLEARLY a bruiser build, because it highly emphasised on dealing AOE damage. If you want to play him as a main tank, you should use Oil Spill for peeling, disruption and zoning instead. Which means, you shouldn't ignite it until it's about to expire, or when you need self heal. The 40% slow is much, MUCH better than the damage when it comes to the aformentioned purposes. That's why a main tank build should be focused on the utility from his abilities. It should be like this (I can't remember the names of the talents though):

Lv 1: The globe talent seems really strong. It provides you a reliable self-cleanse on top of 'reducing' (I don't know if collecting a globe permanently reduce the cooldown or just refund 5s of the cooldown) the cooldown of it. 

Lv 4: The increased area and slow of the oil seems really good for this build. The cooldown reduction of oil when hitting a hero with Q can be good too.

Lv 7: Since you rarely ignite the oil with people inside, the quest talent doesn't really fit here. May be increasing his siege damage can be good. 

Lv 10: Bunker should be the default choice here because it provides more utility to teammates.

Lv 13: The charge talent is really good at spreading oil, unless you need the other talents to counter someone.

Lv 16: The self heal for your D (gachiGasm) can make you really tanky. 

Lv 20: Bunker upgrade is quite good actually. It can spread more oil and give more armor, which is really nice to have. The other talent seems really, REALLY underwhelming.

You really feels like a typical assassin main who want to deal all the damage by yourself, even if you're not playing an assassin.

Edited January 10, 2018 by ShadowerDerek

[Valhalen 1,485]

Hey @Oxygen, do you know if Meltdown stacks with Suppressive Fire? I have been testing but I couldn't tell the difference yet. Technically they should, right? Against melee-oriented spell damage-based opponents (Greymane, Alarak, Thrall, Kerrigan, etc.) it should be really powerful.

On a side note, I kinda agree with @ShadowerDerek points on the Igniter build being more of a Bruiser build. Maybe adding another build option that focuses on laying carpets of Oil Spill without igniting them immediately would be nice. For instance, this is the build I tend to use when I'm solo tanking.

I honestly like Combustion more than Bunker Drop since it can be used for peeling due its massive radius, plus the Flash Fire upgrade turns Combustion into something similar to Gall's Twisting Nether.

[ShadowerDerek 69]

35 minutes ago, Valhalen said:

On a side note, I kinda agree with @ShadowerDerek points on the Igniter build being more of a Bruiser build. Maybe adding another build option that focuses on laying carpets of Oil Spill without igniting them immediately would be nice. For instance, this is the build I tend to use when I'm solo tanking.

Oxygen is very NArrow-minded (get it?) when it comes to talent choices. In most of his guide, if he finds a talent 'amazing', he'll just completely ignore any talents in the same tier and marked them as 'not recommended' with the reason being 'it must compete with powerful alternatives' without elaboration.

I sometimes criticise Kendric for recommending too many talents, but Oxygen is like the complete opposite.

40 minutes ago, Valhalen said:

I honestly like Combustion more than Bunker Drop since it can be used for peeling due its massive radius, plus the Flash Fire upgrade turns Combustion into something similar to Gall's Twisting Nether.

I don't know man. Using Combustion for peeling is kinda awkward. The fact that you need to channel it longer to have a longer slow, means that you either have to channel it pre-emptively and risk being interrupted, or the slow would be too short or too late to save your allies. As a main tank, you're gonna get CC'ed a lot. And tying it with your only defensive ability is really awful, especially when you pick the self heal on D at Lv 16.

Bunker is much more immediate, and much more impactful if you use it right. I often view Bunker as an Ice Block for your whole team.

[Guest ZeroTheSecond]

Quote

Lv 7: Since you rarely ignite the oil with people inside, the quest talent doesn't really fit here. May be increasing his siege damage can be good. 

You do realize that talent makes you ignite oil spills with basic attacks, right? Seems counterproductive since you said that the slow is better.

Considering this, your build doesn't seem that different from Oxygen's build, outside of your Heroic preference.

[Valhalen 1,485]

1 hour ago, ShadowerDerek said:

In most of his guide, if he finds a talent 'amazing', he'll just completely ignore any talents in the same tier and marked them as 'not recommended' with the reason being 'it must compete with powerful alternatives' without elaboration.

Not really. If you read his recent reworked guides, you'll see he often put situational talents and explain in what situations they'd be useful. The thing is, he has a point on deeming certain talents as "amazing", which you pointed yourself ("it must compete with powerful alternatives"). There are some talents that simply outclass every single other talent in the respective tier, and picking any other talent would, in most situations, mean give up on a massive powerspike.

A prime example of this is Sonya. Although she has many interesting talents through her entire tree, she simply cannot flee from some key-talents that completely define her late-game (which are Nerves of Steel and Ignore Pain, pretty much). In very VERY few occasions you can pick something else (like picking Arreat Crater instead of Ignore Pain) but even so if you'll be giving up a powerful advantage.

Another example, which I'd say is even less versatile than Sonya when it comes to talents, is Diablo, with 4 out of 7 talents that simply will weak his game if they're not picked. Devil's Due, From the Shadows, Diabolical Momentum and Domination are all MUST GET talents that turn Diablo into a one of the best hard-engage Heroes in the game (plus with the changes to health orbs Devil's Due is easily the best self-sustain talent in the entire game).

Edited January 10, 2018 by Valhalen

[Oxygen 446]

2 hours ago, Valhalen said:

On a side note, I kinda agree with @ShadowerDerek points on the Igniter build being more of a Bruiser build.

As more things come to light, I don't think Blaze is geared to act as a main tank. He can do it better than a few other "bruisers" such as Artanis and Sonya, but he's not quite  like ETC or Muradin here. I suppose that explains why I naturally gravitated towards a bruiser-esque build. I'm certainly keeping a close eye on how Blaze is doing and on how he's being used. His day-1 win rates are surprisingly really low, but it makes sense for players to, perhaps, be confused by his role. Pretty high skill cap, too.

Treat and draft him like Sonya for the time being.

[Valhalen 1,485]

3 hours ago, Oxygen said:

As more things come to light, I don't think Blaze is geared to act as a main tank. He can do it better than a few other "bruisers" such as Artanis and Sonya, but he's not quite  like ETC or Muradin here. I suppose that explains why I naturally gravitated towards a bruiser-esque build. I'm certainly keeping a close eye on how Blaze is doing and on how he's being used. His day-1 win rates are surprisingly really low, but it makes sense for players to, perhaps, be confused by his role. Pretty high skill cap, too.

Treat and draft him like Sonya for the time being.

Yeah, after playing with him I felt that he was pretty much something between Sonya and Muradin; a semi-bruiser, semi-tank. 

Do you think he'll be subject to any kind of buffs in the near future, based on those low day-1 win rates?

[Trensicourt 5]

Oxygen, can you compare to ChaosOS' stance on Blaze's talents? He made a math of the storm on Blaze and one of the key points he mentions is how powerful Fortified Bunker. I would like to see your differing opinions and why.

[ShadowerDerek 69]

12 hours ago, Guest ZeroTheSecond said:

You do realize that talent makes you ignite oil spills with basic attacks, right? Seems counterproductive since you said that the slow is better.

Considering this, your build doesn't seem that different from Oxygen's build, outside of your Heroic preference.

Yes, slow is better, but not when it's expired.

The key element of the build is to control the timing of igniting the oil. Given that each oil spill lasts for 5s without igniting, the 4s cd of your Q is actually quite long to be able to control your ignition. So, having another way to ignite the oil is really nice to have. Just make sure to control your basic attacks.

I agree that the later talents is quite similar to Oxygen's build since they provide utility and survivability.

[ShadowerDerek 69]

11 hours ago, Oxygen said:

As more things come to light, I don't think Blaze is geared to act as a main tank. He can do it better than a few other "bruisers" such as Artanis and Sonya, but he's not quite  like ETC or Muradin here. I suppose that explains why I naturally gravitated towards a bruiser-esque build. I'm certainly keeping a close eye on how Blaze is doing and on how he's being used. His day-1 win rates are surprisingly really low, but it makes sense for players to, perhaps, be confused by his role. Pretty high skill cap, too.

Treat and draft him like Sonya for the time being.

I don't really think he's geared as a bruiser tbh. He simply lacks the single-target burst damage or strong CC to be as threatening as the likes of Sonya and Dehaka. And his sustain is not as strong as the likes of Malthael and Leoric either.

New heroes' win rates (including recently reworked heroes) will always be low simply because people haven't figure out his best playstyles and builds yet while competing with heroes that are well-analysed. As times goes, their win rates will show their true potentials; so don't judge them based on their day-1 performance. Li Li, Johanna and Alexstraza are the perfect examples.

[Erathis 53]

While I do agree with most of the talent recommendations, I would say Meltdown deserves perhaps another look.  Probably only when you're also running New Habit (for the cooldown reduction on his trait) but Meltdown very quickly takes the enemy's damage for a nose dive.  It's not as flexible as the oil talents, sure, but the amount of survivability it gives you (and your team for that matter) is pretty strong.  If your team is trying to use Blaze as a main tank (especially against a mostly melee team), perhaps give it a consideration.

Edited January 11, 2018 by TSRD

[Morcalivan 86]

Bunker

Primary use of Bunker is used when Blaze is naturally the focus of aggro from all the slows and flashy fires and area stun charges. Ya lay it out to avoid burst and lockdown while gaining armour to then pop out the other side and run while laying down more oil slows or charging away.

Secondary use is body blocking. You can use it to block someone from following you or from escaping your team. Since you can throw slows ahead of them and then charge, its pretty easy to plant this ahead of them. You can exit the other side faster than they can run around it. You can also use it around core.

Thirdly comes finishing towers without using your oil spills and standing out in the opetn to do it. This lets you avoid the slow and gives you a warning against what might be hidden on the other side of the wall. You can also drop it to escape towers if you end up pulled into them by providing them another target. Also works to buy time on finishing core.

Lastly is the lure. Planting a bunker down simply draws fire ans bodies to it. People want to destroy it and feel the need to attack it or the people inside when they come out. I've planted this many times for the purpose of dying, knowing how many opponents will crowd around it. You can use this with teammates like Stukov, Jaina and Kael to punish them for pulling and killing you by extending the time they spend on doing so.

For fun 1 on 1, jump in and out one side to another while dropping oil. It's loads of fun. You can also jet leak around it before reentering. Good stuff! :)

P.S. Use Pyromania after exiting Bunker to stack armour and become unstoppable to increase your odds of survival further. Or use it offensively to bait for a Pyromania initiated offense. That's 50-75 armour depending on what you grabbed.

Edited January 12, 2018 by Morcalivan

[Leadblast 28]

Blaze is very odd. He feels like some kind of "AOE bruiser". I figured his initiation combo pretty quickly (Jet + Pyromania on hit, then start spilling Oil and igniting it as expected) and it worked for me.

I have yet to try Combustion but the bunker protects fragile allies decently. It doesn't go very well with spellspammers like Li-Ming tho.

[Valhalen 1,485]

I've been playing with Blaze non-stop, and he easily became one of my favorite Warriors, or rather, one of my favorite characters. Once you get the hang of the vector targeting of Oil Spill, using it becomes second nature; it is an incredible versatile tool, great for checking bushes, and placing it in narrow corridors.

I tried a couple of different builds, but I ended up enjoying the Ignite build @Oxygen posted the most, but I pick New Habits most of the time; the extra CD reduction from health globes plus the unstoppable effect is too good to ignore. Also, on maps that require heavy waveclear (such as Tomb of the Spider Queen and Sky Temple), I find myself picking Incinerator Gauntlets + Burn Notice.

Combustion is definitely the best Heroic, as Bunker Drop simply doesn't offer enough aside from dodging some lethal targeted skills. It's kind of a pain in the ass because people rarely enter the Bunker and instead try to outrun Pyroblast... I really love Flash Fire, as I mentioned earlier, as it essentially turns Combustion into Twisting Nether.

If the enemy team features way too many "mages", then Juggernaut Plating + Pyromania (with New Habits completed) is the way to go. I lost count of how many times I escaped certain death from nasty Kel'Thuzad combos by using this combination. I even dare to say that Juggernaut Plating is an improved Nerves of Steel. Depending on the situation I also tend to pick Endurance Stimpack and use it in conjunction with Juggernaut Plating and Pyromania if the enemy team doesn't feature many CCs; this makes Blaze ridiculously resilient, specially if you have Supports like Uther and/or Tassadar.

I think his body blocking could be a bit better, since he is not as large as some other Warriors (like Diablo, Stitches and ETC). However, with enough practice plus Fuel Leak, he can do some nasty body block akin to Stitches with Putrid Bile on a much lower cooldown. Pretty insane.

My final verdict is that he works the best on a team with a Bruiser (Sonya or Ragnaros are fantastic) instead of another pure tank and a strong dedicated healer. His team fight presence is very strong if he has proper setups and follow ups (Jaina is absolutely fantastic with him). I have even found myself topping the Hero damage charts in a few matches because of the absurd sustain combined with constant damage he can provide. Really fun to use.

Since Blaze is one of the most balanced characters to come to this game, I don't really think he'll get any nerfs in the upcoming patches; maybe I'd say he'll even get a buff to Bunker Drop and maybe a bit of damage increase. I currently noticed there is a bug with Blaze and Ana, that Nano Boost does not haste the cooldown reduction of Oil Spill.

My only real complaint (more of a nitpick) is that his recolors are pretty lame and don't even change the patterns in his armor (ike some Tychus skins). His Fel Reaver skin also doesn't look as good as I expected. They should add a white recolor to his base skin so he looks like Baymax from Disney's Big Hero 6, haha.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Valhalen

[Leadblast 28]

He's an area denial hero, as expected. If you think deeper about it, he's quite the oddball among warriors, just like Tassadar among supports, or Medivh among specs. This will prove a big problem if HotS' dev team seriously thinks about expanding the roles, as he's not much of a conventional tank (his only "hard cc" being the stun on a successful Jet Propulsion hit, I see slows like Oil Spill more as a soft cc) nor a bruiser (even though he deals lots of damage). Nonetheless I hold him in good regard, and I like his style. As one could guess, he's very strong in Volskaya, and a bunch of other maps where the objective is an area that must be held (Braxis, Sky Temple).

[Guest pugilist]

On 1/9/2018 at 3:42 PM, Oxygen said:

No!

Homonymous
adjective
1. of the nature of homonyms; having the same name.

What are the homonyms in this case?

[positiv2 955]

7 hours ago, Guest pugilist said:

What are the homonyms in this case?

Ignite. It's the name of the build and the eponymous mechanic of Oil Spill. You can find it in the description of said build.

[Guest Pugilist]

On 2/15/2018 at 9:14 AM, positiv2 said:

Ignite. It's the name of the build and the eponymous mechanic of Oil Spill. You can find it in the description of said build.

It's confusing because homonymous is used incorrectly. As you point out, they are eponyms, not homonyms.

[positiv2 955]

On 2/17/2018 at 11:47 PM, Guest Pugilist said:

It's confusing because homonymous is used incorrectly. As you point out, they are eponyms, not homonyms.

As far as I know, the word homonymous can also, albeit not that commonly, refer to two objects having the same name with the same meaning (unlike the more common usage of two words having the same name, yet being different in meaning). However, I can see that "homonymous" is not the best choice here simply because it is ambiguous, especially since it uses its less common meaning. I'll go ahead and change it to eponymous.

[ExorionAether 11]

Why do you recommend in your Ignite Build [Bunker Drop] and [Flash Fire] at the same time? As far as I'm aware that's not possible. If the go-to pick is Bunker, which other Level 20 would you generally recommend?

Personally I'ld go with the Armor Upgrade and only take [Burn Notice] if you need additional soft CC.