heroes Upcoming Sonya & Medivh Gameplay Updates

[Stan 5,248]

Blizzard released updated Hero spotlights for Sonya and Medivh, highlighting all changes that will go live next week.

Useful Links

• PTR Patch Notes: February 26
• In-Development: Hero Reworks, Enforcer Skins, Sprays...

Blizzard (Source)

Launching in all regions with next week’s patch, we’re smoothing feathers and sharpening blades with gameplay updates for both Medivh and Sonya. Read on for a high-level description of what’s changing, and find out why we’re excited for you to get your hands on these remastered versions of your favorite Guardian and Barbarian Heroes.

Sonya

Wondering what’s New with the Wandering Barbarian?

For Sonya, we love her core gameplay but have noticed that there is very little wiggle room in what’s generally considered her default talent path. To combat this, we are opening up more survivability options so players don’t feel pressured into always taking Nerves of Steel and Ignore Pain. We are also adding a couple of fun new tools into her arsenal, including more disruption options for Ancient Spear and a number of new talents for Seismic Slam that place more focus on area-of-effect damage. As an example, the Shattered Ground talent now also increases the splash range of Seismic Slam, allowing some interesting opportunities for poking opponents in lane, or dishing out tons of damage in a teamfight.

Talent Preview:

Chosen at Level 4, Shattered Ground significantly increases both the range and splash damage of Seismic Slam.

Composite Spear, a new Level 20 Storm Talent, increases the range of Ancient Spear by 50% and grants Sonya 25 armor for 4 seconds.

A new Level 1 option, Furious Blow empowers the damage and removes the Fury cost of every fourth Seismic Slam.

Medivh

A Bird’s Eye View of Updates to the Last Guardian

When looking at updating Medivh, we recognized his reputation as a challenging Hero who excels in the right hands. We absolutely love this about the Hero, and wanted to add even more opportunities for players to show off their skills while simultaneously reducing some of the frustration players can experience when playing against Medivh. To accomplish our goal of amping up the more fun and challenging aspects of the Hero, we are making a modified version of The Master's Touch talent a baseline quest for Medivh, and adding a version of the Reabsorption talent into Force of Will. On the other hand, in order to combat some of the frustrations experienced when playing against Medivh, we are reducing the overall uptime on both Force of Will and Portal. We think these changes, in combination with several exciting new talents, will allow enemies to effectively play around Medivh, while also rewarding those players who time clutch Force of Wills and land massive amounts of Arcane Rifts.

Talent Preview:

A new option at Level 7, Force of Magic grants Medivh 20% Spell Power (stacking up to 2 times) for 12 seconds if enough damage is prevented by Force of Will.

Adding some sustain to Medivh’s kit, Mystic Assault is a new Level 7 option that empowers Medivh’s next Basic Attack after landing Arcane Rift against a Hero, dealing bonus damage and healing Medivh for a portion of damage dealt.

Temporal Flux, a new Level 16 Talent, reduces Medivh’s Heroic Ability cooldowns with both Basic Attacks and Arcane Rift hits.

We hope you’re as excited for these major gameplay updates as we are. Be sure to stay tuned for next week’s patch notes to find out all the details. Until then, we’ll see you in the Nexus!

[ATM2100 0]

I am a little confused on how the portal raven thing works. can anyone explain that? I thought the portal could be cast in raven form.

[Slam 40]

nice way to explain reworks. I like it!

[SleepySheepy 41]

Spell power increases heal from shield? Otherwise I don't see reason why would they give him Spell power, instead of just saying 20% more damage on Q.

 

[Bashe 0]

1 hour ago, SleepySheepy said:

Spell power increases heal from shield? Otherwise I don't see reason why would they give him Spell power, instead of just saying 20% more damage on Q.

 

Spell power increase will also increase the bonus damage on basic attacks

[PrivateJoker 27]

6 hours ago, ATM2100 said:

I am a little confused on how the portal raven thing works. can anyone explain that? I thought the portal could be cast in raven form.

based on how they explained it, if you pick that talent at level 1, you gain the ability to cast your portals in raven form. This is ADDED functionality to the existing talent, where it lets you manually place both ends of the portal. You can either press E to just use portal normally (which places one end where you click, and the other end just plops down where Medivh is standing) to keep it as quick as possible, or you can press the 1 key. If you press 1, you will only place 1 portal, and still have to press E to place the other end where you want it to go.

This should be useful for allowing teammates to dive, or escape danger, without needing Medivh to stand in the fray. The fact that you can do it in Raven form means Medivh not only doesn't have to position himself optimally, he doesn't even need to risk getting touched.

[ArusVicious 156]

Not gonna lie but Blizzard has gotten super good at doing reworks lately. First Tyrael's exceptional rework, then Malfurion's incredibly well done one. And now Sonya and Medivh, with reworks looking super powerful. I honestly think Sonya is actually MORE powerful now than she is on live. And Medivh too. So I wouldn't be surprised to see tuning adjustments before these changes go live.

[Morcalivan 86]

Just bought Medivh today, leveled from 5 to 8 I believe. He's pretty fun as is. Not sure I would see any use for a basic attack that heals for so little. For the most part, basic attacks are for finishing runners or attacking bosses/mercs. Standing around long enough to hit heroes with basic attacks usually means you're about to die. And that's just in QM. It puts you into a position of using your Force of Will for yourself instead of your teammates, which is not a good idea, since the portals are your only way to outrun additional attacks, and they take time. Much better to Force a teammate and build portals for them ahead of their escape path, or in the case of some melee characters, right on them. The only thing I can think of is using it vs non-heroes to reduce the downtime between actions.

The Flux looks really useful since it can use Arcane Rift. Though at the moment, I kinda prefer one-shotting minions (includes catapults) with my Rifts, which, combined with 50% speed boost in Raven form talent makes for some good double-triple laning. I have been Nano Boosted a few times as Medivh and it is basically Malthael all over again, only possibly better. So cooldown reductions of any kind are a welcome sight, even if it's only for the heroics. Timestop is pretty badass since you can use it to let a boss get a number of shots in, or just steal a boss/merc camp by timestopping as your raven is positioned on the circle. It'll end up giving you the camp before they are free to do anything. Kinda mean, meaner than Tyreal maybe.

The spell power boost from casting force of will looks incredibly simple to use. There's always someone diving too much or getting dove on too much in a game. So, yeah, I'd grab it. I can see myself using force near towers to easily amplify attacks after placing portals to better finish kills.

Still havening trouble getting people to actually use the portals even when I tell them it gives them armour. Maybe then can add some sort of icon or something as a visual aid for non-Medivh players? I spend a lot of time placing portals in a way that will benefit my teammates and they still ignore them. We know they can learn since they learned to use the Bunker from Blaze for the most part. Not sure why the Portals are so confusing.

I haven't played Sonya since I leveled her to 5. Just seems like everyone plays her too much already. So no comment. :p

Edited February 28, 2018 by Morcalivan

[xevex 41]

2 hours ago, Morcalivan said:

Just bought Medivh today, leveled from 5 to 8 I believe. He's pretty fun as is. Not sure I would see any use for a basic attack that heals for so little. For the most part, basic attacks are for finishing runners or attacking bosses/mercs. Standing around long enough to hit heroes with basic attacks usually means you're about to die. And that's just in QM. It puts you into a position of using your Force of Will for yourself instead of your teammates, which is not a good idea, since the portals are your only way to outrun additional attacks, and they take time. Much better to Force a teammate and build portals for them ahead of their escape path, or in the case of some melee characters, right on them. The only thing I can think of is using it vs non-heroes to reduce the downtime between actions.

Thats how Medivh deals dmg. You can see it in pro play too. Q>Basic Attack>Q>Basic Attack. So the talent might be actually good. His Q dmg was slightly nerfed so they added the new lvl 7 talents. Altough the spell power will be probably more powerfull but without self-sustain.

[SleepySheepy 41]

8 hours ago, Maxkitty said:

Not gonna lie but Blizzard has gotten super good at doing reworks lately. First Tyrael's exceptional rework, then Malfurion's incredibly well done one. And now Sonya and Medivh, with reworks looking super powerful. I honestly think Sonya is actually MORE powerful now than she is on live. And Medivh too. So I wouldn't be surprised to see tuning adjustments before these changes go live.

Minus Hammer rework. *cough* *cough*