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Samuro Build Guide “My humble skills are yours.”
Welcome to our guide for Samuro, a Melee Assassin in Heroes of the Storm. Within these pages, you will find everything required to understand how best to play this hero, in both different map styles and team compositions.
Samuro's Overview
Samuro is a Melee Assassin who can Stealth and create Images of himself on demand. His Mirror Images can confuse his enemies, causing them to waste resources and cooldowns. Samuro is an excellent Offlaner. With proper micro, his clones become a great nuisance for the enemy team, while Samuro will shred through any target.
Samuro's Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths
Has very good DPS if he is free to hit- Has 2 different cleanses for DoTs or debuffs
- Can tank many skillshots with clones
- Can quickly clear Minions, Mercenaries or Monsters with
Bladestorm - Has a very high skill ceiling
- Can distract and confuse enemy Heroes with
Illusion Master - Easily escape from any gank attempts
- Has great self-sustain by using the Hearth Trick
Weaknesses
Weak early game- Images can help enemies complete Quests
- Vulnerable if Revealed
- Vulnerable to peel and Knockbacks
- Hard to play
- No crowd control as a Bruiser
Samuro's Talent Build Cheatsheet
Wind Storm Build
Recommended
Samuro's Wind Storm Build is excellent to enhance Samuro's macro.
It has 
Way of the Wind (greatly increases Samuro's
self-sustain and
rotation speed), 
Burning Blade (enhances Samuro's waveclear),
and 
Bladestorm (can be used to clear a wave instantly).
Further, it also focuses on Talents that increase Wind Walk's utility.
This helps Samuro get into and out of melee range, where Samuro deals all of
his meaningful damage. This build is a great starting point for players new to
Samuro, and can perform well at all levels of play.
Bladestorm will mostly be used to clear Minions and Mercenaries effectively,
due to its low cooldown and high area of effect damage.
At Level 16, you hit a huge power spike which gives you kill potential against
many Heroes in the game, even when they are at full Health. This is
accomplished by applying Harsh Winds with a stored Critical Strike,
activating Critical Strike immediately after in order to reset your Basic
Attack, and then keep attacking the target until they leave your Basic Attack's range,
in which case you should use Blade Storm to execute the target, as it has a greater range
than your Basic Attacks. 
Shukuchi makes it possible to close into melee range very
quickly in order to deliver your lethal combo. Wind Strider allows you to
benefit from most of your other Talents much more often.
Illusion Master Build
Advanced
The Illusion Master build is a good choice if your playstyle will be more focused on teamfights than on the macro part of a game. This build is excellent if you are experienced with the Hero, as it is considerably harder to use than Wind Storm build.
Samuro's Synergies and Counters
Samuro synergizes with
Samuro does well with Heroes who can increase the stats of his Images, or that can heal
him from afar, like Malfurion and Deckard can. He also excels with Abathur,
the only thing better than 
Three Blade Style is
Six Blade Style.
You, improved.
Samuro is countered by
As Samuro has a hard time dealing with Knockbacks, Heroes like Lúcio
and E.T.C. can greatly reduce his effectiveness by pushing him away at every
possible aggression. He also suffers against Heroes that can easily kill his images,
like Jaina, Orphea or Cassia with 
Surge of Light.
Furthermore, Heroes that benefit from hitting clones can be a problem, such as
Medivh, or Diablo.
Stukov is exceptional against Samuro
because of 
Biotic Armor and 
Flailing Swipe,
which can greatly reduce Samuro's damage.
Samuro's Maps
Samuro does very well on maps dependent on point capture, like Dragon Shire or Braxis Holdout, because he can easily beat almost every hero after Level 7. He is also very good on big maps where you need to channel objectives, due to his great stall capabilities and great duel potential during them. Samuro excels on maps with many different flank angles, where you can chase enemies or hit them from behind during objectives.
Samuro's Tips and Tricks
- Hearth Trick: Mirror Image can be used to heal in an unconventional way. When you are outside of combat, hold Left-Shift and cast
Image Transmission on a Mirror Image while channeling Hearthstone. If the Mirror Image is still alive when Hearthstone's channel completes, you will instantly return to lane with the health restoration provided by the Hall of Storms. - Clones' initial focus or movement can be controlled prior to Level 10, by using an Attack-Move command in the same moment they are created (This can be done by holding the button during the
Mirror Image usage). - Use Mirror Image to tank tower shots while ganking, or to damage structures without a friendly minion wave.
Critical Strike resets your Basic Attacks; activate it immediately after delivering a Critical Strike for optimal effect.
Wind Walk can be used to quickly approach enemies, or to help you escape dangerous situations. Remember the cooldown starts ticking as soon as the ability is activated- Use Bladestorm to clear waves or to deal some AoE damage in fights, when enemy has no crowd controls available.
- The Movement Speed provided by Image Transmission can be used not only to chase, but to dodge or to disengage from combat as well.
- Activate Image Transmission to engage on a Hero near one of your Images, or to reposition to safety when you are in danger.
Samuro's Role in the Current Meta
Samuro fits well into team compositions that need a Melee Assassin and Offlaner, but that also does not require extra peeling for the most vulnerable Heroes in the team. Samuro can be a liability against certain Heroes because his Images can help enemies to quickly finish quests, or to enhance Healing dependent on hitting Heroes, like Malfurion and Diablo have.
Despite all of Samuro's Weaknesses, an excellent player can have great impact
playing as him in all situations, due to his high skill ceiling.
With Illusion Master,
Samuro should be constantly harassing enemy backline, being
aware of when they spend their Abilities, to use 
Image Transmission
and kill them.
Changelog
- 24 Jul. 2021 (this page): Builds updated to reflect current meta
- 01 Mar. 2021 (talents page): Builds and Talents updated after meta development.
- 01 Mar. 2021 (abilities page): Updated Bladestorm section.
- 01 Mar. 2021 (this page): Guide updated after meta development.
- 30 Jan. 2021 (this page): Illusion Master Build changed to advanced.
- 20 Nov. 2020 (talents page): Builds and Talent recommendations updated to reflect current meta.
- 20 Nov. 2020 (this page): Builds updated to reflect current meta.
- 14 Oct. 2020 (talents page): Updated Builds and Talents after recent balance patch.
- 14 Oct. 2020 (this page): Builds updated after recent balance patch.
- 30 Jul. 2020 (this page): Updated Bladestorm Build.
- 25 Jun. 2020 (abilities page): Updated Abilities to address Samuro's most recent rework.
- 25 Jun. 2020 (this page): Updated Guide to better reflect current meta.
- 09 Apr. 2020 (talents page): Updated builds and Talents to reflect current meta.
- 15 Dec. 2019 (this page): Updated Role in the Current Meta to include information on current Nexus Anomaly.
- 02 Jul. 2019 (talents page): Recommended builds and Talents updated to reflect current meta.
- 02 Jul. 2019 (abilities page): Updated abilities section.
- 02 Jul. 2019 (this page): Recommended builds and Talents udpated to reflect current meta.
- 04 Mar. 2018 (talents page): Talent section updated to reflect current meta.
- 14 Dec. 2017 (talents page): Talent section updated to reflect Samuro's rework.
- 14 Dec. 2017 (abilities page): Abilities section updated to reflect Samuro's rework.
- 14 Dec. 2017 (this page): Guide updated to reflect Samuro's rework and general changes to the Stealth mechanic.
- 20 Nov. 2016 (this page): Guide added.
More Melee Assassin Guides
Derenash has been playing Heroes of the Storm since 2015 and has achieved Grandmaster in multiple seasons, peaking at Top 1 in Season 3 and 4 of 2018. He participated in the HGC Copa America in 2018 where his team had a strong victory. He is passionate about teaching others about the game, and streams often on Twitch in Portuguese, and you can find him in Wind Striders' Discord as well where he is happy to answer any questions in English or Portuguese.
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