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Table of Contents
General Information
Welcome to our Stitches guide for Heroes of the Storm. Here you will learn everything you need to know in order to play Stitches in a competitive environment, whether you play on your own or with a team.
About the Author
Straften is a Grand Master ranked player in both Hero League and Team League. He has a passion for theorycrafting, and regularly tests new features early on the PTR. He explains his strategy, reasoning, and implementation in these guides.
1. Quick Reference for Stitches
Slam Build (talent calculator link)
The Slam Build focuses on Talents that transform Slam into a powerful and
versatile Ability. Putrid Ground and Toxic Gas allow you to infect enemy units
with a stronger 
Vile Gas from a safer distance. These two Talents
already give Stitches some much needed improvement to waveclear.
Mega Smash increases Slam's range and arc width, making it much safer to use on
enemy Heroes during team fights. Pulverize squeezes more value out of all of
the other Slam Talents, by decreasing Slam's cooldown. Pulverize also adds a
strong (yet brief) Slow to enemies, each time they are hit by Slam. This effect
gives you even more team fight presence. All of these Talents force enemies to
worry about more than just 
Hook, and allow Stitches
to participate in important PvE activities that he will struggle with
otherwise. The Slam build is easy to use, and very impactful in most matchups.
Sustain Build (talent calculator link)
The Sustain Build sacrifices the strong Hero damage and PvE from
the Slam build, and replaces it with much more survivability. 
Dampen Magic
can be taken in place of Hungry for More when the enemy team has significant
Ability based damage. Amplified Healing will increase healing from all sources,
which works well with Savor the Flavor. Indigestion helps with the lack of PvE
capability this build path provides. Because this build trades so much utility
for survivability, it is important to take Fishing Hook in order to remain
threatening to enemy Heroes. Finally, Cannibalize is excellent with Hungry for
More, but 
Potent Bile may be used instead if Dampen Magic
was taken at Level 1.
Synergies and Counters
Stitches works well with Heroes who can quickly respond to successful Hooks by locking the targets down with unavoidable Stuns, Roots, and Slows. He is also good with Heroes who are simply good at punishing enemies who are out of position.
Because so much of Stitches' ability to impact a match is baked into Hook, he can be challenged by frontline Heroes who are bad Hook targets. This typically means that these Heroes can easily escape once pulled by Hook, that killing them is of little consequence, or both. These Heroes can stand in front of their team, making it much harder to land Hook on more meaningful backline enemies.
Maps
Stitches is good on maps where Hook can be used advantageously with terrain
features, and that have confined objectives that ensure value from Vile Gas.
These objectives will typically be those where teams fight in close proximity
for control of an area for prolonged periods of time. Stitches may struggle on
maps that contain map objectives that encourage teams to split across the map.
This is primarily because Hook is more effective when there are more allies to
respond to it.
TL;DR Tips
Vile Gas hits nearby enemies when triggered; position yourself to maximise this effect when it is safe to do so.
Hook can be used to pull enemy Heroes away from safety, or to pull your allies out of danger.
Slam is a great tool for dismounting enemy Heroes at range, and is also suitable for use on Minion waves.
Devour should be used to recover health as needed, or to deal bonus damage to non-Heroic units.
Putrid Bile can be used bile to slow escaping enemies, or to disengage.
Gorge can be used to bring enemy Heroes behind your gate and walls, resulting in easy kills.
2. Overview
Stitches is a low-mobility Tank, capable of pulling
distant Heroes to him with Hook. Stitches has a lot
of Health, and a powerful self-sustain with 
Devour. He
works best with Heroes who can follow up Hook with strong
crowd control, which will help to secure picks
throughout the game.
3. Strengths
- Hook can pull enemy Heroes completely out of
position, allowing your team to kill them easily.
- Hook can pull allied Heroes out of danger, or
into otherwise advantageous positions.
- Good sustained AoE damage
- Strong self-sustain with Devour
- Good disengage with Putrid Bile
- Gorge can isolate enemy Heroes or temporarily remove threats from team fights
4. Weaknesses
- Poor waveclear without several Talents into Slam
- Lacks hard crowd control besides Gorge
- Lacks gap closers
- Lacks burst damage
- Hook's impactfulness often scales with the the difficulty of the skillshot.
5. Role in the Current Meta
Team compositions that Stitches excels in usually
play off of Hook, where Heroes with Stuns, Roots, and
burst damage can instantly kill or crowd control a
pulled enemy Hero. Uther,
Jaina, and
Xul are fantastic Heroes to pair
with Stitches for this reason.
Stitches is most effective when you use Hook to
pull a vulnerable enemy backline Hero into the midst of
your team, winning a team fight before a counter engagement occurs. Once a team
fight breaks out, Putrid Bile can be used to Slow the enemy Heroes'
advance or retreat. Vile Gas inflicts damage over time in an
AoE around Stitches, which can add up to a significant
amount over the course of a team fight. However, Stitches' lack of
crowd control and gap closers can make him more vulnerable to focused attacks
than other Tanks, as he cannot quickly reposition himself. One of
the reasons Slam build has been prevalent in the meta for so long is that it
allows the user to apply Vile Gas from much safer positioning.
6. Reading Further
To take things further, we have 2 more pages that you can read:
- Abilities and Strategy: an overview of your hero's abilities and how to use them;
- Talent Build: a detailed rundown of your talents and how to choose them.
7. ChangeLog
- 02 Oct. 2017 (this page): Moved Stitches' guide to the new format and updated it for Ana's patch.
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