Warhead Junction Introduction

Warhead Junction is a 3-lane Battleground with vertical symmetry, meaning that the left zone is equal to the right zone and the top zone is different from the bottom zone.

Being a StarCraft-themed Battleground, the signature Objective of Warhead Junction is a Warhead that can be collected by Heroes and then used to damage enemy Structures.

On this Battleground you can also find a unique Boss Camp that is not present elsewhere, which is so powerful that it is the primary component of the recommended strategy for playing Warhead Junction.

2.1.1.

Global Heroes

With Warhead Junction being quite big, despite the presence of the Sewage Tunnel connecting top lane and bottom lane together, we find that global Heroes (such as Brightwing) are helpful for managing lanes, contesting the Objective, or ganking isolated enemy Heroes.

2.1.2.

Mercenary Clear

Being able to quickly clear Mercenary Camps (for example Raynor with Exterminator at Level 1) is important because you need them to constantly pressure the enemy team across all lanes and especially because you need to capture the Boss Camp at the top of the battlefield as fast as possible after getting a few kills.

2.1.3.

Sustain Healing

Due to the constant action that characterizes Warhead Junction, we recommend picking a sustain Healer (such as Lucio). Combined with a smart use of the Healing Fountain, they will help you stay on the battlefield as much as possible without needing to Hearthstone too much. When your team does not have enough sustain healing coming from your Healer, prefer Heroes with good self-sustain instead (for example Blaze).

2.1.4.

Point Control

Point control tools are good to deter the enemy team to stop you from taking the Boss Camp or, alternatively, to steal the Boss Camp from the enemy team while they are trying to capture it. Some Time Stop effects (such as Ice Wall by Mei) and Knockback effects (for example Expulsion Zone by Zarya) are great for that.

2.1.5.

Siege Damage

Heroes who can help their team to take down enemy Structures (notably Sylvanas) and/or can deal a lot of damage to enemy Structures on their own are good on Warhead Junction because they can siege with the Slime Boss rewarded by the Boss Camp in the top lane or, alternatively, with the Hellbats from the Siege Camps in the bottom lane.

2.1.6.

Poke Damage

Considering that the Objective requires to be channeled for a while, we recommend picking Heroes who are specialized in poke damage to easily deny the enemy team to collect Warheads while your team gets value somewhere else.

2.1.7.

Self-Sustain

We recommend picking a few Heroes who have access to self-sustain because it is easy to end up having no Healer nearby on a big Battleground like this, especially considering that the Objective is basically split across different locations active at the same time.

2.2.1.

Terrain Dependency

Warhead Junction features a lot of wide areas, therefore you will not be able to fully unleash the power of Heroes that need to fight near impassable terrain (such as Diablo with Shadow Charge) or that can create it (for example Hogger with Loot Hoard).

2.2.2.

Long Cooldowns

Considering that Warhead Junction is characterized by constant action and that the Slime Boss can easily be a win condition towards the mid game, we recommend avoiding Heroes that have Abilities with extremely long cooldowns (such as Dragonqueen by Alexstrasza).

• Use the first Healing Fountain before or around 1:00 minute because the first Objective on Warhead Junction activates at 3:00 minutes, so you will have it back in time.
• Your team should try to capture the allied Bruiser Camp in the top lane around 1:00 minute, so that you will be able to do the same for the second Objective phase, and the allied Siege Camp in the bottom lane around 2:00 minutes, to keep enemy Heroes busy for a few seconds and/or to match enemy Mercenaries in lane.
• Warheads do not deal bonus damage in the center, therefore they give maximum value when hitting as many Structures at possible at the same time. With the help of Minions and Heroes, a single Warhead will be usually enough to take down both external Towers and the Healing Fountain nearby.
• While we recommend to use Warheads in the top lane, to make Slime Boss more threatening, do not hesitate to use a single Warhead per lane to destroy all external Healing Fountains in order to gain a tactical advantage while laning as well as for consecutive Objectives. Thanks to their damage scaling over time, Warheads will one-shot Healing Fountains near Forts after 4:00 minutes and Healing Fountains near Keeps after 11:00 minutes.
• After 5:00 minutes, you should look for opportunities to capture the Boss Camp after killing one or more enemy Heroes. The number of kills you need depends on how fast your team is at killing the Slime Boss and how hard will be for the remaining enemy Heroes to stop your team from doing so.
• Make sure to defend your Structures from the Slime Boss because it can easily reach your Keep. When needed, do not be reluctant to use Warheads defensively, to damage enemy Mercenaries and Bosses while also forcing enemy Heroes to stop hitting your Structures for a few seconds.

Being a 3-lane Battleground with a single and powerful Boss Camp, the metagame strategy for Warhead Junction is to have your 3-man in the top lane, the Solo Laner middle, and another Hero bottom. You should usually use Warheads in the top lane to clear the way for your next Slime Boss capture, unless you want to remove Healing Fountains from other lanes to gain a tactical advantage or to destroy enemy Forts so that enemy Heroes will not be able to retreat there anymore.

You should prefer having the Solo Laner in the middle lane because there are no Camps there, making it the least important lane for winning the game, but it is also fine to have the Solo Laner in the bottom lane. If your Solo Laner is middle, the bottom lane can be covered by any Hero who is capable of staying in lane for long on their own, usually with a good amount of self-sustain (such as Fenix or Thrall) and/or enough range to never take damage from enemy Heroes (for example Junkrat) while safely defending Structures from enemy Minions before they take damage. A single Hero will not be able to double soak middle and bottom lane because they are too far from each other.