Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Playing the Skeleton King in Heroes of the Storm

After a delay of a couple hours, Leoric, aka the Skeleton King from Diablo, was made available for purchase in Heroes of the Storm. I decided to chuck a few bucks Blizzard's way and get the bundle with both Leoric and his Vrykul skin (what's fun is that the different color schemes you earn as you level for the Vrykul are basically normal Vrykul, blue Ymirjar, and green Kvaldir, complete with a seaweed cape.)

Leoric is a lot of fun. He encourages you to play aggressively, because you actually get to do stuff even if you die. Mind you, you should still avoid dying if you can - you'll still want to retreat and use a healing fountain if you get low on health - but if you see an enemy hero who's on his or her last legs, the stakes are a bit lower for you to chase after them.

The reason being Leoric's trait, Undying. When you die playing Leoric, rather than having to wait at the spawnpoint, you'll instead become a ghost (I don't know if you can see the ghost if you're on the other team.) While a ghost, two of your abilities become available in a non-damaging capacity, but using them will allow you to speed up your death timer by regaining "health." And once you've filled up your health again, you'll simply pop back into existence wherever you ghost is. While Undying, you can't do basic attacks, but you get alternate versions of Skeletal Swing and Drain Hope.

Essentially what this means is that your opponents can never get rid of you. They can only turn you into a nuisance rather than a threat.

Q: Skeletal Swing: Q will allow you to swing your giant mace in a wide, 180 degree arc, slowing enemies that are hit. This lands for a lot of damage, and is great for taking out swaths of minions in a single swing, or at least getting them all pretty low. It's also useful when used in conjunction with the W ability. It does double damage against non-hero targets, so this can be used to knock down entire squads of minions, and at higher levels you might be able to just take them all out completely in one go. Given the wide arc, you can also hit a gate and its two turrets with a single swing.

While Undying, Skeletal Swing becomes Ghastly Swing, which does no damage but reduces death time.

W: Drain Hope: W is a skill-shot that hits an enemy hero and begins to drain health from them. It only works on heroes, but thankfully will pass through minions if they're in the way. You'll be slowed while this is active and you'll need to remain in relatively close range for it to continue to work (hence why hitting them with a mace swing is a good idea) but this will provide both damage and a decent amount of healing.

While Undying, this become Drain Essence, and no longer deals damage but also doesn't slow you down.

E: Wraith Walk: E is a somewhat more situational ability, but quite useful when used properly. Hitting E will free your ghost, leaving your body stationary but "unstoppable" (to prevent people from stopping you using the ability.) You'll move your ghost separately and when the timer runs out or when you hit E again, your body will be where your ghost has gone. Importantly, though, your body can still take damage during this, so you'll want to hit E again as soon as you're clear, lest you wind up dead before the timer runs out.

Wraith Walk is problematic as an escape move, given that you're leaving your body there for them to beat on, but it's great at chasing down enemy heroes, as the longer you wraith-walk, the higher speed you'll travel. You can combine this with your other abilities to lull an enemy into thinking they're winning by holding off on your attacks for a second and just doing basic attacks, then Drain Hope, Skeletal Swing them to slow them down, and when they get low enough that they want to run, finish them off by catching up to them with Wraith Walk. It's also a fantastic counter to things like Nazeebo's Zombie Wall.

R: Entomb is one of your heroic abilities, which creates a three-sided room essentially to trap enemies inside. I think this barrier will work regardless of whether your enemy is inside or trying to move past it, but it blocks allies as well, so be careful with it. Still, a great addition to the "you can't escape" arsenal.

R: March of the Black King is the one I tend to go for, which sends you forward, unstoppable, smashing everything in your path with massive strikes that heal you. You'll travel relatively far and strike three times in a wide arc. This can be useful for finishing off enemies, dealing with a crowd if you get ganged up on, or getting a lot of cathartic stress release from just smashing things like crazy. You also heal for something like 70% for each hero you hit, so if you find yourself low on health with a bunch of enemy heroes nearby and don't feel like playing the ghost game and handing them some XP, this is a great way to survive and maybe put them on the ropes long enough to make a getaway or wait for the cavalry to show up.

The build I've been playing puts a ton of emphasis on healing, making Leoric quite the implacable foe. He's certainly not as tanky as Johanna, but with the right talents he can be a very hard-to-kill harasser and bane of minions. There a nice talent at level 4 that heals you and restores mana whenever a minion dies near you, which can really charge you up quite well. Also, one of the level one talents allows you to collect regen globes while Undying, as well as giving yourself a permanent health regeneration bonus for each one.

I love the aesthetic of the Skeleton King (though it pains me to say it, I actually think he looks cooler than Arthas - though Arthas is certainly the character I like better.) His Master Skin is a little funny looking, (nowhere near getting it - my max character is Sergeant Hammer, who's level 7, though I expect Leoric to join her and maybe even surpass her) but the Vrykul look is pretty good, though it doesn't really hit the "skeleton" theme (though this will cost real money - there's a bundle up now for both Leoric and the Vrykul skin, which is the main reason I payed real money for him.)

For future skins, I think a living Leoric would be pretty obvious, and I'd like to see how he'd fit into some of the other universes that exist solely in HOTS' alternate skin descriptions.

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