Heroes of the Storm Closed Beta Patch Notes -- January 13, 2014
We’ve brought
Heroes of the Storm offline for a period of extended maintenance today
in order to kick off our Closed Beta testing phase, and bring you a
brand new patch! Maintenance is ongoing, but don't worry; we'll let you
know just as soon as the Nexus is back online.
The Technical
Alpha testing phase has officially come to an end, and we’ve got a new
Battleground, a new Hero, our first iteration for Ranked Play, and much,
much more in store for you with today’s update. Check out the complete
patch notes below, and welcome to the Heroes of the Storm Closed Beta!
General
New Portrait Rewards
Two new portraits have been added that will be awarded to players who accomplished the following during Technical Alpha testing:
Played one or more games during the Heroes Technical Alpha.
Reached Player Level 40 during the Heroes Technical Alpha
Two new portrait rewards have also been added for players who accomplish the above during the Closed Beta testing phase.
These portrait rewards are not available for use just yet, but will be added to qualifying players’ accounts very soon!
New Battleground
Sky Temple, a brand new 3-lane Battleground, has been added to Heroes of the Storm and is now available for play in all game modes!
Temples at the center of each lane will activate after 90 seconds,
and can be captured to fire devastating beams of energy at enemy
Structures.
Beware! Once a Temple has been captured, its Guardians will rise and
attempt to remove players by force. Defeat them to maintain control of
an active Temple.
A Temple will cease firing shortly after all players have left its
grounds, and can then be recaptured by either team. Be ready to fend off
enemy players who seek to wrest control of the Temples for their own
benefit.
One, two, or three Temples will activate at a time, and Temple activation will occur periodically throughout a game.
Temples will deactivate once their Ammunition is depleted.
New Hero
Thrall, Warchief of the Horde, has entered the Nexus and is now available for play! Read on for a brief overview of his abilities.
Abilities
Chain Lightning (Q)
Blast 3 enemies with lightning.
Feral Spirit (W)
Releases a fiery wolf spirit to burn enemies and root Heroes.
Windfury (E)
Increases attack and movement speed.
Trait
Frostwolf Resilience
Casting Abilities on enemies grant charges that Heal you.
Heroic Abilities
Earthquake (R)
Persistently slows enemies in a massive area.
Sundering (R)
Sunder the earth in a line, damaging and stunning enemies in its path.
User Interface
General
Versus Mode has been renamed to Quick Match.
All Daily Quests can now be completed in Practice Mode.
Hero League
Initial implementation for Hero League, the first Ranked Play mode in Heroes of the Storm, has been added to the game!
With Hero League, players will be able to queue up alone, or in a
party of any size, for ranked, competitive matches against others of
similar skill and party size.
In order to queue for Hero League, players must meet the following requirements:
Reach Level 30 or higher.
Own 10 or more Heroes (weekly free rotation Heroes do not count toward this requirement.)
Draft Mode
After finding a match, players will enter Draft Mode, in which teams
will take turns picking the Heroes they’d like to use for the upcoming
game.
Coin Toss
A coin toss will determine which team will pick first.
The team that wins the coin toss will be prompted to pick one Hero
on the first turn, after which, teams will alternate picking two Heroes
per turn until just one player remains on the team that lost the coin
toss.
Hero Selection
Players may only choose from the pool of Heroes that they already own.
Each player will have 30 seconds to select a Hero during their turn.
If no selection is made, a Hero will be locked in automatically.
Once locked in, a Hero can no longer be selected by any other player.
Points and Ranks
All Hero League players will be ranked individually, starting at Rank 50.
Win games to earn points that count toward promotion to the next rank, up to a maximum of Rank 1.
Losing games will result in a loss of points, and enough losses can
cause demotion to the previous rank (though not below Rank 50.)
Players can view their own Rank and win/loss record at any time on the Hero League Play Screen.
Game Abandonment
A player that leaves an in-progress Hero League or Quick Match game
will not be allowed to queue for Ranked Play until a new Quick Match
game is completed.
Leaving a Hero League game during Draft Mode will result in a loss
of 300 ranked points in addition to the above penalty, and all of that
player’s party members at the time of Draft Mode abandonment will also
receive these penalties.
Custom Games
The “Lobby Mode” dropdown found at the top-right corner of Custom
Game lobbies has been enabled, and can now be used to switch between
Hero Select formats:
Standard - Mirrors the same Hero Select format used in Quick Match games.
Draft Mode - Consists of two options:
Predetermined - Causes Hero Select to mirror the same Draft Mode format used for Hero League games.
First Come First Served (FCFS) - Utilizes a
different Draft Mode format, which allows each team to freely decide the
order in which its players will select their Heroes.
For a much more in-depth look at features mentioned above, check out our recent Hero League and Draft Mode blog post.
Furthermore, kindly keep in mind that today’s addition of Hero League
and Draft Mode represent an early look at Ranked Play, and a number of
improvements are planned for each of these features with future game
updates. Feel free to share your thoughts on these features with us
using the official feedback forums.
Art
General
New 3D art has been added for Stimpacks in the Heroes of the Storm Shop.
Battlegrounds
Healing Wells have received updated visual effects when activated by a player.
Siege Camp spawn animations have been updated.
Various assets have been optimized to help improve performance.
Heroes, Mounts, and Skins
Dance, victory, and taunt animations have been added to a number of Heroes.
Cloak reveal duration increased from 2 to 3 Seconds
Hearthstone (B)
Can no longer be cast within the Altar of Storms
Battlegrounds
Structures
Core
Damage versus Heroes increased by 20%
Abathur’s Symbiote and Tassadar’s Plasma Shield can once again be cast on the Core.
Towers
The amount of time that towers are disabled while regenerating ammunition has been increased from 20 to 30 seconds.
This was done to align with a previous change, in which the rate of
tower ammo regeneration was reduced to 1 per 15 seconds. As such, towers
will now come back online with 2 ammunition.
Mercenaries
Grave Golem
Root
Grave Golems will no longer pause when casting Root.
Root will now be cast on ranged Minions.
Heroic units will remain the preferred targets.
Stomp
The post-cast delay on Stomp has been removed.
Stomp will now be cast when there are at least 2 Heroic units around the Grave Golem, or at least 3 Minions.
Stomp will not be cast unless the Grave Golem is already stationary.
Stomp now deals increased damage versus Minions.
Talents
General
Level 20 Talents have been re-ordered in the Talent Select Pane for
all Heroes so that Talents which modify Heroic Abilities are listed in
the first and second slots.
Resurgence of the Storm
This Talent has been removed from the game.
Calldown: MULE
MULE intelligence has been increased!
MULEs now prioritize repairing Structures over replenishing
ammunition (if a building has ammunition, its ammunition will still be
replenished while it is being repaired.)
MULEs will now prioritize Town Halls and Towers, then Gates and Moonwells, and then Walls.
If two Structures with equal priority are in range of the MULE’s
placement, it will begin repairing the one it was dropped closer to.
After all Structures in range are healed, a MULE will then prioritize based on their need for ammunition.
Mercenary Lord
New functionality
Siege and Bruiser Mercenaries now deal 50% increased damage.
A player with the Mercenary Lord Talent must be within proximity of
Siege and Bruiser Mercenaries in order for them to receive the damage
bonus.
Turn an allied Minion or Locust into a Monstrosity for 60 seconds.
When enemy Minions near the Monstrosity die, it gains 4% Health and 4% Basic Attack damage, stacking up to 30 times.
Using Symbiote on the Monstrosity allows Abathur to control it, in addition to Symbiote’s normal benefits.
New Talent (Level 16): Volatile Mutation
Ultimate Evolution clones and Monstrosities deal damage to nearby enemies every 3 seconds, as well as when they die.
New Talent (Level 20): Evolution Complete
Increases the Monstrosity’s duration by 50%, and the Monstrosity
gains the Ability to Deep Tunnel to any visible location every 30
seconds.
Locust Strain (Trait)
Eradicate Minions (Talent) removed
Combat Adaptation (Talent) removed
Regenerative Microbes (Talent) moved from Level 7 to Level 1
Assault Locust (Talent)
Explosion damage reduced from 60 (+12 per level) to 50 (+5 per level)
Survival Instincts (Talent)
In addition to the 30% bonus to Locust Health, Locusts now last an additional 10 seconds.
New Talent (Level 20): Locust Nest
Activate to create a nest that periodically spawns Locusts. Only one Locust Nest can be active at a time.
Symbiote (Q)
No longer has a timed duration.
Barbed Spines (Talent) removed
Pressurized Glands (Talent) moved from Level 4 to Level 1
New Talent (Level 4): Sustained Carapace
Increases the duration of Symbiote’s Carapace (E) by 50%, and allows it to persist after Symbiote ends.
New Talent (Level 4): Adrenal Overload
Symbiote’s host gains 25% increased Attack Speed.
New Talent (Level 7): Networked Carapace
Using Symbiote’s Carapace (E) on a Minion or Mercenary also applies Carapace to all nearby allied Minions and Mercenaries.
New Talent (Level 13): Soma Transference
Symbiote’s Spike Burst (W) heals the host per enemy Hero hit.
New Talent (Level 20): Hivemind
Casting Symbiote now creates an additional Symbiote on a nearby
allied Hero. This Symbiote mimics the commands of the first. If the
second host moves too far away, it is destroyed.
Needlespine (Talent)
Now increases Stab’s range and damage by 20%.
Stab (Q)
Damage reduced from 44 (+13 per level) to 44 (+9 per level)
Toxic Nest (W)
Prolific Dispersal (Talent) moved from Level 13 to Level 4
Ballistospores (Talent)
Now also increases Toxic Nest duration by 25%, in addition to granting unlimited placement range.
Ultimate Evolution (R)
Ultimate Evolution clones no longer inherit the host’s Heroic Ability.
Ultimate Evolution clones now provide a small amount of XP when they are killed.
Cooldown reduced from 120 to 80 Seconds
Evolution Master (Talent) removed
New Talent (Level 20): Evolutionary Link
As long as an Ultimate Evolution clone is alive, Ultimate
Evolution’s original target gains a Shield equal to 20% of their maximum
Health that refreshes every 5 seconds.
The Ultralisk can now be re-targeted using the “R” key.
Torrasque (Talent)
This talent has been reworked. Duration and Health increases have been removed.
The Torrasque now morphs into an egg when it dies or expires. If
the egg is not killed within a short time, a new Torrasque is spawned.
This effect can only occur once.
Abilities recharge 3 times as fast when Fast Feet is active.
Basic Attack
Starting damage increased from 20 to 25
Fast Feet (Trait)
Movement speed bonus decreased from 15% to 10%
New Talent (Level 7): Shake It Off
Reduces the duration of the next Stun or Root by 75%. Can only trigger once every 15 seconds.
New Talent (Level 16): Safety Sprint
Increases Fast Feet’s Movement Speed bonus 10% to 20% while Li Li is under 50% Health.
Healing Brew (Q)
New Talent (Level 1): Pro Toss
Increases Healing Brew’s range by 30%
New Talent (Level 7): Pitch Perfect
After casting Healing Brew, its cost is reduced by 10 Mana for 6 seconds. This effect does not stack.
The Good Stuff (Talent) functionality has changed
Healing Brew now heals for an additional 30% over 6 seconds. Multiple heals extend the duration of this heal over time.
Two For One (Talent) functionality has changed
No longer increases Healing Brew’s Mana cost
Now increases Healing Brew’s cooldown from 3 to 4.5 seconds
Herbal Cleanse (Talent)
Movement Speed bonus duration increased from 2 to 3 seconds
Scaling heal decreased from 20 to 18
Cloud Serpent (W)
Cloud Serpent functionality has changed.
Cloud Serpent now automatically attacks nearby enemies. Only 1 Cloud Serpent can be active on a Hero at a time.
Cost decreased from 40 to 30 Mana
Starting damage increased from 15 to 20
Timeless Creature (Talent) moved from Level 16 to Level 1
Lightning Serpent (Talent)
Damage dealt to targets after the first increased from 25% to 50%
Search range increased by 20%
New Talent (Level 4) : Mending Serpent
Cloud Serpent heals its host each time it attacks.
New Talent (Level 16): Serpent Sidekick
Li Li gains her own Cloud Serpent after casting Cloud Serpent on an ally.
Blinding Wind (E)
Number of Basic Attacks missed increased from 1 to 2
Cost decreased from 50 to 40 Mana
Starting damage decreased from 50 to 30
Scaling damage increased from 12 to 13 damage
Gale Force (Talent)
Damage bonus increased from 25% to 50%
Mass Vortex (Talent) moved from Level 1 to Level 4
Lingering Blind (Talent)
Increases the number of Basic Attacks missed from 2 to 3
New Talent (Level 13): Surging Winds
Li Li
gains 5% Ability Power for 8 seconds per target hit by Blinding Wind.
Additional enemies hit refresh the buff duration and further increase
Ability Power. Stacks up to 4 times.
Damage and Attack Speed slow reduced from 300% to 250%
New Talent: Headshot (Level 13)
Reduces Ability cooldowns by 4 seconds after killing an enemy Hero
Cloak (Trait)
Advanced Cloaking (Talent)
Basic Ability cooldown regeneration removed
Nova now regenerates 2% Health per second while cloaked.
Pinning Shot (W)
Covert Ops (Talent) functionality has changed
Mana reduction component removed
Now increases Pinning Shot’s slow amount by 1% for every second Nova is cloaked, to a maximum of 50%. This effect expires if Nova is decloaked for more than 1 second.
Holo Decoy (E)
Holo Clones no longer have collision.
Holo Clones now have movement AI as part of their base functionality.
Cast range increased by 25%
Digital Shrapnel (Talent) removed
Digital Shrapnel’s 2 second cooldown reduction has been added to the Remote Delivery Talent.
Double Fake (Talent)
The AI movement component of this Talent has been removed.
Tychus
no longer has to wind-up his Minigun to attack. Instead, it now
instantly attacks, beginning at a slow rate of fire, and increases to
its previous maximum speed after 1.5 seconds.
Zagara can now see the duration remaining on her Creep Tumors.
Endless Creep (Talent)
Creep spread increase removed
Creep spread area increased from 25% to 50%
Now also doubles Creep Tumor Health
Infested Drop (E)
Bile Drop (Talent)
Now deals the 100% bonus damage on impact, rather than damaging over time.
Corpse Feeders (Talent)
No longer increases Roachling duration
Now decreases the damage that non-Heroic units deal to Roachlings by 30%
Devouring Maw (R)
Tyrant Maw (Talent)
Cooldown reduction from this talent is no longer dependent on Zagara killing a Hero inside of Devouring Maw. This is now a passive bonus. Anytime Zagara is credited with a Hero takedown, Devouring Maw’s cooldown is reduced by 25 seconds.
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed several issues that could cause Abilities to not fire
appropriately while holding down the right mouse button to move with
Quick Cast enabled.
Fixed an issue which caused exceptionally bright lighting to appear on certain Heroes while watching a Replay.
Corrected several typos and tooltip errors across multiple aspects of the game.
Art
Fixed a slight animation pop that could occur while Tyrande was riding the Battle Beast Mount.
Battlegrounds
Catapult Minions no longer deal half their intended damage, and once again deal area of effect damage around their target.
The Burning Rage Talent no longer deals double damage to towers
affected by the Raven Lord’s Curse on the Cursed Hollow Battleground.
Brightwing’s Phase Shift can no longer target the Dragon Statue while it is capturable on the Dragon Shire Battleground.
Fixed an issue in which summoned Grave Golems on the Haunted Mines dealt significantly more damage to Heroes than expected.
Muradin’s Haymaker will no longer knock enemies out of the playable area in the Haunted Mines.
Neutral Garden Terrors will no longer drop regeneration globes inside of walls.
Summoned Grave Golems on the Haunted Mines now properly ignore summoned units.
Heroes and Talents
Abathur’s Symbiote is no longer visible when near the edge of the Fog of War.
Casting Abathur’s
Ultimate Evolution on a target affected by the Garden Terror’s Spore
Queen’s Curse no longer causes a plant model to persist on the clone.
Arthas Ghouls no longer instantly die to Anub’arak’s Web Blast
Glow effects for Arthas’ Frostmourne Hungers no longer visually persist through polymorph-type abilities.
Bolt of the Storm and Zeratul’s Blink can no longer be cast while rooted.
Chen’s
Storm, Earth, Fire Spirits no longer become unable to cast Abilities if
Triple Attack is used to jump into the enemy Altar of Storms.
E.T.C.’s Mosh Pit now properly reveals Cloaked Heroes.
Visual effects for E.T.C.’s Guitar Solo are no longer visible through the Fog of War.
Gazlowe’s Deth Lazor should now properly freeze enemy Structures and Minions after learning the EZ-PZ Dimensional Ripper Talent.
Fixed an issue in which Illidan’s The Hunt could cause unexpected behavior with Zeratul’s Cloak.
Fixed an issue that could cause Illidan to fly out of the playable area when casting the Hunt and then shift-queuing Dive into Zeratul’s Void Prison.
Heroes that activate the Ice Block Talent can no longer queue Abilities until Ice Block has expired.
Kerrigan’s Assimilation Trait now appropriately grants Shields for damage dealt by her Psionic Pulse Talent.
Li Li’s Cloud Serpent will now attack mounted Heroes.
Li Li’s Timeless Creature Talent no longer allows two Cloud Serpents to be present simultaneously on the same target.
A range indicator is now displayed when hovering the mouse over Malfurion’s Innervate Ability icon.
Fixed an issue in which Muradin’s starting Health regeneration was much higher than intended.
Muradin’s Haymaker targeting arrow will no longer persist on the target, nor display through the Fog of War, if Muradin is killed before Haymaker can be cast.
Nova’s
Holo Decoy will now appropriately use Basic Attacks even if it does not
have enough Mana to cast Abilities when it is spawned.
Fixed several inconsistencies that could occur with Raynor’s Penetrating Round after learning Talents that modify its damage.
Fixed an issue that could cause Rehgar to briefly pause before his first Basic Attack after casting Feral Lunge.
The cooldown for Rehgar’s Ancestral Healing is now appropriately reduced to 10 seconds if the Ability is cancelled.
Rehgar will no longer exit Ghost Wolf form when activating the Farsight Talent.
A Stitches that Gorges a hero and then becomes affected by Zagara’s Devouring Maw will now continue to hold onto the Gorge target until Devouring Maw expires.
Stitches’ Hook will no longer become visually stuck to targets that cannot be pulled.
Fixed an issue which caused summoned units to deal half damage to Heroes with the Superiority Talent.
The duration bar for Tassadar’s Archon will no longer remain visible on the death screen if Tassadar is killed while transforming into his Archon form.
Casting Tassadar’s Dimensional Shift immediately after being struck by Tyrande’s Sentinel will no longer cause the revealed indicator to persist on Tassadar until his next death.
Fixed a rare issue in which Tychus could be immediately killed upon exiting the Odin after entering it at full Health.
Corrected a tooltip which incorrectly indicated that Tychus’ Drakken Laser Drill was only dealing half its actual damage.
If Tyrael’s
Judgment is cancelled prior to reaching the target, he will now
continue to fly toward the target’s previous location rather than drop
into unpathable terrain.
Casting Tyrande’s Sentinel now displays an appropriate minimap icon after learning the Ranger Talent.
The visual effects for Valla’s Manticore Talent will no longer persist on Tassadar during Dimensional Shift.
Sound
Illidan’s Metamorphosis voiceover is no longer globally audible.
The First Blood announcer voiceover is no longer played for each Murky death while watching a Replay.
Grave Golem attack sounds are no longer audible through the Fog of War.
Selecting Sgt. Hammer’s Hyper-Cooling Engines Talent while she is dead will no longer cause the associated sound effects to play before respawning.
Voiceover indicating that a Garden Terror is spawning will no longer
default to English when another language setting is selected.
User Interface
Fixed an issue that could cause excess UI elements to appear upon
returning to game menus after playing with a Hero that cannot use
Mounts.
A party member that cancels the matchmaking queue just as the
countdown begins will no longer cause the bottom navigation bar to
disappear for remaining party members.
The Hero Level progress bar on endgame Summary Screens now more
accurately reflects the amount of XP required when very near level-up.
Bringing up the Radial Ping Menu on the minimap will no longer cause the minimap to stop functioning.
zephiris
zephiris 
Heroes of the Storm Closed Beta Patch Notes -- January 13, 2014
We’ve brought Heroes of the Storm offline for a period of extended maintenance today in order to kick off our Closed Beta testing phase, and bring you a brand new patch! Maintenance is ongoing, but don't worry; we'll let you know just as soon as the Nexus is back online.
The Technical Alpha testing phase has officially come to an end, and we’ve got a new Battleground, a new Hero, our first iteration for Ranked Play, and much, much more in store for you with today’s update. Check out the complete patch notes below, and welcome to the Heroes of the Storm Closed Beta!
General
New Portrait Rewards
New Battleground
Sky Temple, a brand new 3-lane Battleground, has been added to Heroes of the Storm and is now available for play in all game modes!
New Hero
Thrall, Warchief of the Horde, has entered the Nexus and is now available for play! Read on for a brief overview of his abilities.
User Interface
General
Hero League
Custom Games
For a much more in-depth look at features mentioned above, check out our recent Hero League and Draft Mode blog post. Furthermore, kindly keep in mind that today’s addition of Hero League and Draft Mode represent an early look at Ranked Play, and a number of improvements are planned for each of these features with future game updates. Feel free to share your thoughts on these features with us using the official feedback forums.
Art
General
Battlegrounds
Heroes, Mounts, and Skins
Shop
Weekly Sales
Bundle Packs
Heroes
Mounts
Price Changes
Skins
Design and Gameplay
Battlegrounds
Structures
Mercenaries
Talents
General
Resurgence of the Storm
Calldown: MULE
Mercenary Lord
Heroes
Abathur
Azmodan
Chen
Falstad
Gazlowe
Illidan
Jaina
Kerrigan
Li Li
Muradin
Nova
Tassadar
Tychus
Zagara
Bug Fixes
General
Art
Battlegrounds
Heroes and Talents
Sound
User Interface