The next hero got leaked (again)!

[Hollycakes]

Heroes of the Storm Update - Feb 08, 2019

While we have more balance changes coming at regular intervals, our next new hero is also right around the corner. There are some theories floating around as to who’s next, but we have a few more releases before they’ll be ready to see the light of day.

Kaéo[/blizzquote]

Maybe it's not Anduin? He seems to imply there are others coming before him. Or am I reading it all wrong?

[Triceron]

I don't normally buy into the "Horde vs Alliance favouritism" debate, but the representation IS kinda skewed...

Horde only have 6 heroes total:
Thrall
Garrosh
Samuro
Rexxar
Gazlowe
Sylvanas

Rehgar is neutral, so is ZJ, ETC isn't in the lore, Gul'dan is... questionable...?

Meanwhile Alliance has 11:
Falstad
Greymane
Jaina
Maiev
Valeera
Varian
Muradin
Yrel
Malfurion
Tyrande
Uther

And now a 12th being added, with Anduin. It's a bit of a disparity

Well, to be fair if you're not going to count Rehgar, ETC, Zul'jin, Cho'gall and Gul'dan for not being officially part of the Horde, then characters like Maiev, Valeera and Yrel shouldn't be counted towards the Alliance.

Yrel never officially joined the Alliance, she just fought alongside them which is pretty loose. We even see what happens to her in joining the Army of the Light in the alternate universe future in BFA. Valeera, despite being a personal bodyguard/spy to Varian/Anduin, has never truly been affiliated with either faction. Maiev is the only shaky one here, since she is technically now Alliance due to the events of Battle of Darkshore, but I believe the Heroes of the Storm depiction to be of her prior to joining the Alliance and still acting independently as leader of the Watchers. As a very loose 4th, Malfurion generally has stayed neutral, but I'd probably still chalk him up as Alliance just because.

Also an odd duck - Uther is technically part of the Alliance of Lordaeron and died before WoW's new (Grand Alliance) was formed. He sorta floats in a highly revered-yet never really joined position, and sorta fits in with the War2 era of Alliance/Horde characters. I mean it totally makes sense that he'd be an Alliance character, but at the same time I feel Zul'jin, Gul'dan and Cho'gall, Rehgar and ETC should all be considered Horde since that is the faction they all identify with symbolically and historically.

But yeah, Horde is still missing some pretty big names like Vol'jin, Baine/Cairne, and Grom.

[Nerraw]

Maybe it's not Anduin? He seems to imply there are others coming before him. Or am I reading it all wrong?

Personally I'm thinking we'll see him in April, instead of March as one would expect from previous release patterns. That and the apparent increase to a 5-week release schedule in stead of 4 weeks has me slightly concerned. Not overly concerned, but a little bit.

[Reztek]

I don't normally buy into the "Horde vs Alliance favouritism" debate, but the representation IS kinda skewed...

Horde only have 6 heroes total:
Thrall
Garrosh
Samuro
Rexxar
Gazlowe
Sylvanas

Rehgar is neutral, so is ZJ, ETC isn't in the lore, Gul'dan is... questionable...?

Meanwhile Alliance has 11:
Falstad
Greymane
Jaina
Maiev
Valeera
Varian
Muradin
Yrel
Malfurion
Tyrande
Uther

And now a 12th being added, with Anduin. It's a bit of a disparity

How is Rehgar neutral when he has at least 3 quotes like "Power to the Horde!" or "For the Horde!"? Dunno about currently in WoW post-Legion, but imo in HotS he's clearly representing the Horde.

[Nikkaszal]

How is Rehgar neutral when he has at least 3 quotes like "Power to the Horde!" or "For the Horde!"? Dunno about currently in WoW post-Legion, but imo in HotS he's clearly representing the Horde.

Rehgar is Earthen Ring. Like the Cenarion Circle, they are totally neutral and represent Azeroth rather than a faction.

[adamzz]

Maiev currently sides with the Alliance as she is fighting off the Horde in the current Darkshore Warfront.

Oh no, she's fighting off the Horde that's invading her homeland and burned down her peoples world tree. Doesn't mean she's in the Alliance, just means that they have a common enemy. If the Horde didn't want Maiev as an enemy maybe they shouldn't have burned down her home?

[kendro1200]

I don't normally buy into the "Horde vs Alliance favouritism" debate, but the representation IS kinda skewed...

Horde only have 6 heroes total:
Thrall
Garrosh
Samuro
Rexxar
Gazlowe
Sylvanas

Rehgar is neutral, so is ZJ, ETC isn't in the lore, Gul'dan is... questionable...?

Meanwhile Alliance has 11:
Falstad
Greymane
Jaina
Maiev
Valeera
Varian
Muradin
Yrel
Malfurion
Tyrande
Uther

And now a 12th being added, with Anduin. It's a bit of a disparity

I count that as actually six Alliance Faction heroes if you put Rehgar as a neutral character.

Uther is part of the Alliance of Lordaeron, so if Gul'dan doesn't count by being part of the Old Horde, then Uther doesn't count either.
Valeera's allegiance was strictly to Varian and his family (as was made clear in the Before the Storm novel), she does not care about the Alliance.
Yrel is friendly to the Alliance because they had Draenei, but has done nothing to help or aid the Alliance after we provided aid on AU Draenor.
Malfurion sat around as one of the most neutral of neutral characters in the entire game. While orcs were literally chopping up the children of his teacher he would sit there and sing "Why can't we be friends?"
Maiev went completely rogue from the Kal'dorei before they even joined the Alliance.

In truth the way Blizzard sees it is this way: Any character that is part of a race or faction that teamed up with either the Horde or Alliance is thus an Alliance or Horde hero, unless their current affiliations prove otherwise. So Zul'jin is Horde because the Forest Trolls teamed up with the Horde at one point. Gul'dan and Cho'Gall are Horde because they were part of the Shadow Council which ran the Horde. Uther is Alliance because he was part of the old Alliance. Malfurion is an Alliance because Night Elves joined the Alliance, same with Maeiv. Chen is Horde because he helped with the Founding of Durotar that one time, and Li Li is Horde because she's attached to her Uncle. The list goes on, and the only place it gets a little weird is the Scourge.

Overall, the Horde is getting its limelight in the MMO, calm down, if Blizzard wants to try and keep Alliance players somewhat interested in the Warcraft franchise by putting another hero that they think might appeal to them, then that is the way it is.

[Stormcall]

I count that as actually six Alliance Faction heroes if you put Rehgar as a neutral character.

Uther is part of the Alliance of Lordaeron, so if Gul'dan doesn't count by being part of the Old Horde, then Uther doesn't count either.
Valeera's allegiance was strictly to Varian and his family (as was made clear in the Before the Storm novel), she does not care about the Alliance.
Yrel is friendly to the Alliance because they had Draenei, but has done nothing to help or aid the Alliance after we provided aid on AU Draenor.
Malfurion sat around as one of the most neutral of neutral characters in the entire game. While orcs were literally chopping up the children of his teacher he would sit there and sing "Why can't we be friends?"
Maiev went completely rogue from the Kal'dorei before they even joined the Alliance.
.

Malfurion and Maiev are actively helping the allies and fighting and killing the Horde in the current game, so that pretty clearly makes them Alliance. Valeera is also directly helping the Alliance currently, and yes, if your loyalty is "only" to the person who EMBODIES THE ALLIANCE, then yeah, sorry, that makes you Alliance. Y'Rel was Alliance, though now that she's gone Space Hitler I dunno where she stands, so I suppose you can count her as "neutral".

[Triceron]

Malfurion and Maiev are actively helping the allies and fighting and killing the Horde in the current game, so that pretty clearly makes them Alliance. Valeera is also directly helping the Alliance currently, and yes, if your loyalty is "only" to the person who EMBODIES THE ALLIANCE, then yeah, sorry, that makes you Alliance. Y'Rel was Alliance, though now that she's gone Space Hitler I dunno where she stands, so I suppose you can count her as "neutral".

Yeah but that's BFA/WOW Horde/Alliance. Like some of us pointed out, Horde and Alliance in HOTS doesn't work the same way, and if you just break it down to 'as it is in Warcraft current' then yeah of course it's going to look imbalanced because the Horde in WoW has gone through multiple Warchiefs and you may as well cut out Thrall and Garrosh since Sylvanas is the current and only Warchief.

HOTS doesn't balance its horde and alliance based on WoW lore, and that's why we have so many outliers like Rehgar, ETC, Cho'gall, Zul'jin and even Chen. That's not even counting all the Horde/Alliance skins they've added in the game, like Demolisher Hammer, Az'guldan, and the legendary Warsong Commander and Sapper skins.

I actually wish they did more of those. We could use an Artanis Draenei skin, or a Cassia Headhunter skin.

[melzas]

How can you even count Reghar as a neutral hero? He is as much "For the Horde!!" guy as it gets...

Anyway, this whole Alliance vs Horde debate is dumb anyway, devs don't look at the roster and go "Hey we have X amount of Alliance heroes, time to add more Horde!" because that would be just silly. I'm pretty sure what determines which heroes they are creating goes more by the list of:
-playerbase demand and fan favourites
-cool ideas for spells and mechanics
-distinctive sihoulettes
-roles
-universe representation

I doubt their team sits there thinking "man, Reghar is 75% horde and Yrel is 53% alliance, maybe we should add Baine next, because he is like 25% horde so that evens out with Anduin who comes soon and who is 47% alliance????"

[msdos]

They're adding way too much cute/glorious crap.

The next WoW hero needs to be Akama, Baine or Vol'jin. I want ugly and gritty, downright grotesque would be nice as well. Children and girls and grandmas aren't the only people playing these damn games, jeez!

I'm thinking Vol'jin needs to have serpent wards, spirit link/voodoo shuffle and some kind of ranged nuke. Support style, ranged version of Illidan who prefers to zone rather than chase who can gg you if you ignore him. Basically a Gazlowe but if you wanted an actual good assassin hero.

Akama and Baine can both just be tanks because they need to get people playing tanks.
I would make Akama the "mobility" tank to counter the Overwatch stuff and rampant CC that is flying around. Give him like a dash that can move through people, that dashes back to his initial position. Give him a skillshot that puts him into stealth if he lands it and give him active mitigation instead of passive, but high reward for timing similar to Varian.
Baine can have totems?? Maybe a complete zone tank with totems. That'd be hilarious and very throwback.

[DesoPL]

How can you even count Reghar as a neutral hero? He is as much "For the Horde!!" guy as it gets...

Anyway, this whole Alliance vs Horde debate is dumb anyway, devs don't look at the roster and go "Hey we have X amount of Alliance heroes, time to add more Horde!" because that would be just silly. I'm pretty sure what determines which heroes they are creating goes more by the list of:
-playerbase demand and fan favourites
-cool ideas for spells and mechanics
-distinctive sihoulettes
-roles
-universe representation

I doubt their team sits there thinking "man, Reghar is 75% horde and Yrel is 53% alliance, maybe we should add Baine next, because he is like 25% horde so that evens out with Anduin who comes soon and who is 47% alliance????"

Thing with Rehgar is, that he was added in WoW with Legion for shaman class hall where he was suprisingly... Neutral and still is neutral in BfA trying help heal Azeroth along with Hamuul Runetotem at Magni's camp.

Yeah he was horde member back in old days, but he also enslaved people to work for him as gladiators in his arena. But then he resocalizate himself or whatever, and joined earthen ring.

[Donald Hellscream]

Anduin? Thats a funny way to spell Deathwing.

[Unholyground]

We need an Old God already!

[DesoPL]

We need an Old God already!

Aka Abathur 2.0? xD

[Unholyground]

Aka Abathur 2.0? xD

I would like to see N'Zoth lol.

[RadasNoir]

I would like to see N'Zoth lol.

Considering that we're now going to get heroes releases to tie-in "synergistically" with major events from the other franchises, N'zoth seems the likeliest candidate to be the first Old God to show up in HotS, if one is going to get added at all. If I remember correctly, the devs are kind of leery about adding another character like Abathur, who can't be directly "fought" on the battlefield, and I don't really see how else you would properly portray an Old God.

[Kallisto]

after the burning of teldrasill, maiev seems to be heavily alliance sided

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valeera isnt alliance, she doesnt care about faction, she is loyal to the house wrynn

House Wrynn is the Alliance.

[Hollycakes]

Madness will consume me if it's not Yogg. Need more tentacles. Plus he could flirt with Orphea. And because I want him. And they said they'd love a core hero. And yes. Zero grammar.

[KainneAbsolute]

Anduin abilities can bring us some spoilers about WoW. For example, Anduin will have shadow powers? will he have some melee combat abilities?

Grom, at the end, fought against the demon blood and killed the source of it. He freed the orcs and got redemption.