A New Look for Stealth in Heroes of the Storm

[Nerraw]

As part of our 2018 Gameplay Updates, we’re making significant changes to how Stealth works in Heroes of the Storm. We’ve outlined those changes below, along with some reasoning and explanations behind the changes from the Live Design team.

What’s Changing and Why:
Making the decision to change the way stealth works in Heroes of the Storm wasn’t an easy decision. While we recognized that stealth Heroes in their previous incarnation did a great job of fitting the fantasy of their characters, we also identified that the stealth shimmer visual gameplay was extremely hard for a significant number of players to see, and was ultimately just an eye test for the opposing team. Previously, if the opposing team could quickly spot the enemy stealthed Hero, they gained a significant advantage while the stealthed Hero was left with very few options for counterplay. On the flip side, against a team that consistently failed to spot the shimmer, stealth Heroes could dominate the match and force players into a very passive and not-entirely-fun playstyle. Due to this, there was also a large disparity in the power level of stealth Heroes at different ranks of play. In uncoordinated Quick Match games, stealth was king. However, in high-level ranked play and esports, stealth Heroes were much weaker and hardly ever seen.

With our upcoming changes to stealth, we want to remove the “eye test” mechanic and give both stealth Heroes, and the opposing teams, a better experience in matches. Here’s how:

• New Visuals:
  
  • The stealth shimmer visual effect is now much easier to spot when you’re facing off against stealthed Heroes. With this change, we want to shift this power away from that ‘eye test’ and encourage more strategic use of stealth. Some important things to note are that stealthed Heroes will still be hidden on the minimap, and they still cannot be directly targeted by abilities. You must still hit them with an aimed attack if you want to break their stealth.

• New “Invisible” state:
  
  • If a stealthed Hero remains immobile for a short amount of time (currently 1.5 seconds) they will become “Invisible” and will not display any outline or visual effect until they move again or are revealed by dealing or taking damage. Our goal with this addition is to bring back some of the uncertainty when playing vs. stealth Heroes that we’ve lost with the more obvious stealth visual effects. If a stealth Hero maneuvers carefully and plans ahead, they could be hiding anywhere… even right next to you!
  • To avoid some bad gameplay situations, we’ve also implemented a couple of exceptions to this new mechanic:
    
    • Stealthed Heroes cannot become Invisible on active battleground locations (such as an active Volskaya Foundry capture point) and are removed from invisible if the point becomes active with them present
    • Stealthed Heroes cannot become Invisible on Mercenary capture points once the camp has been defeated.
• Changes to “Unrevealable”:
  
  • Before, “Unrevealable” is a state that exists where you cannot be broken out of stealth. While in this state, we hide your stealth shimmer much like the new “Invisible” state. This mechanic exists on several Heroes, namely Valeera and Samuro, when they first enter their stealth states. Now, “Unrevealable” remains unchanged in that the Hero cannot be removed from stealth during the duration, but we do not hide the stealth visual effect. The only way to hide completely during stealth is through the new “Invisible” state. Unrevealable was implemented as a way to give a character like Valeera a chance to use her openers in combat – without it, she could be immediately broken from her stealth and lose her second set of abilities. We wanted to keep that while allowing the opposing team to keep track of her movement.

Updating Stealth Heroes:
With the easier to spot stealth visual, we’re not only hoping to alleviate the oppressive nature of stealth Heroes in Quick Match, but we’re also opening up the ability to enhance these Heroes kits and roles since a significant portion of their power no longer relies on them going unnoticed in combat. With these updates, we didn’t want to just do straight number buffs, but rather wanted to see if we could give these characters some new tools and tricks to play with. You can check out the highlights below or read the full patch notes from the PTR here.

• Nova:
  
  • Nova now starts with a new active (called Ghost Protocol) that she can use to immediately enter Stealth (Default Hotkey: 1) that also spawns a Holo Decoy at her location. Additionally, Nova now gains a significant movement speed boost when stealthed (currently 15%). These changes should allow Nova to position a little more aggressively and have some opportunities for escape if she is caught.
  • The Snipe Master talent is now baseline to reward careful positioning and aim without having to sacrifice a talent tier.
  • Holo Decoys now do a small amount of Nova’s damage baseline, and use a smarter AI system. Since Nova’s position will be much more apparent in the new system, we know that Holo Decoys would be much less effective as a confusion tool. With the new smarter clones and added damage, they might fake people out a bit more, add a bit of confusion, and can also be used to dismount enemy Heroes, prevent objective captures, etc.

• Samuro:
  
  • With Samuro’s update, we wanted to play up the “3-card monte” gameplay that we originally intended for this Hero. Samuro should keep his opponents guessing as to which of his images is real, then “reset” using his new Trait once he’s been discovered. To that end:
    
    • Samuro can now control his positioning when making new Mirror Images with the real Samuro always spawning towards your current mouse location. This allows more aggressive and calculated plays since you have much more direct control over your positioning.
    • Samuro can now swap positions with one of his Mirror Images using his new Trait, Image Transmission. Choosing the Illusion Master talent will now greatly reduce the cooldown of Image Transmission.
    • We’ve shifted a significant portion of the damage dealt by Mirror Images into Samuro himself, since we want to reward players who can successfully utilize his new trait to reposition and confuse the enemy.
• Zeratul:
  
  • Before these changes, Zeratul was the most competitive Stealth hero in high-level play, and didn’t require as much tuning to normalize across all levels of play. However, we saw an opportunity to make some tweaks and add a couple of fun new elements to his kit:
    
    • Zeratul now has the Vorpal Blade talent as a baseline ability, granting some extra mobility and letting player pull off some extra-flashy maneuvers.
    • We’ve added a new Heroic Ability in place of Shadow Assault, Might of the Nerazim, that was designed with the goal of competing with Void Prison and playing into the technical playstyle that makes high-level Zeratul players shine:
      
      • Might of the Nerazim Passive: Each time you use an ability, your next basic attack deals bonus damage. With this passive effect, Zeratul* players will want to weave basic attacks in between abilities for maximum effectiveness.
      • Might of the Nerazim Active: Your Heroic Ability button (Default: R) becomes the last active Basic Ability you used. If you Blink in, your R is now Blink. You’ll want to pay extra attention to the order in which your abilities are cast. Another Cleave is a great source of extra damage, but what if you had a second Blink to escape the fight with your life?
      • Might of the Nerazim Storm Talent Upgrade:* Might of the Nerazim resets the cooldown on ALL basic abilities when used. After choosing this, Zeratul players can weave in basic attacks between all of their abilities, press R, and do it again!
• Valeera:
  
  • When considering Valeera, we decided that having two sets of abilities, a number of utility openers, as well as an on-command stealth meant that she already had a lot of really cool things going on and didn’t require as much work as some of our other Heroes. However, we did feel that Valeera was likely to be the most impacted by the stealth visual change since she has melee openers and no gap-closing abilities. In order to address this, we implemented the following changes:
    
    • After remaining in stealth for 3 seconds, Valeera’s openers teleport her to the enemy.
      
      • With this new gap closer, opposing players are still able to see Valeera coming and react, while Valeera players can use quick maneuvers and careful positioning to still get the jump on enemies.
    • We’ve reworked her openers from stealth to be less about stun-locking an opponent and burning them down, and more about having options to shut down enemy damage dealers.
      
      • Cheap Shot: We’ve significantly reduced the stun duration, but added a blind to counter Heroes that rely heavily on Basic Attacks.
      • Garrote: To help in shutting down Supports and Assassins that focus on casting spells, we’ve buffed the duration of Garrote’s silence effect.
      • Assassinate: We’ve cut out some of the damage of this ability, but added an armor reducing effect. This should help Valeera take down more durable targets with the help of her team.

We hope you’ve enjoyed this detailed look at the Stealth changes we are making in Heroes of the Storm. As always, please let us know what you think in the comments below and we’ll see you in the Nexus!

[Demona3]

Tried it out on the PTR tonight and I have to say, I was beyond horrified and disgusted. So much so, I requested a refund on the year stimpack I just got (which refund was granted). I figured the best way to send a message was to close the wallet. I also informed the rep I was chatting with to send a strongly worded letter in my name and include my phone number if they wished to chat with me further about this issue.

The changes being done to stealth are beyond absurd. There is no "sneaking up" anymore to anyone. I got matched tonight with against Hammer, Rehgar, Chromie, Hanzo, and Nova. I was constantly broken out of stealth from afar very easily by the Nova. When I tried to get the jump on Hammer - yeah, screw that. She immediately blew me out of stealth. By nature, enemy teams seem to chase or gravitate towards the revealed character in an attempt to kill it. There was definitely no shortage of that tonight. They saw me moving about and gave chase every time. And that was just the first match........

The second match - Hanzo, D'Va, Alexstraza, Genji, and Nova. Easily broken out of stealth, every single time I moved. YAY GENJI! And of course, you can't escape him now, because there is no more escape back into stealth. Hell, you just can't escape anymore PERIOD. You're literally fucked, even if you took smoke bomb ult.
So basically, just stand still all game, in a bush or anywhere really, and hope an enemy hero you can take out, walks near you without breaking you out of your "stealth".

Valeera doesn't need any openers anymore, because 9 times out of 10, she won't be able to use them anyway unless it's a massive team fight and she can "sneak" in to that 1 character in the group.

The assassinate ability is laughable now. You'll be lucky if you can use it - which, btw, they moved the talents around. You don't get the option for that until late game. I believe it was...13 or 16? I dunno, I was so disgusted by then, I wanted to quit out of the game.
Please don't get me wrong here, I went into the matches tonight on the PTR with an open mind and attempt to work around the new "stealth". I love Valeera, I play her as a main, and I can assure you, this is gut wrenching to me after tonight.

The other new change: true sight to towers, also absurd. This leaves Abathur and Murky's egg forever safe. No more sneaking in to get the egg and having the thrill to see if you survive after destroying said egg or slug....
Also, Hanzo gets a "flare" talent for stealthies.... let that sink in. There clearly isn't enough to reveal your stealthed butt in the game as it is... even more so with the stealth change.

Please don't take my words for it, try it for yourself. The PTR is up.

[TheTyro]

I've always played Nova as a mage, so her having baseline snipe master quest is just gonna make me a god. Good job blizzard! #Balanced

[Zapanth]

Tried it out on the PTR tonight and I have to say, I was beyond horrified and disgusted. So much so, I requested a refund on the year stimpack I just got (which refund was granted). I figured the best way to send a message was to close the wallet. I also informed the rep I was chatting with to send a strongly worded letter in my name and include my phone number if they wished to chat with me further about this issue.

The changes being done to stealth are beyond absurd. There is no "sneaking up" anymore to anyone. I got matched tonight with against Hammer, Rehgar, Chromie, Hanzo, and Nova. I was constantly broken out of stealth from afar very easily by the Nova. When I tried to get the jump on Hammer - yeah, screw that. She immediately blew me out of stealth. By nature, enemy teams seem to chase or gravitate towards the revealed character in an attempt to kill it. There was definitely no shortage of that tonight. They saw me moving about and gave chase every time. And that was just the first match........

The second match - Hanzo, D'Va, Alexstraza, Genji, and Nova. Easily broken out of stealth, every single time I moved. YAY GENJI! And of course, you can't escape him now, because there is no more escape back into stealth. Hell, you just can't escape anymore PERIOD. You're literally fucked, even if you took smoke bomb ult.
So basically, just stand still all game, in a bush or anywhere really, and hope an enemy hero you can take out, walks near you without breaking you out of your "stealth".

Valeera doesn't need any openers anymore, because 9 times out of 10, she won't be able to use them anyway unless it's a massive team fight and she can "sneak" in to that 1 character in the group.

The assassinate ability is laughable now. You'll be lucky if you can use it - which, btw, they moved the talents around. You don't get the option for that until late game. I believe it was...13 or 16? I dunno, I was so disgusted by then, I wanted to quit out of the game.
Please don't get me wrong here, I went into the matches tonight on the PTR with an open mind and attempt to work around the new "stealth". I love Valeera, I play her as a main, and I can assure you, this is gut wrenching to me after tonight.

The other new change: true sight to towers, also absurd. This leaves Abathur and Murky's egg forever safe. No more sneaking in to get the egg and having the thrill to see if you survive after destroying said egg or slug....
Also, Hanzo gets a "flare" talent for stealthies.... let that sink in. There clearly isn't enough to reveal your stealthed butt in the game as it is... even more so with the stealth change.

Please don't take my words for it, try it for yourself. The PTR is up.

This is the problem for league under upper plat and in quick match. Prior to this patch if their was pitched team fights you could sneak up on opponents and destroy them if they're not careful. We're going from an era of careful positioning and timing your strikes to be as effective as possible to an era of................................................. just waiting in random areas waiting for a gank. Whats more fun I ask you, stalking and pouncing on your prey or standing still doing nothing waiting for someone to walk by?

[derpkitteh]

it's stealth. the point of stealth is to be a sneaky bitch.

i don't understand why they would make stealth more visible. it defeats the whole purpose.

[Nikkaszal]

it's stealth. the point of stealth is to be a sneaky bitch.

i don't understand why they would make stealth more visible. it defeats the whole purpose.

Stealth is being shifted more from "SURPRISE MOTHERFUCKAS" to "activated immunity to being targetted".

Heroes are being changed to reflect the new playstyle. The new brand of stealth favours more active engagement and harass rather than waiting on the flanks for the right moment to delete someone. Nova is going to be played as a single target mage, and instead of stealth being about popping out of nowhere 5 seconds after a fight breaks out to kill someone on 50% HP, she will be played as an aggressive harasser who uses stealth as an "untargetable" shroud to reposition. Valeera and Zera are being designed as high-damage melee assassins who are hard to pin down.

As to the first responder above - I do not disagree with you about Valeera. She's been hurt more by this change than the other two for one reason: she's melee, and thus less safe than Nova, and while she has a gapclose she has no escape, making her strictly weaker than Zeratul. While Nova and Zeratul will still be valid choices after the change - should actually try new Nova and play her as an embedded mage rather than a flanking finisher, she's actually quite strong now - Valeera doesn't quite fit yet.

I expect she'll get some pretty big buffs to her survivability soon to compensate.

[Thaledwyn]

152 levels of Valeera fun will be gone soon...

[Austilias]

Frankly if the 'unfairness' issue was around shimmer visibility, they should have just removed the shimmer and made stealth 100% invisible.

What is the alternative we have now? We've seen it before - it already exists in WoW, and in exactly the same form: Hunter camouflage.

You can't be auto-attacked/targeted out of stealth, but AoE's will do the trick. You're 100% visible, except for when you're standing still - which generally isn't a good idea in HOTS. Calling it 'stealth' is frankly a joke.

EDIT: When people argue that stealth in its current form is too hard to counter, I'm not sure I agree. Stealth in its current form tends to punish two things: straying too far from your team, and overextending from your forts. Given that these two things should generally be avoided, I've never seen the problem.

[Demona3]

152 levels of Valeera fun will be gone soon...

Right there with you.

- - - Updated - - -

This is the problem for league under upper plat and in quick match. Prior to this patch if their was pitched team fights you could sneak up on opponents and destroy them if they're not careful. We're going from an era of careful positioning and timing your strikes to be as effective as possible to an era of................................................. just waiting in random areas waiting for a gank. Whats more fun I ask you, stalking and pouncing on your prey or standing still doing nothing waiting for someone to walk by?

I enjoyed stalking my prey.. but this forces you to sit and wait, which is something none of these characters are designed to do.

[Vinho]

Bye Zeratul, Nova, Valeera. Sad as they were some of my favourites to play. This is stupid Blizzard.

[Highelf]

Couldn't agree more.

"Support Heroes that can heal others is taking the fun out of it, so we're going to change it to where they can only heal when they stand still."

[PPN]

That sucks. I always found that its challenging to find those heroes who are stealthed. I mean you expect them more or less how they will come and thats also why you see them. You can ruin their whole game when you unstealth them. And then they are pretty squishy or useless for a while for their team.
If someone plays for example as sylvanas and just running around solo then its there own fault, it has nothing to do with stealther who are OP.
I dont see why they have to make them super visible, just because some ppl dont see them?
The game is easy enough like this, thats why its also so user friendly. No need to dumb it down.
The thing i like about the change is that you cant be now stealthed on control points. That was just stupid. You can just sneak into the corner and stop the loading progress until your whole team comes back from that start xD

[Fabray]

Stealth is being shifted more from "SURPRISE MOTHERFUCKAS" to "activated immunity to being targetted".

Heroes are being changed to reflect the new playstyle. The new brand of stealth favours more active engagement and harass rather than waiting on the flanks for the right moment to delete someone. Nova is going to be played as a single target mage, and instead of stealth being about popping out of nowhere 5 seconds after a fight breaks out to kill someone on 50% HP, she will be played as an aggressive harasser who uses stealth as an "untargetable" shroud to reposition. Valeera and Zera are being designed as high-damage melee assassins who are hard to pin down.

As to the first responder above - I do not disagree with you about Valeera. She's been hurt more by this change than the other two for one reason: she's melee, and thus less safe than Nova, and while she has a gapclose she has no escape, making her strictly weaker than Zeratul. While Nova and Zeratul will still be valid choices after the change - should actually try new Nova and play her as an embedded mage rather than a flanking finisher, she's actually quite strong now - Valeera doesn't quite fit yet.

I expect she'll get some pretty big buffs to her survivability soon to compensate.

This guy gets it, honestly some of you (OP asking for a refund lol) are being ridiculous.

152 levels of Valeera fun will be gone soon...

No offense, but if you played that much Valeera, you’re simply not a great person.

[Charge me Doctor]

Tried it out on the PTR tonight and I have to say, I was beyond horrified and disgusted. So much so, I requested a refund on the year stimpack I just got (which refund was granted). I figured the best way to send a message was to close the wallet. I also informed the rep I was chatting with to send a strongly worded letter in my name and include my phone number if they wished to chat with me further about this issue.

The changes being done to stealth are beyond absurd. There is no "sneaking up" anymore to anyone. I got matched tonight with against Hammer, Rehgar, Chromie, Hanzo, and Nova. I was constantly broken out of stealth from afar very easily by the Nova. When I tried to get the jump on Hammer - yeah, screw that. She immediately blew me out of stealth. By nature, enemy teams seem to chase or gravitate towards the revealed character in an attempt to kill it. There was definitely no shortage of that tonight. They saw me moving about and gave chase every time. And that was just the first match........

The second match - Hanzo, D'Va, Alexstraza, Genji, and Nova. Easily broken out of stealth, every single time I moved. YAY GENJI! And of course, you can't escape him now, because there is no more escape back into stealth. Hell, you just can't escape anymore PERIOD. You're literally fucked, even if you took smoke bomb ult.
So basically, just stand still all game, in a bush or anywhere really, and hope an enemy hero you can take out, walks near you without breaking you out of your "stealth".

Valeera doesn't need any openers anymore, because 9 times out of 10, she won't be able to use them anyway unless it's a massive team fight and she can "sneak" in to that 1 character in the group.

The assassinate ability is laughable now. You'll be lucky if you can use it - which, btw, they moved the talents around. You don't get the option for that until late game. I believe it was...13 or 16? I dunno, I was so disgusted by then, I wanted to quit out of the game.
Please don't get me wrong here, I went into the matches tonight on the PTR with an open mind and attempt to work around the new "stealth". I love Valeera, I play her as a main, and I can assure you, this is gut wrenching to me after tonight.

The other new change: true sight to towers, also absurd. This leaves Abathur and Murky's egg forever safe. No more sneaking in to get the egg and having the thrill to see if you survive after destroying said egg or slug....
Also, Hanzo gets a "flare" talent for stealthies.... let that sink in. There clearly isn't enough to reveal your stealthed butt in the game as it is... even more so with the stealth change.

Please don't take my words for it, try it for yourself. The PTR is up.

Sounds like LTP problem. Had no issues sneaking on opponents as Valeera. Sounds like you played only against opponents who couldn't see old stealth ripples even if their life depended on it

[Kithelle]

If only they'd do this in WoW...Rogues are annoying as hell!

In all seriousness...I've never really played the stealths in HotS, but this seems like a really REALLY stupid change and basically makes *stealth* useless.

- - - Updated - - -

Sounds like LTP problem. Had no issues sneaking on opponents as Valeera. Sounds like you played only against opponents who couldn't see old stealth ripples even if their life depended on it

You could be playing against people who just aren't paying enough attention, it can go both ways.

[Thelxi]

Wow these are some serious changes.

[Kaleredar]

And nothing of value was lost.

[De Lupe]

Stealth is being shifted more from "SURPRISE MOTHERFUCKAS" to "activated immunity to being targetted".

Heroes are being changed to reflect the new playstyle. The new brand of stealth favours more active engagement and harass rather than waiting on the flanks for the right moment to delete someone. Nova is going to be played as a single target mage, and instead of stealth being about popping out of nowhere 5 seconds after a fight breaks out to kill someone on 50% HP, she will be played as an aggressive harasser who uses stealth as an "untargetable" shroud to reposition. Valeera and Zera are being designed as high-damage melee assassins who are hard to pin down.

As to the first responder above - I do not disagree with you about Valeera. She's been hurt more by this change than the other two for one reason: she's melee, and thus less safe than Nova, and while she has a gapclose she has no escape, making her strictly weaker than Zeratul. While Nova and Zeratul will still be valid choices after the change - should actually try new Nova and play her as an embedded mage rather than a flanking finisher, she's actually quite strong now - Valeera doesn't quite fit yet.

I expect she'll get some pretty big buffs to her survivability soon to compensate.

I love the Nova change. Melted a Diablo at full health with auto-attack, decoy build. She's a single target killing machine. I never really played enough of the other three to give a fair comparison. But Nova is walking away a winner from this update.

[Charge me Doctor]

If only they'd do this in WoW...Rogues are annoying as hell!

In all seriousness...I've never really played the stealths in HotS, but this seems like a really REALLY stupid change and basically makes *stealth* useless.

- - - Updated - - -



You could be playing against people who just aren't paying enough attention, it can go both ways.

The thing is, stealth makes people unable to target you, that's its whole case. It doesn't make you magically invisible, that's why shimmer effect is in the game. Apparently, shimmer effect in fast paced game is too strong and they have to adjust it (because it's fine for SC2) correctly.

This changes literally nothing (for me), since you used to run in (as a Valeera for argument sake) on a Hammer only when she already dumped her W. Same with Jaina - you run into her only when she is out of CoC, because not waiting for that opportunity (sitting in a smoke cloud or out of sight, so the whole "now stealth is visible" argument is null, because it always was visible. When you approach "a lone enemy" and he "doesn't see you" it's not because you are "a skilled hunter", it's just because he didn't played enough against stealth heroes to see ripples. So fucking many dead novas who come into my vision range and think i can't see her...) is a suicide mission, smart players don't do shit like "well i hope they won't notice me", it's like rolling a 3 red dice in BB and expecting opponent to pick fucking POW

[Kithelle]

The thing is, stealth makes people unable to target you, that's its whole case. It doesn't make you magically invisible, that's why shimmer effect is in the game. Apparently, shimmer effect in fast paced game is too strong and they have to adjust it (because it's fine for SC2) correctly.

This changes literally nothing (for me), since you used to run in (as a Valeera for argument sake) on a Hammer only when she already dumped her W. Same with Jaina - you run into her only when she is out of CoC, because not waiting for that opportunity (sitting in a smoke cloud or out of sight, so the whole "now stealth is visible" argument is null, because it always was visible. When you approach "a lone enemy" and he "doesn't see you" it's not because you are "a skilled hunter", it's just because he didn't played enough against stealth heroes to see ripples. So fucking many dead novas who come into my vision range and think i can't see her...) is a suicide mission, smart players don't do shit like "well i hope they won't notice me", it's like rolling a 3 red dice in BB and expecting opponent to pick fucking POW

Maybe you can't target them but I'd assume if you have some kind of AoE you can still hit them?