Yrel Concerns - Developer Responses, Weekly Hero Rotation & Sales, Maiev Montage

[Nerraw]

Yrel Concerns - Developer Responses
The newest hero to join the Nexus released last week, and she has drawn criticism towards several aspects of her character. Hero Designer Matt Villers took to the forums and the Heroes subreddit to answer questions and provide some insight into what the developers are currently thinking about both Yrel and other issues.

We need a heal number for Yrel
We've heard some feedback to this effect and are currently discussing it. On the one hand, we want to make sure the information we're offering on the scoreboard is actually meaningful, but on the other we realize we're not entirely consistent here and whether or not Yrel should show healing is part of that conversation we're having. (MattVi)


She's a solo lane bruiser who can't waveclear.
To be honest, we've had a lot of discussions around where she fits in a team role-wise. Setting tuning aside for a moment, at her core she has the tools to be a tank or a bruiser, and we're actually really interested to see where players end up using her most often.

I think the claim that she "does no damage" and "can't waveclear" is largely hyperbole, and that numbers-wise she's not nearly as far off as people seem to think she is. She's got a lot of staying power and uses it to do damage over time, very similarly to someone like Blaze.

What is happening with LEFT MOUSE click? Right now it castes all her abilities and there is no way to turn it off!
This is consistent with other abilities that can be charged like on Cho'gall, Gazlowe, etc. The reason is that while charging an ability you're in "targeting mode", and left-click in our game executes abilities that are being targeted.

We have seen reports from some people who use left-click to move that they run into issues here, and that's something we're looking into.

Have you guys considered showing numbers in a more detailed after game screen?
Showing more detailed stats after the game is over is a cool idea and something we'd like to explore, once we take care of some more pressing updates.

As for why we don't show every stat for every hero, there are two main reasons-

• First, a lot of those stats aren't super meaningful for most heroes, and while small there is a downside to showing unnecessary stats. The more stats we shove into that screen the more it looks like an excel sheet than a scoreboard, and becomes harder to parse at a glance in the middle of a game.
• Second, showing info that's not relevant to your role could potentially drive toxicity. Suppose we show damage taken for all heroes, and get "oh look Nova took more damage than Arthas", or show healing and get "oh look Yrel's outhealing Lucio".

Neither of these things constitute a hard line where we'd simply refuse to show more stats, but it does give us pause to at least think about it and try to be somewhat picky. There are also things we could do to mitigate it, like re-designing the score screen to display more information in a format that's easier to read. All that to say we're reading your feedback and having discussions around it, and we'll update once we have more info to share =) (MattVi)


As others have said before, her "charge" gimmick feels like it was incorporated just to be a gimmick <...> But that's just my opinion. Maybe that playstyle somehow appeals to others.
I can definitely appreciate your perspective there, but to offer some insight we actually did the charge mechanic not just as a gimmick to be different, but as part of a very specific goal for how we wanted the player to "feel" when playing her.

We looked at this big 2-handed hammer, and how we wanted her to use it, and saw immediate parallels with 2-handed weapon specs in WoW. The feel that goes with those specs is very slow - weapon swing timers are in the 3+ second range, more focus on timing and CD management. It's really rhythmic and deliberate and that's what we wanted to capture with Yrel, and I think we did so pretty successfully.

Now of course, that style's not going to appeal to everyone. There will definitely be people who aren't into that and that's OK, but for the people who do like it it's a breath of fresh air and offers something they weren't able to get in our game previously.

One piece of advice I'll throw out there is that Yrel is a hero you have to play a few games to really get a handle on, as you need to have a feel for which abilities you can get away with using when, and how your Trait factors into all that. Trait management & skill ordering is really critical to playing Yrel effectively, and that's something that's not immediately obvious until you've put some time into her. (MattVi)


As someone who plays a lot of Cho'gall the left click thing hasn't bothered me at all. However, compared to playing Cho'gall I've noticed I accidentally click my talents or character portrait often when trying to cast an ability. Is there any way we can disable that ONLY when an ability is fully charged?
I think this is something we should explore doing in general (disabling clicks on talent UI while in targeting mode for abilities). As I'm not a UI expert I don't know how difficult it would be or if there are any drawbacks I haven't considered, but I'll pass the feedback along to the appropriate team for consideration. (MattVi)


You mentioned not wanting to have the ingame scoreboard look like an "excel spreadsheet" while in-game, have you and the team given thought to the out-of-game results screen looking like a spreadsheet?
Yeah this pretty much captures our feeling as well. When you're not in the middle of a match, we'd like to give you as much data as we reasonably can. I don't have details to share right now, but fleshing out the game stats we share with players (be it through post-game screen, player profile, or API) is definitely on our radar. (MattVi)


That said, as someone who is super passionate about the archetype I really want to play Yrel all the time but that will be hard to do if she is weak. Please, don't let her stay weak for long if the stats show she is.
100% on board with this and we'll do our best. We're going to give her some time to soak so we can get proper data before making changes, but the plan is to make adjustments to help her out if she looks to be under-performing. (MattVi)


Official responses about the state of Yrel on Blizz forums
Thanks for taking the time to summarize all this!

A few quick clarifications-

• We recognize the inconsistency of giving a Healing/Shielding stat to Probius and not to Yrel, and agree that we should do something here to make it consistent. For now we're still discussing this and should have more info to share in the future.
• There are a lot of potential problems you think about as a Designer that aren't necessarily deal-breakers. Design is all about trade-offs, and often minor drawbacks are deemed acceptable in exchange for getting something good in return. When it comes to showing more on the scoreboard, all the concerns I listed fall into that "not necessarily a deal-breaker" space. I'm not saying "we won't give you more stats because maybe toxicity", I'm saying "we're thinking about more stats and here are some possible downsides".
• I want to be clear that my message in this thread is not "We're 100% certain Yrel is perfect and you just need to L2P". We virtually always have to make some adjustments post-release, as we learn things from live servers that we simply can't get from the limited scope of internal and PTR testing. However I can say with certainty that feedback like "she does zero damage" is exaggerated and unhelpful. It's entirely possible she needs some buffs, but we're not going to make that call 2 days after release when people are still learning how to play her. Let's all be patient, get some real data, and see where she lands.

With that I'll leave you all with a piece of Yrel advice: If you want to get better at her, don't forget that you don't have to charge your abilities for the full 1.5 seconds. Releasing them early is often the better play, especially when you see or anticipate an incoming interrupt. Give it a try! (u/BlizzMattVi)

Weekly Hero Rotation
Note: This is a good time to level Abathur to 5, seeing as the period between his free rotations range from 6 months to a year.

Free-to-Play Hero Rotation: June 19, 2018

• Li Li
• ETC
• Zagara
• Butcher
• Kael'thas
• Artanis
• Cassia
• Brightwing
• Zarya
• Ragnaros
• Tyrael (Slot unlocked at Player Level 5)
• Greymane (Slot unlocked at Player Level 10)
• Chromie (Slot unlocked at Player Level 15)
• Abathur (Slot unlocked at Player Level 20)

Weekly Sales

Our next set of Heroic Deals will begin on Tuesday, June 19! Check out the list of upcoming featured items and Hero discounts below.

Upcoming Hero Sales

• Nova — Sale Price: 312 gems
• Stukov — Sale Price: 375 Gems

The following skins and mounts will be added to the featured item rotation and will become purchasable with gems until this round of Heroic Deals comes to an end:

Upcoming Featured Skins

• Rogue Novazon
• Seafoam Buccaneer Falstad
• Ghost Admiral Krakenov
• Neutron Star Lich Kel'Thuzad
• Frostlord Rexxar

Upcoming Featured Mounts

• Space Lord's Starbreaker
• Verdant Magic Carpet

Maiev Gameplay Montage
Maiev has been out for a little while now, and Youtuber Spaßvogel decided to make a case for why she is overpowered.

[Deleted]

If Yrel's damage was just a tiny bit lower, she would be doing negative damage and healing the opponent. Garbo character.

[Lionhearte0]

If Yrel's damage was just a tiny bit lower, she would be doing negative damage and healing the opponent. Garbo character.

So you basically have no idea how to play her. Cool. Try playing another game, maybe something on Mobile?

[Nerraw]

Got MVP twice with her yesterday. She's undertuned, and she needs quality-of-life changes. But she's not the catastrophe people are making her out to be.

[Aracs]

Got MVP twice with her yesterday. She's undertuned, and she needs quality-of-life changes. But she's not the catastrophe people are making her out to be.

All her basic abilities just mimic Muradin's one to one. Only difference is that they can be interrupted. So the main question is: For what reason should I take Yrel instead of Muradin, who has almost the same abilities, almost the same sustain and much more damage output?

I think the whole design of her basic toolkit is bad.

[Nerraw]

All her basic abilities just mimic Muradin's one to one. Only difference is that they can be interrupted. So the main question is: For what reason should I take Yrel instead of Muradin, who has almost the same abilities, almost the same sustain and much more damage output?

I think the whole design of her basic toolkit is bad.

Area denial. If you want to hold an area as Yrel, you will hold that area. Pop down Sacred Ground on something like a beacon on Braxis and you will not lose it.

[Aracs]

Area denial. If you want to hold an area as Yrel, you will hold that area. Pop down Sacred Ground on something like a beacon on Braxis and you will not lose it.

I've really tried, but Garrosh ruins that completely, Sylvana with MC ult, Muradin with Haymaker, Falstad, Dehaka, Stiches, Artanis and so one...
She needs to be immune to "forced movement" while inside Sacred Ground or else too many counterpicks.

[Nerraw]

I've really tried, but Garrosh ruins that completely, Sylvana with MC ult, Muradin with Haymaker, Falstad, Dehaka, Stiches, Artanis and so one...
She needs to be immune to "forced movement" while inside Sacred Ground or else too many counterpicks.

That means they're using everything on you, leaving your team to do their thing in the meantime.

[Aracs]

That means they're using everything on you, leaving your team to do their thing in the meantime.

Unfortunately not worked for me several games in a row (mainly because of Garrosh and Stiches). So I just switched to bubble ult, which has pretty good team-fight upgrade on lvl 20.

[Deleted]

Got MVP twice with her yesterday. She's undertuned, and she needs quality-of-life changes. But she's not the catastrophe people are making her out to be.

This, pretty much! Up to level 10 so far, and the games went really well, a ~66% win-loss that's way above my average with other heroes. She really inspires fear of the bush in the enemy, and is very persistent, sustaining very safely in the back, with no need for life-steal! That heal is super handy, but that armor buff is too, +25 Armor and -30% damage done by the enemy means dive never fails!

I really like her most for the wide variety of ways I ended up using the abilities and talents in different combinations. I usually have a cookie-cutter talent pick on others, but Yrel's well-designed when it comes to most talents, 2 good ones on each row at least!

Extremely powerful and fun, except for the whole E being intrerrupted by anything while in mid-air thing, which is probably a bug. W doing less than the auto-attack is weird, too, mostly because it's a super hammer home-run swing, and doesn't feel like Leoric's Q in terms of damage.

[skorpio]

Yup, Yrel isn't bad. She is very very tanky and that's her main role. Jump into enemy team, disrupt and annoy them, jump back. Her dmg is fine and you really, really don't want hero with her survivability and Sonya's dmg. I'm afraid blizz will buff her numbers a little in next patch and she will transform into indestructible monster who can solo enemy team.

[Stormcall]

That means they're using everything on you, leaving your team to do their thing in the meantime.

It doesn't mean they're using "everything" on you, they only need 1 of those, not all of them. Several of them don't even need their ult to do it, like Garrosh, Artanis, Diablo, or Stitches.

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Her dmg is fine

Seriously? She is so non threatening that the best way to counter her is ignore her while you kill the rest of her team then finish her off last. If a Muradin gets in your backline, he can do enough damage to be a threat. I've laughed at Y'rels trying that.

[skorpio]

Seriously? She is so non threatening that the best way to counter her is ignore her while you kill the rest of her team then finish her off last. If a Muradin gets in your backline, he can do enough damage to be a threat. I've laughed at Y'rels trying that.

You assume ppl are smart enough to attack her last? And if they ignore you thats good, you can charge your abilities then.

[Stormcall]

You assume ppl are smart enough to attack her last? And if they ignore you thats good, you can charge your abilities then.

I've seen it happen, yes. And you're right, you can charge your abilits. You can get a charged Q that does less damage than an auto attack, a charged E that lets her jump farther(not a concern, since her staying alive isn't an issue), and a charged W that's telegraphed and easy to dodge, and all the while she's charging she's not even getting her AA damage out there.

[skorpio]

I've seen it happen, yes. And you're right, you can charge your abilits. You can get a charged Q that does less damage than an auto attack, a charged E that lets her jump farther(not a concern, since her staying alive isn't an issue), and a charged W that's telegraphed and easy to dodge, and all the while she's charging she's not even getting her AA damage out there.

And still her overall dmg is comparable to Stitches. Last time Stitches had more dmg, he was nerfed. If u can't hit anyone with charged hammer or u are kited or u are wasting her insta charge trait then u are playing her wrong.

[Nerraw]

I've seen it happen, yes. And you're right, you can charge your abilits. You can get a charged Q that does less damage than an auto attack, a charged E that lets her jump farther(not a concern, since her staying alive isn't an issue), and a charged W that's telegraphed and easy to dodge, and all the while she's charging she's not even getting her AA damage out there.

What talents do you pick? I've started using the hammer talent at 7 that increases your movement speed drastically when charged. It is way underrated. Also pick the damage reduction on 13. You may not do a whole lot of damage when you Q. But neither will they.

[ophion1990]

After playing her a bit I do agree that she mostly seems fine, tbh. I think her disastrous launch might just be attributed to her being more niche, compared to all of the releases since Hanzo, who were either OP or generally fit into more/most teams. I think she'll end up like Tyrael, a fair winrate but low pickrate. I do think she could make do with a buff, though.

[Stormcall]

If u can't hit anyone with charged hammer or u are kited or u are wasting her insta charge trait then u are playing her wrong.

If you DO hit someone with charged hammer, or aren't being kited, whoever you are playing against is playing THEIR hero wrong. Trait is the only thing that helps her, and even that isn't super threatening if you're not playing like an idiot.

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What talents do you pick?

I don't play her. But I love seeing her on the opposing team, cause it basically means my team has a permanent 5v4 advantage, cause Y'rel is not at all a threat to anyone who's not a moron.

[Verdugo]

Garbage character gets a garbage representation in hots, i see no problem.