Heroes of the Storm Yrel

[positiv2 952]

This thread is for comments about our Yrel guide.

[Valhalen 1,484]

Really nice guide! The suggested build will make her a pretty solid solo tank.

If I may suggest, what about her Avenging Wrath build? I've tested it in the PTR and feels really strong; she becomes pretty much a Leapquake Barbarian from Diablo III, hopping like a frog constantly in a way that will make Muradin jelly.

It's amazing in hard engage compositions with her a secondary tank. It turns her into a very potent Bruiser with high self-sustain, crowd-control and pressure. So stuff like Maiev, Sonya and Butcher become her best friends.

Here is how it works:

• Holy Avenger (7) + Repetance (13) makes Yrel very hard to peel off. She will be able to inflict a Hero with 75% slow for 1.5 seconds, every 2.5 seconds, as Holy Avenger puts Avenging Wrath on a 1 second cooldown.

• Charge Avenging Wrath and leap in the middle of the enemies, then use Sacred Ground, pop Divine Purpose followed by Righteous Hammer and start charging Avenging Wrath again, using Vindication when needed.

• Yrel will be able to reset the CD on Divine Purpose really fast thanks to Divine Favor (16), be able to leap on enemies all the time, and all that while boasting from passive 40 armor granted from Sacred Ground, which will have 100% uptime as she hops around thanks to Hallowed Ground (20). And all that while granting 25 armor to nearby allies through Aegis of Light (4), which has quite a large radius.

[Morcalivan 86]

I'd say the leap is pretty strong so far. Repositioning to allow for instant hammer stuns that knock the enemy into teammates is one of the best moves this character can do. Also, just charging a power and not using it is an effective maintained crowd control. Being a shiny lure is a big part of this character. Therefore the leaping becomes a key component. So I usually prefer the leaping build. It is even useful when Holding Ground. Just leaping over people body blocking with an uncharged leap to stun swing them back can let you stand your ground much better.

She often times finishes or secures kills in a similar way to Lucio. Fun stuff. Worth the gold.

P.S. Velen's Chosen is a nice little bonus to Avenging Wrath to let you better heal/bomb or follow up with a D+Hammer. Instant 30% spell power if you time the jump or a Hammer strike initiation properly to follow it up with any D+ability.

Edited June 13, 2018 by Morcalivan

[Erathis 53]

Wow, so Yrel's talents got their descriptions on release day while Deckard waited weeks?  Favoritism!  ?

Anyway, I finally got to get a few games in on Yrel and here are some thoughts I had:

Yrel is one heck of a healer.  I'm not even joking when I say by level 16 she heals as well as (if not better than) most of the supports do!  On its own Gift of the Naaru is an excellent emergency heal but once you get Divine Favor?  You're able to toss out those fairly impressive heals every few seconds indefinitely...  Being reasonably tanky with great mobility and self peel leaves me never wanting to play another support ever again.

Since I've mostly been playing her as a support tank (same build as what is currently on the main page) so far I haven't gotten a chance to do more than one game with her leaping build.  It was fun, if a touch unforgiving (you really feel those hit boxes when you're betting on a cooldown reset on your jump).

You can even mix the two builds.  Just drop Aegis (good but the healing is better IMO) for Gift of the Naaru and you've got the important skills for both builds in one.  You're a primary healer with bunny hopping power on demand.  You do give up Steed though which is a tough loss but the jump build always gives that up so nothing new there.

Edited June 13, 2018 by KSDT

[Morcalivan 86]

Synergies and Counters for Guide:

Yrel can use Sacred Ground at 10 and Avenging Wrath upgrade at 20 to push towers without minions. So synergy towards push characters. She can protect poke damage dealers like Fenix, Junkrat and Sgt. Hammer. She can push enemies into Deckard's scrolls and lure them into it before jumping out or let Deckard follow up a leap with a scroll. The Potions + self healing and leaping into potions also helps and affects Yrel even when jumping over Potions from what I could see. You really need ranged damage dealers on your team to take advantage of her though. All that control gets wasted on melee teammates and can even help the enemy.

Any anti-armour really messes up her armour builds that so effectively march into other characters' attacks. 75 armour is pretty good. When armour bypass is in play, she has to consider a healing build. This also prevents boosting team armour and allows control to narrow focus on watching for the healing charge. Polymorph can snipe counter Yrel charged abilities. Other than that just generally, characters that can poke from afar or punish divers are the other biggest threat. Alarak's silence/pull is a big pain too and probably one of the more dangerous characters to fight due to the slowed mobility when charging making it very easy to land Discords. If distance is added to TK then your leap won't be able to save you if you get pulled in even if not silenced. The only real hope you have is punting him back into your teammates and healing yourself.

[Morcalivan 86]

Map Weakness is definitely not Spiderqueen. For one thing, you have Sacred Ground as not a first pick so having that as your reason for a weakest map is a pretty odd choice. Not that it isn't effective on that map for pushing, defending vs spiders, defending/countering turn ins and taking on/stealing boss. She can knock gem spiders back to safer gathering areas, and deal some good area damage and more safely collect and horde gems than others due to toughness/control/mobility combo. I'd say it's a strong map for her.

Not sure yet what a weak map would be fore her.

[lChronosl 182]

Cool guide, even if I don't agree on most levels. And I agree with Valhallen on the Avenging Wrath build. It is surely the most fun build, and you can keep your whole team with 25 armor all the time if they stay close to you.

Also, the 1 sec cast time of Bubble Hearth is not cancelled by damage, only by stuns or silences.

 

 

Edited June 13, 2018 by lChronosl

[Guest Greywall]

Yrel gets absolutely destroyed by Muradin... if he picks Skullcracker (which he will if he's up against a Yrel) and Haymaker he's able to reliably stun her out of all of her abilities and ult her away during both of her ults, making her a waste of space... it's not even funny.

[Erathis 53]

Second day in and I'm really feeling the Bunny Hopping Healer build.  I don't really find myself missing Steed all that much (which probably means I wasn't making the most use of it I could, it is a super busted talent, no argument there) and the better jumping has made for more effective control for team plays and escapes.

The stand out talent from this round of testing for me however has got to be Maraad's Insight.  Normally I'm not a fan of on hit healing outside of ranged AA champs and Zeratul but this talent has really impressed me (especially for a level 1 talent).  The amount feels good and Yrel spams skills to the point where it's on every single one of her basic attacks.  Combined with the healing from Vindication and her sustain both in and out of combat is simply amazing.  She might not be able to kill a map boss on her own (nowhere near enough damage) but with this talent and good stepping the boss barely manages to dent her.  It's become my go to talent pretty much ever match and when I tried to go back to Light of Karabor the loss was shockingly noticeable (which is rare for me to miss having a talent that much).

I'll be playing with her other talents a bit but I think I've settled on my preferred build at this point:

Maraad's Insight > Gift of the Naaru > Holy Avenger > Ardent Defender > Repentance > Divine Favor > Seraphim

Edited June 14, 2018 by KSDT

[gerbercage 15]

Quite a lot of counter to her.

Dunno why they set her to movespeed slow when charging. If she move 100% spd, will she overpower?

Her E range is quite short, I feel that should be longer abit. With this charge channel time and move spd and this max jump range, no way to able to chase down opponent at all. The only way to work is in teamfight when opponent fighting then you jump in only.

Varian taunt, garrosh taunt,throw, Brightwing polymorph and those target stun skill really can finish her on time before she can leave. Even you jump out on that time to flee, muradin stun can bring down from air.

She need teammate with CC and also movespeed boost to work well.

Most of the time, the best use is "D" then ability, no chance to charge at all due to every match got a lot of cc to counter it plus slow movespd.

Have to find more way to use it.. Currently only got 1 path for her, jumping path should be the best. Hammer path cannot use at all.

The many weakness without much reward when use well.

This is melee hero, low spd attack, average dmg. All skill need channel to be effective and the skill mostly is short/melee range.

seraphim is a good talent for her but come too late in lvl 20

lvl 16 talent can consider only 1 choice, other 2 is useless at all.

Anyone what is the range of Gift of Naaru?

Too bad a few of good ability which can help yrel a lot are not allow to cast on herself.

So far channel skill mostly is range so that it seldom disrupt by opponent but this yrel all channel skill is melee.

She is half tank half support hero.

 

 

[Valhalen 1,484]

5 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Quite a lot of counter to her.

(...)

The many weakness without much reward when use well.

This is melee hero, low spd attack, average dmg. All skill need channel to be effective and the skill mostly is short/melee range.

(...)

She is half tank half support hero.

I agree. She feels a bit undertuned in my opinion. She REALLY IS fun to play, but I can't really think of any reasons to pick her instead of someone like Muradin. Currently her only niche is probably as a secondary tank in a hard engage team, in my opinion.

She has a really offensive kit but must be played defensively to be effective. Any interrupt put her abilities on full cooldown (which isn't that bad considering they all have 6 second cooldown). And moving while at full charge reduces her movement speed. I think that removing this penalty would already make her more viable. And maybe even reduce the charge time (like from 1.5 to 1.25, at least).

She has one of the slowest Attack Speeds in the game, if the most, which makes the few Basic Attack talents very underwhelming. Either they buff her Attack Speed or Basic Attack Damage.

This may be nitpicking because she is a new Hero and people are still learning how to use her properly, but this is how I feel.

Edited June 14, 2018 by Valhalen

[Erathis 53]

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Dunno why they set her to movespeed slow when charging. If she move 100% spd, will she overpower?

Probably not.  The slower move speed does make it harder to jump on people then charge up a hammer swing and knock them back.  They usually have time to move around you to the side by then.  That's probably the biggest instance where the movement speed matters from my experience.

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Her E range is quite short, I feel that should be longer abit. With this charge channel time and move spd and this max jump range, no way to able to chase down opponent at all. The only way to work is in teamfight when opponent fighting then you jump in only.

This isn't entirely true.  You can chase people with it, I have done it.  You have no room for deviation though.  Your jump range grows at about the rate the enemy moves basically.  Combine with travel time it's easy to miss them.  You need to be in front body blocking them to ensure you get a good landing.  Or jump over a wall/around a corner and cut them off.  Still it's not easy and won't work if you're already too far behind them.  Of course using your trait fixes this problem and you certainly can catch them with that.

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Varian taunt, garrosh taunt,throw, Brightwing polymorph and those target stun skill really can finish her on time before she can leave. Even you jump out on that time to flee, muradin stun can bring down from air.

If you're trying to jump out of the middle of the enemy team (close enough that Garrosh can taunt) then your only option is to use your trait.  Then it's simply a matter of if they can read you before you can get away.  This is the main reason why I don't think jumping into the middle of a team for initiation is the option you want to go with (despite most people talking about it when they mention her).

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

This is melee hero, low spd attack, average dmg. All skill need channel to be effective and the skill mostly is short/melee range.

Her damage isn't bad per swing but yeah it's a bit slow.  That said slow swings don't matter all that much with her I've found.  Very rarely are you going to want to just sit on a target and swing at them.  Most of the time you're really going to be moving around to body block or using a talent in between swings which make her attack speed a relatively moot point.

Speaking of her skills I think people are too hung up on thinking charging her skills is required when it really isn't.  Her jump only needs to be charged as far as you want to go and her hammer swing honestly doesn't need charging much at all.  Yes it has that oh so tempting stun if you do but honestly in many situations the knock back alone is enough.  Even her self heal (while not as good without charge) is fine to pulse in between hammer swings.

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Anyone what is the range of Gift of Naaru?

From my experience it's about a quarter the length of the screen around your character.  Not as long as Chromie's sand blast.  A bit longer than Muradin's storm bolt.  Somewhere in there.  It has good range.

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

Too bad a few of good ability which can help yrel a lot are not allow to cast on herself.

Yrel really doesn't want Gift to target herself as it would ruin her ability to heal others.  She already has a great amount of self heal via her Q (and Maraad's Insight which I strongly recommend).  Use her Q on cooldown mid fight (don't charge it) and after the fight use it to top yourself off.  You should do good HP wise unless you're really being focused.

6 hours ago, gerbercage said:

She is half tank half support hero.

1 hour ago, Valhalen said:

I agree. She feels a bit undertuned in my opinion. She REALLY IS fun to play, but I can't really think of any reasons to pick her instead of someone like Muradin. Currently her only niche is probably as a secondary tank in a hard engage team, in my opinion.

IMO she isn't even a tank and shouldn't be compared to Muradin (at least with her current build).  Instead I think of her as a full Support at this point.  Think of her as an Uther who traded his stun and line heal for more durability, self heal, a jump, and knock back ability.

Sure that's weird because she's listed as a tank and that's what she is intended to be I'm sure but given what she has atm if you want to find a reason to play her, think of her as a Support and go from there.

Edited June 14, 2018 by KSDT

[Valhalen 1,484]

47 minutes ago, KSDT said:

IMO she isn't even a tank and shouldn't be compared to Muradin (at least with her current build).  Instead I think of her as a full Support at this point.  Think of her as an Uther who traded his stun and line heal for more durability, self heal, a jump, and knock back ability.

Sure that's weird because she's listed as a tank and that's what she is intended to be I'm sure but given what she has atm if you want to find a reason to play her, think of her as a Support and go from there.

She is kinda of a Hybrid Bruiser/Support. She has one of the highest base healthpools in the game. But your points are valid. Maybe when people start playing with her less agressively (unless when using the Avenging Wrath build) she will have a better performance.

[ShadowerDerek 69]

Just went to a Chinese (Taiwanese) forum, those people are whining about Yrel being absolutely garbage. Not tanky enough, self-sustain requiring channel, E being really slow ...... 

And she has 35.8% win rate. ==

[Erathis 53]

1 hour ago, ShadowerDerek said:

Just went to a Chinese (Taiwanese) forum, those people are whining about Yrel being absolutely garbage. Not tanky enough, self-sustain requiring channel, E being really slow ...... 

And she has 35.8% win rate. ==

HotS Reddit is covered in posts like that too.  Not enough damage, not tanky enough, charge up is too easy to interrupt, useless, ect...

I think it's very much a question of looking at her from the proper perspective than it is her being garbage.  If they are looking for another Muradin, able to jump into a full team go Avatar, and then jump out at his leisure then yeah, she doesn't do that.  I think part of the problem is how she was presented (as a Retribution Pally specifically) and part is people having an idea of how they want her to play that doesn't fit with how she does play.

Everyone I've seen is hung up on the idea of her jumping in and using hammer to smack an enemy or two back into her team.  That just doesn't work out well but they evaluate her whole kit around that anyway.  Only very rarely do I see a comment mentioning her healing and disengage ability and those people (usually professed Support mains) seem quite happy with her.

Edited June 14, 2018 by KSDT

[lChronosl 182]

As a professed support main, I agree. She is surprisingly like Overwatch's Brigitte in that regard, bruiser/support. Her strengths are peeling, guarding and other indirect support, with healing thrown in if you pick Gift of Naruu.

Also, if you go for Maraad's Insight and Holy Wrath and spam her skills, weaving basic attacks between them, you can dish out a significant amount of AoE damage and self healing at the same time.

[XeaKon 23]

To all Yrels out there, learn what ETC mains learned: STOP SPREADING THE MINIONS WHEN I TRY TO HIT THEM.

[Erathis 53]

1 hour ago, XeaKon said:

To all Yrels out there, learn what ETC mains learned: STOP SPREADING THE MINIONS WHEN I TRY TO HIT THEM.

Honestly her W is her worst and least useful wave clearing ability.  Her E does full damage uncharged and her Q does the most damage to a wide area.  Her wave clear should thus be E into D + Q followed up with auto attacks.  It's actually quite decent and reasonably quick.  If it's a large wave repeat the E into D + Q a second time.  As a bonus it also heals her a lot and doesn't use much mana.

The only times you'd use W is if there are siege Mercs or catapults you want to knock into your tower's range.

[lChronosl 182]

(Copying here almost the same as the other post, because I was proud of it, and for posterity)

Weighting the pros and cons of charging up instead of instant casting is also part of playing Yrel. Of course, her abilities are stronger when fully charged, but they are only worthless if cancelled. If you instant cast them you get around 50% utility, I would say. If you end up in a position when you know the enemy can interrupt you (and they know it, too), then don't charge up. Or even better, play mind tricks with them. All of Yrel's abilities got only a 6 second cooldown, and since you shining all gold and mighty in the middle of the fight will call a lot o attention, use it to your team advantage. Friendly ETC is ready to cast Mosh Pit? Bait an enemy's Storm Bolt to interrupt your Vindication, wasting their cooldown. Need to run away, but oponnent Maiv is hot on your trail with Umbral Bind off cooldown? Let it interrupt your Righteous Hammer instead of your Avenging Wrath. The hero is too new (and not that popular) for us have seen all of it's possibilities. And playing with this level of coolheadedness is already hard enough with old and tested heroes.

Also, her talent tree is flexible enough to allow you to build up according to the enemy team. They have both Johanna and Anub'arak? Well, assume you will never be able to charge up completely and pick talents such as Maraad's Insight, Dauntless, Aegis of Light, and Holy Wrath that don't require you to charge up to get value. The enemy has no hard CC, or maybe only a Jet Propulsion? You can safely pick Holy Avenger, Aldor Peacekeeper or Velen's Chosen and fully charge most of times. Even if the enemy has three melee heroes with interrupts you can still make some strategic picks such as Light of Karabor, Aldor Peacekeeper, Divine Favor and every time use Divine Purpose with Vindication during team fights.

And talking about her role, she is that 5th pick to round up your team. Already have a burst assassin, a strong frontliner, an efficient healer and someone to put constant pressure? Yrel can help on all of those roles, even if she can't fulfill them every time. Pair her to your squishes to guard them. Follow your frontliner to further disrupt the enemy team. Give healing, armor and cleanse to your allies from time to time to help them stay alive. Bait enemy's dangerous abilities or ultimates. That is her role.

In a similar way to Tyrande, she falls under the generalist stigma. People don't like her at first because they don't immediately get her purpose and effectiveness. As I posted before (or maybe another thread), she is a "true support" (support ≠ healer), capable of assisting every role on most situations.

Edited June 21, 2018 by lChronosl

[Guest Pollux]

Guys I'd like to add one small thing that I feel you're overlooking: Yes all her abilities can be interrupted by stuns and this weakens her. But consider her role. Every stun used on her or kept free for her is a stun not used on her teammates. What she does very well is to distract from her team. At least when I play her I get a lot of attention from the enemy. She's a well done stun magnet.

If you got built-in face aggro, you need no taunt.

[Guest Mac]

[Bubble Hearth] description is plain wrong.

" any damage she receives during that channel will cause Bubble Hearth to get interrupted"

False. Only HARD CC during the first second of the channel interrupts it, not damage.

Also there's a few talents which are described as "good", which in truth are huge baits, limiting your playstyle and ultimately causing Yrel to feel bad, but that's highly subjective, so I won't bother talking about those (even if Light of Karabor instantly comes to mind: after playing for dozens of games with Maraad's Insight, I switched back to LoK and it felt unplayable, it's a bad talent - lvl30 Yrel with 58.9% winrate, not QM)

But for [Bubble Hearth], please fix it.

[KendricSwissh 66]

Hey everyone, 

 

I'm currently re-working and updating the Yrel guide with the recent balance updates. ?

[Guest Guyst]

"Dauntless can be a valid choice if the enemy team relies heavily on physical damage, especially against fast attacking Heroes like Tracer. "

Just wondering here, why does it matter if the attacks are fast or not, when it's a percentage damage reduction? Wouldn't it be equally effective against physical damage regardless of speed?

Other than that, thanks for the guide update, gonna give a try for the new recommended talents.

[Guest Rice]

Description for Ardent Defender is incorrect.

Quote

It is absolutely worth mentioning that Ardent Defender should usually be used while Yrel is still at 50% of her health or higher, in order to guarantee her participation during a team fight once the ability has expired.

The ability heals as damage is applied, not after the ability is over. There is no reason to fear dying during the duration of the skill.

[Morcalivan 86]

On 6/29/2018 at 9:37 AM, Guest Guyst said:

"Dauntless can be a valid choice if the enemy team relies heavily on physical damage, especially against fast attacking Heroes like Tracer. "

Just wondering here, why does it matter if the attacks are fast or not, when it's a percentage damage reduction? Wouldn't it be equally effective against physical damage regardless of speed?

Other than that, thanks for the guide update, gonna give a try for the new recommended talents.

Due to the 2 second duration. I believe he meant the time it takes to deal the damage. Tracer comes in and shoots then jumps out. Tapping an ability when you see her about to jump in should give you armour for most of her shots.