Orphea Build Guide “I won't miss your face.”
Welcome to our guide for Orphea, a Ranged Assassin in Heroes of the Storm. Within these pages, you will find everything required to understand how best to play this hero, in both different map styles and team compositions.
Orphea's Overview
Orphea is an odd caster with above-average survivability and high damage output potential but limited access to crowd control. Given that all of Orphea's Abilities have a cast time or delay, they can all be avoided by prepared opponents... unless you are better prepared.
Orphea's Strengths and Weaknesses
- All Abilities have a short cast time or delay, making them avoidable
- Very limited access to crowd control
- Relatively short range on most Abilities
- Unable to efficiently claim Mercenary Camps
- Easy to counter, as the main healing source can be countered by having blinds or physical armor
- Particularly weak when playing from behind
Orphea's Talent Build Cheatsheet
Standard Build
RecommendedThis build is the most consistent build of them all, it can be used in any game, against any composition. The recommended Heroic is Eternal Feast, however, Crushing Jaws can also be picked to cancel a channeled ability, like Mosh Pit.
At level 4 Allegrissimo can be chosen if the opposing team does not have any ways to quickly burst Orphea, and if she can consistently hit Shadow Waltz on a large target, like on Deathwing or Diablo. At Level 16 Lurking Terror can be chosen if Orphea's team needs better follow-up on a backliner, like on Hanzo or Valla.
Shadow Waltz Build
AdvancedOrphea's Shadow Waltz Build focuses on improving sustain damage and chase potential. Even though this build has the highest possible DPS, it is challenging to make it work. Any crowd control greatly reduces Orphea's damage and survivability. Therefore, this build is only recommended for experienced players against compositions with low crowd control.
Chomp Build
BeginnerOrphea's Chomp Build has the best survivability among all Builds, and it is the best for beginners, as its damage is not reliant on hitting Shadow Waltz or Dread. However, it is terrible against enemies with high range, as it requires proximity to them to be useful.
This build has 2 main power spikes, the first one being on level 7, with Insatiable, which boosts Orphea's damage significantly. The second one is on level 13 with Abyssal Symbiosis, enhancing her survivability. After those levels, it is important to be take advantage of those strengths and focus on punishing enemies that are close to Orphea, as the extra shield and heal ensures that she will survive if not stunned or outnumbered.
Aram Build
ARAMOrphea's Aram Build is focused on high-range burst damage. To excel using this build, Orphea should focus on quickly completing her 2 quests, Growing Nightmare and Mind Devourer. Since Mind Devourer gets stacks from both the wave and explosion of Dread, it is always better to make sure that the wave will hit. Therefore, it is better to always aim Dread behind enemies.
Orphea's Synergies and Counters
Since Orphea depends highly on skillshots to deal damage, she works well with any Hero that can provide reliable crowd control. Her frailty also makes her dependent on other Heroes to peel for her against melee Assassins particularly; Tanks tend to fulfill these two needs, though other Hero types can too.
Since Orphea relies heavily on skillshots with a cast time to deal damage and on hitting her charged Basic Attacks to heal herself, she is countered by many heroes. Her damage and survivability can be significantly reduced by canceling her abilities, blinding or evading her basic attacks, dashing out of her abilities, chaining crowd control, or using very high range attacks.
Orphea's Maps
Orphea is a strong pick on snowball maps. She excels on maps with important bosses, like Sky Temple and Tomb of the Spider Queen, because her Eternal Feast is excellent in these situations. However, her lack of single-target PvE damage makes her a poor choice on maps like Battlefield of Eternity. As long as another hero can claim Mercenary Camps, she remains a reasonable pick on most maps.
Orphea's Tips and Tricks
- Each enemy Hero hit by Overflowing Chaos generates one Chaos, making area hits key to improving your survivability.
- Shadow Waltz may be tempting to use on-Cooldown, but using it to avoid dangerous skillshots is paramount.
- Shadow Waltz does not require Orphea to instantly dash after hitting an enemy, the dash can be used after a delay to avoid a skillshot or to wait for her next ability to be ready.
- Shadow Waltz's dash can be used to dodge certain player created walls, such as Leoric's Entomb or Tassadar's Force Wall.
- Chomp synergises naturally with Shadow Waltz; use the latter to dash to your intended target.
- Both Dread's initial wave and eruption can hit a given target, so it is better to aim slightly behind an immobilized or slowed target.
- Before having Dead Magic, it is better to not waste Orphea's empowered Basic Attack on an armored enemy, as it would greatly reduce her healing output.
- After reaching Level 20 with Crushing Jaws and picking Engulfing Oblivion, Orphea should not hesitate to use it on a tank enemy, as the -50 armor debuff is enough to burst anyone down.
Orphea's Role in the Current Meta
Compared to most other casters, Orphea provides higher-than-average on-demand burst damage and decent sustain damage. On the other hand, she lacks much crowd control, making it necessary to pick her along Heroes who can provide it. As with many Heroes who provide little more than damage, Orphea's popularity depends entirely on her power level resulting from game balance. Regardless, building a team composition that aims to stay ahead of one's opponents in terms of Experience is the best way of exploiting Orphea's strength as a snowballing Hero.
Due to her reliance on crowd control, Orphea is at her best when part of a roaming group of Heroes. She can hold her own in the offlane as well against most melee Heroes, but must be careful when rotating and may need help clearing out large Mercenary Camps.
Changelog
- 14 Sep. 2024 (talents page): Talents and Builds updated to ensure meta relevance.
- 14 Sep. 2024 (abilities page): Updated inconsistencies in Shadow Waltz's description.
- 14 Sep. 2024 (this page): Guide updated to ensure meta relevance.
- 22 Nov. 2020 (talents page): Talent description for Ancestral Strength and Insatiable updated.
- 30 Aug. 2020 (this page): Role in Current Meta section updated.
- 14 Aug. 2020 (talents page): Talent builds and recommendations updated.
- 14 Apr. 2020 (talents page): Talent builds and recommendations updated.
- 14 Apr. 2020 (this page): Guide fully reviewed.
- 27 Jan. 2020 (talents page): Talent builds and recommendations updated following January 22 balance patch.
- 15 Dec. 2019 (this page): Added a note about current Anomaly.
- 11 Dec. 2018 (talents page): Talents updated.
- 06 Dec. 2018 (talents page): Shadow Waltz build added.
- 13 Nov. 2018 (talents page): Guide published.
- 13 Nov. 2018 (abilities page): Guide published.
- 13 Nov. 2018 (this page): Guide published.
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Derenash has been playing Heroes of the Storm since 2015 and has achieved Grandmaster in multiple seasons, peaking at Top 1 in Season 3 and 4 of 2018. He participated in the HGC Copa America in 2018 where his team had a strong victory. He is passionate about teaching others about the game, and streams often on Twitch in Portuguese, and you can find him in Wind Striders' Discord as well where he is happy to answer any questions in English or Portuguese.
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