Things are heating up in the Nexus with a new ranged warrior, Blaze the Firebat. Although his lore is a bit lacking compared to other heroes, Blaze has blown away the competition with his hot kit and unique talent tree.

Blaze offers tons of CC as well as off-laning ability/waveclear, but he struggles to find a role. He feels like a bruiser with main tank health and damage, and as such, he walks a fine line between the two roles without really fulfilling either completely. As a main tank, he is more of a niche counter-engage tank. As a bruiser/solo laner, there are heroes that fill that role already more effectively. It will be interesting to see how Blaze develops over time and if he stays in this undefined main tank/bruiser hybrid spot. Hopefully we will learn more when HGC rolls around and pro players can show off Blaze in all his fiery glory.

Strengths and Weaknesses

Abilities

Blaze’s kit is based on interaction and utility. At first, his abilities may seem simple, but they open themselves up to nuance and hard choices. Pyromania is great for survivability with its 25 armor, and it packs a punch too. Key use of Pyromania seems to be the defining characteristic for a good Blaze player, and being able to keep it on a low cooldown with Flame Stream makes it that much more powerful. Plus, bodyblocking an opponent and burning them alive is certainly a fun feeling.

Flame Stream is a very straightforward ability, but good usage indirectly affects Blaze's overall damage output and survivability. There are two separate streams which reduce his trait cooldown by five seconds each whenever they hit a hero. On average, Pyromania can maintain close to a 40 second cooldown with decent Flame stream usage, but in a best-case scenario, the cooldown can be shortened all the way down to ten seconds! A skilled Blaze player will focus on using Flame Stream against heroes often, which will indirectly buff Pyromania, and considering the amount of talents that affect Pyromania, it can have a huge effect on his overall gameplay.

Oil spill is the central ability of Blaze’s kit. Reminiscent of Chen, the goal for Blaze is to drop Oil Spill on the ground to slow enemies and then light it on fire. The key difference here between Blaze and Chen’s combo is that this can be a hard choice for Blaze players. Knowing whether to light the oil on fire for extra damage and healing or leave it as is for the slow has definite repercussions in teamfights.



Oil Spill is fantastic in tight spaces and corridors on battlegrounds such as on Cursed Hollow or Braxis Holdout. On more open battlegrounds, it can be harder to land good combos and have much impact in teamfights. Good aim is important here, especially with the vector targeting of the ability. The AoE damage of Oil Spill also makes it a great ability for clearing waves at a safe distance and give Blaze the best waveclear in his class.

Jet Propulsion (E) is a great stun ability, but the clearly telegraphed long windup makes it very easy to deal with. Opponents have a split second to react, and the ability is easily interrupted by CC. However, Jet Propulsion is technically a small AoE stun, and Blaze can also use it to escape (unless he hits an enemy hero on the way out), so it’s a very versatile ability.

Blaze players need to make sure they have good aim because a missed charge with no stun usually puts them in a bad spot. Stuck in the middle of the fray with no stun, Blaze can have difficulty making it out of the fight alive. Blaze may have a ton of health, but when hard CC’d and bursted down he might as well be a wet noodle, especially if the enemy team has percentage-based damage heroes such as Tychus or Malthael.

Blaze's Heroics are nuanced but otherwise fairly lackluster. Bunker Drop can be used in a myriad of fun ways such as blocking an enemy gates to cut your opponents off, dropping it just shy out of fort range so that you and nearby allies can DPS it down with flamethrowers, or simply saving a teammate's life. Juggling cooldowns is a key part to using this Heroic. If you want to use the bunker aggressively, simply drop it down, jump out and use your abilities, and get back in! Doing this will give you a little bit of extra damage, especially with the level 20 Storm talent.



Combustion is the more reliable Heroic. It's a great counter-engage and area denial tool, and it can unleash some serious damage if it hits the entire team at max charge. The key weakness of this ability is its charge time and reduced movement speed while charging. If enemies are right next to you while during the channel, you can hit them with good damage and a decent slow, but fleeing enemies or heroes with good mobility can easily escape it. It's also easily negated with crowd control. Hard CC can interrupt the charging animation and pre-maturely detonate it for lower damage and slow duration.

Talents

In terms of talent tree diversity and utility, Blaze is one of the best heroes in recent memory. Nearly every single tier has multiple viable choices, which vary from game to game. As of right now, there is not a single dominant build, but that may change in the near future once pro players get their hands on Blaze in the HGC.







Right off the bat, Blaze is faced with multiple viable choices at Level 1. Endurance Stimpack and Neural Stimpack are great for main tank and off-lane roles, respectively, and probably the go-tos in this tier. However, five seconds of mount speed from Adrenaline Stimpack shouldn’t be underestimated. It synergizes well with Combustion and also makes Blaze much more effective at bodyblocking. New Habits was originally overlooked, but many players are now starting to see the value in Unstoppable frames during Pyromania. In addition, the cooldown reduction from collecting regen globes is just fantastic.



The Level 4 tier is the only tier that really has a “standout talent” for Blaze. Adhesive Petroleum is the dominant choice simply because it stops you from having to sacrifice CC to gain self-sustain. For the time being, it seems that this talent is dominant. However, if you’re going for a trait-focused build, Meltdown is a potential choice here. The stacking damage reduction on top of everything else turns Blaze into a 1v1 powerhouse.

Blaze’s Level 7 tier is a great utility tier. Grill and Kill gives you extra ignite damage and duration and can be stacked quickly with a properly placed ignited Oil Spill. Crossfire seems bland and skippable at first, but the damage increase is noticeable, especially when going for a Pyromania build which already relies on hitting good Flame Streams. Incinerator Gauntlets is great when your team needs a bit of waveclear and gives you more choice regarding your Flame Stream usage.

At Level 13, Blaze gains even more utility with enemy spell power reduction on Suppressive Fire or attack speed reduction with Nanomachine Coating. Fuel Leak may seem like a must-take talent since it greatly increases the amount of oil on the battlefield, but there are many choices here depending on the situation.

For players who are building around Pyromania, Heat Treatment at 16 is the talent for you. Healing for 75% of the damage dealt on top of all the other possible effects is just the icing on the cake. Juggernaut Plating gives you an extra boost of spell armor and shielding in a pinch and can be great against more burst-oriented compositions. Thermal Protection sounds great on paper, but it’s fairly unlikely to hit more than one hero at a time with Jet Propulsion. On an earlier tier, Thermal Protection could have been competitive, but it’s not nearly good enough to pass up the other two options at 16.



Blaze’s Storm talents provide him with some new gameplay and bonus damage. Fortified Bunker adds the fun bonus of allowing your allies to cast Oil Spill. Unfortunately, the flamethrowers from the Bunker do not ignite oil, so Blaze still has to jump out and ignite the oil to get maximum value from it. Flash Fire greatly improves Combustion by giving it more crowd control and reliability. Finally, there’s Burn Notice. The slow from Burn Notice stacks up rather quickly...and even though it might not always be optimal, who doesn’t enjoy burning their opponents alive?

Metagame Analysis

Placing Blaze in the current meta is very challenging. The 2018 Gameplay Update shook things up dramatically, and the changes that came alongside Blaze greatly adjusted things as well. The current warrior meta has established main tanks and solo laners who already who do their job effectively, and unfortunately, Blaze doesn't look like he's going to replace them anytime soon.

Blaze’s base kit is solid enough, but his lackluster ultimates combined with unreliable CC put him in a niche role of a hybrid between main tank and bruiser. The one huge perk of Blaze is his waveclear, though. If players can figure out a way to utilize his tankiness in teamfights effectively, perhaps the insane amount of waveclear he brings to the table will be a saving grace.

A large chunk of the player base will likely be able to play Blaze effectively, but in higher levels of play, he will be mostly played as a counter-engage tank against heavy dive compositions. Luckily, we only have to wait until Week 2 of HGC 2018 for our chance to see Blaze in action.

Pro/Streamer Opinions