After more than five months, Heroes of the Storm has received a new major patch. The previous content update was Hogger’s patch, back in December. The new 54.0 patch doesn’t bring any new heroes, but it introduces some gameplay changes and reworks to shuffle the meta a little.

Though the anomaly system for testing new features is over, this patch revisits one of the first—and most successful—anomalies: the experience globes. In previous patches the little orbs used to vanish after six seconds, anchoring the players in charge of soaking experience to their lanes. From now on, the globes will shrink after their initial lifespan instead of disappearing. These tiny orbs will remain on the battleground for an additional 39 seconds, granting a 25% of their starting experience value. This change will enable many more rotations to closer lanes or mercenary camps without losing all the laning experience. The new system can be more forgiving with poor experience management, but it can also unlock a whole new level of macro plays.



There’s one more general gameplay update: the Loan Talents. The idea behind these special talents is somehow the opposite of Quest Talents. With quests, heroes could scale and become late-game beasts. The Loan Talents grant heroes a very early power spike, but this power diminishes every time they die. In this patch only four heroes have received Loan Talents (Johanna, Stitches, Raynor and Valla), but someday they’ll probably be something as common as quests.

Even if there aren't any new hero releases in patch 54.0, it brings us five reworks: Anduin, Johanna, Stitches, Raynor and Valla. The Warcraft priest now automatically heals the lowest health ally (like Brightwing) when he lands basic attacks on enemy heroes. This new trait functionality synergizes well with the +20% attack speed buff the healer has received. His talent changes are intended to make Anduin less late-game dependent.



Johanna’s rework will help her become a human shield to protect her whole team. One of the most important changes affects her heroic ability Falling Sword. Its damage has been drastically reduced and it doesn’t slow enemies anymore. In its new version, when Johanna is in the air, the allies underneath her become unstoppable. And the ability can even heal them, if improved at level 20.

The other reworked tank, Stitches, has become a deadly threat. The abomination’s Vile Gas has many more synergies now, making it much more dangerous than before. We could think that the abomination isn’t just a walking hook anymore, but his Q ability has also been improved. The 40% extra range at level 13 is now part of the baseline kit instead of a talent. But the most insane change is the new level 20 talent Master Hooker. It reduces the Hook cooldown by five seconds, but also makes hooked allies unkillable for two seconds and reduces hooked enemies’ healing by 100% during the same time window.



Raynor and Valla had been reworked before, but their kits felt a bit obsolete compared to newer autoattack-based heroes. Old Jim Raynor has a couple new tricks up his sleeve. Give ‘Em Some Pepper has new sinergies, so choosing the target for the empowered fourth basic attack is more important than ever. Veteran Marksman is now a Loan Talent: it scales slowlier (0.75% per hit instead of 1%), but has an initial value of 60%. However, dying is not that bad for the new Raynor with his level 20 talent Execute Orders. It reduces the death timer to 30 seconds and casts Hyperion upon death towards the closest enemy hero.

Valla’s Loan Talent is Creed of the Hunter, now on level 1 (moved from level 4). Its attack speed boost has doubled to 20%, but it decreases by 5% every time the demon hunter dies. Many more talents have been moved to different tiers, so some old builds may not be viable anymore. The new Valla is intended to have more synergies across her abilities. One example of this design is the new Frost Show functionality: Hungering Arrow deals 25% more damage to enemies slowed by Multishot.