HOTS New PTR July Build Brings New Hero and Xul Changes

The new Public Test Realm patch arrived, and it brought a new hero, UI updates, bug fixes and big changes to Xul. There is a ton of new skins and three new bundles. The testing will take place until July 10, so if you are eager to try out the new hero or the changes made to Xul, be sure to step up.

HOTS July 3, 2017 PTR Patch Notes

The stuff that players can test out and report about includes a new hero, art, user interface, battlegrounds, heroes, collection and bug fixes. The new hero is Alexei Stukov, a melee support coming from StarCraft. He was recently introduced with the hero spotlight, and he will be the next one to step into the Nexus, just after the previous 2.26.1 update.

The full PTR list is as always posted on the official site, where you can find all notes, including the detailed bug fixes not posted below.

Art

• Mounts – Run animations for Battle Raptor and Epic Battle Raptor Mounts have been updated.
• Heroes, Abilities, and Talents – Xul has received updated visual effects to coincide with Talent updates.

User Interface

• General – If the Heroes of the Storm client is minimized, or not the current focus window, it will now retake focus in the following situations:
  • If a player who was queued for matchmaking is removed from the queue.
  • When a game is found while a player is queued for matchmaking.
  • If a draft is cancelled and the player is removed from a draft lobby.
• Disable Screen Shake Setting – A new Disable Screen Shake setting has been added to the Gameplay tab in the Options Menu. If this setting is enabled, the screen will no longer visibly shake when Forts and Keeps are destroyed.
• Emoji Autocompletion – The client will now display a list of suggested Emojis as it attempts to predict the player’s intended Emoji when they begin typing shorthand into the chat window.
• Team League – The tooltip that displays when queue times for 2-player parties are lengthy will now include estimated wait times for parties of 2, 3 and 5 players. Additionally, the Ranked Play interface has been adjusted, and the tooltip’s size and layout have been revised to help prevent it from overlapping other UI elements.

Battlegrounds

• Map Rotation Update – The Ranked Map Rotation has been updated to include the following: Hanamura, Dragon Shire, Tomb of the Spider Queen, Cursed Hollow, Infernal Shrines, Garden of Terror, Warhead Junction, Haunted Mines, Towers of Doom.
• Hanamura
  • Core Life increased from 7 to 8
  • Sapper Minions will no longer spawn for the enemy team after a Keep is destroyed
  • Map Objective:
    • First Payload spawn time increased by 15 seconds
    • Second Payload spawn time increased by 15 seconds
    • Payloads now grant 1200 XP upon reaching their destination
  • Mercenaries:
    • Fortification Camp
      • Turret power-up will now prioritize attacking Heroes
      • Turret power-up health has been increased by 10%
      • Turret power-up now deals double damage to Minions
    • Recon Camp – Dragon Spirits power-up no longer dismounts enemy Heroes
    • Support Camp
      • Initial Spawn time increased by 15 seconds
      • Health total decreased by 10%
      • Base attack damage decreased by 12%
      • Attack damage scaling reduced by roughly 60%
      • Self-heal ability cooldown increased by 2 seconds

Hero Ragnaros Abilities

• Molten Core – When Molten Core expires, the camera will now snap back to Ragnaros if he is not on screen.

Hero Xul Abilities and Talents

• Spectral Scythe (Q) – Mana cost reduced from 65 to 55
• Cursed Strikes (W) – Mana cost reduced from 65 to 60
• Bone Prison (E) – Now causes all active Skeletons to fixate on the target.

• Level 1 Shackler (Active) – Added functionality: Basic Attacking a Hero that is slowed, rooted, or stunned reduces the cooldown of Bone Armor by 2 seconds.
• Level 4
  • Reaper’s Toll (Q) – New functionality: !Quest: Hit enemy Heroes with Spectral Scythe / !Reward: After hitting 20 Heroes, reduce the cooldown by 3 seconds.
  • Jailors (Trait) – New functionality: Cause 2 Skeletons to spawn when you cast Bone Prison. These do not count toward the maximum limit of Skeletons you can own. / !Quest: Spawn Skeletal Warriors. / !Reward: After spawning 80 Skeletons, when Skeletal Warriors fixate on an enemy from Bone Prison they gain 50% Movement and Attack Speed.
  • (New) Grim Scythe (W) – Every time Cursed Strikes damages enemies, reduce its cooldown by .5 seconds, up to 10 seconds.
• Level 7
  • Trag’Oul’s Essence (Trait) – Moved from level 4 to level 7 / Redesigned: Skeleton Basic Attacks restore 1% Health and .4% Mana.
  • Harvest Vitality (W) – Redesigned: Cursed Strikes heals Xul for 60% of the damage it deals to Heroes.
  • Weaken (W) – Now also increases the duration of Cursed Strikes Attack Speed slow from 2 to 3 seconds.
  • Rathma’s Blessing (Trait) – Removed
• Level 13
  • Decrepify (Q) – Removed
  • Giant’s Curse (W) – Removed
  • (New) Echoes of Death (Q) – After an additional 1.5 seconds, 2 more Spectral Scythes appear next to the first and travel back to Xul dealing 75% damage.
  • (New) Rapid Harvest (W) – When Xul damages an enemy with Cursed Strikes, he gains 5% Attack Speed for 3 seconds, up to 75%.
  • Executioner (Passive) – Moved from 16 to 13.
• Level 16
  • Skeleton Mastery (Trait) – Removed
  • Corpse Exposion (Trait) – Moved from level 13 to level 16
  • Bone Spear (Active) – Moved from level 20 to level 16 / Cooldown increased from 10 to 12 seconds.
• Level 20
  • Call of the Grave (R) – Removed
  • (New) Andariel’s Visage (R) – Xul is healed for 50% of the damage done by Poison Nova. Skeleton Warriors become Poison Skeletons, dealing 50% increased damage.
  • Raised Mage (R) – Renamed to Cold Hand of Death / New functionality: No longer causes Skeletal Mages to spawn from dead Heroes. Now causes Skeletal Warriors to become Frost Skeletons, causing their Basic Attacks to slow enemies by 30%.
  • (New) Kalan’s Edict (Trait) – Every time a Skeleton deals Basic Attack damage, reduce Xul’s Heroic cooldown by 1%.

Collection

• New Bundles – available for a limited time
  
  • Stukov Heroic Bundle
  • Admiral Krakenov Skin Pack
  • Terran It Up Bundle
• New Skins
  
  • Stukov – Dictator Stukov, Kaldir Stukov, UED Stukov, Zerus Stukov, Admiral Krakenov, Ghost Admiral Krakenov, Reef Admiral Krakenov, Tideswept Admiral Krakenov, Vice Admiral Krakenov.
  • Auriel – Glorious Archangel Auriel, Shadow Demonic Auriel.
  • Chromie – Leper Timewalker Chromie
  • Diablo – Skyborne Archangel Diablo, Horrific Prime Evil Diablo, Timeless Prime Evil Diablo.
  • Illidan – Vordrassil Shan’do Illidan.
  • Johanna – Holy Spellbreaker Johanna.
  • Kerrigan – Queen of MEKA Kerrigan, Queen of Templar Kerrigan.
  • Li-Ming – Infernal Archon Li-Ming.
  • Muradin – Umojan Maraudin’ Muradin.
  • Rexxar – Biohazard Raider Rexxar.
  • Tyrael – Vengeful Archangel Tyrael.
  • Xul – Bone Visage Xul, Classic Bone Visage Xul, Royal Bone Visage Xul, Rusted Bone Visage Xul, Skeletal Bone Visage Xul, Reaper Necromaster Xul.

We hope you are having fun during the “Sun’s Out, Guns Out” event. Thew new hero, changes to Xul, and more skins to acquire will surely make it more enjoyable.