What’s up everybody it’s me A Plastic Bag and Today I’m going to show you how to build and play the mighty Crusader of Zakarum Johanna.
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Johanna is arguably one of the best tanks in the entire heroes of the storm nexus. She can routinely take what seems like an unlimited amount of damage, while getting away without so much as a scratch. She by far one of the hardest characters to kill in the game. And to top off how she is nearly invincible Johanna packs an amazing arsenal of stuns, blinds and interrupts.
Johanna is one of the best heroes in the game for her overall utility and survivability. But like many heroes in the nexus playing her right is what makes the difference in winning your games with her. I’m going to show you how to build and play her to maximize her potential survivability and utility, as a whole.
Johanna’s combos are pretty straight forward, you use them with purpose
Q Punish can be used to slow an enemy hero trying to kill one of your teammates. You can slow that hero to give your teammate enough time to escape. It can also be used to slow a fleeing hero so that you or your team can secure the kill.
W Condemn should always be used as a follow up move, and never your starting move. I like to start with my E shield glare, then use W condemn to bring them closer to me so I can slow them with Q Punish. Usually around this time as they are fleeing, they’re team usually comes to help and that is where your trait D Iron Skin comes in real handy.
E Shield Glare is also another follow up ability, or an ability to save your teammate from chasing enemy hero. On countless times I have saved, myself and many many others with this, for any auto attack character like illidan or butcher, or even raynor and Valla, it makes what they obsolete for as long as the blind lasts.
Your Trait D Iron Skin should only be used when necessary, or when you suspect another hero is going to try to take you out. One of the best things about it is it can be used to escape every single root, as well as stop enemy heroes from changing your position. This ability alone is what makes Johanna one of the hardest characters in the game to kill. Out of all my games with her, she has died the least, because she despite being one of the most aggressive heroes, is nearly impossible to kill unless you levels down and get caught in a high dps gank. But 9 times out of 10 you should be able to escape every attempt to kill you, which is why your job as the most aggressive tank in the game is easy, when the fight is going south you simply pop the Trait Iron skin and walk away…
Summary Of Talents
With a lot of heroes most of the time inexperienced, unprepared players often misplay them, and with Johanna not understanding how to play her can be the difference from realizing her potential and completely throwing it out of the window.
Take it from me with hundreds of games with Johanna and having her sit at level 17 I have tried every possible permutation of Johanna’s play style and abilities, and even though each map, composition, skill level and circumstances may change, there is one build that will work on any map that truly maximizes Johanna’s true role. And that is to be right there in the enemy’s face absorbing damage and allowing your team to setup kills. Secondarily it is your role to keep your squishy teammates alive, but only if this is needed. Properly played squishies should be focusing on vulnerable players, and as a tank, commentary to popular belief it is not your main role to keep squishies alive, instead squishies should learn to position better, as well as be cautious. Your main role is to bring the fight to you, so that your squishies can get those kills. So long as your team cleans up house it’s perfectly fine to stay in the fight until death so long as all that focus is on you. The problem in team fights when tanks overly try to protect squishies, is it only brings damage towards those squishies instead of absorbing it yourself. With any tank it is your job to lead team fights, and to be right in the enemies team face, this should allow your more squishy character to clean up house, and take out the enemy team while the panic and focus on you. The hardest part with playing a warrior, is most people don’t understand how to play this game. And more often than not you’re going to have to use discretion before diving the enemy team, because you will find that in 99% of your games people won’t recognize golden opportunities, or they won’t be quick enough to follow up on your dive. So a good thing to do before you start is letting everyone know you’re going to dive the enemy team in team fights, so that they can focus the squishies.
So Now Let’s Take A Look At How To Build Johanna
Now keep in mind that some abilities are interchangeable so I’m going to do my best to provide examples on how you can build her to suite the match and map you’re in as well as how to compliment your team composition.
Now for the first pick you’re going to want to look at team comp and map play style. For example:
1st on a map like garden terror where you are going to get a ridiculous amount of health globes. It might be in your best interest to get
Regeneration master. But if you are the sole tank, with squishies characters on your team and a good deal of auto attackers on their team it might be better to get
Reinforce.
The other two abilities are worthless, your job as Johanna is not to do a lot of damage it’s to take it, so
Righteous Smash serves no purpose. And even though
Knight Takes Pawn is an amazing ability on some maps, it’s really not your job to be taking out minions waves either, your job is to be an aggressive tank absorbing damage and stunning, repelling the other team.
For the
2nd pick you going to want to choose
Laws Of Hope. Regardless if you pick
Regeneration master.,
Laws Of Hope is far more beneficial in terms of survivability and longevity in capturing an objective like on curse or towers of doom, and can keep you in the fight long enough to allow your team to do their jobs.
Amplified Healing is a great ability however while doing your role you are going to be bombarded with tons of damage, and not having that burst heal can be the difference from you lasting long enough for your team to do that job they need to do, and if you die prematurely you can cost your team that fight, and subsequently the entire match with loss of XP and momentum. The burst heal keeps you alive and in a lot of ways it has a psychological impact on the other team, when they do a lot of damage to you, and you hit your healing and then immediately after hit shield so that you lose no health while healing through the damage they are doing to you. Timing this ability right is crucial.
Now for the
3rd talent you are going to get
Battle Momentum, now for a long time I was using
Sins Exposed which allowed me to more damage. But the only reason for that is before I smurfed into another account, I was getting paired with really bad players, and I had to carry most of the time, often times not only destroying the other teams Johanna in stat, but beating people like Raynor in hero damage, but now that I am in diamond league, I have found that the best ability to get is
Battle Momentum. This allows me to stay in the fight a lot longer, by cooling down all the abilities I have by half a second every time I hit something. This can be the difference between life and death with Johanna’s abilities.
For your
4th talent you’re going to want to pick despite how amazing falling sword is, 9/10
Blessed Shield is going to setup, earn, and hunt down more kills then the other ability, while the other ability does an amazing amount of damage it’s important to remember you role is to be in the fight and absorb damage, you can’t do that when you’re flying through the air like a bird. Not to mention it totally negates your last ability pick, by removing the many basic attacks you could have been doing to reduce your cooldowns. So all in in, being that your job is to absorb damage not deal it, the ability you’re going to want to pick is
Blessed Shield. Trust me, you will find this shield will do more for you and your team then the jump, with the shield you can secure an escape for you or your teammate, and with the other one it only really ensures your escape.
For the
5th talent pick I am tempted once again to tell you to pick
Hold Your Ground because of the 20% shield increase and because it lowers your cooldown of your
trait D Iron Skin. And in certain situations this is a better pick, but in most situations you’re going to get more out of
Burning Rage. I would suggest making this pick off of your team skill level and map. Some maps having this ability is crucial, on others like curse where there will be heavy team fighting, the
Hold Your Ground talent is much better. So this one is up to you. If you’re facing a lot of squishies, it might be better to just get
Burning Rage, but if you’re going up against high survivability tanks then it might be best to just get
Hold Your Ground, which will pair nicely with
Battle Momentum.
For the
6th pick you’re going to want to decide this one based on team comp and map as well as skill level again.
Holy Renewal is great for staying in the fight against a bulky team, but
Imposing Presence is a much better pick if you’re facing auto attackers, more than likely if you picked
Reinforce in the beginning, you’re going to want to pick
Imposing Presence. And if you picked
Regeneration Master in the beginning you’re going to want to pick
Holy Renewal.
For the last and final pick there is no substitute for
Indestructible. As far as doing role this ability has won me countless games. When you die, instead of dying your given shield maximum to your full health for 5 seconds, so when it goes off begin counting for 5 seconds and just before your shield disappear, you can hit D to make you unstoppable with another chunk of shields, also keep in mind when your indestructible goes off if you have your
Laws Of Hope on cooldown, it would be a good idea to hit that too so that by the time your our of shields you should have 20% of your health which should give you more leeway to stay in the fight and pop that trait
Iron Skinonce more. I can’t tell you how many times I have single handily taken down core by myself while my teammates are running with this build. Sometimes I die, but I often get it to low enough that my team mates can come back and finish it off with a few short abilities.
So there you go! Johanna, if you have any questions or thoughts please leave them in the comment section, and I hope to see some more awesome builds out there. Remember that Johanna’s job is to absorb as much damage as possible while setting up kills for your team. It’s not your job to do anything but lead the fight, and occasionally help out team mates who are fleeing. If you want to play Johanna to her full potential you need to be as aggressive as possible however remember that if your team is skittish and doesn’t follow up with you, the chances of this winning the match alone are slim. There are times to switch up your strategies and pick up the slack of other teammates, but in most cases, the best thing is to follow this guide, and rekt the other team.
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