Hello, my name is "TheTRUTH". I have over 600 games played on Tyrande, and over 1,300 games played in total. I am rank 1 in hero league, (for what it is worth) almost exclusively with tyrande.
Tyrande has a lot of talent diversity, which will mainly be dictated by your teams comp, the opposing teams comp, and sometimes the map that you are playing on.
Tyrande's biggest weakness is low mobility, low health, weak at laning, mercing and no "traditional escape", however, your stun can be used as an escape for both you and your teammates. often times when I die it's because I missed a stun that would have otherwise saved my life. To compensate with these weaknesses, positioning is super important; you want to be close enough to the front line of a fight to be effective, but you need to be far enough away from potential threats so that you don't just get stunned and instant killed. You pretty much want to be with the furthest back heroes on your team, but at the same time you need to realize who the biggest targets are on your team for the enemy team. for instance; if you have a kael'thas or jaina on your team, chances are they will get focused before you do, thus, you don't want to be behind them.
Your strengths lie in utilizing your skill shots to their potential, gaining map vision with your owl and cycling through your abilities very quickly using both "empower/pierce/ranger" talents synergy, and rewind. Becoming proficient with using an effective heal and stun, and then using an owl to hit multiple enemy heroes to then do the same again quickly is part of what makes tyrande compete with the "tier one" heroes. typically, if you aren't exactly sure where to send an owl for map vision, I would recommend owling the most important area of the map that the enemy team could realistically be at. For instance, you could send an owl to check boss or an objective area, but it can also be very important to have an owl ready to deny an objective such as on black hearts bay, tomb of the spider queen, dragon shire or cursed hollow, so make sure not to spam out owls too much.

The build that I have listed above is the most common build that I use with Tyrande, however, you still need to put some thought into each talent that you take based on the info in this guide. Also keep in mind, that the more aggressive you are with tyrande in terms of positioning during team fights, the more valuable "rangers mark" and battle momentum become.

One of my favorite things about tyrande is that every singe talent level has alternative options, that not only are viable under the right circumstances, but are also meta dependent. The biggest deciding factor when choosing talents will be based off both team compositions as well as the map.
Lets look at the talent diversity based on what role you are playing based on the above factors.

Team with another healer: In the case when you aren't the only healer on your team, I almost always go for the owl build. Even then, if the opposing team has 3 or more melee targets, or 2 melee tanks than ranger's mark is going to be a good substitution for empower at level one. Using that same logic, battle momentum would be a good replacement for lunar blaze at level 7. (I would not suggest going for the owl build without at least empower or battle momentum). Level 10 is very much so still up for debate though, as of now, it seems most players are trending towards shadowstalk, but if your team is lacking damage it would probably be smart to take starfall. Shrink ray, as I will mention below, is a viable pick over "overflowing light" in the right scenario.

Solo Healer Tyrande: Even when playing as the only healer I might still go for the owl build. The main advantage is that the empower/pierce/ranger combo helps lower the cooldown of Light of Elune as well as shadowstalk. Battle momentum can also achieve this, but in specific games when having both is viable, it's of course going to be even better. the Level 4 talent is the most diverse for tyrande. I personally light healing ward with tanky teammates, and when the opposing team doesn't have a lot of burst damage; however, if the opposing team does have burst damage, then protective shield is most likely going to be better. When those two talents don't seem appealing, "focused attacks" is a completely viable talent in its own right. Shadowstalk at level 10, and overflowing light at level 13 seem to be must haves as the solo healer, but at level 16 ranger, trueshot aura and shooting star are all viable. If you don't take lunar blaze at level 7 then I would advise taking trueshot aura (assuming you aren't doing owl build), if you would like to take rewind at 20, then I would go for shooting star (assuming you have lunar blaze and aren't doing owl build). Remember!, some heroes don't benefit from trueshot aura as much as most others (abby, zeratul, nova, etcetera) Finally, at level 20 whether or not you should grab rewind should be obvious by now, but storm shield is good with tanky all heroes, and shadowstalk can be good for extra escape or engagement potential.

Hunter's Mark is a very interesting trait in my opinion. At face value, it seems very powerful, as your team can frequently deal 25% more damage to enemy heroes, especially when upgraded with the level one talent, "Ranger's Mark" (lowers cooldown by 8 seconds). The fundamental problem with this trait is that using it often contradicts proper hero positioning with tyrande. Usually, your best opportunities to use this trait will be on opposing heroes that initiate, such as warriors and melee assassins. I find that the 20 second cooldown is already short enough to use this trait when a good opportunity presents itself. Other than my personal opinion, this trait is very strong when focusing down targets such as bosses and map objectives such as the dragon knight, garden terror, and especially the golem on haunted mines.

Light of Elune can be considered a pretty weak heal, even when upgraded at level 13 with overflowing light (increased allied heal by 35% when you are above 50% health), if you are analyzing tyrande as a healer first, and a utility hero 2nd, or if you are the only healer on the team. Overall though, it's decent heal that can make the difference with allies dying and living, but just make sure to always heal something other than yourself when trying to self heal because it heals you for the same amount no matter what! there isn't much to using this ability, just try to make sure to actually use the heal when you can as opposed to focusing too much on hitting a money owl or stun.

Sentinel (or owl as I call it for short) is always a great tool for vision, but can also be the main ability in your build if you do the owl build. This ability will most likely take a bit of practice to get good with, but it's so rewarding to get consistent with hitting moving targets as well as those cross map snipes for hero kills. One tip for hitting an owl more consistently is to use it right after you cast your stun ability, on the same place. of course you only want to do this if you are confident you will hit the stun in the first place. When it comes to long range snipes, consider the map layout when aiming; the longer the straight pathway is the better, and narrow parts of maps are also great places to line up multi hit owls.

Lunar Flare is just simply a great ability no matter what build you do. having a stun with long range (when you pick Lunar Blaze> increases the cast range by 50%) is extremely powerful. It can be used for preventing heroes from retreating, knocking heroes out of their ultimate's or other abilities, as a non-traditional escape for you or your teammates, to set up a chain of abilities from multiple heroes onto one target, and much more. Landing stuns is thus the most important ability to use effectively with tyrande. My tips for hitting consistent stuns is to be patient with using this ability when the hero you are aiming for is moving sporadically, and try to wait for them to make more predicable movement such as a straight path towards you or away from you.

Shadowstalk helps just that much more in making tyrande a viable solo healer. More importantly though, it is a talent that now allows you an option at the ultimate talent level! The thing to remember though is that the healing output is truly not that high; it's only slightly higher than the healing of "Light of Elune". The low cooldown is also nice, and with help from talents such as "empower" and "battle momentum" you can realistically use this heroic two times in a singe fight.

Starfall is overall a pretty solid ult in my opinion. It's fairly easy to use, and because of talents such as empower and battle momentum, you can usually use it every team fight if need be. The only thing to be careful of is using it too early, where the opposing team can just back off from the Starfall, and re-engage once it dissipates. Starfall can also be used to zone teams away from contention points, or to keep them from accessing objectives altogether such as on dragon shire or cursed hollow.

note: for some talent choices, I will sometimes explain my reasoning on when to pick talents based on how many melee heroes the other team has. When I do mention this, keep in mind that enemy tanks will often times be within close range of you much more often than most melee assassins and also gazlowe. You also need to keep in mind that melee heroes such as illidan and murky are going to be more difficult to land stuns on, and other special cases will present themselves as well, so don't blindly follow my rule of "3 or more enemy melee heroes" when deciding which talent to choose. However, if there are at least 4 enemy melee heroes, then ranger's mark and battle momentum are both much more likely picks to make.

Tier 1

Celestial Attunement is deceivingly bad talent. I understand this is never taken at the competitive level, but it was something I used to take often when I was at a hundred games experience or so with tyrande, and that is because you will have mana problems if you go for empower or battle momentum, and even sometimes regardless of having these two talents. However, empower and ranger's mark are just too good of options to pass up.

This talent is pretty much the only talent picked at a competitive level. The assumption with this talent though is that you will be close to the opposing teams heroes very frequently in order to get the benefit of the lower cooldown. Doing so, as I mentioned above, can easily result in you overextending to use your trait, and thus getting stunned and then focused down.
Despite all of this, I do pick this talent on Haunted Mines, as your trait is very effective in both defending against the opposing teams' golem, as well as helping your team kill the neutral golem to secure more skulls.
I have since realized, about a month after first writing my above thoughts on ranger's mark, that vs at least 3 melee heroes or 2 melee tanks that this talent seems like a fair substitute compared to empower even when doing the owl build (of course, if you aren't doing the owl build, then ranger's mark is a good choice at level 1 under most circumstances).


I never take this talent and the reason being because even on a map such as tomb of the spider queen, I find ranger's mark to be more effective than Seasoned Marksman.
The build that this talent is often picked for is the auto attack build for tyrande. I find this build to be pretty lackluster, but I also don't have much experience with it.

This is my most picked talent for tier one, and I pick it on every map other than haunted mines. With pierce and ranger, landing your owls is going to be the foundation of being successful with the owl build, but doing so will allow you to use your abilities at a much higher rate than you would be able to otherwise. like I mentioned above, ranger's mark is a potential substitute even when doing the owl build.


Tier 2


Pierce is one of the four talents that I choose on this talent tier. It is also one of the 3 most important talents that comprise the owl build with tyrande. There isn't much to say about this talent except that if you aren't going for ranger on level 16, than I feel like this talent doesn't offer much.

This talent is not bad when you aren't going for the owl build. If you team doesn't have tanky heroes, I feel focused attacks is usually a smart choice.

Protective shield use to be the go to talent for competitive play. But with the improvement to focused attacks and people finally realizing that protective shield isn't that great on squishy heroes, it has dropped down in popularity. I still take this talent when I have tanky ally heroes, and the opposing team has a good amount of burst damage (which most team comps will have).

Healing Ward is a talent that I consider pretty mediocre since it can be destroyed by the opposing team. I take this talent when there isn't a lot of burst damage on the opposing team.

Searing Arrows is again a talent I never picked on tyrande. And again, I don't have much experience with the auto attack build, but outside of that particular build, the problem with this talent in general is that it eats up a lot of mana, and on a hero that already has mana problems, it just doesn't make a lot of sense to me to take this talent.


Tier 3

Quickening Blessing is a pretty weak talent overall, partly because you aren't healing teammates based on who could use a move speed buff, but instead you want to generally heal heroes to prevent them from dying. Outside of this, not only are the other 3 talent choices at this tier better in my opinion but the extra range on Lunar Blaze is probably the best individual talent choice for tyrande, thus making any other talent choice at this tier a hard sell.

Lunar Blaze is just simply a great talent, and should almost always be taken. Taking this talent also leaves your options open on level 16 and 20(with shooting star and rewind). There is some room for flexibility still in this tier in my opinion though.

Battle Momentum is a fun talent choice when going for the owl build because it allows you to shoot off even more owls, and who doesn't like that?! It is also great for getting out more heals and stuns of course, but the only time I actually consider this talent is when the opposing team as 3 or more melee heroes or 2 melee tanks. Even then, I still take lunar blaze more often, and it's because most of the popular non-tank melee heroes aren't actually going to be within their melee attack range for long. With this said, with 4 or more opposing melee heroes, I almost always take this talent.

Mule is especially good for haunted mines as well as respectable on sky temple and black hearts bay. but chances are that if there is another hero on your team that can choose this talent, they are better off doing so because missing out on Lunar Blaze is usually too big of a hit to justify. (if you don't need lunar blaze due the the opposing teams' composition, then it's probably best to take mule instead of battle momentum)


Heroic Tier


Starfall is remains unchanged from the Morales patch, and thus I feel taking this talent simply comes down to team composition. If you need more damage, starfall will probably be better than shadowstalk.

Shadowstalk is the more popular pick out of the two, and I feel this is mainly because there isn't usually going to be a lack of damage on your team, and even in that instance, shadowstalk can still be picked over starfall.


Tier 4

Overflowing Light is almost always my pick here. even as a 2nd healer, it has great value because you will almost always be above that 50% health threshold to benefit from this talent. With this, your healing output actually comes close to Uthers' primary heal, and your healing numbers should come close to his if you are on top of your heals.

Huntress' Fury is another talent that gets picked often with the auto attack build. Aside from that build, I would never recommend picking this talent. Each of the 3 other talents on this tier are vastly better than Huntress' Fury.

Sprint is an interesting talent for tyrande, because at face value it seems that it solves your mobility problem, which is undeniably one of tyrande's biggest weaknesses. Even without this talent, as long as your positioning is good, you should almost never be dying unless your team overextended and also happened to lose a team fight pretty badly. I will assume that this talent could be good in combination with protective shield and Ranger's Mark as you will often need to overextend in positioning to use these talents to their fullest potential.

Shrink Ray is a talent that I usually don't pick, but if you aren't the only healer on your team, and there is an opposing melee assassin, or other good shrink ray targets than this is a perfectly fine talent to pick. Just keep in mind that other heroes on your team may also have access to this talent, and it's not something you particularly want more than one of.

Tier 5

Trueshot Aura has overtaken Shooting Star as my go to talent at level 16 when I am not going for the owl build. There are many situations where I will take this over Shooting Star, such as; if you don't pick Lunar Blaze, if you have strong auto attack heroes, or pretty much just ranged heroes and if you aren't intending on picking rewind at level 20. The reason this is my preferred pick is because by the time you can pick this talent, your team will usually be grouped ready to fight over key map contention points, and the overall damage in these scenarios will be much higher than the shooting star bonus damage, which is assuming you hit with Lunar Flare in the first place. (having a hero such as abathur will decrease this talents effectiveness).

Mark of Mending is a talent that I have honestly never picked. It just seems so much weaker than your other options at this tier. And even in best case scenarios where your team can all focus the marked target, the healing just seems too low to make a significant impact.

Ranger!! this is the talent that brings the whole owl build together. It is a very strong talent when combined with empower and pierce. ranger not only allows you to start raking in the hero damage, but more importantly you are able to soften up enemy heroes for your assassins to burst them down, and much like kael'thas' flamestrike, you can continue to poke at the enemy heroes prior to a teamfight, putting a clock on them from contesting your team at objectives or other contention points on the map. Ranger also allows you the potential to get some always awesome long range owl snipes across the map. Just don't get too trigger happy and send owls away at the wrong times giving away your teams positioning on the map.

Shooting Star seems to be falling out of the meta due to the typically more powerful counterpart, Trueshot Aura. There are still circumstances in which I would pick shooting star over Trueshot Aura (assuming im not doing the owl build). These include if my team has an Abathur on it, or if I am planning on going for rewind instead of storm shield at level 20. Also, if your team seems to be split a lot due to the map or for whatever reasons, than Trueshot Aura does lose some of it's value for sure.

Tier 6

Celestial Wrath is a talent that seems pretty solid, and for the most part is pretty decent. But really, the global cast range is not usually going to be to useful, but the 30% extra damage is certainly pretty nice.

Hunter's Swiftness is a talent I really can't weigh my own opinion on too much. But the movement speed does seem like good utility with keeping teammates alive when they are trying to run or helping your team engage the enemy, especially when they are split up or out of position. I think the most important thing to consider is the global range that shadowstalk inherently has, and because of this combined with the low cooldown you can pretty much have this escape/engage available whenever need be.

Nexus Frenzy is actually not terrible in its own right for tyrande, the problem is the opportunity cost of this talent and not the talent its self. but Of course, it's the 100% pick for an auto attack build. The interesting thing about this talent is when you consider its potential when paired with battle momentum. Both the extra attack speed and attack range allows you to get more auto attacks in, thus lowering your cooldowns that much more. It would also be an interesting trio with seasoned marksman at level 1 if both empower and ranger's mark aren't great picks given both team compositions and the map. With all that said, rewind fits the "burst meta" (as they say) much better since you can instantly get out up to 6 spells when needed.

Storm Shield is a talent that sees a good amount of competitive play, and rightfully so. It has a short cooldown, and gives a great amount of shield to the entire team in the right situations. I, however have found this talent a bit hard to use to its fullest potential, as it often seems in teamfights that only a couple of your heroes will get focused at a time, thus, most of the shield seems to be going to waste in my opinion. With that said, I do like this talent if I haven't gone for the owl build or Lunar Blaze. Also, if the opposing team has a stealth hero, I find this talent to have extra value.

Rewind is a pretty great talent for tyrande, even when not going for the owl build. But with this build, I find that rewind offers great synergy with the rest of the build. As tempting as it is to use rewind to just simply shoot off another owl in team fights, you will get so much more value out off it if you can stun and heal before rewinding for the 2nd owl. rewind is also great for securing kills by stunning + owling a single opponent, than rewinding to do the same thing again.

Tyrande has a lot of viable build variety in my opinion, For those of your who don't find her as fun as some of the other heroes in the game, I hope I have encouraged you to try out the owl build with her, as it's my favorite play style in this game.

Picking sprint when first learning tyrande is probably a good idea, it will help ease your way into learning her playstyle, as hitting your skill shots and hero positioning are both crucial to playing her well.

Keep in mind that at the start of the game you literally have no health, but by level 20 you are a bit below the average hero health pool. But even then, without sprint, you typically don't want to allow yourself to take much damage at all or else your will quickly find yourself the main target.

EARLY GAME
in the early game, keep in mind that tyrande is really bad at laning by herself. It's something I only do when the team comp calls for it, or other specific reasons. Typically I like to roam the map in the early game, looking for kills, which you can secure by landing your stun, owl, trait, and some help from the ally hero in that lane. (this is especially good with other heroes roaming with you who also have cc).

MID GAME
the mid game is what I consider once your team hits 10. At this point, you will most likely be grouped with at least a couple teammates from here on out, which is a good thing because tyrande is really bad in 1v1 situations. Only once you get access to rewind can you threaten other heroes 1v1, and that's assuming you can land two consecutive stuns and owls on your target. From the mid game on-wards though, it's typically all about objectives and mercs. This is where your owls can really start to help out for vision.

LATE GAME
Once you get to level 16 with the owl build your damage will really start to pile up. This is where it's more important than ever to hit your owls in team fights, but of course your stun is also a key tool in tyrande's kit. And then you are still a healer, so make sure to fire off those heals pretty quickly since your cool-downs will all be lowered because of the empower-pierce-ranger synergy. The last couple things I want to note is that it is very easy to get picked off as tyrande {especially without sprint) in the late game if you are separated from your team, so if you want to scout something, use your owl! And lastly, you will often be running out of mana, this is not to say you should be conservative with your spell usage, but instead that it's ok to "B" away from you team, just make sure to let them know not to teamfight 4v5.

Last, Last thing!
When doing the "owl build", there are only two talent choices that you should consider changing, and that is at level 7 and level 13. Both battle momentum/mule and shrink ray are my alt picks here.