Who am I?

A player with not enough experience but just enough ego to think others might like to read about builds he found and enjoys. These aren't guaranteed to fit in the meta, or be super competitive, or anything really, but they're builds I enjoy, and that's what matters to me.

Who is Tychus?

In Heroes of the Storm, Tychus is a ranged assassin, suffering from a shorter range and longer windup than his peers but with strong abilities that also give him good mobility, as well as being slightly tankier. He can be played as either a highly sticky caster or a high risk high damage basic attacker, but also...

What's this build?

This is a fun build that, like many that I enjoy. straddles the line between assassin and specialist... from the assassin side. Pretty good sustain, monstrous pushing and siege power, and still a good amount of damage you can throw at the enemy team. Still, you will die quickly if caught out of position, so be careful.

D: Minigun - Tychus' trait is the reason for his low basic attack damage and abysmal attack speed of 0.67. What Minigun does is apply a stacking attack speed boost, up to attacking 4 times a second after 4 attacks. A 4.0 attack speed is much nicer for damage (not brilliant but nice), and insanely great for breaking through Block stacks or chests of dubloons. Once spun up, Tychus' damage is respectable, but still unreliable due to the range and necessity to be spun up in the first place.

Q: Overkill - Tychus' Q is a five second channel that makes him deal a truly absurd amount of damage over time to a nearby target as long as it stays in range, and a still respectable half that to all nearby enemies. Tychus cannot cancel this ability, but he can press Q again to focus on a different target. The most important aspect of this ability, however, is the fact Tychus retains full mobility while channeling. That means he can chase or escape from an enemy at full speed, all the while hitting them with his main damage ability. And on top of that, all of his other abilities (including actives) can be used without breaking this channel. This is a great ability, no doubt about it.

W: Frag Grenade - Tychus' W throws a short ranged grenade that explodes in a medium area, severely damaging and knocking away all enemies hit. This is a very handy tool, with quite the learning curve. Remember, the knockback is away from the middle, so learn to place it well. Don't just hit an enemy with it, hit it from the right angle. Push flee-ers into your team, push pursuers away from you, finish off enemies behind gates who think they ran away from your overkill. So many uses, but again, it takes practice.

E: Run and Gun - Tychus' E has him rapidly dash a short distance in any direction; in addition, he also fully spins up his minigun. While this does make it a nice initiation or chase tool for that extra bit of burst, it's generally advised to primarily rely on it as a means of escape, and not a terribly good one at it. But it's better than nothing.

R: Commandeer Odin - Tychus first heroic ability calls down a massive(ish) mecha for him to pilot. Activating it takes 3s and it no longer gives Tychus a fresh bar of health, so it should be done out of harm's way; after that, Tychus gets to pilot the Odin for 20s. While inside, his trait and basic (but not active!) abilities are disabled; in return his basic attack is upgraded with very high range and damage, and he gains a set of three new abilities, all on short cooldowns: Annihilate, a straight-line fairly slow-moving but very long-ranged wide skillshot that deals fairly high damage; Ragnarok Missiles, an instant-cast ability that bombards a sizeable area with missiles after a short delay, slowing and dealing modest damage, as well as Thrusters, a short dash. Used properly, the Odin can greatly increase Tychus' damage.

R: Drakken Laser Drill - Tychus second heroic ability calls down a mining laser near him, basically a turret with high damage, high range, and high hit points (not much less than a hero, in fact). Tychus can reactivate the ability to change the turret's target. This is a great ability because of its considerable damage output if enemies don't move out of the range (which is large) or kill it (which means a significant diversion of dps). Most importantly, it doesn't take up Tychus, and he can drop the laser in cover where it's hard to get, or even leave it to siege a base while he rejoins a fight while it does its thing.

Lvl 1: Armor Piercing Rounds - While Shredder Grenade would synergize beautifully with what I like about this build, making it so much easier to wipe entire (or even multiple) waves and siege down buildings, the 20% damage increase to your primary damage ability that Armor Piercing Rounds offers is just too much to pass up on. It doesn't even matter that it's only to primary target, that's who you want to kill anyway, the aoe is just incidental. Not taking this talent will make you just deal not enough DPS to reliably burn down enemy heroes, which is vital, as well as make you much weaker versus, say, objectives. By that same token, the alternatives here don't compare. Regeneration Master would make you tankier, Scouting Drone would give you vision, and Dash would help your escape not be as poor but, well, those are all slightly shoring up places where you are weak, while the other two make what you're good at, great.

Lvl 4: Melting Point - A core talent for this build. No - the core talent for this build. Melting Point triples your grenade's damage versus buildings, minions and enemy (but not neutral) mercenaries, by way of a 10s dot. This is huge, why? Because it now wipes caster and archer minions with one cast, and heavily wounds footmen. Or you can smack it down on a tower and hit the gate, the wall, and the minion wave if you're lucky or you time it right. This makes you a pseudo-specialist and I love it. But if you're desperate for alternatives, grab Vampiric Assault. You've got pretty good basic damage, so that'll let you take mercs decently safely. Focused Assault adds a tiny amount of damage but often to something you shouldn't be doing. Finally. Spray 'n' Pray adds more range to Overkill, which would be nice, but again, Melting Point. It's just so good.

Lvl 7: First Aid - A necessary bit of sustain. A 35% heal on a 60s cooldown is like having a moonwell and a half to go. Don't be stingy with its use - it takes a while to work, and if it's off cooldown, you're not getting the most heal per time. However, if you trust your healers completely, it has a strong contender in Quarterback, which gives you a lot of extra range on your grenade. This opens up a lot of options - safely bombarding enemy structures, knocking enemies towards you from greater range, protecting your allies, etc. But again, the opportunity cost is great. Sizzlin' Attacks is, in my opinion, terrible. Even worse than Searing Attacks, it voraciously consumes mana and offers not enough extra damage in return, and it's not what you should be doing (though now I think about it, if this works in Odin...). If you want to go auto attacker, and especially if you took Vampiric Assault the tier before, you should look at Rapid Fire - those two extra stacks push your attack speed to 5.67 range, an insane ~41% increase, making your damage output actually pretty scary... but at the cost of being stationary and at medium range. Not what this build is about.

Lvl 10: Drakken Laser Drill - While Commandeer Odin has its proponents, I am much more a fan of the Drill. Mostly, I like being able to still do my thing while it does its. For one, dropped at the edge of a teamfight, in cover but in range, it can force enemies to move or suffer. And its damage output is nothing to sniff at. But more specifically for this build, the drill is great in a specialist role because it outranges buildings. And as long as it attacks its target, it'll keep it visible, even if in the fog of war. Once your grenades burn down the tower and walls, you can place a drill right outside the wall's wreckage, take a few steps towards the Fort for the drill to lock onto it, then walk away. The result? One near dead or dead fort if not disturbed. I love this thing, I really do, even if Odin has some very good synergies with talents I don't pick.

Lvl 13: Stim Pack - Something of an unusual pick, as most people would suggest Lead Rain, to keep your victims in range longer, and help your team catch up. And I agree, it's better for that... but I prefer the added escape value of Stim Pack, plus in a pinch you can drop a decent amount of burst on somebody, between the spin-up and the attack speed. As for the alternatives, Problem Solver might find a spot in an auto-attack build - even though it's three times weaker than Giant Killer, you're looking at a hero with an attack speed of 4.0 vs ~1.3. Or 5.67 vs. ~1.6. Of course, you have to be building for basic attack anyway, and that's not the best idea. Relentless is always handy if you find yourself CCd often, and should be kept in mind, but really, the worst thing that cc does is interrupt your Overkill, and Relentless won't help there.

Lvl 16: Stoneskin - No surprise here, the sudden addition of 30% of your max hp as a shield covereth a multitude of sins. Lock and Load could be pretty nice in an auto-attack build, as it lets you chase, but do keep in mind it doesn't stack with Stim Pack. Concussion Grenade is a tricky beast - if you're using your grenade for repositioning it's great, but I'm much more used to using it for damage and interrupt, so it's not my thing. Executioner, meanwhile, is a good choice in any auto attack build whose team can make use of it. Particularly, remember that your Odin comes with a way to slow enemies, and deals truckloads of damage with its arm cannons. But again, I don't build my Tychus for auto attacks.

Lvl 20: Focusing Diodes - Ahahah welcome, welcome to the holy grail of firepower. This outright doubles your laser's damage after a short delay, and it also turns its range from "large" to "immense". This is great in teamfights, greater if you put it behind walls or smoke and your team (or, ideally, perpendicular to the direction of combat). And in sieges? Remember that trick with the laser soloing forts? Plop this down in the jungle and it'll burn down a keep for you if left unmolested. I love this thing. Sure, Bolt of the Storm would be great for escapes and risky chases but, nope, drill. Nexus Frenzy would be nice for a basic attacker, but again, drill. You'd take it for the range more so than the rate of fire anyway... except for when you're in the Odin, with which Frenzy has insane synergy. Greater, in fact, than the +50% duration Big Red Button that makes your Ragnarok Missiles also drop a high damage but unreliable (due to another delay) nuke.