Heroes of the Storm free hero rotation, sales, and Recruit a Friend

It’s that time of the week again. Heroes of the Storm discounts many heroes and skins as well as rolling out seven 10 new heroes — that’s right, this week’s rotation has expanded to a full 10 heroes — you can play for free during the week.

This week we’re also seeing the introduction of a Recruit a Friend system to Heroes of the Storm. So just how does one recruit friends to a free to play game? In the case of Heroes, you send them a unique recruitment link (just head to the Recruit a Friend page while logged on to your Battle.net account to get it) and you’ll both get rewards as your friend levels up. New players will receive Raynor and a 5-day stimpack immediately and get Sylvanas when they hit level 10. Current players will receive a Recruit a Friend portrait when one friend hits level 10 and a Vulture Hover Bike Mount when four friends hit level 10. On top of that, all players get a 50% XP boost this week to help newbies get started.

The veteran rewards seem a little weak to me, but that’s a decent starter package for newbies — so if you know anyone who might be interested in the game (or who’s playing but hasn’t reached level 5), recruit them to give them a head start.

Because this week’s heroes were announced later than usual, we’ve got no poetry this week, so we’re diving straight in with this week’s free heroes:

• E.T.C.
• Illidan
• Li Li
• Sonya
• Thrall
• Tychus
• Tyrande (Slot unlocked at Player Level 5)
• Sylvanas (Slot unlocked at Player Level 7)
• Leoric (Slot unlocked at Player Level 12) — check out our guide to Leoric
• Rexxar (Slot unlocked at Player Level 15) — check out our guide to Rexxar

If you need a starting point, check out our Assassin guide, Specialist guide, Support guide, and Warrior guide for quick rundowns on each hero.

For sales this week, Blizzard has extended the Black Friday sale, so you can now buy heroes, mounts, and skins for 50% off until the end of the year. Happy shopping, Nexus-goers!

Now let’s dive into the team’s thoughts on this week’s lineup:

Anna: A bit melee-heavy this week.

Alex: Li Li is the easiest Support character to play in all of Heroes, I feel. Whether or not she’s the best is highly debatable, but if you need a hero to knock out any daily quests that want you to play Support, it’s hard to screw up Li Li. She’s solid. As long as you’re pressing your button that heals people, you’ll be helpful. You don’t even need to target people with it, just be in range.

Dan: Li Li is easy and fun. Tyrande takes skill but if you have a second Support in the group you can go with an Owl build for crazy damage that shoots in a straight line across the entire map.

Alex: Tyrande is considered one of the strongest characters in the game right now. She’s more difficult to play, but if you practice a bit, Tyrande is freakin’ incredible.

Dan: If you have a Warrior Daily Quest to knock out, Sonya is a high damage tank that is fun to play. Leoric is also a great choice despite his recent nerf. His sustain, waveclear, and crowd control ability with Entomb make him an enjoyable hero to play.

Anna: Tyrande’s most important skill as a support, I feel, is her bigtime buffing trait. Stick to a buddy and use it when they use their big DPS combo. Later in the game she can pump out the DPS herself, but before that her trait brings in some big kills.

Alex: Sonya is actually my favorite character in Heroes period, but I’ve sung her praises every other time she’s appeared in the rotation, so you get Hot Support Tips from me this week instead.

Dan: For Assassins, new Illidan players tend to go all in and end up dead more often than not. And Thrall’s Sunder Heroic Ability, while fun to use, messes with enemy positioning which could screw up your team’s skill shot, so be careful with that unless fleeing.

Anna: To be blunt, I’ve never seen Sunder used as more of a help than a hindrance. Never.

Dan: Yeah, I was trying to be positive about it, haha.

Anna: Sunder is the new Force Wall? Except Tassadar’s Force Wall is still Force Wall, and Thrall remains extremely rare in competitive situations, so.

Dan: For Specialists, Sylvanas is amazing. Take the trait that depletes ammo in towers and watch her lock down and take down her lane quickly if she has little opposition.

Alex: I have to disagree with Dan about the talent that depletes ammo for Sylvanas. If she’s attacking a tower, she already has it locked down. Depleting its ammo won’t really make a difference. If you stop attacking the tower, it starts regening ammo anyway. Sylvanas’s Barbed Shot talent at level 1 makes her clear waves and mercs significantly faster, which lets her go back to locking down those towers.

Anna: Now that Misha can be directed with more precision, Rexxar is a better hero all-around, but he’s a lot fussier to play.

Dan: I’ve never seen a decent Rexxar player, but Rexxar AI is super annoying with his constant Misha stuns.

Anna: Rexxar has been gaining steam in competitive play. Two bodyblocks are better than one… usually. Make sure you’re not blocking out your team’s more fragile heroes when they’re trying to escape!

Mitch:  My experience with playing Rexxar is sort of like that of a bad relationship. At first, I couldn’t stand his playstyle and even hated seeing him in matches because it usually never went well. Once I played as him in a few more matches, though, he grew on me. I started to get used to his quirks and unique playstyle. The matches never exactly went well — sure, an occasionally awesome play here and there — but I still stuck with him because I told myself his uniqueness made him fun. I just had to get used to it. I even tried to justify him to teammates (see: Dan) but they usually didn’t seem to buy it. One day, I went back to my classic Warrior heroes and oh my goodness. The difference was incredible. They were so much more fun and easy to play. I vowed to never go back to Rexxar again. But… I still think about playing him occasionally, if only to see if my experience is any better.

This week’s freebies and sales are already live, so jump online to take advantage of them. And, as always, we’ll see you in the Nexus!