Cassia, Diablo 2 Javelin Amazon, joining Heroes of the Storm

You thought we wouldn’t get a playable Amazon because of a Nova skin? You were wrong! Cassia, a Javelin Amazon, will be the next hero to join Heroes of the Storm. Cassia is a Ranged Assassin who excels against opposing physical damage Assassins.

While moving unmounted (and only while moving), Cassia has a staggering 65 Physical Armor against Heroic Basic Attacks. More, her W, called Blinding Light, is a targeted AOE Blind. Against Blinded targets, Cassia deals bonus damage. She deals that bonus damage regardless of who applied the Blind; heroes like Li Li and Johanna will be her best friends. Meanwhile, she’ll be the bane of heroes such as Illidan, Zul’jin, and Valla. You can find her full toolkit below.

Cassia’s Kit

Trait

• Avoidance
  • When moving unmounted, Cassia gains 65 Physical Armor against Heroic Basic Attacks, reducing the damage taken by 65%.

Basic Abilities

• Lightning Fury (Q)
  • Hurl a javelin that damages the first enemy hit, and splits into two lightning bolts that deal damage to enemies in their paths.
• Blinding Light (W)
  • After 0.5 seconds, Blind enemies in the target area for 2 seconds.
    • Passive: Cassia deals 15% increased damage to Blinded targets.
• Fend (E)
  • Charge at an enemy, and upon arriving channel for 1.5 seconds, damaging enemies in front of cassia every 0.25 seconds.
  • Deals 50% reduced damage to non-Heroes.

Heroic Abilities

• Ball Lightning (R)
  • Throw a ball of lightning at an enemy Hero that bounces up to 6 times between nearby enemy Heroes and Cassia, damaging enemies hit.
• Valkyrie (R)
  • Summon a Valkyrie that rushes to Cassia after 0.75 seconds, pulling and damaging the first enemy Hero hit, and stunning them for 0.5 seconds at the end of her path.
  • The Valkyrie knocks back all other enemy Heroes in her way.

Cassia’s Talents

Level 1

• Thunderstroke Quest: Hit Heroes with Q. Reward(1): 20 Heroes hit = 60 damage. Reward(2): 40 Heroes hit = 2 Charges.
• True Sight Increases the damage dealt to Blinded enemy heroes by 10%. Quest: Deal Basic Attack damage to Blinded enemy heroes. Reward: 80 Heroes hit = Blind duration +1 second.
• Charged Strikes Activate to cause your basic attacks to bounce to a nearby enemy for 8 seconds and increase their damage by 40%. 20s CD.

Level 4

• Ring of the Leech Cassia heals for 35% of the damage dealt to enemies affected by Blind.
• Inner Light Increases Blinding Light radius by 25%. Upon being Rooted or Stunned, Blinding Light pulses around Cassia. This can only occur every 6s.
• Plate of the Whale Gain 5HPS while Avoid is active. Quest: Every 5 Attacks reduced by Avoid grants 1 additional HPS. After 15 bonus HPS, cap it and gain 10% max Health.

Level 7

• Impale Increases Charged Strikes damage by 50% to enemies below 40% health.
• War Traveler Gain 3% movement speed every 0.5 second Avoid is active. Stacks up to 5 times. The bonus is reset when Cassia stops moving.
• Lightning Surge Cassia stores blocked damage and upon reaching X damage her trait can be activated to deal Y damage in an area around you.

Level 10

• Ball Lightning Throw a ball of lightning at the target enemy hero that deals damage and bounces to other nearby heroes.
• Valkyrie Summon a Valkyrie that pulls an enemy hero toward your location.

Level 13

• Grounding Bolt Lightning Fury slows enemy Heroes by 20% for 1.5 seconds
• Thundergod’s Vigor Hitting an enemy hero with the initial Lightning Fury missile reduces the cooldown by 1s.
• Seraph’s Hymn Reduce Blinding Light’s Mana cost from 70 to 40. Basic Attacks against Blinded enemies reduce the cooldown of Blinding Light by 3 seconds
• Lunging Strike Increases Fend’s duration by .5 seconds and the area of effect by 20%

Level 16

• Pierce Lightning Fury’s primary missile now pierces. Perpendicular bolts are now only spawned from Heroes.
• Penetrate Enemies take 3% increased damage from Fend each consecutive hit.
• Martial Law Basic attacks against Stunned, Rooted, and Slowed enemy heroes deal bonus damage equal to 3% of their maximum health

Level 20

• Infinite Lightning Ball Lightning can now bounce infinitely.
• Imprisoning Light Upon initial impact, Valkyrie deals additional damage to nearby Heroes and roots them for 4 seconds.
• Titan’s Revenge Increases Basic Attack range by 2 and your Basic Attacks now ignore armor.

Movement is an essential part of playing Cassia. If you haven’t learned how to stutter step in Heroes of the Storm yet, it’s a gameplay mechanic you should learn before you take Cassia for a spin. Whenever Cassia isn’t moving, she’s vulnerable — which means a well-placed root or stun can completely shut her down. Her Fend ability is channeled, too. Fend is a great followup on a Blinded enemy, but don’t dive recklessly, because she can’t move and use Fend at the same time.

Cassia’s ultimates are a choice between Ball Lightning to dish out teamfight damage or Valkyrie to set up a gank. Valkyrie’s targeting is similar to Xul’s Spectral Scythe — the projectile spawns at the far end of the skillshot and moves toward you. The Valkyrie can catch a fleeing opponent or drag an enemy on the opposing team’s backline into the frontline.

While Cassia is entering testing simultaneously with the Heroes 2.0 beta, they won’t be releasing at the same time. Expect Cassia on live realms before Heroes 2.0.