Where are the Li-Ming nerfs? Blizzard has your answer.

The latest balance update has a lot of good changes, but many players are confused at the lack of Li-Ming nerfs. Fear not, everything happens for a reason.

I personally like the latest balance update. It changes the more oppressively powerful parts of Kael'Thas while buffing his under utilized heroics. It changes the way we look at Falstad's talent diversity and slightly nerfs some of the obvious top tier heroes like Thrall and Diablo. Cool stuff.

And then we can to the Nova changes. Snipe needed that buff and Snipe master seems like somewhat viable talent now. But, like everyone I asked the same question: "Where are the Li-Ming nerfs?"

Blizzard has a response to that: 

Li-Ming has only been available for a week, and we want to take a little more time to see how she settles into the metagame as everyone gets more experience playing with and against her. We agree with the feedback we’re seeing that she’s a little too strong right now, and while there are adjustments we’d like to make, we want to be sure that the changes we do make are healthy for the game. We’re currently looking to adjust several Talents, including Astral Presence and Ess of Johan, but we haven’t finalized these changes just yet.”

The original quote can be read here with full context.

It's good to see that Astral Presence and Ess of Johan are on the chopping block, but it is even better to see Blizzard restraint in nerfing fun and new heroes. Li-Ming may be powerful, but she has a serious vulnerability, her fragility. Balancing a game isn't just about nerfing or buffing heroes in a vacuum, in fact, some of the changes in this patch might very well be the Li-Ming nerfs no one thought they needed.

For example, the damage buff to Snipe and Sniper Master makes Nova more viable. When Nova is more viable, Li-Ming get's 1 shot more often. The buffs to Kael'Thas Pyroblast damage is a similar case. When Pyroblast damage is increased, fragile heroes get weaker.

I would much rather have a powerful hero in the game that encourages the use of different heroes as a possible counter, than to simply nerf that hero into oblivion. Do you agree?

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