Heroes of the Storm Adds Xal'atath, First New Hero in 6 Years

Blizzard added a new playable hero to Heroes of the Storm for the first time since 2020. Xal'atath, the sentient Void dagger from World of Warcraft's Shadowlands and War Within storylines, entered the Nexus on September 28 as the game's 91st hero, a move the team is framing as a cautious, sustainability-first test rather than a full relaunch of the long-dormant MOBA.

01Who Is Xal'atath in Heroes of the Storm?

Xal'atath is a Medium-difficulty Ranged Assassin who draws on two resources at once: standard Mana for her core kit and a secondary Soul Essence pool that fuels her trait. Her design rewards extended engagements over quick trades, favoring players who control space and time their cooldowns rather than simply landing skillshots.

• Shadow Mark [Q] fires a void orb that deals 75 damage (150 to the center of the impact), marks enemies hit for 4 seconds, reveals them, and pulls nearby minion aggro.
• Dark Heart Ritual [W] summons a pulsing entity that deals 50 damage per second for 8 seconds and detonates for a further 305 damage against any target already marked by Shadow Mark.
• Void Step [E] teleports Xal'atath three times in a triangular pattern, and each Basic Attack she lands afterward gains a stacking damage bonus capped at +30%.
• Void Volley [Trait] charges after five Basic Attacks connect, letting Xal'atath unleash a barrage that rewards weaving auto-attacks between abilities instead of only casting cooldowns.

Talent tiers run at the usual Levels 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 16 and 20, and Blizzard built a passive quest into Void Volley: hitting 20, 60 and 100 stacks over a match unlocks permanent boosts to its range, cooldown and damage, so the trait keeps scaling the longer a game runs.

02Launch Patch 57: The Rest of the Notes

Xal'atath's kit is the headline, but Patch 57 touches several other systems. The homescreen and startup music were refreshed, and Healing Fountains now support a ping so teammates can call one out the moment it's off cooldown. On Garden of Terror, Garden Shamblers start each match 25% weaker before gradually scaling back up to normal strength, smoothing out the early-game power spike that map was known for.

Seven other heroes picked up balance changes: Abathur, Alexstrasza, Garrosh, Mal'Ganis, Qhira, Whitemane and Yrel, mostly adjustments to mana costs, cooldowns and talent power rather than full reworks. Bug fixes in the same patch address Volskaya Foundry's fort walls having mismatched health on each side, a cast delay on Anduin's Leap of Faith against rooted heroes, Malfurion's Entangling Roots failing to apply on first contact, Ragnaros's Molten Core cooldown on Heroic difficulty, and a case where Xul's skeletons weren't dealing damage at all.

03Unlocking Xal'atath and the Twitch Drops

Blizzard is keeping the unlock path simple for now: Xal'atath can be bought directly for $7.99, with gold availability tentatively planned for late November. The team says that's deliberate, both to make the hero easy to pick up for lapsed and brand-new players alike and to help gauge how much appetite remains for further content before committing to more.

To mark the launch, Heroes of the Storm is running Twitch Drops from September 28 at 9:00 AM PT through October 5 at 11:59 PM PT. Watching participating streams for an hour grants 1,000 gold, two hours unlocks an Epic Loot Chest, four hours a Legendary Loot Chest, and eight hours of viewing time is rewarded with an Epic Deadly Chaos Wolf mount.

Xal’atath has entered the Nexus! To celebrate HOTS Twitch Drops are live now: • 1 Hour – 1000 Gold • 2 Hours – Epic Loot Chest • 4 Hours – Legendary Loot Chest • 8 Hours – Epic Deadly Chaos Wolf https://t.co/qiCBwRnhem

— Heroes of the Storm (@BlizzHeroes) on X

04Why Blizzard Is Reviving Heroes of the Storm Now

Heroes of the Storm moved into pure maintenance mode back in 2022 after its esports scene and dedicated development team were wound down, and updates since then have mostly been bug fixes and periodic balance passes rather than new content. Xal'atath breaks that pattern as the first genuinely new hero since 2020, and Blizzard has confirmed a Hero 92 is already in development, though it isn't committing to details or a timeline until it sees how this patch performs.

For players who stuck around through the quiet years, the framing matters: this isn't being pitched as a full relaunch, but as a test of whether new heroes are still viable to produce sustainably. Xal'atath's pick rates, win rates and player retention over the next few weeks will likely shape how fast Hero 92 follows.

Blizzard's Xal'atath Hero Spotlight previewed her kit on September 12, ahead of her September 28 launch.

05Early Tips for Playing Xal'atath

Because Shadow Mark both reveals and marks targets, using it to scout brush or contested objectives before a fight starts is often more valuable than saving it purely for damage. Dark Heart Ritual's detonation only triggers on marked targets, so landing Q before W is the core combo to drill in your first few games; missing that order wastes a large chunk of the ability's damage.

Void Step's stacking attack bonus resets if you stop auto-attacking, so plan your teleport path to end near an enemy hero rather than using it purely to escape. Since her trait needs five landed Basic Attacks to charge, Xal'atath rewards positioning that lets you keep auto-attacking safely, which usually means holding max range behind your frontline instead of flanking like a melee assassin.