Recently, I've gotten into a few pleasant exchanges on Reddit and Twitter about the relative strength of everyone’s favorite crusader, Johanna. If you’ve seen those exchanges, you already know where I stand. Today I’d like to take some time and fully illustrate why I feel so strongly about Johanna’s usefulness. There’s this fascinating dichotomy in the HOTS community where some players feel that she is one of the best heroes in the game, and others, such as myself, feel like she is near the very bottom of the tier list, hanging out with Gazlowe and Raynor. With the help of the greatest card game on the planet, I feel like we can finally explore just what makes Johanna not only bad, but the "trap card" of Heroes of the Storm.





It's Magic!

Quickly before everyone has the wrong idea, we’re not talking about trap cards in Yu-Gi-Oh. The term has a completely different meaning in my favorite card game, Magic: The Gathering. If you’ve never played before, Magic is basically Hearthstone if you removed the RNG, started at 20 life, could act on your opponent’s turn, had a healthy, vibrant limited environment, and were almost nothing like Hearthstone. However, that 20 life part is really all that matters for our purposes today.

See, when someone first learns to play Magic, that 20-point life total feels so incredibly small. 20 is one of the smallest numbers out there! Cards like Lava Axe will hit you for five damage--that’s a quarter of your life! Every new player is crazy protective of their precious life total. Which is why, to every newbie out there, this card seems amazing:

On turn four, you can gain 7 life! Unlike Hearthstone, in Magic you can heal above your starting total, so you could be at 27 life, four turns into the game! To a new player, Angel’s Mercy seems incredible. It gives you so much more life than your opponent and prevents you from dying quickly--it makes you feel safe. You jam it and every other lifegain effect you can find into your white deck, challenge your buddy who taught you how to play--and immediately lose every single game.

You've Activate My Bad Card

In Magic, the term “trap card” refers to a card that seems good when you read it, but is actually terrible in a real game. To any experienced player, Angel’s Mercy isn’t really a trap card, but it tricks tons of brand new players in the same way. The reason Angel’s Mercy is so bad, is because it doesn’t actually affect the game in a meaningful way. You haven’t put any creatures on the battlefield, you haven’t gotten rid of anything from your opponent’s board--you’ve done nothing to advance yourself towards winning the game. All you’ve done is waste time stalling so that you die a little bit slower.

This is exactly why I feel Johanna is the trap card of Heroes of the Storm. Her entire kit is built around stalling and not dying. None of her abilities advance you towards winning the game, they just prevent you from losing. Let’s break down her whole kit to explore why this is the case.

Trait: Iron Skin

The trappiest trap in Johanna’s entire kit. Just like Angel’s Mercy, this trait feels so good as a bad player. When you’re new to the game, or if you’re just bad, the most common way to die is to get caught out of position, get stunned, and blow up. Iron Skin prevents all of that. You feel so powerful when you’re just slowly walking away from the enemy as they try desperately to kill you. The problem is, you didn’t actually accomplish anything--you just didn’t die. Johanna’s trait just keeps her alive longer, but it doesn’t provide her any actual impact in the fight. If you don’t have good positioning, players will just bait out your trait, and then kill you when you try to walk in again. It’s easily counterable, and does nothing to push you towards winning.

Q: Punish

It has a tiny slow, does no damage, and helps a little bit with your wave clear, which we’ll talk about next. I shouldn’t even have to waste any time here, the ability does nothing.

W: Condemn

This is it, your chance to prove me wrong! Johanna is one of the best heroes in the game because of her wave clear! Condemn is incredible for its lane control! You’re absolutely right, Johanna has amazing wave clear. If you don’t have any other wave clear and you have to pick a tank, Johanna is absolutely the right choice. But, here’s the thing about wave clear--it doesn’t actually win you the game. Yes, you have to clear the lanes to soak XP, but that isn’t the win condition in Heroes. To win the game, you have to do one of two things--win a teamfight, or win an objective. With the possible exception of Infernal Shrines (and even then you can draft clear in other roles) Condemn does not actually help you win the objective or the teamfight. The stun is negligible except for cancelling Mosh Pit (ETC has a second ult that’s also good) and it does virtually zero damage to heroes. Just like with Angel’s Mercy, you’ve done nothing to advance you towards your win condition, but you can clear the waves forever, so it will take longer for you to lose.

E: Shield Glare

Again, almost no damage in a fight. The blind (and Condemn, to be fair) is a good counter to Illidan and Tracer, but it’s yet another stalling tactic. Blinds allow your team to live a little bit longer, but don’t put the enemy team any closer to losing. As an incidental ability, having a blind is really nice, but it isn’t enough of a reason to draft a hero. This is actually also true of lifegain in Magic. As an added effect on a card, it's great, but as the primary focus of the card, it's terrible. Shield Glare is also dramatically worse than Lili’s blind because it can be dodged.

Heroic 1: Falling Sword

Heroic 2: Blessed Shield

Stuns on tanks are immensely powerful. They make ETC and Muradin top tier tanks, and having two of them is a huge part of Anub’arak’s appeal. However, the stuns of those heroes have two things in common. First, they are basic abilities with fairly short cooldowns. Second, those heroes actually have ways to follow up their stuns with impactful abilities. They can stun and THEN use a heroic ability. ETC and Anub have a second displacement ability to follow up their initiation stun, keeping the enemy locked down and in chaos for several seconds while their team closes in. Johanna doesn’t have a gap closer. If she throws a Blessed Shield, she then has to walk up to her target. Her follow-ups are low-impact abilities. The stun on Condemn has a huge delay, and might as well not be a stun unless you have yet another follow up CC from a teammate.

As a heroic, the stun is wildly underwhelming. The stun on the first target only lasts .25 seconds longer than Muradin’s stun on a base ability! Johanna’s pick potential is almost zero, her peel is negligible and intermittent. The wave clear on her kit is amazing, but if the opponent stays even with you in XP, your wave clear won't help you win a teamfight. Her kit is exactly like Angel’s Mercy--it keeps your team from losing, but doesn’t actually help you win.

Um, Actually....

Of course, even if you agree with all of this, there’s still a huge question we can’t ignore. If Johanna is so bad, why is she still seeing play in the HGC? Here’s where the Angel’s Mercy metaphor breaks down a little bit, but still gives us some insight. In Magic, there are thousands of cards to play. Even in a limited environment you’ll have more cards available than you can fit into a deck. In every scenario at every level of play you will have a card that works better for your deck than a do-nothing lifegain spell. This isn’t true in Heroes of the Storm.

There are very few viable solo tanks in the game. It is entirely possible to be put in a position where you have to pick Johanna. As the game continues to grow and more true tanks are introduced, we will likely see Johanna’s pick rate continue to fall towards zero (assuming no major rework). We know this is true because it happens in more established MOBAs like League of Legends. In LoL there are dozens of champions that never see competitive play because someone else just does their job better. Miss Fortune went years without seeing relevant play at the pro level because she had less range than Caitlin, less mobility than Ezreal, a worse ultimate than Ashe--there was always a better pick no matter how the draft went. When we have more options at the tank position, there will be fewer spots where you can justify picking Johanna.

That said, there is one scenario we have to give to Johanna. One situation where she might be the best tank in the game. Johanna is overwhelmingly powerful in one instance--when you’re already winning. Blessed Shield, Condemn, Punish--these are great tools for chasing a fleeing mage or support to clean up a fight. The blind is exceptional at preventing the opponent from clearing an Immortal or boss. Iron Skin allows you to sit and tank shots from the keep as your team clears it out. Her waveclear and survivability make her excellent at quickly pushing your team towards enemy structures, and allow you to siege them safely for a longer time.



Unfortunately, this is a huge risk to take. You can’t guarantee that you’re going to be a level or two ahead in the game. This strength for Johanna is a false positive. It makes her seem great, but is eliminated the second your team falls behind, and nothing in her kit helps you catch back up and actually win a teamfight when you’re behind.

There's no denying that Johanna seems great on paper. She does her job very well, it’s just that her job doesn’t help you actually win the game. Seven health is a lot for only four mana, but if your opponent can deal eight damage, you just spent four mana to do nothing. Don’t put Angel’s Mercy in your Magic deck, and don’t put Johanna on your team in Heroes of the Storm.