All concepts discussed in the Rework are free to use by Blizzard without credit.

Once upon an April Fool’s in the distant past of 2004, the Goblin Tinker was born: a joke so good that the community begged for it to become real. Blizzard, in their mercy, decided to listen, and so what quickly became my favorite Hero unit of Warcraft III was made a reality. When I learned that HotS was going to feature Gazlowe as a representative of the Goblin Tinker character, his inclusion became one of the primary driving factors of my interest into HotS.

The point is that I’m really biased.

My own personal feelings aside, it’s no secret that everyone’s favorite One-Man Wrecking Crew has always been pretty awkward compared to his peers. Even back during the Wild West of the Preseason where the strategies were made up and team comps didn’t matter, Gazlowe stood out as being an unconventional choice. At one point, Blizzard even praised players who managed to make him work in Hero League, openly acknowledging how difficult he was to handle and/or fit into a team.

In more modern times, Gazlowe is doing much better: a rework or two over the years certainly made it easier to get consistent value out of the Boss of Ratchet. However, he’s still widely considered to be one of the clunkiest characters on the roster, going almost completely unseen in professional play: Galzowe only appeared in 22 of 8,068 matches - a pick rate of 0.27% over roughly four years. In my opinion, Gazlowe is ripe for a tune-up.

However, before we get into the details of what I think should be done for the chief’s re-engineering, I’m going to review and grade Gazlowe’s current design to build my case on why he needs a rework in the first place.

Unit Stats (shout-out to HOTSNerd!) Out of 85 characters, Gazlowe is: 43rd for Maximum Health

33rd for DPS

Can stutter-step

Melee Range Grade: B-

Gazlowe is, at a glance, pretty Bruiser-like: he’s above-average in difficulty to put down and he’s not too shabby at giving folks the clamp. However, his melee range docks him points, as does his lack of the typical Bruiser tools of mobility, sustain, or reliable Crowd Control. At the same time, he gets a few points back for being able to redirect Non-Heroic focus to his Turrets, helping out his durability against things like Structures or Mercenary Camps.

Salvager Scrap refunds partial cost of relocating Turrets

Scrap’s Cooldown Reduction provides potential for Bomb/Laser caster builds

Destroyed buildings also produce Scrap, creating an incentive to push

Scrap can reduce the cooldown of Heroics, ensuring that the incredibly important Grav-O-Bomb is almost always available

Scrap being generated by destroyed buildings can lead to snowballing

Caster build is clunky due to requiring a turret to be placed first and expensive due to Scrap not refunding full cost of turrets

Enemies can see the location of Scrap, allowing them to zone Gazlowe out and/or bait him into skillshots Grade: C+

Salvager is a good Trait with many powerful uses, but it loses big points for its clunk and even more points for its potential to be used against you. For a character that’s supposed to be the bee’s knees at zoning, it’s pretty ironic that Scrap can lead Gazlowe to being zoned himself.

Rock-It! Turret Good sustained damage, providing 60% of Gazlowe’s DPS per turret

Good range makes them good at poking enemies out of Gazlowe’s bubble

Provides distractions for Structures, Non-Heroics Grade: A

The only complaint that I have about Turrets is that when they were made to obey the rules of Blind and Evasion, they didn’t get any kind of buff to compensate. Outside of that minor nitpick, however, Rock-It! Turrets are fantastic and do pretty much everything you would want a Turret to do.

Deth Lazor Good range, can be charged to amazing range

Okay damage, can be charged to good damage

Requires a 3 second windup to get to full power and earn a good mana investment-to-effect ratio

Roots you while charging, leaving you insanely vulnerable

Heavy talent investment required for consistent/effective use Grade: C-

I am a Laser Goblin apologist and will run Laser Build 99% of the time. However, Deth Lazor without talent investment is dangerous and underwhelming.

Xplodium Charge Good AOE damage

Stuns are always nice

Good for helping beat up Mercenary Camps and Minion Waves

Takes FOREVER to go off, may be tied with Zagara’s Infested Drop for ability with lowest accuracy vs Heroes

Using it to beat up Non-Heroics can be very dangerous, getting caught out with your Xplodium on cooldown means you can’t scare off enemies with the threat of a Stun Grade: C+

Xplodium is difficult to praise in a vacuum. It’s very effective when combined with other abilities, but it doesn’t stand on its own very well. Unfortunately, you’re unlikely to actually hit anyone with it if unless they’re not paying attention or they’re already bogged down in some way.

Robo-Goblin Turns Gazlowe’s basic attacks into something to fear

Active’s defensive benefits are significant

Has no Mana cost for… some reason…

Active is extremely boring from a design standpoint, just the remnants of Sprint and Hardened Shield

Does not synergize with the rest of Gazlowe’s kit in any way

Not picking Grav-O-Bomb 3000 basically shoves Xplodium Charge into a dusty basement outside of combo shenanigans Grade: C+

Robo-Goblin’s Passive and Active portions are very, very good, but the ability on the whole is lacking a “wow” factor and a thematically appropriate feel - there’s nothing about Robo-Goblin that ties its effects to Gazlowe specifically aside from its name.

Grav-O-Bomb 3000 Possibly the strongest force multiplier in HotS thanks to its insane combo potential

Okay damage

Good AOE

Relies VERY heavily on combo potential and is very underwhelming without it

Is basically the only thing in Gazlowe’s kit keeping Xplodium Charge viable

Learning proper timing is tricky because Xplodium Charge’s twisty missile makes travel times inconsistent Grade: B-

There’s not much to say that the bullet points don’t. Grav-O-Bomb is certainly a nice idea, but it inherits a lot of clunk from Xplodium Charge because it relies on Xplodium Charge so heavily. Without a native stun to back it up, Grav-O-Bomb is just a worse version of Zarya’s Graviton Surge because it only yanks enemies rather than hold them in place.

Overall Grade: C-

Gazlowe in his current state is a bundle of old ideas subjected to outdated balance methodology, covered in band-aid fixes and tune-ups that never addressed the core issues of his design.

Which sucks, because I really like Gazlowe.

THE REWORK

So now we’re on the part where I make suggestions on how to fix all of these problems that I’ve pointed out. My goals are thus:

Do not introduce concepts that would require new assets

Make Gazlowe’s abilities more fluid and “modern” without altering Gazlowe’s overall power level

Maintain Gazlowe’s “zoning master” and “one-man wrecking crew” identities

Redesign Robo-Goblin into something more thematically appropriate

Make Caster Gazlowe easier to perform

Clean up existing talents, consolidate weak talents

Build synergy where appropriate, but don’t rely too heavily on it

Notable changes (such as tooltip updates, cost/cooldown adjustments, ect) will be listed in bold.

CORE KIT

Trait - Salvager Destroyed Rock-it! Turrets drop Scrap. Collecting Scrap restores 30 Mana instantly and causes Basic Abilities to recharge three times as fast over 3 seconds. Activate Salvager to dismantle a target Rock-It! Turret and turn it into Scrap. Salvager can be cast on Gazlowe to consume a charge of Rock-It! Turret to generate Scrap.

Salvager’s changes are focused on general functionality: Scrap restores Mana instantly instead of over time and can even be generated out of Rock-It! Turret charges rather than the Turrets themselves, opening up the potential for easier caster-oriented play via allowing the player to bypass the 60 Mana to place a Rock-It! Turret, Salvage it, and then gather the Scrap and refund 30 Mana.

On the flip side, destroyed enemy Structures no longer drop Scrap (to prevent potential snowballing) and Scrap no longer reduces the Cooldown of Gazlowe’s Heroic abilities (because it’s honestly pretty messed up that something as strong as Grav-O-Bomb can be available for every fight if you remember to mill some scrap between teamfights).

Q- Rock-It! Turret Mana Cost: 70

Charge Cooldown: 15 Seconds

Placement Cooldown: 0.5 seconds (-1.5) Creates a turret that deals 62 damage. Lasts for 30 seconds. Stores up to 2 charges. 1 - Focus Turrets! Orders any nearby Rock-It! Turrets to focus the target.

The only change that the Rock-It! Turrets received is the reduction of the Placement Cooldown, allowing players to slam down all of their Rock-It! Turrets in rapid succession instead of having to wait 2 seconds between each one.

W - Deth Lazor Mana Cost: 60

Cooldown: 24 seconds (+12) Charged attack that deals 137 damage to enemies in a line, stunning them for 0.25 seconds. Damage, range, and stun duration increase the longer the Ability is charged, up to 100% after 3 seconds. Deth Lazor can be channeled indefinitely. If Deth Lazor’s channel is canceled, its Mana Cost is refunded. If Deth Lazor’s channel is interrupted by an enemy, the charge is lost.

Here’s where things get weird: Xplodium Charge’s stun has been moved to Deth Lazor, and there are several reasons why.

I feel it is more appropriate to tie Gazlowe’s AOE Disable to something that Disables him in turn: you get a stun in an area for the tradeoff of having to stand still to charge it.

It makes the Grav-O-Bomb/Stun maneuver more straightfoward to perform, but much more limited. On one hand, you’re much more likely to get a group stun after the yank, but you’re not going to get a fully charged Deth Lazor off for the full duration unless you’ve already got help. Additionally, you cannot get an extra stun of your own off from a second Xplodium Charge, further reducing the stun duration you can apply as a tradeoff for the increased usability.

It makes Deth Lazor more powerful on the whole. Right now, Deth Lazor is pretty much only used for Minion Waves, Structures, and poke fights (and using it while poking is incredibly dangerous due to how immobile it makes you). Even if you’re only using a Level 1 version to tap someone out of a channeled ability, the stun makes it much more important to use effectively and at the appropriate time.

It’s more faithful to the original design of the Goblin Tinker from Warcraft III. One of the Tinker’s most important abilities was Cluster Rockets, a short channeled spell that stunned enemies in an area. I can understand the rationale behind making Xplodium Charge into the spiritual successor of Cluster Rockets by moving the channel time into the delay before the explosion (and also because they’re both rocket-based attacks), but mechanically it’s more appropriate to put Cluster Rockets’ stun into the ability that requires channeling first.

As for what I’m doing to Xplodium Charge in return to make up for the removal of the stun:

E - Xplodium Charge Mana Cost: 40 (-20)

Cooldown: 12 seconds (-2) Places a bomb that deals 210 (-23) damage to enemies within the targeted area after 2.5 seconds. Enemy Heroes within the bomb’s radius cause it to detonate immediately.

Xplodium Charge is now a short-lived mine with the potential for instant AOE damage. Like Deth Lazor, these changes come with a handful of justifications:

It suits Gazlowe’s nature as a zone control character better, being able to throw out large chunks of “don’t stand here” that instantly punish enemies for standing there.

It’s very reminiscent of the Goblin Land Mines from Warcraft III, which are cool and good.

While Deth Lazor inherited Cluster Rockets’ stun, Xplodium Charge would inherit Cluster Rockets’ theme of throwing explosives all over the place constantly.

It makes Xplodium Charge much easier to use, drastically reducing the amount of clunkiness that has plagued Gazlowe since his debut.

The “big mine” concept maintains functionality with Grav-O-Bomb while still maintaining viability for use with Robo-Goblin.

R1 - Robo-Goblin Mana Cost: 60 (+60)

Cooldown: 40 (-20) Activate to go into Overdrive, increasing Gazlowe’s Attack Speed by 50% and Movement Speed by 15% for 4 seconds. Basic Attacks against enemy Heroes increase Overdrive’s duration by 1 second, but cannot exceed 4 seconds remaining. Passive: Basic Attacks cleave, dealing 100% damage to enemies in a 180 degree arc.

Passive: Scrap restores 10% of Gazlowe’s Maximum Health over 2 seconds. Additional Scrap extends this duration.

holy overhaul, batman

So, Robo-Goblin. Back in the days of Warcraft III, it gave the Tinker a passive called Demolisher that multiplied the damage dealt to Structures with Basic Attacks. The original design for Gazlowe’s Robo-Goblin featured something similar: Robo-Goblin multiplied Gazlowe’s Basic Attack damage against Non-Heroic targets (including Structures) by 150% (or 200%, depending on the version). However, in a MOBA that featured objectives that usually destroyed buildings for you, this turned out to be not very useful, and so the damage bonus was turned into a generic Basic Attack one so Gazlowe could contribute meaningfully to teamfights outside of turrets and scattering easily avoidable bombs.

The problem with the current version of Robo-Goblin is that it’s just so unbearably BORING: it’s a passive damage boost and an active that’s the stapled-together remains of Sprint and Hardened Armor. It doesn’t interact with Gazlowe’s kit in any way and it doesn’t really evoke memories of the Tinker’s Robo-Goblin either. Yes, it makes him into a pretty okay Bruiser, but it’s not even flashy or impressive like Odin transforming Tychus into an AOE-spamming caster. It’s just there, and it has the potential to be so much more interesting.

So let’s break down the components of what I’ve done and go over why they’re better.

Cleaving Attacks

One of Gazlowe’s core fantasies is being a One Man Wrecking Crew and there’s nothing that racks up Siege Damage like hitting multiple targets at once. Going to town on a Turret with Cleaving Attacks will beat up the adjacent Structures and wading into a Minion line or Mercenary Camp will result in much of the same, playing to his core fantasy much better than having Basic Attacks that really hurt.

On the Teamfight side of the equation, replacing the Basic Attack bonus with Cleaving Attacks is a nerf to Gazlowe’s 1v1 threat. However, it opens up the opportunity for a better performance in teamfights - the player only needs to hit two targets at once to return to the previous level of efficiency in terms of Attacks Made:Damage Dealt, and any additional targets are icing on the cake. This puts greater emphasis on Gazlowe’s positioning and target prioritization, allowing skilled players to turn this rework into a net benefit.

Additionally - and this is a fringe benefit, but still a benefit - it fits Gazlowe’s Basic Attack animations. He primarily uses wide swipes with his Basic Attacks, so when his clamps turn into buzzsaws, it stands to reason that they could be cutting through nearby targets when the arms sweep by.

Healing Scrap

One of the big things that other Bruisers have that Gazlowe doesn’t is sustain, so trading in the Armor for the ability to heal yourself off of Scrap patches that hole up pretty well. It also makes Robo-Goblin fit in with the rest of Gazlowe’s kit better via synergy and feels more thematically appropriate (via Gazlowe using Scrap to patch up the damage to his mech).

An additional benefit to Healing Scrap is that it evokes the spirit of the Warcraft III Robo-Goblin: because it transformed the Tinker into a Mechanical unit while active, players could convert raw materials into hitpoints for the Tinker via Repair. Healing Scrap follows a similar thought process of converting resources into hitpoints, further adding to the theme.

It should be mentioned that it’s intended for Healing Scrap to activate when Gazlowe uses Salvager on himself to consume a Turret charge.

Overdrive

The Movement Speed is there because it was there before and, while it’s boring, it’s not really that big of a deal. We’ll say it’s an homage to the Movement Speed granted by the Goblin Tinker’s Engineering Upgrade and call it even.

As for the Attack Speed boost, that’s there to give Gazlowe a little more punch in teamfights (or for helping to clear out some Non-Heroics) because while I understand that it’s possible to shore up the loss of the Basic Attack bonus on paper, it’s not always going to work out that way. This effectively gives Gazlowe half of Robo-Goblin’s current DPS bonus back for a limited duration while also bringing along the benefit of being less exploitable - because it’s an Attack Speed bonus instead of a Basic Attack bonus, it’s far less powerful when combined with something like Stim Drone or Bloodlust.

Finally, the duration boost is there to encourage offensive use. I have VERY rarely seen Robo-Goblin’s current active used as anything more than an escape and, while there’s nothing necessarily wrong with that, I do want to see it happen less.

R2 - Grav-O-Bomb 3000 Mana Cost: 80

Cooldown: 80 (-10) After a 2 second delay, pull enemies toward the center of an area and deal 251 damage.

Shoring up the rest of Gazlowe’s kit to be more usable makes Grav-O-Bomb more usable in turn. Outside of a minor Cooldown reduction to make up for Scrap no longer affecting Heroics, it needs no changes.

TALENTS

Unlike the core ability changes, alterations to existing talents will not be listed in bold (mostly because very few of the talents resemble their original forms).

Level 1 Talents: Tactics Tier

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle Regeneration Globes grant the benefits of Scrap.

It has always bothered me that Reduce, Reuse, Recycle is based on RNG. This changes it to be more consistent while also giving a minor buff to clearing Mercenary Camps and Objectives that grant Regeneration Globes.

Break It Down! Scrap causes abilities to cool down four times as fast for 3 seconds.

Unchanged.

Improvised Plating Repeatable Quest: Gathering a Regeneration Globe increases Health Regeneration by 2 per second. Passive: Gain Armor against Minions, Mercenaries, and Monsters equal to Health Regeneration, up to 75.

Hired Goons is awkward (because getting stuff to target the freakin’ turrets is a pain) and Goblin Repairs is kinda underwhelming, so I smashed them together for giggles. Improvised Plating is good for players who either want a little extra durability or to spend a lot of time beating up Mercenaires. Depending on if the M/M/M Armor from Regeneration rounds down or up, Gazlowe would be getting the following passively:

Level 1: 3 to 4 M/M/M Armor

Level 10: 5 to 6 M/M/M Armor

Level 20: 8 M/M/M Armor

Level 30: 12 M/M/M Armor

Level 4 Talents: Offense Tier

Extra TNT Increases Xplodium Charge damage by 10% per target hit, up to 100%.

Other than a tier adjustment, there’s no change to Extra TNT. There MIGHT be issues with how much easier Xplodium Charges are to land on Heroes now, but adjusting how much of a bonus you get per target and/or adjusting the maximum amount of bonus damage would be easy to tweak if it became a problem.

Clockwerk Steam Fists Basic Attacks increase the duration of active Rock-It! Turrets by 1.5 seconds.

Quest: Increase the duration of Rock-It! Turrets by 600 seconds total.

Reward: Reduce the charge cooldown of Rock-It! Turret by 3 seconds.

Unchanged except for a clearer tooltip.

Goblin Fuzion After reaching full charge, each additional 0.25 seconds spent charging Deth Lazor increases its damage bonus by an additional 25%, up to 100%.

Since Deth Lazor is much less likely to be used for consistent poke, it’s safe to put Goblin Fuzion at an earlier talent tier. The only real change is that the damage bonus is now delivered in parts, giving the player value for quarter, half, and three-quarter overcharges. It’s very important to note that this is for damage only - the overcharge will not increase the duration of the stun.

Level 7 Talents: Crowd Control Tier

Shell Shock Xplodium Charge lowers the Attack Speed of Heroes by 20% for 2 seconds.

Not much to say here other than “it’s a form of Crowd Control that the other two talents don’t feature”.

Engine Gunk Rock-It! Turret attacks slow their primary target by 20% for 2 seconds.

Engine Gunk is unchanged except for a clarification that it only slows its primary target rather than all damaged enemies. This is important, because Rock-It! Turret XL’s functionality of adding side-guns has been moved to another Talent and players will be able to acquire both.

EZ-PZ Dimensional Ripper Deth Lazor freezes non-Heroes and Structures for 4 seconds.

Moved to an earlier tier, the slow for Heroes has been axed (we don’t need it if there’s a stun!), and the duration increased to 4 seconds because it only affects Non-Heroic targets.

Level 13 Talents: Casting Tier

Kwik Release Charge Xplodium Charge gains an additional charge. Each Hero hit by Xplodium Charge reduces its cooldown by 2 seconds.

Shuffled up to an earlier tier and given a little extra spice ‘cause Xplodium Charge doesn’t stun anymore.

Compact Turret Frames Increases Rock-It! Turret maximum charges from 2 to 3 and increases placement range by 100%.

Turret Storage with a new coat of paint and an extra whistle. Toss them turrets, Gazlowe!

Hyperfocus Coils Deth Lazor charges twice as fast.

Moved to a later tier because Deth Lazor stuns now and therefore is very scary! The mana cost reduction was removed because I felt that the talent was strong enough as it was with just the charge speed boost.

Level 16 Talents: Offense Tier 2

X-Tra Large Bombs Increases the duration of Xplodium Charges by 100% and their radius by 30%.

Makes Xplodium Charges into better mines by virtue of making them last longer and cover a larger area. Additionally, synergizes with the cooldown reduction from Kwik Release Charge by making multiple Heroes easier to hit at one time.

Superior Schematics Rock-It! Turrets gain 25% increased range and attack 2 additional targets for 60% damage when Gazlowe is near them.

Superior Schematics had Rock-It! Turrets XL stapled to it because the original version was underwhelming and I didn’t want to get rid of the side-guns because they’re cool and good. Reminder that Engine Gunk doesn’t apply to the side-guns because it’s for primary targets only!

Siege Engineering Gazlowe can use Basic Abilities and Heroic Abilities while charging Deth Lazor.

Being able to charge Deth Lazor while also casting other abilities makes it WAY more powerful, especially if you’ve got Grav-O-Bomb on hand.

Level 20: Storm Tier

Mecha-Lord Basic Attacks deal an additional 100% damage. Passive: Gain 25 Armor.

Unchanged, despite the rework! Mecha-Lord goes pretty well with the new Robo-Goblin, so there’s not much reason to mess with it.

Miniature Black Hole Increases Grav-O-Bomb radius by 25% and damage by 50%.

Unchanged.

Scrap-O-Matic Smelter Activate to instantly grant Gazlowe 5 Scrap. 30 second cooldown. Passive: Scrap’s cooldown reduction lasts 50% longer and also reduces the cooldown of Heroic Abilities.

Scrap-O-Matic Smelter in name only, this is a better version of It’s Raining Scrap (you don’t have to wander around to pick up the scrap anymore!) coupled with restoring Scrap’s ability to reduce the cooldown of Heroics (so it’s a quantity over quality alternative to Mecha-Lord and Miniature Black Hole).

Firin’ Mah Lazorz Firing Deth Lazor causes all of Gazlowe’s Rock-It! Turrets to fire a miniature Deth Lazor of their own that deals 137 damage. Miniature Deth Lazors do not stun or benefit from any Deth Lazor talents.

Unchanged, just adding a clarification.





Well my friends, that’s all I’ve got for Gazlowe. I hope you liked it and, if you didn’t, I hope you’ll tell me why. I’ve got a couple more reviews/reworks in the pipeline so if you want to see more posts like these, stick around.

Thank you for reading.