North America loves assassins, EU sticks with support

In looking at the top picks and bans on our stats page in the Enter the Storm series for both Europe and North America there are some pretty significant differences - North America absolutely loves Jaina and Falstad while European teams tend to pick a stronger group of support.

North America

Stats from NA Enter the Storm Cup #2

1.) The first major thing that stands out in North America is the two most picked heroes, both picked 100% of the time, are Jaina and Falstad. Jaina is an all around solid damage dealer and is almost never a bad pick. It could very easily be argued that there are better assassins than Jaina, but North America tends to disagree. Falstad offers a huge amount of mobility and can also put up some serious damage, so it makes sense that in North America he would be a top pick.

2.) An honorable mention definitely goes to Muradin and Kael'Thas, both really strong heroes that play within the current meta. Muradin can take an absurd amount of damage plus he can stun targets, making him a top pick as far as tanks go. Kael'Thas, while picked less than Jaina, has an insane amount of burst with stuns, making him an extremely viable character.

3.) North America hates to play against Tyrande. She's definitely OP, as confirmed by Heroes Game Director Dustin Browder:

Tyrande can be built many different ways and offers a lot of versatility to a team, so it makes sense that North American teams don't want to play against her.

4.) The biggest takeaway from these graphs is that the priority in North America is to have strong assassins like Jaina and Falstad and to ban Tyrande. The interesting thing about North America, however, is that Tyrande isn't even in the top 10 most picked heroes - a substantial difference between North America and Europe.

Europe

Stats from EU Enter the Storm Cup #4

1.) European teams tend to prefer a stronger support base than assassins, seeing as Tassadar and Tyrande are both top picks for EU teams. As discussed earlier, Tyrande is an extremely strong support hero and the European preference reflects this. An interesting thing to note is that European teams consistently pick Tassadar, while he isn't even in the North America top 10.

2.) In the European region the honorable mention definitely goes to Zagara and Muradin (again). Both regions tend to love Muradin as a tank, but EU prefers Zagara in their team composition. This is no surprise because of the insane laning ability that Zagara offers, but it's interesting to see that Europe tends to take advantage of this more.

3.) Interestingly enough, the top two North American picks are the top two bans in the European region. European teams don't like to play against Jaina and Falstad seeing as they were banned the most. Jaina's slow and high damage capability can be very tough to deal with and Falstad's mobility can easily shift the tide of a team fight. Europeans must recognize this and try to stay away from it.

4.) The priority for European teams seems to be in their support, rather than in their assassins. Obviously, Tyrande is OP and probably should be a top pick, but for whatever reason EU has this figured out and NA doesn't.

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QUICKPOLL Which region has stronger hero picks? EU, you can't go wrong with solid support.

Thank you for voting! NA, it's all about the damage baby.

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