Heroes of the Storm Rexxar Guide

Heroes of the Storm Rexxar Guide by yieldtothemud

I’m a Diamond HOTS player and not a genius, but I plays me a great deal of Rexxar, and I thought I’d share some tips to improve community play.

Main tank?

Is Rexxar a main tank? Yes he is. Misha is as tanky as any other tank in the game in terms of sheer meat. Plus there’s the added focus problem. Is the enemy team focusing Rexxar or Misha? Making the team choose between the two is part of what makes Rexxar so dang fun to play. The most HUGE rule in my experience- Don’t Rex when the whole of your team is back-line squishies unless you have an expressed reason to do so. Having the entire team stand behind Misha simply clutters up the back line and makes everyone easier to hit. I always ask the team to bring me at least one more melee champion in the mix so we all have a place to stand.

When to pick?

Maps? Rexxar’s strongest maps are Braxis Holdout, Blackheart’s Bay, and Warhead Junction. These are boss maps. I wouldn’t consider Sky Temple and Spider Qeen Boss maps in the same way, because both of these maps have a boss in a high-traffic area where you’re likely to be scouted out and hand the boss over to the enemy team.

The two things Rexxar really brings to the table are boss and node control.

Team Comps?

Rex flourishes against easily kited champions like Sonya, Thrall, Artanis and Johanna. If you can line up big multiple person stuns, you’re all the better for it. People will tell you not to pick Rex into stealth champions, or dive comps, but I find this to be incorrect. The only real threat to Rexxar IMHO is Alarak. His ability to put Rexxar out of position and silence leaves only the smallest of margins for counterplay. Proceed with extreme caution against Alarak.

Rexxar synergizes very well with Jaina, Nazeebo, Artanis, Kerrigan, Illidan, and Sonya.

How to build?

Level 1: Thankfully all Level 1 Talents are good. Grizzled bear (block) vs Deliberate auto attackers like Valla, Raynor and Sergeant Hammer. If they have a stealth or dive comp, or you’re planning on sneaking bosses, take flare. The warning, vision and zone this provides is invaluable. Use it whenever you feel like it because it’s on a short cooldown and costs nothing. (PRO TIP: Shift click flare and move it to button 3 always, that way you never accidentally flare instead of feign death.)

Level 4: Hungry Bear is awesome for holding points and tanking. Crippling talons is situationally awesome vs kiteable champions, or if you’re in a dive comp. Never ever take Easy Prey unless you’re going to be sneaking bosses.

Level 7: Bird of Prey and Aspect of the Beast are nice here. If your team is short on waveclear, go Bird, if not, go aspect. Regardless of your build path up to this point, if you take aspect or prey, you can now clear bruiser camps very quickly.

Level 10: The community disagrees with me heavily on this, but I’M TELLING YOU. Unleash the Boars is Broken. It covers 60% of the visible area in a cone, on a short cooldown. It rivals Falstad’s Gust in terms of team fight control and zone. I almost always take unleash the boars, no matter what I’m doing. I take Beastial Wrath only when I don’t feel boars adds anything to the fight.

How to play?

THE LEVEL 20 ULTRA TANK COMBO: This is how you team fight with Rex as main tank.

1. Observe the enemy team… is it go time? Is my team here? Yes? Hit R to boars the enemy team.
2. IDGAF Yolo into the enemy team and tackle the back line with Misha, ignoring the fatty tank wannabe on the other team. Wait about .5 seconds for the enemy team to focus Rexxar with abilities. (This is a good time to heal Misha pre-emptively)
3. Feign Death, and either deal damage if Misha can pressure someone or have her bear slap people to charge up another stun with aspect.
4. Stun whatever is waiting on you to stand up and then come out of Feign Death stasis. Drop your Q on whatever needs to die and pop your Hardened Skin to negate incoming damage.

Lane: When laning vs a specialist. Just auto attack the wave. Most specialists like Zag and Nazebo like to paint the wave with damage. Position Misha to block that paint damage but don’t let Misha tank the wave or you’ll run oom healing her. Ideally, you let the wave push to your side, then use your abilities to damage the speclaist and follow up with auto-attacks. Most will back off, that’s fine. Just thin the wave out and let it sit by your turret. You win if you zone the specialist off the wave.

Vs healthy assassins, feel free to duke it out unless they have a healing mechanic, in that case, focus on keeping the wave back and maximizing minions hit with your Q, use Misha to pick up globes, it’s easiest to click 1 on the other side of the globe so that Misha walks through the globe rather than trying to click globe itself.

Vs squishy assassins, the killer combo is to auto attack, q and then disengage from them and let misha chew on them. If they have a dodge mechanic like Tychus and Li Ming, it’s best to wait to try and stun them with Misha, also glance at your minimap- Misha’s tackle is your only hard escape.

Finally- Controlling the bear. Here’s a simple test to see if you’re ready to play Rexxar: Solo the Blackheart’s Bay Boss at level 7. If you can do this without Misha or Rexxar being rooted or stunned, you’re now a beginner Rexxar player.

Tips: Use D to call Misha to you to avoid being stunned by the boss, and stay mobile with Rexxar to avoid roots. Once you’ve mastered this, you’ll have a much better feel for how to dodge damage and control Misha.

Use 1 to position Misha often. Lots of Malfurion players like to root Misha so the team can focus her. Use W or 1 to get her out of the way. Same goes for KT players. They really want you to bring Misha into the team with living bomb. Do not let that happen. Control that beast… Then you’re the beast, my friend.

Happy Hunting.