WARNING: Sin's Grasp and Black Pool descriptions are wrong.
Sin's Grasp reduces cooldown when fully used and Black Pool lowers Armour and does damage.

Azmodan is now a Ranged Assassin who now does less damage instead of just a Specialist who does Ranged Assassin damage. He launches very long ranged but slow landing Globes that deal large area damage. He can summon demons to scout, slow enemies, block shots, help with camps, siege towers and clear waves. He can use a short channel beam that, if completed, can deal extra damage, and with a talent, area damage. And finally, can choose between enhancing his Globe damage very repeatedly with a short cooldown, or launching a short and fragile, but deadly, Demonic Invasion from afar with a longer cooldown.

Azmodan is a character that can play safe or aggressive based on the initial level 1 Globe talent choice. Based on these three choices he can determine his role throughout most of the game. If you want to clear waves and deal burst structure damage, then Greed is the way to go. If you want to stay as safe as possible and provide fire support to your team, then Gluttony is the way to go. If you want to clear waves, fight at closer range with auto attacks and split push, then Wrath is the way to go.

Azmodan adjusts his talent strategy based on the map, the comps, and your playstyle. He is a very versatile character who can play well on ANY map. This makes him a very strong Quickmatch character and early Draft pick. Azmodan does well in most compositions, but does best with crowd control tanks who both draw in enemies and can pin them down. This allows Azmodan to better land Globes, use ASB, and deal damage over time with demons.


Updated November 2019

Greed - Towers Shall Burn

Overall: This Greed build means right away you are grabbing non-hero damage. This means minions, mercs, monsters, and structures. You are also working toward Demon buffs. So because of this, the heroic Demonic Invasion and the number of demon warriors summoned is a priority to take advantage of these things. All of your talents will work toward this goal. You want to be able to approach a camp or structure and quickly use all of your abilities to deal an enormous amount of damage in a short period of time as you then back away to a safer position. You can also ignore safety all together and dive onto structures to guarantee progress in a lane.

Gluttony - Team Annihilation

Overall: This Gluttony build can split push by using Tide of Sin with a Globe to wave wipe in one shot to quickly move to the next wave with your low Globe cooldown. Using your default Globe you can clear the back three minions for stacks with the help of auto attacks beforehand. At level 16 you get a 4% enemy health removal for each target hit by your Globes. The speed reduction for your Globes are per enemy hit, not hero, but enemy. That means wave wiping doesn't put you at cooldown as much as other Globes, while Art of Chaos returns mana when you strike two heroes so you can keep doing it longer. And your overall combination of talents give you much more stacks from your Globes alone, without getting into closer range. Try to include minions and mercs in your targeting area when throwing globes for the cooldown reduction when possible.

Wrath - Splitting Tide

Overall: This Wrath build can be the most competitive, but also the most self destructive. Against a good team, Gluttony can be difficult to get early game stacks. This can put you behind. Wrath can get early stacks quickly, but does so by putting your large body at risk. This is the reason Azmodan has a large health pool. To offset the ease of opponents to land skill shots. You will want to poke from your maximum auto attack range and move in and out of range as you do so. Use your Globes to reduce their initial health and then start stacking. Once you get Bombardment, you can do so from a longer range, off multiple heroes and your bonus damage can also get a better effect. The reduced cooldown from Sin's Grasp gives you that extra fire power up close when needed, and Trample can be used as a finisher, a way of body blocking, and escape. Think of it more as a jump than a dash. Your Lieutenant will cooldown quicker and be more effective so you can split push throughout the game and reinforce teammates laning. Use your Demon Warriors as scouts and skill shot shields.


Updated November 2019

Each Globe has a use starting with the map. Greed does well on three lane maps with plenty of minion waves, mercenaries, and travel time. Gluttony does well on two lane maps that concentrate heroes, and any three lane map that concentrates teams. Wrath is best used for solo laning since the scenario limits stacking with Greed and Gluttony while increasing chances for Wrath hits. This diversity allows Azmodan to better adjust for Quickmatch or early picks in drafts and becomes harder to counter as you don't know the role. When not in Quickmatch, Wrath is almost always going to be a poor choice compared to others due to there always being better heroes to use for close quarters. Ones that don't body block teammates in a group fight setting.

Siege and Hero damage are what he does best. It's not uncommon for him to be top on those and top experience earner as well. He can reach out and kill minion waves and heroes alike without being seen or even reachable. This combines with his letting teammates take the brunt of the damage to give him longer up times where he is doing damage more frequently to more heroes and minions than most other characters save perhaps Abathur and Murky, and getting the xp to show for it.

Scouting is one of his talents as well, since he can summon demons to march in a direction and launch globes that reveal not only their landing area, but partially reveal the path of the globe. Often times you can launch a globe at maximum range and see an enemy between you and the globe landing zone. At the start of a match for example, you can use your globe and minion to give your team some much needed information on who is where and let your team take up better position. If the globe shows no one then the enemy is most likely on the sides of the lane waiting to ambush. You can also see beyond walls and bushes revealing ganks or hearthing enemies.

Body Blocking is a constant thing with Azmodan. He can block teammates accidentally, be blocked by enemies more easily, but also save teammates and trap enemies himself. It is a double edged sword that is an advantage with Gluttony, and a liability when using Wrath. When you use Wrath, All Shall Burn, or Bombardment, keep in mind the collision between heroes. And when body blocking for a teammate, make sure they know to run straight so that you can run around their smaller body and not cause a situation where you both accidentally block each other as they try and run around your wider one, which naturally takes longer.

Globe of Annihilation (Q) - These things add stacks every time it hits a hero or kills a minion after 1.5 seconds. The stacks add to the base damage of your globes permanently throughout the game. Globes are used to deal damage to targets from afar, over obstacles and across fog of war. There is a delay that increases based on range, so practice is required. Make sure your teammates know to keep the enemy clustered and not scattered for better targeting. Globes can be used for scouting, as I've described up top as well. Once you choose your Globe talent at level one, your play style is defined by it, as are the rest of your talent choices. So know which map and hero combination requires which Globe talent.

Demon Warriors (W) - The primary purpose of these guys are to scout against getting flanked and to let you target enemies with your globes. The second is to slow down the enemy advance on you or your allies. The next use is to push waves. The final use is to do siege damage in a smaller amount of time. Hellforged Armor and Brutish Vanguard, are useful ways to get these scouts and fighters to last longer so you can target more still opponents. Battleborn can get you more of them so you can check multiple angles more quickly at the cost of more mana. Chain of Command and Hell Rift can help them clear waves and camps more quickly. Siegebreaker enhances structure damage if you grabbed Demonic Invasion from all your demons. And Black Pool enhances your Demon damage against all targets, but to a lower degree and shorter time frame.

Note: Warriors can be summoned the same time as a skill shot is fired at you. They will finish their summon animation wounded and you will have seemed to have 'dodged' the shot. Just be sure to summon in the direction of the threat. A very useful follow up to activating All Shall Burn or running away in general.

All Shall Burn (E) - A hero finishing and zoning tool. Useful for taking out mercenaries, bosses, and structures. The talent Hell Rift can greatly add to it's ability to deter or siege when it creates a free demon warrior upon a full channel. Using it as you back away or toward an enemy is key to surviving it and turning it into a real weapon. It has a delay before activating and will have a full cooldown when interrupted or canceled by lack of range. This makes it more useful when you target an aggressor or someone who is stunned, rooted, or slowed. Using yourself as bait is the most common method of getting a full channel. When an enemy comes at you, try backing away until they leave the immediate support of teammates before rushing them with All Shall Burn, causing them to move into it further and creating the room/time you need to overcome the slow effect it has on you. Trample adds to this capability as you can use it to close into the enemy 'chasing you'. The other instances typically require targeting structures or mercenaries. A minion will always be killed on a single channel and many times not live long enough for it to reach the end. That is why it's a poor method of gaining Annihilation with the Master of Destruction talent. That talent does, however, let you deal damage to minion waves as you target structures and take camps more quickly. But if all you want to do is target heroes, then Sin's Grasp for range and cooldown and Cydaea's Kiss to make up for taking more damage during channel, are the talents for you. It's a magnificent hero killing when used properly. And does much of Azmodan's structure and mercenary damage even with demons around to help.

Demon Lieutenant (D) - The primary use of this ability is to push waves across the map. The second use is to extend your scouting by summoning on dying warriors. The third is to support a teammate or warrior push a wave. And when not being used to help stall an enemy as you flee, is best used to add siege power to structures with minions or a group of three warriors, easily done with either Army of Hell or Battleborn mixed with Chain of Command and Hell Rift. This ability costs no mana. And further enhances your ability to take camps.

Important Note: You can simply click on the wave of blue dots in a lane in a split second and don't need to adjust your actual map vision. As long as the mouse cursor changes, then you'll know you've been successful and your Lt is pushing that wave.

Demonic Invasion (R) The Heroic talent's demons die easily and last only for a short time. It also has a long cooldown. The Storm talent Siegebreaker's benefit for structure damage is normally too specialized compared to the other talents and can only be taken with the Heroic to begin with, specializing it even further. That said, it does one thing better than Tide of Sin, which is burst damage. If you need a camp or want to damage a boss, or damage a structure in a short amount of time from a position of safety, this can do that. However, you sacrifice too much in the later levels when you need to constantly use Globes at a large stack to do the damage needed to win. A 20 second cooldown simply cannot be beat. So using it with Gluttony is out. Using it with Greed means your early minion wave wipes for massive stack increases won't happen until later, which means you will rely on Globe+Bombard combo on waves to get stacks. Follow that up with Demonic Invasion on structures once waves are cleared. Wrath desires this heroic the most. It adds bodies to block shots, hero damage, and non-hero damage in those moments where Wrath is trying to capitalize on it's Annihilation enhanced Auto-Attacks. Also does very well as a Boss capping tool. Can be further enhanced by Chain of Command and Siegebreaker, and can combine with Army of Hell, Hell Rift and Lieutenant to create a lot of clutter and burst damage even without those two damage upgrades when taking a fort.

Tide of Sin (R) - The favoured Heroic by Gluttony users. It boosts the damage of your next Globe by 50%. This lets you deal some much needed damage in the early levels to minion waves and better combines with Bombardment to allow Greed to waveclear for extra stacks. For Greed, it is unecessary in later levels for minions to wipe, and able to be saved for Heroes and Mercenaries. For Gluttony, the build needs it to finish waves for stacks and split pushing, and add damage to heroes until Total Annihilation. On the plus side, it can launch more Globes to try and make up for that. Combines very well with Total Annihilation and Pride to add even more damage. If you can get the vision and the clustering of enemies, then these things can give your team a major advantage. For Wrath, it lowers enemy health in one shot to then get stacks from basic attacks and helps weaken waves to finish with Bombardment for minion stacks if hero targets not available.

Updated August 24th 2018

Greed - This talent is used in the later game to multi-lane, and defend against or quickly cap Mercenaries. At level 7, you can quickly wipte and stack off of minion waves by combining the 3 second minion kill timer on this talent with the Bombardment's 6 basic attacks for 2 seconds. Tide of Sin further lets your Globes one-shot most minion waves every 20 seconds. Once you get to 200 stacks, your ability to near-wipe waves increases and 2 Globes will finish a wave. Using Tide of Sin will by then one-shot a wave. Pride will let you save your Tide of Sin for Mercenaries. Monsters and Heroes are not affected by Greed's damage buff. There is also a 33% increase in range, which further adds to your split capability. Unlike the other two talents, your Globe overcomes your need for Lieutenant to help you split push. This means you can better choose talents for your warriors to help you push in towers as your own waves march into them unchallenged. This gives your warriors cover from cannons and let you focus on increasing their damage output. Army of Hell and Brutish Vanguard combines to double slow enemies diving you so you can get away. It also combines with your All Shall Burn to keep them within range longer. This allows your Hell Rift to finish more often to summon another warrior to add another 20% slow and possibly up to 60% in total.

Gluttony - This talent accelerates your stack building the easiest and safest. Once complete at 200 stacks, it allows you to fire more Globes of Annihilation more quickly, increasing your chances of maxing out your stacks to 400 earlier. This talent requires Art of Chaos to return half mana on Globes, and with 2 hero hits add additional Annihilation of 4 for a total of 10 if you land a double hit. It works well with Total Annihilation and Pride to magnify it's hero Globe damage. Also works on any piloted objectives like Dragon and Mech.

Wrath - Since this talent doesn't have the extra time to kill minions or the bonus vs heroes, it requires you to get closer to heroes to compete with stacks. You need to hit a hero who is below 75% in HP to get a single stack point per basic attack. Once complete at 200 stacks, a successful hero strike by a Globe will allow you 3 seconds of Annihilation damage bonus to your next Basic Attack on that target. This is one shot on a short fuse, so you will need to be in place before firing your Globe versus most heroes. Because the damage bonus is tied directly to a full cooldown Globe, the usefulness of Wrath is greatly reduced and often will go unused as you need to keep using your Globes for other ranged situations, where as a Greed can always target more minions, or a Gluttony can get another Globe firing much faster for half the cost on any nearby hero. This talent is best used when solo laning, since your minions and heroes to target are reduced, as is your number of opponents to retaliate. This means it also works well with siege and all shall burn talents.

Updated July 29th 2018

Army of Hell - This creates double the fun at the cost of 10 additional cooldown seconds, but no extra mana. This pairs well with either Chain of Command (which add 25% damage to each warrior) or Brutish Vanguard (which adds 25% health AND 20% slow to each warrior). This talent turns your single scout into a burst combat tool. Either to help shield you as you flee and dodge shots, or to smother a target in slows. It is best used versus mercenaries or structures, preferably with minions when against structures. It also combos well with Hell Rift, Demonic Invasion and Siegebreaker. Hell Rift immediately gives warriors double damage for 6 seconds, which if added with a Lieutenant will mean Army of Hell can do 375% more damage than a single regular warrior.

Hellforged Armor - This increases the uptime of your summoned warrior so that it may make it further to explore more and find a target or discover an ambush. It also allow you to hold your sight at a location further so you have time to launch your globe or see if anyone is going to respond to your threat. It also does better in taking shots from towers long enough to use an All Shall Burn, preferably with Hell Rift. Can be further enhanced to survive and delay the enemy using Brutish Vanguard.

Battleborn - This talent is used to let you summon more Warriors to scout and hold waves, while also giving you more Lieutenants to buff your warriors, grunts, minions, and mercenaries. This lets you cover multiple angles more easily and have your Lieutenant buff mercenaries and minions more frequently, even across map. Best with the Wrath build for the frequent basic attacks and need to remotely push other lanes.

Updated July 29th 2018

Art of Chaos - Enhances your Globes by returning HALF the mana cost and 4 Annihilation if you land 2 Hero hits with a single Globe. On a Gluttony build this gives you 10 stacks on a 2 Hero hit for 30 mana. The cooldown reduction for Gluttony pairs well with this talent.

Bombardment - After using a Globe your range increases and you launch 3 basic attacks twice instead of your regular attacks. As they hit heroes you get stacks. This does well with Greed since the minion kill timer for stacks is 3 seconds after a Globe instead of 1.5, which means you can use to finish with Bombardment's second attack in most cases, followed possibly by a third single regular attack for one more stack. Wrath takes advantage of the extra range to get more stacks on heroes and after 200 stacks, deal bonus Annihilation damage. Not using Bombardment for Greed or Wrath is going to cripple your stack stat for Greed and cause safety issues for Wrath.

Master of Destruction - You can only use this on full health minions in the first few levels, otherwise they die before it finishes. It can be used on heroes, structures, and mercenaries regularly. However do not expect to get Annihilation from it. Heroes will not run into their teammates with this but run away from them as a result of running from you. This is a zoning tool vs heroes only. Against Mercenaries and Structures it can add some damage and is beneficial to have. But not at the cost of other talents in this level bracket since you need them for the stacks.

Updated July 29th 2018

Tide of Sin - Every 20 Seconds, get a 50% damage buff to your Globe of Annihilation. This talent lets you wave clear, finish kills or just shock and awe the enemy when it hits as they try and push. It, is, brutal. When you combine it with your other talents, it leads to late game terror for the other team due to Azmodan's range. Pairs well with Greed's existing minion and mercenary damage bonuses, Gluttony's cooldown reduction and Wrath's use of Globe trigger for more Burst. This is often used to one-shot minion waves early on without stepping near the lane and can add that extra little bit of damage to a globe to finish fleeing opponents. For Wrath, it would be used to take off that initial amount of health to better stack off basic attacks, similarly to grabbing Total Annihilation.

Demonic Invasion - Every 90 seconds, and NOT reduced by Battleborn, you can launch some short lived demons. Can combine with Globe and Lieutenant to do some burst damage to heroes or structures. But is unreliable in it's cooldown. Best used with Wrath which can better use the situational heroic to better solo lane and deal better burst damage.

Updated July 29th 2018

Brutish Vanguard - Allows your warriors to live longer for more scouting and damage, but most importantly, slows around them for 20%. This pairs well with the level 4 talents, Hellforged Armor for a more durable scout and Army of Hell for doubling the overall slow to 40%, and Hell Rift for a 60% slow overall.

Cydaea's Kiss - In most cases, your Mana is what you want restored, not your Health. Landing All Shall Burn regularly between your Globes can be a big benefit to your team, so long as you don't let the enemy draw you into damage by keeping pace. Often times you want to flank from top or bottom to get a full burst, or use it when team is pushing or backing away. If you can land these regularly then an 8% health might just be worth it. However, your other talents in this tier magnify your demons quite a bit. Only those who do not require the demon talents should bother with this talent. Gluttony is the only build currently capable of the fast Globes to split push without the Lieutenant, and the ranged stacking to not need the warrior's slow buff.

Chain of Command - Used to enhance damage of demons, minions and mercenaries by 25%. Most cases it will be used to instantly enhance a wave from across the map to help a teammate or to keep waves pushing. In other cases it will be used to extend the lifespan of your scout by replacing your dying warrior. In others, it will enhance mercenaries to help them push. Combined with your globes, you can have your mercenaries push very hard, very fast without you having to risk yourself too far in the opponent's territory. It costs no mana and can be used in an emergency to take cannon hits, but also is beneficial to Demonic Invasion and block skill shots.

Updated July 29th 2018

Total Annihilation - A 5% health strike to target heroes. Enhances your Globe play solo and in team fights. Effective versus armour and large health pools. Pairs well with Gluttony, which can use more Globes more often.

Hell Rift - Creates a demon warrior and doubles the damage of all demon warriors nearby for 6 seconds. Pairs well with Army of Hell, Hellforged Armor, and Battleborn at level 4, or Brutish Vanguard and Chain of Command at level 13. It is a very useful siege and merc capture tool that can add to the clutter of combat when used on heroes. It also combines with Brutish Vanguard to slow your All Shall Burn target by 20% for a short moment.

Sin's Grasp - Extends the range of your All Shall Burn to keep you safer and make it stick longer. It also reduces the cooldown so you can use it more often. Overall not a bad gain, and if you can't make use of the others or use All Shall Burn constantly, then it's a welcome addition. But the lack of Globe damage or warriors that are created to take siege shots or delay enemies is painful.

Updated July 29th 2018

Siegebreaker - An added benefit to existing Demonic Invasion strategies. This trades in more Globe damage, armour debuff zoning, and escape for additional siege damage. It is a specialization and therefore suffers when not being used for it's specialty. When combined with Chain of Command and Hell Rift, your Demonic Warriors get 175% bonus to their siege damage. Best used in burst siege strategies followed by a quick exit.

Black Pool - This pairs well with teammates of all kinds, gives you some zoning ability, increases damage to those trapped inside. It lowers armour by 8% over time for 5 seconds up to 15% and does damage per second ticks to finish off weakened enemies. Typically players don't stand in it for anything of great impact. Unless they need to defend an area and can't leave it. Like forts and objectives. So if you take, expect it to be used to zone your enemies defensively, or to initiate a dive attack by your teammates if they have crowd control. If damage IS truely the goal, then Mercs, Monsters and Bosses are the targets. As they will stand in for all 5 seconds once they meet a structure.

Pride - If you can reach 400 stacks this will let you deal more damage to heroes and minions alike in a larger radius, making it easier to land globes at 125 bonus damage. Combines well with Greed and Gluttony builds. Pairs well with Greed's desire to one-shot waveclear with Globes without using Tide of Sin every time. Pairs well with Gluttony's maxing of group hero damage along side of Total Annihilation's 5% guarantee. Pairs well with Wrath's need to hit a target using larger radius to then follow up with an auto attack.

Trample - It is a closing and escaping tool that does what it does well enough, but at a very long cooldown. If you don't have the stacks for Pride, this is a useful choice. Used for securing kills on it's own, letting you get into All Shall Burn distance, or evade retaliation and body blocks. It can also be used to bypass your teammates to then body block for them. Usually this is a tricky process since you're so much bigger than them that you coming back to block for them can in turn accidentally block them. So having that lunge from Trample can help. The damage is pretty poor though and using it for that purpose can get you killed quickly. If you're facing a lot of 'pull' opponents then it is of great value to evade those abilities.

Updated July 29th 2018

The Lost Vikings (three targets)
Samuro (three targets, focus on back Samuro, keep two closer ones at edge of circle, track runner, refire)
Rexxar and Misha (two targets, focus on Rexxar who Misha follows)
Chromie (fire when sand blast animation begins, has small body, longer distance to flee)
Brightwing (two bodies to five bodies within radius)
Lucio (when he's healing, as you can hear the music, his team will rally to him for heals)
Medhiv (target portals, enemies will use them to push fights near death then escape, finish them at exit)
Stukov (fire once Lurking Arm is used)
Stitches (larger body makes it difficult to exit entirely from landing zone)
Zul'jin (fire once he starts throwing)
Sgt. Hammer (a rooted target with a large body that teammates like to defend or hide behind)
Alexstrasza (creates a green targeting area with a timed delay for you to hit her and her teammates)
Murky (track him after using his bubble shield, launch your Globe for when he exits, can one-shot kill)
Guld'dan (if his health is going down he'll lifedrain, interrupt with Globe and Lt on his drain target)
Sonya and Dehaka (launch a Globe when they use their spin abilities and commit near teammates or minions)
Tyreal (teammates need to be nearby to get Shielded from him)
Nazeebo (if he uses the Spirit heroic, he roots himself as used, Globe and Lt him when he does)

Azmodan (when he Globe or ASB, you Globe him, not available in HL or TL)

Stealthed Characters (reveal them with a Globe, locate them with warriors and nuke their concealment)

Animation/Channel based abilities. Know when someone is about to use an ability.
It could give you the time to land a Globe.

Know when a teammate is extended, as they make good bait triggers. Globe before enemy reaches them so they get hit as they attack. It can make them reconsider and let your teammate know he's not alone and has somewhere to flee too. Typically, an All Shall Burn and Body Block waiting to support their escape.

Hero Piloted Monsters: Dragon, Plant, Mech
Mech counts as one Hero only. But, can be targeted as a Hero when empty.

Updated July 22nd 2018

Characters that can negate your damage through shielding, healing or speed boosting.

Characters that can locate you and strike you from afar.

Characters that can close the distance on you.

Characters that can silence you.

Characters that can stun you.

Characters that block you.

Yourself.

Updated July 29th 2018