Hello I'm Equinox and I'm an Assasin main in Heroes, I've played quite a few games of heroes (about 4000+ now) and I've played a lot of Jaina since her release and experimented with her builds in pubs, scrims, and tournament matches. I feel I'm pretty good with her so I decided to make a guide and share my thoughts and how to build/play her and the situational talent picks that you should think about. On Jaina most of her talents are situational, so you should always keep that in mind and think about what's good against the heroes you're up against.



Social Media for asking questions/checking out my stream.

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Early Game

Jaina's early game is great, she gets a lot of her damage at level 4 and 7 via and . Early game you want to focus on roaming unless you have a comp that can't roam jaina needs a roaming partner such as , , or .

The best lane you to go to if you aren't roaming is a side lane (top or bot) or on mines the lane that isn't your golem lane, normally people do a 4-1 split on mines (4 in golem lane 1 in bottom lane) however in pubs this isn't consistent. If you do go against a 4 man push use your range and blizzard to your advantage, be careful of their ranged kill potential so you don't get bursted over the wall. On every other map there is normally a tri lane, jaina is very powerful against tri lanes so make sure you're against them.

You have a lack of defensives/self peel early game so it's important that you watch your positioning the most during this time, position yourself behind your frontline but near your supports when people go on you play near your supports don't run away unless you can out kite the enemy and kill them. Basically just soak experience and rotate to where your team needs you early game, pay attention to the map, play safe in teamfights unless you know you can start being aggressive, and last but not least don't give up if you lose early game or even midgame there's always a chance to come back besides in certain situations where you teammates give up.


Mid Game

Midgame is where you can peel for yourself and your teammates and also where you get a lot of your power spikes which let you play more aggressive. At this point in the game you won't be laning other than to push out waves, stay grouped with your team and always go the safe route through your jungle (those being on your side of the map and usually the longest route through) check any bushes with .

In teamfights you want to look for a flank, jaina is an amazing flank hero allowing you to single out a carry and burst them. Jainas mid game strength is her ability to burst people and make the fight a 4v5 as soon as possible. Try to flank with you and your strongest engage hero examples being and ,


Talents that allow you be more aggressive in mid game:


Late Game

Late game is where you get your huge burst/survivability spike via and .

If you get wintermute: Once you get wintermute then you want to burst whoever comes forward or look to 100-0 a backliner with a good flank. Keep in mind that talents work with the water elemental such as . Focus on killing whoever comes forward or whoever you can get on in the backline if you attempt to flank.

If you get bolt: If you got bolt you're probably playing against a tyrael or a super hard engage comp, if against tyrael just save it for to blink judgement wait till he gets in mid air or watch his cast bar, once the cast bar is full hit bolt immediatly and it'll cancel the judgement stun, damage, and travel. If you aren't going against a tyrael be as aggressive as possible with flanks and hitting backliners as you can easily get out with bolt.

Outside of the talents at lvl 20 you're able to play more aggressive because of your big increase in burst/survivability so try to push your limits but don't do really risky things that'll lead you to dying. Dying late game can cost you the game.

I'll be going over the talents that are the most effective for each tree and what situation they're effective in.

Level 1

This talent I take against comps with more drawn out team fights (high sustain low damage comps) it allows you to do more damage on more targets because you can keep your passive up more often on multiple targets.

This talent is amazing you can stick on backliners and kite frontliners more effectively overall a solid choice.

Level 4

Really good in the current meta because of how often you'll be ganking/bursting a single hero.

really good when you're not going to be taking short fights or you're roaming often and you need to not back a lot.

Level 7

Really solid in the current meta, you're all about flanking/bursting heroes as jaina so you want to do as much damage as quick as possible.


Level 10

Very annoying to deal with for the enemy team and you can stick it on a backliner and completely zone them or render a tank useless because of the constant slow, it's quite tanky and takes awhile for 1 person to kill so sticking it on a target like nova/valla makes them have to worry about the water ele. Post 20 with you can 100-0 almost anyone with your full combo besides a couple tanks or anyone with spell shield up.

This talent is only good with setup heroes like and if you get the timing down with maw or the communication with zeratul it can be a rather deadly combo, takes some practice with placement though. It's very hard to hit with mobile heroes and offers little to no usefulness if you do miss.

Level 13

Great escape/chase that synergizes well with your kit which is control and burst I recommend this talent against most comps especially in pubs because it allows you to rely less on your team to protect you and gives you that extra kiting potential to get kills or to be able to chase down your opponents.

take when you're going to take bolt > sprint and you need to hit frontliners more.

Level 16

Amazing talent to maximize your burst potential, take this against teams that you need to burst 1 target very quickly to succeed in a fight even if it's a frontliner making a fight 4v5 instantly can always be a plus.

My personal favorite in this tree, gives you a big boost in control with a 1 second root that's rather easy to hit. Goes well with your kit making blizzard get its 2nd tick off guaranteed if you time it right and allows you to kill people that are out of position. Keep in mind this talent and Northern Exposure both are activated by wintermute ability copies.


Level 20

Take this when you take sprint, better than wintermute because it flat out increases your damage and it is instant effectiveness.

This is the talent you take when going against the heavy CC team or tyrael, you can completely cancel tyrael's and Illidan's with the proper timing of bolt.

To bolt tyrael ult you need to be paying attention to his caster bar and bolt right as the cast bar reaches about 80% or while he's mid air. It will cancel the damage, travel, and CC of the ult.

To bolt Illidan ult you need to wait 1 second after you see the debuff on you then bolt, give or take a second or so depending on the distance he is away from you. This takes a lot more practice to get right since it's such a weird timing that you have to use it on.

Solo Que tips

1. The most important tip, always group with your team even if you know it's a bad decision there's always a chance it will work out. It's better to be grouped and lose then to be split and never have a chance of winning.

2. Don't chase unless you aren't going to waste a lot of time and you're 100% going to get the kill, get the objectives/merc camps instead they'll help you out a lot more than a kill.

3. As Jaina be very aware of the map during laning phase and at any point in the game when you're alone, you're extremely vulnerable to ganks so watch the map as much as possible.

4. Keep practicing, Jaina takes a lot of practice to get used to when it comes to positioning and hitting your skill shots so don't get discouraged if you lose on her she's not an easy hero to pick up against decent players.

5. Learn when you can play aggressive and when to play safe, like I said above Jaina is a very vulnerable hero so learn your limitations against certain heroes and play to these limits. Again it takes a lot of practice to get the feel for her limits.

Competitive tips for scrims/tourny matches.

1. Don't pick Jaina against initiate/chase heavy teams unless you have a good healer to protect you (uther/rehgar with ancestral) try to pick her against soft initiation teams (arthas/muradin as their engager)

2. Don't be afraid to take non damage talents, make sure you read over the talent breakdowns so you understand what talent is good against what kind of teams and choose from there. It's not always about doing the most damage, it's about being the most effective in teamfights and in the game.

3. Be vocal when you need a peel and when your ultimate is down, it's very important that your team knows when they have to come back and it's also important that they fight when they have your ultimate which can sometimes turn a teamfight by itself.

4. Don't be afraid to burst a frontliner, as long as you're doing it with the team it can work out rather well. However don't burst a frontliner unless they're out of position or their team is lagging behind or you have heroes that can split their team (falstad w/ mighty gust, brightwing w/ emerald wind, and zeratul w/ vp)

5. Last tip for competitive, keep waves pushed if your team isn't doing anything just clear a wave really quick. Experience is worth so much in competitive, Jaina has one of the fastest wave clears in the game so use that to your advantage especially against heroes like or


Final Notes

Thank you for reading my guide, if you have any questions or if you don't agree with something I've put feel free to comment and I'll respond when I notice it. If you liked my guide feel free to tweet at me here https://twitter.com/EquinoxHotS

I'll keep this guide updated if I change my opinion on anything.