Welcome to My Guide For Rehgar!

My name is Demonrag and I have been playing HOTS since the early beta. I have played more than 3,000 games and I have well over 500 games on the mean green machine himself. I was there for his release, I was there during his rework (when he was undoubtedly the most powerful hero in the game), and I've been there for every single one of his nerfs. Despite all of Blizzard's efforts to tone him down, I am more than confident that Rehgar is still one of the best heroes in the game and I'm going to show you why that is and how to play him in this guide!

PROS Excellent Dueling Potential High Mobility High CC/Zoning Potent Single Target and AOE Healing Admirable Burst and Sustained Healing Surprisingly High Single Target Damage Moderate AOE damage Powerful Ults Decent Scaling Access to Cleanse High Escapability Respectable Health Pool Good Wave Clear

Rehgar is one of the most undervalued heroes in the entire game. His toolkit is powerful and flexible, allowing him to adapt to almost any situation, map or team comp. Regardless of his build, Rehgar has a lot of lockdown and damage which, combined with his superior mobility, allows him to roam and gank very effectively.
Additionally, he wins most all-ins against enemy characters AS A SUPPORT. Due to his powerful sustain, healing, and wave clear, he can also effectively hold his own in lanes.

During teamfights, Rehgar provides tons of healing to counteract both single target damage and AOE damage. Additionally, his totem helps lock down targets, his cleanse helps prevent your squishy assassins from being CC'd to death, his lightning shield gives your divers a respectable boost in damage and his single target damage helps you execute assassins who are caught out of position. When played properly, Rehgar is just as safe in team fights as any other ranged healer, if not moreso due to his high health bar.

Lastly, Rehgar provides loads of map control. His ability to solo mercenary camps is still very impressive, especially for a support, and his wave clear is reasonably fast. If your draft is suffering from low PVE clear (as most competitive drafts are these days), Rehgar can help remedy that issue almost entirely on his own. You could compare his early game potential to that of a "jungler" from other MOBA's in that he can take camps and gank/push out nearby lanes quickly and efficiently.

Cons Pitiful Ranged Damage No Hard CC Cooldown Reliant Weak to Sustained Single Target Damage Can be CC'd to death Mana Hungry Doesn't Excel At One Thing in Particular

As one of the most flexible heroes in the game, one of Rehgar's weaknesses is that he does not do ONE particular thing better than most other heroes. For example, Rehgar has excellent wave clear but it does not compare to someone like Azmodan or Zagara. Rehgar can outduel most other heroes in the game due to a combination of his ability to sustain himself, CC targets and deal damage, but his overall damage is lower than an assassin's, his overall CC is lower than a tank's, and his overall self-healing is slightly unimpressive due to the fact that chain heal is designed to be hitting three people at a time.

Rehgar is not very powerful when it comes to poke damage. When at range, his potency really comes from casting his chain heal and lightning shield on allies along with dropping his totem to zone/slow enemies. A nifty little trick is that you can cast your lighting shield on your totem to create a small ward that radiates damage, but the totem dies quickly when exposed and the damage is very low on its own. Additionally, getting close enough to cast the totem and lightning shield for poke can put Rehgar in danger.

Besides these, Rehgar has a couple of other small weaknesses. As a melee hero, Rehgar is incentivized to join in the fight when he can do so. However, this puts him out of position and makes it so that CC can really put him in danger. His escapability in wolf form is high, especially when paired with his totem, but it's important still to be careful. Additionally, Rehgar is somewhat cooldown dependent because his abilities have long natural cooldowns. This makes his team somewhat vulnerable to sustained damage (although he has talents that can help alleviate this). Finally, Rehgar's mana costs are high so managing your mana, particularly in the early game, is extremely important.

TL;DR Rehgar is a jack-of-all-trades Rehgar does not excel at one particular thing. Rehgar outduels people. Rehgar has no hard CC. Rehgar is very mobile. Rehgar has mana problems. Rehgar deals good damage. Rehgar has no poke.

Build #1: Competitive Support

This is Rehgar's most effective build. It is mostly focused upon improving Rehgar's ability to support his teammates more than it increases his own personal potency. It is also the most versatile, allowing Rehgar to counter most types of damage, and has the most CC. It's major weaknesses are that it's low in damage, requires mana management and is cool down dependent.

At level 1, increasing the totem's range and area allows Rehgar to cast his totem from a safer distance and to control a large area of the battlefield for a long period of time. This has great synergy with your level 16 talent because it allows it to hit more enemies upon its initial cast. Throughout the game your totem can serve to lock down enemy heroes or to zone them out of areas; this not only serves to reduce the enemy team's mobility but also protects your backline and your healing totem from being damaged/destroyed.

The healing totem talent at level 4 is extremely important for your success because it does SO much healing so try your best to protect it! Compare it to Storm Shield (the level 20 talent): the healing totem at full value does just as much work as Storm Shield (20% max health) but has a lower cool down and is available from practically the beginning of the game. Placing it in bushes, behind walls, or areas obscured by the fog of war are great ways to keep it safe.

At level 7, Cleanse should be your go-to talent for any competitive setting. It's extremely rare that you run into a scenario where the enemy team does not draft enough cc for you to get value out of the talent. If you aren't well-practiced in cleansing people or if the enemy team REALLY doesn't have any valuable crowd control, totemic projection is also a decent choice and synergizes well with your level 1 talent.

At level 10 you should take Ancestral Healing unless your team is specifically built around Bloodlust. I'll discuss the two ultimates in greater detail later.

At level 13 Earth Shield is your most reliable choice. You get more value out of the shield when you cast it on tanker targets but sometimes that extra shielding makes the difference between life and death for your backline squishes or your diving melee assassins. Keep in mind that as this point your mana consumption will increase pretty substantially as you cast earth shield more frequently.

We've already discussed level 16, but I'll mention it here. A full 90% slow in an area upon multiple heroes can peel extremely effectively, prevent enemies from escaping, or stifle an enemy team's ability to dodge powerful skill shots.

At level 20 your best options are Storm Shield and Rewind. Storm Shield is much healthier for your mana bar but Rewind gives you more overall value (since it refreshes all of your long cooldowns). Additionally, each of your abilities have received individual talent upgrades throughout the game (except for chain heal, which is naturally very strong without talents), so you get more value out of your other talents if you pick Rewind. However, if your team fights are too long/drawn-out, Storm Shield will preserve your mana bar and allow you to endure the enemy onslaught longer than Rewind will. Overall Rewind is the better choice, but your game-to-game pick should depend more on the nature of your team fights.

Build #2:AOE Healing

This build is my personal favorite and only varies from the highly competitive version by one talent. Instead of taking the Earth Shield talent at level 13 this build looks to seek maximum value from Earthliving Enchant, which can potentially increase the healing value of your chain heal by 80% per cast.

This build excels in situations where your team will periodically be taking large amounts of aoe damage because Earthling Enchant will only proc when your targets are below 50% health. For example, consider taking this build when facing off against characters like Kael'thas or Azmodan. However, if you feel like your backline will be melted too quickly by single target damage, Earth Shield is likely a better choice.

In comparison with Earth Shield, you can consider Earthliving Enchant a higher risk/reward talent. Although Earth Shield is more reliable, its effective healing value is actually pretty low. Earthliving Enchant is much more difficult to use optimally because it requires the user to know when to wait for targets to fall below 50% and when to cast chain heal on cool down, but the payoff in net healing is much greater.

There are a few other things to consider when choosing your level 13 talent. The fact that Earth Shield is a shield instead of raw healing allows it to be cast preemptively to avoid damage at the cost of cutting down on sustain. Additionally, the fact that Earthliving Enchant is a hot instead of an instant-speed shield means that it is worse against focused damage. Overall, take Earthliving if the enemy team has considerable aoe damage and you feel experienced enough with the tempo and flow of HOTS to use it properly. Otherwise Earth Shield is probably better.

With this build I prefer Rewind greatly over Storm Shield because your only two valuable cool downs are Chain Heal and Earthbind Totem. Because of this, managing your mana in the late game becomes much easier thereby removing most of the downside that the talent already has.