Hello it's Raptorspank or Raptor again and since I recently hit level 11 and climbing on Jo I figured it was time to do a guide up for her. Right now she sits as the best universal comp warrior in the game, fitting pretty much every map and composition you can think of do to her absurdly good survival capability as well as wealth of hard cc options.
Pros
-One of the best true tanks in the game
-Great peeling and enemy lockdown for your team
-Can easily interrupt most interruptible heroics
-Fits any composition
-Practically unkillable at level 20
Cons
-No escapes (The sheer sustain helps to negate this)
-Relatively low damage compared to other warriors
-Weaker initiates than warriors like Diablo or Anub'arak
Trait : Iron Skin ( D )
A very strong passive, Iron Skin not only grants you a good size shield about every ten seconds but Johanna is unstoppable while it is up, letting her walk out of roots or dodge other hard cc with it. When timed right it can swing entire fights. (Iron Skin right before a mosh pit goes off means one very sad ETC)
Punish ( Q )
A great ability for locking down targets or peeling for your backline, albeit at an extremely short range. Punish targets in an arc, dealing a decent amount of damage. Time it right and you can slow the entire enemy team if they are bunching together.
Condemn ( W )
One of Johanna's best and most fun abilities, Condemn pulls all targets affected in towards you and applying a short stun. The range is not very far but if you stand in the right place (right next to the caster) in the minion wave you can hit the entire wave with it. Keep in mind that this ability stuns at the end, so if you pop it as an ETC starts to channel mosh pit, even when it 'stuns' you the condemn will still finish casting and interrupt his mosh pit. It can also be used to interrupt Li Li's jug of 1,000 cups. You can also pull enemies back through their gate with it.
Shield Glare ( E )
This ability is fairly weak early on but after we put a few talents into it, this ability becomes extremely potent and an important aspect of your kit. It's important to note that shield glare does a bit of damage but it also blinds targets, which can be an extremely good counter to heroes like Illidan or Zeratul who rely pretty heavily on basic attacks. (Blinds cause heroes to miss their next couple basic attacks)
Falling Sword ( R )
This heroic is rather lack luster. It serves as a pretty good initiate since it's a delayed leap that you can control before it completes and it knocks up and damages enemies is a rather large area. This ability makes up for Johanna's lack of a good initiate and so can do well in a composition that is lacking any real way to initiate into the enemy team. The problem is you give up the other heroic which is such an incredibly potent form of hard cc that it is really hard to give up.
Blessed Shield ( R )
Blessed Shield is a fantastic heroic. It can be easy to miss because the hit box is fairly thin but if you land it you can completely shut down a team fight. You have no control over where the shield bounces although it does favor heroes. This is important to note because if you are using it to interrupt a heroic such as Li Li's jugs then you want to make sure you hit her with the shield directly rather than rely on the bounce. Also important to note that you can bounce the shield off enemy minions and structures (including walls) so if the enemy is JUST out of range you may be able to hit them with a bounce of a minion.
The goal of this build is to serve as your teams central tank, so it focuses on utility particularly in the forms of ccing the enemy team and boosting your team's capability. The way the guide works is that talents in
orange are my personal choices, talents in
green are also extremely good substitutes, talents in
red are good in very specific situations and finally
purple talents I would not recommend in pretty much any setting.
Level 1
My Choice : Knight Takes Pawn
I list this as my choice because its the best choice in the majority of maps (if you check the builds listed above you will see that I have too main builds, based on two different groups of maps) and even if you pick this talent on a map where its not the absolute best talent it will still work extremely well when used correctly. This talent sounds really lack luster on paper but it really does work when you get use to it. It greatly increases the damage condemn does to minions (on Infernal shrines you can pretty much one-hit the minions by level 7 or 10) and then it also greatly increases the stun duration on minions. This is really good on maps like Sky Temple which I will explain later in the guide. (See the maps section)
Other Choices
Regeneration Master
Regeneration Master is the best talent on maps where clearing camps aren't very important, such as Battlefield of Eternity and Dragon Shire. Remember that when you win the immortal fight you can pick up not one but two globes in the middle. This talent just basically gives you a reliable increase in tankiness against any enemy composition. The bonus from this talent can snowball pretty quickly if you are good at getting globes, and even in a losing lane you can use iron skin to get the globe and get out with minimal damage.
Reinforce
It's fairly good, especially against basic-attack heavy comps like Illidan. It's essentially Johanna's version of block only you build the stacks by using abilities. The downside is you don't get them passively over a short time so you have less uptime on charges as block but the plus side is you are in direct control of when you get the charges so you can build them up right when you need them. Overall since its only basic attacks it provides less sustain than regeneration master will, although early game reinforce is better.
Righteous Smash
The mana you get back from this is pretty minimal. Not a terrible talent per say but giving up any of the other three, much-better-talents for this one is a loss. So I don't recommend picking this talent up unless you are trying for some-sort of damage Johanna... which I also wouldn't recommend.
Level 4
My Choice : Laws of Hope
I use to run amplified healing on Johanna like most other warriors that can take it, but Laws of Hope is actually better. Sure amplified will make the heals your support puts on you more effective, but Laws of Hope lets them send their healing to other targets instead which can really change a team fight. Not to mention Laws of Hope will help you if you need to solo an objective like Sky Temple and it provides a relatively massive amount of health.
Other Choices
Eternal Retaliation
I use to ignore this ability for the most part, but its very important to note that this applies to minions as well. If you manage to hit an entire minion wave you'll be left with only two or three seconds left on the cooldown so you can really provide a large amount of crowd control quickly. Hard to get away with this talent because of how important sustain is to the tank but this ability will pay major dividends if you can stay alive.
Amplified Healing
Amplified Healing is a great talent and it can do work on Johanna if you are getting the majority of your team's heals. Laws of Hope generally helps you stay alive better but you can still swing amplified healing if your healer is pulling off very frequent but low powered heals. This can help to negate how low Tyrande's late game healing is. Still, I would generally take your own personal heal over this talent.
Roar
Again, this guide is for tanking as Johanna and giving up the great sustain or crowd control talents for a damage increase will hurt your team. The damage increase is pretty good so again, if you are trying some sort of damage Johanna then you want this but I mean, why would you?
Level 7
My Choice : Sins Exposed
This really fits the point of Johanna to me and makes your Shield Glare ( E ) the insanely potent ability it can be. The damage increase from this ability is huge if your team works around it correctly. Whether its blowing away a high priority hero by boosting damage against them or helping to clear bosses or keeps quicker, the work you get out of this talent is huge. This can really change team fights.
Other Choices
Battle Momentum
Most of the pro players take this talent from what I've seen. It's a curious choice and can help get your condemns and punished off cooldown a lot quicker which means even more peels and lockdown. I don't feel it contributes as much as sins exposed does for the team but it can still be very useful. Remember that your trait does not count as a basic ability. This talent will
not help you get iron skin off cooldown faster.
Conviction
This ability can be great when used right. If you don't need condemn quicker but you need to just stick to the targets better, and your team also doesn't need any more damage then this talent can do well. The movement speed increase from it is fairly good, although it is short in length. This talent lets you use condemn to escape as well, worth remembering.
The Crusade Marches On
Not worth taking, your basic abilities are worth more than iron skin so if you want cooldown reduction then you want battle momentum over this talent. Iron Skin is great, just not worth as much as the rest of her kit.
Level 10
My Choice : Blessed Shield
Blessed Shield is just too good. Whether it's for interrupting important heroics or stopping any enemy retreat, blessed shield does a lot of work. It stuns up to 3 targets which can buy your team enough time to turn and erase the enemy team.
Other Choice
Falling Sword
Again, only take if your team has literally no way to initiate a team fight. And even then, blessed shield (since it is ranged) is still probably better. A timed falling sword into a phoenix and flame strike (the knock up will keep them in it) can be a potent combo, but then so can stunning them in it with blessed shield.
Level 13
My Choice : Spell Shield
This is extremely effective especially against enemy teams that have a Kael'Thas or Jaina. It's true that it is for 3 seconds, but thirty seconds isn't a huge cooldown and once you reach the team fight stage of the game, you are going to get work out of this ability. If the enemy damage dealers are waiting for spell shield to end then chances are they aren't still standing once it ends. The damage decrease is more than worth it.
Other Choices
Burning Rage
Burning Rage is great if you are ahead in the game and you are looking to close it out quickly. The further and further the game goes the more and more the worth of this talent goes down, since the damage output is pretty marginal. Still, it helps your team kill targets quicker even if not by much so when you are doing well and you're looking to secure those kills quicker then this talent is for you.
Subdue
Not a great talent in general, it still works well in certain circumstances. Particularly if you think the game is going to go longer but your team isn't having trouble, where this talent will help secure kills well into the end game more so than burning rage. It's also great if you just need to slow the enemy targets a little more to peel for your teammates.
Hold Your Ground
Spell shield will make you tankier for the team fights, since they tend to last only a few seconds. If fights are getting drawn out a lot so you are looking for more sustained tankiness then maybe this talent outweighs it but in general spell shield does more work.
Level 16
My Choice : Holy Renewal
This talent is the best pick since it continues to beef up your shield glare. Most team fights start with abilities coming out, so you don't necessarily need the blind right at the start but teams tend to bunch up in the fights letting you consistently land this ability on multiple targets. The healing from it is pretty substantial and it has a great synergy with the level 20 talent we take.
Other Choices
Imposing Presence
Imposing Presence is always a great pick up against a melee focused comp. If you want to survive longer and you are facing a lot of basic-attack-focused heroes then imposing presence will provide a huge boost to your tankiness.
Fanaticism
An odd talent for sure, the movement speed boost from this talent is very good. The reason you would take this talent is if you either keep diving deep into the enemy team and need to sprint back out of there or if you keep chasing enemy targets under tower where the movement speed increase will help to counter the slow coming out of the fort/keep's shots, letting you stick to the target.
Blessed Hammer
My problems with this talent come from first that the damage is so marginal but also that when it spins around it goes farther out from the center, and it spins very far out. Generally this means that the blessed hammer is going to hit the target once and maybe twice before spinning so far away that it is no longer contributing to the fight. You definitely should not take this talent without having battle momentum, since the more frequent uses of condemn will make it more worth it.
Level 20
Here we are, the big one. The final talent pick.
My Choice : Indestructible
This is legitimately one of the most overpowered talents in the entire game. You are the tank, you are going to be in the center of the fight taking a lot of damage from the other team's AoE abilities. Having indestructible means that your healer can focus their heals elsewhere more, and the amount of shields as well as their duration is incredible. Combine this with Holy Renewal at level 16 plus the Laws of Hope at level 4 and you can often boost yourself back up to 50% health before the shield even falls off. This talent makes you the hardest person on the map to kill, which makes it easier to do your job since you can stay in the fight longer.
Radiating Faith
Its pretty hard to make use of the bounces off this talent, but you can stun the entire enemy team if they bunch up close enough. The range increase is pretty insubstantial, you don't even really notice it that much. The reason you would take this talent is if your team is so incredibly ahead that you don't need to be unkillable and you really just want to stun the entire enemy team while they are trying to flee.
Heaven's Fury
If you took falling sword for some reason than you probably want this talent, since it does increase the damage from the heroic by a fair amount. That said you should usually stick to indestructible anyways because that talent is so good in most circumstances.
Storm Shield
Not worth it. The range isn't that large and the shield is pretty small. It's better for your team if you have indestructible allowing you to stay alive longer and peel for them. I mean Storm Shield is an incredible talent, just not on Johanna.
Understanding how to use Johanna on each map, particularly her knight takes pawn talent, is key to succeeding with Johanna. So I'm going to cover the maps that require a little more understanding of its dynamics to use to its fullest.
Sky Temple
Sky Temple is where Knight Takes Pawn really shines. So when you go to tank a temple you want to wait until right before the big minion starts to attack and then pop iron skin. This should absorb the damage from his two attacks. After two attacks the large minions starts to cast its large damage knock-back. Just wait half a second into his cast and then pop your condemn. (or you can pop it right away, better than being late on it) What this does is that it interrupts the large minion's knock-back and it will do some sizable damage to him. From here you want to basically use iron skin to absorb more damage.
By the time the large minion goes to do his knock-back again the other two small minions on top should have spawned. If you have been tanking roughly near the center / top of the temple then you should be able to walk up to the pillar at the top of the temple and use condemn to not only interrupt the large minion but to also pull together and stun the two smaller minions as well.
The best way to finish the temple is just when the last two minions start to spawn you want to walk just off the ring in the SW corner of it. This should START to drop the cap but you are only doing it long enough for the far minion to take a single step. At this point you should step back on and line up your condemn to hit all the remaining minions. Since the far minion took a step or two forward you should be able to hit both the close and far minion with your condemn. And you should have never lost the cap (assuming the enemy team wasn't contesting, if they are then don't attempt that last step) because you were off the point for such a short time.
Infernal Shrines / Garden of Terror
Pretty much the same for both maps, Knight Takes Pawn does significant damage to the camps. With Infernal Shrines it won't be until level 7 or 10 that it will one shot the minions so you can take the shrine easily, but even at the lowest levels it will do an incredible amount of damage, letting you finish the camp off with your Punish ( Q ).
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