Kharazim is a Support class through and through. While he was initially pitched as a hero who has the ability to really modify his play style with this three trait options at level one, no matter what you pick, Kharazim is still a solid healer. Even if you attempt to create a damage-dealing (DPS) build, from our experience Kharazim falls short of most other support classes. You can dish out more damage than Li Li’s healing build, but you won’t be putting up Assassin or even Warrior damage in general. It may take some time to really understand how to weave in and out of combat with Kharazim, but after a few games you should start to get the hang of it.
Radiant Dash (Q)
This is Kharazim’s bread and butter technique. It doesn’t heal, but this is where a bulk of his movement options come into play. Radiant Dash allows you to immediately jump to any hero or minion whether they’re friendly or an enemy. If it’s an enemy, Kharazim will immediately use a basic attack on the target. The distance on the attack reaches farther than most other teleport options in the game, so it’s a great way to escape if you’re lagging behind the crowd. Because you can jump to a minion, you have a lot of escape options depending on the targets nearby. While there’s a 12 second cooldown, you stock two charges of the attack so you can use it to quickly move in, use Breath of Heaven to heal, then escape to a safe distance.
Breath of Heaven (W)
Breath of Heaven is Kharazim’s primary healing ability. It heals all allies in a small radius around the character. When we say small, we mean small. You have a little bit of wiggle room, but for the most part you need to be pretty close to your teammates to heal with Breath of Heaven. Luckily you can use Radiant Dash to get close, toss out a heal, then move away. The ability also increases movement speed by 10 percent for 3 seconds. This makes it one of Kharazim’s escape tools and can also help allies escape by increasing their movement speed when it’s time to make a quick getaway.
Deadly Reach (E)
When this ability is used nothing happens immediately. Your next basic attack will activate the ability, which doubles your damage and attack speed for two seconds. If you see an enemy about to escape, hit E, then use Radiant Dash to quickly dart over to them and unleash a volley of rapid attacks. If you’re already attacking a target, use Radiant Dash first, then press E immediately to unleash a volley of attacks following the dash.
Healing Build
Level 1 – Transcendence or Iron Fists
Level 4 – Overtake or Protective Shield
Level 7 – Echo of Heaven
Level 10 – Divine Palm
Level 13 – Quicksilver or Fists of Fury
Level 16 – Circle of Life or Soothing Breeze
Level 20 – Peaceful Repose or Storm Shield
At level one you need to decide how you’re going to play the match. Pick Transcendence if you’re the main healer. This makes every third basic attack heal a nearby ally with the lowest health. It’s not a big heal, but it certainly adds up over time and it doesn’t cost any mana to use this heal. If you’re opting for a more damage-based healer you can go with Iron Fists, which doubles the damage of every third basic attack. Generally speaking, you won’t get a ton of damage out of Kharazim, so Transcendence should be your first choice unless you have another healer in the party.
When you reach level four, Overtake should be your ability of choice. When Deadly Reach is active, using a basic attack will increase your movement speed by 30 percent for 2 seconds. Normally this is used to chase down a fleeing enemy, but it works just as well to make a quick escape. If you’re in trouble, activate Deadly Reach, use one basic attack and make a mad dash for safety. If you don’t need the escape option, go with Protective Shield to give an allied hero a temporary shield.
Level seven is an easy choice of Echo of Heaven. Two seconds after using Breath of Heaven, Kharazim activates it a second time at no cost. The second Breath of Heaven heals for 50 percent of the first usage, but it goes a long way. This is especially effective if you need to heal an ally that’s out of reach of your initial Breath of Heaven. You can use Radiant Dash to get close to them in time for the second heal.
When it’s time to select a Heroic ability at level 10, Divine Palm is your only choice as a healer. This one requires a bit of skill, but when used, it replenishing a large amount of health if the targeted hero takes fatal damage within three seconds of the Divine Palm cast. Unlike Rehgar’s Ancestral Healing Heroic ability, Divine Palm is an instant cast. However, if the target does not take fatal damage during the three second window, they are not healed. When using this on a Warrior hero, it generally replenishes about half of their maximum health. On heroes with lower health pools, it can sometimes completely heal them.
At level 16 you have a couple of choices depending on how the match is going and who you’re up against. Pick up Circle of Life if you need more healing. This ability adds an additional 10 percent healing potency to Breath of Heaven for each allied hero it touches. That means if you’re close enough to heal your entire team you get a 40 percent boost to the healing potency of the ability. However, if you’re facing off against a team with a lot of stun or crowd control abilities, go with Soothing Breeze. This gives Breath of Heaven the additional ability of removing silence, blind, slow and root from all targets it hits.
You have another choice to make at level 20. If the opposing team is watching Kharazim to switching targets as soon as Divine Palm is cast, this is a great ability. If the target of Divine Palm does not die (triggering the big heal), the recast of Divine Palm is set to 5 seconds instead of 60. If this isn’t happening very often and Divine Palm is activating every time you use it, opt for Storm Shield instead to provide a temporary protective shield to all nearby allied heroes.
DPS Build
Level 1 – Iron Fists
Level 4 – Overtake or Foresight
Level 7 – Way of the Hundred Fists
Level 10 – Seven-Sided Strike
Level 13 – Fists of Fury
Level 16 – Blazing Fists
Level 20 – Transgression
Kharazim is primarily a Support class, but he can be played with a decent amount of damage if you’re focused on a complete DPS build. You won’t be inflicting damage like an Assassin hero, but it’s respectable damage for a Support class. At level one pick up the Iron Fists trait so that every third basic attack inflicts twice as much damage as your normal basic attack. This alone isn’t going to result in huge damage, but it certainly helps.
When you reach level four, pick up Overtake or Foresight. Overtake gives you better movement by increasing your movement speed by 30 percent when you use a basic attack during Deadly Reach. Foresight is best used if the opposing team has cloaked heroes such as Zeratul or Nova. It will reveal the area around you making them far less deadly.
At level seven select Way of the Hundred Fists. This gives Radiant Dashing a significant damage increase and you’ll start to see how Kharazim can dish out some damage with the right build. With this ability you unleash a volley of attacks as soon as you hit an enemy with Radiant Dashing. This replaces the guaranteed basic attack for a big damage boost.
Pick up the Seven-Sided Strike Heroic ability at level 10. When used Kharazim attacks any enemy heroes within a small radius, starting with the hero that has the most health. Every strike inflicts 7 percent of the target’s maximum health, for a maximum of 49 percent damage if there’s only one hero nearby. You can use it at the start of a team battle to lower the opposing team’s health as a whole, or if you find one enemy alone you can take them out once they reach roughly 50 percent health. It’s a bit of a waste when only used against one hero, but depending on the circumstances it can be beneficial.
At level 13 select Fists of Fury to increase the duration of Deadly Reach by 50 percent. This is yet another increase to Kharazim’s damage output off of Deadly Reach as it becomes his primary damage tool. However, pay close attention to your charges because Kharazim doesn’t have a large health pool. If you’re overextending too much you can get caught too far from your allies and end up dying pretty quickly.
When you reach level 16, pick up Blazing Fists. This ability lowers the cooldown of Deadly Reach by one second with every third basic attack. This allows you to use Deadly Reach again slightly faster than the Blinding Speed ability at this same level. When you couple this with some of the previous abilities in this build you can see that a lot of damage comes from Radiant Dash.
Finally, when you get to level 20 your build will be complete with Transgression. This adds four additional strikes to Seven-Sided Strike which is roughly a 50 percent damage boost. Against a single target you can drain 84 percent of their health, or 42 percent when there are two targets. Once again, this is a deadly technique in a team battle to either start off draining the opposing team’s health, or finish them off once their health has been knocked down a bit.
Three more heroes and a new battlefield will be entering the Nexus over the coming weeks and months. Now that you’ve got Kharazim down, check out our coverage of the new additions!
Published: Aug 19, 2015 11:01 pm