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Fighting The Cho’gall Virus

by - 8 years ago

Prepare yourselves Heroes! The Cho’gall virus is about to strike the Nexus.

Cho’gall may be the most unique addition yet to Heroes of the Storm, both in his design as well as his distribution. For those who do not already know, Cho’gall is a two headed ogre who is simultaneously controlled by two players. He is arriving in the next patch, which should be released on November 17th. Initially, you will not be able to purchase Cho’gall with gold or real money.

Anyone who attended Blizzcon or purchased a Virtual Ticket, as well as a few randomly selected players, will have Cho’gall added to their accounts for free. For everyone else, the only way to get Cho’gall is to party up with someone who already owns him, and win two games while playing Cho’gall with them. Since this is the only way to acquire him, the number of Cho’gall Heroes in games is going to increase exponentially as soon as he is released. This phenomenon is being called the Cho’gall virus, and it is going to dramatically affect games for the first week or so after his release.

The first step to protecting yourself against the Cho’gall virus is to be informed. Once the patch drops, expect to see Cho’gall in all of your Quick Match games, probably on both teams. Like all new Heroes, he will also pop up in Hero League, but the draft will allow you to adapt to that on a case by case basis when it happens. For Quick Match, you just have to go in with the assumption that you are going to encounter Cho’gall in every game.

Let’s look at a few things you can do to protect yourself against having the Cho’gall virus ruin your day.

Play Heroes with a strong lane presence

Since Cho’gall is one Hero controlled by two players, you are effectively playing 4 vs 5 anytime he is on your team. While Cho’gall is an exceptionally strong Hero, the fact that you have one less body can cause problems on maps like Dragon Shire and Sky Temple, where you need to control multiple locations simultaneously. Depending on your team composition, trying to divide four bodies between three lanes can also make it more difficult to soak lane experience.

As a result, you should play Heroes who can solo lanes and win 1 vs 1 fights against other Heroes. This means Heroes like Nova, Lt. Morales, and Abathur should be avoided during the initial Cho’gall outbreak. It doesn’t mean that they are bad Heroes, it just means that playing them in this situation will increase the likelihood that you will end up with a bad team comp.

Range is your friend

Being two Heroes attached to one body gives Cho’gall built in wombo combo potential. Upheaval combined with Shadow Bolt Volley can unleash a tremendous amount of damage that can easily take out an entire team. Being able to spread out will make it much more difficult for Cho’gall players to land that big combo on multiple Heroes.

Because of this, you should probably favor ranged Heroes over melee Heroes while the Cho’gall virus is spreading. If you are playing a Warrior you don’t have much choice, but keep the melee versus range factor in mind when you are playing an Assassin or Support. Muradin, Malfurion, and Jaina will probably be much safer against Cho’gall than Muradin, Kharazim, and Butcher will be. Much like the lane presence consideration, this doesn’t mean that melee Heroes are bad, it just means they will increase the likelihood that you will find yourself with an unfavorable match up.

Play Heroes that have Giant Killer

It is just common sense. There is no better way to take down a giant two headed ogre than with the Giant Killer talent.

Cho’gall has 50% more health than any other Hero, which means that he is especially vulnerable to the Giant Killer talent, which causes basic attacks to deal bonus damage equal to 1.5% of the target’s maximum health. Heroes that have access to Giant Killer include Falstad, Illidan, Raynor, Sgt. Hammer, Thrall, Valla, Zagara, and Zeratul. Tychus also has a similar talent called Problem Solver. One or two of these Heroes can quickly melt Cho’gall if given the opportunity. Blood for Blood can also be an effective talent versus Cho’gall, as it can be activated to deal 10% of the target’s max health as damage, as well as heal your Hero for twice that amount. This talent is available to Anub’arak, Azmodan, Illidan, Murky, Rehgar, Sylvanas, Thrall, Tyrael, and Valla.

Stuns have extra value

Cho’gall is considered one Hero, so a single stun will effectively remove two players from the fight.

As a result, Heroes with stuns and other incapacitating abilities are especially effective against Cho’gall. There are numerous examples, but a few include Muradin with Storm Bolt, Gazlowe with Xplodium Charge, Uther with Hammer of Justice, Anub’arak with Cocoon, and Brightwing with Polymorph. Keep these abilities in mind when deciding which Heroes to play while the Cho’gall virus is spreading. Being able to incapacitate the strongest Hero on the enemy team can go a long way towards swinging a team fight in your favor. Conversely, if you have a Cho’gall on your team, the ability to Cleanse these effects away can be quite valuable. Brightwing, Kharazim, Lt. Morales, Malfurion, Rehgar, and Uther all have access to Cleanse at level seven. You might have noticed that Brightwing and Uther have the ability to both incapacitate and cleanse, which should make them especially useful in the coming days.

chogall victory

This article was written primarily from the perspective of what to do when you are the one playing against Cho’gall. If you are the one playing Cho’gall, use this information so that you will know what to expect from your opponents. Either way, taking the information available to you and planning accordingly is the key.

Keep in mind that you can unlock Cho’gall by playing Versus AI as well. You don’t have to play Quick Match, and in fact you probably shouldn’t. Since it requires two wins for a new player to unlock Cho’gall, the fastest and easiest way to accomplish this is by playing Versus AI against beginner bots. Once you have Cho’gall down, if you want to play versus real people in Quick Match or Hero League more power to you, but if your goal is simply to unlock Cho’gall do everyone a favor and play AI games.

If you would like to unlock Cho’gall, but don’t know anyone who has him, I would be happy to help spread the virus. I am Alebeard#1345 in game, feel free to contact me. GLHF!


JR Cook

JR has been writing for fan sites since 2000 and has been involved with Blizzard Exclusive fansites since 2003. JR was also a co-host for 6 years on the Hearthstone podcast Well Met! He helped co-found BlizzPro in 2013.


0 responses to “Fighting The Cho’gall Virus”

  1. Lars says:

    Nice read. I can share my experience as well. Yesterday there was a Cho’Gall on both teams, every match. So there will be a lot of Cho’Gall vs Cho’Gall duels going on. If you manage to help your Cho’Gall to take down their’s, your team will get a massive advantage.

    At first I had some difficulties to adjust to Cho’Galls power, but when I started to play Brigthwing things turned around! I can’t emphasize enough how good Brightwing is against Cho’Gall. 🙂

    There are several builds possible, but the focus will be on polymorphing the Cho’Gall as much as possible, and give your own Cho’Gall Pixie Dust and Blink Heals. So try to be in the same lane as the opponent’s Cho’Gall.

    I liked this build:

    1 Unfurling Spray (Hyper Shift is fine if that suits your playstyle better)
    4 Unstable Anomaly (or the regular Manic Pixie if you already have enough damage in your team)
    7 Phase Shield (or mistified, depending on your playstyle)
    10 Blinkheal
    13 Shield Dust
    16 Greater Polymorph (yes, it is worth it if you’re up against a Cho’Gall)
    20 Rewind

    If the game goes to late game and lv 20, you will likely win. Just spam Greater polymorph on the opponent’s Cho’gall, use Pixie Dust on your own, blink heal, rewind and repeat. Usually their Cho’Gall will go crazy after a while, and try to hunt you down no matter what. So be wary with your positioning, so that you can use blink heal to escape. Also remember to B back to base regularly, so you can Z back and give your team mates that Phase Shield. GL! 🙂