Deckard Cain Build Guide

Blizzard’s Heroes of the Storm is currently deep in its first season for 2019. For all you Deckard Cain players out there, here is a quick guide to keep you each in front of the pack this season.

A billion dollar industry, MOBA games have taken over the gaming world. From SMITE to League of Legends, players have been banding together to dish it out in battle arenas for years. Blizzard Entertainment’s Heroes of the Storm is a prime example. Thriving with thousands and thousands of players, Heroes of the Storm offers a unique spin on the MOBA genre.

Within the game, players can take control of some of the most memorable characters from Blizzard Entertainment’s several franchises. Heroes within the game hail from Overwatch, Diablo and several other franchises.

One of the game’s most popular heroes at the moment is Deckard Cain. Native to the Diablo franchise, Deckard Cain is a powerful support hero. Offering a bevy of abilities and some strong tactical advantages to his teammates, Cain is often a strong choice for any talented support player.

With that in mind, here is a quick guide on how to best take advantage of the Diablo scholar.

Overview

Deckard Cain first graced Blizzard Entertainment’s franchises back in 1996 through Diablo. Cain was also featured in Diablo II and Diablo III. Lastly, Cain has become a playable hero in Blizzard Entertainment’s Heroes of the Storm.

A scholar, the elder character offers words of advice to players in Diablo, including details on the famous Horadric staff. However, in Heroes of the Storm, the Diablo quest giver forgoes sitting on the sidelines in favor of getting himself a piece of the action.

A support hero, Deckard Cain is primarily a healer. However, the hero is also quite prepared to orchestrate the battle field with some seriously effective crowd control (CC). That being said, Cain’s powerful support abilities to come at a cost.

While Cain is capable of significantly healing party members and can CC opponents, the Diablo native hero is also greatly hampered in his mobility. If you need to fight in a single area, Cain can be quite strong. However, the hero has some difficulties when trying to travel great distances quickly.

Advantages and Disadvantages

PROS	CONS
1. Cain’s healing provides some serious sustain to your team.	1. Cain fails to offer effective burst healing.
2. Cain offers effective AoE crowd control.	2. Cain has poor mobility.
3. Cain’s talent choices provide a great ability to adapt as needed.	3. Cain’s waveclear is poor.
4. Cain’s trait is impressively useful.	4. Cain’s damage is poor.

Deckard Cain is a talented healer. Consequently, you will likely want to keep Cain from waveclearing duties or dealing damage. The hero’s strengths remain elsewhere.

Cain provides incredible sustain to your party through his healing potion. However, the Diablo native does not have much in terms of burst healing. As a result, you are definitely going to want to back off of intense exchanges.

Cain also has low mobility. His healing potion requires activation and has to be aimed before thrown, causing the player to have to slow down a bit in order to be effective with the ability.

Scroll of Sealing offers some intense area denial, with his Horadric Cube ability providing significant slows. Thanks to these, you can make it incredibly tasking for anyone to chase you.

Positioning is incredibly important when playing Cain. The hero is vulnerable to assassinations, on top of having weak mobility. However, when positioned properly, Deckard Cain can be a top-tier support healer.

List of Abilities

Deckard Cain has a hearty set of abilities, each capable of dealing some serious havoc. Check out a video of Cain’s abilities down below.

Deckard Cain’s trait is incredibly useful. By staying within roughly two units of at least a single ally, Cain will gain 10 armor and a 50% boon to his ability recharge rate.

Cain’s standard recharge rate is pretty slow, so you will want to take advantage of this trait so you can provide maximum sustain with your healing potions. In summary, Cain’s trait is yet another reason that positioning is paramount with his hero.

Deckard Cain’s healing potion ability is a great tool for providing sustain. The potion must be thrown before being applied to an ally. When thrown on the ground, an ally may walk over the potion to activate it. However, a skilled Cain player may also throw the potion on top of an ally in order to activate it more quickly.

Either way, while providing great sustain, Cain’s healing potion requires too long a recharge time and too much finesse to use to provide significant burst healing. Still, the healing potion can heal for over 500 health at level 20 and Cain can holster up to 5 potions at a time.

You will want to place down healing potions before your allies even require healing. As you can not throw potions at a swift pace, your team will be vulnerable to burst damage unless you have already left some potions lying around for them to use.

The Horadric Cube ability is going to be your first line of crowd control. With Cain’s mobility lacking pretty significantly, it is paramount that you utilize the Horadric Cube so that chasing you will be more tasking for your enemies.

The Horadric Cube slows enemies by 35% for 1.75 seconds, but the slow does come at a cost. The ability takes some time to detonate, as well as some time to travel before detonating.

The ability Scroll of Sealing is generally going to be used in combination with Horadric Cube. Just like Horadric Cube, Scroll of Sealing is easily telegraphed. As players can more easily dodge this ability, it is best used in succession with Horadric Cube.

The ability roots enemies for 1.5 seconds, creating some serious crowd control. Despite how easily telegraphed Scroll of Sealing and Horadric Cube each are, these abilities are still incredible at zoning enemies. If you need to get away and need to keep enemies off your back, these two are wonderful tactics.

Lorenado is likely the weakest of Cain’s abilities. Wielding a hearty cooldown time and a short effect time, Lorenado offers some minor CC but at some serious costs. It is best to stick with the combination tactic of using Horadric Cube followed by the Scroll of Sealing when trying to regularly CC enemies.

Lorenado can still be effective situationally, such as when enemies have been effectively zoned into tight spaces. However, this ability is still rarely utilized effectively in competitve

play.

Stay Awhile and Listen offers some incredible crowd control all on its own. Capable of putting multiple enemies to sleep, Stay Awhile and Listen is capable of offering your team a chance to escape a bad exchange. However, the ability offers such an impressive level of CC that Stay Awhile and Listen has many applications.

Talent Build

Rather than spending time at an item shop, as games like League of Legends implement, Heroes of the Storm allows players to focus their time building each character through talents. At specific levels, players are granted the opportunity to add new talents to their characters. Each talent offers a new, unique and effectively tactical edge to gameplay.

When it comes to Deckard Cain, the name of the game is maximizing his CC while also increasing the recharge rate of his abilities. Check out the full talent build down below.

Cain’s Counters

Deckard Cain can be a powerful support when used by the right player. That being said, there are certain team compositions that can sway the tide of battle for or against the Diablo native. Check out the graphic below to see which heroes are best teammates for Deckard Cain, which heroes are weakest against Cain and which heroes are the largest threats to the character.

Cain’s Best Maps

Deckard Cain can mostly adapt to any map, allowing for a large level of adaptation when playing the high tier support hero. However, there are a few maps that generally spell trouble for the Diablo native. Check out a list of Cain’s worst and best maps down below.

Last Minute Tips

While you now have a well rounded understanding of Deckard Cain’s advantages and disadvantages on the field of battle within Heroes of the Storm, there are still a few useful tips left to learn if you truly want to master the top tier support healer. Check out these tips to up your support play.

1. Remember to always follow through with a blast from your Scroll of Sealing if you successfully land a shot with your Horadric Cube. The compound crowd control you cause is sure to muck up your enemies’ plans.
2. Stay Awhile and Listen can be tough to use in combat. The ability is easily interrupted, making it unwise to use in the middle of an all out exchange. Rather, attempt to isolate individual enemies.
3. Always stay near your team. The recharge rate for your abilities is significantly reduced when you are near your allies, so make sure to stay close to them. Otherwise, you are going to find yourself dealing with more than a few issues early on.
4. Remember to unload your healing potions anywhere your team is likely to exchange. You cannot deliver potions fast enough to provide burst healing. However, your allies can collect healing from previously dropped potions as needed.
5. If you are facing a team that is frequently diving you, try saving your Horadric Cube for when the pressure becomes too much. Horadric Cube can be a great way to get out of the fray.