Heroes of the Storm – incredible Li-Ming and her builds

No one will argue that Li-Ming is new Nova in the matchmaking. Moreover, with recent Kael'thas changes she is one of the strongest heroes in the game. She's definitely a hero to use if you want to increase your matchmaking rating. In my article, I'll highlight Li-Ming builds that are viable for matchmaking environment and different levels of play.
Li-Ming, Rebelious Wizard
Introduction
Lore
Magic Missiles build

Arcane Orb build

Teleport build 

Situational talents
Terminology
Introduction and Lore

Introduction

Before the first balance patch applied to Li-Ming, she had almost 100% ban rate and win rate. After the patch, her story is not that successful. Even though she is seen in almost any casual game, her win rate has dropped in the competitive games. She is a high risk, high reward hero. Such heroes can do wonders in less organized games. However, it is harder to succeed with them in professional games. Don’t get me wrong though! She is incredibly strong on any level of play.

Personally, I think that Li-Ming is one of the best heroes that Blizzard has created so far. Her design suits very well into any level of play. She is the first hero that can drastically affect the outcome of a fight. She is also a first hero that can snowball the fight like no other hero can. This is the idea behind her design, and Heroes of the Storm could use more heroes like that. Definitely, Li-Ming is a hero that like no other can snowball fights and impact the game. She is a complex and fun to play hero. The better you play, the more rewarded you feel and the greater are your results and an impact on the game.

Lore

Li-Ming is a representative of the Wizard class from the Diablo 3 universe. Lore-wise, you play her in the world of Sanctuary if create a female Wizard character. She is a young, partly self-taught magician. Li-Ming has her story developed before and during Diablo 3 times. You can read a more detailed description of the lore by the links below.

A lore based on the events of Diablo 3 times:
http://heroesofthestorm.gamepedia.com/Li-Ming

A short story about pre-Diablo 3 times, about younger Li-Ming and her way as a Wizard: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/game/lore/short-story/wizard/1#read

Magic Missiles build

This is a perfect choice if you are new to Li-Ming. The build offers a rather safe game play. At the same time, you dish out insane damage numbers. The Magic Missiles spell is a core spell of the build. It deals single target damage, has a low cooldown, and tricky mechanics. The spell has very low Mana cost. The build is ideal for poke wars. Low cooldown and Mana cost allow spamming Magic Missiles almost indefinitely. The usual gameplay of this build looks like this: you either poke an enemy hero from behind the front line or you flank your enemies. In the first case, you want to predict enemy movement and land the Magic Missiles spell in the future location of your target, or you can time the spell with disruptive abilities of your allies. In the second scenario, you are going to look to backstab a fragile enemy hero. If you want to succeed, you would like to hide from enemy line of sight. In both cases, you would like to mind Li-Ming’s fragility and stay at a safe distance towards enemy heroes.

Talent choices

Li-Ming's Magic Missile buildImage source:

Force Armor
(level 1)

Many Li-Ming players underestimate this talent. Just think about it! Starting at level 1, you have a unique version of the common Spell Shield talent! Moreover, you can choose when to activate it so that it absorbs the spell you want it to absorb! This is a perfect talent for poke wars. You can use it to absorb key enemy spells and then be fully healed by your Support.
In the build, Force Armor serves not only as a cunning talent but also as a mean of compensation for the Glass Cannon talent. With the help of Force Armor, you will partly negate its negative feature. You are probably thinking that the talent is imbalanced, however, I want to point out that it activates only if you hit a hero with the Magic Missiles spell.

Talent description: when Magic Missiles damages an enemy Hero, you gain a charge of Spell Block, reducing the damage from the next enemy Ability against you by 50%. Can hold up to 4 charges. Can only gain 1 charge per cast.

Dominance
(level 4)

Li-Ming’s Trait makes her a snowball hero. The talent further improves the snowball effect and the hero sustain. Again, it is a build up towards the Glass Cannon talent, to further compensate its negative part. At the same time, Dominance will be very handy in clutch fights. You will be able to turn the tides of battle in your favor and benefit from some unfavorable trades. Sometimes you can even allow yourself to absorb a skill shot or two, knowing that the talent will heal you. Of course, Dominance greatly increases the snowball potential of the hero.

Talent description: Takedowns restore 25% of your maximum health.

Seeker
(level 7)

Seeker is the first talent that actually contributes to the Magic Missiles spell. Generally speaking, Li-Ming is a hard to play hero. Her damage numbers are directly influenced by her accuracy. The same story is with this talent. It won’t be very effective if you can’t consistently connect Missiles. Ideally, you would like to have a few allied heroes with disruptive spells that can hold an enemy hero in place for a brief period of time.
Once you become more experienced with the hero and the build, the allied help won’t be needed and you will consistently land Missiles on your own, predicting enemy movement and actions to deal a devastating amount of single target damage.

Talent description: if three Magic Missiles hit the same target, the third one deals an additional 274 (130 +4% per level) damage.

Disintegrate
(level 10)
Heroic

This is your finisher in any build. Spell's mechanics is similar to Diablo's ultimate, Lightning Breath. The only difference is the beam's width. The width is smaller and the spell is more sensitive to cursor movement. Also, Disintegrate has a bigger reach. While Heroic is an outstanding finisher with low cooldown time, it has a downside. The downside lies in channeling mechanics. Li-Ming is one the most fragile heroes in the game. She has a low number of hit points compared to many other heroes. Channeling Heroic makes her extremely vulnerable. You would like to use Disintegrate from a large distance, or make sure that there is no grave danger in using it up close.

Depending on the target, you would like to use Disintegrate when target has 1/3 of health pool. Ideally, you would like to have a few heroes with disruptive abilities so you could channel the ultimate for the full duration. In such case, you can even take down a fragile hero that has a half of maximum hit points. In poke wars and in the Magic Missiles build, you have two approaches on the use of the Heroic. The first one is to use Disintegrate as a finisher. The second one is to use Disintegrate as a poke spell.

Description: channel a powerful beam, dealing 1168 (462 + 5% per level) damage over 2.5 seconds to enemies while they are in it. The direction of the beam changes with your mouse cursor position. The ultimate has the 20-seconds cooldown and costs 80 Mana.

Glass Cannon
(level 13)

The talent is a tradeoff. You sacrifice part of health to gain extra spell damage. Li-Ming is already a fragile hero. Using Glass Cannon makes her even more fragile. Usually, the talent doesn't cause any problems. However, if you are not sure that you would like to use the talent, consider using the Illusionist talent. It will be better at negating positional mistakes and it is more suitable for new players.

Expect the 15% boost in the ability power if you decide to use the Glass Cannon talent. On the level 13, you will do more than one thousand damage using the Magic Missiles spell. You can repeat these damage numbers as long as you want. Magic Missiles is a cheap spell with low cooldown time.

Talent description: increases your Ability Power by 15%, but decreases your maximum health by 15%.

Fireflies
(level 16)

On this talent tier, you choose between the Fireflies and Mirror Ball talents. The first talent will be better for new players and in situations where you want to deal as much damage as you can for a short time. The speed increase of the spell will improve your accuracy by a lot. So, Fireflies greatly improves Li-Ming's poking potential.
On the other hand, there is the Mirror Ball talent. It drastically improves the damage of the Magic Missiles spell, by adding two more projectiles, but is more suitable for experienced players. So, you would like to play with the Fireflies talent if you are learning how to play Li-Ming, and you would like to play with the Mirror Ball talent if you feel confidence in your accuracy.

Talent description: drastically increases Magic Missiles speed, and lowers its cooldown by 1 second.

Temporal Flux
(level 20)

At first glance, you might think that this talent is not a big deal. I can assure you that the talent is stronger than it seems. First of all, a slow effect allows you to channel the ultimate for the full duration. The only way for an enemy hero to dodge the Heroic is to use an escape ability. However, if you use the ultimate when the enemy hero has the escape on cooldown, there is nothing he can do to avoid your damage.
Second of all, the slow effect adds an initiation potential to Disintegrate. The ultimate has a long-range. So, you can use it to start a fight or even force some defensive abilities from an enemy team. Lastly, you can use the Heroic to save a fleeing ally. Again, Disintegrate has a long-range, meaning you can help an allied hero from afar.
So, as you can see, the slow effect adds much more than it seems at first glance!

Talent description: Disintegrate slows enemies by 60%.

Pros and Cons of Magic Missiles build

Li-Ming is a unique hero. When speaking of other heroes, it is a rather easy task to find their strong and weak spots. In case of Li-Ming, it is hard to do. The development team has made her a high skill, high reward hero. This means that she not only has strong and weak spots based on the chosen build but also based the level of a player. The better you play, regardless of the build, the less vulnerable you are. Virtually, after a certain level of a player, Li-Ming doesn’t have any weak spots. Of course, we can say this about any hero. However, this is true for the hero, as the developers have designed Li-Ming in that way.

As for the build, let’s talk about strong spots first. The build is terrific in poke wars. You have the Magic Missiles spell. It is your main poking tool. The spell has low cooldown, small Mana cost, and insane single target damage numbers. Such configuration of Magic Missiles makes them ideal for poke wars.
On the other hand, you need to worry about your positioning and hit points. These are two main weak spots. You would like to always mind your positioning and calculate the odds of survival depending on the hit points number. It is very easy to lose a track of the map and health pool when playing Li-Ming. Her gameplay is very dynamic, and you need to watch a lot of game components at once. You would like to finish off low health targets, watch mini-map, your own health pool, predict the way a fight will go, and so on.

So, the strong spot of the build is an incredible poke potential while the weak spots are positioning and health pool. When playing Li-Ming, keep in mind that her Teleport ability is not the same as the Bolt of the Storm talent. Compared to Bolt, Teleport has a smaller range and is not that good at repositioning. It is designed more as a Juking tool that helps you evade enemy spells.

Arcane Orb build
Li-Ming art from the Diablo 3 short storyImage source:

The build is a bit harder to play compared to the Magic Missiles build. You would like to have a good accuracy with the spell, Arcane Orb. Also, the build is more sensitive to your mistakes, as the cooldown of Arcane Orb is higher than that of Magic Missiles. However, the reward for connecting the spell is also higher. You deal incredible damage numbers from afar. The reach as well the damage is higher than that of the Magic Missiles build. Lastly, spell damage is AoE. Usual Arcane Orb gameplay is similar to that of the Magic Missiles build. You will also be looking to either flank enemy heroes or damage them from behind your front line. The build can be effective in poke wars as well as in setups based on battle momentum and burst down. In any case, the Arcane Orb spell is harder to land than Magic Missiles. The spell has a slower travel speed and is more noticeable visually. That is why you would like to have a few disruptive spells in your setup if you are going to shoot the spell from a front line. If you are going to flank, the effectiveness of the build purely depends on your accuracy. It is also important to keep in mind that Arcane Orb is not your common AoE spell. The spell will stop upon colliding with any unit. So, if you want to hit many enemy heroes, you should flank them.

Talent choices

Li-Ming's Arcane Orb buildImage source:

Aether Walker
(level 1)

This is your default spell for this build. At first glance, you might think that it doesn’t fit into the build but believe me, you are going to love the talent. Aether Walker greatly improves your mobility around the battlefield. It will be very effective for constant flanks with Arcane Orb spell. First of all, it reduces the Mana load on the hero. Arcane Orb is not that cheap compared to the Magic Missiles spell, it costs 50 Mana. Second of all, the talent does fit in the flanking and backstabbing gameplay. With the help of Aether Walker, you are hard to catch and you don’t mind using the Teleport spell for constant mobility because it has no Mana cost.

Talent description: if you haven’t taken damage in the last 5 seconds, Teleport costs no Mana and its cooldown is decreased by 2 seconds.

Triumvirate
(level 4)

The talent allows you to poke with Arcane Orb just like you would do with the Magic Missiles spell. Each time you will connect an Orb with an enemy hero, the talent will reduce the cooldown of Arcane Orb by 6 seconds. Triumvirate complements burst down and poking gameplay. If you play in the poke setup, you can use Arcane Orb each 3-4 seconds. On the other hand, if you play in the burst down line-up, the spell will go off cooldown right after your usual spell rotation (W>Q>R).
Keep in mind that cooldown reduction triggers only if you hit an enemy hero with Arcane Orb.

Talent description: if Arcane Orb hits an enemy Hero after traveling at least 65% of its base range, the cooldown is reduced by 6 seconds.

Zei's Vengeance
(level 7)

The talent is a tradeoff. However, the talent perfectly suits the gameplay of the build. You won’t notice any downsides, as build gameplay is based on poking or flanking from afar. Actually, the talent contributes more to the Arcane Orb build than it hurts it. Zei’s Vengeance, as well as Arcane Orb, will be extremely effective on maps with narrow areas and positional fights for map objectives. For example, it is quite easy to flank enemy heroes and benefit from the talent on the Cursed Hollow and Sky Temple maps. The first map has a many narrow corridors and areas, plus a Tribute capture requires positional fights. On the second map, you have the understanding where enemy heroes are. This allows you to easily poke their position and force them to flee.

Talent description: Arcane Orb does an additional 25% more damage to enemies far away, but will deal 25% less damage to enemies up close.

Disintegrate
(level 10)
Heroic

This is your finisher in any build. Spell's mechanics is similar to Diablo's ultimate, Lightning Breath. The only difference is the beam's width. The width is smaller and the spell is more sensitive to cursor movement. Also, Disintegrate has a bigger reach. While Heroic is an outstanding finisher with low cooldown time, it has a downside. The downside lies in channeling mechanics. Li-Ming is one the most fragile heroes in the game. She has a low number of hit points compared to many other heroes. Channeling Heroic makes her extremely vulnerable. You would like to use Disintegrate from a large distance, or make sure that there is no grave danger in using it up close.

Depending on the target, you would like to use Disintegrate when the target has 1/3 of health pool. Ideally, you would like to have a few heroes with disruptive abilities so you could channel the ultimate for the full duration. In such case, you can even take down a fragile hero that has a half of maximum hit points.

In the Arcane Orb build, you use Disintegrate as a finisher either after a burst down rotation of your spells or after a poking with Arcane Orb. Before level 16, the ultimate has a bigger reach than the Arcane Orb spell, so, there shouldn't be any problems with finishing your targets off.

Description: channel a powerful beam, dealing 1168 (462 + 5% per level) damage over 2.5 seconds to enemies while they are in it. The direction of the beam changes with your mouse cursor position. The ultimate has the 20-seconds cooldown and costs 80 Mana.

Glass Cannon
(level 13)

The talent is a tradeoff. You sacrifice a portion of health to gain additional spell damage. Li-Ming is already a fragile hero. Using Glass Cannon makes her even more fragile. Usually, the talent doesn't cause any problems. However, if you are not sure that you would like to use the talent, consider using the Illusionist talent. It will be better at negating positional mistakes and it is more suitable for new players.

Expect the 15% boost in the ability power if you decide to use the Glass Cannon talent. On the level 13, you will do almost one thousand AoE damage using the Arcane Orb spell. If you are going to consistently hit enemy heroes with the spell, you can repeat these damage numbers each 3-4 seconds because of the Triumvirate talent.

Talent description: increases your Ability Power by 15%, but decreases your maximum health by 15%.

Arcane Orbit
(level 16)

After learning this talent, you would like to position yourself rather far out to get the benefit from additional damage. The talent further increases a damage potential and a reach of the Arcane Orb, making your positioning even safer when poking or flanking with the spell. Of course, using this talent to its maximum extent will require some practice and experience. Depending on the map, there are a lot of interesting spots a Li-Ming player could use to benefit from the Arcane Orbit talent.

Talent description: Arcane Orb travels 25% farther, doing up to 25% more damage.

Tal Rasha's Elements
(level 20)

Usually, on this talent tier, you choose between the Tal Rasha’s Elements and Temporal Flux talents. While the slow effect from Temporal Flux is a flexible tool, in the burst down build you would like to have an extra portion of instant damage, so the Tal Rasha’s Elements is the choice. At the level 20, Arcane Orb alone hits for 1400 AoE damage (at max range you can even deal around 1600 damage). Disintegrate will do almost 1600 damage after 2.5 seconds and Magic Missiles do almost 1000 damage.
As you can see, the level 20 choice fits well in the burst down gameplay. Only if you are in drastic need of disruptive spells, you can choose the Temporal Flux talent. Otherwise, it is better to go for the Tal Rasha’s Elements talent. The talent fits common rotation of your spell and will be a nail in the coffin of your enemies.

Talent description: your Abilities benefit from 10% bonus damage as long as they aren’t cast twice in a row.

Pros and Cons of Arcane Orb build

Just like in the Magic Missiles build, the positioning and a poor health pool are two concerns. Compared to the previous build, they are less threatening. Unless you are going to be greedy with your position, Arcane Orb build features a rather safe and far, far away positioning compared to other Li-Ming builds. Instead of worrying about those two, you should care about the accuracy and team coordination. These are two main problems when it comes to playing the build. You would like to anticipate a course of actions in a fight and use Arcane Orb accordingly. Understanding allies’ logic and timing your W with their disruptive spells, as well as other actions, will be key points of succeeding with the Arcane Orb build.
As for strong spots, I think it is understandable that the build dishes out crazy damage numbers in a large AoE. Once you start connecting your W's, your damage numbers will fly away just like your enemies do; across the map.

Teleport build
Another great Li-Ming artImage source:

The build is great for experienced players. You can do wonders with its help. Generally speaking, Heroes of the Storm is a team based game. Sometimes too team based. You rarely can win a fight on your own. Moreover, the game is so team dependent that you can play perfectly but still lose a game because of one teammate’s mistake. In this regard, Li-Ming is a different hero. She can win fights alone! If this wasn’t enough, she has a very snowballing design. As long as she is alive and you have wounded allies, the fight is not over. The Teleport build exploits the snowball feature to a great extent.
When playing the build, you would like to be cunning and patient. To snowball a fight and use your Teleport spell efficiently, you would like to hide from enemy sight and help your mates to score a kill. Once you score a kill, cooldowns of your spells will be reset. After this, you would like to start killing and finishing off one target after another, prioritizing heroes that have the lowest health bar.
Using this build, Li-Ming is almost unmatched in the snowball effect that comes from the Trait as well as crazy sustain the hero has. This allows you to win almost any clutch fights and duels. You can even win uneven fights, and the snowball effect can start from the unfavorable trades.

Talent choices

Li-Ming's Teleport buildImage source:

Aether Walker
(level 1)

The talent adds mobility and saves some Mana for you. The spell is also a build up for the level 7 talent, Calamity. Those two combined offer a great wave-clear potential. You won't spend Mana clearing minion waves, and the process will be easier compared to other builds and spells. Even on level 7, you can clear a minion wave with two Teleports, spending no Mana and only 3 seconds of time. This is a rather good wave-clear for an Assassin, right?
Other than the wave-clear potential, Aether Walker will greatly improve your team fighting capabilities. You will become more effective at chasing heroes and dashing around the battlefield. Lastly, the talent will save you some Mana.

Talent description: if you haven't taken damage in the last 5 seconds, Teleport costs no Mana and its cooldown is decreased by 2 seconds.

Dominance
(level 4)

Li-Ming’s Trait makes her a snowball hero. The talent further improves the snowball effect and the hero sustain. At the same time, Dominance will be very handy in clutch fights. You will be able to turn the tides of battle in your favor and benefit from some unfavorable trades. Sometimes you can even allow yourself to absorb a skill shot or two, knowing that you will be healed by the talent. In the Teleport build, Dominance greatly increases the snowball potential and sustain of the hero.

Talent description: Takedowns restore 25% of your maximum health.

Calamity
(level 7)

Calamity is a core talent of the build. In the build, you use Teleport as a source of additional damage numbers and as a finisher. The talent stacks incredibly well with Li-Ming's snowball design. Combined with the level 13 and level 16 talents, Illusionist and Diamond Skin, the talent will allow you to drastically snowball team fights. Combined with the level 1 talent, Aether Walker, the talent will be a mean of a free and effective wave-clear.
While using Teleport aggressively, keep in mind that you are an incredibly fragile hero. You would like to calculate the odds of your actions and use the spell as a finisher only in situations when you are sure that it will lead to a kill. Using this talent and the build properly and to a great extent will require some time, practice, and experience.

Talent description: Teleport does 542 (309 + 3% per level) damage to enemies near your destination.

Disintegrate
(level 10)
Heroic

This is your finisher in any build. Spell's mechanics is similar to Diablo's ultimate, Lightning Breath. The only difference is the beam's width. The width is smaller and the spell is more sensitive to cursor movement. Also, Disintegrate has a bigger reach. While Heroic is an outstanding finisher with low cooldown time, it has a downside. The downside lies in channeling mechanics. Li-Ming is one the most fragile heroes in the game. She has a low number of hit points compared to many other heroes. Channeling Heroic makes her extremely vulnerable. You would like to use Disintegrate from a large distance, or make sure that there is no grave danger in using it up close.

Depending on the target, you would like to use Disintegrate when target has 1/3 of health pool. Ideally, you would like to have a few heroes with disruptive abilities so you could channel the ultimate for the full duration. In such case, you can even take down a fragile hero that has a half of maximum hit points. In poke wars and in the Magic Missiles build, you have two approaches on the use of the Heroic. The first one is to use Disintegrate as a finisher. The second one is to use Disintegrate as a poke spell.

Description: channel a powerful beam, dealing 1168 (462 + 5% per level) damage over 2.5 seconds to enemies while they are in it. The direction of the beam changes with your mouse cursor position. The ultimate has the 20-seconds cooldown and costs 80 Mana.

Glass Cannon
(level 13)

The talent is a tradeoff. You sacrifice part of health to gain extra spell damage. Li-Ming is already a fragile hero. Using Glass Cannon makes her even more fragile. Usually, the talent doesn't cause any problems. However, if you are not sure that you would like to use the talent, consider using the Illusionist talent. It will be better at negating positional mistakes and it is more suitable for new players.

Expect the 15% boost in the ability power if you decide to use the Glass Cannon talent. On the level 13, you will do more than one thousand damage using the Magic Missiles spell. You can repeat these damage numbers as long as you want. Magic Missiles is a cheap spell with low cooldown time.

Talent description: increases your Ability Power by 15%, but decreases your maximum health by 15%.

Fireflies
(level 16)

On this talent tier, you choose between the Fireflies and Mirror Ball talents. The first talent will be better for new players and in situations where you want to deal as much damage as you can for a short time. The speed increase of the spell will improve your accuracy by a lot. So, Fireflies greatly improves Li-Ming's poking potential.
On the other hand, there is the Mirror Ball talent. It drastically improves the damage of the Magic Missiles spell, by adding two more projectiles, but is more suitable for experienced players. So, you would like to play with the Fireflies talent if you are learning how to play Li-Ming, and you would like to play with the Mirror Ball talent if you feel confidence in your accuracy.

Talent description: drastically increases Magic Missiles speed, and lowers its cooldown by 1 second.

Temporal Flux
(level 20)

At first glance, you might think that this talent is not a big deal. I can assure you that the talent is stronger than it seems. First of all, a slow effect allows you to channel the ultimate for the full duration. The only way for an enemy hero to dodge the Heroic is to use an escape ability. However, if you use the ultimate when the enemy hero has the escape on cooldown, there is nothing he can do to avoid your damage.
Second of all, the slow effect adds an initiation potential to Disintegrate. The ultimate has a long-range. So, you can use it to start a fight or even force some defensive abilities from an enemy team. Lastly, you can use the Heroic to save a fleeing ally. Again, Disintegrate has a long-range, meaning you can help an allied hero from afar.
So, as you can see, the slow effect adds much more than it seems at first glance!

Talent description: Disintegrate slows enemies by 60%.

Pros and Cons of Magic Missiles build

Li-Ming is a unique hero. When speaking of other heroes, it is a rather easy task to find their strong and weak spots. In case of Li-Ming, it is hard to do. The development team has made her a high skill, high reward hero. This means that she not only has strong and weak spots based on the chosen build but also based the level of a player. The better you play, regardless of the build, the less vulnerable you are. Virtually, after a certain level of a player, Li-Ming doesn’t have any weak spots. Of course, we can say this about any hero. However, this is true for the hero, as the developers have designed Li-Ming in that way.

As for the build, let’s talk about strong spots first. The build is terrific in poke wars. You have the Magic Missiles spell. It is your main poking tool. The spell has low cooldown, small Mana cost, and insane single target damage numbers. Such configuration of Magic Missiles makes them ideal for poke wars.
On the other hand, you need to worry about your positioning and hit points. These are two main weak spots. You would like to always mind your positioning and calculate the odds of survival depending on the hit points number. It is very easy to lose a track of the map and health pool when playing Li-Ming. Her gameplay is very dynamic, and you need to watch a lot of game components at once. You would like to finish off low health targets, watch mini-map, your own health pool, predict the way a fight will go, and so on.

So, the strong spot of the build is an incredible poke potential while the weak spots are positioning and health pool. When playing Li-Ming, keep in mind that her Teleport ability is not the same as the Bolt of the Storm talent. Compared to Bolt, Teleport has a smaller range and is not that good at repositioning. It is designed more as a Juking tool that helps you evade enemy spells.

Arcane Orb build
Li-Ming art from the Diablo 3 short storyImage source:

The build is a bit harder to play compared to the Magic Missiles build. You would like to have a good accuracy with the spell, Arcane Orb. Also, the build is more sensitive to your mistakes, as the cooldown of Arcane Orb is higher than that of Magic Missiles. However, the reward for connecting the spell is also higher. You deal incredible damage numbers from afar. The reach as well the damage is higher than that of the Magic Missiles build. Lastly, spell damage is AoE. Usual Arcane Orb gameplay is similar to that of the Magic Missiles build. You will also be looking to either flank enemy heroes or damage them from behind your front line. The build can be effective in poke wars as well as in setups based on battle momentum and burst down. In any case, the Arcane Orb spell is harder to land than Magic Missiles. The spell has a slower travel speed and is more noticeable visually. That is why you would like to have a few disruptive spells in your setup if you are going to shoot the spell from a front line. If you are going to flank, the effectiveness of the build purely depends on your accuracy. It is also important to keep in mind that Arcane Orb is not your common AoE spell. The spell will stop upon colliding with any unit. So, if you want to hit many enemy heroes, you should flank them.

Talent choices

Li-Ming's Arcane Orb buildImage source:

Aether Walker
(level 1)

This is your default spell for this build. At first glance, you might think that it doesn’t fit into the build but believe me, you are going to love the talent. Aether Walker greatly improves your mobility around the battlefield. It will be very effective for constant flanks with Arcane Orb spell. First of all, it reduces the Mana load on the hero. Arcane Orb is not that cheap compared to the Magic Missiles spell, it costs 50 Mana. Second of all, the talent does fit in the flanking and backstabbing gameplay. With the help of Aether Walker, you are hard to catch and you don’t mind using the Teleport spell for constant mobility because it has no Mana cost.

Talent description: if you haven’t taken damage in the last 5 seconds, Teleport costs no Mana and its cooldown is decreased by 2 seconds.

Triumvirate
(level 4)

The talent allows you to poke with Arcane Orb just like you would do with the Magic Missiles spell. Each time you will connect an Orb with an enemy hero, the talent will reduce the cooldown of Arcane Orb by 6 seconds. Triumvirate complements burst down and poking gameplay. If you play in the poke setup, you can use Arcane Orb each 3-4 seconds. On the other hand, if you play in the burst down line-up, the spell will go off cooldown right after your usual spell rotation (W>Q>R).
Keep in mind that cooldown reduction triggers only if you hit an enemy hero with Arcane Orb.

Talent description: if Arcane Orb hits an enemy Hero after traveling at least 65% of its base range, the cooldown is reduced by 6 seconds.

Zei's Vengeance
(level 7)

The talent is a tradeoff. However, the talent perfectly suits the gameplay of the build. You won’t notice any downsides, as build gameplay is based on poking or flanking from afar. Actually, the talent contributes more to the Arcane Orb build than it hurts it. Zei’s Vengeance, as well as Arcane Orb, will be extremely effective on maps with narrow areas and positional fights for map objectives. For example, it is quite easy to flank enemy heroes and benefit from the talent on the Cursed Hollow and Sky Temple maps. The first map has a many narrow corridors and areas, plus a Tribute capture requires positional fights. On the second map, you have the understanding where enemy heroes are. This allows you to easily poke their position and force them to flee.

Talent description: Arcane Orb does an additional 25% more damage to enemies far away, but will deal 25% less damage to enemies up close.

Disintegrate
(level 10)
Heroic

This is your finisher in any build. Spell's mechanics is similar to Diablo's ultimate, Lightning Breath. The only difference is the beam's width. The width is smaller and the spell is more sensitive to cursor movement. Also, Disintegrate has a bigger reach. While Heroic is an outstanding finisher with low cooldown time, it has a downside. The downside lies in channeling mechanics. Li-Ming is one the most fragile heroes in the game. She has a low number of hit points compared to many other heroes. Channeling Heroic makes her extremely vulnerable. You would like to use Disintegrate from a large distance, or make sure that there is no grave danger in using it up close.

Depending on the target, you would like to use Disintegrate when the target has 1/3 of health pool. Ideally, you would like to have a few heroes with disruptive abilities so you could channel the ultimate for the full duration. In such case, you can even take down a fragile hero that has a half of maximum hit points.

In the Arcane Orb build, you use Disintegrate as a finisher either after a burst down rotation of your spells or after a poking with Arcane Orb. Before level 16, the ultimate has a bigger reach than the Arcane Orb spell, so, there shouldn't be any problems with finishing your targets off.

Description: channel a powerful beam, dealing 1168 (462 + 5% per level) damage over 2.5 seconds to enemies while they are in it. The direction of the beam changes with your mouse cursor position. The ultimate has the 20-seconds cooldown and costs 80 Mana.

Glass Cannon
(level 13)

The talent is a tradeoff. You sacrifice a portion of health to gain additional spell damage. Li-Ming is already a fragile hero. Using Glass Cannon makes her even more fragile. Usually, the talent doesn't cause any problems. However, if you are not sure that you would like to use the talent, consider using the Illusionist talent. It will be better at negating positional mistakes and it is more suitable for new players.

Expect the 15% boost in the ability power if you decide to use the Glass Cannon talent. On the level 13, you will do almost one thousand AoE damage using the Arcane Orb spell. If you are going to consistently hit enemy heroes with the spell, you can repeat these damage numbers each 3-4 seconds because of the Triumvirate talent.

Talent description: increases your Ability Power by 15%, but decreases your maximum health by 15%.

Arcane Orbit
(level 16)

After learning this talent, you would like to position yourself rather far out to get the benefit from additional damage. The talent further increases a damage potential and a reach of the Arcane Orb, making your positioning even safer when poking or flanking with the spell. Of course, using this talent to its maximum extent will require some practice and experience. Depending on the map, there are a lot of interesting spots a Li-Ming player could use to benefit from the Arcane Orbit talent.

Talent description: Arcane Orb travels 25% farther, doing up to 25% more damage.

Tal Rasha's Elements
(level 20)

Usually, on this talent tier, you choose between the Tal Rasha’s Elements and Temporal Flux talents. While the slow effect from Temporal Flux is a flexible tool, in the burst down build you would like to have an extra portion of instant damage, so the Tal Rasha’s Elements is the choice. At the level 20, Arcane Orb alone hits for 1400 AoE damage (at max range you can even deal around 1600 damage). Disintegrate will do almost 1600 damage after 2.5 seconds and Magic Missiles do almost 1000 damage.
As you can see, the level 20 choice fits well in the burst down gameplay. Only if you are in drastic need of disruptive spells, you can choose the Temporal Flux talent. Otherwise, it is better to go for the Tal Rasha’s Elements talent. The talent fits common rotation of your spell and will be a nail in the coffin of your enemies.

Talent description: your Abilities benefit from 10% bonus damage as long as they aren’t cast twice in a row.

Pros and Cons of Arcane Orb build

Just like in the Magic Missiles build, the positioning and a poor health pool are two concerns. Compared to the previous build, they are less threatening. Unless you are going to be greedy with your position, Arcane Orb build features a rather safe and far, far away positioning compared to other Li-Ming builds. Instead of worrying about those two, you should care about the accuracy and team coordination. These are two main problems when it comes to playing the build. You would like to anticipate a course of actions in a fight and use Arcane Orb accordingly. Understanding allies’ logic and timing your W with their disruptive spells, as well as other actions, will be key points of succeeding with the Arcane Orb build.
As for strong spots, I think it is understandable that the build dishes out crazy damage numbers in a large AoE. Once you start connecting your W's, your damage numbers will fly away just like your enemies do; across the map.

Teleport build
Another great Li-Ming artImage source:

The build is great for experienced players. You can do wonders with its help. Generally speaking, Heroes of the Storm is a team based game. Sometimes too team based. You rarely can win a fight on your own. Moreover, the game is so team dependent that you can play perfectly but still lose a game because of one teammate’s mistake. In this regard, Li-Ming is a different hero. She can win fights alone! If this wasn’t enough, she has a very snowballing design. As long as she is alive and you have wounded allies, the fight is not over. The Teleport build exploits the snowball feature to a great extent.
When playing the build, you would like to be cunning and patient. To snowball a fight and use your Teleport spell efficiently, you would like to hide from enemy sight and help your mates to score a kill. Once you score a kill, cooldowns of your spells will be reset. After this, you would like to start killing and finishing off one target after another, prioritizing heroes that have the lowest health bar.
Using this build, Li-Ming is almost unmatched in the snowball effect that comes from the Trait as well as crazy sustain the hero has. This allows you to win almost any clutch fights and duels. You can even win uneven fights, and the snowball effect can start from the unfavorable trades.

Talent choices

Li-Ming's Teleport buildImage source:

Aether Walker
(level 1)

The talent adds mobility and saves some Mana for you. The spell is also a build up for the level 7 talent, Calamity. Those two combined offer a great wave-clear potential. You won't spend Mana clearing minion waves, and the process will be easier compared to other builds and spells. Even on level 7, you can clear a minion wave with two Teleports, spending no Mana and only 3 seconds of time. This is a rather good wave-clear for an Assassin, right?
Other than the wave-clear potential, Aether Walker will greatly improve your team fighting capabilities. You will become more effective at chasing heroes and dashing around the battlefield. Lastly, the talent will save you some Mana.

Talent description: if you haven't taken damage in the last 5 seconds, Teleport costs no Mana and its cooldown is decreased by 2 seconds.

Dominance
(level 4)

Li-Ming’s Trait makes her a snowball hero. The talent further improves the snowball effect and the hero sustain. At the same time, Dominance will be very handy in clutch fights. You will be able to turn the tides of battle in your favor and benefit from some unfavorable trades. Sometimes you can even allow yourself to absorb a skill shot or two, knowing that you will be healed by the talent. In the Teleport build, Dominance greatly increases the snowball potential and sustain of the hero.

Talent description: Takedowns restore 25% of your maximum health.

Calamity
(level 7)

Calamity is a core talent of the build. In the build, you use Teleport as a source of additional damage numbers and as a finisher. The talent stacks incredibly well with Li-Ming's snowball design. Combined with the level 13 and level 16 talents, Illusionist and Diamond Skin, the talent will allow you to drastically snowball team fights. Combined with the level 1 talent, Aether Walker, the talent will be a mean of a free and effective wave-clear.
While using Teleport aggressively, keep in mind that you are an incredibly fragile hero. You would like to calculate the odds of your actions and use the spell as a finisher only in situations when you are sure that it will lead to a kill. Using this talent and the build properly and to a great extent will require some time, practice, and experience.

Talent description: Teleport does 542 (309 + 3% per level) damage to enemies near your destination.

Disintegrate
(level 10)
Heroic

This is your finisher in any build. Spell's mechanics is similar to Diablo's ultimate, Lightning Breath. The only difference is the beam's width. The width is smaller and the spell is more sensitive to cursor movement. Also, Disintegrate has a bigger reach. While Heroic is an outstanding finisher with low cooldown time, it has a downside. The downside lies in channeling mechanics. Li-Ming is one the most fragile heroes in the game. She has a low number of hit points compared to many other heroes. Channeling Heroic makes her extremely vulnerable. You would like to use Disintegrate from a large distance, or make sure that there is no grave danger in using it up close.

Depending on the target, you would like to use Disintegrate when a target has 1/3 of health pool. Ideally, you would like to have a few heroes with disruptive abilities so you could channel the ultimate for the full duration. In such case, you can even take down a fragile hero that has a half of maximum hit points. In the Teleport build, you would like to be more careful with the use of the Heroic, as the build features more close up gameplay compared to other builds.

Description: channel a powerful beam, dealing 1168 (462 + 5% per level) damage over 2.5 seconds to enemies while they are in it. The direction of the beam changes with your mouse cursor position. The ultimate has the 20-seconds cooldown and costs 80 Mana.

Illusionist
(level 13)

The talent is beneficial to Teleport build in many ways. First of all, an extra range on the Teleport spell will make you more mobile. Also, chases and escapes will be better. Apart from mobility, the additional range will improve your snowball potential and effectiveness of the build and Teleport spell. You will be even better at winning clutch fights and duels.
The cooldown refreshment effect is also a great offensive and defensive tool. It will grant an extra Teleport to finish off or damage a target. In dire situations, it will be a difference between life and death.

Talent description: increases Teleport range by 50%, and if you lose more than 15% of your Health at once, its cooldown is instantly refreshed. This cannot happen more than once every 4 seconds.

Diamond Skin
(level 16)

Diamond Skin is the last power spike in the Teleport build. The talent grants you additional sustain in a form of a shield. The talent applies the shield each time you cast Teleport. Due to the snowball design of the hero and previously chosen talents, Diamond Skin is extremely strong talent. It will grant you a lot of free and virtual hit points which you can trade for real hit points of your enemies. The talent further increases your dueling potential as well as sustain and snowball potential. Each time you get a Reset, you would like to use Teleport to gain the shield, deal damage, reposition yourself, and absorb enemy damage.

Talent description: when you Teleport, gain 20% of your maximum Health as a Shield for 4 seconds.

Temporal Flux
(level 20)

At first glance, you might think that this talent is not a big deal. I can assure you that the talent is stronger than it seems. First of all, a slow effect allows you to channel the ultimate for the full duration. The only way for an enemy hero to dodge the Heroic is to use an escape ability. However, if you use the ultimate when the enemy hero has the escape on cooldown, there is nothing he can do to avoid your damage.
Second of all, the slow effect adds an initiation potential to Disintegrate. The ultimate is a long-range spell. So, you can use it to initiate a fight or even to force some defensive abilities from an enemy team. Lastly, you can use the Heroic to save a fleeing ally. Again, Disintegrate is a long-range spell, meaning you can help an allied hero from afar.
In the Teleport build, the talent is like the nail in the coffin. Not only you have incredible sustain, snowball potential, and damage but you also gain an AoE slow, which further complements the snowball and overpowered nature of the build and hero.

Talent description: Disintegrate slows enemies by 60%.

Pros and Cons of Teleport build

You might not agree, but I say that this built has no real weak spots. Sure, it is superbly hard to play. You need to calculate or feel the amount of damage you can do and need to do. You need to mind your positioning and simultaneously use the escape ability to dodge and absorb enemy damage as well as to deal damage. At first glance, this all seems hard to execute and perform. However, as you master the hero and the build, you get this unmatched feeling of value you bring into the game. As if you are winning the game on your own. Of course, you are not. This is still a team game, and your team matters. But the build allows you to heavily impact the game and fights when played on the high level. So, due to the nature of the build, a real downside or a weak spot that can be is the way you execute Teleport build, as well as your level of play. This may sound a bit offensive, but it is the way it is with such high skill cap heroes.
As for the strong spots, there are plenty! The Teleport build has incredible sustain and mobility. It further sharpens the snowball and a duel potential of Li-Ming. Lastly, it has Sylvanas-like wave clear and brings in tons of burst down damage.

Situational talents And Terminology 
Li-Ming art by Blizzard's Mr-JackImage source:
Situational talents

There are no perfect builds in Heroes of the Storm. The game is complex and has many variables, so, there are many situational talents in the builds listed above. I’ll start with build specific talents and then will describe talents viable for any build. The talents are listed by a build and according to a level.

Magic Missiles build
Illusionist
(level 13)

If you are new to Li-Ming, don’t want to risk, and looking for a safe option, Illusionist is perfect for you. It will help you dealing with positional mistakes. Also, the talent will give an extra layer of defense in the form of an extra charge of Teleport. This way, you can use the spell for chasing and escaping, and you won’t have to worry about its cooldown.

Talent description: increases Teleport range by 50%, and if you lose more than 15% of your Health at once, its cooldown is instantly refreshed. This cannot happen more than once every 4 seconds.

Mirrorball
(level 16)

The talent is a great choice once you become experienced with the hero and the build. Mirrorball is a flat 66% damage increase for the Magic Missiles spell, provided you will connect the spell with a target. At level 16, Magic Missiles will do almost 1200 damage. If you add the Glass Cannon and Seeker talents to the mix, the spell will deal 1600 damage! This is almost 80% of hit points of many Assassin heroes!

Talent description: Magic Missiles fires an additional 2 missiles.

Arcane Orb build
Illusionist
(level 13)

The reasons for picking this talent in the Arcane Orb build are the same as for the Magic Missiles build.

If you are new to Li-Ming, don’t want to risk, and looking for safe option, Illusionist is perfect for you. It will help you dealing with positional mistakes. Also, the talent will give an additional layer of defense in the form of an extra charge of Teleport. This way, you can use the spell for chasing and escaping, and you won’t have to worry about its cooldown.

Talent description: increases Teleport range by 50%, and if you lose more than 15% of your Health at once, its cooldown is instantly refreshed. This cannot happen more than once every 4 seconds.

Temporal Flux
(level 20)

The talent is a nice addition to the build if you feel that you already doing enough damage and require an extra disruptive spell. Temporal Flux does a lot of work. With its help, you can use Disintegrate to start a fight. The talent also boosts your solo kill and finishing potential. If you catch a fragile enemy hero that has a cooldown on his escape ability, the talent guarantees you a kill.

Talent description: Disintegrate slows enemies by 60%.

Any build

Power Hungry
(level 1)

The talent is extremely powerful on small or roaming maps (Tomb of The Spider Queen, Dragon Shire, and so on). Whether you are going to roam alone or with your team, Power Hungry will increase your roaming potential. Not only you will do more spell damage but also you will regenerate almost all Mana used for a wave clear or gank.

Talent description: Regeneration Globes restore 100% more Mana and grant 10% Ability Power for 20 seconds.

Charged Blast
(level 4)

The talent adds a burst down potential the build. It will be handy when playing against many fragile heroes. If you know that you don’t need more sustain from the Dominance talent, Charged Blast will be a decent replacement. It synergies well with the Magic Missiles build. You can think of it as one extra Missile. Li-Ming’s basic attacks deal poor damage numbers. So, the talent is a boost to auto-attack damage and adds extra damage in for clutch fights and duel scenarios.

Talent description: Basic Attacking a target recently hit by a Magic Missile does an extra 191 (91 + 4% per level) damage.

Terminology

Meta-game – conditions of the game that make some heroes more popular than the others, due to a nature of the game environment. For example, Meta-game in professional games and casual environment is different. In the first case, people have voice communication and spend a lot of time in the game. They can play various heroes on an extreme level, and do organized moves as a team. At the same time, casual environment consists of players of different skill and understanding of the game, so, heroes that are easier to play are more valued there.

AoE – Area of Effect.
Burst down – a use of high damage spells and abilities in a quick succession.
DoT – damage over time.
DPS – damage per second.
Ganking – roaming between the lanes to kill enemy heroes.
Gap closer – an ability used to shorten a distance between you and a target.
Hots – Heroes of the Storm.
Juking  an action aimed at deceiving your opponent. Usually, it involves a cunning use of hero abilities and movement.
Peeling – use of disruptive abilities, as well as body-blocks, to protect your allies. Usually, Warriors are occupied with such action but it can be done by any role. 
Poking – dealing small amounts of damage while maintaining a safe position.
Stutter-stepping – an action that uses cooldowns between auto-attacks to move a bit towards a target. As a result, a player can dish out more right-click damage.
Takedown – a secured kill of an enemy hero.
Wombo-Combo – a setup of spells or Heroics that brings overwhelming results. For example, utter destruction of the enemy team. Usually, it involves spells with tricky mechanics.

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