Characters / Warcraft 3 Heroes

Warcraft Main Character Index
Adventurers
The Alliance: Stormwind (Humans) - Lordaeron (Humans) - Gilneas (Humans/Worgen) - Kul Tiras (Humans) (Jaina Proudmoore) - Other Human Kingdoms - Ironforge (Dwarven Clans) - Gnomeregan (Gnomes) - Quel'Thalas/Telogrus Rift (High Elves and Void Elves) - Darnassus (Night Elves) - The Exodar (Draenei) - Vindicaar (Lightforged Draenei) - Mechagon (Mechagnomes)
The Horde: Orgrimmar (Orcs) - The Darkspear Tribe (Trolls) - Thunder Bluff (Tauren) - The Forsaken (Undead) - Quel'Thalas (Blood Elves) - Bilgewater Cartel (Goblins) - Thunder Totem (Highmountain Tauren) - Suramar (Nightborne) - Zandalari Empire (Zandalar Trolls) - Voldunai (Vulpera) - Other (non-playable races)
Other factions: The Old Horde/Iron Horde | The Scourge (Arthas Menethil) | Sylvanas and her followers (Sylvanas Windrunner) | Knights of the Ebon Blade | Illidan and his followers | Garrosh's Horde | Pandaria | Other mortals | The Void (The Old Gods) | The Light | Eternals | Shadowlands (Death) | The Titans (Arcane) | The Burning Legion (Fel) | The Dragonflights | Wild Gods |
Individual media: Warcraft I And II Units | Warcraft III Units | Warcraft III Heroes | Film characters | Hearthstone characters | Warcraft characters in Heroes of the Storm (Assassins - Warriors - Support)

In Warcraft III, Heroes are the main leaders of the armies and have their own abilities, personalities, and voice lines. Unlike in Warcraft II, they are not simply upgraded versions of regular units.

In Reign of Chaos, each race has 3 heroes, with a 4th added in The Frozen Throne; they are summoned by a special Altar building^note Altar of Kings for humans; Altar of Elders for night elves; Altar of Storms for orcs; and Altar of Darkness for undead. Additionally, Frozen Throne introduced a number of neutral heroes that can be hired from Mercenary Camps. The first hero costs nothing other than food; subsequent heroes can be summoned once the player's main Town Hall building is upgraded a second and third time, but will cost considerable resources. Heroes are classified as Cunning heroes (main stat is Agility), Warrior heroes (main stat is Strength), or Mystical heroes (main stat is Intelligence).

The heroes' game design (stats, levelling, inventory) was borrowed from Diablo (1997) and Diablo II, and went on to influence the game design of the Player Character in World of Warcraft. Defense of the Ancients before it became Dota 2 started out as a Frozen Throne map and many of the characters found their origins in these heroes. Four Heroes in Dota 2 still have proper names lifted from the generic heroes names of Warcraft III. ^note  Terrorblade (Demon Marauder) and Darkterror (Faceless Void) are lifted from the Demon Hunter, Banehallow (Lycan) is lifted from the Dreadlord, and Razzil Darkbrew (Alchemist) is a combination of Razzil Naypolm and Ezzel Darkbrewer from the Goblin Alchemist. However, only Terrorblade is commonly known by his proper name, with the rest known by their class.

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Heroes in General

• Anti-Hoarding: Heroes can only carry 6 items. Until Reforged, multiple consumables (potions, scrolls) would take multiple item slots as well (while having a shared cooldown).
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: Even after The Frozen Throne added a fourth hero for every side and neutral heroes that anyone can hire, each player remains limited to three heroes in a multiplayer game.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: Heroes that have purely offensive ultimate spells almost always bypass spell immunity ^note Bladestorm, Earthquake, Starfall, Death and Decay, Inferno, Tornado, Charm, Transmute, Doom, and Stampede, though Volcano does not. Spell Immune units will not be protected from being damaged or affected by these spells.
• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: All factions have this type of approach to the hero selection in The Frozen Throne. The 3 heroes for all races in Reign of Chaos already leaned towards a flexible caster (Balance), a frontline warrior (Power), and a fragile but potentially very powerful usually-Intelligence hero (Skill). When the expansion came about, the 4th hero as a result was much more outside-the-box in design. This is with the exception of Undead, whose new hero fit into one of the existing roles much better. More details and explanations are in each of their race sections below.
• Boring, but Practical: Unlocking an ultimate spell can be a major boon, but sometimes, maxing out two of a hero's spells can be just a useful if not more so. Some heroes like the Death Knight work well this way as their two key spells are very potent. The Lich can be effective this way too by maxing out Frost Nova for maximum snare time and damage or Dark Ritual to maximize Mana recovery for said Frost Novas.
• Brains Evil, Brawn Good: On average, intelligence heroes (or more accurately, caster heroes) in each faction tend to be more unpleasant and ruder than strength heroes, who tend to be more outwardly heroic.
  • Compare the Archmage or Blood Mage to the Mountain King for example in the humans. This is also very visible with the Undead heroes where the Liches and Dreadlords (actually strength-intellect hybrids) are heinous and monstrous, while the Crypt Lord is almost a Punch-Clock Villain in comparison. Additionally, the Big Bad of Reign of Chaos is also an intelligence hero. Notable aversions are the Orc Far Seers who are noble spiritual leaders, and the strength-favored Death Knights who enjoy wanton cruelty to the living.
  • Agility fighters tend to be anti heroes. This is visible with Night Elf Demon Hunters only using the dark arts to fight existential threats like the Burning Legion, and the Wardens who do much dirty work for the Sentinels as jailers, assassins, and bounty hunters. The Orc Blademasters deliver brutal attacks with Wind Walk backstabs and critical strikes that can severely wound targets, but are still honorable fighters serving the new horde. The Dark Rangers are a tragic case, as they're former archers of Quel'thalas who are primarily upset over being forcibly raised as Banshees (originally) to serve the Scourge, and mainly lash out at targets in grief over their predicament.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Spells deal less damage to heroes (they only take 70% damage from them), most spells have a reduced duration on heroes. There are several spells ^note usually some kind instant kill spell like Charm or Transmute, or extremely powerful debuffs like Doom or Polymorph that they are completely immune to. Normal units can attain hero status duration and immunity to certain spells (though not reduced damage taken) if they have the Resistant Skin passive.
• Continuing is Painful: Heroes can be revived after they are killed in the melee game and in campaign missions with bases. However, reviving takes a long time and requires a lot of money depending on their level. Many melee games can become flat-out hopeless if you lose one or multiple heroes in a fight. You can revive heroes instantly at double gold cost at the tavern, but they will start at half health and no-mana. Averted in The Founding of Durotar, where Rexxar and his companions will be revived at full health at the last resurrection stone they approached only a few seconds after they die.
• Diminishing Returns for Balance: In most if not all cases, an item that grants a passive ability that replicates a similar hero ability does not stack with duplicate items or the hero's own version of that ability. The strongest version of that effect will take effect. Any duplicates can be passed on to your other heroes, however. For example, the Demon Hunter can not simultaneously benefit from a Talisman of Evasion and the Evasion talent; however, if the Demon Hunter didn't place points into Evasion, the Talisman can be used as a weaker substitute to level 2 Evasion.
• Dueling Player Characters: Various campaign characters you play as often become opponents in a later campaign. The Frozen Throne exaggerates this with Illidan Stormrage, who is an enemy for most of the first campaign, playable at the end of it, playable again near the end of the second campaign, and becomes the last opponent of the third campaign.
• Dump Stat: Heroes have a stat that is optimal to stack, sometimes one that isn't a "primary" attribute. For instance, many strength heroes have trouble in the mana department and can benefit from regeneration and capacity as a priority while relying upon their baseline strength growth for survival. The Death Knight is a solid example as their basic attack is much less efficient than spending mana on Death Coil since it heals fellow undead or harms living opponents. Death Knights are also not typically risked as a tanking hero so there's even less incentive to stack strength or health items.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Heroes have their own special attack type, which causes them to deal full damage to all armor types except Fortified and Divine, but that wasn't always the case. It was patched into Reign of Chaos, but originally (and still in the Reign of Chaos campaigns), all heroes (minus the few that had the Chaos attack type) had the Normal attack type. This is the same as most melee units (like Footmen and Grunts) and was effective against ranged units (like Archers and Riflemen). This meant it fit (both thematically and in balance terms) with melee heroes, like Paladins and Blademasters. However, it was out of place on ranged heroes such as the Lich and Priestess of the Moon, whose attacks dealt massive damage to ranged units without having to get close to them. Since heroes already had their own special armor type, it was a logical choice to give them their own attack type too.
• Experience Penalty: In The Frozen Throne, creeps stop giving experience to heroes after they are level 5 (in melee games). This means that your hero will not be able to learn their ultimate ability without engaging in combat with the enemy army. This was not the case in Reign of Chaos where you could creep to level 10 if you wanted to.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: Warrior, Mystical, and Cunning heroes. They are heroes with the primary attribute Strength, Intelligence, and Agility respectively. Most heroes conform to these role archetypes pretty closely, unless they are a Mechanically Unusual Class. Only the Orcish Horde has all 3 types available by default. Humans and Undead don't have Cunning Heroes, Night Elves don't have Warrior heroes. Neutral heroes come in all types. Factions with deficiencies can cover this lack of flexibility with the right neutral hero.
• Flunky Boss: If there is an enemy hero in the campaign, there tends to be other additional aid. After all, they are the leaders of armies. The two times where it appears to be Subverted it is actually Double Subverted.
  • The Blademaster of the Blackrock Clan is fought alone without any mooks. But one of his abilities create Mirror Images, which can take damage, but cannot deal any, effectively acting as additional meat shields for the real Blademaster.
  • The Dreadlord, Balnazzar, exclusively attacks your bases alone. But he will summon multiple Infernals once he is engaged in combat, so he essentially creates a force as strong as an entire army on his own.
• Fragile Speedster: A huge majority of Squishy Wizard heroes are riding mounts and have higher movement speed than default, balancing their frailty a little bit.
• Frontline General: Most strength heroes and some agility heroes like the Demon Hunter lead their army from the frontlines and are capable or well suited for absorbing damage.
• Hero Must Survive: In any Baseless Mission, this is always a condition.
• Hero Unit: Which grants them perks like Contractual Boss Immunity and limitations like only one iteration of a hero being allowed for recruitment per player and a maximum of three heroes recruited. However, there are ways around these limitations such as an ally leaving a game and thus granting you control of their army.
• Large and in Charge: Hero units are usually bigger than most units in a techtree. It helps visually distinguish them from their soldiers. Some heroes like the Tauren Chieftain, Crypt Lord, and Pit Lord are even bigger than the other heroes.
• The Law of Power Proportionate to Effort: Many heroes have channeling spells as their ultimates (or in some cases like the Archmage, as a normal spell). They are very powerful, but need the hero to stand still uninterrupted to maintain it.
• Mook Commander: Any hero with an aura is one of these by default.
• No Body Left Behind: When Heroes die, their bodies fade away, rather than rotting. Their corpses cannot be raised for spells that use it. Justified by gameplay mechanics, as unlike regular units, heroes can be revived at an Altar or Tavern, no worse for wear compared to when they were killed.
  • The living (not Undead) heroes ascend upwards while fading away, like a less cartoonish version of Winged Soul Flies Off at Death.
  • Undead heroes are a bit different. The Lich and Dreadlord implode and explode respectively while the Death Knight and Crypt Lord fade away without ascending. Instead of flying upwards, the undead has a special "dissipate" effect, where spirits and a ghostly skull ascend instead. This could possibly indicate their release from undeath, or signify them going to hell rather that ascending to heaven.
  • Hero models do not have decaying animations because of this mechanic. If their model was given to a unit in the editor, they would not rot like most units. The only exception is the Pit Lord, because a Unit-version of a Pit Lord appears in a mission in the Night Elf campaign in The Frozen Throne.
• One-Steve Limit: This rarely if ever comes up in melee games, but if there are more heroes than there are names for them, the game will just add a number to the existing name (Samuro III, Destromath II).
• Power Glows: Each hero's model visibly glows along with their weapons, which helps visually distinguish them from the normal units.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: Heroes fill the role of generals and are usually as strong as a Tier 3 unit when they start at level 1, though they eventually become much stronger as they level up and gain items.
• Signature Move: All melee-game heroes have unique skillsets, but for most of the heroes it's the first ability that is the flashiest (e.g Holy Light, Chain Lightning, Frost Nova) and most often maxed out. The second and third abilities, while often viable to max out or take early, tend to be less flashy. Some heroes who have more boring skillsets like Priestess of the Moon are more closely associated with their ultimates instead.
• Speed, Smarts and Strength: This is represented by the Agility, Intelligence, and Strength attributes in the game. Strength points increase health and health regeneration. Agility points increase armor and attack speed. Intelligence points increase mana and mana regeneration.
• Spell Blade: At tier 3, each faction's shop allows heroes to purchase a magical Orb that empowers their attack with increased damage and an added effect. Melee heroes also gain the ability to attack air units.
  • Humans have the Orb of Fire, which (depending on the version) either allows the hero's attacks to deal splash damage or reduce the healing and health regeneration received by the target.
  • Orcs get the Orb of Lightning, which gives the user's attacks a chance to cast Purge on the target, greatly slowing it and removing all buffs from it.
  • The Undead use the Orb of Corruption, which reduces the target's armor.
  • The Night Elves get access to the Orb of Venom, which slows the attack target and deals minor damage over time.
  • Two more Orbs exist, but cannot be purchased and can only be dropped by neutral creeps on certain maps: the Orb of Darkness causes the hero's attack to place the Black Arrows effect on victims, causing them to spawn skeletons on death, while the Orb of Frost allows the holder's attacks to inflict a heavy slow. The Founding of Durotar campaign also has an Orb of Slow that gives the holder's attacks a chance to cast the Sorceress's Slow on targets.
• Support Power: Blurring the line between special abilities and this trope, some heroes essentially let you interface with supporting abilities. Abilities like a Defog of War work especially like this due to the range being essentially unlimited.
• Three-Stat System: Strength, which determines max health and HP regeneration; Agility, which determines armor and attack speed; and Intelligence, which determines max mana and mana regeneration.
• Uniqueness Rule: In skirmish games, each player is limited to one hero of any type.
• You Have Researched Breathing: Heroes have backstory about their exploits and why they're legendary in the story, but for gameplay balance, they all start at level 1, and only start with a single level 1 spell, available to be unlocked.

Human Heroes

Human Heroes in General

Left to right: Mountain King, Archmage, Paladin, Blood Mage

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• Anti-Regeneration: Patch 1.31 modified the Orb of Fire item to reduce healing and regeneration by 35%. This gives it a good niche against the Undead to counter their Healing Factor mechanics and Death Coil's healing component when focusing on key targets.
• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: Paladin, Mountain King, Archmage, and Blood Mage.
  • Paladin is a semi supportive semi-tank healer Stone Wall with some offensive capabilities against Undead opponents, Mountain King is a powerful frontline warrior who can deal and take a lot of damage, Archmage is a backline Squishy Wizard with a flexible and supportive skillset, and the Blood Mage is completely focused on dealing massive magical spell damage and maintaining the mana to keep doing it.
• Elemental Powers: The heroes have different elemental powers in their abilities. Water and Ice for the Archmage, Fire for the Blood Mage, Lightning and Thunder for the Mountain King, and Light for the Paladin.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: All of the heroes except the Paladin have spells that can do this. However, the Archmage and Blood Mage risk friendly fire, so its not uncommon to build a lot of Spell Breakers (who are immune to magic) to not have to worry about this.
• Jack of All Trades: The Human Alliance heroes generally are more flexible than the heroes of the other factions, who tend to be more specialized and only have one flexible hero. They fill a variety of roles with tanking, healing-and-protection, harassment, nuking down targets, and more. Blood Magi can offer a degree of economic harassment with their Flame Strike spell and can steal enemy mana to sustain the effort, but they lack the defensive powers of the Blademaster and Demon Hunter who are also used in a similar role of harassment and mana-burning respectively. Mountain Kings offer valuable snares and stuns and a powerful nuke spell with its own stun, and their Avatar ultimate turns them into a formidable spell-immune tank, but their tanking prowess isn't on the same tier as an Undead Crypt Lord and they don't have the raw health potential of a Tauren Chieftain with Reincarnation. Paladins offers survival support for the Alliance with Holy Light and Devotion Aura, but they're not as ubiquitous as the Undead Death Knight due to their offense being limited to casting Holy Light on the Undead. The Archmagi are perhaps a shining example of a jack of all trades caster, with a reasonably durable summon who can attack air units, area damage support like the Blood Mage (but it needs channeling), an aura that simply lets heroes and casters recover mana faster (very valuable in team games), and the Mass Teleport ultimate that is equally invaluable for both defensive and offensive use and has a generously short cooldown.
• Mechanical Animals: Mechanical Critters, which are unique to the human Arcane Vault, serve as very slow spies in the early game. They are also used to block neutral creeps, since they do not draw aggro. Players often stand at a choke point and trick the neutral creeps into trying to attack them but are unable to reach because a mechanical critter is in the way.
• A Taste of Their Own Medicine: Human players pose a major threat to Undead opponents as Paladins can damage all of their biological units with Holy Light. Human players can even exceed the Undead heroes' abilty to nuke down targets with nukes of their own: A Blood Mage may banish an Undead, boosting the magical damage they take by 66% and a Mountain King and Paladin may cast Storm Bolt and Holy Light respectively for a devastating combo.
• Teleportation Rescue: Staff of Sanctuary allows any human player to save any unit they have, teleporting back to the highest tier town hall, disabling and healing it over time. This allows them to keep high value units alive and ready to redeploy.
• Wolfpack Boss: A few times in The Founding of Durotar, multiple human heroes form a boss encounter. The most infamous of these is in Act II on the Theramore Island submap, against a Level 14 Mountain King and Level 12 Archmage and Paladin.

Archmage

"This had better be worth it!"

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Blizzard, Summon Water Elemental, Brilliance Aura, Mass Teleport (Ultimate)
Possible names: Tenn Flamecaster, Nilas Arcanister, Andromath, Shal Lightbinder, Aran Spellweaver, Manath Magesinger, Landazar, Doril Magefont, Peril Spellbinder, Conjurus Rex, Fordred Aran, Dalar Dawnweaver, Kelen the Seeker
Playable Campaign character: Jaina Proudmoore
NPC Campaign character: Antonidas

Archmages hail from the magical kingdom of Dalaran, and use their magical powers to defend humanity from all external threats. Mounted on horseback, they can move quickly. They can bolster their armies with hulking Water Elementals, rain terror down upon their foes with Blizzard, and support allied spellcasters and heroes with Brilliance Aura. Their ultimate ability, Mass Teleport, allows them to quickly teleport large numbers of troops to friendly units or buildings, providing for a quick retreat or rendering aid to allies under attack.

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• Anchored Teleportation: Mass Teleport requires one friendly unit or building to serve as an anchor for the Archmage and nearby units to teleport to.
• Boring, but Practical: Mass Teleport is one of few ultimate abilities with no direct offensive use or boost, but it can be devastatingly effective when used properly, as it allows two full control groups (24 units) plus the Archmage himself to be teleported to any friendly unit or building, giving his army unparalleled mobility to siege, intercept, or flee from enemy forces.
• Composite Character: Archmagi are seniors like the Warcraft I Conjurers and may similarly specialize in summoning Water Elementals, but may also specialize in calling down dangerous Blizzards like the Magi of Warcraft II, and hurl fireballs as a basic attack instead of a spell that requires mana.
• Crutch Character: Like the Far Seer below, the Archmage is at his most useful in early game, which is why he's often picked as the first hero; Blizzard is excellent for killing cluster of weak units or workers, while Water Elemental can tip early battles where there are few units. However, as the match progresses, armies become much bigger and weak units are replaced with stronger ones, reducing the usefulness of those two spells, so he can only contribute by increasing the mana regeneration of casters and other heroes through Brilliance Aura and moving armies around with Mass Teleport, needing other heroes to carry the battle.
• Decomposite Character: Archmagi do not have Slow, Invisibility, or Polymorph like their Warcraft II iterations. Sorceresses have these abilities instead.
• Fragile Speedster: They aren't very durable, but their horses mean they can move quickly and maneuver easily. And if he learns Mass Teleport and the foe can't interrupt it, he can just teleport to safety right before the enemy's eyes.
• Grumpy Old Man: Known for being gruff and impatient.
  Archmage: Whatever.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Despite being one of the most common enemy heroes, the player only gets to play as an Archmage (Jaina) in two missions early on in the Human Campaign of Reign of Chaos. She returns in The Frozen Throne for a brief segment near the beginning of Act II of The Founding of Durotar, but quickly leaves the party again.
• An Ice Person: Their Blizzard spell calls down a rain of ice.
• Making a Splash: They can summon Water Elementals.
• Magic Staff: The Archmage carries a staff which he uses to cast his spells.
• Mass Teleportation: Their ultimate spell, Mass Teleport, which allows him to teleport himself and up to 23 friendly units to another friendly ground unit or building.
• Moveset Clone: The Archmages are subjected to this a few times with imitators.
  • In The Founding of Durotar, Admiral Proudmoore has a strong Archmage as one of his lieutenants, called "Chief of Chaplains". He has the same skills as a normal Archmage, except he also has a stronger version of the Demon Hunter's Mana Burn.
  • In the mission "The Dungeons of Dalaran", four Ghostly Archmages occupy the dungeon, but they have the same abilities as when they were alive, and the only difference is that they are classified as Undead.
• Odd Name Out: Kelen the Seeker. All other Archmage names are their names without titles, though oddly Landazar and Andromath also both have no last name.
• Our Ghosts Are Different: Four ghost archmages that were killed by Arthas show up in "The Dungeons of Dalaran", unable to find peace in death. They have the same skills as when they were alive, and summon some still-very-corporeal water elementals.
• Playing with Fire: Their regular attack is a fireball cast from their staff.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The blue to the Blood Mage's red; the Archmage's focus on ice and water magic and their general apathetic disposition contrast with the Blood Mage's focus on fire spells and their burning desire for revenge.
• Simple, yet Awesome: As described under Heart Is an Awesome Power above, Mass Teleport may not be as flashy as summoning a super unit to fight by your side, or channeling a super spell for massive damage, but the spell enables incredible mobility for your army.
• Squishy Wizard: Doesn't have much health or armor and goes down fairly easily when focused. Their abilities help offset the weakness, though.
• Summon Magic: Summoning Water Elementals. They are reasonably strong ranged units.
• Support Party Member: Aside from Blizzard and Water Elementals, the Archmage doesn't personally contribute much in the way of damage nor can he stand in the front line and absorb damage. That being said, he has two amazing support abilities in Brilliance Aura and Mass Teleport to keep his army supplied with mana and on the move, and can spit out said Water Elementals to contribute damage and serve as meat shields. Blizzard comes into play the most in team matches, where allies can help divert attention so the Archmage can't be stunned, and it's more difficult to dodge the ice storms due to larger formations of armies.
• Underground Monkey: In the fifth Undead mission in Reforged, "The Fall of Silvermoon", there are four Archmages that use a unique model, with a High Elven rider.
• Unicorn: The manual mentions unicorns as Archmages' mounts, though in the game itself they ride normal horses.
• Wizard Beard: As the archetypical wizard of the Warcraft setting, the Archmage fittingly has a long white beard extending down his chest.

Mountain King

"All right, who wants some?!"

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Storm Bolt, Thunder Clap, Bash, Avatar (Ultimate)
Possible names: Bor Stonebreaker, Munin Ironcliff, Thorgas Broadaxe, Kelv Sternhammer, Grim Thunderbrew, Buri Frostbeard, Huginn Ironcliff, Thordin Rockbeard, Bandis Forgefire, Gar Doomforge, Beazel Bludstone, Modi Stonesmith, Aggronor the Mighty
Playable Campaign character: Muradin Bronzebeard
NPC Campaign character: Baelgun Flamebeard

The mighty dwarven Mountain Kings (or Thanes) of Khaz Modan defend their mountain kingdom with ferocity and courage. Wielding enchanted hammers and axes, they safeguard the Alliance that saved Khaz Modan during the Second War against the merciless Horde, and are now sworn to its protection. They can stun enemies from afar with Storm Bolt, deal damage and slow foes around them with Thunder Clap, and deal extra damage and stun (noticing a theme?) with their passive bonus Bash. Their ultimate ability, Avatar, transforms them into a juggernaut colossus that deals bonus damage, and is tough to take down due to gaining additional health and armor, and also becoming immune to spells.

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• Anti-Infantry: The Mountain King with levels in Thunder Clap is one of the most effective anti Zerg Rush tools, due to Thunder Clap's area of effect, high damage, low cooldown, and powerful slow.
• Anti-Magic: Avatar makes him immune to spells and magical damage from casters and heavy air units, which allows him to avoid the most dangerous threats to almost all heroes.
• Battle Cry: When using Avatar, the game plays an audio clip that screams "For Khaz Modan!".
• Boisterous Bruiser: Very much so. He yells most of his lines, with several of them telling people to move out of his way.
• Blood Knight: According to the official description, Mountain Kings "live only for battle," and his quotes seem to match that.

  Mountain King: Wait till ye see me in action!

• Cool Helmet: The Mountain King wears an impressive helm with curved horns, iconic enough to be part of the Dwarf heritage armor in World of Warcraft.
• Crowd Control: All their normal abilities lean toward this. Storm Bolt does a big hit of damage and stuns, Bash gives them a passive chance to stun, and Thunder Clap deals area of effect damage and slows all enemies hit.
• Disc-One Nuke: Storm Bolt is, hands down, the strongest single-target disable and nuke available in multiplayer, and it's usable right from level 1. The reliable stun makes it phenomenal for locking down enemy heroes and interrupting channels right from the get-go, and if he levels it up further, the hefty damage allows him to simply destroy weakened units and heroes outright. The only thing keeping Storm Bolt in check is the Mountain King's tiny mana pool, but that can be solved with a Blood Mage to feed him mana and Banish targets to make Storm Bolt hit even harder.
• Dual Wielding: Wields a hammer in one hand and an axe in the other.
• Glacier Waif: As normal for a fantasy dwarf. Despite his very small model size, the Mountain King is a badass Mighty Glacier, even more impressive in combat than the more generically heroic-looking Paladin.
• Hot-Blooded: The generic Mountain King shouts most of his lines. The campaign Mountain King, Muradin Bronzebeard, is more relaxed, thoughtful, and wisecracking in contrast, though he has his own share of energetic lines.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: Thunder Clap hits all land units around the Mountain King and slows them. It is extremely effective at countering Zerg Rush strategies.
• The Juggernaut: Once a Mountain King hits level 6 and pops Avatar, good luck taking him down - he's completely immune to crowd control and magic damage, hits like a truck with his spells and bonus attack damage, and has about five truckloads of health.
• Living Statue: Avatar makes the Mountain King's skin stone-like and causes him to grow, giving this kind of a look. In lore, this is the Mountain King tapping into their ancestral powers, when they were Titan-forged before succumbing to the curse of flesh.
• Magic Knight: The Mountain King is a powerful physical fighter and tank but he attacks rather slowly so he deals a huge amount of his damage as magical burst damage between Storm Bolt and Thunder Clap.
• Mighty Glacier: They're tough and deal heavy damage, but also move and attack fairly slowly and suffer from a fairly small mana pool to cast their spells.
• No-Sell: While using Avatar, the Mountain King is immune to spells. After later patches, this only applies to enemy spells, so friendly units can still heal him.
• Odd Name Out: Aggronor the Mighty is the only Mountain King with no last name.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Likes fighting? Check. Hammers and axes? Check. Lives in cities under the mountain? Check. Like drinking? If the "Thunderbrew" name is any indication, check. Exaggerated Scottish accent? Check.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: He's a dwarf, with the stature that implies, but is the frontline tank for Human armies, able to take a few hits and hit back harder.
• Shock and Awe: Storm Bolt and Thunder Clap both make use of lightning magic.
• Super Mode: Avatar transforms them into a juggernaut that hits hard and is even harder to kill, with magic immunity and a huge health bonus.
• Thunder Hammer: Storm Bolt is a lightning hammer and deals massive damage when thrown.

Paladin

"I live to serve all believers."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Holy Light, Divine Shield, Devotion Aura, Resurrection (Ultimate)
Possible names: Granis Darkhammer, Jorn the Redeemer, Sage Truthbearer, Malak the Avenger, Gavinrad the Dire, Morlune the Mighty, Agamand the True, Ballador the Bright, Manadar the Healer, Zann the Defender, Arius the Seeker, Aurrius the Pure, Karnwield the Seeker, Buzan the Fearless
Playable Campaign characters: Arthas Menethil, Magroth the Defender
NPC Campaign characters: Uther Lightbringer, Duke Lionheart, Dagren the Orcslayer, Halahk the Lifebringer

The Paladins of the Silver Hand were formed in the Second War to fight back the marauding Orcish Horde, when priests of Stormwind began to study arms and knights of Lordaeron were tutored in holy magic. Now wielding both, the Paladins, armed with mighty warhammers and unshakable faith, defend their kingdom and the innocent from all manner of threats. They can heal their allies and burn undead foes with Holy Light, make themselves invulnerable with Divine Shield, and provide extra armor for their allies with Devotion Aura. Their ultimate ability, Resurrection, brings 6 allied units back to life, enabling them to turn the tide of battle when all hope seems lost.

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• Back from the Dead: Resurrection summons an angelic figure made of light that restores six friendly corpses to life... unless they were already reanimated, chewed on, gibbed, or converted into skeletons by the undead. Notably, you can revive units even if you are at the max food limit, which means Resurrection is one of the only spells that potentially goes around that game mechanic.
• Bling of War: Uther's model features shining armor in white and gold with added lion symbols in contrast to the plainer plate and leather worn by the regular Paladin. In Reforged, most of the campaign Paladin variants feature heavily decorated plate armor, particularly Uther and Arthas.
• Combat Medic: Unlike most healing heroes and units, the Paladin is comfortable at or near the front lines. He is very durable with Devotion Aura and Divine Shield prevents him from being damaged.
• Cool Sword: Dagren the Orcslayer's model in Reforged has him inexplicably wielding the iconic Ashbringer from World of Warcraft.
• Crippling Overspecialization: The Paladin is one of the most highly specialized heroes, being a powerful asset when batting the Undead faction with Holy Light, but only able to support with their spells outside of battling the Undead as Holy Light only damages Undead units. As a result, they tend to show up most in 1v1 matches against the Undead and in team games where their healing and armor aura are great support for their team.
• Graceful in Their Element: With Holy Light's ability to damage the Undead and Divine Shield providing up to 35 seconds of invulnerability, the Paladin is well suited to battling the Undead faction and becoming invulnerable to all sources of damage. Divine Shield is also an excellent counter to the Undead's nuke spells. Undead players must take special care to protect their Acolytes and Ghouls from Paladin raids, lest the Paladin level up unopposed and go from a nuisance to a major danger. In team game, the Paladin remains an ideal hero against The Undead, but can opt for early Devotion Aura instead of Divine Shield to bestow significant armor points to allies.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Magroth the Defender is one of the optional variety in "The Ruins of Dalaran" in Terror of the Tides, being an optional rescuable hero that will help Maiev and Malfurion stop Illidan. He does not join in the final mission.
• Hammer of the Holy: Devout Church Militants wielding a truly impressive warhammer.
• Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: The Paladin wears heavy plate armor, but no helmet unlike their previous incarnation.
• Holy Burns Evil: Holy Light can heal living allies, but it can also damage undead enemies. This is quite useful in the Human campaign, since the undead are the main enemies for most of it.
• Holy Hand Grenade: Holy Light can only be used aggressively on the Undead (or demons flagged as Undead). It cannot be used to heal them if allied.
• Humongous-Headed Hammer: The Paladin carries a two-handed sledgehammer the size of their own torso.
• Ideal Illness Immunity: According to the Death Knight's unit lore, Paladins are immune to all disease up to and including the Plague of Undeath (although Gameplay and Story Segregation means they are still vulnerable to the Meat Wagon and Abomination's Disease Cloud effect).
• Knight in Shining Armor: Though they may not ride horses in this game, the Paladins are also known as the noble and selfless Knights of the Silver Hand, devoted to protecting humanity from whatever threatens it.
• Light 'em Up: He has light-based powers.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: They are unique in that their unusual heal/nuke spell can only harm Undead units. They are also unique among melee heroes in that they have an Evil Counterpart, the Death Knight whose heal/nuke only harms the living and only heals the Undead.
• Moveset Clone: Like the Archmage, in The Founding of Durotar, the Paladin has a Admiral Proudmoore lieutenant counterpart with all the same abilities, called "Chief Petty Officer".
• Mutual Disadvantage:
  • Towards the Undead. Paladins have a lot more offensive capabilities against the undead than the other races due to Holy Light, but conversely, Undead heroes and units are the only ones ^note besides a few neutral units and mercenaries that also have access to these undead abilties, and the Night Elven Avatar of Vengeance that can raise or destroy enemy corpses which can make Resurrection close to useless in a battle.
  • When dueling opponent Paladins, they have no offense spells for direct damage, limited to their melee attack and any offensive items they have.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: When using Divine Shield he's immune to damage and spells. When fully upgraded it lasts for 35 seconds.
• No Self-Buffs: The Paladin can't heal himself with Holy Light. Fortunately, he can protect himself with Divine Shield instead.
• Odd Name Out: The name Granis Darkhammer doesn't sound exactly Light-themed.
• Old Soldier: Apart from Arthas, the regular Paladin and the campaign variants are all generally depicted as older and hardened veterans.
• The Paladin: Natch. They are particularly the "defend the innocent" good type, though Arthas shows that even these can fall to darkness, while the Rexxar campaign-only Shield of the Deathlord mentions a paladin who murdered his own family thinking they were impure.
• Palette Swap: Due to the number of Paladins that show up in the campaign, there's a few recolored variants of the standard hero with black or white hair, while Uther's model has unique white and gold armor. Reforged goes beyond just swapping colors and gives most of the Paladins in the campaign their own unique model with different weapons.
• Recurring Boss: Many, many Paladins show up as opponents in the campaigns, especially the Undead campaigns that take place in Lordaeron. Most of them have the names of the generic Paladins, but some get unique names.
• Shoot the Medic First: A Paladin can be a huge pain to fight because of how much healing that Holy Light provides, as well as the armor boost from Devotion Aura. It can make it hard to focus down or kill certain units when he's around. However, low level Paladins can be killed surprisingly easily by focus fire because he can't use Holy Light on himself. He has Divine Shield to counteract this weakness a bit, but it takes a lot of levels before he truly is very difficult to kill.
• Spell Book: The Paladin carries a large holy libram at their side which they pull out and use for their spells.
• Stone Wall: The Paladin has almost no offensive capabilities whatsoever (barring Holy Light against Undead), but he's fairly bulky by himself, can pop Divine Shield to protect himself from focus fire, and can make allies very hard to kill with his armor aura and healing.
• Support Party Member: All of his abilities involve healing, protection, and overall increasing durability and survivability of your other units with almost nothing in the way of offense. His offensive potential is against undead. You'll need other heroes to do actual damage.
• This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: They are very specialized for team game support with healing plus buffing the team's armor and/or fighting the Undead with Holy Light, but they are very good at their roles.

Blood Mage (Frozen Throne)

"Burning to avenge."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Flame Strike, Siphon Mana, Banish, Phoenix (Ultimate)
Possible names: Eldin Sunstrider, Tanin Hawkwing, Lorn Bloodseeker, Aldos Firestar, Gilaras Drakeson, Hale Magefire, Kath'ranis Remar, Tyoril Sunchaser, Sylvos Windrunner, Tenris Mirkblood, Marakanis Starfury, Geldor Earthfire, Halendor Burnkin, Kelen the Destroyer
Playable Campaign character: Kael'thas Sunstrider

The high elves of Quel'Thalas were all but wiped out when the Scourge invaded, seeking the power of their sacred Sunwell. Driven to seek new sources of magic, the Blood Mages turned to the fel, augmenting their already considerable magics with demonic power which they use in their ruthless quest to avenge their fallen people. They can call pillars of flames with Flame Strike, steal enemies' mana with Siphon Mana, and render enemies unable to attack with Banish. Their ultimate ability, Phoenix, summons a magical bird of fire that burns all enemies and itself over time; when it dies, it can be reborn from its egg.

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• Achilles' Heel:
  • Both Flame Strike and Siphon Mana require channeling, making the Blood Mage vulnerable to interruptions such as stuns, roots, and silences (Flame Strike fizzles if he's stunned during the channel time before the spell takes effect, and Siphon Mana will be cut short and not drain the full amount).
  • The Blood Mage can do nothing to enemies that have magic immunity, since most of his kit relies on offensive debuffs and magic damage. His basic attack is very weak. Even his Phoenix only deals magic damage and thus can't touch them.
• Animal Motifs: Phoenixes, and birds in general. In World of Warcraft, the phoenix is the crest of the blood elves.
• Anti-Structure: Flame Strike has an advantage over Blizzard due to not being blunted by structures. This enables Blood Magi to contribute to base sieging efforts more efficiently than Archmagi. It is still just as powerful against land units, but they have the ability to evacuate the blast zone (unless they are snared or stunned).
• Black Mage: The Blood Mage is designed as an extremely powerful offensive damaging spellcaster. He is supposed to use Banish on his target, then Flame Strike them and right click them with his Phoenix, and to keep his mana up by draining it from enemy heroes or casters. This gives him massive potential damage and makes him self sustaining. However, in practice, its often more common for him to see a lot of support use by being a mana battery for mana dependent heroes.
• Boring, but Practical: Not a very flashy way to play, but a Blood Mage pairs incredibly well with a Mountain King as a Support Party Member; the Blood Mage can feed the Mountain King mana and Banish targets so that the MK can follow up with a Storm Bolt dealing 66% additional damage, presenting a major setback to any target's health. This combo also works with a Paladin against an Undead opponent by amplifying Holy Light's damage component.
• Call-Back: A member of the Sunstrider and Windrunner families is a possibility for which Blood Mage you end up recruiting. Kael'thas Sunstrider, and Sylvanas Windrunner are both campaign characters.
• Double-Edged Buff: Banish makes the target more vulnerable to magic damage and stops it from attacking, but also makes it immune to physical damage. This gives the spell both offensive (no one wants to eat a Storm Bolt or Flame Strike after being Banished) and defensive utility (for saving units that are being dogpiled by heavy melee attackers).
• Glass Cannon: For maximum damage, Blood Magi can Banish a target and nuke it with Flame Strike and/or their Phoenix summon for heavy damage, but they have low vitality for a hero and their Banish does not stop heroes or casters from casting potentially dangerous spells, it just disables their basic attack. Their Phoenix is also penalized with a strong debuff that causes them to be unaffected by Fountains of Health, and rapidly lose health until they become an egg. It is crucial to fly the Phoenix to safety before they become an Egg, as they Phoenix Egg is very fragile, and its survival is necessary to get the best milage out of the Blood Mage ultimate.
• Hellfire: In lore, they fuel their fire magics with demonic energy, and part of their signature look is the three orbs of felfire always orbiting around them. Tellingly, two of their spells (Siphon Mana and Banish) became warlock spells in World of Warcraft (though Flame Strike did go to Mages).
• Mana Drain: The main purpose of Siphon Mana, though it can also be used to transfer the Blood Mage's mana to an ally.
• Mundane Utility:
  • Flame Strike is one of the few abilities in the game that can knock down trees en masse on a short cooldown, letting armies with a Blood Mage take surprise expansions and open alternate attack paths without investing in artillery.
  • One perfectly viable way to play the Blood Mage (particularly in smaller games) is to forgo Flame Strike entirely and just use him as a mana battery for a mana-hungry hero like the Mountain King, by using Siphon Mana to steal the opponent's mana and feed it to his partner.
  • Some players skill Banish first because it is a 0-cooldown disable that has to be dispelled, basically used like a better version of Sleep to aid in creeping and catching escaping units, though it cannot interrupt channeling spells. Banish also makes a great healing booster for Holy Light or Priest Heal but it's a double-edged sword due to the damage vulnerability.
• No-Sell: The Blood Mage can inflict this against hero magic resistance using Banish. Heroes take 30% less damage from spell damage but Banish gives the target a 66% damage penalty to more than overcome this condition. The Mountain King's Storm Bolt is typically used to capitalize on this debuff, but a Paladin can also use Holy Light if the target is Undead. Banish is even more powerful in team games where allies can use their own instant damage nukes to capitalize on the debuff.
• Odd Name Out: Kelen the Destroyer. Just like the Archmage, all other names are just a name, but the Kelen name comes with a title.
• The Phoenix: Their Ultimate summons one to attack enemies. With high damage, a burning aura that damages everything (including itself), and the ability to revive itself on death, the Phoenix can add a lot of damage to an army.
• Playing with Fire: Flame Strike is a signature ability, and they have 3 orbs of felfire hanging above them at all times. Their ultimate even summons a massive Phoenix made of fire.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The red to the Archmage's blue. The Blood Mage uses fire spells and has a burning desire for revenge, while the Archmage uses ice and water spells and is an apathetic Grumpy Old Man. The Paladin also acts a blue contrast, resisting the urge for vengeance with a stoic personality, using Holy Light powers in contrast to Hellfire, and fighting enemies face-to-face with passive toughness instead of staying behind the army for protection. Blood Magi are intended for offensive use while Paladins provided defensive utility.
• Skill Gate Characters: In multiplayer, the Blood Mage is considered one of the weakest (first) heroes simply because Flame Strike is too slow and unlikely to ever hit a human opponent that knows how to dodge it (so much so that the flame pillar delay had to be reduced in a patch). If they don't or can't dodge it (in the case of workers, who are usually too slow, or someone already impaired, such as a follow-up to a Mountain King's Storm Bolt), the spell is extremely devastating. The Blood Mage is still used as a support for a Mountain King in high level games though (as a second or third hero), since his other spells combo phenomenally well with the Mountain King.
• Squishy Wizard: The Blood Mage works wonders as both a powerful offensive caster in larger games and a valuable and versatile support caster in smaller ones, but he's rather fragile with a weak basic attack.
• Stat Overflow: Siphon Mana can push the Blood Mage's mana pool over the maximum.
• Summon Magic: Their Ultimate summons a Phoenix. Unlike other summons the Phoenix doesn't have a timed life, instead they have a passive ability that damages everything around them, including the Phoenix itself, meaning they will eventually run out of health even if they are out of combat. They come back if their egg survives but there can only be one at a time.
• Support Party Member: When played as a mana battery and nuke booster, the Blood Mage is a great support hero, but does not function much at all without his spellcasting hero partner.
• Tranquil Fury: Despite constantly going on about revenge and hatred, Blood Mages are generally quite soft-spoken.

Night Elf Heroes

Night Elf Heroes in General

Left to right: Demon Hunter, Keeper of the Grove, Priestess of the Moon, Warden

• Anti-Magic: The Night Elf Ancient of Wonders sells Anti-Magic Potions at the highest tier, which grant temporary immunity to spells, though it can be dispelled. It pairs well with the Demon Hunter if he has a lot of levels and is well equipped with items. It is also good on both the Keeper of the Grove and Priestess of the Moon because they both have powerful channeled ultimate spells.
• Armchair Military: Unlike the other races, Night Elves heroes are not built around standing their ground in the front lines. The Demon Hunter is the best at it, but it takes a lot of levels and items to get him comfortable in that role compared to a lot of strength heroes who can do it effortlessly ^note Additionally, since the Demon Hunter's ultimate turns him ranged, it's clear he is not meant to stand in the front line as a pure tank, but rather behind tank units as a tanky damage dealer. The rest of the heroes stand behind the frontline troops (Keeper, Priestess) or move in and out of combat (Warden). The faction is more reliant on certain units like Druid of the Claw (in Bear form) and Mountain Giants to do the tanking. Night Elves can also get around this by hiring a strength Tavern hero like Pandaren Brewmaster or Goblin Alchemist.
• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: Priestess of the Moon, Demon Hunter, Keeper of the Grove, and Warden.
  • The Priestess of the Moon is a Jack of All Stats and Jack of All Trades without any outstanding strengths or flashy skills besides her ultimate, Demon Hunter is a melee mage and hero killer who can be deceptively durable and grows to be quite the powerhouse with levels and items, Keeper of the Grove is a rushing and hero killing oriented Squishy Wizard, and the Warden is a Magic Knight built around Teleport Spam and hit-and-run tactics.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Despite being based on Night and Moon based magic, the Night Elven heroes are generally on the side of good.
• Invisibility with Drawbacks: Like the female night elf units, the Priestess of the Moon and the Warden can both turn invisible at night if they stay still.
• Teleportation Rescue: Night Elves has the Staff of Preservation in their shop, which teleports a unit back to the highest-level town hall, saving them from being killed. Unlike the human Staff of Sanctuary, it does not heal them, but Night Elves have Moon Wells to take care of that.

Demon Hunter

"At last, we shall have revenge."

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Mana Burn, Immolation, Evasion, Metamorphosis (Ultimate)
Possible names: Shadowsong, Shadowfury, Shadowstalker, Flameseeker, Darkweaver, Darkterror, Darksorrow, Sindweller, Painkiller, Hellbourne, Wrathbringer, Ragerunner, Firebrand, Bloodwrath, Terrorblade
Playable Campaign character: Illidan Stormrage

First founded by Illidan Stormrage, Demon Hunters are shadowy warriors, shunned by broader night elf society, who turn the terrible powers of the Burning Legion against them. They ritually blind themselves to develop "spectral sight," allowing them to see demons and undead with greater clarity. They can burn away enemies' mana and damage them with Mana Burn, cloak themselves in flames with Immolation Aura to damage nearby enemies, and dodge enemy attacks with Evasion. Their ultimate ability, Metamorphosis, transforms them into a terrifying demon with massive bonuses to health, health regeneration, and damage.

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• 11th-Hour Ranger: Each time a Demon Hunter (Illidan) can be played, it is pretty briefly near the end of each campaign.
  • In Eternity's End, Illidan is the sole hero of his own level in the penultimate mission, and leaves before the final battle against Archimonde.
  • In Terror of the Tides, Illidan is the primary hero of final mission after being the antagonist for the entire campaign, and Malfurion, who was the Big Good to that point, becomes the hero to the secondary base instead.
  • In Curse of the Blood Elves, Illidan is only playable in the final two missions of the campaign, taking the spotlight from the other playable characters.
• Achilles' Heel: Evasion makes a Demon Hunter surprisingly resilient, but snares, stuns and chain nukes can give them a difficult time. Chain nukes can be particularly bad as they ignore Evasion, while movement impairing effects will hamper their ability to close the distance when Metamorphosis is unavailable. A Bloodmage who knows Banish and Siphon Mana, and is accompanied by a Mountain King with Storm Bolt can inflict all three ailments and amplify nuke damage by a staggering 66% while depriving the Demon Hunter of mana.
• Anti-Infantry: Immolation allows the Demon Hunter to deal damage to a lot of units early on. Metamorphosis makes him into more of a One-Man Army by making each hit a Herd-Hitting Attack.
• Anti-Structure: Because Metamorphosis grants the Demon Hunter the Chaos damage type, he deals twice as much damage to buildings by default than other heroes. Because of this he greatly outdamages all other heroes (except Tinker with Robo-Goblin) with his right clicks on buildings when he is transformed.
• Armored But Frail: With their "armor" being a combination of innate armor and Evasion, Demon Hunters are highly resistant to attacks. They are, however, less resilient to spells. Fortunately for them, the Night Elf faction shop also happens to sell Anti-Magic Potions.
• Bad Powers, Good People: Well, "good" might be a stretch, but they seek to defend the night elves against the Legion and use the Legion's dark powers to combat it.
• Balance Buff: Their attack while using Metamorphosis used to damage friendly units until it was patched.
• Blind Weaponmaster: They ritually blind themselves and wear blindfolds. Their "spectral sight" still allows them to see their prey; whether they can see anything else is left ambiguous.
• Dual Wielding: Dual-wields large glaives.
• Foil: While similar to the Orc Blademaster as a deadly yet honorable fighter, Demon Hunter gameplay contrasts. Mana Burn only works on Mana users while Windwalk provides a universal attack buff. Immolation, Evasion, and Metamorphosis all encourage direct confrontation as opposed to the Hit-and-Run Tactics employed by the Blademaster. Finally, unlike the Blademaster, the Demon Hunters' tool kit has limited ranged capability with Mana Burn and especially with Metamorphosis.
• Fragile Speedster: Zig-zagged; they have fast movement speed and low health, but their Evasion ability and high armor actually makes them decent tanks... as long as they don't get focused down by spells from enemy heroes, a major concern against Undead whose heroes can all spec instant damage nukes.
• Gender Flip: While Demon Hunters are all male in the original Warcraft III, Reforged gives the option to make them female through a skin.
• Mage Killer: Their quick speed and Mana Burn ability makes them excellent anti-spellcaster heroes.
• Magikarp Power: Early on, a Demon Hunter isn't capable of much other than harassing with Mana Burn. However, they're the Night Elves' premier frontline hero for a reason, as picking up more levels brings out the raw damage their right-clicks can do and skilling Evasion makes them deceptively resilient.
• Mana Burn: One of their normal abilities. The mana also combusts, causing damage equal to the amount drained.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: All of the Demon Hunter names are over-the-top in how dark and edgy they sound.
• Nerf: Mana Burn's damage has been considerably reduced after being patched.
• Odd Name Out: Painkiller is the only name about deliberately ending someone's misery.
• One-Man Army: With some items, the Demon Hunter can become this in Metamorphosis. His splash damage and high attack speed can allow him to take out a small army by himself.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Their whole shtick is to turn the dark powers of the Legion against the demons.
• Recurring Boss: In The Frozen Throne. Unlike most instances of this trope in regard to heroes, each time a Demon Hunter is fought, it's one character, Illidan Stormrage. He is fought as an enemy hero in three separate missions (two in the Sentinels Campaign and one in the Scourge campaign), with the last of them acting as the Final Boss to the main story.
• Shout-Out:
  • Their war glaives are very similar to the Klingon Bat'leth.
  • An in universe shout out, some unit models have a Pandaren mug shot painted on the center of their war glaives.
• Super Mode: Metamorphosis transforms them into a shadowy demon. It's not as strong as the Mountain King's Avatar, giving the same health boost but not the spell immunity, armor and damage increase. Instead, it gives a boost to HP regeneration, a ranged attack that inflicts Chaos damage with splash damage, something that is very deadly thanks to the Demon Hunter's high attack speed. Compared with the Mountain King who's ultimate makes him a melee powerhouse, the Demon Hunter's Ultimate turns him into a ranged killing machine.
• Wreathed in Flames: Immolation Aura cloaks the Demon Hunter in flames, damaging all nearby enemies. It continually drains mana while active, though.

Keeper of the Grove

"I must safeguard the land."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Entangling Roots, Force of Nature, Thorns Aura, Tranquility (Ultimate)
Possible names: Larodar, Anubris, Nandieb, Califax, Bandalar, Malorne, Gholbine, Dagda, Nuada, Oghma, Centrius, Ceredwyn
Playable Campaign character: Malfurion Stormrage (referred to as "Furion" in Reign of Chaos)
NPC Campaign characters: Cenarius ^*He is actually a Moveset Clone class called "Demigod" which has modified stats, and the additional ability Cyclone, Califax

The Wild God Cenarius, son of Elune and the great stag Malorne, is the patron of the wild forests of Azeroth and protector of the night elves. His sons, the Keepers of the Grove, are charged with protecting their father's domain. With the upper body of a night elf and the lower body of a stag, the Keepers of the Grove stand ready to respond to any who would threaten the wild places they and their charges call home. They can immobilize and damage enemies with Entangling Roots, bring trees to life to do battle with Force of Nature, and let allies damage melee attackers with Thorns Aura. Their ultimate ability, Tranquility, heals all allies in a large area for 20 hit points per second.

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• Attack Reflector: Thorns Aura causes damage to any melee attacker that hits a friendly unit near the Keeper.
• Blow You Away: Cenarius has the ability Cyclone.
• Crutch Character: Among the Night Elf heroes, he is most powerful at early game rush strategies, but is far weaker than the rest in the late game when dispels become plentiful, making two of his abilities useless. Tranquility likewise becomes fairly weak if the opponent has any disables whatsoever to interrupt it, which any competent enemy probably will if they see a Keeper in your army.
• Good Counterpart: Thorns Aura is this to the Dreadlord's Vampiric Aura. Instead of the aura healing allies for a percentage of their melee damage dealt, Thorns Aura causes enemies to suffer a percentage of their melee damage dealt. If both auras are present in battle and at equal level, then Thorns Aura will heavily negate Vampiric Aura making it a powerful direct counter.
• Green Thumb: All their abilities involve some kind of plant magic.
• The Marvelous Deer: Their bodies' lower half is a stag, and they are the grandsons of the great white stag Malorne.
• The Medic: Once he has Tranquility, this becomes one of the Keeper's main roles in combat. Unlike the other Night Elf healing spell, Rejuvenation, it cannot be dispelled save for interrupting the channeling.
• Moveset Clone: Cenarius is technically another class called "Demigod". He has much higher base stats and divine armor, but all his abilities are the same, except he also has Cyclone.
• Nonindicative Name: Somewhat confusingly, Malfurion Stormrage is designated a Keeper of the Grove, but is not a child of Cenarius and is a Night Elf that is not a stag-centaur. Keeper of the Grove refers to his class and skills, but not his race. He is still Cenarius' greatest pupil and knows the same skills that the Keepers all would, and in-universe he is mostly known as "Archdruid".
• One-Steve Limit: Averted. Malorne is a generic Keeper of the Grove name. Malorne the great stag is also the grandfather of all the Keepers of the Groves. Maybe he's named after his grandfather.
• Our Centaurs Are Different: Swap out a night elf for a human and a stag for a horse.
• Plant Person: They have wooden-esque right hands and manes of leaves that flow down their backs. Their antlers also resemble tree branches.
• The Right Hand of Doom: Their right hands resemble large wooden claws.
• Red Mage: The Keeper has one of the best hero killing spells in the game with Entangling Roots, but also the great mass healing spell, Tranquility.
• Summon Magic: Treants are summoned in a unique manner by Force of Nature. They are converted from an area of trees, rather than summoned in front of the Keeper.
• Squishy Wizard: Keepers possess strong disruptive spells and a decent heal as their ultimate but have very low survivability under fire.
  • Malfurion in the Reign of Chaos Night Elf campaign has a path to overcome the weakness and become a full on Combat Medic. He always carries the Horn of Cenarius, which adds 200 health and 2 HP regeneration, so Malfurion has around 1100 health at max level with no other items. With some stat or armor items and a Necklace of Spell Immunity (dropped by The Largest Panda Ever in the 5th mission) to prevent Tranquility from being interrupted, he makes a shockingly effective frontline tank in the final mission. This is not something he can replicate in The Frozen Throne, as the item drops in that campaign don't lean towards tanking and he no longer carries the Horn of Cenarius.
• When Trees Attack: Force of Nature animates an area of trees into Treants to attack enemies. Leveling up the ability causes it to create more Treants from a larger area of areas. Notably, if the player does not target enough trees, the max number of treants is not created.

Priestess of the Moon

"Warriors of the night, assemble!"

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Scout, Trueshot Aura, Searing Arrows, Starfall (Ultimate)
Possible names: Kathris Starsong, Adora Nightshade, Mora Moonsinger, Felore Moonray, Anara Chillwind, Kera Stardragon, Mave Whisperwind, Delas Moonfang, Mira Whitemane, Theta Saberfang, Tygra Snowscar, Ariel Darkmoon, Diana Windwood
Playable Campaign character: Tyrande Whisperwind

Devotees of the moon goddess Elune, the Priestesses of the Moon are the main religious and military leaders of the night elves. Riding atop great cats and armed with deadly longbows, these women will stop at nothing to keep their forests pure and unsullied by any who would trespass. They can summon an owl to reveal the map with Scout, add extra Fire damage to their shots with Searing Arrows, and grant allied ranged troops extra damage and accuracy with Trueshot Aura. Their ultimate ability, Starfall, summons a star shower that damages all enemies caught in the storm.

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• Action Girl: One of only two female main-faction heroes, the other being the Warden (also of the night elves), and the only standard playable female hero in the base Reign of Chaos game.
• Aerith and Bob: Most of the Priestess names are fantastical or archaic, but three of them are relatively common names for women in the present; Diana, Mira, and Ariel.
• Anti-Structure: Because Starfall hits buildings (though for reduced damage) and they can't move out of its range, it's not uncommon to see high-level Priestesses tear down entire bases if left unchecked.
• Arrows on Fire: Their Searing Arrows consumes a little mana per shot to set their arrows on fire, increasing damage. Unlike real-life flaming arrows, however, they are not designed to damage buildings (although they can do that too).
• Boring, but Practical: All of her skills except Starfall are all pretty boring. But they do their job well, especially Trueshot Aura, which benefits a huge majority of the units in the Night Elf techtree, including the Demon Hunter in Metamorphosis.
• Church Militant: Their role is both religious and military.
• Death from Above: Their ultimate spell sends waves of falling stars into every nearby enemy (land and air) and structure.
• Horse Archer: A mistress of the bow who rides a great cat in the same manner as a horse.
• Horse of a Different Color: Their panther mount, the Frostsaber.
• Invincible Minor Minion: Owl Scouts are invulnerable, allowing them to spy on enemies with ease as they can't be repelled.
• Jack of All Stats: The Priestess has a pretty even stat distribution, with a surprisingly high intelligence gain, but low base intelligence. This ties into her versatility, but lack of outstanding strengths.
• Jack of All Trades: The Priestess of the Moon has a versatile skillset and can do a little bit of everything but lacks the specialization of the other Night Elf heroes. She is an effective support hero with Scout and Trueshot Aura, but she can deal some damage with Searing Arrows and can be a huge factor in fights with Starfall. Just about the only things she can't do are heal and duel enemy heroes, as she lacks any sort of burst damage or disable.
• Lunacy: Their powers come from the moon goddess.
• Mage Marksman: The Priestess of the Moon wield both bows and the divine magic of Elune against their enemies.
• Meteor-Summoning Attack: Their Starfall ultimate calls down waves of falling stars that deal heavy damage on anything that walks within the spell's radius.
• Panthera Awesome: They ride large cats into battle.
• Person of Mass Destruction: Starfall, if allowed to channel, can deal the most damage to the highest amount of units of any spell in the melee game. Unlike most AOE damage spells, it has no limits on the total amount of damage it can do per wave and the area is much larger than any other AOE damage spell. If a Priestess is not interrupted or killed, she can destroy entire armies with the spell.
• Quirky Bard: At early levels, the lack of burst damage spells makes her a very support-oriented character, sending out Owl Scouts to key points to spy on enemy activities, buffing ranged units with Trueshot Aura, and/or using Searing Arrows to help focus-fire a target. However, once she unlocks her ultimate ability Starfall, she gains a powerful Herd-Hitting Attack against multiple targets, but is vulnerable to interrupts stopping the channeling of the spell. When Starfall is too risky to use due to the opponent bringing out stuns, she can fall back on her support powers, perhaps even using a Tome of Retraining to reallocate her skill points.
• Support Power: The Owl Scout fills this role, letting the player send out a flying spy who can spy on enemy movements and reveal stealth as well. The Owl is Invulnerable and Spell-Immune so the Owl doesn't need attention to avoid enemy fire and essentially works as a movable Defog of War.
• True Sight: The owl summoned by Scout can see invisible units.
• The Unfought: No Priestess of the Moon is fought as an enemy hero in any of the campaigns. The (High Elven) Ranger class in the campaign who is a Moveset Clone (besides having Cold Arrows instead of Searing Arrows) serves as a substitute in the gameplay sense.

Warden (Frozen Throne)

"My prey is near."

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Fan of Knives, Blink, Shadow Strike, Vengeance (Ultimate)
Possible names: Alsa Iron-cell, The Iron Raven, Marin Bladewing, Shalis Darkhunter, Sira Moonwarden, Saithis, Malace Shade, Kiri Starstalker, Anaya Felgrove, Mirana Starlight, Felhala Starmoon, Drelanim Whisperwind, Cordana Felsong, Nalmeena Darkfollow
Playable Campaign character: Maiev Shadowsong

The secretive Wardens are the night elves' special police force in Kalimdor. Where others protect the night elves from external threats, the Wardens keep watch on internal ones. They serve as the jailers and marshals of night elf society, rooting out all manner of threats to their peaceful existence from within — from tracking and apprehending fugitives, to guarding the prisons that hold the worst criminals, to assassinating those too dangerous to be allowed to live. They can damage and poison enemies with Shadow Strike, throw knives out in a circle with Fan of Knives, and teleport short distances with Blink. Their Ultimate ability, Vengeance, summons a shadowy Avatar of Vengeance that creates Spirits of Vengeance from nearby corpses to attack the Warden's enemies.

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• Action Girl: One of the few female heroes and a capable direct combatant, and unlike the others, Wardens are expected to get up close and personal with their enemies.
• Black Mage: 2 of her 3 main non-ultimate spells are offensive. One is an instant area of effect nuke, and the other is an instant nuke that deals Damage Over Time after. Blink is also often used aggressively to more effectively target her two nukes, since they are both short ranged.
• Devious Daggers: Both Fan of Knives and Shadow Strike are throwing knife-based. Even the edge of their cloak appears to be lined with blades. Fitting for a Secret Police operative.
• Flash Step: Blink lets them teleport short distances.
• Flechette Storm: Fan of Knives.
• Fragile Speedster: The Warden's Blink ability makes her extremely mobile, letting her weave in and out of battle with ease and making her nearly impossible to evade as long as she has mana. If she runs out of mana or if locked down by disabling effects, she folds very quickly.
• Glass Cannon: The Warden outputs a lot of spell damage, but she is very fragile for a melee agility hero. This is made worse by the fact that her spells are close ranged.
• Magic Knight: Despite her primary attribute being Agility and having a melee attack, the Warden is still primarily a spellcaster, as the damage inflicted by Fan of Knives and Shadow Strike far eclipses her regular attack.
• Magikarp Power: At low levels, the Warden is pretty unremarkable, with spells that don't do much and low health. However, as she levels up, Fan of Knives and Shadow Strike both start doing actual damage and Blink's cooldown and mana cost decreases dramatically, making her a hard-hitting, highly-mobile threat that can ravage worker lines with impunity, shred enemies around her with spell damage, and flee halfway across the map before the enemy can react.
• Odd Name Out: All Warden names seem like normal Night Elven names, except "The Iron Raven", and Saithis.
• Poisoned Weapons: Shadow Strike hurls a poisoned dagger at the target.
• Rings of Death: They wield a large circular chakram as their main weapon.
• Sdrawkcab Speech: The Spirit of Vengeance has unintelligible voice lines resembling speech. This is due to the Spirit's voice lines actually being snippets of Maiev's lines played backwards.
• Secret Police: The Wardens serve as this in night elf society.
• Summon Magic: The Avatar of Vengeance is a summoned unit that will summon additional spirits from nearby corpses.
• Teleport Spam: A lot of Warden gameplay is built around moving in and out of combat with Blink. At max level, it has a very short 4-second cooldown and virtually no mana cost, allowing her to use it with impunity (it was even spammier before, with a 1-second cooldown when maxed).
• Unique Enemy: Maiev Shadowsong herself is the only Warden fought in the campaigns, during the MOBA-style mission in the Blood Elf campaign.

Orc Heroes

Orc Heroes in General

Left to right: Tauren Chieftain, Blademaster, Far Seer, Shadow Hunter

• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: Far Seer, Tauren Chieftain, Blademaster, and Shadow Hunter.
  • Far Seer has the most flexible skillset as a Jack of All Trades, Tauren Chieftain is a powerful Magic Knight who is able to absorb a huge amount of damage and disrupt fights, Blademaster is a micromanagement intensive Confusion Fu Glass Cannon hero (and also the only Skill hero that is Agility instead of Intelligence), and Shadow Hunter is built around healing, support, and disables in a faction that is starved of it (which lets them cover weaknesses instead of amplifying their own strength). The Shadow Hunter's ultimate is also one of the gimmickiest in the whole game.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The clearest example of all playable factions, with the Tauren Chieftain as the Fighter, the Far Seer as the Mage, and the Blademaster as the Thief in Reign of Chaos. The Shadow Hunter is a Mechanically Unusual Class that is mostly The Mage but incorporates elements of The Thief.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: Orcs are the only faction that between their heroes, they only have one aura (Endurance) instead of two ^note Devotion and Brilliance for Humans, Thorns and Trueshot for Night Elf, Unholy and Vampiric for Undead. Instead, their second aura (War Drums, also called Command Aura) is carried by a unit, the Kodo Beast Rider, and it is leveled up by a research upgrade.
• Misleading Package Size: The Voodoo Lounge sells Tiny Great Halls, which is a pocket Great Hall that builds at full size very quickly and can be made by a hero rather than a worker. This allows for potentially very quick expansion building late game. If players of other races use the items, they will get an equivalent town hall of their race.
• Super-Speed: The Voodoo Lounge's Scroll of Speed gives a huge speed boost in an area, allowing the Orc army to easily outmaneuver the enemy's army.

Blademaster

"My blade seeks vengeance!"

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Wind Walk, Mirror Image, Critical Strike, Bladestorm (Ultimate)
Possible names: Tojara, Nikoro, Kajind, Mikasa, Samuro, Akinos, Mazuru, Yozshura, Daisho, Kigami, Arashicage, Moogul the Sly, Jubei
Playable Campaign characters: Grom Hellscream, Samuro
NPC Campaign characters: Jubei'thos, Haomarush, Genjuros, Khanzo, Blademaster of the Blackrock Clan, Mizgill, Gorgosh, Bonethirst, Bloodgrin, Nera'thor, Sagra'nel, Rend, Maim

The Burning Blade clan of orcs was among the most vicious and unstable of all the corrupted clans in the demonic Horde. Ultimately their violence caused the clan itself to collapse entirely. Having seen the results of their fall from honor, the elite warriors of the Burning Blade — the Blademasters — swore an oath to free themselves and their people from the demons' grasp forever. They can randomly increase their attack damage with Critical Strike, create illusory copies of themselves with Mirror Image, or gain speed and invisibility with Wind Walk. Their ultimate ability, Bladestorm, causes them to become a spinning engine of death, continually slashing at all nearby enemies for a short time.

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• Achilles' Heel: True sight, especially in or near your base can limit Blademaster's disruptive and harassing capabilities. Mana Burn to a lesser extent, since the Blademaster is reliant on his spells to get out of trouble. Human Arcane Towers do both and are one of his biggest counters.
• Balance Buff: Mirror Image was enhanced so that images deal 20% of the Blademaster's original damage, allowing images to distract from the Blademaster and provide extra damage output.
• BFS: Wields a giant katana-like sword. Grom Hellscream prefers a big battle axe instead.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: No explanation is offered for the Blademaster's more ''mystical' abilities except their impossible skill with a sword or, in Grom Hellscream's case, a battle axe.
• Close-Range Combatant: The Blademaster is the only hero with no ranged abilities whatsoever. He has to get up close and personal with opponents in order to do anything, which is where Wind Walk comes in handy to let him close the gap.
• Combo Platter Powers: There are two Fel Orc Blademaster types in the last Blood Elf campaign mission, "Lord of Outland" that don't have Wind Walk and instead have a different ability for direct combat. Both abilities are taken from strength heroes and make the hero more of a direct fighter, removing their agility themed stealth aspect entirely.
  • The ones with the standard model (Bonethirst, Bloodgrin, Sagra'nel, and Rend) have the passive Bash, which makes their attacks even more dangerous, since it stacks with Critical Strike.
  • The ones with the Grom Hellscream model (Nera'thor and Maim) have Shockwave, giving a direct AOE nuke and making the hero a partial Magic Knight.
• Confusion Fu: His fighting style, between turning invisible and confusing his enemies with his mirror images, is to make the enemies constantly wonder where the real Blademaster is.
• Critical Hit Class: Much of the Blademaster's killing power comes from his Critical Strike. At max level, it can deal 4x his normal damage on proc, dealing crippling damage to whatever's on the receiving end, and his fast attack speed means that he can rack up a lot of them if he can stay alive.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Unlike most Orcs, the Blademaster is too fragile to charge into the enemy recklessly and hope for the best, meaning you have to keep an eye on him at pretty much all times and make sure he doesn't get picked off and to convincingly use the mirror images to misdirect your enemies. However, once you get the requisite micromanagement down, the Blademaster is by far the deadliest combatant among the Orc heroes.
• Doppelgänger Spin: Mirror Image creates up to three illusions of the Blademaster that deal reduced damage and take increased damage, but look just like him to the enemy. As part of the effect, it also shuffles his position with those of the images, making it harder to find the real one.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • Wind Walk originally did not have a backstab mechanic, making it a pure scouting and escape ability with few offensive applications. It also kept the Blademaster's collision box, which meant that you could still be surrounded or blocked. Both changes were made pretty early on in the version history.
  • Oddly, Grom Hellscream is one of the only heroes in Warcraft III that when he reappears in World of Warcraft does not fight in any style resembling how he fought in this game, never turning invisible or creating clones of himself. His Warrior class suggests he's more of a brute fighter which implies much less finesse than the Blademaster.
• Foil: While similar to the Demon Hunter as a deadly yet honorable fighter, Blademaster gameplay contrasts with the Demon Hunter with a focus on Hit-and-Run Tactics insead of direct confrontation. Unlike the Demon Hunter, Blademasters and their Mirror Images have no ranged capabilites and need to be in melee range to use any of their attacks.
• Glass Cannon: Has exceedingly high damage output thanks to Wind Walk and Critical Strike along with a blistering attack speed, but not nearly as much durability. Luckily, they have Wind Walk and Mirror Image to help get out of danger or provide additional sustained damage in the case of the later.
• Guest-Star Party Member: In both Orc campaigns, the Blademaster hero is controlled only briefly.
  • In The Invasion of Kalimdor, Grom Hellscream is a computer-controlled ally (or potential enemy if the player attacks him) in his first appearance, and then is playable for two missions before he and the whole Warsong Clan suffer Demonic Possession under the campaign's Arc Villain.
  • The Founding of Durotar has a short section at the start of Act II where Rexxar's party stays behind and Samuro has his own Stealth-Based Mission to set up the bombs. After this is done, he is not seen again for the rest of the campaign.
• Hit-and-Run Tactics: The main strategy of the Blademaster is to run or sneak into the enemy's midst, wreak havoc with its high damage, and then escape before the enemy can successfully counter. Mirror Image was eventually buffed so images deal 20% of the Blademaster's original, allowing some variation from the standard hit-and-run attacks.
• Katanas Are Just Better: The Blademaster's sword is Japanese styled, going with their Samurai motif. However, Grom Hellscream prefers a battle axe and has a more traditional Orc warrior personality yet performs identically to Samurai Blademasters.
• Magikarp Power: The Blademaster's only source of damage is his basic attack until level 6, where he gets the long-cooldown Bladestorm. That being said, his incredibly fast attack speed and high-level Critical Strike mean that it's often more than enough to tear enemies apart once he gets some levels and attack-boosting items. Blademasters tend to get more mileage out of Claws of Attack than most heroes for this reason.
• Mook Lieutenant: Despite being heroes, their role within the Magtheridon army is limited to being lieutenants leading small bases.
• Odd Name Out: Moogul the Sly is the only name with a title.
• Recurring Boss: Blademasters are the most common enemy hero when facing hostile orcs. Throughout the story, despite their lore, they tend to be the heroes most likely to be aligned with the Burning Legion.
• Samurai Shinobi: Combines elements of samurai (able to pull off a Single-Stroke Battle or magical spinning sword attacks, meditation, carries a banner on his back) and ninja (Doppelgänger Spin and invisibility attack that deals extra damage on the first hit).
• Spin Attack: Bladestorm damages all nearby foes while also protecting the Blademaster from all magic for the duration.
• Super-Speed: The manual's explanation as to why the Blademaster turns invisible from Wind Walk is that he is moving too fast for the eye to see.
• Unexplained Accent: No other orc in the whole franchise has the Blademasters' exaggerated Japanese-sounding speech patterns. In the campaign, only Samuro has this accent (which is fitting because he is also one of the default Blademasters), and other campaign Blademasters speak with exaggerated patterns but do not have the accent.
• Warm-Up Boss: The unnamed "Blademaster of the Blackrock Clan" is the first Hero Unit fought in the Reign of Chaos campaigns ^note this is not counting the last 3 levels of the prologue campaign, which were part of the demo but removed from the original release, though restored in Reforged. He fights alone, without any backup. On normal mode, he is only level 2 and is very easy to take on. On Hard mode, he is level 6 and more of a threat with Bladestorm, showing the potential danger of high-level enemy heroes.

Far Seer

"The future is ours."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Chain Lightning, Far Sight, Feral Spirit, Earthquake (Ultimate)
Possible names: Gar'dal Grimsight, Negal Fireye, Kazil Darkeye, Magis Coldeye, Bale Bleakstare, Gorr Grimwolf, Kag'ar Winterfang, Nazgrel, Morg Wolfsong, Kazragore, Fenris'ar Gul
Playable Campaign characters: Thrall, Drek'thar
NPC Campaign characters: Throk'Feroth, Mazrigos

Under Thrall's guidance, the orcs threw off the chains of demons and embraced their shamanistic past. Far Seers represent the pinnacle of shamanic power; wielding the might of the elements and able to divine the future, they are the spiritual leaders of the New Horde, riding great wolves into battle. They can deal damage to numbers of enemies with Chain Lightning, reveal hidden areas of the map with Far Sight, and summon fierce spirit wolves to bolster their forces with Feral Spirit. Their ultimate ability, Earthquake, causes the ground beneath an area to tremble and break, rapidly destroying buildings and slowing the movement speed of those caught within.

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• Anti-Structure: Earthquake damages buildings in its area of effect, but not units which are merely slowed.
• Canis Major: Their wolf mounts, as well as their spirit wolf summons.
• Chain Lightning: One of their signature abilities, releasing a lightning bolt that bounces between enemies, damaging each one.
• Critical Hit: Spirit wolves have a chance to deal critical damage when upgraded.
• Crutch Character: Usually picked for early domination, the Far Seer's Feral Spirits give him a massive edge in early game, but pales compared to the late game potential of the other 3 heroes, lacking the raw damage of the Blademaster, the power and durability of the Tauren Chieftain, or the utility of the Shadow Hunter.
• Defog of War: Far Sight lets the Far Seer reveal a portion of the map, along with any invisible enemies in it, through the fog of war. The ability also has global range.
• Dishing Out Dirt: Their Earthquake ultimate.
• Gameplay and Story Integration: In two separate missions that take place in underground caves, Thrall does not have access to Far Sight, since it logically cannot be used in such a setting.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Two Far Seers show up as enemy heroes in a mission belonging to the demon worshipping Blackrock Clan faction. They are probably meant to represent some kind of high-ranking Orc Warlocks. In Reforged, this is somewhat addressed, though not fixed. The models are changed to Stormreaver Warlocks and their class is renamed "Warlock", but they are still a Moveset Clone and have the same shamanistic Far Seer abilities.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Drek'Thar's brief playable stint in Act I of The Founding of Durotar is limited to an optional quest inside the sub-map "Thunder Ridge".
• Horse of a Different Color: They ride large wolves.
• In the Hood: They wear hoods, adding an air of mystery to them.
• Jack of All Trades: Not of all stats, since he's more of a Squishy Wizard, but his skillset is a mishmash of functions between Summon Magic, Scouting, Damage, and Anti-Structure.
• Noble Wolf: They are the noble spiritual leaders of the free New Horde, and wolves are a major symbol of theirs.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted. One of the generic Far Seer's names is Nazgrel, the same name as one of Thrall's commanders. He shows up in The Frozen Throne as a Raider and is a Warrior in World of Warcraft. Another is Morg Wolfsong, who is a minor Shaman questgiver in the same campaign.
• Seers: As if the name weren't enough of an indicator, Far Sight can reveal large unexplored areas of the map, though they can't see the future (at least in game; shaman have been known to receive omens and visions in lore). Many of their in-game quotes hint at this as well.
• Shock and Awe: Chain Lightning.
• Support Power: Far Sight gives you access to a Defog of War with unlimited range. At level 3, it can reveal an incredible chunk of the map.

Tauren Chieftain

"I have an axe to grind."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Shockwave, War Stomp, Endurance Aura, Reincarnation (Ultimate)
Possible names: Marn Thunderhorn, Tygore Dusthoof, Tam Windtotem, Durn Harpyslayer, Kam Ghoststeer, Kel Stonebull, Mull Stormhoof, Grok Bloodhorn, Malar Plainstrider, Taur Runetotem
Playable Campaign characters: Cairne Bloodhoof, Baine Bloodhoof

These wise, mighty chieftains are the tauren's leaders in life as well as in battle. Wielding mighty axes and bearing their clans' ancient totems, the Tauren Chieftain is charged with upholding the honor and simplicity of tauren culture. They can damage units in a line with Shockwave, stun enemy units around them with War Stomp, and grant their allies improved attack and movement speed with Endurance Aura. Their ultimate ability, Reincarnation, allows them to return to life when killed once every four minutes.

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• Achilles' Heel: Neither of the Tauren Chieftain's spells hit enemy air units, and his melee attack means he can't reach them with basic attacks either without an orb.
• Anti-Structure: Shockwave deals full damage to buildings, making it lethal against clusters of low-health buildings like Farms or towers.
• Auto-Revive: Reincarnation always revives the Tauren Chieftain at full health and mana after 5 seconds, as long as the ability is off cooldown when he dies. There's no way to stop him from reviving ^note There is one circumstance where the Chieftain will die without reviving, which is if he is in a transport and it dies over deep water or unpathable terrain (cliffs, deep water, or heavy tree density). This will have him marked as dead without ever triggering Reincarnation. The reasoning for this is because the Chieftain is technically not on the map while in the transport which means he can't trigger Reincarnation because he technically doesn't have it while on the transport. Additionally, him respawning over unpathable terrain wouldn't really be helpful either.
• Back from the Dead: Their ultimate ability, Reincarnation.
• Close-Range Combatant: Not just because he's melee, but because War Stomp only applies the damage and stun to enemy land units near him, and Shockwave's slow projective makes it not as effective at range as most AOE nukes. This weakness is alleviated a bit by the movement speed from Endurance Aura.
• Magic Knight: The Tauren Chieftain's damage is mostly from Shockwave. He is melee and attacks slowly, even with Endurance Aura.
• Mighty Glacier: While not necessarily slow due to their Endurance Aura, Tauren Chieftains can still have trouble positioning themselves in battle due to their large, unwieldy hitbox. But once they do get in position for a Shockwave or War Stomp, watch the damage start racking up.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: The Tauren Chieftain is the only hero in the melee game that has a fully passive ultimate, and the only one that triggers on death. He is also the only hero that has 2 passive abilities.
• Mundane Utility: Endurance Aura can be leveled to speed up resource harvesting of Peons whenever the Chieftain is in the base.
• Old Soldier: The campaign Tauren Chieftain, Cairne, definitely qualifies, and the voice of the regular multiplayer version gives the same impression.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: The chieftains lead their people, and are also the most fearsome of them in battle.
• Slap-on-the-Wrist Nuke: War Stomp is one of the most dramatic looking and sounding spells. Despite this, it deals negligible damage. Compared to the Mountain King's Thunder Clap, it trades off dealing about half of the damage to have a stun instead of a slow.
• Shockwave Stomp: War Stomp. It does damage to land units around the Chieftain and stuns them.
• The Stoner: Their Stop Poking Me! quotes give off this vibe after they mention the peace pipe.

  Tauren Chieftain: Oh... I can see my ancestors...

• Sword Beam: Shockwave sends out a wave of energy along the ground from the Tauren Chieftain's axe.
• The Unfought: No Tauren Chieftain is fought as an enemy hero in any of the campaigns. The Tauren are never an antagonistic force in any of the campaigns. During the Night Elf campaign when the Tauren would have been part of Thrall's Horde at the time, the only Horde hero they fight is a Blademaster.
• Violation of Common Sense: An effective, if seemingly insane way that a Tauren Chieftain refills his health and mana if he's high level is to have his troops kill him and Reincarnate with full health and mana. It's faster than most methods of healing him (especially since he has a massive health pool). It makes sense if you don't have a healing ward ready and are not going to be fighting while Reincarnation is cooling down. Plus, enemy players have no way to know if the Chieftain has used his ultimate yet unless they saw him die recently, and as such will probably ignore him as much as possible since focusing down a Tauren Chieftain with Reincarnation first in a fight will probably only make things worse for yourself.
• Why Won't You Die?: Tauren Chieftain is extremely difficult to kill at high levels. He has among the highest strength of all heroes, can stun all land units around him, runs faster than most heroes with Endurance Aura, and comes back to life if he dies after 5 seconds with full HP and Mana when he dies.

Shadow Hunter (Frozen Throne)

"Want to see somethin' real scary?"

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Healing Wave, Hex, Serpent Ward, Big Bad Voodoo (Ultimate)
Possible names: Zul'kis, Zul'abar, Zul'rajas, Zul'maran, Jo Jo Headshrinker, Shaka-zahn, Shakti-lar, Mezil-kree
Playable Campaign character: Rokhan

Among trolls, those skilled in voodoo magic and battle become the revered leaders of their tribes; these leaders are called Shadow Hunters. Wielding a variety of magics, Shadow Hunters can heal and sustain their allies, curse their foes, and commune with the spirits to bargain for power or plead for aid in the interest of carving out a future for the trolls. They can heal multiple allies at once with Healing Wave, summon a fire-spitting snake totem with Serpent Ward, and turn enemies into frogs with Hex. Their ultimate ability, Big Bad Voodoo, allows the Shadow Hunter to turn all nearby friendly units (but not himself) invulnerable for up to 30 seconds.

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• Animal Motifs: As with most trolls in Warcraft, reptiles and amphibians. Hex turns enemies into frogs, and their summoned Serpent Wards are (as one might expect) snake-shaped.
• Forced Transformation: Hex turns enemies into frogs. Note that unlike the Sorceress's Polymorph, Hex does work on other heroes (albeit with reduced duration).
• Hollywood Voodoo: Although the religious element of actual Vodoun is present to some degree (bargaining with spirits and such), it's mostly just a cool Caribbean-flavored variant of shamanic magic.
• Increasingly Lethal Enemy: Shadow Hunter can be a huge problem for his enemies if he can stack up Serpent Wards all over a fight. If they aren't killed before the next one spawns it gradually adds up to a lot of damage.
• Immortality Field: Essentially what Big Bad Voodoo does for everyone except the Shadow Hunter himself.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: He is a ranged Agility hero that plays almost exactly like an Intelligence caster. To add to this, he has very low agility gain and high intelligence gain per level. This makes him less fragile than your average Squishy Wizard, but also means he deals less damage because of his low primary attribute gain.
• The Medic: For the Orcish Horde, which has a bigger issue with health sustain than the other races. An early Shadow Hunter can mitigate these issues with Healing Wave so you rely less on salves from the Voodoo Lounge or waiting to research Healing Wards.
• Mundane Utility:
  • Serpent Wards are not just extra damage in a fight, but also very effective for scouting out unexplored areas or to watch for potential ambushes, especially if placed on top of high cliffs.
  • Big Bad Voodoo can be used as an instant, large area dispel due to granting invulnerability. This can be useful if multiple spellcasting units were hit by a AOE silence, or a huge number of your units have been hit by powerful debuffs.
• Nigh-Invulnerable: Big Bad Voodoo turns allies invulnerable for a period of time. However, it does not work for him.
• No Self-Buffs: The Shadow Hunter himself is still vulnerable to damage when channeling Big Bad Voodoo (as well as stuns that would break the spell). Worse, as invulnerable units can't even be targeted. Enemy attacks can only hit him. Additionally, Big Bad Voodoo will dispel certain positive buffs when active and it cannot be reapplied. Most notable of these is Bloodlust.
• No-Sell: Serpent Wards are immune to magic like other wards, but unlike most summoned units. This means they are immune to dispels and spellcasters trying to attack them and they are instead weak to long ranged siege weaponry which can knock them out in 1-2 shots.
• Odd Name Out: Jo Jo Headshrinker is the only generic Shadow Hunter name that does not have any Troll naming conventions.
• Pragmatic Adaptation: Because The Founding of Durotar is more of a open-world RPG instead of a Real Time Strategy, Rokhan does not have Big Bad Voodoo, since its use is for large scale army battles. Instead he gets a new ultimate, Voodoo Spirits, which is effectively a reskinned Locust Swarm and more generally useful for combat.
• Red Mage: He has offensive and defensive capabilities between the ability to heal and support, while also disrupting with Hex and summoning damaging wards.
• Support Party Member: Shadow Hunters have no direct damage abilities and their only kind of damaging attack is Serpent Ward. However, they provide Healing Wave to a largely healing-starved orcish army, and Hex is an excellent way of disabling powerful enemy units. This trope is best exemplified, however, in Big Bad Voodoo, which makes everyone but the Shadow Hunter invulnerable.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Their basic attack throws a glaive at the target. This is a bit of a case of Early-Installment Weirdness, as in World of Warcraft, most shadow hunters use bows.
• The Unfought: No Shadow Hunter is fought as an enemy hero in any of the campaigns. This is because the Horde is Out of Focus in the Frozen Throne campaigns and never show up as antagonists.
• Witch Doctor: Not to be confused with the unit, Troll Witch Doctor, but it still fits in his abilities being based around healing and curses.

Undead Heroes

Undead Heroes in General

Left to right: Dreadlord, Lich, Death Knight, Crypt Lord

• Alpha Strike: A known undead strategy, also called the "Undead nuke". Undead is the only race where all the heroes can instantly damage an enemy with a nuke spell (except other Undead with the Death Knight). Many use the heroes this way to quickly kill key enemy targets or heroes. The most common combo is Death Knight's Death Coil and Lich's Frost Nova. The Dreadlord's Carrion Swarm or Crypt Lord's Impale can also be added for a triple-nuke. This strategy is aided by the fact that you need fewer Acolytes than other factions' workers (since lumber is harvested by Ghouls instead), so there is the option of rushing to Tier 2 extra early for a second hero by diligently protecting your gold mining Acolytes from base raids.
• Balance, Power, Skill, Gimmick: Death Knight, Crypt Lord, Lich, Dreadlord.
  • Death Knight is a Jack of All Trades who can do a lot of what an undead army needs but is not as specialized as the other three, Crypt Lord is The Minion Master and frontline Stone Wall that becomes a Mighty Glacier as he gains levels and items, Lich is a Squishy Wizard built around damage and mana with the option to go defensive if needed, and the Dreadlord is a melee strength hero that plays more like a Squishy Wizard and is focused on disrupting fights with his spells.
  • The Dreadlord in Reign of Chaos was the Power by default, being the best at close combat among the original three, but he was pushed to Gimmick by the Crypt Lord being a better Power than both him and the Death Knight by all metrics. This is unlike the other factions, where the newest hero in the expansion was the Gimmick hero.
• Boring, but Practical: The Tomb of Relic's tier 3 non-Orb item is remarkably more boring than the other races. Instead of a Staff of Sanctuary, Anti-Magic Potion, or a Tiny Great Hall, they get Scroll of Healing (up to 2 stocked at a time), which heals 150 health in a relatively large area. Getting them on 3 heroes would give the entire undead army up to 450 more health, making their armies extremely difficult to fight head-on, and it rewards most Undead army's tendency to use a mass of weak units. This gives the Undead a strong incentive to get a lot of heroes, more than other races. Even though the scrolls can be bought from any Goblin Merchant, the convenience of having them on demand at the player's base means the player does not have to extend their forces to try to control the neutral building (that may not even be on the map) to do the same.
• Card-Carrying Villain: The Death Knight and Lich both have lines where they call themselves "evil". The Dreadlord is the most Obviously Evil of them and talks about darkness, his intelligence, and eating souls. The Crypt Lord is the only exception, where his personality is more akin to a soft-spoken Boisterous Bruiser compared to the rest of them.
• Defeat Equals Explosion: Uniquely among heroes, when Dreadlords and Liches die, they don't just fall down. Dreadlord explode into a swarm of bats, and the Lich implodes into nothingness with only a bit of frost as they disappear.
• Devour the Dragon: As befitting the Undead, both Lich and Death Knight have an ability to do this with benefits to the caster's mana and health respectively.
• Evil Is One Big, Happy Family: Within the same factions of the Undead, the Undead leaders get along just fine thanks to the Curse of Undeath making it difficult to be around the living, and many being hated by their kind for betraying the living. Dreadlords are a different case as they're Demonic rather than Undead overseers who are tasked with keeping the Scourge in line for the Burning Legion.
  • This gets carried into gameplay as well. In team games, the Undead have some advantages that are exclusive to them, such as building and regenerating on blight, which means they are not really able to build defensive structures in a living ally's base, but they could bolster an Undead ally's base. Several powerful hero spells can only target undead too, such as Death Coil or Dark Ritual. Due to the strong synergy between Undead heroes, it's a common strategy in team games to all play Undead and pick different heroes and play close to each other.
• Frontline General: Three of the four Undead heroes (except the Lich) are melee Strength heroes who tend to hang out near or at the frontlines. Death Knight's are very common but they are more valued for their Death Coil's nuking or healing and Unholy Aura than for deliberately engaging in melee; they tend to stay back behind melee units. The Dreadlord also hangs back slightly due to being relatively fragile and more focus on mana growth than the typical strength hero. The Crypt Lord is best suited for leading at the front with their tanking abilities, and powerful Life Drain ultimate. This philosophy also crosses into gameplay as the Undead heroes can combine their nuke spells to blast priority targets and are thus encouraged to stay grouped up instead of running off on their own, especially since Death Knight healing is so pivotal and they can all conveniently buy Scrolls of Healing from a Tomb of Relics to provide additional mass healing.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: They have mostly threatening names that allude to darkness, death, or cold. Crypt Lords have an association with Ancient Egypt instead.
• No Self-Buffs: A variation. Ironically, three of the four Undead Heroes have support abilities, and all of these abilities (except Unholy Aura) are suboptimal when applied on themselves. Death Coil cannot be cast on the Death Knight at all, he needs to use Death Pact (which is overall a weaker heal) to heal himself. Frost Armor is better on a frontline tank like an Abomination or Crypt Lord, since the Lich is not meant to tank either way. Vampiric Aura is carried by the Dreadlord, who is the most fragile frontline strength hero, so it's more for actual frontline melee heroes and units rather than the Dreadlord himself.
• Obviously Evil: All of them look and act evil. And they are. The Lich even nods to this by declaring "The ancient evil survives." upon being recruited. The Dreadlord is so vampiric and demonic with a matching Vampire Vords personality that it verges on parody.
• Weakened by the Light: Like all biological undead, Undead heroes and the Demonic Dreadlord are all vulnerable to the Paladin's Holy Light, making Human Paladins more powerful than usual for countering Undead Heroes. This gets even worse if a Blood Mage is in tow to Banish them for a +66% damage penalty.

Death Knight

"The pact is sealed."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Death Coil, Death Pact, Unholy Aura, Animate Dead (Ultimate)
Possible names: Lord Nightsorrow, Lord Soulrender, Lord Dethstorm, Lord Maldazzar, Lord Darkhallow, Lord Lightstalker, Baron Bloodbane, Baron Felblade, Duke Dreadmoore, Duke Ragereaver, Baron Frostfel, Lord Darkscythe, Duke Wintermaul, Baron Perenolde, Baron Morte
Playable Campaign character: Arthas Menethil

Death Knights are the premier warriors of the Undead Scourge. Though they were once paladins who ventured north to find the source of the Plague of Undeath, these former champions of truth now serve the Lich King, riding at the head of his dreaded armies and sowing chaos and destruction in their wake. Mounted atop fearsome undead deathchargers and wielding runeblades infused with dark magic, they bring terror to all who would stand in the Scourge's way. They can heal their undead allies and damage living enemies with Death Coil, sacrifice a friendly undead unit to restore their own health with Death Pact, and grant their allies improved movement speed and health regeneration with Unholy Aura. Their ultimate ability, Animate Dead, brings to life the corpses of the 6 most powerful nearby units, putting them all under the Death Knight's control for the duration.

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• Animate Dead: Literally the name of their ultimate, which reanimates corpses near the Death Knight (friend or foe) and makes them invulnerable. Conveniently, units raised this way are flagged as Undead regardless of what they were in life, allowing the Death Knight, Lich, and Necromancer to sacrifice them for their own abilities.
• Aristocrats Are Evil: All of their randomly-generated names contain a title of nobility — "Baron," "Lord," or "Duke."
• Black Knight: An evil knight clad in black armor. They do not wear any kind of identity-concealing helmet, however.
• Boring, but Practical: They're not the flashiest hero to recruit mainly due to mediocre attack rate and damage. Much of their utility is in throwing Death Coils for damage or healing, buffing your army with Unholy Aura's healing and speed buff, and occasionally skilling and using Death Pact for an efficient self-heal. However, they provide a lot of staying power to the Undead as their damage spell is also a great way to save your units from being picked off. Meanwhile, Unholy Aura allows your troops to passively heal automatically off of blight and maneuver more swiftly. The most boring builds skip Animate Dead at Level 6 in favor of maxing out both Death Coil and Unholy Aura because they're that effective. Fortunately, if you really need them to attack physically, the Necromancer's Unholy Frenzy will give them a considerable 75% boost to attack rate, and Unholy Aura can even negate the health drain.
• Call-Back:
  • Unholy Aura is very similar in principle to the Death Knight's Haste spell in Warcraft II, except it provides a universal Healing Factor instead of an attack rate buff for a select few units. Death Pact's self healing works like the self-healing in the old version of Death Coil, except you must kill one of your units and you gain up to 300% of that unit's current health.
  • In Warcraft II, the Death Knight unit made comments alluding to his limited patience. The Death Knight hero sometimes comments that "My patience has ended." when selected.
  • Baron Perenolde's name implies that he has ties to the ruling family of Alterac. Upholding Alterac's infamous betrayal of the Alliance in the Second War, he has joined The Scourge, the successor to the Dark Horde, and carries on Alterac's reputation for treachery.
• Combat Medic: Unlike most healers, the Death Knight likes to be near the front lines. He wants to be within Coil range of any allies that need healing, but also any enemy he can try to nuke. Due to his poor melee attack, he rarely wants to be in the thick of battle, but with points in Death Pact, he can do some tanking too.
• Continuity Nod: In Warcraft II, Death Knights were Liches mounted atop undead horses and one of the few units vulnerable to Paladins' Exorcism. This next generation of Death Knights are instead fallen Paladins who were corrupted by the Lich King and wield Evil Counterpart versions of the Paladin spells and are vulnerable to Holy Light just like their predecessors were to Exorcism. The Death Knights of the second war still exist, but they were transformed into the new Lich heroes.
• Cool Sword: They are known for using runeblades, swords emblazoned with runes that grant the weapon magical powers.
• Devour the Dragon: Death Pact lets the Death Knight sacrifice his own non-Hero units to restore health based on that unit's current health. In addition to all the expendable, timed life fodder the Undead can summon to begin with (including the ones raised by the Death Knight's own Animate Dead, which are invulnerable, so they always heal him for the full amount when sacrificed), simply using it on a lowly Ghoul is already more efficient than chugging a healing potion.
• Evil Counterpart: Explicitly described in-game to be this to Paladins, having many equivalent abilities, including a reversed version of Holy Light that damages the living and heals undead, a self-protection ability with similar usage to Divine Shield, an empowering aura (albeit more offensive than Devotion Aura due to the speed boost), and the ability to reanimate dead units. Its original name during development was even the Anti-Paladin before it received the Death Knight name, initially used for a separate hero unit whose model got reused for the Revenant creeps.
• Fallen Hero: The Death Knights were not turned by the Plague like the rest of the undead — they defected willingly in response to persecution from distrustful people of Lordaeron, who accused them of secretly being infected. Some Death Knights like Arthas Menethil gave into (unwittingly or otherwise) the lure of corrupting power from The Lich King out of despair or desperation to save their people from the Plague of Undeath.
• Foil: Their overall theme of an unholy healer and reanimator contrasts with the Lich whose spells are themed around freezing, decaying, or sacrificing targets; Death Coil is still an effective nuke against the living, nonetheless. Their sacrifice spell also contrasts, being used to heal the caster instead of restore mana.
• Fragile Speedster: Relatively speaking, Death Knights are this compared to their former Paladin selves. They have slightly less base armor and more base health, giving them minutely less effective health. However, they also lose Devotion Aura's defenses in place of Unholy Aura's speed and regeneration and are slightly more vulnerable to focus fire... although with Death Pact, the practicality of doing so is still rather minimal.
• Gender Flip: While all Death Knights in the original Warcraft III are male, a skin in Reforged makes the multiplayer Death Knight female instead.
• Graceful in Their Element: Inverted with the Paladin hero as their element is battling the abundant living factions and their Death Coil has no effect on enemy Undead at all. However, this does mean that living neutral heroes are less desirable due Death Coil being unable to heal them.
• Healing Factor: Unholy Aura provides this as one of its components, allowing health recovery to the Undead Army even without blighted ground.
• Hellish Horse: Rides an armored skeletal horse with horns known as a "deathcharger."
• He Who Fights Monsters: The Paladins of the Second War were specialized to heal the sick and wounded and perform Exorcism on Death Knights and their skeleton minions. When the Plague of Undeath caused vilification due to the Paladins' disease immunity, some grew resentful and defected to the Lich King, becoming Death Knights themselves. What is ironic is that the Death Knights of the Second War are now their Lich allies.
• Jack of All Stats: The Death Knight is the most well rounded of the Undead heroes and is able to heal allies, nuke living enemies, increase his army's mobility, keep himself alive by "eating" a unit, and potentially turn the tide of a battle with his ultimate. While somewhat durable as a strength hero, he isn't exceptionally tanky and more built around speed and supporting. He's considered the safest first hero to pick on Undead in most circumstances, unless you're doing a hero-specific strategy that requires one of the other heroes' specializations (like using a Lich to rush or using a Dreadlord to be paired with Ghouls/Abominations).
• Magic Knight: The Death Knight's damage mostly comes from Death Coil. He has low attack damage, and his attack speed is very slow. As a result, players will often prioritize itemizing their Death Knight with mana gear at every opportunity.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: They are unique in that their unusual heal/nuke spell can only harm living units. They are also unique among melee heroes in that they have a Good Counterpart, the Paladin whose heal/nuke only harms the Undead and only heals the living.
• Mutual Disadvantage: When fighting other Death Knights solo, neither can use their Death Coil offensively, they can only slowly melee one another and use whatever offensive items they have on hand.
• No Body Left Behind: The fate of Animate Dead units after their timer expires is that they explode, so they cannot be raised again for the same purpose.
• No Self-Buffs: Zigzagged: while Death Coil can't be used on the caster to heal himself, Death Pact (kills an allied undead unit to absorb some or all of its HP) only works on the caster, so the Death Knight has a means to keep himself alive, it just requires additional skill points.
• Odd Name Out: Baron Perenolde is unusual as it's a standard name without the usual references to evilness, similar to Arthas Menethil.
• One-Handed Zweihänder: The Death Knight wields a sword that looks to be at least a meter long with one hand. He uses the other hand to keep a grip on his horse.
• Red Mage: While the Death Knight's main purpose is to be a healer for his troops, Death Coil is a useful nuke too, as long as it's targeting a living opponent.
• Revenant Zombie: Their ranks are filled with corrupted Paladins who have entered a state of Undeath with all of the perks and weaknesses it entails plus they retain their original personalities. Like all biological Undead, they can be hurt by a Paladin's Holy Light.
• Revive Kills Zombie: Inverted with Death Coil, which does damage to enemy living units and heals friendly undead units.
• Shoot the Medic First: Death Knights often make extremely high-priority targets for enemies fighting an Undead player since his only form of self-healing requires killing allied units and because of his high damage and healing potential. Furthermore, Death Pact is often passed up as taking it means not using the skill point to improve his other skills, which are generally more valued for the improvement they give to your army, and using Death Pact means he has less mana to spend on Death Coil.
• Sword Beam: The Death Knight's spellcasting animation has him aiming his sword at his target, like it's a Magic Wand. When casting Death Coil it looks like it's being blasted out of his sword.
• Unique Enemy: Only two Death Knights are fought in the campaign, both of them during the final mission of The Frozen Throne's Night Elf campaign.
• We Can Rule Together: After Ner'Zhul's Dark Horde lost the Second War to the Human Alliance, Ner'Zhul used his new Lich King powers to lure disaffected Alliance Paladins to join him as his new Death Knights.
• You Can't Kill What's Already Dead: The expansion makes Animate Dead's units invulnerable in exchange for lasting less time. This makes them great targets for abilities like Death Pact or the Lich's Dark Ritual (restores mana) as the units will survive to be usable again for this purpose.

Dreadlord

"The night beckons."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Carrion Swarm, Sleep, Vampiric Aura, Inferno (Ultimate)
Possible names: Terrordar, Nerothos, Bleakill, Necros, Fearoth, Dethecus, Maldibion, Nochthitus, Gholbine, Rashgarroth, Aramachus, Zilfallon, Lorthiras, Zenedar, Mullioch, Algammon, Banehallow, Ven'Gyr
Playable Campaign character: Varimathras (with modified skills, has some Pit Lord abilities)
NPC Campaign characters: Mal'Ganis, Tichondrius, Anetheron, Dalvengyr, Detheroc, Balnazzar, Talnivarr the Sleeper

Dreadlords, also called Nathrezim, are among the most powerful of demons and the primary agents, spies, and enforcers of the Burning Legion, sent to keep lower units in line and prepare worlds for the demonic invasion. On Azeroth, they have been tasked by the Legion to oversee the Scourge, the vast undead army tasked with weakening the inhabitants of Azeroth so that they cannot offer resistance to the Legion. They can send out a swarm of bats against foes with Carrion Swarm, put enemies to sleep with Sleep, and allow allies to recover health when damaging enemies with Vampiric Aura. Their ultimate ability, Inferno, summons a mighty Infernal demon from the sky.

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• Aristocrats Are Evil: Like the Death Knights, Dreadlords are like a nobility in the Burning Legion thanks to their Vampire Vords theme and charming personalities. Like aristocrats, they domineer over their subjects to ensure they carry out the will of their supreme leadership.
• Bad Powers, Bad People: They're so Obviously Evil that it verges on parody and their spells are vampire-themed overall.
• Barrage of Bats: Carrion Swarm fires a wave of bats at enemies, although strangely the ability icon actually shows a swarm of locusts.
• Bat Out of Hell: Going with their whole "demon vampire" thing, Dreadlords are demons that have giant bat wings and can launch a wave of bats at enemies with Carrion Swarm.
• Black Mage: The Dreadlord's active abilities are all targeted towards damaging or disabling foes. Even his summon ability involves damaging and stunning an area first; that aspect of Inferno is almost as important as the summon itself.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Most plot-relevant Dreadlords have a different colour palette than that of the player they belong to. This, in turn, also helps players to recognize which Dreadlord is which, given several appear in the campaign, and often in groups. To further emphasize this, most of these Dreadlords carry an Orb of the same colour they use. Some Dreadlords, however, do share a colour (Mal'ganis and Detheroc are green, and Tichondrius and Varimathras are red), but these identically-colored Dreadlords only show up when the previous one had been killed.
• Combo Platter Powers: Several campaign Dreadlords switch out their default abilities for other skills, suggesting they each have their own specialization in magic (often tied to the element of the orb they carry), whereas the default Dreadlord has skills mostly in line with a Warlock, built around Fel magic.
  • Varimathas has Rain of Fire and Doom instead of Carrion Swarm and Infernal. He has similar skills to the Pit Lord and gives the player a taste of their skills in the campaign. In-universe it suggests that Varimarthas favors fire magic, since he also carries an Orb of Fire by default. Unlike some of the other "altered" Dreadlords, Varimathras's two replacement spells still serve the same function as the spells they are replacing (AOE damage and damage spell that summons a big unit).
  • Detheroc swaps Vampiric Aura for Shadow Strike and Inferno for Death and Decay, and he carries the passive Disease Cloud like an abomination. These abilities make Detheroc an even more dedicated caster with skill in Necromancy and poison magic, eschewing melee combat and Summon Magic for it. The poison theme to the abilities also ties to the orb he carries being an Orb of Venom.
  • Balnazzar swaps out Carrion Swarm for Finger of Pain (a weaker Finger of Death), Inferno for Rain of Chaos (a much stronger version of Inferno that summons multiple Infernals), and has a 5th ability, Earthquake. His Orb, Orb of Darkness allows him to create skeletons if his target dies after he attacks it, potentially allowing even more minions. This makes him an extremely powerful summoner and focused on sieging bases.
  • Talnivarr the Sleeper is interesting because he swaps out Vampiric Aura for Trueshot Aura (an aura he cannot benefit from), and Inferno for a specialized version of Rain of Chaos, which lets him summon his own, tougher Infernals. Even though Trueshot Aura does not help him, it does help his skeleton archer minions, which are the main source of damage in the encounter against him. Ultimately his job is to be a Support Party Member and to tank for his minions, despite being a Super Boss.
• Crippling Overspecialization: Zigzagged in regard to Vampiric Aura, though it arguably applies to the hero as a whole due to the importance of auras in how armies are structured.
  • Vampiric Aura has a much narrower use than most auras. If you look at the undead techtree, they can only build two normal melee units: Ghouls and Abominations ^note Acolytes and Gargoyles can get Vampiric Aura too, but Acolytes are workers and not used for combat except very early in the game and Gargoyles only get it when fighting other air units in melee range . This gives it less utility than the Death Knight's Unholy Aura, which applies to all units and has them recover health without having to hit any units. Vampiric Aura is only extremely powerful if a player were to go rush mass abominations with the "Unholy" upgrade line, but that strategy leaves huge weaknesses to air units and spellcasters (which would normally be covered by the "Creature" upgrade techtree units like Crypt Fiends and Destroyers, which you are less likely to build in this strategy). In order to use it optimally, you would have to put yourself in a vulnerable box that is easily countered.
  • It can end up Downplayed because of the Magikarp Power aspect of the skill, where it loses some of the "Crippling" aspect of the trope. The healing it provides grows as the game goes on as the affected unit's attack damage increases. The aura applies to most Undead summoned units (especially the Infernal) and 2 of the 3 other Undead heroes ^note 3 of the 5 if you count the two Undead neutral heroes. So even if it affects few units, it affects the most important ones. In strategies where Gargoyles are used as Anti-Air, it works incredibly well at Level 3 and can really help them outlast their targets thanks to their very-high melee damage ^note but be wary of hard-counters like Dragonhawk Riders or Troll Batriders who you don't want to use air-melee against . It becomes even more powerful in team games, as Vampiric Aura is extremely well suited for the melee-combat heavy Orc faction.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: In the campaign cutscenes Dreadlords are often shown teleporting to taunt a hero or concocting their plans. In-game, Dreadlords can only teleport by themselves with the help of certain items.
• Dynamic Entry: Inferno drops an Infernal on the targeted spot in the form of a Flaming Meteor that stuns and damages surrounding enemies before the Infernal itself stands up and starts punching.
• Evil Counterpart: Vampiric Aura is this to the Keeper of the Grove's Thorns Aura. Instead of causing enemies to suffer a percentage of their melee damage dealt, Vampiric Aura heals allies for a percentage of their melee damage dealt. If both auras are present in battle and at equal level, then Thorns Aura will heavily negate Vampiric Aura.
• Evil Genius: Almost all of the campaign Dreadlords: Tichondrius, Dalvengyr, Varimathras, Detheroc, and Balnazzar, have significantly (45%) more intelligence than the average Dreadlord, with only Anetheron and Mal'Ganis excluded. It could be considered Gameplay and Story Integration given their high ranks and in-universe cunning and leadership skills. Even the multiplayer Dreadlord has better intelligence growth than usual, with the Lich being the only Undead hero to surpass them.
• Fat Bastard: Reforged inexplicably gives obese models to Anetheron and Detheroc.
• Forced Sleep: The Sleep spell is an extremely straightforward example of this.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Dreadlords are the only hero where within the same faction virtually every single one is viewed with resentment and disdain by the other heroes. A lot of this is because they are agents of the Burning Legion and jailers of the Lich King, and the large portions of the sentient Scourge leadership (like Kel'Thuzad and Arthas) wants to free their master from their grasp.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Zigzagged. They are high ranking enforcers of the Burning Legion who out rank the Lich King himself (though they are happy to be the The Man Behind the Man and pretend to be subservient to him). The Dreadlords get treated in this manner when shown commanding Undead factions in the campaign story far more than any of the other undead heroes. However, in melee mode, Dreadlords are just an optional hero that can be recruited and it's usually a Death Knight who is in the spotlight and acting as the focal point of an Undead army for pragmatic reasons. The Dreadlord is more of a gimmick hero in terms of actual gameplay.
• Good Wings, Evil Wings: Their bat wings put them firmly on the "Evil Wings" side of the spectrum.
• Horned Humanoid: They have curved horns coming forward out of their foreheads.
• Horror Hunger: Appears to have a variant of this; they often say "I must hunt soon" when idle or "I hunger!" when attacking.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: They have responses that give this effect. "What, mortal?", "You thought of that.", and "That was my plan." convey the sense that even though Dreadlords are high-ranking members of the Burning Legion, they are still playing along with taking orders from the player as opposed to bossing around the Lich King himself. This is despite their high ranking which means they should be giving the commands.
• Life Drain: Vampiric Aura gives it to all nearby friendly melee units, giving them a portion of damage they deal out as health. Despite having a lifestealing passive with Vampiric Aura, the Dreadlord has rather poor right clicking and frontline potential, and the aura is more for the other heroes and units (especially the Infernal).
• Magikarp Power: Dreadlord has shades of this trope, though not as much as the Crypt Lord (who has even greater potential).
  • Dreadlords have poor combat stats for a melee strength hero and get a huge power spike when they reach level 6. They are commonly played solo without other heroes to split experience with to try to get to level 6 as soon as possible. Once they have Inferno, they try to swiftly end the game with the power spike. However, if they can't end the game quickly, their Infernal power spike will end (as it can't stand against multiple high-level heroes and highly upgraded troops) and the solo Dreadlord will fall off.
  • Vampiric Aura is the most late-game oriented of the auras, becoming much stronger as Undead heroes get more damage.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: Despite being a strength hero, the Dreadlord plays much more like an intelligence caster. He has low starting strength and modest strength gain, but high base intelligence and good intelligence gain (same as his strength). He is far less durable than all other strength heroes and frequently needs to be protected and micromanaged well to not die. Most campaign Dreadlords take this further, where they have 45% more intelligence than normal Dreadlords, but their other stats (which are used for direct combat) stay the same.
• Non-Player Character: Unlike the other faction heroes, the player never gets to play as a normal Dreadlord in the campaigns, but instead play as Varimathras, who has half of the normal skills swapped with the Pit Lord.
• Our Vampires Are Different: Clearly designed to evoke a classical vampire, from the abilities, to the quotes, to the bat Animal Motif, to the slight Romanian accent. Earlier versions of the unit (known then as the Dread Lord) were also more vampiric and less demonic, lacking horns, hooves and armor and instead wearing a robe, though they still had wings and massive claws.
• Purposefully Overpowered: Tichondrius and Balnazzar both have Rain of Chaos, which is an insanely overpowered version of the standard Dreadlord ultimate (it summons 2-4 Infernals, costs no mana and has a lower cooldown than the normal Inferno ultimate) and their other abilities are also very annoying, with Tichondrius having Finger of Death and Balnazzar having Earthquake. Both are treated as a major Climax Boss in-game, with Tichondrius being the last opponent of the penultimate level and Balnazzar is the enemy hero of the last mission of Sylvanas' arc.
  • Anetheron has Rain of Chaos as well, though he is otherwise a normal Dreadlord and not a Climax Boss.
  • There's also Talnivarr the Sleeper, who has his own version of Rain of Chaos and is extremely tough overall in combat.
• Quirky Bard: The vanilla Dreadlord tends to be a supporting hero, selected last or taken first in circumstances such as team games where your team can cover their deficiencies or when you can leverage their strengths. While Carrion Swarm gives a damaging spell option, it's most efficient against a large group of enemies. If you get a Dreadlord to level 6 however, Inferno is an amazing ability, summoning a powerful Infernal golem to fight for your army. Sleep may also come into play against a solo harassing Blademaster, or to interrupt a channeled spell.
• Recurring Boss: There are multiple enemy Dreadlords in the campaigns since they act as the main agents of the Burning Legion. Unlike most of the other recurring enemy heroes, the Dreadlords are more prone to having altered skillsets, and most of the named Dreadlords carry an orb.
• Skill Gate Characters: The Sleep spell can be very crippling to armies, able to disable half of the units in them if you are not able to micromanage your units to wake your other units up. If you can, it is just a minor inconvenience. Dreadlord users in multiplayer often prioritize Carrion Swarm instead and use Sleep only if the interrupt would be impactful or use Sleep mostly for creeping (because creep AI does not include waking each other up). Many players get a lot of practice against this spell because of how many Dreadlords you fight in the campaigns.
• Squishy Wizard: Relatively speaking, they're this compared to other Strength heroes. The Dreadlord's lower health and armor relative to other heroes and lack of a truly potent defensive ability make him less suited to frontlining. His value instead comes from his ability to force his enemies into sleep or deal damage with Carrion Swarm, and at high levels, has his Infernal to do the fighting for him.
• The Starscream: Parodied. One of the generic Dreadlord's gag responses has him plotting to overthrow the player.

  Dreadlord: And then... after I overthrow this fool... o-oh hello! I didn't know you were there!

• Summon Magic: The Infernal called down by the Dreadlord's ultimate ability is easily one of the most powerful melee fighters in the game; it runs quickly, has loads of health, hits like a sack of bricks, stuns enemies it lands on, has a passive ability that burns everything around it for good measure, and is immune to magic so using Anti-Magic spells on it like on most summon units doesn't work. It can also be healed by the Death Knight or by the Dreadlord's Vampiric Aura to make it even harder to kill, making it hugely threatening against ground armies. It can also knock down trees to open surprise attack paths.
• Super Boss: Talnivarr the Sleeper is an Optional Boss in The Founding of Durotar, and one of the few that is a Hero Unit. He is in the Outland Arena with his two fellow gladiators, Destroyer Zardikar (a powerful Doom Guard) and Sinstralis of the Pain (a powerful succubus), who are both units. Because of this, Talnivarr is the only one that personally gets stronger the more times you beat him, starting at level 2 and ending up at level 15 at his strongest. His stats are also far greater than any other Dreadlord, especially his Agility, and thus his armor. More information on him and his fellow gladiators is available on this page.
• Wings Do Nothing: Lampshaded during one of their Stop Poking Me! quotes.

  Dreadlord: If I have wings, why am I always walking?

• What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: The main reason the campaign Dreadlord Mal'Ganis is extremely weak in a gameplay standpoint is because he loses Vampiric Aura and Inferno and gains two abilities that are only useful for the first mission where he appears. Dark Conversion, which turns a villager into a zombie, and Soul Preservation, which sends a zombie to the "nether-realm" (removing it from the map). Soul Preservation is only used in "The Culling" for Mal'Ganis to reach the mission's Game Over objective. Otherwise he is just a weak hero with no ultimate and only 2 abilities that are useful for combat. Reforged restores Vampiric Aura and Inferno, making him as formidable as a normal Dreadlord.

Lich

"The ancient evil survives."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Frost Nova, Frost Armor, Dark Ritual, Death and Decay (Ultimate)
Possible names: Ordin Frostbane, Ras Splinterspine, Morbent Fell, Rage Winterchill, Araj the Summoner, Kali'naj Dethknell, Rak Coldskull, Din Frostfire, Calis Wraithson, Venim Iceblade, Naze the Eternal, Ras Frostwhisper, Coldreaver, Cho'Nammoth, Kryptikk Soulslayer, Alandil Lieng
Playable Campaign character: Kel'Thuzad
NPC Campaign character: Rage Winterchill

The first Liches were originally Orc Death Knights, warlocks who were transformed into twisted aberrations of their former selves by the Legion when Draenor was destroyed. They are empowered with the vengeance of the cold north and the decay of death itself, but their tremendous magical power carries an equally tremendous price: they are enslaved to the will of the Lich King, Ner'zhul. Ner'zhul recruited additional Liches by corrupting Magi, the Human Alliance counterparts to the Orc Death Knights. One of Ner'zhul's most notable recruits is the human Kel'Thuzad who began his career as a Mage studying the forbidden arts of necromancy. Liches can damage groups of enemies with Frost Nova, grant allies armor and slow their attackers with Frost Armor, and sacrifice a friendly undead unit to gain mana with Dark Pact. Their ultimate ability, Death and Decay, damages all units and buildings in a large area, friend or foe, for 4% of their maximum health every second.

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• An Ice Person: They specialize in ice magic, coming from the Grim Up North. In-game, they possess Frost Armor and Frost Nova.
• Anti-Structure: Strictly speaking, Death and Decay is just as effective versus non-structure units as it is against structures; the difference is that an army can walk out of the area of effect while buildings can't (besides Night Elven ancients, and even then they're so slow it will do a number on them anyway), making it far more effective at razing bases in general. It also does percentage-based damage, making it more damaging versus enemies with higher HP, which buildings usually do compared to units. One way to use this to devastating effect is to hide a Lich behind trees, use line of sight from a unit like a Shade, and cast Death and Decay on a town hall structure to sneakily halt expansion activity.
• Art Shift: The Lich's icon was redrawn between Reign of Chaos and The Frozen Throne, becoming more streamlined and more obviously a skeleton face, where the original was from a dramatic low angle but was hard to see the details of.
• Black Mage: Though he actually does have a defensive ability with Frost Armor, the Lich is commonly played as a pure offensive caster (taking Frost Armor last), using Frost Nova as much as possible and Dark Ritual to cast more Frost Novas, or Death and Decay if sieging a base.
• Black Magic: Dark Ritual and Death and Decay are their main "dark" arts, but the Lich King also favors Frost magic as well. Frost Nova is the Liches' prime damage spell and is commonly paired with Dark Ritual to supply mana to cast it, while Frost Armor is available as a situational defensive magic.
• Body Surf: In the second game, Death Knights were the souls of orc warlocks who were forced into the bodies of dead human knights. When Ner'zhul became the Lich King, these death knights were remade into Liches, losing the Death Coil spell but keeping Death And Decay.
• Crutch Character: Liches when first-picked are ideal rushing heroes, since Frost Nova is a Disc-One Nuke that can deal huge damage to multiple small foes and it is extremely effective for killing low level heroes. His Dark Ritual allows him to sacrifice ghouls or skeletons to keep blasting the enemy heroes or army with Frost Nova since an early-game army can not burst him down. Later in the game the Lich dies very easily in combat compared to the other 3 Undead heroes (who are all strength heroes) and Frost Nova is no longer the army destroying spell it once was if players go further up their techtree and get more durable units. Despite this, Death and Decay is still an unmatched Anti-Structure spell and getting chain-nuked by Frost Nova and the other Undead damaging spells is still extremely unhealthy for any hero. The Lich doesn't become obsolete but becomes very dependent on other heroes like the Death Knight to keep him alive.
• Decomposite Character: The Lich King's Liches have among their ranks, the Death Knight casters from Warcraft II; they kept their Death and Decay talents while their Death Coil was swapped for a new Frost Nova. Meanwhile, the new Death Knights are a new generation, largely consisting of Revenant Zombie former Paladins, who have a variant of Death Coil, and have an even more powerful ability to raise the dead.
• Disc-One Nuke: Frost Nova. Deals a ton of damage to its main target, significant damage in an area, and slows all units in that area to a crawl. It is one of the most effective hero killers in the early game.
• Dem Bones: Entirely skeletal, though they also wear long flowing robes.
• Devour the Dragon: Like the Death Knight, the Lich can use Dark Ritual to consume a unit, though to refill his mana instead of health. It pairs excellently with Frost Nova for providing a steady stream of damage bursts, and Necromancers or Rods of Necromancy for summoning timed-life fodder.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil: True for all of the Undead forces, but Liches are notable for being recruited from multiple races, especially Orc Warlocks and Human Magi. This is notable as heroes in Warcraft III usually have a single representative race but Liches get around this by being embodiments of any powerful sorcerer — whose bodily remains are still available — that is selected by the Lich King. Kel'thuzad stands out as a Human Mage who betrayed his kin for promises of power, and is the playable Lich representative in both Undead campaigns. Multiplayer Liches are mostly Orc Warlocks at heart, but the diversity of names suggest Humans, Elves, and perhaps Ogre-Magi are among them too.
• Evil Is Deathly Cold: In contrast to the Archmage's ice magic, which is more raw elemental power and comes from their water-based magic, the Lich's ice powers are firmly rooted in the chill of the grave.
• Evil Genius: Most of the Liches are former Orc Warlocks and by extension, Warcraft II Death Knights, but Ner'Zhul also recruited corruptible Human Magi, most notably Kel'Thuzad. Both magicians favor intellect and magic over brute force.
• Fighting a Shadow: Liches don't use their original form in battle, a fact that is demonstrated when Kel'thuzad is resurrected and discards his original form. The form implodes when the Lich is temporarily defeated.
• Foil: Their spells are themed around freezing or decaying the life out of targets, in contrast with the Death Knight being an unholy healer and reanimator of the dead. Their sacrifice spell also contrasts, restoring mana and letting them deal more damage instead of healing the caster.
• Four Is Death: Death and Decay deals 4% of a target's health per second.
• Glass Cannon: The Liches' Frost Nova is devastating against clusters of small units and single targets of opportunity and Death and Decay does damage equal to 4% of a target's total health per second in a large area, long enough to kill or destroy them. However, Liches can't take much abuse for a hero unit and work best with a Death Knight to heal them. Frost Armor can help to an extent but is usually forgone in favor of Dark Ritual to supply mana for Frost Nova and ensure the Lich can nuke targets in tandem with a Death Knight.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Liches have a variety of different names with some of them being names that are indicative of the Lich being another species besides an Orc, but all melee Lich heroes use the same voice lines of Orc Liches sworn to Ner'Zhul. In the story campaign, Kel'thuzad manages to avoid this by having his own unique lines that indirectly acknowledge his history as a Human Mage and Necromancer.
• Good Powers, Bad People: Their Dark Ritual is the only one that is deliberately dark themed and relies on a sacrifice for mana. Their Frost and Decay magic are all themed around processes that occur in nature and aren't evil in and of themselves. The Liches use them to devastating effect nonetheless, and this isn't even fel magic which is noted for its corrupting influence.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Despite being one of the most common enemy heroes, the player only gets to play as a Lich (Kel'Thuzad) in two missions in Reign of Chaos, and only the very first Undead mission in The Frozen Throne. It is a bit downplayed in the Reign of Chaos campaign, since even though Kel'Thuzad is not playable in the final mission, he is still the mission objective that the player has to protect.
• Kill It with Ice: Their signature Frost Nova can hit like a truck against multiple targets and is one of the reasons for recruiting a Lich. It's such a good ability that more often than not, it's paired with the Dark Ritual spell and perhaps some mana potions to keep the Lich well supplied to cast this ability.
• Necromancer: More of a theme than their actual in-game abilities. Death and Decay makes use of death magic, but they don't reanimate bodies like the Death Knight can. The Lich's spells are themed around conditions inhospitable to life, such as deadly cold, sacrificing for mana, and rapid decay. The Death Knight by contrast can work in the opposite direction as an unholy healer and reanimator of any corpse.
• Odd Name Out: Alandil Lieng and Cho'Nammoth stand out for not being flashy names relating to winter or some other superlative; the former to be a regular name of presumably an Elf or Human, while the latter is similar to the Ogre Mage Cho'gall's name.
• One-Steve Limit: Averted. Rage Winterchill shows up as an enemy hero in the last mission of Reign of Chaos but he has Finger of Death. It's also a name for generic liches.
• Our Liches Are Different: They are essentially floating skeletons wearing flowing dark robes who levitate and specialize in ice and death magic. In World of Warcraft, it is further explained that liches' souls are stored in Soul Jars called phylacteries, and they can only be truly killed if their phylactery is destroyed. Also, with the exception of Kel'thuzad in the campaign, almost all Liches seen in Warcraft III are of Orcish origin, with some odd names out leaving things open for speculation.
• Percent Damage Attack: Death and Decay deals the Max HP percentage variant on this trope. Unlike most versions of this trope, this spell is intentionally made to easily tear apart tanky enemies and it ignores Spell Immunity and Contractual Boss Immunity. In practice it's mostly used against buildings.
• Power Floats: The Lich's immense power is shown through floating rather than running or riding a mount (like all other Squishy Wizard heroes). He is the only hero with the "hover" movement type (a few units like Sorceresses, Banshees, and Wisps have it too). This is mostly visual, though it has a small gameplay element, in that a Lich can't set off goblin land mines, which could be relevant in the campaigns.
• Recurring Boss: Generic Liches are one of the more common enemy heroes in the campaigns. They serve multiple masters through the campaigns, between the Lich King or specific Dreadlords in the name of the Legion.
• Robe and Wizard Hat: Their long, flowing black robes are a key part of their trademark appearance.
• Shoot the Mage First: If facing an Undead player that doesn't have a Death Knight but has a Lich, he is often the top priority hero target. He blasts out massive amounts of damage, has a ton of mana and mana recovery, and is very fragile. Unlike most Squishy Wizard heroes, he is not also fast moving, so is considerably easier to kill than them (even if he can potentially make himself tankier and harder for melee heroes to catch with Frost Armor).
• Squishy Wizard: While they can alleviate their lack a physical damage mitigation with Frost Armor, they still have slim health pools and need protection from magic nukes. The Lich is the most fragile Undead hero, offsetting their powerful spells and powerful mana recovery ability.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: The Lich is the first high level enemy hero that is a threat in the Reign of Chaos campaigns. A level 6 and level 10 Lich are the enemy heroes in the 5th mission of the Human Campaign, "March of the Scourge" (on both Normal and Hard). This mission is often considered to be the first difficult level in the campaigns. Both Liches have high levels in Frost Nova and know Death and Decay, which means they will blast your army and destroy your base if you do not focus them down.

Crypt Lord (Frozen Throne)

"From the depths, I come."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Impale, Spiked Carapace, Carrion Beetles, Locust Swarm (Ultimate)
Possible names: Thebis-Ra, Typhis-Ahn, Anubiros, Memphis-Ahn, Horus'aman, Nephri'thos, Arak-arahm, Tuten'arak, Pharoh-moth
Playable Campaign character: Anub'arak

The fearsome Crypt Lords were once the kings of the mighty underground kingdom of Azjol-Nerub, which stretched beneath the continent of Northrend. When the Scourge, led by the Lich King, proved its supremacy in the War of the Spider, the Crypt Lords were swayed to join the Scourge and were granted the immortality of undeath. These massive, insectoid beings are the mightiest of the Scourge's warriors and guard their holdings in Northrend. They can deal damage to enemies in a line and hurl them into the air with Impale, improve their armor and return damage to melee attackers with Spiked Carapace, and create Carrion Beetles from enemy corpses (5 in the campaigns, 6 in the melee game). Their Ultimate ability, Locust Swarm, sends out a horde of locusts to attack enemies, which return and heal the Crypt Lord.

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• Achilles' Heel: None of his abilities are any good against air units except Locust Swarm. He and his Beetles cannot attack air naturally and Impale can't hit air units, even if they are grounded by Web or Ensnare ^note The ability also cannot impale land units affected by Ensnare or Entangling Roots. Internally, because it alters the elevation height of the units it hits, it flat out cannot target enemies that are affected with a debuff that fixes their elevation height, particularly to the ground level, like Web and the two previously mentioned abilities. Carapace also cannot return damage to any air units the way Footman's Defend can.
• Ancient Egypt: Crypt Lord multiplayer names all have obvious Egyptian influence, and they wear headdresses with an Egyptian aesthetic.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: Locusts are unusual because they are summoned units who automatically attack enemies and their damage type is the same as spells. But these attacks also damage spell immune enemies. The actual attack damage is reduced by armor value, however. Because it can bypass spell immunity, the Crypt Lord is one of the few heroes that can outfight a Mountain King.
• Attack Reflector: Spiked Carapace damages melee enemies that attack the Crypt Lord by a portion of the damage dealt and also increases his armor.
• Badass Boast: Several of his lines make big claims about his strength. Due to his great durability, he's not lying.

  Crypt Lord: My might cannot be matched!

• Balance Buff: Impale was known for being a buggy ability for a long time, where enemies were invulnerable while in mid-air, which meant that you could flat out miss nukes you are trying to combo with (especially ones with projectiles like Death Coil or Storm Bolt) because the enemies were invulnerable for a short time when the spell was about to hit. It was eventually fixed in a patch in 2020.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: They resemble massive rhinoceros beetles with praying mantis arms.
• Beetle Maniac: Aside from being large beetles themselves, he can also create up to 5/6 Carrion Beetles to attack enemies.
• Boisterous Bruiser: Downplayed, since he's actually quite soft spoken compared to the Mountain King, but he is still The Big Guy who favors making a Badass Boast instead of acting like a Card-Carrying Villain like the other undead heroes.
• Boring, but Practical: Spiked Carapace is not flashy, but it makes Crypt Lord much more durable and punishes enemies, especially Glass Cannon melee heroes and units, from taking what would normally be free shots at him. Due to his low mana pool, he rarely has the option to go for both his active abilities as well, so secondary skill points are often spent on the passive.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: He can do this to enemies with (what else?) Impale.
• Invincible Minor Minion: The Locusts are summoned units, but are completely invulnerable and cannot even be selected. They do die if the Crypt Lord does, however.
• Life Drain: Locust Swarm is a variation on this. The Locusts will damage enemies in the area and when they return, they will heal the Crypt Lord based on a portion of the damage they dealt. Each one returns and heals the Crypt Lord 20 health after dealing 26.6 damage (2 attacks on a 0-armor target, more if the target has high armor), and all of them return at the end of the duration. As such, the Crypt Lord's enemies are incentivized to either try to focus down the Crypt Lord before the spell ends so he doesn't get that heal at the end or run away so the Crypt Lord gets little healing.
• Magikarp Power: Among Undead Heroes, the Crypt Lord is really nothing more than a Stone Wall meat shield (and meat shield summoner with his beetles) until level 6. Learning Locust Swarm is a massive power spike for him, even compared to other heroes, and changes him into a Mighty Glacier.
  • The Crypt Lord is made artificially less durable. Unlike all other heroes he has 25 base health instead of 100. So, even though he has 26 starting strength, he still only has 675 health at level 1 (like a Death Knight) instead of 750 like the Pit Lord (who has the same starting strength).
  • He does not have any real ability to support or output huge spell damage like the other 3 heroes for Undead. He has some stun threat potential, but no real damage from Impale either. In order to truly deal damage, he needs Locust Swarm. The perk of the Life Drain aspect of the spell is an added bonus.
  • He also has very high strength growth, so his health pool and attack damage outstrips the other Undead heroes greatly when he reaches high levels. He also has very fast attack speed for a strength hero, 1.9 base cooldown, whereas almost all others have between 2 to 2.5. ^note Only the Dreadlord, who has poor strength growth and durability, has faster (1.8). The Goblin Alchemist has Chemical Rage to boost his attack speed, but his base attack time is still the very slow 2.5.
• Mighty Glacier: The tankiest of the undead heroes, he is slow-moving and focused on defense, and his low mana pool means he's limited in how much he can use his abilities. Initially, the damage he and his beetles deal is subpar, but once they learn Locust Swarm, the Crypt Lord becomes a huge threat with his damage output.
• The Minion Master: The Crypt Lord can raise Carrion Beetles from nearby corpses. Unlike most summoned units, Carrion Beetles do not have a timed life and last indefinitely, though he can only have up to 5/6 at a time. Conveniently enough, the Undead have a structure that generates free corpses, allowing him to fill out his beetle count before entering battle. Part of his threat is also all the beetles he can summon in-battle to replace his initial batch, as long as there is a supply of corpses and he has the extra mana.
• Mundane Utility: Carrion Beetles make handy targets for the Death Pact and/or Dark Ritual, particularly from Level 2 and on due to their health surpassing Skeleton Warriors. Because they never expire, they're more likely to be available for this purpose. The trade-off is that the Crypt Lord needs to spend a small sum of mana (50) to raise each Beetle, but this can give the Crypt Lord a niche as a mana battery for a Lich hero. The Beetles are also handy scouts thanks to their ability to burrow and thanks to their lack of a food cost.
• The Quisling: The backstory for the Crypt Lord reveals they were Nerubian Spider Lords who betrayed their people to the Scourge for rewards in undeath.
• Randomized Damage Attack: Locust Swarm is this in regard to its total damage because of A.I. Roulette. Locusts actually do a very consistent 13-14 damage with 1 second cooldown and attack from melee range. This means that each Locust can do up to 13.5 DPS, which with 20 locusts over its 30 second duration would mean it can potentially deal up to 7500 total damage (accounting for the fact that it takes 4 seconds for all 20 locusts to be summoned). However, their short range making them easy to kite and their flawed AI (they have a critter-like ability where they will wander instead of looking for targets to attack) causes a lot of variations in the damage's consistency. Player testing found the ability's total damage in optimal conditions is between 2000 and 3000.
• Revenant Zombie: Like the Human Death Knights, the Crypt Lords were rewarded with the undeath by the Lich King and fully retain their original personalities. Though the campaign Crypt Lord Anub'arak seems to be a slave with just enough free will to complain about it, possibly.
• Spikes of Villainy: Spiked Carapace. They aren't just for show either.
• The Stoic: Compared to his fellow Undead heroes, the Crypt Lord lacks the sadism and theatricality. He rarely has any big shows of emotion.
• Studded Shell: With Spiked Carapace, the Crypt Lord gains an attack reflector as well as increased armor value.
• Super Mode: Locust Swarm is not a transformation per se, but instead summons a bunch of invulnerable units to attack nearby enemies. These units die if he dies but heal him as they damage enemies and again at the end of the duration. It functions like an odd fusion of a transformation spell and a summon spell.
• Super-Persistent Predator: Locusts fly and chase after anyone in the area for a long distance even if the Crypt Lord is stunned. Almost nothing can stop them while the Locust Swarm is active, besides running/teleporting out of range or killing the Crypt Lord.
• The Swarm: Locust Swarm can damage up to 20 enemies at a time. Alternatively, if there is only one target, up to 7 locust can attack that same target at a time. This effectively means that the Crypt Lord is nigh-impossible to duel one-on-one.
• Tough Beetles: They are giant scarab beetles, are among the most durable heroes in the game, and he can also create up to 5/6 dangerous Carrion Beetles to assist him.
• The Unfought: No Crypt Lord is fought as an enemy hero in any of the campaigns. In story, they are only in Northrend at the time of the story. In The Frozen Throne all enemy Undead are fought in Lordaeron or near there (like Dalaran).
• Why Won't You Die?: A Crypt Lord can be insanely hard to kill at when he reaches high levels. He has the highest armor and strength of all undead heroes, can stun multiple ground foes on a low cooldown, and is healed when Locust Swarm ends. Additionally, he is the most ideal target for the Undead's support spells and auras, benefitting far more than the casters from Death Coil ^note due to Crypt Lord's high armor, he gets more "effective health" from healing, as each health point is more valuable and harder to deplete, Vampiric Aura ^note the Crypt Lord has great strength growth so he deals more damage than the Dreadlord (despite a slightly slower base attack time) and he is more comfortable in the frontline tanking damage which means he spends more time attacking rather than running, and Frost Armor ^note the buff stacks very well with Spiked Carapace, giving the Crypt Lord massive armor and huge punishment for any melee attackers.

Neutral Heroes (Frozen Throne)

Neutral Heroes in General

The Tavern, where Neutral Heroes are hired

• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • Even though they are Only in It for the Money, you can still get one at no gold or lumber cost if they are your first hero, as long as you have an altar.
  • Though most of them would (even the Dark Ranger if she is free Undead), several of the heroes would not believably be mercenaries. Many of them are fanatical lieutenants to Always Chaotic Evil factions and won't be fighting for other factions just for gold. Naga Sea Witches basically all work for Azshara or Illidan. Pit Lords work for the Burning Legion. Firelords are elementals with the motivation to destroy all life, possibly working for the Old Gods. As such, hiring those 3 from the tavern is just an excuse for the player to be able to access the heroes.
• It's All About Me: Tavern hero gameplay leans a lot more selfish. None of them have built-in auras, and only the Goblin Alchemist has a defensive support ability. They are also all very mana intensive, requiring a lot more to function than most of the standard race heroes. By default, this makes them very well suited for Night Elves, who have Moon Wells. Humans can support their mana hungry neutral heroes with considerably more effort if they pick the Blood Mage or less commonly, the Archmage. In the case of Undead, the Dark Ranger and/or Pit Lord also have good synergy as the Death Knight can heal them and Obsidian Statues can help them recover mana.
• Mercenary Units: These heroes can be hired by any player, regardless of race, from neutral Taverns.
• Multiplayer-Only Item:
  • The Tinker, Firelord, and Alchemist do not appear anywhere in the campaign, having been added to the game after the campaigns were finished.
  • In melee games, AI players will never hire neutral heroes.
• Only in It for the Money: They'll work for any faction who pays them, without any objection.
• Sixth Ranger: Dark Ranger and Pit Lord are classified as Undead and are effectively a 5th and 6th Undead hero and can thus be healed by the Death Knight; Obsidian Statues also provide them with much-needed mana & health recovery support. Alchemist, Beastmaster, and Brewmaster are also effective options for the Night Elves due to providing them with early-game tanking heroes who can replenish efficiently at Moonwells. See their entries for more details.
• The Unfought: Most of them. The player only faces off against Naga Sea Witches and Pit Lords in the campaigns. And if it counts, the player also kills a Pandaren Brewmaster in the Tower Defense bonus mission.
• Villains Out Shopping: Relatively speaking; When the Sea Witches, Pit Lords, or Firelords aren't busy with supporting their existential threat factions, they're available for hire at Taverns to do battle in smaller skirmishes for entertainment.
• You All Meet in an Inn: Parodied. The fact that you hire a commander of your army from a random Tavern is a parody of the trope and a reference to the start of a lot of fantasy adventure stories.

Naga Sea Witch

"I stand ready."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Forked Lightning, Frost Arrows, Mana Shield, Tornado (Ultimate)
Possible names: Anna Kondra, Scilla Murkshadow, Ursula Snakemane, Lady Venomtongue, Lady Serpentra, Lady Darkscale, Serena Scarscale, Asprah Serpus, Venna Seastorm, Charib'dishal
Playable Campaign character: Lady Vashj

When the Legion invaded Kalimdor and made war upon the ancient night elf empire, Queen Azshara, along with her highborne loyalists, was blasted beneath the sea. Transformed into monstrous serpentine creatures by their queen's magic, the naga remain fervent loyalists to Azshara. Leading the naga are the sea witches, those who have mastered both the bow and the arcane magic that was so prized among their highborne predecessors. Sea witches can empower their bow attacks with ice magic with Frost Arrows, protect themselves with Mana Shield draining mana instead of health, and shock multiple targets at once with Forked Lightning. Their ultimate ability, Tornado, summons a massive tornado that wreaks havoc on buildings and can toss enemy units high in the air.

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• Aerith and Bob: Between the outlandish names available, the player can get a Sea Witch with the relatively common names of Anna, Ursula, or Serena.
• An Ice Person: The Sea Witch can imbue her arrows with frost magic to deal extra damage and slow down her target.
• Anti-Structure: Tornado deals heavy damage to buildings directly under it and minor damage to buildings in the general vicinity. Compared to the Far Seer's Earthquake, Tornado has a smaller area-of-effect for its maximum damage, but has the advantage of being more disruptive to units, being able to slow air units, and more importantly, being mobile.
• Blow You Away: The ultimate Sea Witch spell summons a controllable tornado. It is great for destroying buildings and temporarily slowing down enemy units by tossing them into the air (if they get too close) or hindering their movements.
• Composite Character: She acts as an iced-themed snare hero who provides lightning Area of Effect damage, similar to the Undead Lich and Orc Far Seer respectively. Mana shield also works on a similar principle to the Death Knight's Death Pact (sans requiring a target to sacrifice, but with less less mana efficiency) while Tornado lets her siege bases but not damage units, like with the Far Seer's Earthquake.
• Crutch Character: Probably the defining example of this trope in multiplayer. The Naga Sea Witch is one of the most powerful heroes in the early levels.
  • The Sea Witch is able to cheaply slow down any target early on with her Frost Arrows (something that normally would only be available on Tier 2 units onwards, units like Dryads, Sorceresses, Shaman, or Frost Wyrms). When she is picked up in a smaller game, it's almost always to pressure the enemy hero with Frost Arrows and force out a quick win.
  • Additionally, Forked Lightning deals a lot of damage to a small number of units. As the size of armies get bigger the spell's usefulness diminishes.
  • She is also one of the only heroes that benefits from the immediate recruitment from the Tavern, since she can apply pressure as soon as the start delay is over and the player has an altar, instead of taking 1 minute to create her after the altar is built.
• Do Not Touch the Funnel Cloud: Downplayed. While Tornado does the most damage to buildings on contact, buildings in its general vicinity will also take minor damage, and it can slow and toss units from a considerable distance away.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Despite the Naga being aquatic in nature, the multiplayer Naga Sea Witch can't swim for balance reasons (although Lady Vashj is amphibious in the campaign).
• Mage Marksman: Equally adept both at arcane magic and using a bow.
• Mana Shield: Literally the name of one of their spells, which drains the Sea Witch’s mana to shield her from damage.
• Odd Name Out: Charib'dishal, out of the available Sea Witch names. It does not follow the standard first-name-last-name or title-last-name setup and there are no references to Snakes or the Sea. However, the name itself is a reference to a Greek Mythological sea monster "Charybdis".
• Punny Name: Anna Kondra, as in anaconda.
• Recurring Boss: Throughout The Frozen Throne. Due to how prevalent the Naga are as opponents, it is often a Sea Witch leading them, if it's not Illidan himself.
• Shock and Awe: The Forked Lightning spell shoots lightning at up to three opponents.
• Shout-Out: One Sea Witch is fittingly named Ursula Snakemane.
• Sssssnake Talk: Appropriately enough, the Naga Sea Witch has a hissing voice and tends to stretch out her S's to some degree.
• Useless Useful Spell: Mana Shield. Being able to tank more damage by using her mana as a second health pool sounds nice, but the Sea Witch is dependent on spells to have an impact in battles, and is already so mana-hungry that turning on Mana Shield will take her out of the action faster than facetanking damage with her health pool. Not to mention, putting skill points into Mana Shield to learn it and improve its efficiency means not putting points into her other spells, limiting her usefulness.

Dark Ranger

"I'm here, as always."

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Silence, Black Arrow, Life Drain, Charm (Ultimate)
Possible names: Anya Eversong, Nara Pathstrider, Anthis Sunbow, Clea Deathstrider, Cyndia Hawkspear, Mira Shadewither, Amora Eagleye, Siren Ghostsong, Somand Wayfinder
Playable Campaign character: Sylvanas Windrunner

The undead Scourge wrought untold havoc upon the elven lands of Quel'Thalas in its quest for the power of the Sunwell. The greatest defenders of Quel'Thalas, the elven rangers, fell against the undead onslaught, and many were forcibly raised from the dead as banshees, elven spirits that can possess their foes. Now freed from the Scourge as part of the Forsaken, however, many banshees chose to possess their own corpses, regaining their former skills and adding their dreaded powers to make a formidable combination. They can prevent all enemy spellcasters in an area from casting with Silence, empower their ranged attacks and raise undead minions with Black Arrow, and drain their targets' hitpoints with Life Drain. Their ultimate ability, Charm, allows them to permanently take control of an enemy unit.

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• Aerith and Bob: Anya and Mira are not uncommon names in the present for women, in contrast to the other possible names like Anthis and Siren.
• Anti-Magic: Silence is one of the most effective anti-magic abilities in the game, capable of shutting down spellcasters in a wide area of effect.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: The Dark Ranger can potentially defy the trope by going over the max food limit by using Charm when at max food. She can do this as many times as needed, as long as her units stay alive, though obviously the player will not be able build any more units for other purposes.
• Boring, but Practical: The Dark Ranger is not a very flashy hero, but has a very useful skillset that is able to counter spellcasting units with Silence and steal many high-value units with Charm. She can pose a threat to heroes by damaging them over time and sustain her health with Life Drain (which also makes her deceptively durable) and finally her Black Arrow also makes her good at creeping and building momentum in fights.
• Borrowing from the Sister Series: Dark Rangers function like hero versions of the Protoss Dark Archon. Their Charm spell is very much like Mind Control; unlike the Banshees' Possession, it also works on air units and does not "kill" the caster, albeit it does not work on heroes or creeps above level 5. Silence also serves a similar role to Feedback as an anti-magic measure. The Dark Ranger also has a form of Spawn Broodling with Black Arrow which debuffs a biological target so that they spawn a Dark Minion skeleton if they die under the debuff.
• Charm Person: Their ultimate ability. Unlike the Possession used by the Banshee, it can be used on flying units and units that are normally immune to spells (like Spellbreakers and Dryads), though like Possession it can't be used on heroes and high-level creeps.
• Dem Bones: The minions summoned by the Black Arrow's victims are even tougher than the regular Undead skeletons. Because Black Arrow doesn't need to be the killing blow on a unit, it's not uncommon for a battle to end with four or five newly-spawned skeletons.
• Increasingly Lethal Enemy: Converting several enemy units to Dark Minions can easily turn the tide of a battle in the Dark Ranger's favor early on.
• Life Drain: One of their abilities. It channels enemy health into the Dark Ranger. It was eventually patched to even apply the Black Arrow effect if you've added points into it.
• Mage Marksman: Mainly an archer, but supports her abilities with quite a bit of dark magic.
• Mind Control: Charm permanently converts an enemy unit to the Dark Ranger's faction. Some restrictions apply, such as Resistant Skin blocking the spell.
• Necromancer: Black Arrow can raise undead minions when the target affected by it dies.
• No-Sell: An inversion, as Charm bypasses Spell Immunity. It still can not bypass Resistant Skin for balance reasons, however.
• Required Secondary Powers: One perk of Charm (shared with the Banshee unit's Possession) is that the charmed units will have research upgrades they've received, minus default racial combat upgrades. This means if you charm a Crypt Fiend whose player researched Burrow and Web, your techtree will automatically research those upgrades and your newly charmed Crypt Fiend will have access to both Burrow and Web. This is particularly useful if you are playing the same race as the units you are charming, as effectively it will allow all your units to get access to the upgrades without any cost to you. An example would be an Undead player that only researched Ghoul and Abomination upgrades going for a Crypt Fiend, like the example above.
• Revenant Zombie: Dark Rangers are Banshees who forcibly possessed their own corpses and retained their cunning and intellect that possessed while living.
• Simple, yet Awesome: Charm allows you to steal quite a number of powerful unit types and the ability is on a 45 second cooldown so you don't have to wait too long to have it available again. The main issue will be keeping mana supplied as the spell is moderately expensive to cast.
• Sixth Ranger: No pun intended - however, the Dark Ranger makes a phenomenal addition to Undead armies despite nominally being neutral, especially in combination with a Lich and Death Knight. Her Silence helps shut down enemy casters to make up for their lack of area crowd control, Black Arrow skeletons make excellent fodder for Death Pact and Dark Ritual, she's flagged as Undead so the Death Knight can heal her, and can have her mana/health replenished by Obsidian Statues.
• Scissors Cuts Rock: Somewhat unintuitively, the Dark Ranger's Charm spell can be used on targets that have Spell Immunity (a trait shared with most offensive ultimate abilities). It is instead units with Resistant Skin who cannot be affected by the spell.
• Trick Arrow: Black Arrow adds extra damage. Additionally, any target who dies while under the effect of Black Arrow will be raised into a skeleton.
• Weakened by the Light: Like all Undead, she is vulnerable to the Paladin's Holy Light, making Human Paladins more powerful than usual for countering Undead Heroes. This gets even worse if a Blood Mage is in tow to Banish her for a +66% damage penalty.

Pandaren Brewmaster

"Fresh, cool ale here!"

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Breath of Fire, Drunken Haze, Drunken Brawler, Storm Earth and Fire (Ultimate)
Possible names: Mojo Dark-Ale, Sinjo Honeybrew, Kesha Wildbarley, Tatsa Sweetbarrow, Mushi Ale-Hearth, Jinto Reedwine, Masha Storm-Stout, Polo Barrel-keg
Playable Campaign character: Chen Stormstout

The Brewmasters of Pandaria walk the lands, seeking the finest brews and spirits and spending their time concocting their own recipes to share with travellers. However, when push comes to shove, they prove themselves just as capable of fighting as they are at drinking and brewing, bringing their Pandaren might and agility to bear against their foes. The Brewmaster's claim to fame is his Breath of Fire, burning enemies in a wide area in front of him. It becomes even more powerful in combination with Drunken Haze, which douses enemies in booze to reduce their movement speed and make them miss some of their attacks; it also causes them to ignite when hit by Breath of Fire, receiving further burn damage over time. In melee combat, the Brewmaster's Drunken Brawler ability lets him evade enemy attacks and deal powerful critical hits, and in the heat of battle, his ultimate ability Storm, Earth, and Fire splits the Brewmaster into three mighty Pandaren warriors, each able to wreak havoc with their own powerful set of abilities.

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• Anti-Infantry: The Drunken Haze + Breath of Fire combo is terrific for tearing down masses of weak units, making the Brewmaster a huge threat to enemies favoring masses of Ghouls, Footmen, and the likes. Even using Breath of Fire on its own can put a huge dent into infantry clusters.
• Ascended Meme: They were originally based on an April Fools joke of a supposed Pandaren faction that was being added to the game.
• Big Fun: The Brewmaster is a friendly giant-panda man and is appropriately wide and heavy.
• Boisterous Bruiser: They're lively and good-natured, though no less lethal in combat for it.
• Booze Flamethrower: This appears to be how the Brewmaster uses Breath of Fire, based on the animation. Furthermore, enemies drenched by Drunken Haze will be set on fire when hit by Breath of Fire.
• Combos: Uniquely, the Brewmaster has two abilities that are meant to directly combo with each other. Dousing enemies with Drunken Haze and then hitting them with Breath of Fire will ignite them for further damage over time, dealing more damage than simply using the two separately.
• Drunken Master: Underestimate the drunk panda at your peril - he will rip entire armies a new one if left unchecked.
• Elite Mook: The 3 Pandas summoned by Storm, Earth, and Fire. Each are as powerful as level 7-8 creeps and nearly each as powerful as an ultimate summon on their own. Storm is a powerful ranged spell caster like a Dark Wizard, Earth is a tank with AOE damage potential, like a Tauren and Mountain Giant, and Fire is effectively a more fragile higher damage Infernal that is not Spell Immune.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: A three-for-one deal with Storm, Earth, and Fire. The Earth panda is the Fighter, with his high durability and ability to taunt enemies; Storm is the Mage, with multiple spells to help shut down enemies and support his allies; and Fire is the Thief, a relatively fragile, hard-hitting melee fighter.
• Fighting Panda: Whether in hand-to-hand or by setting things on fire, the Pandaren Brewmaster can more than hold himself in a fight.
• Guest-Star Party Member: A Pandaren Brewmaster joins Lady Vashj and Kael in a level if you successfully beat the Tower Defense level before, where the final boss was a Pandaren Brewmaster. He is only around for that one level and there is no plot explanation as to why he is there.
• Herd-Hitting Attack: Drunken Haze into Breath of Fire can easily decimate hordes of weak units with high area-of-effect damage.
• Magic Knight: While Drunken Brawler's critical damage is nice, it's somewhat let down by the Brewmaster's slow attack speed, especially compared to the Blademaster. He'll be doing the bulk of his damage with his spells, with his impact in a battle often being determined by his mana supply.
• Magikarp Power: The Brewmaster is very weak before level 3, having poor crowd control and unimpressive stats. He wants at least a few points for his Drunken Haze + Breath of Fire combo to take effect. Once he has some levels, he deals a huge amount of magical damage, a respectable amount of physical damage, and is very durable with evasion and his ultimate stopping him from taking damage. The three pandas summoned by Storm, Earth, and Fire are also extremely powerful, so Brewmaster gets a much larger power spike than almost all of the other tavern heroes from learning his ultimate.
• Optional Party Member: Chen Stormstout is this in The Founding of Durotar. Having him in your party is not necessary to beat the campaign, though he makes it considerably easier.
• Pungeon Master: They're pretty pun-happy in their responses, with a few sprinkled into almost all of their response categories.
  Pandaren Brewmaster: (selected) "Is trouble brewing?"
  Pandaren Brewmaster: (ordered to attack) "I bring panda-monium!"
• Sixth Ranger: They're a popular pick for Night Elf players who otherwise lack their own strength hero and would like one to lead a charge. Moonwells really help them stay supplied with mana and health to this end.
• Summon Magic: Storm, Earth, and Fire is an odd combination of a summon ultimate and a transformation ultimate. It hides the Brewmaster and replaces him with 3 summons that are each about as strong as a normal ultimate summon (such as a Doom Guard) but if they all die within the duration he does too. The summons together are stronger than a Brewmaster would be in any normal game, but they have different skills and their power does not scale at all with the Brewmaster's like other transformation spells. Due to the campaign's gameplay and all the fancy items he can get, Chen Stormstout in The Founding of Durotar can become far more powerful than all 3 of the pandas and may end up becoming weaker by using Storm, Earth, and Fire.
• Useless Useful Spell: Taking Drunken Brawler early is usually a poor investment as the Brewmaster has the greatest impact with his two active abilities, while his slow attack rate makes the critical hit chance a crapshoot. Storm, Earth, and Fire will also provide a great defensive advantage anyway by making the opponent deal with three different versions of the Brewmaster. If a Talisman of Evasion happens to drop, then you have a good substitute for the Evasion component.
  • Due to the far different gameplay of The Founding of Durotar creating unnaturally powerful heroes, Drunken Brawler is considerably more powerful there (especially since it gets a 4th level where it gets a chance to deal 6x damage), while Storm, Earth, and Fire is the spell that verges on this trope due to not scaling with the Brewmaster's power at all.

Beastmaster

"I hear the call of the wild."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Summon Bear, Summon Quilbeast, Summon Hawk, Stampede (Ultimate)
Possible names: Mag Bearmaul, Tagar Bearclaw, Gorsh Talonfang, Maxx Rocmane, Gaz Boartusk, Mok Rocksnout, Gish Eagle Eye
Playable Campaign character: Rexxar

The Mok'Nathal are a clan of half-ogre, half-orc hybrids, native to Draenor. Some accompanied the Horde on its first invasion of Azeroth, but their mixed ancestry meant they never quite fit in; outcast from both ogre and orc society, they honed their hunting arts to become Beastmasters, isolated from all civilization and relying only on themselves, their companions, and their skills to survive. These lone wanderers are able to call forth all manner of beasts to aid them in combat and seek to perfect their skills through mimicry of beasts. They can summon a powerful bear with Summon Bear, a quill-shooting boar with Summon Quilbeast, and a proud hawk to scout the map with Summon Hawk. Their ultimate ability, Stampede, calls down a horde of rampaging thunder lizards to explode against the Beastmaster's enemies.

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• Achilles' Heel: The trouble with relying upon summons is that the Beastmaster is vulnerable to anti-magic play. If his animal friends get dispelled, much of his offense is eliminated.
• Action Bomb: The thunder lizards summoned by Stampede explode upon contact with the enemy.
• Animal Stampede: The Beastmaster can summon a stampede of Thunder lizards. Though unlike most stampedes, they explode on contact.
• Anti-Air: Quilbeasts, especially if you have several of them, as they can splash damage (when maxed out) to air units which are more likely to clump together.
• Bears Are Bad News: Their most durable and versatile summon is a bear, which can teleport at high levels.
• The Beastmaster: Duh. In-game they generally summon their pets, but that's more a case of Gameplay and Story Segregation. The campaign Beastmaster, Rexxar, names all his pets and has a personal connection with each of them (though in the game, only Misha the bear doesn't have a life timer).
• Crutch Character: The Beastmaster has very powerful summons, especially the Bear which offers an extremely valuable meat shield. However, due to being countered so hard by dispels, he can be pretty lackluster late game. However, dispels take a while for each race to get ahold of, all of them requiring at least Tier 2 (Tier 3 for Undead), so it is possible to gain an advantage against the enemy before then.
• Dual Wielding: They dual-wield axes.
• Full-Boar Action: The Quilbeast most resembles a boar or warthog, though its ability to shoot quills also brings to mind a porcupine.
• Glass Cannon: Both the Quilbeast and the Hawk (at max level) have low health but are able to output a lot of damage. Notably the Hawk starts unable to attack but ends up with the highest damage output.
• Head Hat: They wear a beast head as a helmet.
• Magikarp Power: Hawks grow the most in power per level. The level 1 Hawk is only a scout with no attack, the level 2 Thunder Hawk deals about 20 damage a hit (less than the other summons at the level), and the level 3 Spirit Hawk deals over 50 damage a hit (far outstripping the other summons) and is permanently invisible. It can be risky committing to leveling Hawks, because they are much weaker then Bears and Quilbeasts in combat until level 3, and due to their higher cooldown (a Beastmaster can have multiple Quilbeasts or Bears active, due to their duration being much longer than the ability cooldown, but only one Hawk).
• Noble Bird of Prey: Summon Hawk summons a "proud hawk" that's useful for spying on enemies, as its upgraded versions can both see invisible units and are invisible themselves.
• Non-Human Humanoid Hybrid: Though in lore all manner of races take up the Beastmaster mantle, in-game they are always the orc-ogre hybrid Mok'Nathal.
• Pelts of the Barbarian: They have the wanderer-warrior culture of a classic fantasy barbarian, and all their (limited) clothing consists of furs.
• Pragmatic Adaptation: Rexxar has slightly different skills from a normal Beastmaster to accommodate The Founding of Durotar being an exploration-based RPG instead of an RTS.
  • Rexxar does not have the ability to summon hawks and instead has a basic nuke and stun with Storm Bolt. A Hawk that can see the whole map would ruin the exploration experience. The Hawk fits better in the RTS game, where it can be used to spot where the enemy is going and if they have invisible units, whereas no such enemy attacks or invisible units are a threat in the campaign, and Storm Bolt makes him much better in direct combat.
  • Rexxar's Bear, Misha, is much stronger than a normal bear, has no timer for her life, and casting the spell again will resummon her at full health instead of summoning more bears. In the melee RTS, momentum and urgency from trying to use multiple summons on the enemy is a huge element of the Beastmaster's gameplay, but in a slower exploration game, having a single, powerful summon to tank creeps is much more fitting, and that urgency element is only preserved in the Summon Quilbeast spell, which is still the same (though it costs less mana likely to downplay the hero's mana issues for the campaign). Misha also cannot blink, so players can't use her to bypass barriers.
  • Rexxar has a built-in ranged attack against air units, where he throws his axes at them. This allows him to engage enemy air units without having to buy a (often pretty expensive) orb, which means the campaign can use air units early on as enemies, since Rexxar will reliably be able to engage with them.
• Shock and Awe: At higher levels, his summoned hawk can attack with bolts of lightning.
• Sixth Ranger: Another solid pick for the Night Elf faction as they provide a tanking hero the faction otherwise lacks and can summon a bear who tanks effectively as well. Their main drawback is that dispels are a major Achilles' Heel, so their late game performance can suffer.
• Summon Magic: His whole gimmick. Every single one of his basic abilities conjures an animal companion.
• Teleport Spam: The Bear at max level can Blink. Why is not explained in game and the Warcraft III site's only comment is "Teleporting Bears are funny". It is a useful tool to stop them from being kited.
• Thunderbird: The Hawk as it gains levels will fire lightning bolts.
• True Sight: The Beastmaster's summoned hawk can see invisible units.
• Underground Monkey: The Beastmaster's summons have different colorations based on the tileset of the map. The colors for "tropical" settings like Lordaeron Summer, Sunken Ruins, and The Barrens have all 3 brown. "Cold" settings like Lordaeron Winter and Icecrown have all 3 white (with the bear looking the same as the Polar Bear creeps in Icecrown). Some "Mystical" settings like Ashenvale, Dungeon, and Underground have the bear and hawk purple and the quilbeast black.
• Walking Shirtless Scene: They wear their beast head helmet, a cape, a single pauldron, a loincloth, and boots. Their legs and chests are completely exposed.
• Weaksauce Weakness: The Beastmaster is heavily countered by dispels since all of his spells are based around summoning units. Stampede is the exception, where the thunder lizards are actually spell projectiles that look like units, but being a long-duration channeled ability means any stun/root/sleep/silence effect will end it prematurely.

Pit Lord

"I come from the darkness of the pit."

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Rain of Fire, Howl of Terror, Cleaving Attack, Doom (Ultimate)
Possible names: Azgalor, Brutillus, Mongrethod, Destromath, Gogonnash
NPC Campaign characters: Mannoroth (cinematic only), Azgalor, Magtheridon

The annihilan, also known as Pit Lords, are powerful demons in the service of the Burning Legion, serving as commanders and fearsome warriors alike. They fight with fanatical zeal and revel in bringing death and destruction. In battle, they are powerful warriors that instill terror among their foes and cleave them apart with their tremendous blades. They can use Rain of Fire to raze enemies from above, reduce their damage output with Howl of Terror, and strike multiple enemies at once with their Cleaving Attack. Their ultimate ability, Doom, places an undispellable curse on a non-Hero unit that prevents it from casting spells and damages it until it dies. Upon the victim's death, a fearsome Doomguard will be summoned from its corpse under the Pit Lord's command.

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• Armor-Piercing Attack: The mechanics of Cleaving Attack make it so that for the units hit by the cleave (not the main target) ignores Armor value, treating it as zero. This means with enough levels of the skill you can deal more damage to a high armor target by attacking the units around them instead of them directly. The cleaving (not the direct attack) also ignores evasion which helps against Demon Hunter, Pandaren Brewmaster, or anyone with a Talisman of Evasion ^note though if the Pit Lord is blinded (by skills like Curse or Drunken Haze) he can miss both the main attack and the cleaving .
• Bad Boss: In addition to shutting down and killing enemy units, Doom can also be used on friendly units to convert them into Doomguards. Dooming an allied unit to create a Doomguard is potentially a smarter move because you can control where and when the Doomguard spawns.
• Beard of Evil: He has a large grey beard. The default Pit Lord in Reforged is clean-cut instead.
• Blood Knight: As per their lore, Pit Lords take pleasure in terrorizing and slaughtering enemies.
  Pit Lord: (when given an attack order) This will please me!
• Call-Back: Doom works similarly to how lore describes the rumored effect of "Summon Daemon" in Warcraft I. However, instead of the Pit Lord sacrificing himself, a friendly or enemy unit is selected for the Doom ritual. The summoned Doomguard is visually very similar to the Daemon and fills a similar role as a major summon.
• Continuity Cameo: Most of the Pit Lords, Azgalor, Destromath, and Mongrethod, makes cameos in different Legion controlled areas (especially in the Legion expansion). Gogonnash and Brutillus may even be present as well, but under the misspelled names of Gorgonnash and Brutallus.
• Crutch Character: Pit Lords have the highest starting strength and health in the game. Their innate tankiness plus Rain of Fire also makes them the single best hero at soloing small early-game creep camps (minus spell immune mobs like Mud Golems or ones that can stun him out of Rain of Fire, like Kobold Tunnelers). A player can quickly start trying to get experience on him even before building combat units. If a Pit Lord player plays quickly, they can keep their Pit Lord ahead of the enemy heroes in experience, and maybe get a power spike from learning Doom. Later in the game, they start to fall into their Master of None shortcomings as other heroes will outshine him, and the Doom Guard can be killed by dispels unlike all other ultimate summons.
• Double Weapon: They carry giant double-bladed spears.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Pit Lords appeared as campaign exclusive heroes in Reign of Chaos. They have higher stats and Chaos Damage-dealing attacks, since they weren't designed to be balanced. They also used a mix of spells from other heroes that emphasized more Anti-Structure and Magic Knight style of gameplay. ^note Their skills were Shockwave, Thunder Clap, Reincarnation, and Earthquake, which gives them two ultimates
• Herd-Hitting Attack: All three of the Pit Lord's basic abilities can strike multiple enemies, and while Doom only works on a single target, the Doomguard it spawns also has several area-of-effect abilities.
• Jack of All Trades: A Magic Knight who has Rain of Fire as a spin on the Archmage's Blizzard, Cleave for dealing with being surrounded, and Howl of Terror for enemy-debuffing utility. Finally, they can Doom a friendly or hostile unit which summons a Doomguard with their own set of damage and utility spells, essentially giving the Pit Lord four more spells to play with along with a powerful demon to fight with them. Pit Lords don't have any outstanding strengths besides their bag of tricks they can perform.
• Master of None: The Pit Lord lacks a specific specialization and is frequently outperformed in his potential skills by other heroes.
  • He is less durable than dedicated tank heroes like Crypt Lord or Tauren Chieftain (due to having no dedicated tanking abilities, only having high natural strength and being reliant on Howl of Terror), he is a weaker offensive caster than a Lich or Blood Mage (due to not having as much mana to cast spells and Rain of Fire being weaker than other offensive spells), he is less of a mass killing One-Man Army than the Demon Hunter or the Mountain King (due to Cleaving Attack offering less overall damage, and not being able to attack and use Rain of Fire at the same time), and he lacks the utility to control combat to the extent of heroes like the Shadow Hunter or Dreadlord (due to having much weaker crowd control with Howl of Terror, which only reduces damage).
  • This also applies to his ultimate summon, the Doom Guard. It bears closest comparison to the Dreadlord's Infernal. The Doom Guard is a well-rounded heavy melee unit (that can also attack air units) with lots of utility spells and Resistant Skin and is summoned on death by a Damage Over Time debuff on one target. The Infernal in contrast is more of a melee powerhouse, having Spell Immunity and a permanent Immolation effect, attacking faster and hitting harder than the Doom Guard, and is summoned through an area stun on land units, while having no active spells or the ability to attack air units at all.
• Mighty Glacier: They're big and slow, but also fairly bulky and can pack a decent punch.
• Non-Player Character: The only one heroes of the original release of The Frozen Throne that was never playable in the campaigns, but instead we get some of their abilities mixed in with the Dreadlord's in Varimathras. ^note All the neutral heroes below Pit Lord on this page were patched in later, so their absence is justified
• One-Man Army: If he is well equipped with items and/or buffs, the Pit Lord can charge into huge swaths of land units and cleave them for huge amounts of damage. Though he does not perform this role as well as other heroes specialized for it.
• Our Demons Are Different: Pit Lords are demonic brutes with vaguely-reptilian, quadrupedal lower bodies and vaguely humanoid upper bodies. The Doomguards they summon more closely resemble the classic Big Red Devil wielding Flaming Swords.
• Paper Tiger: Pit Lords are not really as powerful as their appearance suggest.
  • A level 7 Pit Lord appears in The Tomb of Sargeras, and at a glance, it looks like it would be a dangerous foe. However, this specific Pit Lord is a non-hero unit, having high health but only dealing about 25 damage a hit (roughly as much as a level 1 Pit Lord hero). He only has the abilities War Stomp and Raise Dead. As such, he is not nearly as much of a threat as it would seem, and far less than the hero version of the Pit Lord.
  • The melee game Pit Lord, despite its fearsome appearance, is a tanky Jack of All Trades rather than a frontline damage dealing hero and will lose to most other strength heroes in direct combat. Almost every time an enemy Pit Lord appears in the campaigns (besides the example above), they are buffed up.
• Perpetual Frowner: In contrast to their Slasher Smile icons and models, the Pit Lord's portrait in the original game has a very deep and permanent frown.
• Playing with Fire: Rain of Fire, a spell that acts as a weaker version of the Arch Mage's Blizzard but calls down fire instead of ice and sets units on fire to deal damage over time.
• Purposefully Overpowered:
  • Azgalor in the last mission of Reign of Chaos is the most dangerous of the killable heroes in the level. He has higher stats than normal heroes and the chaos damage type. He also has two ultimate spells, which would be both Reincarnation and Earthquake. This makes him disproportionately powerful compared to any normal hero, and he takes a lot of effort to bring down.
  • Magtheridon is the final Pit Lord hero fought in The Frozen Throne and he is the Final Boss of the Alliance Campaign. He has extremely inflated health, mana pool, damage, and armor. He also has 11 abilities instead of the usual 4. He has the standard Pit Lord Howl of Terror and Cleaving Attack, but also has Finger of Death, Shockwave, Frenzy, Bash, Frost Nova, Rain of Chaos, Hardened Skin, and True Sight. Since he's supposed to fight 4 max level heroes and their entire army it is justified, even if he has his own minions to help him fight.
• Sixth Ranger: Like the Dark Ranger, the Pit Lord and his Doom Guard is flagged as Undead and can be healed by Death Coil. He is more durable than the other undead heroes (except the Crypt Lord) and can be picked up as a more durable alternative to the Dreadlord, the hero whose skillset the Pit Lord is closest to.
• Slasher Smile: Their default expression in their icon and model is an especially prevalent one.
• Summon Magic: Their ultimate Doom does damage to a unit every second until they die and a Doomguard is summoned in their place. Doomguards aren't as strong or fast as Infernals, but they are still very strong and have a flexible selection of spells to play with.
• Weaksauce Weakness: While the Pit Lord's Doomguard is formidable, unlike other units summoned by ultimate abilities it doesn't have spell immunity, making it weak to dispels. Dispels also counter Howl of Terror, which is how the Pit Lord's army gets an edge in large scale fights.
• Your Days Are Numbered: The victim of Doom can't cast spells and loses health at an alarming rate, spawning a demon on death. It's possible to outlast the spell, but it takes a lot of healing spells and time.
• Weakened by the Light: Like his Dreadlord counterpart, he is vulnerable to the Paladin's Holy Light, making Human Paladins more powerful than usual for countering him. This gets even worse if a Blood Mage is in tow to Banish him for a +66% damage penalty.

Tinker

"All parts accounted for!"

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Pocket Factory, Cluster Rockets, Engineering Upgrade, Robo-Goblin (Ultimate)
Possible names: Gazz Stripbolt, Riket Contraption, Mekka Gobb, Tek Piecetinker, Plug Rattletrap, Ratso Steamwheedle

Goblins are known for their ingenuity and peculiar mechanical know-how, and the Tinker is no exception. Armed with a Claw-Pack/Hammer-Tank combo, the Tinker's boundless enthusiasm is never diminished, even when the occasional part may fail. Or explode. Tinkers can construct a Pocket Factory which automatically deploys Clockwerk Goblin soldiers that explode on death, fire Cluster Rockets that stun and damage enemies in an area, or get an Engineering Upgrade that passively increases their damage and speed and boosts their other abilities. Their ultimate ability allows them to transform into a Robo-Goblin, gaining bonus strength and armor, dealing extra damage to buildings, but becoming Mechanical until it's toggled off.

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• Achilles' Heel: Disables and slows that affect mechanical units prevent Tinker from fully being a Lightning Bruiser in Robo-Goblin form. Notably, Frost Wyrms and Raiders (in decent numbers) counter the Goblin Tinker very hard.
• Ascended Meme: The Tinker was originally announced as an April Fools joke in 2004. However, the idea proved to be legitimately popular, so Tinkers were added in the next major patch.
• Action Bomb: The clockwork goblins spit out by his Pocket Factory explode when they die or expire, dealing damage in an area. They can also be commanded to detonate manually.
• Anti-Structure: In Robo-Goblin form, the Tinker deals double his normal damage to buildings. Engineering Upgrade increases the damage, up to 3.5x at maximum level. Throw in his Cluster Rockets, which can also hit buildings, and a high-level Tinker is not someone you want near your base.
• Awesome Backpack: By default, the Tinker wears a mechanical backpack with a pair of claws extending from it, used for his melee attacks. It also has a rocket launcher built in for firing his Cluster Rockets.
• Boring, but Practical: Engineering Upgrade simply makes the Tinker faster, improves his other spells, and gives him a little more attack damage. In many cases it's better to level the Upgrade passive to effectively add more value to your active spell of choice and to the Robo-Goblin form, rather than to get points in two spells that you should not be spending the mana on.
• Fragile Speedster: With his Engineering Upgrade, Tinker can run around very quickly and cast his spells throughout the map, he can be hard to catch but still dies rather easily when he is caught.
• Hit-and-Run Tactics: A very common way to play the Tinker is to take advantage of his Fragile Speedster (or Lightning Bruiser if he has his ultimate) status and try to disrupt the enemy bases with his pocket factories and flee before the enemy brings their army to retaliate.
• Humongous-Headed Hammer: His primary weapon in Robo-Goblin form is a hammer with a comically huge head, bigger than his entire body. The weapon is scaled down significantly in Reforged.
• The Juggernaut: In Robo-Goblin form, most spells cannot target or affect him (because he is mechanical), and he gains both strength and armor, so it is normal for high level Tinkers to just charge at expansions and destroy them with no way to stop him. It also means he can be repaired by workers, giving him another way to restore health in combat.
• Lightning Bruiser: In Robo-Goblin form, he becomes extremely tough to kill while being the same speed as before.
• Macross Missile Massacre: Cluster Rockets bombards an area with a flurry of rockets that stun and damage enemies. The damage is pretty minimal, and the stun is fairly short, but the ability also has a very low cooldown and hits a large area with Engineering Upgrade, allowing a Tinker that builds around the ability to put out some serious sustained damage and frequent interrupts.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: The Tinker is the only melee intelligence hero in the melee game. In Robo-Goblin form he plays a lot more like a very fast strength hero (or a Siege Engine). The Robo-Goblin form also makes him the only Mechanical hero in the game, making him immune to a number of spells (both beneficial and harmful) while allowing workers to restore his health by repairing him.
• Mook Maker: The Pocket Factory spell creates a small structure that produces a slew of small clockwork goblins to attack opponents.
• Odd Name Out: Mekka Gobb doesn't follow the typical goblin name convention where the last name especially alludes to a mechanical device. The name instead declares that the Tinker is a mechanical person, akin to a person being called "Robot Man".
• Powered Armor: The Tinker’s ultimate ability turns them into a tank! More armor and damage, faster movement and immunity to a bunch of spells, makes this a unit that’s tough to crack. And it does bonus damage to buildings.

Firelord

"Beware, I live."

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Soul Burn, Summon Lava Spawn, Incinerate, Volcano (Ultimate)
Possible names: Ragepyre, Hatespark, Blazefury, Heatflayer, Volcanus, Flashfire, Kar the Everburning, Smolderas, Singeslayer

Firelords are powerful sentient Fire Elementals. While Elementals were banished to the Elemental plane upon the Old Gods' defeat, wizards have learned to summon Elementals back into Azeroth, with the Firelords among them. These creatures now roam the land, sewing fiery chaos in their wake. Their destructive abilities include silencing and burning enemies with Soul Burn, conjuring Lava Spawn that can multiply in the heat of combat, and empowering their attacks to Incinerate enemies with a stacking damage bonus and causing victims to explode on death. Their ultimate ability summons a Volcano that spews molten rocks to stun and damage surrounding units.

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• Armor-Piercing Attack: Averted. Volcano is the only offensive oriented hero ultimate that does not affect Spell Immune units.
• Anti-Magic: Soul Burn is a single-target silence that also deals damage over time and reduces the attack damage of the victim. Unlike the Dark Ranger's Silence, which is suited for groups of small fragile spellcaster units, Soul Burn is for strong creeps or units with spells that can also deal some damage with their attack, or heroes.
• Anti-Structure: Volcano deals extra damage to buildings and is more powerful against them because they can't just move away (besides Night Elf ancients).
• Black Mage: Fitting stereotypes about characters with fire powers, the Firelord's spells are all offensive in nature and built around damage, even if they aren't doing damage directly. Soul Burn deals a lot of damage over a significant duration, Lava Spawns are the highest damage but least durable early game summons, Incinerate stacks damage on each attack and deals damage in an area if the target dies, and Volcano blasts all targets with molten rock for damage and stun.
• Continuity Cameo: All of the firelord heroes save Smolderas appear in the Firelands in World of Warcraft, either on the Molten Front or within the raid itself.
• Crutch Character: Lava Spawns are extremely powerful early game, able to split and heal if they are not killed quickly. Soul Burn also is a huge Disc-One Nuke that needs to be countered with dispels. Later on, Lava Spawns are quite easy to kill compared to a lot of other summoned units and Soul Burn can be easily dispelled. Firelords then are forced to change their gameplay to playing around Volcano and trying to hit the enemy base and expansions with it.
• Fog Feet: Firelords have a fiery version of this trope.
• Increasingly Lethal Enemy: Firelords' abilities make them very dangerous in a sustained fight. Incinerate gives him a stacking damage bonus, Lava Spawn can split, and Soul Burn can shut down non-Heroic casters for a very long time.
• Living Lava: Lava Spawns are made of lava. The Firelord's body also looks this way.
• Odd Name Out: Kar the Everburning is the only name with a distinct title.
• Omnicidal Maniac: According to the official website, his motivation is to extinguish all life. Given how elementals all used to work for the Old Gods, it would make sense.
• Playing with Fire: As expected of a fire elemental, all of the Firelord's abilities are fire themed.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Firelord is very dependent on Soul Burn and his Lava Spawns to kill casters/heroes and to deal damage. Dispels counter both of them. Volcano is also a channeling spell and is countered by many abilities that can interrupt it.
• Why Am I Ticking?: Incinerate turns targets into living bombs that explode violently if they die under the effect, dealing damage around themselves. Note that units killed this way leave no corpse behind.

Goblin Alchemist

"Ready to brew!"

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Healing Spray, Chemical Rage, Acid Bomb, Transmute (Ultimate)
Possible names: Razzil Naypolm, Niffy Gurglebeaker, Ezzel Darkbrewer, Lapis Concocter, Savvy Foulmixer, Fictious Warpotion

A goblin alchemist riding a chemically subdued ogre into battle. Can damage and decrease enemy armor with Acid Bomb, attack faster with Chemical Rage, heal allies with Healing Spray, and instantly kill enemies by turning them into gold.

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• Acid Attack: The alchemist can fling a bottle of acid at opponents, decreasing their armor and dealing damage over time.
• Combat Medic: While certainly potent in a fight with Acid Bomb and Chemical Rage, the Alchemist's Healing Spray also makes him an effective healer if you choose to build him as such.
• Damage Discrimination: Notably, Healing Spray previously did not have this, meaning that it can heal enemies in the area of effect as well; a Balance Buff changed it to only affect allies, though its healing output had to then be lowered in response.
• Dual Wielding: While affected by Chemical Rage, the ogre wields two large glaives.
• Human Resources: The Alchemist's ultimate spell turns an enemy unit into gold, which is added to the player's resource pool. The higher level the target has, the more gold. This also makes the Alchemist the only hero that can generate resources for the player.
• Jack of All Trades: Alchemist can feasibly be built around maxing any of his main abilities. He can focus on healing by maxing Healing Spray, he can focus on offensive supporting with Acid Bomb, or he can try to build up his damage potential by maxing Chemical Rage.
• Lightning Bruiser: In Chemical Rage, the Alchemist gains massive movement and attack speed, allowing him to easily close the distance and strike very quickly.
• Magikarp Power: Alchemist starts the game rather weak as his spells don't have that much impact early on when they have one point in them, but he becomes a lot more powerful as you put multiple levels into each of his spells. He scales well into late game once he has some damage items for Chemical Rage and when gold on the map becomes very hard to attain (because gold mines ran dry) Transmute is extremely powerful, especially since it can instantly kill very expensive units like Knights, Tauren, or Frost Wyrms.
• Mechanically Unusual Class:
  • The Alchemist is the only melee hero that has a built-in ranged attack for hitting air units, waiving the need of an orb to do so, and the only hero who can generate resources from their Ultimate, and thus extend your bank beyond the typical limits of a map's resources and sellable items, outside of methods like the Orc Pillage ability, or the Night Elf ability to gain infinite lumber from Wisps.
  • The Alchemist is also one of two heroes, along with the Blademaster, who can exceed the normal movement speed limit of 400 units and reach up to 522 units, thanks to Chemical Rage. This is technically because the normal Alchemist is swapped out with a different version of the Alchemist who provides the Chemical Rage "buff" and has a higher movement speed cap of 522. This is similar to the Pandaren Brewmaster activating Storm, Earth, And Fire.
• Mighty Glacier: When not in Chemical Rage, he moves and attacks slowly, though he still does a bit of damage with Acid Bomb and having naturally high attack damage.
• Mundane Utility: Due to the bonus movespeed of Chemical Rage, it is just as common to use it to run away as to engage with enemies. This is unlike almost all other transformation spells, which are always used to commit to an engagement.
• One-Hit Kill: Transmute instantly kills the target unit and is most effective against expensive targets, which also provide more gold to the player when turned into gold.
• Only in It for the Money: Implied by his status as a mercenary hero and being, well, a goblin. He is a bit more obvious about it than the Tinker, though:
  Alchemist: (ordered to attack a hero) FOR THE HIGHEST BIDDER!
• Power Up Full Color Change: The Alchemist's ogre turns purple during Chemical Rage.
• Red Mage: He has the ability to heal, but also deal spell and attack damage.
• Sixth Ranger: Notable for being a viable hero for any faction thanks to Healing Spray even healing Undead units. His mix of healer, armor debuffer, and Lightning Bruiser make him valuable for any army and any faction will appreciate the extra gold from Transmute.
• Super Mode: In-game, Chemical Rage is treated as a transformation that gives the Alchemist increased attack and movement speed while active. At max level, an Alchemist under Chemical Rage has the highest attack speed of any hero in the game; throw in some damage items, and watch him mulch anything that tries to take him in a straight fight.
• Too Important to Walk: The alchemist rides an ogre slave.

Campaign Only Heroes

Campaign Heroes in General

• Combo Platter Powers: Most of the melee game heroes have clear themes in their abilities, especially the human heroes who has a preference for specific Elemental Powers. The campaign exclusive heroes all have skillsets made from existing heroes (or sometimes units), rather than original abilities (with the exception of the Warlock, who has extremely overpowered original abilities), even if it would go against the theme of the hero.
• Unique Enemy: Most of them only appear once, maybe twice, if they are a special class.

Murloc Sorcerer

"You may have rescued the others, but I'll see to that the exalted one does not go completely unappeased."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Rain of Fire
NPC Campaign character: Murloc Sorcerer

An enemy hero that was originally exclusive to the Reign of Chaos demo. The missions he appeared in were cut from the final game, but his missions were partially restored in The Frozen Throne as part of the generic custom campaign (without voice acting), and fully restored into the canon prologue campaign in Reforged. The Murloc Sorcerer is the high sorcerer of the Underworld Minions, a faction that resides on the Darkspear Isles and antagonizes the trolls there. He shows up in the second half of the demo campaign. Unlike most heroes, he has only one ability, Rain of Fire.

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• Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance: In the original Warcraft III, he has red and orange coloration and wields fire powers.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: The murloc sorcerer and his minions cannot swim in gameplay and do not have the means to cross deep water. In their first appearance in a cutscene, they are seen emerging from the sea.
• Killer Rabbit: Downplayed overall. Murlocs are mostly viewed as cute and harmless in and out of universe, so a cult leader murloc that is an actual threat is very unusual. Then again, he really is not as dangerous as he claims to be.
• King Mook: He is a Palette Swap of the murloc mooks and they all share the same animations. Moreso in Reforged where his model actually is larger than the other murlocs.
• Playing with Fire: He throws fireballs, and his one ability is fire themed.
• Purple Is Powerful: In Reforged he is purple instead of red and orange.
• Recurring Boss: Originally, despite the high sorcerer being slain at the end of "The Fires Down Below", another Murloc Sorcerer shows up in the final mission, "Countdown to Extinction" to help the Sea Witch try to defeat Thrall. This is averted in Reforged, where the final mission, that faction sends a Mur'gul Shadowcaster, the strongest Murloc creep that was originally introduced in The Frozen Throne, in the place of the sorcerer for those attack waves.
• Squishy Wizard: He is not particularly durable and will go down quickly if focused on.
• Version-Exclusive Content: Since the missions where this hero appears were cut from Reign of Chaos. He appears in all other versions of the game, but most notably in Reforged.
• Warm-Up Boss: In Reforged. Even though he is the second enemy hero faced in the campaigns (after the Archmage in mission 3), and the first to be a high level (6), he is not much a threat in combat, only having Rain of Fire.

Sea Witch

"Very well, your choice is made! The air you breathe now will be your last"

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Summon Water Elemental, Brilliance Aura, Earthquake (Ultimate)
NPC Campaign character: Sea Witch ^note World of Warcraft reveals this character is named Zar'jira

Like the Murloc Sorcerer, the Sea Witch was originally a demo-exclusive enemy hero that was fully restored in Reforged. The true leader of the Underworld Minions, the Sea Witch is an undead naga that demands sacrifices. She shows up in the final mission of the demo-exclusive prologue campaign missions to deal with Thrall herself. She tends to be confused with the Naga Sea Witch, especially in Reforged where her model is changed to match one.

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• An Ice Person: She shoots bolts of ice in Warcraft III. In Reforged she shoots arrows instead.
• The Artifact: Despite her being changed to be a Naga Sea Witch in Reforged, she still has the same abilities as originally, rather than having the ones belonging to the Naga Sea Witch or any Naga abilities in general.
• Dishing Out Dirt: Her ultimate spell is Earthquake. In cutscenes she is shown collapsing caves and sinking islands.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: She debuted before the Naga Sea Witch. The Reign of Chaos Sea Witch has the abilities of other heroes in the campaign, rather than any unique abilities. The idea of a Sea Witch that ranks over murlocs in an army becomes an element of the Naga race in The Frozen Throne. To match the lore of World of Warcraft, her model in Reforged was changed from the original Night Elf Ghost to a Naga Sea Witch, fully committing to the Retcon.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • She is unable to walk on deep water. She is able to do it in a cutscene, but looking at the map on the editor will indicate her cinematic self's movement type is actually "Flying" which suggests that the "Amphibious" movement type was not programmed into Reign of Chaos.
  • She is not classified as Undead, despite being a ghost. Though it's not particularly relevant, since spells that affect undead units do not appear.
• King Mook: She would technically count as this (not counting Reforged which changed her model). Some smaller ghosts that are her servants with the same model as her appear in the mission just before her debut.
• Making a Splash: She can summon water elementals.
• Mage Marksman: In Reforged she uses a bow, while keeping her spellcasting skillset.
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: She is a ghostly Undead Naga Sea Witch, which seems to give her powers (in lore) exceeding a normal Naga Sea Witch.
• Squishy Wizard: She is quite easy to kill, as a ranged intelligence hero with no defensive abilities.
• Starter Villain: She is the last foe of the prologue campaign and does not return in the main campaigns of the game, though she is not defeated, and the game's main conflict is not tied to her at all.
• Version-Exclusive Content: Just like the Murloc Sorcerer, she is prominent in Reforged after being cut from Reign of Chaos and sidelined in The Frozen Throne.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: In Reforged. She is the first high leveled enemy hero with an ultimate spell. Earthquake makes her a big threat to the player's towers in the final mission, which is a Hold the Line mission. However, Thrall's units actually have ways of dealing with both of her abilities (Raiders can Ensnare her to interrupt Earthquake and Shamans can kill her Water Elementals with Purge), meaning she also tests whether you can use unit abilities effectively.

Ranger

"You think that I'm running from you? Apparently you've never fought elves before."

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Scout, Cold Arrows, Trueshot Aura, Starfall (Ultimate)
NPC Campaign characters: Sylvanas Windrunner, Jennalla Deemspring

What the Dark Ranger used to be when she was alive. Originally a hero for the Human Alliance, the Ranger was cancelled, with some of their abilities reworked into other heroes^note Flaming Arrows given to Priestess of the Moon as Searing Arrows, while Cold Arrows were later given to the Naga Sea Witch, while in the campaign they use similar abilities as the Priestess of the Moon. In the Reign of Chaos campaign, the Ranger class is exclusive to Sylvanas Windrunner, the Hero Antagonist that opposed Arthas in his invasion of Quel'thalas. In the first undead mission of The Frozen Throne it's possible to fight against another Ranger named Jennalla Deemspring, though she has no characterization.

For information about the character Sylvanas Windrunner, see Warcraft Sylvanas Windrunner.

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• Action Girl: A female exclusive hero.
• An Ice Person: She can fire ice arrows that can slow enemies down.
• Fanservice Pack: In the original version, both Ranger heroes are fully-covered in leather armour, which only shows some cleavage. In Reforged, their new models, in addition to being more detailed, are based on Sylvanas' model from Wrath of the Lich King, complete with bare midriffs.
• Forest Ranger: The Ranger is a master of survival and archery that dwells in the forests, hunting down any intruders within the elven lands.
• In the Hood: Fitting for a Forest Ranger she wears a cowl.
• Moveset Clone: Functionally identical to the Priestess of the Moon, albeit with Cold Arrows instead of Searing Arrows.
• Palette Swap: Shandris uses a Night Elf version of the Ranger's model in the campaign, though she is just a stronger Archer.
• Summon Magic: Can summon an owl to scout the area and reveal invisible units.
• Useless Useful Spell: A very rare NPC version of this trope. Owl Scouts are of no use to the computer. It already knows where you are. At most it will help them kill your Shades.

Banshee

The Banshee in Reforged

Primary attribute: Agility
Abilities: Silence, Howl of Terror, Life Drain, Charm (Ultimate)
Playable Campaign character: Sylvanas Windrunner

Exclusive to Reforged. In lore, Sylvanas Windrunner is slain and turns into a banshee. In Reforged, she becomes a Banshee hero that is very similar to her Dark Ranger self. This hero bears some physical similarity to Sylvanas' flying banshee form that she uses in World of Warcraft starting with Battle for Azeroth. Not to be confused with the Banshee unit in the Undead techtree.

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• Adaptational Badass: In the original Reign of Chaos she becomes a slightly more durable Banshee that does not have Possession. In Reforged she becomes a hero.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Only playable for a portion of one mission, "The Fall of Silvermoon". When Sylvanas returns, her character class changes to Dark Ranger.
• Moveset Clone: Almost identical to the Dark Ranger, except she has Howl of Terror instead of Black Arrow.
• Power Floats: She floats, rather than walking like the Ranger and Dark Ranger.
• Version-Exclusive Content: Her being a hero in that mission is exclusive to Reforged.

Ancient Guardian

An Ancient Guardian in Reign of Chaos. Pictured is Fire Protector

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Firebolt, Sleep, Inner Fire (Fire Protector), Frost Nova, Frost Armor, Curse (Ice Protector), Storm Bolt, Lightning Shield, Chain Lightning, Evasion (Lightning Protector)
NPC Campaign characters: Fire Protector, Ice Protector, Lightning Protector

Three ghost Keepers of the Grove that appear in the Reign of Chaos Night Elf campaign. They are the guardians of the Horn of Cenarius on Moonglade Isle. Tyrande needs to slay them in order to awaken Malfurion Stormrage. They are three spellcasters that have completely different spells than the living Keepers of the Grove, having control over the elements instead.

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• Character Select Forcing: The Ancient Guardians are countered very strongly by Dryads in the first mission where they are available. Though it's not necessary to defeat the guardians, the mission they appear in is a notoriously difficult Timed Mission on Hard Mode and Dryads will heavily speed up the process of killing them.
• Elemental Powers: Instead of standard Keeper spells, they have elemental spells that mostly match their names. Though some liberties are taken, such as Ice Protector having "Curse" and Fire Protector having "Sleep". They also all have Orbs that match their elements.
• Flunky Boss: They all have Owlbears (renamed "Wildkin" in The Frozen Throne and Reforged) to help them fight.
• Mini-Boss: They appear at the end of "The Awakening of Stormrage", the 3rd mission of the Night Elf campaign. Even though they are the last enemies of the mission, the real challenge of the mission is destroying the large orc base with the Blademaster on the way to them. They do not have ultimate spells and are treated more like strong creeps than true enemy heroes.
• Squishy Wizard: They are not any more durable than a standard Keeper, except Lightning due to his Evasion.

Warlock

"Hear me, night elves! The time for reckoning has come!"

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Rain of Chaos, Dark Portal, Bash, Finger of Death (Ultimate), Spell Immunity
NPC Campaign characters: Archimonde, Kil'jaeden (cinematic only), Gul'dan (cinematic only)

An extremely powerful Hero class exclusive to Archimonde (in gameplay), boasting bloated stats, Divine Armor, Spell Immunity, Chaos Damage and powerful summoning spells. Kil'jaeden and Gul'Dan both have no abilities and are there just for cinematic reasons.

For information about the character Archimonde and Kil'jaeden, see Warcraft The Burning Legion.

For information about the character Gul'Dan, see Warcraft The Horde Old Horde.

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• Anti-Magic: He's immune to all magic.
• Beef Gate: Exaggerated. The Warlock's main function for most of "Twilight of the Gods" is to protect his base from the player assaulting it. At no point in the mission does the player get the objective to destroy the base. Some players are not dissuaded though.
• Death of a Thousand Cuts: Since Divine armor reduces all non-Chaos damage taken to 5%, the most effective way to deplete the Warlock's health if the player chooses to try (besides Furbolg Champions), is to hit him with many instances of low damage. A mass of archers or of towers. After all, he can't reduce the damage taken to below 1.
• Final Boss: In Reign of Chaos, Archimonde engages against the player's forces in the final 45 seconds of the Hold the Line final mission Twilight of the Gods. The player is very unlikely to kill him in that time.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: In a sense with the two cinematic warlocks, based on the World Editor. Neither appear in gameplay and their stats are never visible to the player in the campaigns, so the editor makes them out to be far weaker and more incomplete than the story suggests they are.
  • Kil'jaeden is a cinematic-only hero. Unlike Mannoroth (another cinematic only hero), who is set to have around 5000 health and have spells, Kil'jaeden has no spells and has relatively normal stats, though has an extremely high intelligence gain. In lore, Kil'jaeden is roughly as powerful as Archimonde. This mostly implies that Mannoroth was intended to be fought in gameplay at some point and Kil'jaeden was never meant to be.
  • Gul'dan is similarly cinematic only. He also has no abilities, since he is a Posthumous Character through the entire game and only appears in flashbacks. Strangely, he is programmed be a strength hero, to have 1500 range (more than a siege weapon) and naturally deal around 140 damage a hit, higher on average than Archimonde.
• Infinity +1 Element: His attacks deal Chaos Damage, which deals full damage to all armor types and is reduced only by armor value.^note Normal heroes use Hero Damage, which is largely the same but gets a damage penalty against Fortified armor.
• The Juggernaut: The Warlock has extremely high stats, is immune to spells, and has Divine Armor, so most attacks only do one point of damage to him. As such, he is very hard to kill.
• Lord British Postulate: This unit is designed to be too strong for players to defeat. It hasn't stopped players from doing so by building a big enough army or exploiting his Artificial Stupidity. ^note If a Ballista (Glaive Thrower in Reforged) fires at the Warlock from outside his line of sight, he won't move far enough to see it, allowing it to slowly pick away at the Warlock's HP.
• Master of All: While nominally an Intelligence hero, he also has huge Strength and Agility, which grants him a lot of HP, armor and attack speed.
• One-Man Army: Because he's so resilient, this hero can take on entire armies and win even without his spells.
• Purposefully Overpowered: Due to his role as the Final Boss of the Reign of Chaos campaign, this unit is ridiculously powerful. Additionally, players are not meant to take him down.
• Randomized Damage Attack: His damage spread is massive. Most heroes have between 5 to 25 difference between the minimum and maximum damage they deal. His damage spread is over 110, which means in the mission he appears, without items, he would do anywhere between 62 and 176 damage per hit.
• Slap-on-the-Wrist Nuke: Finger of Death instantly deals 500 damage to a target, which is a lot (able to kill most tier 1 units and severely cripple anything else). However, the tooltip claims it "turns the target inside-out", which would probably be a lot more of an instakill of it were true.
• Summon Magic: Rain of Chaos brings down four Infernals; Dark Portal permanently summons several Doomguards and Felhounds that don't yield any experience upon dying.
• This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: His Divine armor means that he takes only Scratch Damage from all damage types except Chaos. In Reforged, the player is able to get ahold of Furbolg Champions from a mercenary camp, an otherwise unimpressive unit for its cost and not particularly good at the mission's primary Hold the Line objective. However, Furbolg Champions are the only player-attainable unit on the map that has access to Chaos damage. If the player gets enough, they can kill the Warlock in about 20 seconds, instead of about 3-5 minutes against mass archers, towers, or glaive throwers. This did not work in the original Reign of Chaos as Furbolg Champions had the Normal attack type.

Dark Knight

"Humanity shall rise again!"

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Holy Light, Shockwave, Devotion Aura, Avatar (Ultimate)
Playable Campaign character: Lord Garithos

A powerful mounted knight that boasts great HP, armor and speed, as well as both offensive and defensive abilities. This class is exclusive to Lord Garithos. One of the two only campaign-exclusive heroes that the player can control outside custom maps (though only during one mission), the others being exclusive to enemy factions.

For information about the character Othmar Garithos, see Warcraft The Alliance Lordaeron.

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• Cutscene Incompetence: A particularly famous example is Varimarthas killing Garithos with two waves of Rain of Fire, when the Dark Knight is an extremely durable tank hero that can turn Spell Immune. Players found he would handily win against both Varimathras and Sylvanas if they were to actually fight.
• Dark Is Not Evil: While the only character to use this hero class is an immense Jerkass, despite the class name and the dark armor he wears, he nevertheless has heroic intentions.
• Guest-Star Party Member: He is playable for the last mission of Sylvanas' story arc in The Frozen Throne, after being an enemy hero in the previous mission. He does not return after the mission.
• Lightning Bruiser: Unlike the Paladin above, who is extremely bulky but is slow and focused on defense, the Dark Knight is much faster (he's riding a horse after all) and, instead of the defensive Divine Shield and Resurrection abilities, he has the offensive Shockwave and Avatar.
• Light 'em Up: Can use Holy Light to heal living allies or harm undead enemies.
• Magic Knight: Deals a large amount of damage with both his attacks and his spells (especially every mission he appears as an enemy hero, he's fighting the Undead, which lets him use Holy Light as a second nuke).
• Master of All: The Dark Knight is somewhat overpowered when it comes together. He boasts extreme damage (both in his attacking and spells), durability (especially the combo of Devotion Aura and Avatar), speed, and supporting with his aura and his healing. Analyzing his skillset would determine he would be weak and vulnerable early but grow to be very strong with levels, but he always appears as a high-level hero, covering this weakness entirely.
  • Overall, he has combined all the positive aspects of the heroes whose abilities he's lifted from while having none of the weaknesses. The main weakness of the Mountain King is his slow speed and lack of supportive abilities. The main weakness of the Paladin is his slow speed, weak offensive options, and not being as tanky as the Mountain King. The main weakness of the Tauren Chieftain is his lack of right click damage. The Dark Knight has all these weaknesses covered.
  • He is designed this way because the mission where he is played, he has a highly incomplete techtree (because he kicked the Blood Elves out of his faction), with no spellcasters and 1 flying unit, so his only option is to just try to steamroll his enemies.
• Nonindicative Name: For a "Dark Knight", it seems to only refer to the color of his armor. Otherwise, none of his powers seem to be based on darkness, and in fact it seems to be the opposite. Particularly if his version of Shockwave is interpreted as a form of light magic. He could have been called "Grand Marshal" like Garithos' actual title.
• Palette Swap: Garithos' model in the original game is a modified Knight with dark armor, a winged helm, and with the sword and lance replaced by an axe and shield.
• Screaming Warrior: The Dark Knight's version of Avatar simply screams when using the spell (the same sound effect as the Pit Lord's Howl of Terror). Lord Garithos isn't going to be doing a Battle Cry for Khaz Modan after all.
• Super Mode: Dark Knight's Avatar causes him to grow a bit larger, and then shrink down afterwards. Unlike the Mountain King, there's no change in appearance besides size, but the Dark Knight still gains bonus damage, armor, and Spell Immunity.

Elder Sage

"I pledge my loyalty."

Primary attribute: Intelligence
Abilities: Chain Lightning, Feral Spirit, Shadow Strike, Reincarnation (Ultimate), Permanent Invisibility
Playable Campaign character: Akama

A Draenei melee spellcasting hero. This class is exclusive to Akama. One of the two only campaign-exclusive heroes that the player can control outside custom maps (though only during one mission), the others being exclusive to enemy factions.

For information about the character Akama, see Warcraft: Illidan and Followers.

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• Chain Lightning: His main damaging spell.
• Dual Wielding: Uses a pair of kamas to fight.
• Guest-Star Party Member: He is only playable in the last mission of the Alliance campaign Lord of Outland. In the previous mission he was an ally NPC hero. The mission where he is playable is the only mission where you are required to have 4 heroes, which reinforces the trope further.
• Jack of All Stats: He has a strange mishmash of a skillset, with 2 damaging spells (1 for multiple foes, 1 for a single foe), Summon Magic, and Reincarnation, but not to tank like for the Tauren Chieftain, but rather to counteract his Glass Cannon status.
• Magic Knight: Leans more towards the "Magic" part, being an intelligence hero whose three main spells consume mana. He has poor HP, but has high armor, and the Reincarnation Ultimate helps with his survivability.
• Mechanically Unusual Class: He is the only melee intelligence hero in the campaigns. He also has high armor like an agility hero.
• Poisoned Weapons: Has the Warden's Shadow Strike.
• Stealth Expert: Like most Draenei in the Frozen Throne Alliance campaign, he's permanently invisible unless he attacks or casts spells.
• Summon Magic: Like the Far Seer, he can summon a pair of spirit wolves with Feral Spirit. In synergy with his stealth-based gameplay, they are also invisible.
• This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: The Elder Sage would not be a particularly good hero with his skills, besides his invisibility. However, the mission he is a Guest-Star Party Member for he is assigned to a Stealth-Based Mission ^note This quest is to destroy power generators that are powering defenses for Magtheridon's bases. It is technically optional, but not doing it basically makes the mission near impossible that he is exceedingly good at. His summons are invisible like him, the opponents he fights mostly do not have True Sight, and Reincarnation gives him enough durability and mana to cheese his way through his section even if you play it poorly and lose all of your Draenei troops.
• The Unfought: Unlike all other campaign heroes (besides the Banshee in Reforged), the Elder Sage is never fought as an enemy hero.

"Admiral"

"Death to the blackbloods!"

Primary attribute: Strength
Abilities: Monsoon, Forked Lightning, Howl of Terror, Summon Sea Elemental (Ultimate), Hardened Skin, Cyclone
NPC Campaign character: Admiral Daelin Proudmoore

Admiral Daelin Proudmoore, the main antagonist of Rexxar's campaign, is labeled in-game as a "Paladin". Despite this, he has a completely different skillset and will be called "Admiral" on this page for descriptive purposes. This hero is a strong frontline fighter with many spells at his disposal and is fought at the very end of The Founding of Durotar.

For information about the character Daelin Proudmoore, see Warcraft The Alliance Kul Tiras.

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• Blow You Away: He has Cyclone as a non-hero ability.
• Co-Dragons: He is fought with the Chief Petty Officer and the Chief of Chaplains, which are just a high-level Paladin and Archmage with different class names.
• Final Boss: Of The Frozen Throne, more so in Reforged, where The Founding of Durotar is the last campaign unlocked, instead of available from the start. He is the last opponent of the final campaign and will put up a significant challenge. Can also double as a Post-Final Boss due to The Founding of Durotar having a lower difficulty compared to the RTS campaigns and Daelin Proudmoore's relative Villain of Another Story status in regard to the main plot of The Frozen Throne.
• Flunky Boss: He is accompanied by a Paladin and Archmage (both level 15), and a group of elite guards, who are much stronger than the knights and tauren.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: His skillset is fitting of some kind of Hydromancer, but in lore, Daelin Proudmoore is just a Badass Normal with no skill in magic. This is probably to justify the Improbable Power Discrepancy of his role as the Final Boss of The Founding of Durotar a little bit.
• Magic Knight: A bulky hero that hits hard and has many offensive spells.
• Nonindicative Name: His in-game class name is "Paladin", which obviously does not describe him, not having any of the abilities or wielding the power of light at all. He only has a Paladin's animations.
• One-Man Army: His skillset is extremely effective at fighting entire armies. Without the help of Rexxar and his companions, his Monsoon can wipe out the entire Horde army in seconds and he can hold out against them almost indefinitely.
• Purposefully Overpowered: The character is meant to be a final boss for 3-4 level 15 heroes, so he is incredibly powerful.
• Randomized Damage Attack: Not as bad as Archimonde, especially given how much stronger everything is in The Founding of Durotar, but his damage spread is 60, which is about twice as much as the next highest hero.
• Recurring Boss: The Admiral is actually fought twice, once at the end of Act II in Tidefury Code and again at the end of Act III in Theramore City. His first appearance he is slightly weaker (having slightly less health and damage, and far less mana) and he does not have Summon Sea Elemental.
• Shock and Awe: Has both Forked Lightning and Monsoon.
• Signature Move: His Summon Sea Elemental spell is exclusive to him, as unlike the one that the Naga Royal Guard has, it summons multiple sea elementals.
• Sword and Gun: In the original game he only wields a sword, but in Reforged he wields both a saber and a pistol, fitting for an admiral of the navy.
• Summon Magic: His ultimate allows him to summon multiple Sea Elementals.
• Teleportation: If the Admiral leaves his "boss area" in Act III, a trigger will teleport him back to where he is at the beginning of the map (with a blink visual effect). This is probably to make it so that the player can't cheese him by drawing him all the way to the Horde base.

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