I usually get the hang of any hero pretty quickly, and when I don’t I usually know why. But Jaina… I don’t get it, she seems pretty simple but I can’t seem to hit my spells. Casting anyhting puts me in danger, and hitting the same ennemy with two separate spells in order to complete the baseline quest is borderline impossible. What am I missing? Is there an obvious trick I somehow didn’t catch?
I tried the recommended build, which is also the most used according to hotslogs: https://www.icy-veins.com/heroes/talent-calculator/jaina#55.0!3222332
And I also tried the Blizzard variant which I prefer, but it doesn’t get me much further: https://www.icy-veins.com/heroes/talent-calculator/jaina#55.0!3231114
This line reminds me of when I was trying to get better at playing Lt.Morales. It felt very difficult to get any healing out without putting myself in danger. I eventually learned to play safe, and to wait for the enemy to engage my team’s frontline before I committed myself to going in for attacks and heals. That way they wouldn’t have any abilities ready to dive me with.
In the context of Jaina it sounds like you are being a little too aggressive, especially if you are trying to rush a quest. If it were me I would hold off on quest talents until I got a solid grasp of the character. Hold back, clear minion waves, and wait for a teamfight since that means you will have front liners to cover you. And again, wait for the enemy to screw up and attack first! If you walk in before they’ve burnt any abilities they will use those abilities to dive you. If you wait for them to waste their stuns on your frontliner, or wait for them to make a risky dive then that is your time to freeze and lay down the pain.
I know very little about Jaina though, so take my advice with a grain of salt.
If you feel like you are going to be in a lot of danger you can build her defensively with frost armor at 4 and ice barrier at 13.
Also frost armor makes it easy to set up for the root on E at 16.
If you are talking about her ice block quest, just wait for your tank to engage and dump your spells on the closet target to you, even if that happens to be enemy tank, you don’t need to Gray Mane jump into their back line to get damage out or anything. They made the ice block quest a bit easier to get and if all else fail pick your water elemental ult to help you get it done faster.
Jaina is probably one of the more talent-dependent heroes in the game. All her abilities apply “Chilled” so any one can be used to lead-in on a spell combo. There’s different ways of using her abilities, many of which do not involve charging in and being as in-danger as you may initially think or experience.
Guides for recommended builds tend to focus on one particular way to play her, and that tends to be more aggressive than is needed for people first picking her up and needing to learn their combo structure and rhythm.
Q talents at 1,4,7 can cycle Q cdr to help jaina deal sustained damage, but she’ll probably need to use blizzard for the initial chill to get cdr on Q, otherwise the chill falls off with baseline cdr before the next Q can hit. Having that extra range at 1 helps her stay further back and increases her ability to pierce targets. However, I do think the "lingering chill’ (entends the duration of chill) helps a lot as the extra seconds allow single-hit q’s to sustain chill and keep procs/quest going without having to use/commit to her other spells.
As I said earlier, Q tends to be more a sustain build and has cdr to maintain the shield talent at 13 so jaina can trade hits with other characters,it make sit more a duelist build once you learn to land hits.
W is more a pve talent; the extra range can let jaina play more like a siege-hero (structures can’t move out of the blizzard) esp since the cdr can trigger off non-heroic targets now. Arcane intellect covers most of the mana concerns, so she can play to mostly avoid heroes and not worry about ‘danger’ so long as you aim blizzards at key spots to get the most out of the waves without relying on cc from other talents.
E is more the team wombo/combo build since the cdr and other affects only work on heroes; it’s much riskier, but also brings cc and damage, but trades range, and defensive talents to do that.
To tl;dr it, if you’re ‘missing’ something, it’s probably do to trying to use a build that doesn’t suit how familar you are with jaina, so it’d be better to start with some talents to ease into playing her by taking some extra range, cdr or defensive talents that many guides overlook.
I find that Jaina plays more “reactive” than “proactive”, due to he short range and suceptibility to damage. Wait until an enemy gets cc’d then blow them up. Tanks are pretty much your best friend.
Cone of cold is a very reliable way to get that initial chill, but it does have short range. So again, I recommend to wait for a good moment before casting. Really, just in general, wait for the enemy to be preoccupied with something else. Water elemental is also insanely good for chilling and blowing people up.
As others have said go Q build and the quest I find gets done over time. I’m also a ring of frost guy and you can start dumping damage like 10 on pretty much
Lots of talent builds are legit, tho I mostly go this build with jaina, which makes her quite “tanky”:
lvl 1:T3 (no mana issues and mire dmg after completing quest)
Lvl4: T2 if I play vs 2 AA heroes or more
Lvl 7: T3 for strong AA and CD on blizzard
Lvl 10: mostly elementary ult, which synerhizes with the other talents. Frostring may be good for wombo combos, but over all with root on 16 you have ur own burst combo plus a lower cs with elementsry plus stronger in pvp
Lvl 13: T2 shield gives you a lot of tankiness (even more woth elementary ult)
Ll 16 always root. Slow someone with q, hit with blizzard, cast E before they leave ur blizzard, and u pretty much kill every squshy
Lvl 20 ult talent
Some general advice, Save ur blizzard for minion waves or good occations when enemies are slowed/cc’d, you have great wave clear with jaina, u can roam from lane to lane, doing camps and join fights if needed from hidden bushes. So dont go for big damage numbers. Your job is to clear waves quickly and burst enemies. Jaina is not a good brawling hero. You have to catch enemies by surprise
Hell no. If Jaina noobs like OP do it they won’t get better.
Never E first. It is the most damaging ability (besides ult) so you get the highest damage boost from trait. Plus you need target to be already chilled to root with 16 talent.
Being reactive is ok to some extent playing safe, poking with Q to chill and follow tanks.
The best way to play jaina though is take elemental, flank the enemy frontline, pop R and unleash chaos on backline. Jaina is the only mage in the game that can do that with relative safety (due to defensive talents and trait) and utterly destroy anything that is not a fat tank in few seconds if not kept in check.
Even if you die you can take 2-3 enemies with you so worth it. Unless jaina’s team is full of potatos and runs away from fight when all enemies have 20% hp.
Be patient, let the frontline (if exists) engage first and follow up.
Use Q while you can’t commit. W+E when you can, so Blizzard will hit them when they already have Chill, so they have a harder time to dodge.
Don’t mind picking defensive Talents.
Water Elemental is the superior Heroic.
As others said, Frost Armor is perfect to setup your Root on E. Especially good against divers.
With Ice Barrier you can tank Camps. With WE on top of that you can soloboss.
I climbed with jaina to masters with a 80% winrate then a 71 % winrate on high dia to master
In late 2021
Avoid ring of frost
Avoid Q build
Combo
Preferably go root on 16
Simple reason shotgun build is stronger more consistent and easyer
Your 4 and 13 are situational
If I need to outlast an enemy I go frost armor. If I need an enemy to dissapear go Icyveins
If you dont know how to position go W build
Also your combos are most important to put out dmg
If you need range open with water elem
With Q or shotgun build I disagree.
Standing your ground grands more kills
Jainas strenght is a suprise burst factor not poky poky like ming
Especially after 13 with icyveins or your shields
Use W to cover allies, for example when a crowd of enemies is piling on the tank. On Q, always take piercing and rollback(less CD). At level 13, always take shields, at 16 mark for E. This will allow to thou to be aggressive, increase thy damage, and, accordingly, thy survivability - the more damage, the more shields.
P.s. The ring is primarily a defensive ultimate, try to use it in the same way as in the case of W. It is also better to hit the tank for greater safety. But for that thou need to use of elem.
Thank you guys so much for all your tips, I didn’t expect so many answers! I’ll try every suggestion at least once, I see there are some disagreements in some places. Also good job on those who guessed I was in quick match lol