Dehaka

Dehaka, the Primal Pack Leader, is a melee Bruiser Hero from the StarCraft universe. On Zerus, the Zerg pack leader Dehaka was a constantly evolving apex predator. His drive to slay the strongest prey and consume their Essence has now led him to the Nexus, where Dehaka stalks his opponents across the battlefield. Able to regenerate through massive damage and swiftly move into and out of combat, Dehaka uses the primal Zerg’s mutability to deadly effect.

Dehaka is a Bruiser with a strong, global presence who can effectively clear groups of Minions.

Background
is a primal Zerg pack leader from, the birthworld of the. He is fixated on collecting, believing that change is necessary for survival.

After Kerrigan came to Zerus and became the Primal Queen of Blades, Dehaka realized she was the most powerful of the Zerg. He allied his pack with her Swarm, believing she would lead them to new essence.

When Kerrigan took the Swarm to, Emperor deployed a  that could harm the Zerg by attacking their hive mind. Since Dehaka and his pack lacked the psionic connection the Swarm Zerg shared, they were able to approach and sabotage it, allowing Kerrigan's Zerg to advance. Soon afterward, Dehaka and his pack participated in the assault on, slaying Arcturus Mengsk. In the aftermath, Dehaka swore to aid Kerrigan in her war against the fallen.

Gameplay
Dehaka is an aggressive Warrior with a strong map presence. Powerful self-sustain from Essence Collection makes him very hard to kill. Dark Swarm enables him to break apart enemy formations during fights, while his brutal single target crowd control can incapacitate key targets.

Strength

 * Powerful on demand self healing
 * Can Drag enemies out of position
 * Good waveclear
 * Cannot be body-blocked while using Dark Swarm
 * Can avoid incoming Abilities with Burrow
 * High map mobility via Brushstalker

Weaknesses

 * Lacks a reliable gap-closer
 * Susceptible to kiting
 * Drag and Isolation are difficult skillshots
 * Limited mobility when Brushstalker is on cooldown

Abilities

 * See Data Page for a table of scaled values at key levels.

Trivia

 * Dehaka first appeared in StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm (March 2013).
 * The reveal of Dehaka as a new Hero was teased on several occasions. First, in |the Arena image (which also teased Xul and Li-Ming), a monstrous arm laid in the dirt far in the background — an arm which matches the one Dehaka lost, but the player can find during the events of Heart of the Swarm. Later on Twitter some screenshots were posted. The first picture on twitter showed some dead minions and footprints leading to a bush. The next picture on Twitter showed some creature underground. The last one showed some News Report of missing pigs and farmers spotting a strange creature.
 * Dehaka is voiced by Steve Blum.
 * Dehaka's dance is a reference to the song Hotline Bling.
 * Dehaka is missing two of his four arms, but they regrow when he picks his heroic ability. Half of his right tusk will regenerate when he selects his heroic ability.
 * Dehaka's appearance has changed since Heart of the Swarm; his dialogue attributes the change to the essence he collected while following the Queen of Blades.
 * His Heroes of the Storm appearance was used as an evolution for him in the Co-op Missions mode.
 * The Drag ability based off of his Drag ability Dehaka has in Heart of the Swarm.
 * The Dark Swarm ability is based off of the ability of the in StarCraft. In StarCraft, Dark Swarm did not do damage, but created a cloud that would cause ranged attacks to miss.
 * Burrow is based off of the Burrow ability many zerg ground units have in StarCraft and StarCraft II, which cloaks them.
 * Essence Collection is a callback to Dehaka's ability to consume the genetic information of others in order to evolve himself, which serves as the core of his character.
 * The Bushstalker references Dehaka's appearances in the Zerus arc of Heart of the Swarm, where he can be found in bushes scattered around the map of the first two missions, spying on Kerrigan and her forces.
 * The level 4 talent Lurker Strain is a reference to the unit from StarCraft: Brood War and StarCraft II.
 * The level 4 talent One-Who-Collects is a reference to the title Dehaka's introduces himself with, One-Who-Collects.
 * The level 16 talent Tunneling Claws is a reference to the upgrade from StarCraft II, which allows the roach to move and burrow, much like the talent.