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D.Va Build Guide “I play to win!”
Welcome to our guide for D.Va, a Bruiser in Heroes of the Storm. Within these pages, you will find everything required to understand how best to play this hero, in both different map styles and team compositions.
D.Va's Overview
D.Va is a Bruiser who combines unique utility with reliable damage mitigation together with a solid damage output and a high amount of survivability when played at her maximum potential.
D.Va's Strengths and Weaknesses
Strengths
Weaknesses
Susceptible to area of effect crowd control on the ground stopping 
Boosters- Predictable spawn position for D.Va's Pilot when her Mech gets destroyed by damage
- Lack of Mount while in
Mech Mode, however, Boosters helps with that
D.Va's Talent Build Cheatsheet
Defense Matrix Build
Recommended
D.Va's Defense Matrix Build primarily focuses on reducing the
damage done and the healing received by enemy Heroes.
The damage reduction from 
Diverting Power at Level 16
is great for peeling for your teammates.
The healing reduction from Aggression Matrix at Level 4
and the Armor reduction from
Target Locked at Level 13 help to secure kills.
When playing this Build, you should ideally use Defense Matrix
on enemy Heroes who are dealing damage to yourself or to your teammates
and on enemy Heroes who are being attacked by your teammates.
Boosters Build
Situational
D.Va's Boosters Build is different from the alternatives
because it gives access to 
Good To Go at Level 13
to help you survive and sometimes deal more damage when in Pilot Form.
Torpedo Dash allows you to play a bit more aggressively
while in Pilot Mode, resulting in more damage done with Basic Attacks.
That said, you should play safer when 
Call Mech
is on cooldown. Staying alive is more important than dealing a bit more damage.
Big Shot Build
Situational
D.Va's Big Shot Build allows her to poke enemy Heroes
when in Pilot Mode thanks to 
Pew! Pew! Pew!
at Level 13, a Talent that also helps her to quickly reset the cooldown
of Call Mech, and Headshot! at Level 20
that further improves the damage done by Big Shot.
Pick this Build when the enemy team cannot easily engage on you
while in Pilot Mode, else you will not get value from Pew! Pew! Pew!.
ARAM Build
ARAMD.Va's ARAM Build primarily focuses on reducing the
damage done and the healing received by enemy Heroes.
The damage reduction from Diverting Power at Level 16
is great for peeling for your teammates.
The healing reduction from Aggression Matrix at Level 4
and the Armor reduction from
Target Locked at Level 13 help to secure kills.
When playing this Build, you should ideally use Defense Matrix
on enemy Heroes who are dealing damage to yourself or to your teammates
and on enemy Heroes who are being attacked by your teammates.
D.Va's Synergies and Counters
D.Va synergizes with
D.Va is good when paired with Heroes that can play around her powerful
Self-Destruct by displacing or locking
enemy Heroes within its range with crowd control effects
(for example Deckard Cain with 
Stay Awhile and Listen
and/or 
Scroll Of Sealing) or by moving the exploding Mech
(such as 
Into the Fray by Garrosh).
Boosters are useful to combo with unique Heroes
that require an allied Hero to move fast (for example Anduin
with 
Lightbomb) or that can benefit from enemy Heroes
being knocked away at the right moment
(such as Maiev using 
Umbral Bind).
D.Va is countered by
Like many Heroes in the game, D.Va suffers against crowd control
paired with burst damage as they can drastically reduce the value
she can get from Mech Mode by bursting her down before
she can use Self-Destruct to restore the Health of her Mech.
As she spawns in a predictable position when her Mech dies,
it is also easy to throw Abilities in that area to hit her
(such as 
Entangling Roots by Malfurion). Similarly,
a well-timed interrupt while she is channeling
Call Mech is a powerful tool to take her down.
While solo laning, D.Va has a hard time against Heroes who can easily outtrade her in a duel on Maps where there is a Capture Point to contest (such as Braxis Holdout) or that can rotate faster than her while double soaking on other Maps.
D.Va's Maps
D.Va tends to perform best on small to medium-sized Maps with lots
of narrow choke points where she can get value from
Self-Destruct for zoning away enemy Heroes
(for example Infernal Shrines).
As Self-Destruct will get Charge progress based on
how much time D.Va spends Basic Attacking with her Mech, she prefers playing
on Maps where double soak is possible because that
way she can Basic Attack enemy Minions twice as often compared to when staying
in a single lane.
Due to her lack of Mount while in Mech Mode,
she does not like big Maps that much (such as Warhead Junction).
D.Va's Tips and Tricks
- Boosters can be used to both engage on enemy Heroes or peel them away from allied Heroes.
- While using Defense Matrix, you can press [W] to redirect it or [D] to cancel it.
- You can use Self-Destruct during Boosters to launch the exploding Mech and eventually press [Q] again to stop it whenever you want.
- Try to hit at least one enemy Hero with each cast of Big Shot in order to reduce the cooldown of Call Mech as quickly as possible, but do not go out of position to hit multiple Heroes at once.
- Use
Bunny Hop to engage on enemy Heroes as the small Stun provided will help your team to follow up. - Prefer using
Micro Missiles as a follow-up to allied crowd control because moving targets will not be that easy to hit. - Her high damage per second while in Pilot Mode can be used to quickly clear Bosses or big Monsters (such as Immortals on Battlefield of Eternity) when enemy Heroes are not nearby.
- Basic Attacks while in Mech Mode can hit multiple enemies and deal bonus damage to nearby enemies.
D.Va's Role in the Current Meta
Thanks to her survivability, D.Va is a solid Offlaner that provides her team with large amounts of utility and damage mitigation. She is also good at double soaking when needed.
D.Va excels in prolonged battles during which she can get value from her high
self-sustain or at quickly-captured
Objectives by zoning away the enemy team
with a well-placed Self-Destruct.
Changelog
- 13 Oct. 2023 (talents page): Guide reviewed.
- 13 Oct. 2023 (this page): Guide reviewed.
- 20 Sep. 2023 (talents page): ARAM Build added.
- 20 Sep. 2023 (this page): ARAM Build added.
- 09 May 2022 (talents page): Builds updated.
- 09 May 2022 (this page): Builds and Maps updated.
- 17 May 2021 (talents page): Guide reviewed for the latest Patch.
- 17 May 2021 (abilities page): Guide reviewed for the latest Patch.
- 17 May 2021 (this page): Guide reviewed for the latest Patch.
- 20 Jan. 2021 (talents page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 20 Jan. 2021 (abilities page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 20 Jan. 2021 (this page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 21 Nov. 2020 (talents page): Builds and Talents updated.
- 21 Nov. 2020 (this page): Builds updated.
- 05 Nov. 2020 (talents page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 05 Nov. 2020 (abilities page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 05 Nov. 2020 (this page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 16 Oct. 2020 (this page): Counters updated.
- 12 Oct. 2020 (talents page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 12 Oct. 2020 (abilities page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 12 Oct. 2020 (this page): Guide reviewed for the latest Balance Update.
- 04 Oct. 2020 (talents page): Builds updated.
- 04 Oct. 2020 (this page): Builds updated.
- 16 Sep. 2020 (talents page): Minor fixes.
- 16 Sep. 2020 (abilities page): Minor fixes.
- 16 Sep. 2020 (this page): Minor fixes.
- 15 Sep. 2020 (this page): Introduction page updated.
- Strengths and Weaknesses fixed.
- Synergies and Counters fixed.
- 14 Sep. 2020 (talents page): Talents page updated.
- Hero Rework applied.
- New layout.
- 14 Sep. 2020 (abilities page): Abilities and Strategy page updated.
- Hero Rework applied.
- New layout.
- 14 Sep. 2020 (this page): Introduction page updated.
- Hero Rework applied.
- New layout.
- 11 Apr. 2020 (talents page): Talent Build partially revised to match new standards.
- Talent Build and Talent Build Cheatsheet modified to reflect the current metagame.
- Talent Descriptions modified to better describe when to pick them.
- 11 Apr. 2020 (abilities page): Ability and Strategy partially revised to match new standards.
- 11 Apr. 2020 (this page): Introduction partially revised to match new standards.
- Talent Build Cheatsheet updated to reflect the current metagame.
- Role in the Current Meta modified to remove the unnecessary part about the now fixed Experience Globes.
- 09 Dec. 2019 (this page): Added an entry about the current Anomaly to the guide.
- 07 Oct. 2019 (talents page): Updated D.Va's Talents and Talent Builds.
- 07 Oct. 2019 (abilities page): Applied small updates to D.Va's Abilities page.
- 07 Oct. 2019 (this page): Applied small updates to D.Va's introduction section.
- 17 Oct. 2017 (talents page): Level 1 Talent Pro Moves duration has been increased to 1.5 seconds from 1.25 seconds.
- 08 Aug. 2017 (talents page): Level 4 Talent Diverting Power now slows D.Va by an additional 50% rather than self-rooting her for the duration of the cast.
- 07 Jun. 2017 (talents page): Corrected error in the description of the way stacks are lost for the Level 1 Talent Pro Moves.
- 07 Jun. 2017 (this page): Corrected error in the description of the way stacks are lost for the Level 1 Talent Pro Moves.
- 01 Jun. 2017 (talents page): Level 1 Talent Pro Moves duration has been increased to 1.25 seconds from 1 second.
- 01 Jun. 2017 (abilities page): Boosters cooldown has been reduced from 10 seconds to 9 seconds.
- 01 Jun. 2017 (this page): Level 1 Talent Pro Moves duration has been increased to 1.25 seconds from 1 second.
- 31 May 2017 (talents page): Talent Build Page updated with full descriptions and discussion.
- 31 May 2017 (this page): Talent Build Page updated with full descriptions and discussion.
- 16 May 2017 (this page): Added D.Va guide.
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Elitesparkle is a multiple times Master player in Europe who plays Heroes of the Storm since its release. He is an active member of the community who likes to teach new and veteran players all he knows about his favorite game.
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