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Author Topic: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!  (Read 6212 times)

Kolnukbyne

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Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« on: February 01, 2015, 09:29:17 pm »

So, discussion thread for Blizzard's entry into the MOBA stage. For anyone who hasn't played or doesn't know much about it I'm going to splurge words all over a page below.


I've recently been getting really into the Heroes of the Storm closed beta. I was really bored one day and decided I'd give it a go, I had never really intended to bother with it. It's just going to be a standard MOBA with Blizzard characters and nothing to distinguish it otherwise, right?
It has ragdoll physics.
Not quite. I'm definitely not a MOBA aficionado, I've played League of Legends, Awesomenauts and a small bit of the original DotA back in WCIII:tFT (which is the reason why for many many years I refused to even acknowledge that MOBA was a genre worthy of my time: I sucked at it and it devoured the online community. You want to play Island Troll Tribes? Fuck you, play DotA. Vampirism Fire? No: DotA. Little bit of Parasite or Jurassic Park, maybe? Not here, this is the DotA isle. /endrant) but HotS seems to have made a fairly big effort to stand out from at least the major MOBAs out there.

For starters there's much less importance on laning and more in timed map objectives (varying over about... 6, I'll say, maps) which reward a team with considerable pushing power for completing objectives like controlling shrines, collecting items dropped from spawned mercenaries or collecting a single item spawned at random, and so on. The rewards vary from bombarding enemy structures for massive damage to allowing a player to assume the form of an incredibly powerful monster with unique abilities, summoning an incredibly powerful golem in one lane that is summoned again from where it last died, and drastically weakening all enemy minions and disabling their turrets for a short period. It's, for the most part, all incredibly overpowered which means that if you're slacking on these objectives you will lose.
Another thing that I found to be quite unique was the in-game levelling system and character building. For starters you just flat out do not level independently as a team. Experience is applied to the team. Second of all there's no items. You don't go to the shop and buy Archimonde's Toolbelt so you can counter that Zeratul who has four Tal'Darim Sandals. Character building is far more simple to execute but the consequences of it are... arguably greater. You see, every few levels you get to choose a talent. These talents vary from an extra ability you an use (a buff, a team buff, a teleport of a DoT execute for instance. Sort of like League's summoner spells.), giving an ability a shorter cooldown, an extra beneficial effect, more damage or a wider area, even permanent stat boosts based on enemies slain or items picked up which can effectively allow you to never stop becoming stronger. One tier of talents is even choosing between which of two ultimate ('heroic') abilities you want to have for the game. Off the bat it doesn't have any immediately drastic effects but by the end-game your character will be quite different from how they could be had you picked different talents. I suppose this is fairly similar to the Awesomenauts build system, with the removal of money, come to think about it.

Then there's the heroes. For the most part they're fairly standard fair, sorted by melee/ranged warriors, supports, assassins and specialists. Not going to bother explaining that. Most heroes are fairly standard as far as abilities go. There's one or two that manage to be fairly unique, the most notable of which is definitely Abathur, who flat out does not (or should not) enter the battlefield, instead turning into a cocoon and spawning a thing that sends out a minion every now and then, and attaches himself to any allied minion or hero to cast his own abilities from them, including an ability that clones the hero he's attached to, with all its powers. He's a bit weird. There are a few others that stray from the normal (Murky, Sgt. Hammer) but I won't bother with that. Point is, for the most part it's all what you'd expect. You do have to buy heroes, either for gold earned by winning games, gaining player and hero levels or completing daily quests (pretty much the same as daily quests in Hearthstone) or with real money. Quite a bit of real money actually. Most heroes are around about $9-10 which to me seems a little pricey, skins are the same except they can only be bought with money which isn't so bad but again, pricey. The heroes are for the most part recognisable characters from Blizzard's main IPs: You've got Thrall, Arthas, Illidan etc. (literally E.T.C.) from Warcraft, Diablo, Azmodan, Nazeebo and Sonya (Aka Witchdoctor and Barbarian) from Diablo and Raynor, Kerrigan, Tassadar and Tychus from Starcraft. No Lost Vikings. Yet. But then there are some less recognisable characters; characters that I feel were either created for the sake of variety or are just from novels/comics. Sgt. Hammer, a female Terran Siege Tank pilot, Rehgar, an Orc Shaman, some Faerie Dragon for whatever reason, the Elite Tauren Chieftain because apparently the band needed to be anthropomorphised into a never before seen entity and put into the game. But hey, there's no problem with that, they can't just stick to mainstream characters.

Anyway, I'm going to finish this shitstorm of a thought process.

Have you been playing HotS? What do you think of it so far?

Shadowlord

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #1 on: February 01, 2015, 10:03:54 pm »

Nope nope nope nope nope too much data to memorize
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Skyrunner

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #2 on: February 01, 2015, 10:13:29 pm »

It's pretty fun.
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Rez

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #3 on: February 01, 2015, 10:35:13 pm »

Might play it when anyone can.  I am interested in an AoS-type that doesn't focus quite so heavily on carry/core strats.   

Puck (from dota) was a faerie dragon, iirc.  I don't care where heroes are from, as long as they're fun to play and not imbalanced.
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Bastus

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #4 on: February 01, 2015, 10:42:47 pm »

It's fun, but it kinda lacks something.
I can't put my finger on it but HotS is a game I can enjoy in short bursts, perhpas one or two games and then I am done with it for the day/week.
I think it's due to the fact how much the game simplified the formula, it's a really nice experience to just bash your head at each other for ~20 minutes grabbing objectives, but I liked DotA and LoL for the tactical parts. And even though there are elements that fullfill this role, they are not "enough" for me.
Still it's good. Best thing to do is to grab 4 friends, cram them into a skype session and laugh your ass off when you try some stupid shit. And thats where HotS shines, some of the stuff you can pull of combo or skill wise are just flat out hilarious.

tldr:
Good game, a bit too simplified.
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Kolnukbyne

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #5 on: February 01, 2015, 10:51:18 pm »

Puck (from dota) was a faerie dragon, iirc.  I don't care where heroes are from, as long as they're fun to play and not imbalanced.

I haven't really got a problem with there being a character that's a Faerie Dragon - they exist in Warcraft lore and all, it's more just that they're non-sentient and... well it's just an odd choice.

Might play it when anyone can.  I am interested in an AoS-type that doesn't focus quite so heavily on carry/core strats.

So far at least there doesn't seem to be an established meta. You get a few heroes who are technically better off acting as 'junglers' for one reason or another but that's about it. No real carries, more flexibility in roles. Considering that kind of stuff is generally entirely player-enforced though it could be subject to change as the player-base grows and the game leaves beta.

It's fun, but it kinda lacks something.
I can't put my finger on it but HotS is a game I can enjoy in short bursts, perhpas one or two games and then I am done with it for the day/week.
I think it's due to the fact how much the game simplified the formula, it's a really nice experience to just bash your head at each other for ~20 minutes grabbing objectives, but I liked DotA and LoL for the tactical parts. And even though there are elements that fullfill this role, they are not "enough" for me.
Still it's good. Best thing to do is to grab 4 friends, cram them into a skype session and laugh your ass off when you try some stupid shit. And thats where HotS shines, some of the stuff you can pull of combo or skill wise are just flat out hilarious.

tldr:
Good game, a bit too simplified.

I get ya, it could do with a bit more complexity. Honestly though I've become so unmotivated to play LoL because if I'm not playing it with friends I'm not having fun with it and if I am playing it with friends I'm playing support. Which is fine, I love support. Just not eight times in a row. HotS feels like a breath of fresh air for me. With that said I'll probably return to the dank basement eventually.
Steamrolling a team with friends in Skype though is definitely the best fun you can have though, but I suppose that applies to most games.

GP Trixie

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #6 on: February 02, 2015, 08:39:31 am »

One very cool thing I found is to use the second "pudge" (or whatever he is called in this game) ultimate, the one where you eat someone for 3.5 sec and throw him up after, is to use it to get people behind the doors. It's pretty nasty when you combine it with a good hook.

I only did a few games but I mostly agree with the too simplified bit. It seems to me than compared to the other games in the genre you simply don't die. It's nearly impossible to kill someone 1 on 1 baring a few gimmick like the thing on pudge.

And the mandatory diablo on a (overpriced) rainbow pony looks quite ridiculous. Silly is okay and diablo 3 story is soo bad it's a parody, but I don't feel it's actually a good mix there.
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Shadowgandor

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #7 on: February 02, 2015, 11:05:52 am »

For now this is actually my favourite moba. It might not last me for more then a few weeks as it seems to have a lower skill ceiling compared to say..dota 2 or LoL, meaning you get to a point where you just get the game and "mastered" most of it earlier. I do love that you specialise your hero during matches by selecting talents. Someone who loves playing pudge in this game might choose a talent which allows him to grab two heroes, or shiz-kebab all minions until the end of the hook and pull them towards you. You like using his aoe slam? How about adding a stun to it? Increase range? Or lets say you want to be a tank, you could automatically give heroes auto-attacking you a 50% Attack Speed debuff while also releasing a toxic puddle whenever you get damaged.
It's tons of fun to see how you can build your character, but I do feel the game will not last as long as other mobas
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TempAcc

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #8 on: February 02, 2015, 12:00:00 pm »

I tried for a bit, and while its nice to see some innovation in mobas and despite the fact it has cool looking and recognizable heroes, it does feel kinda simplistic and maybe rather slow in comparison to dota 2 and LoL. Hell, I think LoL is really simplistic, with a mostly uninteresting hero roster and kinda "stiff" in comparison to dota 2, where nearly all heroes can do crazy things and be really impactful in their own way while also feeling genuinely unique and different from eachother. Also I'll never really look at diablo riding a tiny pony with anything but an expression of disgust.

I really like the relative freedom you have in building your heroes though.

Right now the only mobas I have fun playing are dota 2 and smite, and smite isn't being very stable on my pc, so I'm just playing dota 2.
« Last Edit: February 02, 2015, 12:01:41 pm by TempAcc »
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Kolnukbyne

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #9 on: February 03, 2015, 06:19:33 am »

Smite is one I've been looking at, since I have a friend bugging me to play it with him. Other than changing up the method of control though it really doesn't look like it strays much from the norm. DotA2 I still haven't tried because I still bare a bitter grudge against the DotA name for swamping Warcraft III's online community.

I only did a few games but I mostly agree with the too simplified bit. It seems to me than compared to the other games in the genre you simply don't die. It's nearly impossible to kill someone 1 on 1 baring a few gimmick like the thing on pudge.

Totally agree. Unless you're against an especially powerful or well-tooled hero (Thrall) there's really not much chance you'll end up dying in a 1v1 unless you over-commit. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing though, the alternative tends to be situations where whether you like it or not you're completely screwed no matter what you do.

My favourite strategy is pretty simple. It's called playing Thrall. Guy's hilarious. If you build primarily Feral Spirit talents and Windfury at all other times nobody can escape from you (long as your wolves are on point) and you deal pretty big damage, not to mention that every few spells you heal yourself for a pretty big chunk of health.

Reyn

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #10 on: February 16, 2015, 10:05:17 am »

If anyone's curious about this title, mmorpg are doing a 3000 keys sweepstake. For this you need an account on their site, and to log on daily(in case you want to raise your chances of success)
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dennislp3

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #11 on: February 16, 2015, 12:24:53 pm »

I like SMITE personally.

I don't find the RTS controls to be the most intuitive when handing one individual...I have died SOOOO many times in LoL and other MOBAs because of fighting with moving my character how I want.

SMITE turns it into an FPS format which feels so much better...I prefer being in control of my character
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Frumple

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #12 on: May 19, 2015, 04:24:47 pm »

... so hey, necro. Game has gone into open beta... today? I think? If anyone's interested that wasn't in on the closed. I haven't downloaded yet, myself, but probably will sooner or later -- I've been watching a fair amount of HotS videos and it looks like a faintly interesting variation on the AoS formula, for once. Slimmed down more than I'd really prefer, but maybe in a good way.

Anyway, heads up for folks that didn't know about it, et al.
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Shadowlord

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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #13 on: May 19, 2015, 05:55:44 pm »

(It turned out that my initial pessimism was too... pessimistic :P. I gave it a chance anyway and it turned out to be pretty good. Better than any other MOBA I've played.)

That omission of genre-standard features improved the gameplay by their absence, IMHO. For instance, the lack of items and the item shop, and the shared xp pool, meaning there's no last-hitting, no item micromanagement, etc.

It also helps that it has a bunch of heroes or heroes based on units that I'm familiar with. :V

That said I haven't played it in a couple months because I was playing it with other people, and they stopped playing.
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Re: Heroes of the Storm - Surprisingly not League of Warcraft!
« Reply #14 on: May 19, 2015, 06:08:55 pm »

It is certainly streamlined. In a good way, not the dumbing down way these things tend to end. However it may not be to everyone's liking, since sometime complexity makes a game desirable. I like HotS, but I miss items.
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