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Heroes of the Storm: We Lich Kings of Frozen Throne
Sterica
YesRegistered User, Moderator mod
YesRegistered User, Moderator mod
Heroes of the Storm is a...moba? Dota-like? TEAM BRAWLER? The genre name is still a matter of contention, so we'll go with "similar play style as Dota 2 and League of Legends." You take a team of five chums and fight against five other not-so-chums in a battle to lead AI-controlled minions to your opponents' base and destroy it. Instead of its own universe, Heroes is kinda like the Smash Bros. of Blizzard properties, so you have have Jim Raynor ganking Thrall or Hemet Nesingwary hunting the most dangerous game of all: Diablo. It's very much got a tongue-in-cheek tone and flippant attitude about itself, so don't take it too seriously.
Blizzard has also put a number of twists in Heroes, which includes removing old standbys like an item shop and shared team experience. This makes the game significantly easier for new players to jump into, and it also is designed in a way where games are significantly shorter than similar games of its ilk (15-30 minutes compared with Dota's 30-75). The game will be FREE TO PLAY, and uses the a very standard funny money (gold) to buy heroes and you can also use real cash dollars to buy heroes and overpriced skins. It is currently in an invite-only, technical alpha. Keep checking those mailboxes!
You too can remove his helmet for the low, low price of $7.49!
Heroes of the Storm has a lot of changes from other types of games like this. It can be a bit weird at first, but the goal is to make things simpler so it doesn't take long to get in the swing of things.
Each team has a base, and each base has a core. The core is the Important Thingie and the team that loses their first is the one that loses the game. Protect your core! Now, instead of each lane having X towers along the way to your core, each side has two towns for each lane. A town has the following:
1. Towers: There are two towers on the outer perimeter and one inside the town. They deal decent damage, but have the lowest ammo. An okay deterrence early on, but the low ammo pool means you can only have them bail you out but so many times. Oh, did I mention that towers have ammo? Yeah, after X shots a tower will shut down. Ammo does slowly regenerate.
2. Walls and Gates: Walls basically keep shit out of your towns, and alongside two towers and a gate make up the perimeter of your base. They do provide some vision for the enemy, so they should be destroyed if you have the time. They don't attack or anything so don't worry about it. A gate is just a wall that only allows a friendly team to pass through it. You will become very familiar with these, as these will likely save your ass more than towers ever would. Like walls they can eventually be destroyed. Unlike walls, lane minions waddle into these, so their destruction tends to be inevitable. Your respawn has an indestructible gate that prevents the team from spawn camping too hard.
3. Wells: They kinda look like moonwells from Warcraft 3. These provide about 33-50% of your HP and 20-33% of your mana back over time. Over time. OVER TIME. I cannot tell you how many people have died because they think the well heal is instant. It's not, so don't start getting reckless right after you use it. Once used, a well gives you a longish (about 100 seconds) debuff that prevents you from using ANY well on the map. Wells are nice because they allow for healing without having to hearth back to your base. They die pretty fast, so I tend to target them first as it inconveniences the enemy and minions tend to target them over more important crap.
4. Fort: Each town has a fort. These are basically big fucking towers with a lot more HP and way more ammo. You gain a significant chunk of experience for taking these down and, more importantly, your lane will spawn beefy catapults when you take down the last one in a lane, so it's in your best interest to attack the enemy's while defending yours. Do not overestimate their power: specialists in particular love to slowly whittle these down.
Then there's your respawn and core. The core is basically a mega-tower: it deals good damage and has infinite ammo, but it can be out-ranged by many heroes. It has a shield that regenerates over time before it gets down to actual HP (which will display on your UI once any core has taken a hit). Core HP also regenerates but not as quickly as shields.
Minions spawn down the lane like merry lemmings just waiting to die to a tower or hero. They are...
1. Soldiers: Dudes with swords, they lead the minion waves. Tend to have higher-than-average HP and a weak melee attack.
2. Archers: Dudes with, get this, bows. They're in the back of the wave, boasting lower HP but a decent ranged attack.
3. Mages: Wizards that coast in the middle of the pack. They deal ranged damage, but the more important thing is that they drop a green orb on death that will give you and nearby teammates a little bit of HP and mana back. There's only one per minion wave, so try to get that orb!
4. Catapults: Beefy siege units that assault bases with a long-range attack. They only spawn when the enemy's final fort in that lane has fallen, giving you incentive to fort that damn fort alive. They can easily outrange towers/forts/cores, meaning they will slowly whittle down a base unless stopped.
Mercs camps are between the lanes in what mobaologists call "the jungle." If you beat them up and sit a circle for a short period afterwards, they will regain all their health and switch over to your side, automatically helping push a nearby lane. Take care: as killing mercs is not enough to win their services: if you get ganked and the enemy steps on the circle, they can easily steal them if they're quick enough. Mercs include:
1. Siege Giants: Also known as "Easy Camps" or "siege mercs", these guys have a large amount of HP and outrange towers. They will push very hard if not dealt with, but they are fairly easy for one hero to handle.
2. Knights: The "Hard Camps", they consist of three knights and a priest. The knights are HP sponges with decent melee attacks, and the priest can heal minions while tossing out mild ranged attacks. Because they have more attacks, these guys will push towns pretty damn hard. Don't let the enemy get these.
3. Grave Golem: The "Boss Camp", this dude is tough and will likely take 3+ heroes to kill in a reasonable amount of time. It has shitloads of HP and a powerful melee attack. Golems also periodically stun in a small radius around them, and also try to root people in a smaller, targeted circle. Avoid that shit. You basically cannot ignore a Grave Golem, they ignore lane minions and it can take down a town all by itself if not dealt with, especially if the outer towers are already gone.
4. Map-Specific Creeps: From pirates on Blackheart Bay to the plant monsters in the Garden of Terror, these mercs will NOT join your side, but instead drop objective-relevant items that help you win the game like skulls, coins, and so on. Difficulty and rewards vary by map.
It's not like they have anything better to do.
So what else? There is no item shop. No in-game gold. No items to be bought. No shoes or rods of whatever. "Blasphemy!" you might say, but Heroes is feeling pretty heretical. Instead of items, you get talents roughly every 3-4 levels. These are anywhere from 2-5 choices that change how your character functions. It might be "killing minions gives you more damage" or "your auto-attacks now slow enemies." At level 10 you unlock your Heroic Ability (aka your ult), and even that has choices! Every character has two heroic abilities, so pick the one most suited for the current game.
Talents make your hero more powerful. Unless you're Illidan.
Oh, and instead of buying boots, you can mount up and go a bit faster. Attacking or taking damage dismounts you, and it does have a brief cooldown. Not all characters can mount up, but instead have mobility skills that in most cases let them get to an area REALLY FAST but has a much longer cooldown.
Heroes come in four delicious flavors.
Warriors are the big fat tanks of Heroes. They can take a lot damage, help initiate team fights, and they try their best to control enemy players during a fight. They don't always have the best damage for lane clearing or taking merc camps, but they can put up a surprisingly good fight against enemy heroes if they have the talents for it.
Examples: Muradin, Tyrael, Anub'arak
Assassins are your squishy damage dealers. Their burst damage tends to be high, and they usually have ways to stick to their targets should they flee. They are incredibly squishy though, which makes it harder for them to initiate fights or do other things like clear minion waves or solo merc camps in the early game.
Examples: Kerrigan, Tychus, Jaina
Supports like to help the team. This is normally done through heals and shields, and Supports also have buffs or debuffs to further help the team. Supports are also somewhat slippery, as most of them have teleports or others to get out of a hot spot. They aren't invulnerable, however, and Supports will quickly fall to the enemy team if they are targeted for too long. Can opt to spec for good sustained damage at the cost of their support capabilities, so don't go into a 1v1 expecting to have a cakewalk.
Examples: Rehgar, Li Li, Brightwing
Specialists are a bunch of weirdos. Their role varies, but they tend to be good at clearing minions, demolishing towns, and quickly taking merc camps. Some Specialists also are made to contribute to winning team fights. However, they have a lot of non-traditional character design, which can make them very challenging kind of hero for new players. Also, a Specialist with a lot of talents for beating up a bunch of NPCs or buildings won't have as much team fight potential.
Examples: Murky, Zagara, Azmodan
Unlike similar games, Heroes has a variety of maps with different layouts and objectives. Certain things remain the same (each lane has two towns then your core), but don't get complacent.
Two Lanes
Haunted Mines features two layers: the top layer is your typically lanes and bases, and the bottom layer contains the mines. Every so often the mines populate with a boss golem and lesser minions. Killing these award skulls, and once they're all dead both teams summon a golem. The more skulls you get, the bigger your golem will be. The general strategy here puts less emphasis on the golem in the early game, as you instead grab merc camps. Because the golems spawn where they last died, getting skulls becomes more and more of a priority as the game drags on.
Three Lanes
Blackheart Bay is a map that features pirates because it's 2014 and pirates are still a thing. The important thing is the pirate in the center of the map: killing mercs or randomly spawning chests will net you coins that you can pay Mr. Pirate to fire off cannons at the enemy town. The cost rises with each firing, making it a bit easier for the losing team to make a comeback. Carrying coins is risky because a player drops all of their coins when dead, so turn that shit in. Also, the pirates will start firing on your core if there are no other buildings left, so don't ignore the coins. This map is a bit weird since the objective is basically "on", so you have to constantly be watching the enemy. You can keep tabs on how many coins the enemy is carrying by hitting tab. You are typically safe if they need like 5+ coins for a turn-in and there aren't a lot of mercs/chests for them to bum off of.
Three Lanes
Dragonshire has two shrines: a northern and southern one. The game will eventually yell at you to go grab them, at which point they will become active. By standing on one, a bar will fill to your team until you control it. Unsurprisingly, enemy players would rather you not do this, and can cancel you out by standing on the shrine alongside you. The bar, however, will keep filling so long as one side has more team members present, so the best option is to typically bringing two players to each shrine. Once you take over each shrine, a player clicks the dragon statue in the center, and so long as they aren't interrupted they will transform into a Ren-Faire Godzilla that can put the hurt on towns. The dragon has two skills: breath fire that does AoE damage on the ground for a duration, and boot an enemy far away. Use the former to wreck minions and burn down buildings while the latter will get players off your back. Attack towns. Attacks towns. ATTACK TOWNS. Only go for players if your intervention WILL save or kill someone. The dragon dies fairly quickly and at best will automatically die after a minute, so you need to get that damage in.
You also don't have to kill yourself to get the dragon. If your push is strong and you can hold at least one shrine, then let the enemy keep throwing themselves against you. At some point enough enemy heroes will be dead and you can grab Mr. Dragon unopposed. I've seen too many games where people feel like they have to get the dragon RIGHT FUCKING NOW and their impulsiveness puts us in really bad teamfights.
Three Lanes
Cursed Hollow features perhaps one of the most important objectives on the map. The upside is that it's one of the most lenient objectives in terms of not condemning your team for one botched teamfight. Basically you have a little bird skull placed in a random spot in the jungle. If you channel without being hit for a few seconds, then you get the skull. Get three and the enemy team will be cursed: their lane minions are reduced to 1 HP and their towers will not fire. As you can see, this is really devastating because even lanes without heroes will naturally push and chip away at your towns. It's very important that your team shows up to contest these skulls, and you should basically be frantically pinging the spot where the skull is incoming. HOWEVER, if you have a really strong push going and the enemy team has 0-1 skulls (and you also have 0-1), then don't be afraid to commit to the push. If they send away someone to grab the skull, then they're going to be outnumbered when defending your push which can allow you to wipe them and win off that.
Three Lanes
Garden of Terror is kinda like Haunted Mines and Dragonshire had a baby. Every so often, night will fall on the garden, reducing everyone's vision radius and spawning a bunch of plant monsters. Damaging (not just killing) these will cause seeds to drop, and once your team has 100 seeds a player can go to base and transform into a giant plant monster. Besides being really good at trashing buildings, they can shut down towers by spawning a destructible flower pot next to them and turn unwitting enemy players into weaker plant zombies.
As you play games in Heroes, you will level up two different things: your Player Level and a Hero Level. Experience you earn from playing game is applied to both accounts. There are two is an experiences bonuses a player can get, and they're each it's about a 50% increase in experience by playing with friends. The other is the Weekend bonus which you get from playing on Saturday and Sunday. The weekend bonus was removed because Blizzard loves a good grind. Also, there's a cap on experience gained from bot matches: roughly 2.25 Million experience a day.
Player Level is just an account rank. You get various features and goodies unlocked as you play. These are as follows:
- Levels 2 and 4: 1,000 Gold each
- Level 6: Daily Quests
- Levels 8: 2,000 Gold
- Level 10: 2,000 Gold
- Level 12 and 15: Each unlocks an additional slot in the free hero rotation
- Levels 16-40: Go Fuck Youself
God Damn It
Hero Level is a series of unlocks for specific heroes. Each hero has their own level, and playing games with them will increase their level (alongside your player level). Here are hero unlocks:
- Level 2: Unlocks your second Heroic Ability
- Level 3: Unlocks Advanced Talents
- Level 4: Unlocks Expert Talents
- Level 5: 500 Gold
- Level 6: Hero Portrait; Mount Tint #1
- Level 7: Hero Tint #1
- Level 8: Hero Tint #2
- Level 9: Hero Master Portrait; Mount Tint #2
- Level 10: Allows purchase of Master Skin (10,000 gold)
Artifacts were a system similar to League of Legend's runes, but more streamlined and simple. It was basically a terrible gold grind that threw game balance out of whack. They were, to put it mildly, unpopular with players. How much? Blizzard removed the whole system after just a week of its release. Nobody liked artifacts, and thus they are gone.
Burn in Hell
If you want a question answered, just mention me (@ "Bobkins Flymo" without the space) and I'll add it to the list.
HOW DO I GET IN ALPHA!?
Patience, mostly. I don't think they're even doing giveaways or anything of the sort. There was a rumored bundle that let you basically buy into alpha, but that seems to have been untrue.
What are some good newbie heroes?
Raynor, Uther, ETC, and Nazeebo are cool dudes. Don't pick Abathur; you will most likely not know what the fuck is going on. In fact, Specialist is a role you probably want to steer clear off for the first few games (except aforementioned Nazeebo). The game also has its own difficulty ratings assigned to each hero (easy, hard, etc) and while I can't say for sure it's probably a decent way to tell which heroes are friendlier to new players than others.
What is the fastest way to get gold?
There is none. However, the least slow way is to do your daily quest (the game saves up to three quests so you can miss a day or two) and then play with friends on heroes you have not gotten to level five with yet. Start with heroes you don't own yet, and then switch to owned heroes if you manage to get all seven free rotation heroes to level 5 within a week. That right there is about 4300 gold a week for the next month or so, not counting gold from account levels and games played. Once you hit 40 and have all heroes to level five you are basically shit outta luck and have to rely on about 250 gold a day. HAVE FUN!
Why I am not getting the friend experience bonus?
Make sure you are on each other friend's list (note that Hots is not hooked up to Battle.net so you will have to repopulate your friends list). You don't even have to be in a party, or on the same team! Just friend each other.
When is the next patch?
Patches, according to Blizzard, are VERY VERY roughly on a four-week cycle. Sometimes small patches drop on maintenance day (usually Tuesday or Wednesday) to fix things or change stuff that has proven to be...disliked (artifacts).
Cinematic Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ecv0bT9DEoNewest Hero: Jaina Proudmoore, Archmage
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehImE3FpDb8Technical Alpha Walkthrough (outdated, but might still be a decent primer for new players)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vB_6GRNS7dg 
Sterica on
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Nerf his sex appeal, you mean.
XBL: InvaderJims
Bnet: Pudgestomp#11153
I read that in the turtle kid's voice:
XBL: InvaderJims
Bnet: Pudgestomp#11153
That kid is like sixteen now.
no i mean he literally outclasses most other characters in his role and contributes too much damage for how durable he is
Hmm. Maybe I haven't squared off against too many "good" Stitches players, because he's one hero that never scares me to engage.
XBL: InvaderJims
Bnet: Pudgestomp#11153
Stitches is the only character in Heroes of the Storm with Real Butt Physics™
You could bounce a quarter off that thing.
Battle.net Tag: Dibby#1582
http://www.teamcurse.net/news/29196-team-curse-welcomes-heroes-of-the-storm-team
http://myinsanity.eu/myinsanity-welcomes-heroes-storm/
The strange thing about the Team Curse lineup is their position listings:
Support- Captain Thomas “Sneaky” Boccinfuso
Carry- Martin “Sev” Vu
Mage, Support- Andrew “Grim” Nan
Tank- Manny “Fury” Medina
Utility- Austin “Gazwaz” Williams
I'm guessing utility means Specialist and tank means Warrior, but which one is supposed to be the Assassin - carry or mage? At least the myInsanity team doesn't have positions slotted.
XBL: InvaderJims
Bnet: Pudgestomp#11153
I'm totally not bitter
Currently DMing: None
Characters
[5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
Well, what we didn't win in map objectives we apparently instead won on flat-out brutalizing them.
Especially since Tassadar is the closest thing we have to a mage, and that is only one hero. Warriors are not all tanks (i.e. Sonya), a "carry" is literally any person who can carry the team, and that can be any role, any character, if the person is good enough. A carry is your clutch player who makes big plays and carries the team. Christiano Ronaldo was the carry of the Portugal World Cup team. And specialist certainly doesn't mean utility. Many characters who aren't specialists have utility. Such as Tassadar with his Oracle ability, Malfurion with his Innervate, and ETC with Guitar Solo, and Raynor with his W. No idea what it's called.
FFXIV - Milliardo Beoulve/Sargatanas
Stitches one on one isn't so bad. His autoattack damage is the lowest amongst warriors, his E ability doesn't do much damage to heroes and has a really long recharge time, and Slam can be pretty anemic damage wise compared to other warriors. Gorge does a good amount of damage in addition to being good CC but it's a single target, melee ultimate so it's not something that can be relied on.
Stitches with a teammate is another matter entirely. He can pull you out of position so his buddy can deal damage, he may well have a talent that makes his weak autoattack apply a slow to make it harder to get away and trigger Executioner, and if you do get away but are low on health, the DoT effect he has can finish you off.
That DoT has probably won me more duels as Stitches than any of his other non-ultimate traits. It does a lot to make up for his low autoattack damage and adds up over time but tends to be ignored by the victim. But it's really rare for a one on one to end that way since it's not a fast fight when you're Stitches.
Among the warriors, Stitches and ETC are the best at helping their teammates kill stuff and Stitches is the king of manipulating positioning. That's a powerful combo even if he's not super great at killing anything that's not AI controlled.
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Still not completely sold. My opponents didn't melt. Whereas with giant killer, I feel I get a lot more dps overall out of it because we're constantly dancing and I'm the one with range. I also already take the 2nd level upgrade, envenomed spines: Basic Attacks have their range increased by 20% and deal an additional 15 damage over 3 seconds.
So it just seems to work better with Giant Killer: Basic Attacks against enemy Heroes deal bonus damage equal to 1.5% of the Hero's max Health.
Also, this wiki seems to actually have real STATS (actual dps numbers, cool downs, etc.), so sweet!
http://heroesofthestorm.gamepedia.com/Zagara
Witty signature comment goes here...
wra
maybe bank a ton of seeds and use team resurgence to push, and then whoever dies respawns and pops another terror? Seems like it would take a lot of luck to make that happen
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But that's not a strategy that will work if you're solo queuing though.
If we wipe the enemy team for 50 seconds, then you're going to wreck their structures horror or no horror.
Has anyone tested Sitches' other ult? The slime one? I'm wondering if it's just psychological that gorge seems ten times more effective. Maybe it's deceptively strong like his passive?
for the ignoring part I was thinking more for organized teams since in solo it is clearly a crapshoot
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Noooooooooooooooo........
I feel it's the inevitable downfall of these games when this starts happening. Everyone watches the pro streams and starts going on about THE META and soon all teams are locked into the exact same composition every game. Remember the first year of LoL where you could be any hero you wanted and go to any lane you wanted? Dual top? Triple mid? Sure! Knock yourself out and have fun!
But soon after the ranked seasons and Twitch happened, every single game was locked into carry/support bot, tanky sustain top, mage mid, and jungle. Deviating from it in the slightest drew curses and quitting before the match even started. I can understand going with the optimal META in serious games, but it was happening every single public unranked match. People who didn't even ward the river after being ganked 5 times would act like not following the META was an instant game over, instead of the very slight edge it gives pro teams who have otherwise perfected every other aspect of play.
My favorite time in new MOBAs is the early period before this sets in. Everyone just pick and play with who you want how you want. What I'm loving about HotS that I hope they don't change is picking your hero before a match is found. Everyone is guaranteed to get who they want and no Mountain Dew chugging wannabe pro can scream at you for it (at least not until the match starts)/
It doesn't do a lot of damage. It's mainly to either cover escapes or as a group slow for teamfights.
Never noticed slime do much, really.
But yeah, sprinting a foo' back behind a gate is glorious.
Witty signature comment goes here...
wra
Especially when you do it to Rehgar. Little asshole is way too durable right now for all of the damage, healing and mobility he can put out, and cornering him behind our second gates(which are all up) is incredibly cathartic.
It must've happened 4 times in one game where I slam someone behind me against a wall and either another hero is next to me or the terrain is just right (or both) and they just can't escape.
That's something I don't see often enough yet when focusing an enemy, team members positioning themselves well enough before attacking someone.
i.e. When I see my team attacking someone, it's great when someone sprints out front to catch or slow them down rather than just start attacking / chasing like the rest of us.
Witty signature comment goes here...
wra
Eh, only a single playstyle being viable is a problem with the game, not with the playerbase. Dota has several different setups possible, depending on your picks and how you play it out. Not nearly as rigid as the league 1-1-2+jungle.
It's part of the reason I try to join a team fight from a flank when possible. Body blocking a retreat is easier that way if you can avoid being focused down yourself.
Anything besides a dragon knight, Odin, or garden terror. Any non-transformed hero is fair game.
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Lord of Terror? Pfft. More like Lord of Hamburger Helper.
XBL: InvaderJims
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Enemy Stitches eats my team's Valla. Then, my team's Stitches eats their Stitches. It caused our Valla to pop out and she was able to safely vault away. Their Stitches didn't fare so well.
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Hearthstone barkeeper, Wirt's Leg, SCV.
But if *I* got to choose the next few heroes to be announced and released, none of them would be Warcraft. I would concentrate on getting the Diablo and Starcraft hero selections up to approximate numbers with Warcraft.
There are only 5 Diablo characters total, which is really sad.
Of course, there's always the possibility that Blizzard is sitting on like 20 completed heroes and once they get into beta they'll start pushing them out with a lot more regularity. I get the feeling that right now the slow trickle of heroes is just a tactic to keep the alpha players interested while they work on their core game design. Once we get to beta, we should hopefully see the roster expand much faster.