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[Jdaki]

I know there are some LoL and Dota2 players here, I used to play LoL a couple years back but just stopped.
Been playing Hearthstone intermittently and just got into the Heroes of the Storm (HotS?) closed beta and played just AI games, not yet dived in against humans.
Seems like will reward team play over individual skill even more than the other Mobas. I do like that is will probably play quicker, though I've heard that in closer games against humans, the game time will be over half hour, this is still shorter than LoL time (one of the barriers from just loading up for a "quick game" is the time commitment.
The pricing seems far too high for me, the real world prices that is. I would have thought that lowered prices would encourage more sales- there's no way I'm paying £5 for one hero.
Am getting a bit bored playing against the basic AI- it is really stupid and you can't really lose, so will probably dive in against humans soon, but would prefer to play with another (probably wait for my brother to play) the games rewards this with XP boost as well.

So there are a few very brief thoughts. What are other people's thoughts?

Also it is funny to see Raynor on a horse next to Illidan and Diablo.

[Watno]

The prizing is indeed quite ridculous. I see no reason not to stick with Dota.

[Grujah]

I got it, I played it semi-regularly. Its faster paced, more team oriented and more casual than Dota. I like it fine.

Pricing doesn't really bothers me as I do not make any ingame purchases with any game (poor college student etc). Grinding it out isn't that bad.

[Grujah]

I am Grujah #2516 on EU server, if you want a game.

[HiveMindEmulator]

The prizing is indeed quite ridculous. I see no reason not to stick with Dota.

The game is much shorter than dota. Dota is primarily about farming, and HotS is much more objective-based, with different objectives depending on the map. They're not really that similar.

I have played some HotS, and the pricing doesn't bother me at all since I'm not playing competitive and thus don't care what heroes I'm allowed to play. I'm happy to play free rotation.

[Watno]

I got it, I played it semi-regularly. Its faster paced, more team oriented and more casual than Dota. I like it fine.

Pricing doesn't really bothers me as I do not make any ingame purchases with any game (poor college student etc). Grinding it out isn't that bad.

I just did a short check on this and it seems to eb pretty bad bad to me: http://www.reddit.com/r/heroesofthestorm/comments/2wfuh9/buying_all_heroes_in_a_year_simplified_math/

I think I'll stick to the dailies for income and skip the average 6 needed daily extra games. This means that at the end of my first year I'll be owning almost 30 heroes.

I'm not sure wether this guy is joking or not.

[Grujah]

i dont really want all the heroes as i dislike playstile of many atm. i have about 10k gold stashed and focus more on what;  like to play than doing dsilies.

[Drab Emordnilap]

So Heroes of the Storm is going into open beta tomorrow. If you're on the fence, you should definitely try it. It's the first MOBA I've enjoyed; the learning curve is much friendlier than League of Legends or DOTA 2. I'm Drab #1455 if anyone wants to play. I'm no expert but I can walk you through the basics at least.

Murky for life!

[Awaclus]

If you're on the fence, you should definitely try it.

This. I also enjoyed LoL for a few years, but I think this is a lot better.

[Kirian]

Man, it's been like 15 years since I played a MOBA seriously.  I suspect the learning curve will be higher for an old dog with no reflexes left.

[Drab Emordnilap]

Man, it's been like 15 years since I played a MOBA seriously.  I suspect the learning curve will be higher for an old dog with no reflexes left.

Honestly it's much less twitch dependent than I thought it would be. There's no "last hit" mechanic, and therefore no creep denial, which were two of the big hangups for me with other MOBAs.

[Grujah]

Man, it's been like 15 years since I played a MOBA seriously.  I suspect the learning curve will be higher for an old dog with no reflexes left.

I'm not even sure that the genre existed 15 years ago..

[markusin]

I was invited to the closed beta. I didn't play the game much, but it's worth trying out if you're a fan of MOBAs. Champions seemed quite expensive however.

[Awaclus]

I was invited to the closed beta. I didn't play the game much, but it's worth trying out if you're a fan of MOBAs. Champions seemed quite expensive however.

In real money prices, yeah, but I don't think they're too unreasonably priced in gold.

[Kirian]

Man, it's been like 15 years since I played a MOBA seriously.  I suspect the learning curve will be higher for an old dog with no reflexes left.

I'm not even sure that the genre existed 15 years ago..

Netrek was published in 1988.

While I'm sure there are those who would disagree, it's hard to deny that two teams moving around a map, playing units with different strengths and weaknesses, attacking each other, and capturing objectives belonging to another team, is the very definition of a Multiplayer Online Battle Arena.

(I played semi-seriously from about 1995 to 2000)

[Watno]

When people say MOBA they seem to refer to Aeons-of-Strife derivative games , that have armies of computer-controled units on both teams sides, as well as increasing power of the player-controled characters during the course of the game.

BTW: I tried it, didn't really convince me, but i might play again in a party.

It really annoyed me that lots of things weren't explained anywhere though.

[Drab Emordnilap]

When people say MOBA they seem to refer to Aeons-of-Strife derivative games , that have armies of computer-controled units on both teams sides, as well as increasing power of the player-controled characters during the course of the game.

BTW: I tried it, didn't really convince me, but i might play again in a party.

It really annoyed me that lots of things weren't explained anywhere though.

What things aren't explained? I found Heroes of the Storm did a better job for me as a new player than other games I'd tried.

[Watno]

Where Regen Globes come from.
What the other heroes in the game can do.
How many Hit Points towers have.
What the benefit of destroying a Fort is.
What death timers depend on.
Why mercenary camps say "Defeat or bribe".
How experience gain works.
How map objectives work.
...

Also, I don't understand why the tutorial hero isn't free to play for everyone, I would have thought that this would be a huge problem for accessibility, but apparently it isn't.

[Lekkit]

I've played it some. But not that much. I went back to DotA 2 instead. :S

[Grujah]

Where Regen Globes come from. - Creeps.
What the other heroes in the game can do. -Well, how do you suppose they can do this. You can try out any hero in singleplayer mode to see what he/she does.
How many Hit Points towers have. - No idea.
What the benefit of destroying a Fort is. - Not sure.
What death timers depend on. - Pretty sure on levels.
Why mercenary camps say "Defeat or bribe". -Some heroes, like Lily, can bribe mercs.
How experience gain works. - when you stand near dieing creeps. This is explain in tut, I am pretty sure.
How map objectives work. - first time you play a map they are explained.
...

Also, I don't understand why the tutorial hero isn't free to play for everyone, I would have thought that this would be a huge problem for accessibility, but apparently it isn't.

Some of it sure isn't explained, and Blizz does that not (not explain things), but that is true for any MoBA, I am sure. You need to learn and pick up stuff as you advance.

[Watno]

For example in Dota, if you click a hero you can read his abilities (but I guess since DOTA is not a MOBA, this isn't relevant here)

Also, noone claims of these other games that they arevery accessible.

[Ichimaru Gin]

Cool. I got a closed beta key for this game about a month ago but never ended up installing it.

I did today--mostly after viewing this thread. I think Blizzard games tend to be on the grindier side (I've never played WoW or any of the Diablo games but know some about them), but I've had an amazing amount of fun just trying to level one of the weekly heroes (Muradin). I've dabbled in both LoL and Dota and found them personally unappealing for different reasons: mainly the complexity (some of which feels slightly gratuitous), community reputation, and game length.

I have high hopes for this one though. Honestly, I was pretty doubtful before I actually started playing it, but now I feel like a new convert! I'd be happy to play with any of you guys. My Battletag is SilentStrike#1453 and I'm on US.

[HiveMindEmulator]

Where Regen Globes come from.
What the other heroes in the game can do.
How many Hit Points towers have.
What the benefit of destroying a Fort is.
What death timers depend on.
Why mercenary camps say "Defeat or bribe".
How experience gain works.
How map objectives work.
...

Also, I don't understand why the tutorial hero isn't free to play for everyone, I would have thought that this would be a huge problem for accessibility, but apparently it isn't.

Yeah I agree this information should be available somewhere obvious. Hopefully they're working on it for release. Most of it is out there on the internet, but you have to work a little to get it. The biggest thing that bugs me is the cast ranges on abilities are not listed. Like if you have the ability, you can see it visually, but say you're considering picking a castable talent like Blood for Blood. You don't know the cast range until you pick it.

That said, the actual game is great. At first I was skeptical, but I do like it much better than DotA (never played LoL). The big obvious things it's missing from DotA are individual experience and the ability to buy items. Items is actually replaced well enough by the talents. It's not like you *really* had that great of variety in the item builds for heroes anyway. Limiting it to 7 choices over the course of the game is actually just as good. Individual experience has no replacement in terms of strategic value. Most of the strategy in DotA revolves around farm acquisition and distribution. But that comes at a cost in terms of game enjoyment. Making the game about farming requires that the game be long. That's fine for high level games, but for pubs game length is a major issue. In DotA, if you get on a bad team, you may have to suffer through nearly an hour of torture, but in HotS you're done with that game in 15 minutes. So that's a worthwhile sacrifice in my book. Plus the big thing heroes has that DotA doesn't is the maps. The map objectives can replace the strategic value that's missing from the shared experience.

[Awaclus]

I think the biggest advantage of HotS over DotA and LoL is that the effect of snowballing is very minor, and even if your team falls behind, you can make up for it by playing better in the late game.

[Ichimaru Gin]

So, Drab and I queued together for a few games. We won every single one!
Pretty awesome stuff. I'm having a lot of fun playing Li Li, and Drab plays a pretty mean Murky. I honestly don't know how Murky works yet, but I hear he is difficult, and Drab seems to be very effective with him.

I think Blizzard has done an incredibly job of making playing a support in this game rewarding--and just as fun as any other type of hero. I really enjoy the emphasis on teamwork as opposed to a single player being exponentially more powerful than anyone else on their team. It's so much fun to heal my allies and see them go from running away to running back into combat