Frenetic Pony

HOTS... no the other HOTS. The Lords Management one damn it!

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I am down for some games, i think i am also level 28 -- Twyst#1619

 

I have also really been liking the TenTonHammer builds.

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This game is such a weird experience to me.

 

Let me get the positive notes out there first. I do like that they wanted to shake up the genre as it has stood 'til now. The goal of shortening round duration is a success. And having different maps with mostly unique functions / goals certainly helps things stay fresh.

 

Sadly that's all I have to say in favor of this game right now. I have no idea what they intend to change or add to, nor the extent, but I feel like the game is very much in a beta phase of balance. Some of the characters are built well for what DotA 2 is right now, but then others are built to just instant-nuke in combat. Healing is kind of the same way. Lili, the panda girl, has a very weak healing ability, and even augmenting it or her other abilities to heal don't really make her compare to other healers. More importantly though, in a battle with the enemy team her healing doesn't amount to shit. The scale of damage coming down in a fight doesn't allow for her healing to make an impact to save the day or turn things around. At best, I've found that Lili's strength is that she can sort of solo the map-specific goals or mercenary camps, leaving more of her team free to fight normally. Which is a bad way to have someone help their team - by not being a part of the team. I guess if I had to tl;dr this whole thing, it'd be that some characters are built to play the game PvE while others are built to play it PvP. But they're playing the same game at the same time, and the PvP side will always trump the PvE side. Because PvP strength counters the benefits of PvE style characters.

 

There isn't much in the way of unique abilities either. For the most part abilities are as follows:

- missile

- aoe

- blink (teleport)

- heal

- shield (the worst kind; shields hardly add any survivability)

 

There aren't any unique things happening for the characters beyond their trait and ultimate abilities, which sure they exist, but it's a very narrow gap.

 

Another weird thing is that there is like zero synergy between characters from what I can identify. The only identifiable synergy in team choice that I can see is picking a team full of intense damage dealers.

 

And while not having an item / shop system certainly helps simplify the game, you have to wonder at what cost it came at. Again, there isn't much in the way of customizing your character from the angle of surprising the enemy. Items in DotA 2 provided many means of surprises, from consumables that made you last longer per trip away from base, or defensive items, or offensive items, or even items that granted outright new abilities. That lacking element of "surprise, you thought I was squishy" or whatever is just disappointing.

 

So I mean... I dunno. Obviously the game isn't for me (and I have played the shit out of it btw, many hours, probably the biggest handshake i've given to a game to determine if I'll like it or not). But it's not for me because I'm seeing what it's declaring to be but it does a terrible job at being that thing. It wants to be faster paced, but some of the characters are built to take it slow - to the point that they don't compete. And the unification of your team leveling up together removes the element of individual performance mattering. "Hey don't let Tychus get out of hand leveling because he will wreck our base single-handedly" doesn't exist. If one team runs away with more than two levels in difference, it becomes almost impossible for the other to mount a comeback. Sure, that serves the purpose of a faster match, but it retains the feeling of having to sit and wait for something to be over with no hope.

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This is the first Lords Management games I've put any time in to - nearly 300 games now, which is vastly more than the 2 games I've had in DOTA 2. I think I am now reaching the stage where the things that first attracted me to this game are now putting me off. I really liked it's simplicity but that is now reaching the point where heroes have very predictable roles. The way the game is played means that certain builds and team compositions will pretty much always win out unless there is a huge mismatch in skill level. This leads to much more predictable games, at least in quick match which I have predominantly been playing. There are occasions where seeing the hero compositions of each side you can already see that the odds are heavily stacked against you, and with most heroes there is little scope to change that.

 

I do really enjoy playing HOTS though! I've been playing predominantly with friends and we've had such a blast. I just don't think that the way the heroes are balanced at the moment it will have the staying power for years to come. As Blizzard fine-tunes the balance this may change but I also think there aren't enough ways to play that Blizzard haven't planned, which is probably a consequence of a lack of an item shop to let certain unforeseen combinations to come up.

 

Playing this has started to lay the groundwork for me getting into another Lords Management game though, and I'd be interested to see whether there is much crossover between this game and League of Legends or DOTA 2 as players get comfortable with the mechanics.

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I have been playing HoTS the last couple of weeks and really enjoying it. Last year I played a bit of DOTA 2 and liked it but it was just so time consuming. I don't have the gaming habits I used to; I'm a dad and I just don't have all that much time to play unfortunately. I did boot up DOTA 2 the other night and man, I had forgotten how many dickheads play that game and hang out in the limited player pool giving new people shit. I still had fun, though after HoTS the laning just seemed so superfluous!

 

Completely different games of course. For me, knowing a game will almost certainly wrap up in 25 minutes and often less is huge. Real life affecting my gaming habits. The DOTA 2 itch won't die either... who knows. Maybe I'll end up getting to the same point in terms of finding it limiting and I'll become the 3 match/week DOTA 2 player I was always meant to be.

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I played some HotS against real people for the first time tonight. It was pretty great! My first game was a little messy, but my Kills/Deaths was about even, and my team came out on top after being down for the first 15 minutes or so. The second game was even better. I only died once, and I got a whole bunch of kills. I was credit to team  :tup:

 

I was surprised how nobody was saying awful things, or really much of anything. Team chat was mostly used to say, "I need help at mid" or whatever. 

 

So far, I've been playing E.T.C. a bit as he's a clone of the one hero I know how to play in League. Any other suggestions of fun but not too tricky to figure out heroes to mess with?

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I kept thinking that HOTS had a better community than other lomas, but apparently part of it is that there's no all-talk, and at the end of the game the only text that will show up in chat is 'gg.' Teammates do seem generally helpful, so maybe there's more to it, but I thought that was an interesting approach. It seems a little heavy handed, but it definitely resulted in me having a better experience with the game than dota, where in my first game after not playing for about a year, I was told to kill myself and never play dota again.

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I find that in HotS, people are hesitant to start talking, until someone breaks the silence. Then it's a pretty constant stream of (mostly friendly) banter between team-mates. The pings in this game are pretty useful and more user-friendly than Dota 2 pings, imo, so often I'll not say anything and rely on those. Stuff like "stick together" is usually the most seen chat message for me, and occasionally there will be some commentary about who to watch out for on the enemy team. Of course I've had the occasional person yelling at everyone else, but because they are such a small minority, it usually ends up being one person yelling, and four other people just laughing about how they shouldn't take the game so seriously. So that's pretty all right imo.

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So far, I've been playing E.T.C. a bit as he's a clone of the one hero I know how to play in League. Any other suggestions of fun but not too tricky to figure out heroes to mess with?

On the character selection screen if you mouse over a hero it'll give an estimated difficulty. As for actual suggestions, Raynor's a pretty straightforward assassin, while for support... Li Li perhaps?

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I find that in HotS, people are hesitant to start talking, until someone breaks the silence. Then it's a pretty constant stream of (mostly friendly) banter between team-mates. The pings in this game are pretty useful and more user-friendly than Dota 2 pings, imo, so often I'll not say anything and rely on those. Stuff like "stick together" is usually the most seen chat message for me, and occasionally there will be some commentary about who to watch out for on the enemy team. Of course I've had the occasional person yelling at everyone else, but because they are such a small minority, it usually ends up being one person yelling, and four other people just laughing about how they shouldn't take the game so seriously. So that's pretty all right imo.

 

Yeah, I have a lot of fun with HoTS that way too. I don't really like being told I'm an idiot and that I'm ruining the game for everyone. Having said that, my limited DOTA experience was helpful with the one regular idiot HoTS player, that staple of the genre: the guy who keeps dying and then complains nobody is helping him.

 

 

On the character selection screen if you mouse over a hero it'll give an estimated difficulty. As for actual suggestions, Raynor's a pretty straightforward assassin, while for support... Li Li perhaps?

 

I love Li Li, she's great. She's very simple (only one basic attack even needs a target) but she can be very useful and you can get your licks in. Also, Shrink Ray is awesome. I was playing some Kerrigan the other day for a daily and after having some trouble with her I found her to be lots of fun. I've only ever played support in these types of games, but she seemed a bit "carry-ish" from how I understand that role... she dies very easily early on but once you're past level 10 and she has an ultimate she can tear things up.

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Yeah, I have a lot of fun with HoTS that way too. I don't really like being told I'm an idiot and that I'm ruining the game for everyone. Having said that, my limited DOTA experience was helpful with the one regular idiot HoTS player, that staple of the genre: the guy who keeps dying and then complains nobody is helping him.

 

I had "that guy" in my team yesterday hahaha. He took too long to draft in Hero League and ended up picking Diablo when we already had a tank, then non-stop complained that we just "ran away" (re-positioning) from him when he was "tanking" (being out of position). Good times had by all.

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I had "that guy" in my team yesterday hahaha. He took too long to draft in Hero League and ended up picking Diablo when we already had a tank, then non-stop complained that we just "ran away" (re-positioning) from him when he was "tanking" (being out of position). Good times had by all.

 

:tup:  :tup:  :tup:  B)

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Hey all, figured I'd poke my head in here, I played a lot of HoTS over the past year, probably close to a few hundred hours, and really like it. I started out in the lords management games with Dota 2, but had to take a break just for my own mental health haha. After watching the international I was drawn back into Dota. After a few weeks of really being the best damn support I could be, I'm back to HoTS. I kept getting into games with "those guys" discussed above, feed 10 kills, and the game is basically over after minute 15. I find HoTS is a lot more forgiving with these kind of players. They can still tank a team, but it never feels as completely over as Dota does, one good team fight and your back in it. And man all these new heroes and maps are great, even minor tweaks to heros abilities is pretty cool to see.

Anyway, if you wanna add me I'm SnakeOiler #1940.

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I'm LawSheng #1739. Just added a couple of you. I muck around with dailies and I like playing support.

 

Just had a close game a little while ago actually. Seems like I'm usually on a team stomping or a team being stomped but this went back and forth, swung from two levels behind to one level up, and both teams were in the 20+ range with some really fun teamfights. We lost in the end, but it was pretty great.

 

One tiny thing that might have been mentioned before: HoTS is usually unobjectionable but now and again I play with nice people, and it's a bummer there's no little mini-lobby after you win or lose just to write "that was close!" or "to be fair, I have no fucking idea what we were doing and I say that as someone that was clearly part of the problem" or things like that.

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Yeah I'm surprised there is no post-game lobby while people are on the results screen. I guess you can individually message people or add them to party from the buttons next to their names on the scoreboard. Also looks like I added you a while ago, Irishjohn. I live in Australia so our play times might not line up very well, haha.

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Yeah I'm surprised there is no post-game lobby while people are on the results screen. I guess you can individually message people or add them to party from the buttons next to their names on the scoreboard. Also looks like I added you a while ago, Irishjohn. I live in Australia so our play times might not line up very well, haha.

 

Hey! Cool. Maybe on a weekend if you're up in the morning. :) I played a quick game with Bagelmage last night, we had fun. Part of the reason I've always been diffident about getting together online is that I tend to play in short bursts. Also why I quite like HoTS.

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I added Bagelmage too, maybe the three of us can play together at some point (and maybe some other thumbs readers too). I played a couple of games with ifthen a while back, though that was several patches ago now, I think.

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So I broke a long run of pleasant or silent teammates last night. We had two guys doing the whole "STICK TOGETHER YOU IDIOTS" while running off on their own. I actually muted them both.

 

Frankly, the team wasn't really coming together in that weird way pub groups sometimes do. Still, though, it doesn't help being chewed out by some dick who doesn't seem to understand that when I'm dead there's not a lot I can do to get to that boss.

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Played my first game in ages last night and had an obnoxious teammate that snuck in a weird insult as we were gging. Thanks, dude!

 

On a related topic, I always appreciate someone taking the reins and giving people advice but I might start immediately muting people who single my character out and tell me to go mid or whatever. Despite all this guy's protestations, we were pretty useless at soaking and two near team wipes cost us the game. 

 

I read about people who love Dota 2 who just don't bother playing it with strangers. I might get to that point eventually with Lords Management.

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Does anyone have the Cho'Gal hero unlocked? i havent play HoTS for any length of time, but this Lord seems super neat...and if someone here had it i would be interested in doing the 2 game req. to unlock and spread the love

 

battlenet - undermind9#1428

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Does anyone have the Cho'Gal hero unlocked? i havent play HoTS for any length of time, but this Lord seems super neat...and if someone here had it i would be interested in doing the 2 game req. to unlock and spread the love

 

battlenet - undermind9#1428

 

I've got Cho'Gall, I'll send you a friend request =)

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I played a couple of games with a friends Cho'Gal the other night and had quite a bit of fun, though we sadly one were victorious once so i don't get my own  to play with yet :P I'm sort of dreading the moment someone first picks that guy in hero league on my team because he has so many hard counters (opposing team picks 2 characters with giant killer /gg), that said im equally looking forward to the moment the opposing team does it.

 

I do really like the little touch they put in of abbreviating the two players names together though.

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