A Hunter with Starfall, and healing abilities

You could be playing Heroes of the Storm right now, if you’d entered my Heroes of the Storm Beta key giveaway (contest now closed).

When I was first invited to the technical alpha, I installed and played through the tutorial for Heroes of the Storm straightaway.

Here’s the thing…I have never really gotten into the MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) scene before. I tried League of Legends, and although I went as far as installing Dota 2, I never actually played it, although my 10 year old had to be surgically removed from the PC, because he LOVED it.

So HotS was in technical alpha, and I was a hideous newb, and to be very honest, I did not feel captivated by it immediately. I thought the graphics looked amazing, and the loading, and setup screens had me squeeing in my chair as a graphic designer at all the shiny things! But in terms of gameplay, I was a bit lost. It was still Mists of Pandaria back in WoW, and there were too many things occupying my game time for me to give it a fair shot at taking hold.

During the past few weeks, with only mythic raiding and whatnot going on in World of Warcraft for me (and daily garrison mission spam), I decided to give Heroes of the Storm another go.

I picked Tyrande (ranged support Hero). Let’s just say…I fell in love!

She’s basically a hunter, but you guys – she has STARFALL!! She also has healing abilities.

If you’ve spent any time reading my blog, you’ll know that I started out my raiding career as a healer, and now main a hunter. The combination of abilities on this character feels as though they have been tailormade for me!

The intensity of the matches, can be similar to battlegrounds in WoW and sometimes, things work so perfectly, and it’s like you can read each others minds, and of course other times you can feel like nobody has ANY clue what to do, and the other team are so good it’s kind of embarrassing.

You know how sometimes you feel like you’re not sure what to do in WoW, maybe your raid was cancelled or some people are away, and you have some friends on voice comms and you want to do something, but you don’t want to run another dungeon? THESE ARE THE DROIDS YOU ARE LOOKING FOR, COME HERE.

This is that activity, that can fill the gaps – and if you’ve played WoW – you already KNOW the characters.

You already have a vague idea how to play at least a third of the Heroes, since they come from the game you know so well. The learning curve is NOT huge. Sure you might want to spend some time considering the talents you pick based on your group composition, but beyond that, it really isn’t difficult.

There is none of that ‘oh my god what do I buy from the store to maximise my character’ stuff that you have to do in League of Legends. If hunters and healing aren’t your thing, then what about playing Illidan, complete with Warglaives of Azinoth? Or Raynor from Starcraft?

Blizzard have designed maps that are interesting, and aren’t just battlegrounds for mindless zerging. You will either be paying some undead pirate coins to blast your enemies forts from afar, or collecting crystals to employ the help of another boss like NPC, and countless other options. The maps themselves are beautifully designed, the detail is eye-wateringly delicious.

This is one of the mounts…Blizzard, you had me at rainbow unicorn…

This game is not supposed to replace WoW in your life, unless you choose it to. For me, it is incredible fun, easy to step in, and easy to step out when you’re done. There is a sense of accomplishment at the end of a game, that we don’t see in WoW, because WoW is not designed to give us that. These games are like siblings in a family, easily loved, but very very different.

I guarantee you, that when you experience that flawless cooperation, from a team who are listening to each other, supporting each other, and clearly going to win, you will be absolutely hooked by the time you see this…

Game launches 2nd June 2015!