At the Heroes of the Storm "Deep Dive" panel this BlizzCon 2014, Blizzard developers started the information session with some news a lot of fans have been waiting to hear: Beta invites will be sent out in mass soon. As of now, players who are already in the technical alpha and who have reached level 20 or higher will be entered into a drawing with thousands of potential winners. The players who's name is picked will be able to invite all of their battle.net friends into the Beta.
Moving forward, the developer team began to explain the design process of how they decide which Blizzard characters will make it into the game and how to best imagine them into the universe. Their three design principals are as follows:
1. The Fantasy: What role does the hero play in their respective universe?
2. The Look: What does the hero look and sound like?
3. The Design: How does the hero function in their respective universe?
These three principals were taken into consideration with HoTS playable hero and that process was further explained using the new heroes revealed at BlizzCon 2014 as an example.
Sylvanas the Dark Ranger is one of these new heroes and was not designed to be a typical ranged assassin. In the World of Warcraft universe and in Warcraft 3 when she was first introduced, Sylvanas used dark powers to manipulate and control those around her. Taking into factor her ability to raise the dead and mind control her enemies, Sylvanas in HoTS will be be a heavy siege hero that cripples the enemies fortifications and mind controls their units. Her dark arrows will stun and she will be equipped with a host of debuffs allowing players to feel more like the shadowy manipulator Sylvanas really is.
The next topic was the iconic shaman Thrall. Thrall is one of the most important and well known Blizzard characters to date, so it was important that players felt powerful when playing as him. In fact, early in Thrall's development, the designers didn't like that Thrall rode a mount just like a normal orc, so they gave him a cyber wolf instead. This need for distinction actually spurred the idea of including different type of mounts, something that is now an well established feature in Heroes of the Storm. The Rehgar's move list was originally designed for Thrall, but it was decided that a healing shaman did not fit the look and lore to Thrall and changed him to be more of a tougher melee assassin more resembling a mix of an enhancement and elemental shaman. Thrall will be the first hero under the category of "Melee spell weaver"
Jaina Proudmore was originally based entirely around her Water Elemental until it was decided that there were too many “minion” type heroes. Water Elemental was upgraded to a heroic ability and the concept of "the perfect frost mage" was introduced when reworking Jaina's abilities. She now features the most iconic frost mage abilities, Frostbolt, Cone of Cold, and of course, Blizzard. Jaina is the first assassin mage introduced to the game and all of her abilities are meant to synergize like pieces of a combo.
The bulk of the time spent creating The Lost Vikings was trying to reshape characters that were 20 years old. The development team debated making them all one unit and playable similar to Chen’s “Storm Earth Fire” heroic ability, But decided to make them all separate units in order to cater towards players who wanted a chance to show off their micromanagement. To avoid making the champion extremely complicated however, they removed individual abilities from each Viking and added group abilities to talents. The group abilities make the hero very challenging to play well, but on the other side of the coin, it is possible to choose talents that are all passives upgrades, making the vikings still accessible to those without extensive micro skills.
The next point discussed were the new battlegrounds. One new battleground called Sky Temple features 3 capture points that attack enemy bases when controlled. The longer you control a capture point more neutral NPCs spawn to try and stop you from capturing the point. Interestingly enough, the development of the map started entirely based upon concept art of an Egyptian style desert.
One of the other new battlegrounds is the Tomb of the Spider Queen pictured above. It is still in early development but will take place in the same universe as Sky Temple, and will feature dynamic lighting, a crypt atmosphere and a gigantic Spider Queen Boss. There is so much unexplored space in just how tough a mercenary camp or a map objective can be and this map seems to test those limits. Another interesting note is the inclusion of dynamic lighting as a larger part of gameplay. Heroes can already hide in the shadows on some maps, but The Tomb of the Spider Queen will seemingly push that to new limits.
The last battleground discussed is the Sanctuary themed map from Diablo 3: half high heaven and half hell. No news on what objectives or mercenary camps might exist on such a level, but it does offer an exciting look at the possibilities of including battlegrounds that are direct locations taken from other Blizzard games and not completely new imaginings.
As the game becomes more polished and the Alpha stage ends, the development team states that they will focus on adding greater details on maps, art, and scenery. A weather feature was mentioned causing the battlegrounds to change appearance during the change of real life seasons. A lot of old maps need polishing to keep up with the visual of the new heroes and spells, and of course the mechanics of some of these maps will need to be changed for balance purposes.
To end the panel, Blizzard gave the fans watching exactly what they wanted. Visuals at new heroes!
Leoric The Skeleton King – Diablo 3
The Butcher – Diablo 3
Crusader – Diablo 3
Someone in the audience asked if there would ever be a Rogue type class in the game, and the was a audible cheer and applause once Blizzard teased that Edwin VanCleef of the Defias Brotherhood is the most logical choice to include, perhaps even Valeera Sanguinar or Vannessa Vancleef. A Warlock hero is also in the works, possibly incarnated as Gul'dan.
Heroes of the Storm is seems to be doing two things very well. For one, they are pushing the boundaries of one of one of the most popular genres around, which is exactly what they did with the RTS and MMORPG genres to such great success. Secondly, they have successfully mastered the art of fan service, continually delivering exactly what they fans are specifically asking for. At this point it becomes easier to discuss what heroes will NOT be in Heroes of the Storm, as every fan favorite has seemingly made the cut.
Will Heroes of the Storm make a Blizzard fan out of you, or have you already hopped on the Blizzard hype train? Let us know in the comment section!
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