Yep, i have no clue why all dotalike games don't do this and just sell skins for money but whatever floats peoples boats. I even had a guy argue with me once how buying champions and having free rotations is good because you can slowly learn heroes and see what you like. How can that compete with having them all unlocked since day 1 is beyond meAtmos Duality said:
Heroes of The Storm's Pricing Structure is Unacceptable. Here's How to Fix it
- Thread starter Steven Bogos
- Start date
As I recall, they had one wipe back in September(within the alpha). They did and are accepting payment, and refunded all monies paid into the Battle.net Balance at the wipe. They have stated that they do not intend any more wipes, and that even if they do wipe at some point, real money purchases will not be reset again.SecondPrize said:
No fucking way. $120 is way too much. It's ridiculous how so many "free to play" games end up costing way more than a normal game to play properly.
I think you're being a little too generous to League. League has the additional problem that runes cost in-game currency, at least one additional rune page is important to hit your "ceiling," and each page costs around 55 hours of gameplay before you factor in the runes to actually fill it out. Also, most of the top-tier champions are either 4800 or 6300 ip, which means, again, a minimum of 40 hours per champion. You need at least 2 or 3 champions you can plausibly play for at least 3 of the 5 major roles, so that's almost 300 hours minimum just to earn the in-game currency required to be minimally competitive. Dota 2 does it best, but it has a steeper learning curve, albeit with a more helpful community than you'd see in LoL.
I think you're being a little too generous to League. League has the additional problem that runes cost in-game currency, at least one additional rune page is important to hit your "ceiling," and each page costs around 55 hours of gameplay before you factor in the runes to actually fill it out. Also, most of the top-tier champions are either 4800 or 6300 ip, which means, again, a minimum of 40 hours per champion. You need at least 2 or 3 champions you can plausibly play for at least 3 of the 5 major roles, so that's almost 300 hours minimum just to earn the in-game currency required to be minimally competitive. Dota 2 does it best, but it has a steeper learning curve, albeit with a more helpful community than you'd see in LoL.
Blizzard overpricing things? How's that even news? Even their decades old prices aren't dropping that fast.
It is a fun game but getting any other characters is just crazy. You didn't mention that most of the skins can be purchased with ONLY money. Thus far I've gotten a character or two but only when they were on 'sale' for like $4 which felt more reasonable.
Hell, at least with HotS you buy a hero with money instead of buying more points than you need to buy a hero, so that is nice. (Not that I would spend money on something like that anyway)
As for the price of the heroes with gold, I haven't really encountered a problem. I got Nova (10,000 gold) within only a few hours of playtime, and she (with the exception of the Lost Vikings) is one of the most expensive heroes in the game.
That being said, each to their own. I have a lot of time on my hands, and I am not overly bothered about getting new heroes often as I tend to stick with a single hero for a while, but I can certainly see why it would be frustrating for a player with very little time on their hands if it takes them hours upon hours to grind for the gold.
Still though, DotA 2's option of "all heroes are available now and forever" trumps all other options. So I guess that wins overall anyway, no contest.
As for the price of the heroes with gold, I haven't really encountered a problem. I got Nova (10,000 gold) within only a few hours of playtime, and she (with the exception of the Lost Vikings) is one of the most expensive heroes in the game.
That being said, each to their own. I have a lot of time on my hands, and I am not overly bothered about getting new heroes often as I tend to stick with a single hero for a while, but I can certainly see why it would be frustrating for a player with very little time on their hands if it takes them hours upon hours to grind for the gold.
Still though, DotA 2's option of "all heroes are available now and forever" trumps all other options. So I guess that wins overall anyway, no contest.
Blizz gives you enough gold early on to pick up a main. A rotating roster of free characters gives you variety. Daily quests let you spice things up anyway. What exactly is the problem here?
Yeah, it'd be nice if it were cheaper, but there's nothing you can't say that about. I'm not seeing any real evidence that HotS characters are too expensive. (Skins... on the other hand...)
Yeah, it'd be nice if it were cheaper, but there's nothing you can't say that about. I'm not seeing any real evidence that HotS characters are too expensive. (Skins... on the other hand...)
I wouldn't really say that skins are expensive, either. Hell, look at LoL, they just released a skin that costs £18 (or $30), yet the most expensive skin in HotS is £10. Even so, HotS at least gives you some variety with how your hero looks without dropping a dime. You get 3 colour variations with every skin, including the basic skin, and then there is a master skin that you can purchase with in-game currency. There is less of a reason to buy a skin in HotS than there is in any other MOBA, and I appreciate that.Travis Fischer said:
Not that I am saying they shouldn't be cheaper, I like spending less money, but with the competition, I would say that HotS is actually quite generous.
"Heck, even $120 for all Heroes included in the game at launch wouldn't be too bad of a deal."
Who thinks this? $120 is enough for two full-price games, it's absolutely outrageous to charge this much from people for what is effectively a set of playable characters.
Bogos is right in saying that a free to play system with cosmetic purchases would be the best, and its one of the reasons DOTA2 is so popular. Charging for each individual character effectively makes the game pay to win and is downright criminal if you're going to charge what Blizzard is charging.
Who thinks this? $120 is enough for two full-price games, it's absolutely outrageous to charge this much from people for what is effectively a set of playable characters.
Bogos is right in saying that a free to play system with cosmetic purchases would be the best, and its one of the reasons DOTA2 is so popular. Charging for each individual character effectively makes the game pay to win and is downright criminal if you're going to charge what Blizzard is charging.
HoTS is going to have much less champions than LoL has. What does it really matter if it takes a couple of hours more to unlock one? It's probably going to take less time to unlock the whole cast compared to LoL anyway. Not that I am defending HoTS, I think if you played one Moba you played them all - I'm not interested in HoTS. It's just that the criticism doesn't seem really fair here.
Hey there. Thanks for taking the time to try and help me out with this. I could have sworn by 27 hr figure for LoL was correct, so I went back and double checked all my numbers. It seems that my math was flawed... but not in the way you thought!Zato-1 said:
The error I made was in ip gain/hour. The 110 number is incorrect - that is my figure for base IP gain without any modifiers. For the record: For a win: 18 IP + 2.312 per minute IP. For a loss: 16 IP + 1.405 per minute IP. Average between the two is 2.312 + 1.405 = 1.8585. 60 minutes * 1.8585 = 111.51IP an hour.
However, considering that average game time is 35 minutes, and the first win of the day bonus is 150, you'd get 17 IP X 1.71 times an hour for an average of 29.14 IP an hour. 111.51 + 29.14 = 140.51IP an hour.
With a 50% win rate playing 2 hours (3.5 games) we get: 140.51 * 2 = 281.02 + 150 = 215.51 IP per hour. Just like in HOTS, the IP gain per hour drops quite a bit after you have exhausted your first win of the day bonus, but we are assuming that the majority of players don't really play more than 2 hrs a day.
TL;DR the error was in the 110 IP/hr figure I had posted, which I have amended in the main article. Thanks!
Your amendment is a bit confusing, because the "aside from a "first win of the day" bonus" seems to suggest your per hour number isn't including the win of the day bonus.Steven Bogos said:
Of course, given that both games have a daily bonus, calculating per hour is...odd. Your hourly rate changes as the day goes on. How about we analyze daily income, assuming players are trying to be most efficient(that is, gain the daily bonus every day, then sign off). You can work your way through your quest log in Heroes reliably by playing 3 games a day. The quest gives an average of 355, and a 50% win rate gives an additional 25 per game, for 75 more; a daily total of 430 gold. On the other hand, LoL's daily bonus is 150, and with our 50% win rate, we'll assume two games to get that. If LoL games average 35 minutes, then you get about 150 from your two games, plus the 150 for the first win bonus; a daily total of 300 IP.
Add in the average costs Zato-1 provides, and we get that it takes just shy of 16 days for a Hero of the Storm, and just shy of 13 days for a LoL champion. If you want a highest-tier character, it's just over 23 days for the Hero and 22 for the champion. That's really comparable.
Haha nope. Blizzard are all about gouging their customers and getting away with it because they're the biggest and most popular fish in the pond.Steven Bogos said:
Look at WoW, to my knowledge the ONLY standard MMO (i.e not Eve Online which is ANYTHING but standard) still charging a monthly subscription fee AS WELL as requiring you to pay for it upfront.
Look at Hearthstone, the ONLY online CCG where you get absolutely nothing for losing and very, VERY little for winning to make it harder to grind for packs without paying, as well as using a disingenous and dishonest rarity system to sell you the stingiest boosters in existence (4 commons and an uncommon, which they call a "rare").
Blizzard are going to keep the prices of HotS heroes at an asininely high price and people are going to lap it up and give them their money anyway because it's Blizzard.