Blog Posts from "HoN the Blog"

Modern Aimbot Fest 2.... err Modern Warfare 2

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 08:31:26 -0500

So for anyone that has been playing MW2 on PC I'm sure you've run into someone aimbotting, getting 25 kill streak in a minute then nuking and ending the game. It isn't very fun, and after playing 7 consecutive Ground War matches all with one or more aimbotters I decided to look into the issue.

Apparently the website http://callofdutyhacks.com/ was able to put out a working aimbot within 2 hours of the game being released. Good job infinity ward, and without dedicated servers, admins can't ban these players. There is no vote kick options either (Left 4 Dead did a great job implementing this) so that isn't an option, if you have a hacker in your game you are forced to just deal with it or leave and hope the next game you join doesn't have one.

However, there is one upside to this, and that is the makers of the hack are charging 20$ to use it so hopefully that should deter some kiddies from using it. Honestly though, I'm to the point where I'm actually considering buying it so I can ******* just get level 70 and access to all the weapons. This way I can fight fire with fire, kinda reminds me of botting in wow because grinding gear is worse than getting aids. Cheating in an fps is obviously more frowned upon than botting in an MMO, but lets be honest here you are still ruining other players experience to some extent.

Anyways just thought I'd bring this to light as anyone considering between L4D2 and MW2 on PC might rethink their decision if they know that every other game they join will probably have a hacker in MW2.

[HoN] A Noob's Guide, Part 2: Shopping

Mon, 10 Aug 2009 17:06:19 -0400

In my previous installment of A Noob's Guide, I discussed the layout of the map and how best to make use of it. In today's installment I will discuss what to buy, and when. I'm going to assume you are doing a 5v5 with 603 starting gold.

Disclaimer: I'm not a super-player.

Starting Items

- Good. You want anything which helps you deal damage. Go get em.

Conclusion

This was already pretty long so I left out the luxury section. While it's nearly impossible review every item, hopefully this will help you get started. As always, experience is much better than text, so just do what seems right. Feedback is always welcome.

[HoN] Puppetmaster underrated? The One-Shot Build

Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:16:04 -0400

I've had much too many games in which I pick Puppet Master only to have my team whine about how useless he is and they'll have to 4v5 this match, only to appologize as I hat-trick their team while we're taking the base.

So why do people think he's so weak? It's because they use him wrong. Puppet master, imo, has more synergy with himself and allies than any other hero. Few if any heroes can hold an opponent in place for 10 seconds allowing your allies to do whatever they want, and this isn't even an ultimate. Puppet master is also the only hero who can one shot opponents at level 7.

DISCLAIMER: This build is not for anything above the PuB level. Getting a bottle in mid as Puppet is under most circumstances wasteful in a higher level game. You should only use this build when you have doubts about the skill of your teammates.

The One-shot Build

This build is mostly for messing around in PuBs because you're not all that useful otherwise. Sounds a lot like Scout doesn't it?

Skills

Level 1 - Puppeteer's Hold

Level 2 - Whiplash

Level 3 - Whiplash

Level 4 - Puppet Show

Level 5 - Whiplash

Level 6 - Voodoo Puppet

Level 7 - Whiplash

Level 8+ Max out Puppeteer's Hold then Puppet Show, getting Voodoo Puppet when possible.

Justification

At level one you need something to protect from ganks. Since a level one gank usually doesn't involve creeps, you'll need Puppeteer's Hold to escape. Whiplash is maxed because it will be your main damage skill and the reason you are able to one shot. It also allows you to last hit easier with the passive +24% base damage. One point is put in Puppet Show so that you can hold them still for a few seconds.

Items

Start with a bottle and try to solo mid. While you can start with intellect items, the bottle gives you a larger window of opportunity by allowing you to store the runes.

After bottle, start building Great Arcanas, as these will allow you to be useful later. If you need them, don't be afraid to get marchers. While I usually don't get them until later, you should definitely get them against heroes like Scout, Night Hound, Swiftblade, Electrician and any other fast hero who keeps killing you.

When building Great Arcana, which components you get first depend on your situation. If the first rune is double damage, you're going to be storing it for a long time, so you'll need to get Scarabs and Robes early to boost your mana regen. If you get any other runes for the first and second rune spawns, then you should get Steamstaff and Robes first for the extra damage because you can use your bottle for mana.

Strategy

Before you start putting points in Whiplash, your attack is extremely weak, making it hard to last hit. Do your best to get the last hits, but don't stress too much because it isn't easy with your base damage. Primarily during the lane phase you should be focusing on your Whiplash attack. When the counter gets to 1, the next attack will be a Whiplash attack. This attack should either be used to last hit two+ mobs at the same time, or used to harass the opponent. The sooner you get to level 7, the easier your combo is to pull off.

Control of the rune spawns is essential, because if you don't get double damage you can kiss your one shot goodbye. The rune spawns at one of two locations every two minutes exactly. It doesn't matter when you get it, it will still spawn at every two minute interval. It spawns in the river either just east of Legion secret shop or just south of Hellbourne secret shop.

The Combo

So you've finally hit level 7, and hopefully have double damage, you can go out and make somebody cry. First you need to get your Whiplash counter to 1. That way, your next attack will be a whiplash. Find an opponent who isn't too close to the tower, preferrably alone. Move in on them, but be sure you don't scare them away before you get Puppeteer's Hold range.

Open with Puppeteer's Hold and close the distance. Once you're close enough, use Puppet Show. Pop your double damage and make sure you're in melee range, then cast Voodoo puppet. Now simply attack the hero. With this attack you will either one-shot or severly damage the hero. Keep attacking until dead if you didn't one-shot them.

How it works

Your Whiplash strike doubles your damage and causes 100% of that damage to strike all nearby opponents, including the puppet. With double damage, your base damage should be around 200-250. Whiplash will double this to approx. 500 damage, plus 500 damage to the puppet. The puppet will take 160% of this damage and trasfer it back to it's target. In total you will deal (Base Damage)*2*2+(Base Damage)*2*2*1.6 damage to the target. With 125 base damage, in total you will deal 125*2*2+125*2*2*1.6 = 500 + 800 damage to the target. Unfortunately, puppet damage is mitigated by magic armor, so it's actually only 500 + 600 = 1100 damage, still a huge chunk. At level 7, very few heroes have 1100 health.

Now what?

Okay so you've one shot somebody, everyone is impressed and no longer thinks Puppet Master sucks. However, you can't keep doing this every 30 seconds, so what do you do now? Puppet master in addition to huge burst damage, has outstanding pushing potential. By building three Great Arcanas you will get a Hellflower. Hellflower grants you attack speed, damage, intellect and mana regen, all the things you need. On top of that, it has a activated silence which doubles as a damage increase for 5 seconds. With a low cooldown do not be afraid to use it. For the rest of the game you should use your combo whenever possible, minus double damage unless you can manage to get it, and push constantly. Don't be afraid to switch lanes to avoid ganks either.

After your Hellflower is completed, what you build is up to you. All three marcher upgrades are good, Steam Boots will give you more damage/pushing potential, Enhanced Marchers will give you speed to escape ganks, and Post Haste will give you massive mobility allowing you to change push lanes every minute. It all depends on your situation and unfortunately I can not make the decision for you. However, if you absolutely have no idea what to get, get enhanced marchers.

After your boot upgrade, there are several good items for you. You can get a Null Stone if the opposition has scary targetted spells like Pyro's ultimate, you can get a Sacrificial Stone if you need health and mana. You can get a Staff of the Master if you need Health Mana and Damage, but don't need the Regen of Sacrificial Stone. Staff of the Master is still useful even if it doesn't boost your ultimate. Other options include Frostfield plate, Wards of Sight and Revelation, Behemoth's Heart, the options are endless. Puppet master is a very flexible hero so if you need to be able to tank damage, don't be afraid of tank items like Heart of the Behemoth. Frostfield plate is a great item because it allows you to tank while also giving you Intellect for more damage.

Even late game, your Puppet + Whiplash combo always does superb damage, so don't be afraid to make use of it. Around level 16 you should have 250ish base damage, so the puppet will still do 1100 damage even without double damage, not something to laugh at. Additionally you should now have a silence, making you very useful in a team battle. Don't be afraid to pop your ultimate in the middle of a team battle, because the puppet takes damage from all sources of AoE.

Remember, your Puppeteer's Hold can be escaped using Blink/Transport skills. This means Predator, Night Hound, Magebane, Chronos, Zephyr, and any other heroes with a Blink Dagger can escape it. Be careful who you use it on, and don't waste it.

Mechanics of Voodoo Puppet

Voodoo Puppet's mechanics are largely a mystery for most people. Most think that it simply transfers it's 550-700 health in damage and thats it. This is not true. No matter what the puppet's remaining health is, it will always transfer the full damage of any attack it gets hit by. This makes a Codex a very fun item on puppet master. This allows you to attack your puppet once or twice to get it low, then hit it with a full Codex burst. So if your base damage is 250 and you hit the puppet once, you'll bring it from 700 health to 200 health at level 16. Now, you hit it with a level 3 codex for 600*2.1 = 1260 damage. Seems powerful to me, and a lot of fun.

Conclusion

Thanks for reading. I hope this gets Puppet Master into more games, because he is a very fun hero to fight with and against. As always, I'm open to constructive criticism. If enough interest is shown, I'll post a non-PuB build at a later date. Unfortunately I haven't played many in-house/league(lol) games recently, so I don't have much content higher level content to post.

By the way, you can expect that from now on Dyvith will be posting interesting articles. The short story was a bit of an experiment, and will not happen again. Sorry again for that.

[HoN] Short Stories With Dyvith

Sun, 02 Aug 2009 19:27:01 -0400

Hello everyone! The following is a short story I have written for your reading pleasure. It will be a four to five part series about a gentlemen, James Burg, and his adventure. I hope you enjoy. The series will be about four or five stories long, possibly longer depending on what people think. Note - This is not WoW related, but merely a fun sample of college level creative writing!

James Burg was racing down Interstate Ninety-Five. Frayed, blonde hair covered his scalp and in the center of his face were the biggest, bluest eyes that one might expect only to find on an infant; eyes which still contained some semblance of innocence, not yet eroded by our world’s harsh reality. He had a smile on him that was so perfect that if you looked at it too long, it might begin to make you feel uncomfortable. He was a broad man, if you could call him a man at all. Burg was young, and if you hadn’t known him better you might think him barely out of college. This wasn’t true, of course, because Burg had never attended a college. He had never been, and he probably never would go. He carried himself with an air of self confidence, especially as of late. You could tell this about Burg without even knowing him, especially when you saw him racing his vintage, recently restored, recently stolen Thunderbird down the highway. You might think that going down an interstate at one hundred and ten would be reckless, even if there were few cars on the road: Burg, however, didn’t think so; he thought it was a necessity.

A week prior, Burg had been hired on the spot by the Journal to be a political writer. He was a vulgar young man, which he thought was what might have given his writing the edge that got him hired in the first place. In addition to being vulgar, his memory was unmatched. He could remember every detail of every important event that had ever transpired in his entire life: his phone interview where he was offered his position at the Journal, when he was kicked out of his house at a young age, and when two of his closest family members died.

The mile marker on the side of the road indicated that Burg was only sixty seventy miles from his final destination. Burg realized he was now sweating, despite the cool temperature within his Thunderbird. His smile widened, he liked this feeling of excitement.

The incident where he had received the opportunity to work for the Journal was still very fresh in his mind. He had been sitting in a tiny, bland office, which smelt heavily of vomit and stale bread, where he had found work as a janitor. Burg had been employed by a private school that felt it best to contribute to the community by hiring select individuals that they felt were in dire need of a helping hand. While their offer sounded fantastic on paper, what he signed up for was little more than a grossly underpaid job working as a janitor, cleaning up after people that were, perhaps, so disgusting that they could have been arrested in some states for their lack of hygiene. The only reason he didn’t quit was because of one of the benefits that he took advantage of the most: a private phone line and new clothes, freshly cleaned- perks not of the job itself, but from the company that had found him to fill the position.

His employer, a stout fellow that went by the name of Gary Mendel, looked as though he had no place working in a school. He resembled a mix between a neo-Nazi, with his hair combed to the side and a mustache that made him look oddly similar to Adolf Hitler, and a body builder. In his life, Burg had encountered his fair share of odd persons, but Mendel was by far the most awkward of all the individuals he had met. He dressed himself akin to a businessman that, one would assume, had forgotten that he had left the Thirties; his vocabulary reflected his dress code.

Mendel had just finished harassing Burg about his poor performance mopping up a particular vomit incident in which bile had ended up not only on the floor, but on the ceiling and two walls as well. Burg thought it was particularly funny, had it not been for the fact it was puke, he might have thought that one of the students had decided to go finger painting: for all he knew that might have been what had happened. But Burgs job was not to know what had happened, only to clean up, and he had forgotten a spot and had been scolded, endlessly, for it. Right after Mendel left (which was good timing, because if he had stayed for much longer, Burg’s temper might have gotten out of hand), the phone began to ring: Burg suspected Mendel was following up his in-person scolding over the phone, so when Burg answered, it took much self restraint not to make a snide remark just in case it wasn’t him. To Burg’s joyous delight, it wasn’t.

The man on the other end of the line said his name was Henry. That was his last name, his first name was William, but he preferred not to be called by that name as that was the name that he was known by in the papers. He had an incredibly deep, husky voice, and although Burg did indeed know exactly what Henry looked like because his picture was in the paper, it wasn’t difficult at all to imagine that Henry was a large, bulky man that commanded the attention of the entire room; at least from everyone that was smaller than him.

“…James, I want to speak with you in person, your article that you submitted was excellent, superb even. The detail and the amount of dirt you must have dug up to obtain some of this information is incredible.” Burg, who had always believed that actions spoke louder than words, had agreed to head to the city as soon as he had made a few arrangements where he was. Although he really had no arrangements to make, Henry hadn’t known this and Burg desperately wanted a few extra days before he set off to make stir up some trouble for those that had made his life so frustrating while at this **** hole he called a job- Burg thought that **** hole was a generous term to call his office.

Sixty miles to go. James could taste his satisfaction on his lips. Yes, life had never been better.

[HoN] Enter The Dyvith - Gaming in the Workplace, Beta Keys

Fri, 31 Jul 2009 21:28:14 -0400

Preface

Hello there, loyal viewers! This is my first blog here on The Riot, so let me start things off strong by introducing myself! My friends call me Greg, but to my Warcraft friends, I go by Dyvith. I play an Undead Discipline Priest on Mannoroth of the Ruin Battlegroup. I am a five time gladiator and I have been playing World of Warcraft since release. I am currently a sophomore at Binghamton University majoring in Psychology and I work as an intern for a Financial Insurance company in New York City. That’s me in a nutshell.

I expect to be writing roughly once a week, and while Tripwyr’s focus is in the arena of Heroes of Newerth, I will be focusing on a broader audience, not focusing on one game in particular (although, if I do begin writing about one game it will either be World of Warcraft or Heroes of Newerth). Instead, I will focus on gaming and how it is evolving and impacting our lives. I am not sure if these topics will interest people, and if they don’t, you can expect I will join Tripwyr in sharing my Newerth experiences with our readers.

Gaming in the Workplace

Today’s topic of interest is gaming in the workplace. I’m not talking about gaming while at Jamba Juice, but instead executives that game – those individuals that are fortunate enough to have a job in today’s horrid economy, and those whom also take full advantage of it by playing video games in the safety of their office – Note: this doesn’t work in cubicles, you are snuffed out too easily. Not only are executives able to get away with this, but so too are interns. Myself being one of them – every day I bring in a laptop and am able to play World of Warcraft from the confines of my office, if I so chose. While not everyone my age will have the luxury of their own office, it amazes me the number of people who don’t do work while at their jobs. Literally, so many individuals do limited amounts of work and the public wonders why our economy is failing. Has anyone pointed out that so many people are literally mooching off of their companies, and yet executives who make six figures are given so much freedom without any real supervision. Note to employers – just because your employee is forty with a family doesn’t mean they take their job very seriously.

The Worst Offenders

Many therapists and human resources specialists will argue that the ability to take time off in the work day to relax will increase performance; however, many people in upper level management jobs within fortune fifty companies seem to have rather relaxed jobs already. I am not referring to the upper echelon, the highest tier of executive; but instead, those just under the executives who are able to milk the system for all it is worth. All this because they work under limited supervision due to their position in the company/workplace.

Employers no longer have the ability to even monitor their employee’s internet activities, unless they invest in a camera to monitor them at all times. Individuals can purchase wireless cards and game from there, removing any possibility of remote monitoring to alert the company superiors. Yes, while some people do genuinely work very hard to get where they are and keep their positions; many individuals are there not because they have the integrity to work hard, but because they know somebody who allows them a free ride. It is not uncommon to see workers in cubicles stop working and chit chatting, and all too often, the door of an executive office is locked; what they are doing in there – no one knows. There is a reason some companies are getting smart and are screening for World of Warcraft applicants. Yes – it is ridiculous, and yes - it probably is highly illegal, but it is also hilarious that people are coming to such measures to ensure quality employees.

Food For Thought

Now, more than ever, people are getting jobs because of who they know, and not what they know. In a world where America is suffering an economic depression, why is it that we allow these people to continue sliding through and burying our economy with it?

Today, I went into work for eight hours, and spent thirty of it working, because as an intern my company doesn’t have much for me to do. I am paid hourly and therefore am only paid when there, and since I need the money and need to be there, I played Heroes of Newerth and World of Warcraft from my office. I played with some friends, even bolstered my alternate character’s ratings up – from a wireless card in a Manhattan office. For this, I made over one hundred dollars today. I am eighteen, working a high paying job, and I am doing nothing – I am, in essence, paid to game. I am not alone either, there are many people, in many jobs, doing the same thing. Take it for what it’s worth; however, I for one feel there needs to be a change in the way Corporate America conducts itself.

With the rising increase in gamers within the population, I strongly believe this problem may continue to escalate until a solution is enacted to keep work in the workplace and gaming out. The automobile industry was just revamped, maybe it is time for the financial sector to receive another revamp as well.

Heroes of Newerth

In other news, I want to touch briefly on the topic of Heroes of Newerth lane duos. I have taken a personal liking of Pestilence, the exact port of Slardar. Pestilence, coupled with Jereziah, the omni-knight port, plays an incredibly solid lane. With the ability to pseudo-randomly single target stun, group stun, group slow, heal, increase movement speed, and block magic, the two plate wearing strength heroes provide excellent lane and crown control. In addition, both heroes (as of the most recent patch and Jereziah’s attack animation change) have excellent last hit/denying potential.

Another great combination which I have only seen and not played personally is Electrician and Swiftblade. The ability to pull a target and whirl on them is truly deadly early on. Boom – Headshot.

League of Legends

I was recently invited to the League of Legends Beta and will be testing that out over the next few months. Due to NDA, I will be unable to comment for some time on how the game plays out; however, I am eager to play it and share my feelings as soon as possible.

Beta Keys

I have a few Heroes of Newerth beta keys, for those interested. Simply leave a comment below stating your interest and possible topics you would be interested in hearing about. I will do some research on a topic that I find the most interesting and with the most potential. When I make the post, I will post the winner and a way to reach me.

[HoN]: Accursed, Support Style

Fri, 31 Jul 2009 17:00:05 -0400

Generally in team battles I don't like to sit on the front line, but I also don't like to sit all the way in the back. I like to sort of bait myself but not too much since Flame of Consumption won't always save you, but it will make them think twice about focusing you allowing you to constantly heal/shield your team. Also I like to stay a little farther back so I don't risk getting stunned/cc'd so I can actually support my team with shield (dispels debuffs as well) heal and ring of sorcery / astrolabe spam.

I know the guide isn't super specific about certain things, and if the readers would like I can go into more detail about starting items and full ability descriptions. Hope you enjoyed my support style accursed build!

[HoN] Patch Thoughts

Wed, 29 Jul 2009 20:59:51 -0400

As you will know if you've logged onto HoN within the past few hours, the newest patch - Patch 0.1.30 - has just been released. It features one new hero and a host of changes for the existing heroes including rebalancing and bug fixes.

For those with a beta account, you can see the full list of changes here:

http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=474

General changes

Wildsoul was completely useless against Tempest (Enigma) because he could simply kill it instantly using his summon.

Conclusion

Overall this patch should help to balance out games more while pushing Arachna to ridiculous status. Expect to see her picked as quickly as Scout in every match soon enough. Note - Scout isn't even all that outstanding but people seem to be in love with him.

Thank you for reading and as always please leave a comment with suggestions for future entries. I'd also like feedback on whether you'd like to see these posts every patch, only on major patches, or never. I hope to have a second installment of A Noob's Guide as well as Part 2 of my Jereziah guide up within the next few days. Stay tuned!

[HoN] New Heroes, New Writers

Wed, 29 Jul 2009 10:34:37 -0400

New Writers

That's right! Two days in I'm already bringing new writers on-board. I'll have one and possibly two new writers starting within the next few days. They won't be posting as regularly as I plan to, but they will be contributing never-the-less. Hopefully this will allow me to post more quality blogs in addition to covering different points of view. Stay tuned!

New Heroes

As you probably know by now, HoN is a stand-alone DotA remake by S2Gaming. While not all DotA heroes have been ported over yet, a few new heroes were introduced. Here is a brief description of each:

I typed all of this out in a detailed format with specific values for each skill, but just as I was finishing the last hero, my computer crashed.

Unforunately for NDA reasons, the images had to be taken down. I'll do a write up on each of the new heroes at a later date.

Don't you worry, future posts will not be this devoid of content unless I lose an entire entry again.

[HoN] A Noob's Guide, Part 1: The Map

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:49:09 -0400

At the recommendation of a previous commenter, I've decided to write a guide for those brand new to Heroes of Newerth. While it may be helpful for those transitioning over from DotA, it will be more useful to those just starting fresh with the genre.

The Map

HoN is based and virutally copied from the Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne map DotA Allstars, specifically version 6.59. With only graphic updates, a few new heroes and bugs to distinguish itself from DotA, you are basically playing DotA, which is based off of Starcraft's Aeon of Strife. The goal is for each side (Legion and Hellbourne) to destroy the other side's "Ancient" in order to win the game. The Legion is on the lower left corner of the map while the Hellbourne reside on the upper right.

The Creeps

The map consists of three "lanes;" top, bottom and middle. These lanes spawn "creeps," minor NPCs to move toward and attack the opposing base, located on the opposite side of the map. On the Legion side, they will spawn in the lower left corner of the map and make their way to the upper right corner of the map, attacking any opposing player, NPC or building they encounter along the way. Each lane contains three towers, one melee barracks and one ranged barracks. In each lane, two of the towers are spaced evenly between the middle of the lane and the base, with one inside the base. Destroying the opposing team's tower will generate a cash reward to the player, and a smaller reward to the player's team. Destroying the opposing barracks will strengthen that lane's respective creep: melee creeps from the melee barracks and ranged creeps from the ranged barracks.

In between each lane is an area of forest containing neutral creeps. The creeps are friendly to neither side and can be attacked by both. These creeps reside on the north west side of the map for and the south east side of the map, closer to the center than the outside lanes. Each consists of one "easy" camp, two "medium" caps, two "hard" camps and one "epic/Ancient" camp. In addition to these camps there is also one very hard creep called Kongor (often called by his DotA name Roshan). Kongor is not an easy creep to kill dealing massive damage while occasionally stunning. Fortunately, he includes a reward for killing him. The first reward is a large gold bonus to the team which kills him. Second is an item drop: for the first two kills he will drop only an Token of Life(Aegis) which will revive the carrier upon death, at the location of his death. For the third kill onward he will also drop "cheese" which restores massive amounts of health and mana on use.

In the lane themselves, the creeps will normally meet at a specific location on their first wave, assuming nothing inteferes. This is generally known as the "meeting point." In the top and bottom lanes it is right at the top left and bottom right corners respectively. In the middle the will meet at the center of the river running from just below the top's meeting spot, through the middle and down to just above the bottom's meeting spot. On the middle lane the towers are much closer together than the top and bottom lanes making the lane much safer for a single hero to play in. This is why you'll often find that the hero who is alone in his lane chooses the middle lane.

The Hills

In several points on the maps are hills which elevate the map at different points. Notable hills are the hills on which each base sits, and the ramps lowering the middle down to the river. When ranged units (both heroes and creeps) attack up a hill, they receive a 25% penalty to their hit rate. This means they will miss 25% more often when attacking up a hill than they would normally. In addition, you can not see over a hill unless something there is giving you vision, because it is covered by the fog of war, a cloud which covers everything not in you or your ally's line of sight.

The Shops

South of the top meeting point and North of the bottom meeting point, in the forest on the far side of the lane reside shops. These shops are called the "outposts" and allow access to a limited selection of items including orbs for teleporting to any friendly structure, most often the base or a tower under siege.

West of the Legion's side middle lane and east of the Hellbourne's side middle lane shrouded by forest resides the "secret shop," holding a selection of more powerful items not available at the home base.

The Future

I'm spliting this series into sections so that it doesn't end up too long and is easier to navigate. The next up will be items including an explanation of how the shops work, where things are stored, etc. In the future I will include some more basic explanations including basic necessary mechanics, very short hero explanations, but will also include more advanced techniques such as effective jungling, lane control and ward placement. Stay tuned.

If you're looking for help in a specific department, don't be afraid to ask in the comments. You can also check out the complete list of strategy guides at:

http://forums.dota-allstars.com/index.php?showtopic=33844

As always thank you for reading and I am always open to suggestions. This particular entry felt almost dry as if it didn't have enough substance, if you agree and/or have any suggestions please let me know. I'm trying to post regular entries so that both those who don't play or are new to playing HoN can remain interested while at the same time providing interesting entries for those well experienced with DotA and HoN alike. Please let me know if there is anything I can do better.

[HoN] Jereziah thoughts, Key giveaway results

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 10:34:22 -0400

Jereziah

As a port of Omni-knight I've noticed a few significant differences between Jereziah and his original. The first is his overall power to completely swing the direction of a team fight and often the entire match. This comes from timing his ultimate well for maximum damage reduction, often when the opposing carry enters the battle. Due to this because of his ultimate, Jereziah never loses power throughout the game and is a potent force in early, mid and late-game.

For a skill overview, see the skill list for Omniknight on here:http://www.playdota.com/heroes/47

Note that his degen aura has been replaced with a passive swing bonus with a 15/12/9/5 second cooldown which grants 50 bonus damage and slows the enemy by 50% decreasing by 10% per second for 5 seconds.

Early-game his targetted heal/nuke is powerful enough to almost fully heal an ally while dealing an unmitigated 360 true damage to an AoE around them. Mid-game his heal is still a powerful force dealing 20-25% of an opponent’s health while still giving a strong boost to an ally. End-game is when his heal begins to diminish in power, but where his heal falls his ultimate will pick up again. With near physical immunity, his ultimate can keep your ally alive long enough to rip apart the opposing carry and turn the tide of a battle.

Overpowered?

Not at all. Unfortuntely he lacks the damage capacity to kill without seriously beefing up his swings. Early game you'll find yourself hurting for mana unless you have a bottle, which is often a waste on you instead your mid hero. So beefing up your melee swings means either sacrificing mana early on, or spending a lot of gold you won't have late game.

Not overpowered does not mean he is underpowered though, he is still a seriously dangerous force on any team and in recent games he's been either first picked or banned in inhouses.

So why is he so powerful?

He was hardly ever picked in DotA and never banned. There is one reason behind this. The shortened cast animations I mentioned in my last blog. In DotA Omni has a 0.5 cast point meaning that it takes 0.5 seconds from casting the spell to the spell landing. Unfortunately such a long cast point makes Omni's heal much harder to land against an enemy, because the damage component only has a 250 radius around the heal's target. However, HoN's Jereziah has a much faster cast point closer to 0.15 which allows him to land the heal much more easily.

Guide

Jereziah isn't a hero with a one size fits all build. Your build will vary greatly between games and is strongly based on your lane matchup. However I will do my best to start you on the path to success.

Skills

Level 1: Inner Light

Level 2: Protective Charm/Righteous Strike

Level 3: Inner Light

Level 4: Protective Charm/Righteous Strike

Level 5: Inner Light

Level 6: Sol's Blessing

Level 7: Inner Light

Level 8: Righteous Strike/Protective Charm

Level 9: Righteous Strike/Protective Charm

Level 10: Righteous Strike

Level 11: Sol's Blessing

Level 12: Righteous Strike

Level 13: Protective Charm

Level 14: Protective Charm

Level 15: Stats

Level 16: Sol's Blessing

Level 17-25: Stats

Remember: Protective Charm is Omni's Repel, and Inner Light is Omni's Purify. Sol's Blessing is Omni's Guardian Angel and Righteous Strike replaces Omni's Degen Aura.

Justification

Inner Light is your bread and butter early game, you will harrass with it, kill with it and heal with it; so it's no surprise you max it as soon as possible.

Protective Charm and Righteous Strike depend on your lane matchup. If you're matched against melee you should get two points in Righteous Strike at levels 3 and 5, with the exception of Blacksmith and Hammerstorm. If you're matched against Blacksmith, Hammerstorm, or ranged heroes you should get one point in Protective Charm and choose either another point in Protective Charm or a point in Righteous Strike. Finally if you are matched against Slither or Hellbringer, you should get two points in Protective Charm to cover all or most of the DoT's effect.

After level 7, what you max is up to you. I personally prefer to max out Righteous Strike first, as more than one point in Protective Charm is rarely necessary (outside the cases outlined above). If you got two points in Righteous Strike at levels 3 and 5, be sure to get one point in Protective Charm at level 8. While more than one point isn't necessary, getting one point allows you to escape from ganks or prevent a stun from landing/chaining on yourself or an ally.

Items

Jereziah is not item reliant like most strength heroes are. All he really needs to succeed are some Marchers(boots), an Arcane Ring and maybe a Ring of the Teacher(Ring of Bascilius). With that in mind, here is my usual build:

Starting items

Ring of the Teacher

1x Rune of Blight(Tango)

First fountain trip

Ring of Protection

Arcane Ring recipe

Boots (if possible)

Midgame

Arcane ring should be completed by now

Boots if you don't have them

Boots of Travel recipe

Start building Necromicon

Lategame

Finish up your level 3 Necromicon

Your core should now be Ring of the Teacher/Arcane Ring/Boots of Travel/Necromicon3

This is where your build will begin to vary greatly.

- Sometimes you may choose to get these if the enemy team is heavily melee and you don't find much use for Travel's teleport, but don't have the money for an Assault Cuirass. This doesn't happen often though, so I would stick with the Travel and get an Assault Cuirass.

Stay tuned for Jereziah Part 2. I'll discuss strategies including laning, effective repel use and teamfights among others.

Beta keys

Congratulations to vcx, Dheartstehe and Msth on their keys. I'll have more keys to give in the future, so be sure to stick around.

I hope to continue writing here plenty in the future. I'm still open to suggestions on my writing style and content. If you'd like information about a specific hero be sure to ask and I'll try to provide my best information.

[HoN] First Entry, Balance Issues, HoN keys

Mon, 27 Jul 2009 21:32:03 -0400

Introduction

Given that this is my first blog, I suppose I should introduce myself. I go by a few online handles including Tripwyr, Shadowalker, Postmordem, and Nyrv. In real life my name is Josh and I'm 17 years old. I've lived in Canada all my life and wouldn't have it any other way. For the last five years I've been playing WoW fairly seriously and only a few days ago decided to finally pseudo-quit. I say that because I'm still playing with a friend of mine, but only extremely casual and outside of that, don't play anymore.

Recently I was invited by a friend of mine to Heroes of Newerth, a DotA stand-alone many of you have surely heard of already. With the lifting of non-media related NDA, I've decided to start writing about it. Before I start, I'd like to note that I have no writing experience what-so-ever, and nearly failed 12th grade English. With that aside, I suppose I'll just jump in.

Balance issues and concerns

Having played for around 3 weeks now, I'd like to say I'm pretty good. I'm not your amazing competitive player but I'd say I'm above your average PuB and can lead an in-house with reasonable success. I understand the basic meta-game and know the power/weaknesses of nearly every hero. So while I'm not the greatest player in the world, I like to think that I'm qualified enough to comment on the balance and general play of the game.

Between DotA and HoN I've noticed several significant issues. Some of been addressed in other blogs and some haven't, but I'll go over them for those less informed.

The first and most obvious is the cast point of several heroes. As those who play DotA regularly know, there are three components to a hero's spell cast; the wind-up, the cast itself, and the "backswing." These vary greatly between heroes in DotA, but in HoN many of them are noticeably different. Take Glacius (AKA Crystal Maiden) for example. In DotA her casting animation is 0.3 before the cast and 2.4 after. Relatively speaking she has a fast wind-up but a very long backswing. In HoN this is not the case. Not only does Glacius have a slightly faster wind-up, has backswing has been significantly reduced. Whether this is good or bad I will leave for you to judge, but it is a noticeable change.

Glacius is not the only hero affected by this change, however. Across the board casting animations seem to be greatly reduced. Noticeable in some heroes more than others, it significantly changes the balance of intelligence heroes. Certain heroes who may not have been nearly as threatening in DotA become first picks in HoN. Now I'm not incredibly up to date on DotA's meta-game, but I never saw Tormented Soul as a significant force in DotA, possibly because of his 0.7 cast point. In HoN however, Torturer (Tormented Soul) has a near instant cast point making his ground-targetted stun much harder to dodge. While bans aren't integrated into HoN yet, I've played several in-houses where teams just decide what they want banned ahead of time and don't pick them. Every game I've been in has banned Torturer.

Are cast points the reason Intelligence heroes seem to be so much more powerful? Maybe, maybe not. I've heard rumors that magic armor is bugged/broken and spells do more damage than usual, but haven't had the time to test it myself.

Another mechanic issue I've noticed is creep AI. This has already been mentioned but creeps don't at all act the same as they did in DotA. The first problem is creep pulling. For those not in the know, creep pulling is when you pull a neutral camp into the path of your own side's creep wave so that they attack the neutral instead of continuing on their path. The advantage to this is that not only do you get assistance killing the neutrals, but now the enemy creep wave will push closer to your tower. This can help if your creeps have pushed too close to the enemy tower and you're uncomfortable being so far from your own tower. In HoN however, the creeps have a hard time latching-on to the neutrals and instead often just ignore them and run by. When you do get them to attack; however, the often end up forgetting about them and moving on as soon as the neutral pack leashes (3 seconds after leaving the respawn box).

The second issue with creep AI is that often creeps won't chase heroes for very long. This can be a mixed blessing much of the time. Some heroes like Legionnaire (AKA Axe) need the creeps to hit them in order for spells like Whirling Blade to proc. Other times, you just want the creep to attack you instead of your own creep wave preserve health for the tower push. Either way, this is much harder in HoN. In DotA, you could force a creep wave to attack you simply by right clicking on an enemy hero then attacking the creeps. In HoN, the creeps will stop attacking you seconds after you click off the enemy hero. This becomes an issue when soloing with no other heroes around. Normally you would simply find a hero somewhere else on the map, right click them, then either hit "s" to stop chasing it or you would track back to your hero and click on the creeps. In HoN; however, by the time you track back to your hero the creeps have often already stopped attacking you. This functionality is good for ranged harassing heroes, but bad for tank type melee heroes, especially Legionnaire. Personally, I'd prefer the old functionality, but it isn't game breaking.

Bugs

With any beta game will come bugs; some major and some minor. One major bug I've noticed is proc-based bashes and entangles (Sylabear). On each bash spell it says that all bash effects have a 2 second cooldown. This cooldown is currently not working. You can test this by doing a 1v1 or 1v0 and picking madman. Get yourself a cranium basher, mask of madness and treads+gloves of haste or hyperstones. Find something which can be bashed but will survive your onslaught of damage. You'll notice that it stays bashed permanently even though the cooldown is double the duration. This is because the cooldown isn't working. If you look closer while you're bash locking, you'll notice that the cooldown starts over before it even finishes. This is because the cooldown isn't actually preventing procs. Many people don't believe me when I tell them this, so test it yourself.

The next bug is that on-kill abilities sometimes proc even if you don't get the kill. Such abilities include Blood Hunter's(Strygwyr) heal, Soulstealer's(Shadow Fiend) soul collection and Zephyr's Tornado spawn. I haven't been able to determine what triggers this effect other than it only happening when the time between you hitting the mob and the mob dying is very close (within 0.1 seconds). Whether this will have any significant long-term effects, I don't know, but it is still worth noting.

Beta Keys

I currently have 6 to give away. I'll be giving away 3 this time, and maybe the rest sometime in the near future. If you want one, I'll pick three random posters for the keys. If you want one, be sure to specify it in your comment.

In conclusion

Thank you for reading. I haven't quite got the formatting figured out, so if anybody can help me understand the format for paragraphs and the coloured text, let me know. I'm also looking forward to your criticism; I want to improve my writing so if theres anything I should be doing differently, don't be afraid to say so. In the future I plan to write about specific heroes, and other balance issues/bugs as I discover them. I don't know how regular my posts will be, it will depend on how well they are received.

This feels a bit like a wall of text, I'll try to make it more pretty next time.