Hold off spending real money in this game.

[minteK917]

Lmao. Yeah, this model is so fail, LoL was only able to make well over a billion dollars in revenue from it last year. In fact, the top 3 revenue producing games last year were all f2p.

Failed to read the entire text i see. Lol gets away with it because it was the only one in the market for a while and now is by far the most popular. Just like in the MMO market World of warcraft still gets away with $15 a months and everyone around them dies or go F2P. Nobody but League of legend has been and can be that expensive, period. This game wont last by copying the greediest game in the marketplace, as the new game. This player base will be restricted to blizzard fan boys only in this model, just means less content around the game, so i guess if you want a stale game that never grow. Good model.

Its funny people in these boards, literally having an opposite opinion on the same thing. Everybody here laughs at wow killers that try to make a new mmo with that expensive subscription model, its just skipping one fucking lunch poor scrubs. It fails every time. Well guess what in the moba market, every single one of them that tried to copy the Lol model fucking died. LOL players arent interested in this game. That model is stupid for any other moba, which is why none of them that survives right now does it. Blizzard think it can do it on IPs recognition alone, they will get a rude awakening by the end of this year.

It will either close or youll see the cost of heroes dramatically drop either in cash or gold. Just wait this winter if you dont believe me, this board will still exist. Heroes, well it might be kind of a ghost town.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I encourage you guys to hold off from spending too much. This free to play (almost choked) model is not sustainable.

Where did you get that?

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Also, when you consider how expensive a micro-transaction in HotS is, you will find it's... not that much really; if you work bare minimum wage in the United States, you can earn a $10 in one hour of work, and if it's minimum wage your getting then that work is probably going to be easy peesy. Ofcourse, many people don't live in the U.S., but given the socialist policies of other nations, I'd imagine that if you worked minimum wage there you'd see similar results here. All in all, a $10 really isn't a ripoff, though there may be better uses for it depending on how you see it. $10 may be better spent on a Taco Bell pack for your family for dinner.

And, if you have patience to wait for sales, you can get skins for bloody cheap.

[minteK917]

Where did you get that?

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Also, when you consider how expensive a micro-transaction in HotS is, you will find it's... not that much really; if you work bare minimum wage in the United States, you can earn a $10 in one hour of work, and if it's minimum wage your getting then that work is probably going to be easy peesy. Ofcourse, many people don't live in the U.S., but given the socialist policies of other nations, I'd imagine that if you worked minimum wage there you'd see similar results here. All in all, a $10 really isn't a ripoff, though there may be better uses for it depending on how you see it. $10 may be better spent on a Taco Bell pack for your family for dinner.

And, if you have patience to wait for sales, you can get skins for bloody cheap.

Not how the marketplace works with players habits. Again mmo get booed for $15 a months. DLCs get booed for $15. The price set on it is unimportant, its expensive by comparison of the value. These heroes are more expensive then full mortal kombat characters. Mortal Kombat character are obviously 50 time a longer and harder process to make then a single moba character. This is what the average consumer sees. HotS microtransaction are the most expensive of any moba, it is a new game, not even established yet. It think it can be the most expensive.

Like i said just come back to the thread in winter, the model will have changed. This experiment has been done by other devs trying to take a bite at the moba market. Because people mistake this market as a growing one, while its not. They have massive games and community, but you arent gona take their share. Just like SW: TOR didnt take anything from wow and ended up F2P.

Unless HotS niche in the moba market place is supposed to be; we are the most expensive/grindy for the hipsters, theres very little room to grow a player base here. Smite understood this, which is why its still the only 3rd moba to survive this long against giants.

[hulkgor]

Blizzard's pricing is absolutely insane. 10-15€ for skins and champions is horrid.

But to be honest, there are so few champions that obtaining them all is fast... and skins are a luxury i can live without, so i doubt i'll spend a dime in the game. If skins were cheaper, at like 1-2€ a pop, i'd probably buy a dozen though.

[FeralSynapse]

Blizzard's pricing is absolutely insane. 10-15€ for skins and champions is horrid.

But to be honest, there are so few champions that obtaining them all is fast... and skins are a luxury i can live without, so i doubt i'll spend a dime in the game. If skins were cheaper, at like 1-2€ a pop, i'd probably buy a dozen though.

That's why you buy them on sale when they are under 5 bucks and buy the hero with gold. Bought the last Tassadar skin (Egypt) theme one for under 4 and I don't regret it one bit-makes me play the character more because I find him 'cooler' being an Anubis than an alien. Some of the base heroes I just go 'meh' can't get into it looking like -that- skin solves that problem.

[Herecius]

I keep hearing about how expensive everything in HotS is, but people always seem to ignore the fact that the sales on the HotS store cut the prices extremely deeply. A 10 dollar hero or skin gets tanked down to 3 on a sale sometimes.

[Mormolyce]

1) Just buy heroes with gold. You don't need to unlock the entire roster on day 1...
2) Play FTP heroes until you unlock the ones you really like. There's plenty once you level your account.
3) If you insist on paying for heroes, wait until their half-price week...

P.S. I don't play LOL but is this an accurate breakdown of the prices by skin quality?

390, 520, 750, 975, 1350, 1820 (Legendary), 3250 (Ultimate)

This is all in Riot Points, which is a cunning way of disguising cost (we do it in finance as well). RP have to be purchased in awkwardly-sized bundles so you always have leftover RP and are encouraged to spend more. Personally that model has always annoyed me... anyway:

US$10/$25/$50/$100 buys 1380/3500/7200/15000 RP respectively. So that's 138/140/144/150 RP per dollar. Let's assume 150, the most efficient. Then skins cost:

$2.60, $3.50, $5, $6.50, $9, $12.10, $21.70

Now LoL clearly has more of a range of prices for their skins. But you have to remember that in HoTS, recolours are bundled into the default AND bought skins so all of them are in the higher end of the LoL scale - the lower scale ones are actually free. I'm not familiar enough with LoL to say where the recolours stop and the higher effort models begin.

Also if you only buy during half price sales, the most expensive HoTS skins get is like $5-6 I think.

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That's why you buy them on sale when they are under 5 bucks and buy the hero with gold. Bought the last Tassadar skin (Egypt) theme one for under 4 and I don't regret it one bit-makes me play the character more because I find him 'cooler' being an Anubis than an alien. Some of the base heroes I just go 'meh' can't get into it looking like -that- skin solves that problem.

I love my Anubis Tassadar skin but by god, they'd better hurry up and put Mecha Tassadar on sale...

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I was in a walmart and I saw a starter box and I was like, "who the hell sells a free game for $20.00?" But then on the back I saw what all it gives you for free and I was like, "mine!".

LiLi, Zeratul, ronin Zeratul skin, Jaina, Sonya, zagara, tiger mount, for $20.00.

Also there are always weekly sales where you can nab a few heroes for 50% off, I only buy from sales weeks.
If you choose to buy things it can be completely affordable especially since you don't need everything up front, be patient and take advantage of sales.

Wait... so there IS an actual box? I thought that picture on the front page was a mockup!

[paralleluniverse]

Dota 2 makes more money per player than LoL. LoL makes money mainly because of its playerbase size. So will HotS make more money with a less stingy business model? Assuming that a more stingy model does not increase the number of players, then the Dota 2 comparisons says yes.

Do I care? No, I still wouldn't play this game even if all hero costs were reduced by 90%.

[minteK917]

My god will you people stop quoting me the price. The price for me is not the fucking point, go to the dota forum, i spend hundred of $$ in that game. Id do the same in Heroes if i thought it had a future (in skins alone). But i know better. Because im part of the 5% that do spend cash in games. The problem is that this grind/money gate will kill this game for people to populate my fucking games. Im not interested in spending money in game i can see leading straight into a ghost town.

They are trying to break into the most competitive market in video game history, with the worse cash cow model imaginable. This game is as likely to bomb as infinite crisis. Only DC fanboys didnt see that coming. Im a blizzard fanboy but just not enough to not see it. The light element that blizzard gave this game to make it different is just not enough to make up for how awful everything else is for the common denominator.

You think even 1% of dota and lol players are gona flock to this game and spend $200-300 dollars and thousand of hours. For a game thats that similar? They needed to aim for much better then this, like freaking smite did. They needed to make it the easiest access of any game, not just gameplay wise, so that it grows. It will not grow at all in this model. Its just gona be the same fanboy jerking off to blizzard ips.

You guys just dont seem to be able to look past the present at this point in time. The price is not the issue, the issue is the idiotic position on this market blizzard took, one thats most awful. Tournament for this game? Blizzard will have to fund it themselves before the end of this year, you thought wow got dropped fast from tournaments and leagues, you havent seen anything yet.

This game had potential, which is why im half upset. But in the end theres other games out there once this one dies out.

Good post above me btw. Illustrate part of the problem very well. Blizzard went for the lol model, which is only sustainable by the biggest game on the market, because its the biggest. Its funny people dont get that on world of warcrafts forums too, i mean hello? Dota and smite have players spending more money on average, yet their practice are less aggressive. They have to earn the community they have to be loyal.

HotS is starting out with no community and the most aggressive possible microtransaction. Talk about good ideas. Blizzard cant do anything wrong? Ok just one name, diablo 3.

[Maconi]

Part of the model includes weekly sales on heroes and skins. If you purchase heroes when they are on sale, you will be spending half of the cost.
Not to mention the ability to get a good chunk of gold rather swiftly. More than enough to have a good roster of heroes to play with.
Another post to complain about a store model in a free to play game. This is surely a groundbreaking thread that will go places.

You say that as if every other MOBA doesn't do sales as well? So they're still much cheaper than Blizzard's current model.

I've always felt their Hearthstone model was too expensive as well.

It must be working for them though, otherwise I'm sure they'd change it.

[minteK917]

You say that as if every other MOBA doesn't do sales as well? So they're still much cheaper than Blizzard's current model.

I've always felt their Hearthstone model was too expensive as well.

It must be working for them though, otherwise I'm sure they'd change it.

Actually HS is pretty competitive against other Online and Real life Trading card games. So they hit the mark correctly for that market place really. They didnt do so for Heroes and it will show soon enough.

[Mormolyce]

I would take those estimates of $/player with a grain of salt. They're working that out from stated revenues and player counts and we don't know that they're really comparing like for like.

They are trying to break into the most competitive market in video game history

HoTS isn't an FPS, wait for Overwatch :P

When people talk about "LoL and DOTA players won't switch to an easymode version of their current game" you're making the same mistake as those people who predicted the doom of WoW because it was a "casual Everquest".

I'm sure there is a large slice of the LoL/DOTA2 base that will not be interested in HoTS. But that's not the whole market.

[Reyzzz]

Not to mention if you plan to buy any bundles and already own some of the heroes in that bundle, you won't get a discout just because. Result is that you are "punished" for buying a bundle.

[Mormolyce]

Actually HS is pretty competitive against other Online and Real life Trading card games. So they hit the mark correctly for that market place really. They didnt do so for Heroes and it will show soon enough.

Seems very similar to the LoL model to me.

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Not to mention if you plan to buy any bundles and already own some of the heroes in that bundle, you won't get a discout just because.

Apparently they're trying to decide how to work that - refunds or tokens or something.

[Thelxi]

Too late, Blizzard already got my money.

[War30]

Strange how they released this model as soon as the shitstorm with Warlord of Draenor happened. They are trying so hard to make up the revenue on those who left WOW the past few month. Overwatch is also going to follow this model. Its up to gamers to be smart and not pay for things like this. Once gamers restrain themselves from these types of models maybe they can go back and fix WOW. Their attention now is focused on how to scam players on micro-transactions every step of the way. I wonder what they have in Store for the next Starcraft. Activision really killed Blizzard. There reputation is going to go up in smoke by the end of Blizzcon this year.

[minteK917]

I'm sure there is a large slice of the LoL/DOTA2 base that will not be interested in HoTS. But that's not the whole market.

Thats by far and large the majority of the market. The gameplay being easier was first mentioned by you just now. Im not sure what this has to do with the marketing model. I predicted the ghost town of infinite crisis for the same reasons on turbines forums. It took the LoL model, with 1/1000 of the player base. I didnt think the game would close. Im predicting the ghost town of heroes of the storm right here.

WoW had identical marketing model to everquest, infact it had a fairer marketing model and easier access. Thats the opposite of heroes of the storm, so im not sure where you are going with this. WoW only had one competitor that was harder to access both from a money stand point and gameplay. Who would bet against it was an idiot back then. As much as an idiot betting on a game now that does the opposite, in a market place with more competitors that cost less and are easier to access.

Nothing about gameplay.

[Mormolyce]

Thats by far and large the majority of the market. The gameplay being easier was first mentioned by you just now. Im not sure what this has to do with the marketing model. I predicted the ghost town of infinite crisis for the same reasons on turbines forums. It took the LoL model, with 1/1000 of the player base. I didnt think the game would close. Im predicting the ghost town of heroes of the storm right here.

WoW had identical marketing model to everquest, infact it had a fairer marketing model and easier access. Thats the opposite of heroes of the storm, so im not sure where you are going with this. WoW only had one competitor that was harder to access both from a money stand point and gameplay. Who would bet against it was an idiot back then. As much as an idiot betting on a game now that does the opposite, in a market place with more competitors that cost less and are easier to access.

Nothing about gameplay.

Well if you're talking about it purely in cost terms it's kind of hard to compare considering HoTS is free. Whether or not the price point is right is something we'll have to wait and see, but if the game itself is popular it'll attract "whales" regardless. The existing Blizzard fanbase alone certainly has no lack of those...

Looking at the current playerbase of games like LoL misses the point. HoTS appeals to people who don't play a MOBA, and ex-players of other MOBAs, moreso than current MOBA players. If LoL has 30 million "players" right now (no indication of how committed those 30 million are, it's FTP so they might've just messed around with it for a week) think about how many ex-players it has. It's 6 years old, I guarantee you that's a large group of people to appeal to as well. Look at the WoW example - it had 12 million players at its peak but over 100 million players ever. And that's a sub based game. The pool of ex-LoL players is probably enormous.

It's like saying that the MMO market consisted of Everquest and Ultima Online players back when WoW came out, so there's no room for WoW.

I'm not saying HoTS will take the genre by storm like WoW did, who knows what will happen? You don't, for example.

[minteK917]

I'm not saying HoTS will take the genre by storm like WoW did, who knows what will happen? You don't, for example.

I do. Blizzard will either realize the miss step and improve it, it will take a while like D3 debacle or the game will be a ghost town. Fortunately both these outcome will happen in the very near future. After blizzcon the effects will be felt one way or another.

[Bapestar]

HoTS is a fun game but I really don't want to spend rl money. Especially when there are better mobas out there. Luckily there are only a few heroes that look interesting to me but it is kind of a turn off I will have to grind my ass off for a hero or pay money. I like dota 2's model, you get access to all heroes from the jump. Spending money on that is purely for cosmetics. Blizzard is just greedy as fuck. Nothing wrong with that but its the truth. 10 bucks for a hero? Yea, no thanks.