Dear DrmDestryr,
Draft mode will be here eventually. WTF do I do?
-TheFuturist
Dear TheFuturist,
Indeedily do, Draft Mode will be here eventually! But what is it? And how can you prepare?
Definition
Draft Mode is simply where you and your team pick heroes based on the choices made by the other team. No idea how it’s going to officially work yet, but there will probably be a timer for each player so no one spends too much time diddling around in the selection screen.
Preparation
Play ALL the Heroes – Seriously. This mode is not for joyriding. This mode is for those who want to come up with their own team comp based on opponent choices. To do so successfully, you have to know counters to each hero. And while you may be able to study your little heart out, gleefully pouring over the pages of data compiled by your gaming idols, nothing will better prepare you for that selection than knowing every enemy’s weaknesses. And, yes, even Nova has those.
Watch Pro Games – As obvious from last week’s column, you can learn a lot from watching people who devote their lives to being awesome at one thing. Take in their strategies, decipher why they do what they do. In that same vein, don’t discount losers. Certainly don’t devote a lot of time to them, but it is valuable knowledge to be able to point out exactly what they do wrong while knowing how to fix it. If you find yourself unable to clearly verbalize this, you’ve found yourself a personal weakness you can improve.
Unlock All Talent Choices – Don’t play with other people with a level 1. Just don’t.
-DrmDestryr
Dear DrmDestryr,
Why can’t everything be free or bought by gold? It’s not fair.
-YoungGun
Dear YoungGun,
You are not the only voice to decry Blizzard’s choice to charge money for certain things in addition to rotating the free-to-play Heroes. While you may not agree with the answer I give you, I hope it at least gives you another perspective.
Free-To-Play
First and foremost, I want to absolutely 100% stress that this is one of the best examples of a free-to-play game on the market today. There are no extra maps that can only be played only if you pay for access. You don’t get any extra skills based on what you buy. It is NOT a pay-to-win in any sense of the term. Any good player can totally kick butt no matter if they’ve spent $0 or $500. Money is not a factor in your ability to do well in the game.
Income
Realize that Blizzard has employees working tirelessly to fix bugs, implement patches, design new skins and otherwise keep the HOTS community active and thriving. The people doing this rely on weekly/monthly paychecks to do so. Since the game itself is free to play, none of the employees are receiving income based on how many copies are downloaded. This, in and of itself, is a financial problem.
How are you supposed to pay the employees working on the game without any form of direct income?
They’ve taken the shitty freemium app idea and transformed it into something that isn’t so shady. You can play a lot to earn gold to unlock characters, skins and mounts. But this satisfies only a small percentage of the community. See, the vast majority of you out there would rather pay to reap the rewards immediately. Explaining the reason for that would go off on a crazy tangent about evolution and psychology, so trust me when I say the need for instant gratification is ingrained in us with some resisting the urge better than others (be it out of necessity or want). Because they are playing on this, they are arguably going to bring in more money than they could have ever done so with a single price tag on the product. This keeps the bills paid and the employees paid, resulting in even more content down the pipeline.
So keep complaining about paying for gratification but at least understand their purpose for doing what they do. Remember kids, they have bills to pay and families to feed, too. And if that doesn’t make you feel anything, think of your payments as an investment in future awesomeness.
-DrmDestryr
Ask DrmDestryr is your weekly Q&A/advice column for Heroes of the Storm. Have a question for DrmDestryr? E-mail her your mental musings at drmdestryr@gmail.com or send happy twoughts her way @DrmDestryr.