HotS - Hero League Tips & Mistakes

Everyone who eagerly started their Hero League career surely has their share of the horror stories from it. Random Tyrande picks when you need a main support, enemy Zeratuls that are somehow always on your ass when you don't need him, these are all of course abnormalities that do not happen often, what our Heroes of the Storm Boost employees suggest is focusing on things that happen more often, such as mistakes that you may not even be aware of, this guide will focus on fixing your own mistakes and taking advantage of them when an enemy team makes them.

DRAFTING (PICK) PHASE

Before the Hero League game begins, there's the draft phase, both teams pick heroes and soon Hero Bans will be implented (yay!). I want to emphasise how checking people's Rank won't do any good, Rank isn't a measurement of skill, MMR is, sort of. So do not bother with people's ranks, you'll just annoy yourself and your teammates.

For instance having our Heroes of the Storm Boost team in your current team on a rank 30 account may aggravate you, when in the end he turns out to be by far the best player in the team.

Often you will run into really weird Hero League drafting and the first rule is that you should not let it shake you, shit picks will happen, troll picks will happen, do not declare a lost game in draft. It is true that bad draft will lower your chance of win but this game is very very subjective to throwing and weird situations so ANY game can be won, even those with bots. We've had our Heroes of the Storm Boost team carry games with TWO disconnected players even, it's possible!



Now that we got the basics covered, let's see about punishing the drafts. The main questions you should ask yourself are:

- How can I make my own pick synergise with the picks my teammates already picked? - What can I pick to counter their picks?

First one being more important honestly, first focus on the composition and synergy of your own team, then on countering their team.

Lets use an example of Li-Li being picked in enemy team, she is a very good healer these days and her ultimate is the interruptable AoE heal. First you will see what your team needs, if your team needs lets say a main tank, you will try to pick a main tank that has an interrupt and is in good state at the moment, that being Johanna, Muradin and let's say ETC. You do not want Leoric even tho he is very strong because he does not have an interrupt. Get the point?

Be smart, use your brain during draft and don't just mindlessly pick.

MAP AWARENESS

Concept of MOBA games is rather simple. Especially Heroes of the Storm one, soak experience, get level 10, get ultimates and join your team into wiping their team before they wipe you. Simple, eh? That's what they want you to think. This is why MOBA concept is appealing to both newbie players and the Pro players, the concept itself being rather simple yet complex, I like to use the phrase: Easy to learn, hard to master. With proper coordination, amazing strategies can be made with such simple concept.



One of the most important thing in order to succeed in Heroes of the Storm Hero League is the minimap. People often forget to take a peek at the minimap often. In early game this is incredibly important in order to counter roaming comps, and stealthers like Zeratul and Nova.

Try this trick that our Heroes of the Storm Boost employees came up with, every 5 seconds take a peek at the minimap. So after you peek, count to five in your head and peek again see if anybody is missing and might be ganking you, if you lose track of the count that means something is happening and consider stopping your push and maybe backing off because a gank will likely get you killed at this point. Do not yell at your teammates for not following their opponent in the lane or calling miss, it will not help and don't forget you play to improve yourself, not your team.

BOSSES AND CAMPS – TIMING

Like I already said, timing is a crucial thing in Heroes of the Storm. General rule is that you should always aim to take mercenary camps just before an objective spawn, for instance in Sky Temple a rule is to take the upper mercenary camp just before the second temple appears (remember that temples appear 2 minutes after the last temple has ended) in order to let the camp push on itself while teams compete for the bottom temple.

Another one is capping the Siege Golem camps in Haunted Mines right when the enemy Golem passes their outer Fort / Gate in order for Siege Golems to attack the Boss Golem uninterrupted.



Bosses on Sky Temple / Cursed Hollow / Booty Bay are a complete different story, the general rule is never to attempt them when the whole enemy team is alive, unless you're really confident in your speed and coordination like our Heroes of the Storm Boost team is. Often if you decided to go for it while they're alive, they see you and try to stop you, you should most often just back off because it will not end good.

READING THE ENEMY TEAM

Later in the game peeking at the minimap will not be as effective especially if enemy team is smart and avoids minion waves in order not to be seen. So in order to find out what are they doing is asking yourself what would you do, would you attempt a boss? An enemy camp? A hard push on a certain lane that still has an outer fort up? Use your brain once more, do not split, do not facecheck and read your enemies like a book.



On the other hand, when the enemy team does not know what you're up to can be extremely beneficial. Using manipulation in a way that it is maybe expected of you to do the boss now but you rather decide to push an enemy lane fast and getting down a fort or keep when it is actually a sub-optimal tactic, but the key is the element of surprise, enemy team may have went to gank you on the boss when you're actually pushing the lane on the other side.

Another form of manipulation is making them think you're doing the boss, you let your team run through the minion wave close to the boss so they think you're going for the boss, then you position yourself in the bush on the way and surprise reck them. Teams get extremely greedy when they think they found out what you're doing and having an ace + boss steal sounds very tempting, and then boom, they get aced and lose the boss. Thank our Heroes of the Storm Boost team later.

STOP OVEREXTENDING

We've all done it. Sometimes you just lose focus and mindlessly push the enemy lane, not peaking at the minimap and getting ganked like a complete noob. Enemy teams always try to capitalise on this weakness, a player who isn't focused and keeps overextending ,getting killed and flamed and playing even worse. Overextending means different things too, a situation where you chase a low HP enemy down the lane / jungle in order to get a kill, just to end up getting picked off by his team rescuing him.



Overextending is also when you play Jaina and you go way too deep in a teamfight just to land a Blizzard on their backline, when opposite happens, you get stunned on the way and killed, ruining the whole teamfight and possibly the game for your team.

Kills aren't everything, control and sustain is also important, a living carry with low damage does more damage than a dead carry.

Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed this article, visit our Blog again or like us on Facebook to get new guides and articles instantly on your feed.

If you haven't already, check out our Heroes of the Storm Boost service, most affordable on the market, it includes Duo Queue Boost where you play your own account. Keep an eye out for discount coupons.

For players who prefer to hire a coach to mentor them one on one, our Heroes of the Storm Coaching service is perfect for you. Starting from 10 EUR/hr.

Meanwhile visit more of our guides completely for free, such as Cursed Hollow 101, Support Guide and Warrior Guide.

Good luck in your Hero League games!