Thanks for a GG - Deposit your joy here! (Part 1)

General Discussion
5039

Didn’t lose but this is what frustration looks like first hand. I’m always on the outer edge and as soon as I get close my guys (who are 4 premade) chase the enemy even further back so I am never able to reach the fight. Whenever I start attacking minions to try and heal, they instantly get obliterated before I even refresh my spell. It’s so bad that I lost to Abathur without AOE shell healing. The matchmaking is a joke. My Xul is full autoattack on Hanamura but so is enemy Zagara who couldn’t keep up her tumors up for longer than 5 seconds.

https://i.imgur.com/pUhISoQ.png

They’re communicating, but dear god 13 deaths. Supposed to be playing together but each one doing their own thing completely alone while we still have the double fort advantage. It’s like one of those pick up groups where someone proclaims they need to go walk the dog just as they finish losing their second game in row because they do not wish to continue playing with the same people.

The joy come from the game finally ending, one way or another.

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5040

After daring to hope i’ve HotS enough Weds and got a bit more back in practice on Butch in Collection - Try Mode practice, I brought out my Butchy Boi for the first time in 4 years, and Fav Pal’s Sis supported me on Lucio. We ended up on Towers of Doom for the first time since long ago… the Map’s still fun to play as ever! <3

With Lucio’s help my Quest was done less than 5 minutes into the Match even with enemy Rehgar getting away a few times, but their Orphea became Kiddo Steak so many times I felt like I was bullying her. Then again maybe Bot Orphea needs to find moar Bus Tickets to Juke City. The enemy never got a single Objective, the Camps never even got needed, we nommed all Keeps and they never got any back, and we won at L13 to their L10 and I barely even had time to enjoy cleaving anything with Full Carnivore Mode. <3

I wonder if it’ll eventually get to the point where Fav Pal gets bored on level Veteran and feels ready for Elite…?

For our last game of that evening I tried out Hogger for the first time trying to test out the Spec i’m pondering on him. Died only once or twice and one of the times was a heroic sacrifice where my Death was a worthy Chess Trade for multiple enemy kills. We won before I ever got my two Quests even half done and didn’t even make it to L16, so my Spec testing out feels woefully incomplete and will need way more Data Sample Size.

Hogger Spec Candidate:

L1: Journeyman Cooking

L4: Brute Force

L7: Dense Blasting Powder

L10: Shockwave (I go outta my way to strive to hit at least one target with this directly for full Damage + Stun and if i’m not CC during or afterwards and don’t dawdle the Stun’s long enough to get a easy Dynamite Direct Hit, so I feel like this synergizes with my Dynamite Speccing. Stuff hit by the ranged part is just a bonus.)

L13: Bloodthirst (Always a fan of Talents like this, plus I think it synergizes with the L4 Talent.)

L16: Kablooie!

L20: Power Spike (I hear the Meta swears by No Control, but I can’t help but to think Shockwave into Dynamiting the victim in the Face fits my Spec more. Also, screw Metas.)

It cracks me up how much Hogger’s Voicing sounds so “Saturday Morning Cartoon Villain”. XD (It’s a shame Game Dev is dead… it’d be fun to see Hogger Skin additions that gave him a cartoonish appearance to go with his cartoonish yakking.)

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5041

W build is very safe and I think its what a lot of new players like to try, its poke, a lot of poke at the risk of not using your Q to its effectiveness, still pretty disruptive.

Hogger’s main build right now is hybrid AA:

L1: On the Prowl
L4: Hogger’s Joggers
L7: Seeing Red
L10: Flex, Preferably Shockwave.
L13: Pummel
L16: Headbanger
L20: No Control or Power Spike

Basically plays on his rage mechanic, he still soaks good, he can hit hard once scaled and his entire gimmick is to position correctly to maximize Qs effectiveness, stun someone whether to a wall or using your trait, then press your heroic, or the other way around and watch anyone who doesn’t have a cleanse get one-shotted.

But I like this one more at least for my own favor, its IMO unorthodox and is kinda old early days build:

L1: Flex, Journeyman’s Cooking if 4-Man, Bones to Gnaw in the solo lane, else On the Prowl.
L4: Aggro Rage
L7: Garbage Fire
L10: Hoardapult
L13: Pummel
L16: Flex between Headbanger and Kablooie
L20: Secret Stash if Journeyman’s Cooking, else Anger Management or Pummel depending on my mood.

Basically high aggro build that focuses on making W sustain, D very distruptive through slow which is also shared into his Heroic, also his heroic is his best engage tool and he can literally decide games depending on how good you can position with it. 16 and 20 dependent on your choices of 1 for dynamite. By 20 every 2 seconds the dynamite just massively heals the more it hits and you will be very strong as long as they stay close to your heroic.

The reason I don’t pick the 7 dynamite in this is I think its kinda of a meme that conflicts, some people like it, I don’t though lol.

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5042

I use both builds, though I believe the 2nd one got hit by nerfs a while back.

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5043

If I have a window of opportunity to Q a foe into a Wall for the Wall Stun to try to use it to get a better shot at direct W’ing them, I do that. The rest of the time I W then combo into Q, especially after L7 and grabbing Dense Blasting Powder. After L7 I can attempt a Dynamite direct hit and if it succeeds I get the better damage and the free Dynamite behind them, if I miss, my Q afterwards activates Dense Blasting Powder’s effect by hitting that Dynamite and simultaneously having Q’s Knockback pressure the foe and potentially leaving them disoriented unsure what to do and they only have split seconds to decide which can lead to opportunity to misplay, to their peril… or at least, that’s my theory, still need more testing how it turns out to actually work out in various kinds of scenarios, opposing heroes, and situations.

In my Shamelessly Biased Opinion, it’s a fun dynamic that can’t quit feeling vibes of old school awesomeness like the Looney Toons. :smiley:

Edit: Now I find myself imagining a idea for a Looney Tunes + HotS Collab Episode starring Wile E. Coyote + Hogger vs Road Runner + Murky… :stuck_out_tongue:

4 Likes
5044

Let me…let me just get those Unfurling Shadow stacks. Just so I can delete the bots as soon as they enter my line of sight.

Let me just talk about why Unfurling Shadows is the best level 1 talent for Sylvanas against bots. Either game ends before you get enough, or it lasts long enough that, with several other talents, she becomes a god that demolishes every bot in the game.

It takes a hyper delete team of Elite A.I before the talent becomes less than ideal. Otherwise, it just stacks, and stacks, and stacks. Especially with Lost Soul and Remorseless.

Get enough stacks, and Life Drain at level 16 gives a ridiculous amount of regen against bots and everything else. She can face tank some heroes while getting more stacks.

Mind Control at level 10 and Withering Barrage at 20 just ensures more staaaaaacks.

Cho’Gall over here thinking they be trolling, but I just bumped my KDA up and got a nice experience boost. I went from being a wet noodle to Thanos smacking the bots around by the end of the game.

It was getting ridiculous near the end. Health bars were melting the moment I tossed a dagger at them.

Stukov and Zeratal were troopers until I took off–it takes a while before Unfurling Shadows starts paying off–with the two of them offsetting the two headed ogre napping most of the match.

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5045

The enemy team had the advantage, but they also had a Nazeebo.

Imgur

The most important fight was challenging the forelast objective, which was the bot temple. The enemy team went bot to get it, except Nazeebo who went mid to get stacks.

My team did play and communicate very well though.

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5046

Im more surpriced that you ended up with a Cho’Gall that did nothing even if its vs AI.

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5047

Not the first time nor will it be the last. I’ve been on teams with people actively afking in game because, and I quote, “It is too early in the morning for Elite A.I.” which I have the screenshot of and remember them vividly. I roasted them a few times in followup games.

While vs A.I is far more forgiving than PvP, it has its share of lemons. Probably the most consistent are people that always pick Elite A.I like its some sort of flex despite them struggling for one reason or another against the bots. Brownie points if they queue up as a hero that relies heavily on teammates to be effective and/or accomplish anything.

I suppose such individuals are comparable to those that claim they are Gold/Silver/Platinum but are stuck on Bronze, blame their teammates, and if you watch how they play you immediately understand why they are where they are in ranked.

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5048

oh yeah they come in all shapes and sizes pinging anyone who couldn’t have safed them to save them.

also got to show up a Valla in Ai she was utterly convinced that since she was Valla she’d get the mvp
I was playing tracer and any ai player knows that a good tracer in Ai can easily dominate the scoreboard in damage hero kills and if they’re particularly persistent siege as well
Valla even did the whole “WHAT HOW” at the end of the match twas fun

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5050

peak comp https://i.imgur.com/LBxbEA8.png

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5051

Imgur

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5052

https://i.imgur.com/IpGIkmX.jpeg

PEAK GAMEPLAY!!!

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5053

Imgur

Ye no need to have a tank to win. The conbined power of Sami and Dr.Logan is enough.

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5054

Clown show but possibly the most fun and enjoyable match I’ve had entire week. MMR is still all over the place but it is such a tight spread so no one in particular is deprived of basic game knowledge. Except ZJ who has an attitude problem, who started whining bad game not 5 minutes in the match while we still had all towers.

AA Valla is completely broken in the right hands and we had the most horrible start which had only made her stronger, allowing her to 2v1 on attack move. It wasn’t a complete disaster only because Arthas knew how to surprise her and going full roots build is what won the late game for us.

https://i.imgur.com/yGenjBE.png
https://i.imgur.com/vwR1BfD.png

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5055

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5056

One of the best situation events just happened to me
I got rematched with someone on my team so I casually said
“heard you talking smack”
and I kid you not he replied
“I didn’t mean it I swear!”

oh it was brilliant could actually play for next few minutes 'cus I was chuckling so hard

3 Likes
5057

Had another fun Wed with my Fav Pal and his Sis. Yet again most Matches ended by L16 and some by L13 for our side. My fav pal actually had to resort to helping me test my Hogger Spec more fully by enabling our Levels to actually get to L20 by resorting to the desperate measure of him pulling out his very rusty Illidan. That finally worked. :stuck_out_tongue:

Now that i’ve seen my Hogger Spec Candidate work all the way to L20 then won with it eventually, despite Fav Pal’s Illidan, I can finally be satisfied that it’s feelin good as my way to go about runnin Hogger and I can feel satisfied to promote it from ‘Candidate’ to ‘My Spec’ for him. :slight_smile: (Especially satisfying moment after L20 during this Match: Hitting Full Health Li Ming with Ult’s Stun + Damage + Armor Debuff, direct hitting her with fully specced up Dynamite, and watching her deleted outta the fight… :joy:)

Also, one of my Matches during that day was with my Toy Dehaka Skin Narrated by that little boy. It’s impressive how funny that little kiddo can be. I wonder if little kiddo would be overjoyed to see a Hogger Action Figure Skin added to game…? Alas, probably no chance of that now…

I dare to hope that Fav Pal is warming up to the idea of promoting our Match Difficulty to Elite. All the Heroes have fun things at L20 to play with, but how does one ever get to play with them if the enemy can’t put up enough fight? :stuck_out_tongue:

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5058

you know, you can buy that kids announcer voice pack for 10k gold so that he announces absolutely every game you are in, right?

(still not as good as the kevin announcer)

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5059

Played the Snow Brawl last night with NGS friends. Such silly fun, and the map is so pretty with the Christmas decorations!

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