Your thoughts on baseline hero quests?

So what’s your thoughts on heroes having high popularity quest talents made baseline? there’s been situations in the past reworks where some quests or talents deemed “mandatory” for the character to “work” have had them rolled in, and what’s your view on this when its done?
Certain heroes, such as arthas with frost presence or Gazlowe with clockwere steam fists, for example, seem to just not feel complete without those quests. But do you view giving a hero such talents baseline is a good or that the team should instead tweak the talents/kit to make such talents feel less neccessary?

As long as it fits the hero’s fantasy.

For example, Zul’jin.
You Want Axe? was a pretty mandatory talent for him to be of any good. Though I don’t remember much about pre-rework Zul’jin. So far back dude.

However, I’m not a fan of Muradin’s baseline quest. I wouldn’t mind seeing it disappear, but Muradin would suffer so badly because his stun is a skillshot that be easily avoided by side stepping and absorbed by minions.

Another example of a bad implementation of a baseline quest was Chromie’s. I didn’t particularly enjoy it because it just became a burden for the player to endure. I’m glad that abomination is gone, but I still don’t understand why Chromie needs a baseline Echo. I would get rid of it and make the echo exclusive to Here and There at Lvl 11.

5 Likes

They are good indirect buffs since some of them had 99% popularity as talents. Now you get them for free just by picking the hero.

2 Likes

I think quests should be talents when they change your play style, or at least the rewards do. I like baseline quests when they give you an incentive to play your hero well, like Medivh’s and Jaina’s, but do not fundamentally change how you are playing them. I thought that giving Jaina Iceblock for completing her quest was a very nice touch.

9 Likes

I would like baseline W quest on Tassadar, because it fits him pretty well.

1 Like

there’s a lot you don’t know my friend

I think there are pros and cons to having baseline quests. From a high level, I think they’re cool and good for the game, but have be used very sparingly because they very heavily control what that hero wants to do until the quest is completed, which can easily warp gameplay in a negative way.

In my mind, the pros are:

  1. Games with baseline quest heroes tend to tell better stories and have more variety. Since the quest is done at a different point in each game, there is a feeling of success or failure depending on how well the player does, which makes those games more interesting.

  2. Having a clear moment of a power spike feels good.

  3. The change in mentality for the player and their opponents of a quest-compete vs. non quest-complete version of a hero can make them feel a lot different to play with and against, which adds more variety to those games.

  4. It feels good as an opponent to deny quests from being completed. It adds a mini-game that isn’t present in “normal” games.

Cons:

  1. Baseline quests heavily warp gameplay, and having too many of them on a team can cause the game to change in weird ways. As an example, a hero with a baseline quest that wants to hit enemy Heroes is much less incentivized to help their team take Mercenary Camps, even if it’s the right thing to do timing-wise.

  2. They can feel unfair to play against, particularly if the questing hero does well, since the power spike given to the questing hero isn’t available to every hero in the game.

  3. They’re often a relatively selfish mechanic in a game that’s heavily based on team play, which can cause issues in team cohesion.

Since we first started putting them in we’ve pulled back a bit. Our bigger fear is that having too many of them on a team too often will warp the game in weird ways, so we try to use the mechanic sparingly. That being said, I still think they have a place in our game. I really like playing heroes like Alarak, Medivh, and The Butcher precisely because of the high highs that they offer.

16 Likes

Jaina rework (after her destruction) was one of the best made. She is a well done hero and the best mage in the game

3 Likes

I like quests that punish deaths since they encourage you to play safe and consider getting stacks vs possibility of dying.

As long as the quest doesn’t have weird requirements like the Thrall Lighting one I wouldn’t mind them baseline.

Muradin’s play style changes a lot before and after he finish his quest, I personally like it a lot.

1 Like

It´s so good i often forgot she even had one, it just ties in perfectly with her playstyle.

1 Like

Minky has a very popular question about damage taken in stats. Do you know if it will return? Or why the devs removed it?
We found it very usefull to see if we did good damage taken wise in our particular role

1 Like

I imagine that was part of the plan to reduce her blow-up potential, by having her Q damage spread out over 2 shots instead of one big nuke.

Also the Echo gives her slightly more aa damage to let her fight divers a bit better without Bronze Talons.

1 Like

Generally, I think quests are best when they’re just an extension of what the character’s designed to do at their core-- Things like Zul’jin attacking heroes, or Azmodan wave clearing are good. Like, for heroes like Gaz or murky, I think it’d be good if they got a stacking buff for late game from taking camps, like what fazlowe’s bribe gives.

I think they are a great teaching tool if used well.

Muradins is a perfect example teaching wise. Get stacks for stuns and get more stacks for securing a kill with it.

More generally I think they are a great way to add power to a hero without messing up the early game. You can work out when the earliest time a hero can possibly complete a quest so you set the target to guarantee a hero doesn’t get the reward until x seconds have passed.

I think they’re good, I’m glad they aren’t ubiquitous.

1 Like