If you were to design the perfect pub stomping hero, what skills would you give him? You obviously want to play mid to control the pace of the game and the runes; And for that you need mobility. Perhaps a slow or stun so you can chase those lesser heroes. Don’t forget high DPS so maybe high AOE dps potential because you are playing 1v5 after all. Well, turns out no need to design such a hero since it exists in the form of Wretched Hag! Keep reading to find out how to turn those death sighs into the baby screams of your enemies after you taunt them and turn them into batfood.
As you may have noticed, S2 has released several previews of the soon to be released hero, Aluna. From the looks of it Aluna is an Intelligence ganker hero, who specializes in mobility, debuffing enemies/buffing herself, and crowd control. Lets start by taking a look at what S2 has released:
Paul Garces - More pics @ Paul-Garces.com
The powers of a modern day Latina superhero will come to life in Newerth this Friday as our newest hero is unleashed!
Beautiful and spirited, Aluna carries within her the essence of Earth itself — the old Earth, long since lost to the decay of ages. Endowed with its might, and carrying the power of the moon in a mystical emerald, Aluna strikes at her daemonic foes with deadly speed. Thanks to her skill in battle, she has already become a celebrity among the heroes of Newerth.
Aluna is inspired by the life of a beautiful and spirited actress. Curious who our new Latina superstar is? Stay tuned to our HoN Facebook page for daily updates!
The Latina superstar turned out to be Paula Garcés. The beautiful actress from movies like Harold and Kumar, Clockstoppers and Warehouse 13.
But enough about Paula! Lets get to Luna and see what S2 has released so far. Lets begin with her teaser video.
NEW Aluna Teaser Video
Aluna’s Skills
Emerald Lightning
Description: Aluna launches a bolt of lightning that bounces off her enemies, stealing their attack speed and leaving them stunned.
Ulti Effects: Increases attack speed drain and stuns the last target for longer duration
Notes: This skill seems similar to Voodoo Jester’s Acid Cocktail although it has a variable effect based on how many targets have been hit. More targets means more attack speed for Aluna. Also as the lightning bolt bounces on units and heroes its effects become stronger, increasing the stun duration and amount of attack speed drained.
Power Throw
Description: Channeling her strength into a single throw, Aluna is able to throw her weapon with deadly speed and accuracy.
Ulti Effect: Gives infinite range and deals full damage for all units it hit.
Notes: Seems like a skillshot, similar to valkyrie’s javelin. Deals damage to units in its path but damage amount is diminished after hitting each unit.
Deja Vu
Description: Aluna can see the past and future on the surface of moonlit water, and she can travel there under proper conditions.
S2 released a teaser video showing Valk’s new skin. Going back to the original Priestess of the Moon from Dota, the alt skin features Valkyrie riding on what looks like to be a wolf. Enjoy!
Long discussed has been the concept of “MMR Hell” or “PSR Poverty”, a phenomenon that occurs once you reach a specific lower level of MMR. Theorized by many to occur within the low 1200 bracket, the idea is that you can never climb out the bracket regardless of how well you play because your teammates are fundamentally awful. The only players who can even attempt to get out of such a predicament are “pros” who can single-handedly win games themselves by maximizing on every mistake their enemy makes.
The theory itself has many supporters, as many of us have had games where you have done everything right but your teammates literally failed you completely. There are also those who denounce such a concept, stating a good player will always be able to climb out of a slump and that those who are stuck within this bracket are rightfully there.
I myself was curious to how true this was, therefore I have sacrificed the MMR of my sub-account “TaintSoul” to determine if such an effect. These posts will detail my experiment in which my MMR has been set to 1200 rating. I will play normal mode games with search criteria: USEast servers with AP, AR and SD modes selected.
To take a more controlled approach I will play 10 games using random heroes, support heroes and carry heroes. The results of these games, with comments of each game will be made for each match. Match ID is linked to Hero Usage
Middle lane vs MQ where I tried to play as badly as possible. Did not compete for many last hits or play aggressive. Did not gank side lanes often. Enemy was aware of minimap as KoTF eyes kept them safe. Teammates gave up at approximately 10 minutes in with a lot of chat about how we were going to lose. Nobody would buy wards and everyone took forever to buy items. No teammates bought wards of sight or dust for KoTF. Players also skilled their heroes incorrectly and argued when confronted.
Every team fight won was because of my ult + pkey combo. Gladiator failed middle and was extremely greedy and our Flint fought me for every last hit, though he couldn’t manage to get last hits even with no enemies in the lane; he missed them by a hair or would attack a fraction too early in an attempt to prevent me from getting it. He also threatened to stay in fountain if I didn’t stop telling him to “stop auto attacking”. Single handedly killed their jungling Tempest as they never had wards.
Game started with good communication and a 4 teammate gank on rune. We killed 3 of theirs for 1 of ours. Laned the top lane vs Swift and Glacius by myself. Both over pushed and auto attacked so I was safe at the tower the entire time. Got a few kills and multiple escapes. Reached critical mass with a Savage Mace and went 19/5/16. Deaths attributed to foolishness at the end of the game.
Laned vs Swift and Pollywog. Both played too passive, let me harass them and had no idea how to deal with skeletons and did not attempt to kill them. Denied all of their farm and while Swift fought with his team they left him to die often. I farmed ~250 CK, about the amount the rest of my team had combined.
Mid as Devo vs Flint. Played it passive but got all the runes and most of the hits. Got an easy kill on Flint and ganked side lanes often. Almost lost the game dispite going 13/3/20, getting all luxury items and killing flint at least 5 times. Madman on our team never said a word, just farmed all game and never went into a team fight. We eventually won the game 4v5 while he farmed ancients with a score of 2/3/2 or thereabouts.
Defiler mid vs DR. Did well and got an early kill but their DR was not a poor player. At least two of my teammates were friends, one helping his ~1050 MMR friend get better. Other team were miserable players aside from DR. Their Empath was completely incompetent and fed often. No wards bought outside of my own.
Probably the most undeserved win of all. While I was leading the team in kills and only one with a positive KDR the rest of my team were feeding their carries. Worst part was we had a scout who refused to speak, never showed up to team fights unless he could KS the remaining low HP heroes and farmed jungle all game. He made a 28 minute Runed Axe and managed to get a Savage Mace by 40 minutes or so. We won because of the other teams incompetence to push, though scout never fought with us as a team his constant killing of random heroes killed their moral.
Completely shut down bottom lane with Witch Slayer as my teammate. Double stun got many kills to the point their PR just quits and we rax them. Short game, though BH got so pissed at me for taking his kills he built a codex 5 as his only real item.
Slow to get a pkey but nothing too bad. Our mid was decent as chipper but we had no true carry and our WildSoul spent most of his time in bear form. Lost because we let WarBeast farm and refused to fight against it. It was literally “well warbeast farmed for 30 minutes, lets concede” before he even killed any of us.
My team was fairly incompetent, with MQ mid never ganking the lane that needs to be ganked leaving Swift to free farm. Despite getting a fast runed axe my Malphas ult was perfect on every teamfight and soon followed by a Bubbles and Kraken ult resulting in several genocides and near genocides. Game was won fairly quickly and easily but heavily due to the result of the Malphas AOE stun combined with other AOE snares
Conclusion
Using just random heroes it appears a player of normal skill level can climb out of the lower brackets of matchmaking. While not all wins can be done single handedly two things I believe attribute to winning consistently are as follows:
Matchmaking pairs players in groups of 5, with a MMR matched player in each slot. Therefore two teams are roughly equal, though they may consist of a 1600, 1500, 1400, 1300 and 1200 player. Thus if the 1200 player truly has gotten better and plays at a 1600 level, he will be matched against a player that should perform poorly in comparison and turning the tides in their favor.
While couriers are common even in lower brackets they are rarely utilized. Upgraded couriers are not as commonly seen and wards are near non-existent. Buying wards, regardless of hero role keeps you safe and keeps your teammates safe. Many players will still ignore obvious signs of a gank on the minimap but if told verbally they need to retreat they often will listen.
I should note that while many players at this level are poorly skilled there are many that are legitimately good. Whether their MMR is low because of terrible teammates, a string of bad luck or similar to myself and have artificially lowered their rating you cannot assume all of your opponents are bad. Conversely there are players that consistently pick heroes that regardless of how poor you play if the game goes long enough you will win. SW, Predator and other heroes that dominate late game should be watched carefully.
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