#380 - Into the Nexus: “with HOTS-Dev Kofalt”

• Garrett • Kyle • NotParadox or Guest

Tracking Link:

https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/

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Intro:  Welcome to Into the Nexus! The Heroes of the Storm podcast!

Associate Game Designer for Heroes of the Storm Josh “RawrJar” Kofalt joins the show! Garrett and Kyle get to sit down with the man behind the balance curtain and ask your questions! Kofalt has a rich history with the game, joining in the technical alpha, Cloud9, coaching and eventually making his way on to the Q&A team. Now part of the developers, Kofalt has taken up the mantle on Reddit for balance updates and inquiries. This episode is a catalogue of design philosophies, strategies and a gimps at the Heroes Team as a whole. Enjoy, and remember to thank your devs!

Josh Kofalt Interview

• History as a pro-player for Cloud9 and other teams.
• When did you start working for Blizzard?
• When did you swap over to the Heroes team?

Patreon Mention: Patreon.com/ITN

Thanks to our Patreon producers Declan H, CheezyBob, Chris K, Shawn B, & Mike R!

Patron Thanks Doc for keeping track

• Jack Tilston

Personal Play

Wahrluck

Who's your favorite hero aesthetically and one you love to play?

Ironik

When you're playing HOTS, what's your personal favorite game mode?

Prodamgarazh

Do you watch CCL or other tournaments? Your favorite teams/players?

Philosophy and Personal Style

Unpronounceable
Is there something you'd like players to do that would make your job easier? (Individually or collectively, in or out of game)

Duality

Have balance philosophies changed at all since Jackson left the team? In general, what are some lessons that Jackson left you with and some of his ideas that you are trying to preserve and what is something new or different that you can now do that was maybe not a goal or a priority before?

(For example, I think I remember that Fishing Hook was almost cut completely during the previous rework but the latest rework made it baseline at 13. What was the thought process then and the thought process now?)

Baconit420

Are the devs willing/able to share anything about some of their philosophies guiding hero reworks?

Jbrunson88

Is there a certain era/patch in your history behind the curtain of Heroes of the Storm where, in your opinion, the game was in as close to perfect balance as it could be?

Krushinator

• Players have a lot of opinions on whether balance/bug fixes should be released piecemeal as it's ready, or whether they should be bundled up in larger patches/content releases. Is there an ideal patch size and release schedule that you aim for, or are there too many variables in workflow to have those kinds of goals?
• Question: If the game was being balanced by a computer or some kind of AI, what sort of mistakes would it make that an experienced balance designer would not? What can't the raw numbers tell you when it comes to balance?

JJP3

What is your least favourite thing about HotS and why? How would you change the game to improve this?

Balance

Zatoichi8

How much do you consider storm league rank when you’re looking at data for adjustments?

Skyzophrenic

• What is the current balance philosophy, in terms of valuing high level gameplay vs low/ average level gameplay?
• How is the balance team accounting for heroes that fall into multiple roles, such as tank stukov - and is this role flexibility something that is being aimed for?
• Has the team tested anything to make the off lane more interactive? I find that once you are locked into the offlane role it is frequently correct to pretty much only focus on the waves and rarely on the enemy hero(es).

Whattup

• What are your thoughts on balancing the game for different levels of play (QM/low-rank/high-rank/competitive)? Do you think it's okay for certain heroes to only be viable in certain rank brackets (like Medivh being highly contested in CCL while seriously underperforming in lower ranks/QM).
• Similar to the last two... Do you watch CCL at all, and does CCL directly influence balance changes or is it more just that CCL influences the overall meta which then helps dictate balance changes?

Deelawn

What is your criteria for 'baking in' a talent for a hero? Do you have any more planned 'bake ins' you'd like to share with us?

Can we expect any sort of regular update schedule? 2020 was basically every 4 weeks. This year has been irregular

Gameplay

Baka_Sanchan

Some people have argued something along the lines of Mercenary camps usually being taken more for their EXP than their pushing potential.

Are there any changes or an anomaly for mercenary camps in the works?

TheJediCounsel

Have you thought about reversing the Forts and Keeps prioritizing Heroes who attack other Heroes over shooting Minions. I’m pretty used to it at this point, but still do feel like I miss the old style.

Duality

When removing the Medallion the dev comment said that cc protection might be explored more in the future. Is something cc-related actively being tested right now?

Corny

Are you happy with fountains? Some are still calling for immunity until the fort/keep dies. If ability to snipe a well is part of a heroes power pie, I'd rather have something cooler

Scorch_62

Why are unranked accounts excluded from rank decay?

fishyPenguin

Could you share a (more) recent ranked player distribution? The last official one we got was mentioned back in summer 2019 and I'm curious what/ if anything has changed since then.

Duality

What can you share about future reworks and other changes/additions?

Talents

SoTheBee

Are you happy with how the Loan Talents are working out? Are there more thoughts on iterations for them?

Daulity

Do you have an extreme or even unrealistic dream for Heroes? Maybe a crazy talent that you want to see added or something?

Spazzo965

Does the team have an internal reference sheet when it comes to designing & implementing talents & abilities - something along the lines of "when implementing a knockback ability, use X formulae", or "when wanting a multiplicative damage buff with Y other buff types, use Z method", or "apply buffs & debuffs after damage is dealt, but markers before"?

Corny

Are you ok with Aba being the only hero with Mule when there's lots of chars that it would make sense also having it like Zag, Probius, or maybe Gazlowe?

Level 20 Talents
Scaboboboobs & Spinn73 both asked about 20’s

There are still heroes with 20's that don't feel impactful or exciting to pick (Blaze, Zagara come to mind).  More fun and stupidly powerful 20s please!

Spinn73

In his podcast AZ Jackson revealed his desire to create more interesting and unique level 20 talents. He expressed his desire to give zagara Broodlust, an ability which would spawn a bunch of summons and buff them for a short amount of time. Do you have any wishes to give more impactful level 20 talents to some heroes in the future? And do you have any personal requests?

ARAM

WhattUp

Does ARAM influence balance changes? It seems like it's growing in popularity (idk for sure), and its balance is all over the place. The absolute chaos of ARAM is fun but some severe outliers like Zul'jin/Gazlowe can make some matchups feel very one-sided.

Theapocalypseshovel

What design insights - if any - are you able to glean from ARAM, given the amount of games that are played/the constant team fight nature of the games?

GanjARAM

any thoughts, revelations or ideas on aram? would love to hear how you people view it behind the scenes!

Reworks

Rework requests from Reddit:

• Keal’thas
• Nova
• Zagara
• Probius
• Nazeebo
• Probius
• Butcher
• Arthas
• Whitemane

Archlichofthestorm

Are there are any plans for reworking Kael'thas? He feels impactful only when enemies group up and are bad at dodging. I think there should be something that makes him more dependent on skill of his user and not skill of the enemy players.

Pscythic

How do you feel about Samuro's current state and how successful do you feel the rework was?

Tailacoster

What is the teams current philosophy with hero reworks, and what should we expect going forward? Is there any chance we see lower popularity/impact heroes (Nova, Probius, etc.) getting any love soon?

Hive0805

Are you planning on redesigning Nova as a support and reworking Zagara, Probius, and Nazeebo? Also appreciate the interaction with your fanbase.

Lucas_Trask

• Are there any plans for a soonishTM rework for Nova? (or even just a talent pass)?

Broomboy381

What do you think of the current state of probius? Now that gazlowe has been reworked to be more of a team fighter I think the niche of a builder type hero could be more.heavily leaned into as the combo and area denial mage probius is outclassed. It would better fit with probe archetype.

Saidet

Nova, Butcher, Arthas, Valeera or Murky any of them getting a rework anytime soon?

SotheBee

Any plans for upcoming balance changes for Whitemane?

Deelawn

As a side note, I love whitemane, can we bake in something fun that's auto attack related?

Rapid Fire

NotBelial

Tell us a lie about something we are not supposed to know!

Lvl100Gulurak

Will Johanna get scaling on her E shield glare?

Corny

Question: Can you add some kind of travel tunnel to blackhearts bay to solve the similar problem you had with warhead junction?

Scorch_62

Can Tyrande get a clearer and longer lasting hunter's mark visual?

Outro

Patreon Shout Out

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Catch the live show Thursday at 5pm Eastern / 2pm Pacific on Twitch.tv/Amovetv. Mobile live stream provided by Alpha Geek Radio.

Follow the show on Twitter @ITNcast and ITNpodcast.reddit.com.

Thanks to Gorath for our intro music and briangriffithmusic.com (@briangriffith) for our outro..

Personal Stuff

Garrett

• Follow Garrett @GarrettArt
• NOMOONart.com for Garrett’s stream designs
• The Angry Chicken: A Hearthstone Podcast
• R2-T2

Kyle

• Twitch.tv/kylefergusson
• Kylefergusson.com

New Hero

New Hero Requests of Reddit:

• N’Zoth (or Core Replacement Heroes)
  Lady Vashj
• Azshara
• Mannaroth
• Shield Hero Similar to old Tassadar

Tailacoster

Can we get any information or hints about when to expect the next hero? Should we only be looking forward to the one, or is there a possibility for more than one to release this year?

Nemanjanemanja992

• 1) Are devs currently working on upcoming new heroes?
• 2) Is there chance that we get Core replacement hero like for example N'Zoth? (after Deathwing I feel like anything is possible now)
• 3) Will we get Naga hero?

D0ctorLogan

Do you have any supports you are working on? Or at least a hero what would have similar kit to old Tassadar? Considering you didn't have any supports in progress, Tassadar was a big lose for support role.

Requests

Twinklesunnysun

New Mal'Ganis skin when? Our local vampire craves moar skins

Gothlilisaregreat

MORE ORPHEA SKINS

Would the team be open to placing community driven events such as CCL on the launcher in the future?

Are there any plans to improve the search tag feature that was recently added (and maybe make it more apparent for hero selection options)? For example, It would be nice to be able to say something a long the lines of "we need something that can engage," and have a team mate just press a button that displays a selection of heroes with reliable engages.

Technical

Spazzo965

Is the team aware that heal taken reduction(like Varian's Mortal Strike talent) is multiplicative with heal dealt increase\reduction(like Varian's Banner of Dalaran granting spellpower, or Blaze's Suppressive Fire reducing spellpower)

I mostly ask as the heal taken reduction floating combat text does its math as though it is additive, Gul'dan's Hunger for Power's Heal dealt increase has the math thinking it is additive, so I'm really genuinely curious if it is meant to be and thought to be additive, but it is actually multiplicative.

Broomboy381

I understand that the past game modes like the pve zerg mode were unable to use current heroes like DW on them and as such were more or less abandoned. With the ability to turn off heroes ALA stukov what is stopping us from having game modes like Pull Party or the PvE maps in at custom lobbies with those characters disabled?

Off-Topic / Other Department

Map editor?

Any words on clan systems?

Lambey332

There are various rumours about dev team size and whatnot, is he able to comment on what he thinks the future of the game is?

MelaniaSexLife

Any plans on monetization that can add to the game? A Battle Pass would be a great addition to keep players playing on their main account and curb smurfs. You guys already have a framework with the seasonal reward track, and you don't even need to create new assets - you can just reuse the HGC rewards, or the HGC Twitch rewards which were stupid expensive and most people couldn't get them.

Pscythic

what is happening with all the bugs in recent patches?

Boner_Elemental

• 1). Are new heroes on the table?
• 2). New maps?
• 3). After our extensive Christmas will seasonal events be returning to a normalish schedule?
• 4). And if they do will there be new stuff?

DomSithe

Are we ever going to get a protoss or diablo demon healer? Maybe rework probius into a healer?

Will missing skins be fixed

ParanoidRocker

And for my final question, will we ever see Haunted Mines in QM again?

Pineconefire

Is it possible that HotS could have a Battle Royale mode?

Twinklesunnsun

Any chance the Mastery Rings could be purchasable with gems too? Kinda sucks running out of gold and still having 2,000+ gems

Tailacoster

Is the team working on any new maps or map reworks? Is there a chance we get a Haunted Mines rework and rerelease? With all the art and sound assets already made, it seems like a great opportunity to breathe fresh air into the map pool.

Is there a fix planned to make all of the skins available for the current events that are up? Currently you can only purchase and craft some of the skins from each of the events, but many are still not available.

 Is Arthas' remodel in plans for this year?

Is there a slight chance of Arthas recieving at least a visual update?

JJP3

• Are there any plans to utilise the cross play system newly implemented across battle net? E.g. to allow players to use heroes and skins they earned in one region in all regions?
• Do you have any plans to promote HotS again across other blizzard games, like the Nexus Challenge did with Overwatch players?

Drexlortheterrible

Is the team (dedicated employees) currently larger or smaller than in 2019?

Frog-Eater

Can we imagine future cooperations with other Blizzard games like we used to have with Overwatch and WoW?