Pet Battles: Pandaren Tamers

Happy Friday darlings!! Well it's a rather dreary day here so I'm drinking a nice hot brew - Twinnings English Breakfast tea incidentally - (Someone asked me on twitter what my 'brew' was!) and today I am going to embark on the second of my Pet Battles series, there will also be an opportunity to win yourself a Gusting Grimoire in honor of me reaching 10k pageviews on this blog! 

First off I shall continue with my favorite pet(s) in each category....

Flying:

For my flying pets I have a love of my Amber moth (who is yet to be named) and Sparks, my firefly, who actually dropped out of a random goodie bag from a ToT LFR. I love him because he's really pretty, however for 'usefulness' I tend to go with the moth as it hits harder and can usually dispatch any aquatic pet quite quickly, however it can also hold its own against non aquatic pets due to it having 'cocoon' which can make it avoid an attack every 3 rounds!


Undead:

I really struggled with this category, seeing as most of my favorite pets seem to be in it! However I managed to restrain and just pick these three... 

My Unborn Val'kyr, she's so pretty...I actually have no idea what she is like as a battle pet, I am aware from my readings that I will possibly need her for the Celestial Tournament but she's just so beautiful I mainly got her for her looks (yes I am that shallow)

Bones, my Fossilized Raptor, apart from being unbelievably cute, he matches my mount and he's quite a handy little pet to have around, especially if you are facing humanoid competition! 

Finally, my last choice in the category isn't particularly cute, or fluffy, or sparkly, which are the qualities I usually look for in a pet, but I have fallen in love with him none-the-less, I think mostly out of pity as I felt so sorry for him when I saw him. Over the months he has actually turned out to be a great pet and got me out of some crappy battles with difficult opponents, may I present to you, my slightly scruffy looking Stitched Puppy 'Patches'!

Dragonkin:

An easy choice here, one for looks and one for looks AND utility!!
My Celestial Dragon, because sparkly, pretty, shiny reasons! 







Lishi, the Wild Crimson Hatchling, she's not only really pretty but she's a really nice pet to use in battles due to her speed and self heals.




Pandaren Tamers.

Before I start I am going to dish these out in the order that I fly round them in, (bear in mind I also incorporate the Pandaren Spirit Tamers and the Beasts of Fable) it seems to be the 'shortest' route and if you are busy working on other things like blogs and such, there a flight posts near each one so you can take a kite if you don't want to fly there yourself. (Although this is a longer route ultimately)


Aki The Chosen.

Found in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms (now by Mistfall Village - Pre 5.4 she was near the Seat Of Knowledge)
Her 3 pets are Chirrup (Beast), Stormlash (Dragonkin) and Whiskers (Aquatic).
For her I like to use (in this order);
Leveling pet

Anubisath Idol
Amber Moth
I use the leveling pet for 1 turn unless they are 20+, then they can sometimes hold out for a few turns but rather than take risk I will use my Idol to kill both Chirrup his Stoneskin pretty much negates all of the Swarms he casts, and Stormlash, for her I will always use Deflection as soon as she is brought out to block her call lightening, which can remove half HP if it crits. This obviously leaves me with Crush/Demolish to deal damage, as Chirrup poses less threat i take Crush which is good against Stormlash, who hits a lot harder and needs to be taken care of quicker. The Idol should easily survive these two, as long as you keep Stoneskin up, I bring out the Amber Moth for Whiskers, as its Slicing Wind, Cocoon Stike and Mothballs are all very strong against him.


Courageous Yon.

A little harder to find initially, he is in a tiny almost invisible cave on top of a mountain on the West of Kun-Lai Summit, he looks a little like Taran-Zhu, and his 3 companions are; Piqua (Flying), Lapin (Critter) and Bleat (Beast).
The pets I use for this tamer and order;
Leveling pet
Anubisath Idol
Son of Animus (If you don't have one, any mechanical pet, preferably with a self heal will be fine)
I will, as usual, use the level pet for one turn, and make use of the Idol's Stoneskin ability as once again, it negates most of not all the damage from Piqua's Flock move. I will also use him for Lapin, however it can be a bit touch and go and crit dependent with this fight, though most of the time Lapin should die, leaving you with a small smount of HP, I swap out the Idol for the animus and make a start on Bleat. Make no mistake, this pet can hit like a truck, especially if 'Chew' Crits, although it shouldn't do, if you're feeling vulnerable you can put your shiled up first, then just use Touch of Anima to regain any health lost from his first 2 turns, tha snimus hits really hard and it should only take you 3 turns dealing to kill him.

Seeker Zushi.

On the same Island as Niuzao Temple next to the lake, this Jinyu's 3 pets are; Diamond (ele), Mollus (Critter) and Skimmer (Aquatic).
The pets I use;
Pandaren Water Spirit
Level Pet
Amber Moth
I use the Pandaren Water Spirit to kill the first pet he has, as he has 3 moves strong against other elemental pets, but is fortunately not susceptible to the attacks that Diamond uses as they are not particularly strong against other ele's. I will bring out my leveling pet against Mollus (who works the same way as the Rapana Welks), for one turn and then use the Amber moth to finish Mollusc and kill Skimmer. If by some unlucky chancce I get crit by Skimmers Pump move, I will bring out the Pandaren spirit to finish him off, being careful to use Dive to negate a move.


Wastewalker Shu.

For me, this guy is a bit of a pain in the arse, even though he has a really cool looking helmet on, I don't even bother trying to level a pet with this one due to his irritating combo of pets that all hit like trucks and are all quite tanky. He uses; Crusher (Aquatic), Pounder (Ele) and Mutilator (Beast).
I use;

Amber moth
Eternal Water Strider
Dark Animus/Darkmoon Tonk/Zepplin
I have tried using levelling pets,. but so far I have not found a 2 pet combo from my own that can reliably 2 v 3 his pets, I shall keep trying and get back to that at a later date perhaps. With no leveling pet, I simply use the Moth on Crusher (Be sure to use Cocoon when the Whirlpool is on 1 to avoid the damage), the Water Strider against Pounder (who needs to be killed quickly as he damages your other pets), and my mechanical pet of choice against Mutilator the super hedgehog!!


Mo'ruk.

Down on an island at the south of Krasrang, this Hozen has 3 delightful pets which took me a while to work out a decent enough combo for to enable me to use him for leveling! He uses; Woodcarver (Beast), Lightstalker (Flying) and Needleback (Aquatic).
I use;
Level pet
Darkmoon Tonk
Amber Moth
I will as usual use the level pet for one turn, it will usually be subjected to Woodcarver's Acidic Goo, which, unless the pet is < level 5, *shouldn't* do it fatal damage. I then switch to my Tonk, deposit mines, then use Charge and lock on to finish the squidgy bug off. I don't tend to panic too much if the tonk dies here, the mines will remain in place, and they will dish out a great deal of damage against Lightstalker when he comes out, you can either finish him off with the tonk if it's still alive or switch to the Moth, which is then used to kill Needleback.

Farmer Nishi.

I always feel bad killing this Pandaren's pets, I love her happy little sunflower and I hate beating him up, however, if I don't get rid of him quickly he can cause Issues!! She uses; Siren (Ele), Toothbreaker ((Ele) and Brood of Mothran (Beast).
I use;
Eternal Strider
Level pet
Son of Animus/Darkmoon Tonk/Zepplin.
I use the Strider to dispatch Siren (Begrudgingly), I ensure that I replace his sunny weather with my cleansing rain, I usually charge pump first and let him cast his Sunlight, then cast my Cleansing water, then let loose with the charged pump, this should almost kill him, leaving a water jet or two to finish him off, if you can recharge pump before he dies ready for Toothbreaker then great.  I usually take the opportunity to bring out my level pet once Toothbreaker casts Sons of Root, I will use my charged pump before hand before swapping the Strider out. After my level pet has had 1 turn I will bring back the Strider and do my best to kill him with that, its not quite the end of the world if he kills the strider as long as you have him on relatively low HP, it just becomes a bit laborious to finish him off with your mech pet as he is resilient to their hits. After he has gone I use the remaining mech pet to kill off the Brood of Mothran and job's a good'un!

Hyuna of the Shrines.

Just south of Dawns Blossom is the final tamer on mainland Pandaria. She has 3 companions, Skyshaper (Flying), Fangor, (Beast), and Dor the Wall (Aquatic).
I use;
Leveling pet
Darkmoon Zepplin/Son of Animus
Amber Moth
As always, I bring out my level pet for one turn, then pull out the Zep/Animus and use him to get rid of Skyshaper (the Animus hits harder for this and has a self heal, making him a more kilely candidate for helping with the other pets). If the Mech pet survives Skyshaper i will usually use them until Fangor kills them, then switch to the Moth, fortunately tall of fangor attacks are weak on the moth, so he should go down pretty quick, for the last pet it's a classic Flying Vs Aquatic, and the moth should take care of Dor with ease.

Little Tommy Newcomer.

Dont let the name fool you, this 'little' guy only has one pet sure, but it's a friggin monster!! I do not use leveling pets against this guy, he also only gives you timeless coins and no sack of pet goodies for defeating him but it's one of those things I had to do at least once!
He uses;
Lil' Oondasta (Who is incidentally not THAT little)
I use;
Darkmoon Tonk
Darmoon Zepplin
Son of Animus

Basically any combination of all Mechanical pets will work on this guy, his Frill blast, which he will open with, will swap out your first pet for your second one, so I use the pets in the order above, so that I can get my Decoy up quickly for his second move Spitfire Beam. After that it's a case of do as much damage as you can while he annihilates your pets with his Crush.  Have fun with this one ;)









Win a Gusting Grimoire!!!!

So to honor my 10k views i am giving away the TCG pet aforementioned. I have the code to the pet ready and waiting, to win the pet, simply comment on ANY of my pet battle posts, about anything pet related, your favorite pet for example, and I shall draw at random from the comments and announce the winner next Saturday after Fridays post has been up for a day!!

Be good

Dark

Pet Battles; Pandaren Spirit Tamers

Hi guys!

Hope everyone's weekend is off to the nice start mine is! After 8 months I have finally picked up my Minfernal pet from Felwood, in addition to this, 2 days ago I managed to capture my Unborn Val'kyr from Crystalsong forest after 6 months of camping her!! I also completed my Pandaren spirit pet collection, which is what led me to my post topic for today.
     Before I get into how I farm the Pandaren spirit tamers, I am going to go through my top pet for each pet family (only some in this post and the rest in future posts), these will be the ones that I use for leveling other pets, farming, or just for the way they look :) 

Mechanical:

Son of Animus - Not only is little guy ridiculously cute, but he is an amazing leveling pet. He has a self heal and a shield and hits like a truck. The best thing about him has to be the way he runs after your toon!! He is a drop from the Dark Animus in Throne of thunder, you can pick him up on any difficulty including LFR. However be warned, if you do not have enough room for him in your bags in LFR when you win him (he drops as personal loot), he will be lost to the twisting nether forever and you will not get him back. He can also be caged and traded so you could always check out your auction house to see if anyone has put him on there.


Darkmoon Zepplin - A little easier to get hold of than the Animus ad you can farm the Darkmoon tickets to purchase it. You can also purchase the Darkmoon Tonk which is another good pet although I tend to favour the Zippy the Zepplin as his decoy move can avoid some real issues with hard hitting enemies such as Lil' Oondasta, buying you some all important turns to get your damage done.



Magical:

Oily Slimeling - This pet I use when I am against flying pets as he is actually really strong, he can heal himself and deal DoT and has a hard hitting spell which can take off half of a flying opponents health if it crits. I also use him against other pets for his nuke and self heals.

Living Fluid - Aother ToT drop (Primordius) which works the same as the oily slimeling but has a different level 20 spell.









 
Harmonious Porcupette - Selfish reasons, it's shiny and cute, nuff said ^_^










Humanoid: 

Anubisath Idol - My little Amun Ra, he is an amazing tank pet and he can hit like a train too, plus he looks really cool (I am a massive fan of Egyptian style stuff).  The ONLY downside to him is that you must either pay a fortune for him from the AH or farm him from AQ 40. He is an 11% drop from Emperor Vek'lor.

Taming the Pandaren Spirit tamers.


Flowing Pandaren Spirit 

This guy can be found in the Dread wastes, on the long rocky path that runs out into the sea between the Wastes and Krasarang Wilds. The spirit has 3 pets; Marley (Aquatic), Tiptoe (Critter) and the Pandaren Water Spirit (ele).
This is one of the harder ones as his first pet Marley can cause huge issues if he is not taken down quickly. I use an Amber Moth and hit him with Moth Balls and Slicing Wind, saving Cocoon Strike for when his Whirlpool is about to hit (This way you take only the hit from the pool, and not him as well). After this I just use Sw and MB's to nuke him down as fast as possible (As he is aquatic these spells will hit quite hard and he is usually dead withing 5 turns). 
Tiptoe is easier to deal with but again you want him to go down quick to minimize the Tidal wave casts as they hit your other pets. I sometimes continue to use my moth as it still seems to hit quite hard and I can avoid an attack every 3 turns with Coocoon strike. However If you want a pet to directly counter him I like to use either my Kovok or My Zandalari Foot slasher, both of which will hit him hard enough to kill him in a few turns. For the Spirit I use an aquatic pet, usually Squirt, my Eternal Strider. Be careful with this water spirit, he can hit really hard and kill you if you don't kill him quickly!
If I am leveling a pet I will always use the moth to kill Marley, use the leveling pet for a round on Tiptoe and take out the eternal strider, replacing for the oily Slimeling as aquatic does not deal as much damage to magic and the slimeling has quite a heavy nuke ability to kill  Tiptoe quick enough.

Whispering Pandaren Spirit.

This is one of my favorite locations for pet battling,m you can find the Whispering Spirit right at the toip of a mountain in the Jade forest, on the left of the map, directly below Dawns Blossom and to the north east of Grookin Hill. He has 3 pets;  Dusty (Flying), Whispertail (Dragonkin) and the Pandaren Air Spirit. (ele)
In my experience dragonkin pets are the best to use here, I have read that an Emerald Proto Whelp can solo all three pets!! The first pet he uses is Dusty, again, the oily slimeling is great here as he does so much damage, also I have noticed that Dusty usually opens with Moth dust, so you can use your Expunge straight away with minimal risk of having it miss due to Cocoon Strike (Obviously if the RnG gods are displeased with you then Dusty may cast CS first but you can always reset the fight if this happens). After I dispatch Dusty (Badum-bum-Tshhhh) I use Chrominius to nuke down Whispertail, purely because he hits like a truck and I usually want to get him gone as soon as possible, I use Howl and Surge of Power, which will usually get at least half, if not more of his HP. I will then use bite until he is dead, unless she manages to kill Chrominius, in which case I will switch back to the slimeling to finish her off. For the Air spirit I tend to use my water spirit as his Whirlpool/geyser combo usually kills the Air spirit, however if you don't have one I would recommend an Eternal strider, use healing rain and pump as soon as you can to get damage out as the Air spirit hits harder against aquatic. 
For leveling I get the leveling pet out against the spirit as the first thing he will cast is the soothing mists, so your baby pet will not get nuked, I will swap out Chrominius as the Pandaren Water Spirit can also take care of Whispertail. If I am leveling I will also keep the slimeling out to get some damage onto him and just let her kill it, this way you can split 2 pets over 3 opponents easier.

Thundering Pandaren Spirit.

This due is up on the mountain between the Horde Shrine and The Seat of Knowledge. His 3 pets are; Pandaren Earth Spirit (Ele), Sludgy (Magic) and Darnak the Tunneler (Beast).
Unlike the other spirits he will open with his mini version of himself, I use the Eternal Strider, open with charging my pump, then he will incapacitate me for a round (there is a chance this can stun for a further round when he deals the damage, I usually reset the fight if this happens!) I will then release pump and try to nuke him down with Water Jet, healing myself with Healing Wave if I drop to 50% HP. All this spirit will do is throw rocks at you, which will hit for 300-400 each time, so you should be able to kill him within 5 turns. For Sludgy I tried anti magic pets but nothing seemed to work for me, so I thought, know what? I'm going to "out Magic-pet" you!! So yeah, you guessed it, out comes the old faithful oily slimeling, and I just mirror his moves, he will usually kill my slimeling just before he dies, so I will pet out my animus to finish him off. I then use the Animus to kill his last pet, taking the spells metal fist, touch of Anima and interrupting jolt. Basic tactic is to nuke down with MF and IJ (although you wont get to interrupt as Darnak is faster) and as with the Eternal Strider, at 50% health use ToA. (Just make sure he has used Burrow within the last 4 turns or you will not get the heal). If you dont have the Animus the Zepplin is also nice here, use Decoy to stop his hardest hitting abilities straight away, then nuke down with Missile after applying Bombing run!
i have yet to figure out a strat for using two pets aginst this guys, as such I don't use him for leveling, I'm working on it though :)

Burning Pandaren Spirit.

Found in north Townlong Steppes west of Fire Camp Osul, this Spirit uses Crimson (Dragonkin), Pandaren Fire Spirit (Ele) and Glowy (Flying).
 Ever seen  a snail kick 3 level 25 pets butts? Well sit back ladies and gentle men, you're about to see something rather spectacular....


Meet Brian. Brian is a Rapana Whelk. Brian is going to single handedly beat 3 legendary pets.

 (Left) Start with a Shell shield
(Right) Follow with a Dive.

 
 (Left) use Absorb until you have 1 turn left on Dive.
(Right) Re apply Shell sheild and follow up with dive again.

 
 (Left) As you can see, Crimson is almost dead and Brian is on 3/4 HP.
(Right) Repeat the process against the Fire spirit's "minime".

 
(Left) After killing the spirit get out your levelling pet and allow Glowy to cast his Confusing sting, use your turn to switch pets.
(Right) Brian is back and begin your Shell/Dive/Absorb routine again.


 
The Shell will block pretty much every Swarm Glowy casts, it takes a little while but you can kill him fairly easily.

So there you have it! A Rapana Whelk that can solo 3 Legendary pets, little dude deserves a medal. If you want to pick up your own Brian, you can find them down in the Briny Muck in the Dread Wastes, they are usually level 22-23 and are easily caught.









This is by no means any sort of official guide to beat these tamers, and there are probably better ways to do it and better pets to use, but this is what I do each day to get my pet supplies, which have a chance to contain one of the spirits, good luck!!

A week away, an all monk flex and more!!

Well hello darlings!!!! Seeing as it's been a whole TWO weeks since I posted last, I guess we have some catching up to do!!

Firstly, my week away was well spent, I went to visit my family, whom I had not seen since Christmas so it was lovely to catch up with them. We also had some gorgeous weather while we were there so I spent some much needed time in the sun walking my Mum's little dog :). Having a week off WoW was also much needed, Midlifecrisis has been running 2 raid groups per week, enabling us to gear our new folk and gear some alts, which is great fun but it's 5 nights a week of solid raiding, so it was lovely to have a break and not have to be sat at the computer for 7.30 each night! 

    Upon my return on Saturday night, I took part in the open raid flex race, I was on Sneezers team with 20 other monks, we raced against a team of Druids, a team of DKs and a team of Paladins. Monks came second by 2 minutes, but we are still maintaining that we are the best class, plus we were horde so we had more trash ;) I jest, it was all good fun and I really really enjoyed it, seeing 25 Xuens leaping all over the place is a truly beautiful sight to behold!! All the guys were really nice, and Sneezer did an awesome job of leading us, I felt very privileged to be picked as the second tank!!


Sneezer runs a lot of races on Open Raid, if you are interested in joining any (EU) you can fins his OR page right...... HERE!! He's a great guy, very fun to rid with, and I really look forward to running more races with him in the future! You can also catch him talking about how we did on the latest Monk Meditation episode by clicking....HERE!!!! 

    I have been doing a bit more "Windwalkering" lately, I have my normal 4 set with 2 heroic weapons and chest piece. I'm really enjoying the spec a lot, I love the extra mobility (That flying serpent kick!!) and I REALLY love when everything lines up and you get those 900k RKS's, but at the moment I'm still feeling a little lost with it. I don't know if this is because I love tanking so much and being a DPS just isn't the same, or if it's because I don't understand the spec enough to get the most out of it, or even a combination of both. Also, I'm still completely confused by the Assurance of Consequence, again I think this is due to my lack of experience with the class to really test out whether I do more damage with or without it, I suppose a few more weeks will tell, especially seeing as we are progressing on heroic Thok at the moment, which up until now I have been doing on my rather undergeared hunter, which I feel cannot pull its weight at the minute. So I shall use my monk (even though 3 melee for 10 man is a bit "meh"), and take Lazeebow to the other raids we run, and get him some more gear, because to be quite frank, hunters are ridiculously overpowered for that fight, being ranged and not suffering to any of Thoks interrupts means that they can push out silly damage (even me sat at 557 i lvl can manage a 1mil burst with 270k sustained), and as we already have one that sits at 400k, I'm guessing it would work to have another. 
       I'm looking forward to trying out WW for the fight, it should be interesting to see how Lady performs with full raid buffs, as until now I have been testing on dummies with self buffs only, so....watch this space!!


I am scouting for another victim to interview, as my E-sofa is feeling a little empty right now, I am also coming up on 10k blog hits (Ermagherd), so if you have any ideas on how I can celebrate feel free to let me know! 

See you next week,

Be good!!

Heroes of the StormTechnical Alpha review

I have been lucky enough to receive an invitation to play the Technical Alpha for Heroes of the Storm. I am going to give an overview of what I think of the game, and I will also compare it to other games of it's nature. So sit back, grab a heroic brew and join me in the storm....


A quick overview of the MOBA games.

So, for anyone who has never played a Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA)  game, here are the basics: Two teams of 5 players (can be less on smaller maps but usually no more) will battle against one another on a (usually) symmetrical map. Each team will have a main base, surrounded by barracks (from which creeps will usually spawn), and towers which will shoot at enemy players. Each player will pick from a pool of heroes, with each hero having 4 abilities (again, usually) which will become available as you gain levels through experience, which will be granted through killing enemy heroes and farming neutral or enemy creeps. Players will also gain money for kills, which will enable them to purchase Items to make their hero stronger. The aim of the game being to make your teams heroes strong enough to take out the enemy base. 

Problems with current MOBAs. 

If you've never played one of these games before, or have played once and not bothered playing again, the reason may be that the learning curve for these games is just too damn steep. Not only do you need to know all the abilities of a hero, but you need to learn how to lane (farm creeps), you need to learn which items to purchase (some items only suit certain heroes), and you need to be incredibly aware of your surroundings and positioning while doing all this. Previous to playing WoW I played Heroes of Newerth quite a bit (Basically DOTA with different named heroes). I really enjoyed the game, after I played it for about 6 months to try and learn how to play it, fortunately having a patient husband meant that I could learn in peace by just playing against him. Unfortunately, the players that play these style of games (in my experience) tend to be more than just a little unforgiving when new payers attempt to learn the game, and instead of encouragement, more often than not, I have seen these new guys (and been on the receiving end of it) take an onslaught of insults and name calling because they don't know how to play. Sadly having just one person on your team who is not self aware and doesn't know how to play means they will get ganked (killed) a lot, thus "feeding" the other team, giving them more money and experience.
      The problem I find is that there is no real safe place for people to learn, when I say safe I mean safe from the constant barrage of "feeder/noob/useless/idiot etc" insults that they will inevitably receive. This makes the game incredibly unattractive to most. Games are meant to be fun, and there is nothing enjoyable about trying to learn a game in such a hostile environment. So for 50% of the people who try playing these games, they end up playing once or twice, assuming they suck, and not picking them up again.


Enter HotS....

The first thing I noticed about HotS is that there are NO ITEMS to purchase, and you level AS A TEAM. These two factors alone, completely negate the "oh my goodness what items do I buy" and "omg that guy's shit he's level 2 while we're all level 6" problems that I found quite predominant while playing other MOBAs. You get to pick talents for your hero as you level, and the maximum choice you have is 4 options, which to me, is so much more simple and attractive as a new player. 
Most of the other aspects of the game are the same, you can kill creeps to get XP, and also enemy players/towers/other structures. However, with no individual gains from kills, there is no contest for getting the killing blow and it becomes more of a team effort, another issue dealt with. (Being accused of Kill Stealing is one of THE most annoying things in a TEAM game!!)
       Another thing I really like about this MOBA is that on each map, there will be a main protagonist that will assist whichever team earns their favor the quickest, which makes the game less about getting the highest KDR and more about achieving objectives, which is something I think other MOBAs lack, and thus, they usually become a kill fest, which gets boring after a while.


Spoiler alert...

If you do not want to know about any game content such as heroes, maps and do not want to see a game play video STOP HERE!!!!!!!! You have been warned!!!!



How it all starts.

You begin the game by playing a short tutorial which goes over the basics of your character and how to use them. It shows you the objectives of the game and forces you to play against AI until you understand enough to get stuck into other players. There is an individual level system in the game, which you can increase by winning matches and completing daily quests. When you queue for a game it will put you against people of a similar  level to yourself. (Note that you must only reach level 3 because you can take the training wheel s off and play against real people!)

Maps.

Currently there is no map selection tool, though I suspect that if you were to create a group you could select a map, or they may have plans to implement this in the future. The maps available in the Alpha are as follows:

Cursed Hollow.

This map features the Raven Lord, for whom you must gather "Tribute" upon receiving 3 tribute from either team, he will help you out by cursing your enemies!

 Haunted Mines.

A really fun map that makes the team go below ground to collect skulls from mobs to empower their Golem (1 per team) every few minutes, quite a crazy push map that I enjoyed playing immensely!!

 Dragon Shire.

2 Shrines appear at the top and bottom of the map, with another in the middle, one team must control top and bottom in order to activate the central shrine and release the Dragon knight!! One of the more "positional" maps, whereby having the right players in the right place is the key to winning.

Blackheart's Bay

Last but not least, my favorite map, featuring Cap'n Blackheart, who, in exchange for Dubloons, will periodically bombard yer enemy team with his cannons!

As it stands, these are the only maps available for play, each of which requires a different strategy to win, I will say that I got put into Cursed Hollow quite a few times in a row, which was slightly annoying as it's my least favorite map to play, but it did encourage me to play some different heroes to add some variety.....which reminds me.....


The Heroes!!

As far as Free to play heroes goes, there are only 6 available, however you can purchase more with real money or in came currency. You may also purchase mounts and alternative skins for your heroes. Each hero starts with a choice of 2-4 talents with 4 becoming available at later player levels, this is nice as it doesn't burden new players with too many choices, enabling them to concentrate on other mechanics. Once you reach a suitable level, you will begin each game by picking a talent from 4 options, from there, your hero will already have 3 abilities available on Q, W and E. Most of the talents I have seen so far are passive, but there are a few "activatable" ones, which seem to go on buttons 1-0, the passives will usually enhance an ability you already have. When your team reaches level 10 you have access to your heroes ultimate ability, this will be a choice from 2, or in Abathur's case, you only have access to a single ability. 
      All of the heroes will either be a Warrior, which is your tanky, up-in-your-face, you cant kill me hero, an Assassin, which are your damage dealers, Support, which bring the heals and other buffs or a Specialist, which will have a range of abilities and a a unique playstyle, foe example, Abathur doesn't actually go into battle, he can "enter" other heroes on your team and assist them, or for his ultimate, he can clone any ally and you have access to all their skills for a limited time. This may seem OP, but when you consider that for the majority of the game, you play 4vs5 when you have an Abathur, it balances it out. 

Would I recommend this game?

Short answer, yes. Longer answer, as I previously stated, it is a nice simple game to pick up, that still has all the aspects of other MOBAs, but without the crazy complexity, meaning it is attractive to the less experienced MOBA player, that just wants to have some fun with friends. Over the next week I shall be compiling some game play to put together into a video, which I shall add to this post!!