So my situation is that we have a young kid (soon 6 months), so my play time with this would be couple of games a week and week or two might go by without gametime.

Would Heroes of the Storm be any fun if you play only once in a while for the fun of it ? Or will I end up being teamed up with those who are all into the "meta" of the game and end up screwing their game ?

I played through the tutorial and really enjoyed it. but wondering if this is worth the time investement :)

There's a quick match mode which, so far that I've played, has been full of quiet players just clicking around making the best of it. No-one was yelling (apart from one whiner after we lost a match but eh!) and I had a lot of fun playing the game. Matches lasted around 20, 25 minutes. You're not allowed to go into the "big leagues" until you own 10 heroes and you're a specific level. That could possibly mean you won't run into the more fanatic players until you get over that threshold, which is completely up to you.

I had fun and felt no obligation to "be the best or GTFO". This is coming from someone who gets anxious looking at the other MOBA's or any other form of "Team Deathmatch" game.

That's so good to hear :) Yeah, the "be the best or GTFO" was what stopped me from trying out Dota 2 and LoL.

I have had plenty of flaming in this game, around the levels you see in other MOBA's.

I really don't think this will have any less, except not seeing the other team, most of the vitriol usually comes from your own team though. Overall, I think everyone will have different experiences with this, I play a lot of dota and while its certainly there, I don't find it that bad.

I haven't really experienced anything too nasty in quick matches, most of the toxic players probably stick to hero league.

You could always just play Coop as well. It's not as high tension as Quick Match and you'll nearly always win but it's still fun because teamwork is fun and it's got that. It's best to play Heroes you haven't played in Coop in any case.

Most games are quick. My quickest has been under 9 mins. My longest has been 25 mins maybe.

One time - just ONCE - the chat was completely empty. Not even any GG's at the end. But this is a rarity.

Toxicity is nowhere to be found...at least so far

Ya definitely give it a go, time commitment-wise this game is much more reasonable than your typical dota. 20 min matches, 15 if you just co-op comp stomp (still fun), means you can keep up with the daily rewards if you just average like half an hour a day. The short matches also makes spur of the moment sessions possible, unlike dota where you pretty much have to plan to go undisturbed at least an hour at a time.

Unfortunately the game does have its share of asshats, but it's not nearly as bad as dota. I think the short games help with that since people aren't as emotionally invested in each match. By the time you know you're beat, it's probably another 5 min tops before your core gets sacked. Unlike dota, where you may be in for another 30 min ass kicking where there is nothing for the whiners to do but bitch and point fingers.

Also definitely join the giantbomb chat channel and party up in there instead of solo queueing if you can to keep the asshats to a minimum.

It is definitely the most relaxing decent quality MOBA I've played. The games are significantly shorter and the chatter is about 70-90% less frequent than in other MOBAs. It does happen occasionally, but comparatively very rarely. I think I've encountered jerks in maybe about 1 out 25 matches.

I've played with some truly awful players, and no one said a thing to them.

HotS is perfect for what you're describing, and that's why no other MOBA is currently on my PC. I've played dozens of rounds. Not only does the matchmaking feel relatively balanced, there is no "meta", and I've met a total of one toxic player. And I've been in it for months, because of the closed beta.

I've got to hand it to Blizzard; they seem to know how to take a gameplay formula's main problems, and fix a whole heckuva lot of them.

This game sounds like what you are looking for. It's an easy pick up and play game compared to other moba's, and if you have some people to play with its even more enjoyable. You likely won't be paired with anyone who is hardcore meta only or die unless you are exceptionally good at the game. The game will give you a match making ranking that you can't see, and it will pair you with people of a similar rank. So if you don't care you're likely to be paired with others who don't care. You may run into someone quoting meta if they are a new player with dreams of reaching the high ranks one day, but you can either mute or listen to them and explore whatever strategies they're typing out. Either way I wouldn't call it a hassle. Quick match comps are mostly random as well, so you won't really have an opportunity to plan compositions anyway unless you are in a pre-made team. Totally worth it, go for it. This game is a blast.

Not entirely true. There is a meta, and there will always be a meta in every competitive game because there will always be trends and general "best things to do here" strategies and counters. You won't see much of a meta in quickmatch and maybe even low mmr hero league, but climb ranked mode or watch higher level play and you will soon run into the current meta of double warrior comps featuring anuburak or the double mage comps featuring kael and jaina. (which incidentally the double warrior comps are designed to counter) Before that we had double support comps although this has fallen off slightly after the kael patch due to the need of having divers and more damage on teams to stop the backline mages. All of this stuff interacts with itself to create a meta.

Your overall point is correct though. HotS is nice because you can feel free to ignore the meta. You'll hit a brick wall with your mmr eventually and stop rising, but its not like other moba's where you walk into your first game ever and people complain because you don't understand the most recent thing that team dignitas does or whatever.

Is this recommended to someone who has never really touched a MOBA before? I know it's supposed to be easier, is it really that much so?

@kishinfoulux: Yes. Its the easiest option around. It's still a moba, so there's still some inherent difficulties that come with most pvp games. While you're learning you'll likely just have to deal with people being better than you, but if you follow around the smart players on your team and listen to them you should be good. Matches are also very fast so while you're learning it's not as frustrating. You'll only be in a losing match for 10-20ish minutes depending on how bad your team is doing, so you can move on from a loss a lot faster than LoL or DotA.

@kishinfoulux:well yes and no.

If you ever aspire to play DOTA, I wouldn't start with HotS. HotS has some refinements to the MOBA formula I think would be hard to go back to, if that makes sense? As much as I love it, DOTA is still a mod at heart in some ways has some odd artifacts of its' heritage.

but I absolutely do think HotS is much conceptually easier to pick up and imo it penalizes personal optimization mistakes a lot lot less (e.g. you can't really build your character anywhere nearly as poorly as you could in DOTA, so it's comparatively difficult to make yourself completely screwed in the endgame), friends of mine who couldn't penetrate LoL or DOTA got the feel of HotS in 5-10 games. Less really, just being conservative.

I still prefer DOTA as the game is deeper but HotS is much easier to casually play.

I've now played few Quick Matches and the chat has been quite positive :) In first game it was quiet, but since most of the comments have been about what to do, when to defend, when to attack and so forth, which is very welcomed when learning the game.

In the last game (the first time I've been on the losing side) there was some "bad game" and such comments, but we were losing badly, lost in 10minutes I think :)

Yup. They do a good job of explaining the mechanics and make it easy to jump into and have fun. Keep in mind though if you got the itch to upgrade to DOTA or League you would still have trouble learning those. The games are all really different and offer pretty unique experiences from one another.

This. A thousand times this. Dota is a great game. It is a deep game. Sadly the community is pretty much ass.

For me, it's just a lot more of an enjoyable experience than either LoL or Dota. Matches are always around 20 minutes. I don't have to really read a whole strategy guide or video on just ONE character and how to build them . There's no stress about last hitting creeps and mobs. Abilities are flashy enough to identify and react. Every character is enjoyable to learn and play. HoTS may be casual, but screw it. I don't have the time or patience to really get myself involved into league, let alone Dota.

Its great. Your 5 abilities can be spammed with some mana management in mind. The strategy just kind of revolves around you going for objectives, and assisting teammates when necessary. There's much more there for people who want to play at a high level but once you learn the maps everything is great. Highly reccomend this game.

I've had a few matches where people were definitely getting mad about the state of the match. But for the most part it's just quiet scrappin for 20-30 minutes.