[2.6.7] Lockpick Speculation and Discussion

[Cyber_Kun]

Now that has been a few weeks since Lockpick has been out and Tournament have started using this new competitive gamemode, lets discussion the balance of the mode and and speculate if it needs changing or anything of the like.

[Gorb]

Approved!

[Reldnahc]

It has been 1 week, not a "few". Also I love the sabotaging of locks and can't wait for teams to discover this.

[Irysa]

^ this

the team with second pick out of locks should always fill the pool with trash locks, so the first team has to also fill it with at least 2 trash picks and force random heroes everywhere!

If you start with the bad locks, you can still do at least 1 decent hero/fits into your strat as your last lock for both teams to at least mean one of your locks is not bad

[MushidoZ]

This seems amazing for varying the characters picked in the game. I would love if a version of it was made to allow solo queuers.

Can't wait to watch a video of it (I am always solo queuing..) and hope the "pros" will end up with "bad locks". I am definately curious to see how the "pros" are doing when they don't play noob heroes.

[Spacey]

Any VODs of this being used in the competitive scene out yet?

[Lariatoooo]

fnatic play cup was played with lockpicks
http://www.zyori.tv/vods/

[pekay]

I only just returned to HoN and after watching the video on how it works it got my hopes on. Then I noticed it's only enabled for teams of 5.
I understand that they're trying to 'force' this into the competitive scene in hopes that it will somehow make HoN's competitive scene popular for whatever reason; but I think they overlooked the opportunity that this had to better the player base in regular Matchmaking.

Usually the issue with solo MM is that no one is willing to 'make the sacrifice' of playing support (except for a few players) - had lock pick been enabled for regular Matchmaking then eventually (after trolls get bored of it) it could've been used to 'force' certain range of players on every MMR bracket into certain roles (either gank or support usually) - While yes it might seem oppressive, it would eventually force these players to improve their game at that role if they ever want to be able to pick freely again.

I understand it's oppressive, but if you allowed it as an additional mode in queues then only people who want to deal with it would join; it'd also allow non-full team MM players to (in theory, eventually) play with people who actually want to improve.

However, instead of at least giving this mode the chance to improve the quality of the experience to the particular segment that wants to improve - yet does not have a 'full team of 5' available at all times; they decide to restrict it to (lets face it) mostly being used only for actual tournaments.

[Brannock]

The problem with lockpick in the public matchmaking community is that there's no real incentive to play the mode over AP or BP or whatever if you're a 5-man pub queue. You play lockpick if you really want to tryhard. A simple (but significant) coin bonus for playing lockpick mode in matchmaking would have done wonders - not only would it keep queues fresh and quick, it also would promote players looking for other like-minded players to group up with and play LP: which would then help promote a sense of community and help develop new blood for the competitive scene.

Letting players solo queue for lockpick would just promote trolling big time (either from vindictive captains or from players upset with what heroes they got). On top of that, lockpick isn't really that much more interesting if you're not the captain compared to BP and it takes much longer to go through. It's very much a team-oriented mode.

[PopCokeSoda]

Asking for lockpick to be played also for non-5man teams is forgetting about all the complaints to S2 for letting organized teams play with solo queuers in normal TMM. The solution from Brannock appeals to me much more. It's a blast to play a lockpick game, but the queues are horrendous for 1800 players and if we do find a game, it's most likely uneven. Giving more incentive to playing lockpick solves the problem of queue-time and, as Brannock intelligently stated, strengthens the community-building aspect of playing the game, by forcing people to find organized teams.

[Hsssh]

What Brannock says is so obvious that i can't understand why someone at S2 didn't thought about it or thought and decided against it.

[Indalamar]

Lockpick is a great option, if it would be available for public mm too.

Every Player can decide by himself if he wants to pick Lockpick or not, and regarding the argument of "trolling", i can say that if a player wants to troll the team, then he will do it, doesn't matter if you play All Pick, All Random or Lock Pick.


Lock Pick should be activated for public mm and players should receive more coins for playing this mode. Therefore the soloque times in this mode would be shorter and ppl would benefit alot by playing this mode, because they have to tryout other roles. Additionaly theres A LOT! more communication in lock pick (due to more time, which is also a negative point for AP).

All in All:


-Activate Lock Pick for Public MM
-Give more coins to Players that play LP(for shorter ques) (like +3)

= Ppl will benefit in learning other hero roles, more communication, less trolling, more competetive in public MM games.

[SuperCommand]

I find it counterintuitive that the team doing the FIRST lock also PICKS the locks first. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

E.g. horribly powerful hero exists, team A locks him and gets first pick on it as well?

[Alten]

I find it counterintuitive that the team doing the FIRST lock also PICKS the locks first. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

E.g. horribly powerful hero exists, team A locks him and gets first pick on it as well?

Read the full thread to know why the second team has its own significant advantage.

[SuperCommand]

Read the full thread to know why the second team has its own significant advantage.

I did read it. However doesn't the strategic dept increase even more by having the opposite order of the locked picks?

[Malefication]

Hellbourne has a big advantage in being able to pick two heroes at the same time in the Lock Pick phase. They can abuse the Locking phase 'way more' than Legion.

[`11411181]

An interesting thought brought up post-release was the idea of 1 ban from the lockpool each, instead of a usual ban. Legion can get a sure pick if they like, but risk having it banned out from under them or Hellbourne will dictate the last 3 picks entirely.

[holylighthps]

Honestly I don't think second team has an advantage, simply because first team has the first pick. You lock pebbles and locking 2 terrible heroes is bad strat now since second team is now going to be snowballed for the rest of the game.

Only thing that really bothers me is that the first bans are blind bans which simply doesn't make sense to me.