Gameplay

Roles
In Planet of Heroes we have roles similar to common roles of Tank, DD and Healer. And each of them has its own purpose and specialization in the team. Warrior class heroes are the ones to initiate battle and to force enemy into the battle. They usually have abilities with crowd control that helps to keep enemy in the battle and make them stay away from other team members. Assassins mostly focus on single targets, their goal is to choose the most dangerous enemy and to take him down as fast as possible. The Specialist class mostly focus on helping team to survive with healing or protective skill, they also usually have abilities to make enemy heroes weaker or more vulnerable thus making them easier to kill. These three base roles are then split further broken down into two separate “specializations” each:

WARRIOR – TANK
The Tank is a sub-class of the Warrior. These heroes specialize in controlling the battlefield and moving enemies around on it. Tanks can withstand a focused attack by a hero, so they have the highest survivability in the class and can survive a few seconds of focused attack by two Assassins. Tanks have crowd control abilities, as well as abilities that allow them to knock enemies back and move them around the battlefield. A portion of a tank’s survivability can also be invested in defensive abilities. Tanks’ offensive abilities typically deal AoE damage.

WARRIOR – FIGHTER
Fighters are focused on attacking one enemy and removing them from battle. To do this, fighters have control abilities, can move one enemy, and have targeted offensive abilities. Fighters have high survivability, though not quite as high as tanks.

ASSASSIN – DUELIST
The heroes of this sub-class specialize in dealing large amounts of damage to a single target in a short amount of time. They have abilities that allow them to pursue a target or prevent it from fleeing.

ASSASSIN – MAGE
The vast majority of mages are ranged heroes who specialize in dealing large amounts of AoE damage. Their abilities are more challenging to use than those of other heroes of their class, but they have powerful combos. They have at least two offensive AoE abilities and at least one control effect in most circumstances.

SPECIALIST - SUPPORTER
Supporter heroes help allied heroes survive and kill enemies in the lane, which means that their primary objective is to increase the potential advantages or cover the disadvantages of another hero with whom they are teamed up. They have abilities that heal allies or enhanctheir defensive stats or damage. Supporters can also curse enemies, thereby weakening their advantages. In order to be considered a member of this class, hereos will generally have at least two abilities that are defensive and/or buff allies, and one ability in their arsenal that is focused on healing allies.

SPECIALIST - HELPER
The heroes from this sub-class are unique in that they have specific abilities that indirectly influence the flow of battle, but in a different way from a Supporter’s skills. A Helper’s defensive abilities could allow them to, for example, make an ally untargetable or invincible, or sacrifice their own health for another hero who needs it. Heroes from this sub-class can also have control-type abilities. These could either be standard abilities (root, stun) or abilities that are somewhat different than those used by Tanks. For example, a Helper might turn an enemy into a harmless creature or create a zone that enemies cannot pass through.

Tactics
Most of the coordination and teamwork is based on the hero roles. Controlling abilities of the Tank role will keep enemy from avoiding damage dealt by Assassin. Supporter skills will help Tank to survive while taking damage from the enemy team. As an example one hero has a Holotrap skill that creates a hologram of the hero that taunts surrounding enemies to attack it. Using Magnums Mortar skill while enemies are taunted by Holotrap is very efficient as they will not be able to run away from falling rockets.

Lane management in Planet of Heroes is not about standing on the lane and farming minions mostly. In a quick game session like ours you are constantly looking for opportunities to push into the enemy territory. Heroes level up rather quickly at the start and gain ability to kill one another just a few minutes into the game. So gameplay on the lane is about trying the enemy defense (what is usually called “harass” in MOBA games) and killing enemies one by one. Usually players try to lure enemies into their defense or flank them from the jungle.

Currently the zone for 3vs3 games in Planet of Heroes is rather compact. You can easily and quickly get anywhere you want - Jungle and all its objectives are located close to the line. Choosing a right time to go to the jungle is important and the time to do so, as in other MOBAs, usually depends on how tense things are going on the lane. In most cases one of heroes goes down to the jungle to provide more experience and faster progression for the team. Another purpose of going to the jungle is to kill jungle boss creature that gives a valuable team buff. Killing that creature usually requires teamwork and creates a dangerous opportunity on the lane for the enemy team. It should be timed carefully and best be done when the enemy heroes are absent from the lane.