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Let's understand that we are not comparing HotA and SoD, but rather HotA and HD+. The difference between them is not in the overall quality, but in their initial positioning: HD+ was designed for online play from the start, while HotA aimed to be a comprehensive add-on for everything at once. As I understand it, HD started as a mod to improve the game's resolution, but gradually evolved into an essential element for online play with the addition of new features. These include troop transfer arrows, autosaves, adding templates and path selection to the interface, password-protected saves, replayable autobattles, and a chess timer. After all, Baratorch didn't come up with all this himself; it was all a response to community requests. Correct me if I'm wrong. In other words, HD+ was initially tailored to the needs of online play, and online play developed along with the mod. HotA has a completely different story. The developers of HotA set out to create a full-fledged add-on. The needs of online play were not and are not a priority for them. I don't deny that a lot of work has been done, but as an online player, I am less interested in all this for several reasons. Changes to the graphics of some creatures and landscapes annoy rather than please me; the new city may be good, but I just want there to be nine cities in the game, which I am used to. Balance changes are sometimes good, sometimes not. New banks, artifacts, objects – these are still tolerable and sometimes even good. But what personally puts me off the most is the presence of various small changes that seem insignificant at first glance, but ignoring or failing to account for them will have an impact on the outcome. For example, removing the immunity of birds to fire, accumulating creatures in hiding places; the most striking example is the change in flight mechanics. Seeing such minor details that can decide the game, I realize that this may be just the tip of the iceberg among such details, and I do not want to deal with all this. And why is there no desire? Precisely because HotA was not made for me, not for online play.

Many times, requests were made to listen to the opinions of experienced players. The HotA Crew responded by creating a special thread for dialogue with experienced players. But somehow, experienced players did not really express their opinion, but the requests to listen to their opinion continue to sound. What kind of secret opinion it is, about which nobody knows except the experienced players themselves, remains a mystery.

That's exactly the point! The developers of HotA decided to listen to experienced players when everything was already done, the contours of the game were defined, and some significant changes in the game became impossible. Offering a dialogue six months after release is simply ridiculous. And at the creation stage, only Vicc represented the interests of online play, who obviously represented them in his own way. At the same time, Vicc has not played for many years, and no one even thought of asking top players (of course, I am not talking about myself). So HotA was initially not made for online play and will no longer become so; making any suggestions now is simply untimely. The fact that HotA Crew took a promise from Baratorch not to make an overall quality patch for SoD – this certainly added fuel to the fire of the holy war; these are dirty tricks to fight for their audience. But given what has been said above, this is no longer very important to me. Now let's compare it with HD+, which was created for online play, specifically for our community. And if you have to choose between HD+ and HotA, then for me, as an online player, the choice is obvious.