The most necessary change for tournament games is a rebalancing of the game mechanics. Strong players have been saying this endlessly. For this reason, some top players don't play HotA.
After dozens of pages of useless discussions, I haven't heard a single valid argument as to why this attribute can't be added with a checkbox for tournament games (this change doesn't affect casual players in any way).
Based on my experience of 15+ games, I've concluded that HotA in its current form can only be played on L-sized maps. On XL+U maps, the variance increases sharply due to the inability to obtain powerful artifacts/resources. Scrolls and shrines of level 4 don't guarantee their appearance in certain zones, and the game turns into a boring run around.
Regarding the Moon faction, I like the change to the special ability damage multiplier to 50%.
I also fully support Juby's suggestion to reduce the number of paths on the 6LM10A map. On SOD, this is currently the best XL+U map; on HotA, it definitely needs to be fixed, because in its current form, it's just a mess of running around.