Heroes special abilities and quirks

I never pay enough attention to my heroes to really pay attention, but I have noticed that some heroes either have (or used to have) special abilities or even preferences in play style.

Can people list the ones they know since they aren't on wiki?

What I've noticed:
Dunkoro doesn't like to smite, Ogden does.
Zhed is a lousy fire elementalist, Sousuke is fair at it though.
Margrid, people say they've seen her do a little teleport/shadowstep?
Jora, does Z-rank style emotes in battle.
Master of Whispers, unmanageable and slow as discord minions, but rocks as Jagged Bones MM.
Norgu seems not as an enthusiastic interrupter as Gwen



This is all anecdotal and I don't use all my heroes often so it's incomplete. So thoughts, or am I just nuts?

I think it's all make-believe. I have used dunkuro as smite on one character and ogden on another one of my toons, but I haven't seen any difference between them (I hardly take smite monks though). I think people intend to give the heroes of the same profession some more individual qualities, to give them some more 'personality' if you will.
For exemple, I use my Zhed as an earth ele with wards where it's useful, because I find it suits him more than a fire/air/water build (don't ask me why, I just think it fits his appearance).
Maybe heroes of different professions (e.g. necro vs mesmer) behave differently with the same skills. I believe all the caster behave the same, though.

On a side note, I do think that individual traits would have been nice on the heroes to make them more unique. So far the only one with a unique trait is Razah, and he's pretty cool for it. Vekk having an asura summon or something, Jora changing to bear form (in a balanced way), ... stuff like that would have been sweet^^

I haven't really thought about it before, but I guess my olias is the one always healing, masters doing mm, and livia cursing things...but switching them up shouldn't matter too much.

Olias is the MM, Master is more curses and if running a healer then Livia is my chick.
Ogden should never ever be allowed to heal or prot. Never. Ever.
Gwen is always my rupter, while Norgu is always illusion.
Can't say I have noticed anything for eles though but they're only used when necessary.

Goren is a natural with a hammer

Norgu Likes to take care of physical mob (could be coz he gets laughed at for his belly)

Gwen is all about domination (dont tell my wife plz)

Mow is definitely a curser, you should ear the stuff he says while hexing foes

Meloni is secretly in love with Koss; if only he could stop drinking...

Zhed was born to run an earthbuild and Sousoke fire.

Anton and Zenmai are just happy to hold on to my extra runes/insignia

You are just nuts.

Anet has confirmed previously that all monks for example use the exact same AI, they are just different skins is all.

You are not alone however, there are many who perpetuate such silly urban myths.

No, you are not nuts. I have noticed similar things.

I would not put anything past Margrid!

I think what they come with is a suggestion as to their personality.

Objective tests do not duplicate the real world of combat and things happen differently there.

A further thorny question involves pets as they behave in real world combat versus dps output in objective tests, but we will not go there.

This quote is taken from the wiki page about MOX
"As heroes were used in PvP at the time, M.O.X. was released exclusively for PvE due to its size and hidden weapons."

HIDDEN?

...MOX does not wield a weapon. Equip any melee weapon to him and he runs up and punches people. Equip any ranged weapon and he punches the air and the arrow/projectile shoots out from his fists.

his size was too large

i find what the op as true. xD but i also see some else weird. on all my gwens i have chaos storm skill. i find gwens on some girls love to use it more then others who dont like using it or dont use it at all. o.o also find tah heals better then dunk. sous better at fire then zhed and gwen at interrupting then norgu.

The only one I've noticed any kind of peculiar behavior is Zhed. I'll never take him in my party unless I HAVE to. Many times when I did take him along, he would (while set to "guard") run off through the mob I'm fighting to a mob well out of aggro range and attack it - never again!

He tries to use Trample and realises he doesn't have it only after he enters melee.

There are no quirks or special abilities - all heroes with the same primary class behave identical. Mercenary heroes incluced. Different behaviour results solely from different build, different weapon, different party position, different combat setting.

Whenever I've had to switch them around (like, for example, taking Dunkoro as smiter instead of the usual Tahlkora), the heroes of the same profession have always acted exactly the same.

....made me laugh abit inside

Some of it could be AI with weapons, but I'd like to think it's not that buggy. My Zhed refuses to use fire nuker spells, but he's equipped with an energy storage staff. Does that mean it's ER or GTFO?

It's all AI. Heroes use an identical AI to HM mob AI. It's all the same. Any differences are merely perspective and wanting to believe they are different.

Do you honestly believe, with the troubles of doing the AI coding, that they would change the AI for different heroes/henchmen? :/ It's the same.

Now on that terms, sometimes it may seem like patterns emerge - I seem to get an awfully lot of 'Show me the money' inscriptions when I take gwen, for example. It's just a matter of the human brain attempting to see a pattern or reason when there isn't, but it's funny to think on nonetheless.

The consensus is split 50/50.

However each of the heroes were added at different times, came with different default spells and weapons, and we know that henchmen are different. Stefan is more aggressive than Little Thom, and so on.

We all know that the Anet team can be a little "quirky". Why does everyone use Livia and Olias as rit healers but never MoW?

Feel free to play around and experiment to prove or disprove, but a lot of people are noticing.

The one X-factor is weapon types. Try to see if your paras will fight with a sword, your smiting monk will heal, etc.

No, Stefan and Little Thom are identical. They run on an identical AI - the difference is skills. Monsters added at different times do not have a different AI. Heroes added at different times do not have a different time.

I run MoW as a BiP rit healer. Olias is used as an MM because he's generally the first necro obtained, and that is usually used as an MM. Cursing took popularity later, and thus MoW, the second, became the curser (he starts with cursing skills, too). People set up runes for heroes, and then they don't change them. Thus, when the rit healer became popular, Livia was the one. It's also a subconscious 'female' thing to have a female healer.

Yes, I have run heroes with different weapons. I run spear sets on my mesmers generally with +10 vs demons shields, depending on the need, and I've run Ogden as a healer plenty of times, in addition to a smiting monk, depending on what's needed. Since Ogden is the third monk, and you don't run 3 healing monks, he was relegated to a smiter in most roles - not to mention, he's a dwarf, and it's a subconscious thing for people to associate dwarves with fighters, damagers, and not necessarily healers.

I'm quite experienced with heroes and henchmen, the AI is one of my specialties as I've experimented with the AI to try and get desired results, and I'm completely confident about this. Stop trying to see things where things aren't. (if you want examples from others, check out other hero threads - particularly the DoA and glint's, as people tried to run other professions as mesmers with perfect success beyond the loss of fast casting - I've also ran a ranger as a mesmer interrupter). The AI is entirely dependent on what skills are equipped and what weapons are being used, and targeting to a lesser extent is based around profession (ie, using BiP on casters regardless of weapon, and on melees only with a caster weapon).

Mercenaries also have an identical AI - there is no mercenary that plays differently from a hero. People subconsciously apply personalities to the heroes they have, and people generally give the same personalities, because we each play with the same people following the same storyline. We all get similar impressions from them. It's a mental thing, no more.

For a fun perspective, it can be entertaining, though. For a role play perspective, also. If you enjoy envisioning Livia as a pro healer, then go for it - if you want to envision her as a sadistic curser, that's also fine, because the AI is the same. Thus, play them as you feel like playing them, and envision them however you'd like, the game's intended to have fun.