That may justify the price, not the practice as such. You're still buying a beta, your'e just getting some stuff with it. It's pretty much the usual "pre-order our unfinished game and get some goodies" deal.

In my opinion it's still more reasonable solution than giving away beta keys to people, only to find them later on eBay for 200-300$, like it was in the past.

That may be, but it is only because of people insane enough to not only pay to play beta, but to pay so much. I guess it's true, one can't fully blame Blizzard for taking advantage of such people.

Let me rephrase that for you:
"The level of trust needed for people to be willing to front money for a product that will eventually become free for everyone speaks volumes about Blizzard's reputation and their dedication to quality."

This is not a charity. If people didn't give money to "the rich", they would cease to be rich pretty quickly.

Well, this conclusively shows your ignorance to the world. Point, people. Point at him and laugh.
This game's Alpha was more polished than many games after release... and quite a few patches. This is Blizzard we're talking about, the company that polishes things to perfection. Sure - it has not been FULLY tested. They have only implemented the Tutorials, Practice, Co-op, Quick match, Hero League, and Custom game modes. They only have 33 fully playable heroes. Just 5 distinct battlegrounds. It IS still beta. You know why? Because a few characters don't have dance animations yet. A few models will probably be re-worked. Characters that don't use mounts need to have some separate unlocks with tints put in. Team Ladder needs to be implemented. Player profiles need to be taken care of. Some skill icons don't contain final art! This is what a Blizzard beta is about.
Go ahead and whine about whatever you want, but know better than to respond to a guy with first-hand experience with your make-shift conjectures based on broad generalizations... in a thread dedicated to a game you don't want to play from a genre you don't care about. Your statements may be true or false, but they are evidently based on superficial understanding of what is going on.
Want to make a general argument? At least have the decency to provide justification for your claims. Also - in that case - pick a better suited thread than the one called "Heroes of the Storm" and dedicated to a polished multiplayer product that people are willing to pay for to just to get in early... and in spite of key giveaways around the net ON TOP of the regular waves sent out.

It really does not say much, seeing how people are willing to pre order or pay for early access or kickstarter for numerous games. And as for quality of Blizzard games, Diablo 3, both the game and it's disastrous launch preatty much waved goodbye to that reputation. Or at least it should, but plenty of fanboys still live in a world were Blizzard can do no wrong.

Please do. I don't really expect any better from you at this point.

And this is exactly why I doubt you people. You are so obviously Blizzard fanboys it's impossible to take your word for it when you praise them.

As for the rest of your post, you seem to have not understood what I was saying at all, and there really is no point in me repeating myself. Please, do go back to throwing your money at Blizzard. I won't get in your way. Just don't blame me if I burst out laughing if another Error 37 happens :)

Hmmm i can't really agree.. The skill trees go to 30 (10 per unique type), and level 1 you start with no skills, although you get a beginning item that boosts the first skill by 1 point so you have something to look forward to.

But the Zy-El mod... mmmm :) You are really weak, only strong enough to take off the weakest of monsters for a while without help, or a poster.

Reminds me of one of the annoyances of D2... Early skills are useless, you either get them to get other skills later, or if you use them upgrading them is crap because the growth of that skill is weak. Sorcerer the firebolt is crap after 1-2 levels in it, and the necromancer you do minimal upgrades for your skeletons because your later raises are much stronger. Maybe if they didn't do that odd rebalance in patch 1.07/1.08 that made later areas more difficult it would have been okay. I remember after patching the game, my brother had to replay all the previous areas because the enemies were like 4x harder and he couldn't survive, had to re-levelup.

That's, once again, me you're talking about. I have kickstarted many a title.
Of course, once again, you give no reason whatsoever for your stance. You just throw these things out there as if they were self-explanatory.

The game is really fun and my fix to the launch issues was "go to sleep and check back once everyone stops hammering the servers at the same time".

Let me fix that for you: "...and if you disagree with me, you are wrong". It's the simplest of answers, since it allows for no retort. Dare I disagree with your assessment of the situation? Well, in that case I am blind to reality which you so clearly see. Dare I like things you do not? I guess that makes me a "fanboy": a "boy" who is a "fan"... which is BAD, because "a person who likes things" is an insult for a good reason, right?

This is a perfect circle of confirmation bias.
You see someone who praises Blizzard -> You conclude they are a fanboy -> You discount their opinion -> Your opinion continues to be negative

Most people would've attempted to EXPLAIN themselves instead of repeating. You have chosen an even better route of discrediting any sort of criticism from the get-go.
To reiterate: you've entered a thread on a particular game and made an off-the-cuff remark on a general trend tangential to both the title and the discussion at large. You have then expressed lack of interest in the particular title, the entire genre, and the company that made the game. You have based your dislike in part on an inductive conjecture that had no basing in reality. You have dismissed criticism by painting any dissenting voice as biased to the point of blindness towards truth. Finally, you have, stubbornly, refused to provide any sort of justification for the claims you are making. How the fuck is anyone supposed to take YOU seriously?
I wrote an entire paragraph that summarized the facts about the game and what makes it unique within the genre. I have contributed SOMETHING that might further the understanding of people who might be interested in the game. You haven't provided jack shit. You haven't even made a case for your off-topic pet-peeve.

Don't mind if I do. When disaster strikes (be it a power outage, Internet issue, Battle.net problems) I'll have other games to play, movies to watch, and books to read, while you'll have the delicious schadenfreude of laughing at other people's misery. Laugh it up, it's good for your health.

Woo-hoo! After 2 months the 'Buy Founders Pack' button changed into 'Install' button! :-) Entering the beta! :-)

So, how long does it take to get a beta key? I subscribed today on their website.

It's hard to tell. Anyway, open beta starts May 19th, a week from now.

I read "heroes of the steam" by mistake, and entered to see the infighting. Because there must be if there's steam in the title.

I read wrong, but I am not disappointed.

Oh, nice to know, my friend is asking me to play this so i'll tell him to wait a week, lol.

Well, that same friend got me a key as a birthday gift and now we're confused, as i redeem it it said something about World of Warcraft item was added to my account but there's no purchase/activated history so i don't really know what was activated, meanwhile i'm downloading the game client, does that mean that HotS was activated on my account or not?

Yup, it's available to play :) See you on the battlefield!

Cool, i'll give it a try tomorrow and leave some feedback here.