Dota 2

[Huw the Poo]

It looks like Geek and I are going to be jumping into this at some point.  The last couple of days I've been going through the new tutorials and playing offline against bots, getting a feel for it.  I think that, given the right circumstances, I could really be sucked into this one.

It's generally available now, although Valve are apparently staggering the rollout to interested players in order to efficiently scale up their infrastructure.

So who's in?  Anyone here already playing?

[bob48]

I've had a look on the website and at some of the stuff on Steam. I can't actually make my mind up as to what the heck its all about?

[Huw the Poo]

I've had a look on the website and at some of the stuff on Steam. I can't actually make my mind up as to what the heck its all about?

It's an RTS/RPG hybrid, and to many people, an e-sport.  Briefly, two teams of five players (along with mindless AI drones called creeps) battle to take out the opposing team's base.  You earn gold and XP for kills, spending XP on levelling up your skills and gold on items that augment them and your base stats.  You spend your time killing enemy creeps and players, eventually moving on to taking out their defensive towers and, ultimately, their base.  It's frenetic and lots of fun!  It's also very heavily team-based; you just can't win without cooperating with your team.

Actually the Wikipedia page does a very good job of explaining it.

[OJsDad]

what's a DOTA 2?

[TheCommandTent]

Ok I'm just gonna say it ... League of Legends is better don't get sucked into Dota2  :)

[Huw the Poo]

Ok I'm just gonna say it ... League of Legends is better don't get sucked into Dota2  :)

Haha!  Dota 2 natively supports Linux, which is why I chose it.  Also, it's reportedly a bit slower-paced than LoL, so I surmised it will be better for new players. :)

[Huw the Poo]

Well, I've finally made my way through the training stuff and did just fine, so last night I played my first two games against other people.

The first game, I used a random hero pick because you start with more gold and I need to get a feel for as many heroes as possible.  The game chose Omniknight for me, and I hated him!  Firstly, he's a support hero so I stayed with a teammate in my lane to support him and allowed him to get all the last hits, and thus gold.  This meant I couldn't buy the items I needed to supplement my mana pool, leaving me pretty much useless until very late in the game when I was able to jungle.  I need to do some reading and find out how the hell to play a support properly.

The second game I again used random pick, and was given Sniper - much better!  This time I was able to get quite a few kills and assists.  The Sniper's ultimate is a really powerful shot which can do loads of damage at ridiculously long range.  I even managed to gank my lane opponent, Juggernaut, a couple of times, which was fun. :D

During the second game everyone was almost completely silent which was weird.  However, in the first game we were all chatting about being noobs and swapping advice on strategies etc.  It was great.  So far I've had no experience of the dreadful community that MOBAs have.  I've even been voted as a "friendly" player a couple of times!

Really, really good fun.  Can't wait to play again!  Y'all know this is completely free to play, right? :)

[undercovergeek]

Ill be there!! Goddam holidays razn frazn mutely noises

[Nefaro]

My primary complaint with DOTA 2 was that the old Warcraft 3 engine was stretching the graphics to cover higher resolutions.  It may be okay at lower resolutions, but at 1680x it was quite blurry from the gfx stretch.  :(

From what I've played, I do like the wide variety in characters available, each with their own style.  I couldn't get used to the gameplay as it seemed like you're always pushing up a lane and then running away, then pushing, back and forth rinse/repeat.  Dying regularly in my case, because I can't get my ass moving fast enough when a large wave comes at me with a main character in it.  And that against the AI! 

I was terrible at this thing and while I like the wide variety in the character selection, the gameplay strategy sounds very repetitive.  Perhaps many of the morons with diarrhea of the mouth have moved on to other MOBA titles, so that would be enough of a positive to give this a try once more. 


Also... I thought "jungling" was something you were supposed to do around mid-game, not too long into it?  I didn't quite understand how the game flows so it's no wonder I never improved much at it.

[Huw the Poo]

Nefaro, your frustrations come from inexperience.  No offense intended; I imagine every player new to MOBAs has had exactly the same thoughts.  I know I have.  Let me give you a couple of examples:

I couldn't get used to the gameplay as it seemed like you're always pushing up a lane and then running away, then pushing, back and forth rinse/repeat.

Yeah, this is laning, and this is what you spend most of your time doing (subject to hero selection).  You aren't actually supposed to push the lane until you have the upper hand; early-mid game is spent actively trying to keep the creep line where it is, while you level up on killing enemy creeps and accumulating gold.  It's down to a fine art these days, and it makes for tense, extremely enjoyable gameplay in my opinion.  Trying to get those last hits in, denying the enemy last hits on your own creeps, occasionally harrassing your lane opponent to keep him out of the lane (and therefore not accumulating XP) as much as possible etc.  It's my favourite part of the game, but as with all aspects of Dota, it's nuanced and your lane strategies will differ enormously subject to your opponent, your hero, your items, what's happening elsewhere etc.

Dying regularly in my case, because I can't get my ass moving fast enough when a large wave comes at me with a main character in it.

You die a hell of a lot as a noob, it's just how things are.  The lesson you eventually learn is that if you're being ganked by a single enemy hero in a lane, you've done something wrong.  Either you've fallen behind on XP or items, you're not paying attention, your lane control is all wrong (pushing too early for example), and so on.  In my previous post, when I mentioned ganking Juggernaut a couple of times in my lane, I was able to do that because he was playing like a banana. :D

Anyway, I think I've made my point.  What you describe is how the game is, at least as seen through the eyes of an inexperienced player.  Again no offense - I've rarely played such a hardcore game and I will consider myself a noob too, until I have at least a few dozen games under my belt. :)

Perhaps many of the morons with diarrhea of the mouth have moved on to other MOBA titles, so that would be enough of a positive to give this a try once more.

I hope you do.  I braced myself when I launched that first game with other players, but apart from a couple of "WTFs" in the second game, everything was perfectly amicable.  After each game you get to rate the other players in terms of friendliness, willing to teach, leadership etc.  You can also report abusive players.  This must have something to do with the vast improvement in attitude I've seen so far.

Also... I thought "jungling" was something you were supposed to do around mid-game, not too long into it?  I didn't quite understand how the game flows so it's no wonder I never improved much at it.

There are various reasons for jungling, again depending on so many factors.  In my case, as Omniknight, I was entirely dependent on my mana-intensive spells.  I wasn't getting any gold in lane, which meant I couldn't buy items to improve my mana pool and mana regen, so I was essentially useless and just dead weight.  Going into the jungle was an attempt to get some gold.  It worked - too late to have much of an effect on the outcome of the game, but it worked. :)

I really hope you give it another try, Nefaro.  As multiplayer PvP goes, this is about as pure an experience as it's possible to get.  When you learn more and start having those eureka moments, playing gets infinitely more enjoyable.

[Nefaro]

I may give it another swing sometime. 

I'll be the first to admit that I was, and will still be, an utter noob at it.  While I'm usually a quick learner, that didn't happen much for me in the few games that I had played against the AI.  It was a learning failure I'm not accustomed to, and I felt confused as to what I needed to do to improve.

[Huw the Poo]

This guide is an excellent primer.  But yeah, the learning curve is staggering, matched only by the likes of Eve Online.

[Nefaro]

Watched some primer vids recently because I have an itch to play a genre that I normally don't. 
(Sorry Rising Storm guys, still haven't been in a shooter mood yet! -- Soon!™)

I think there are two facets that pushed me away before.  One is how structured the setup and gameplay is.  In a Strategy/ARPG-ish game, the concept is just alien to me.  I've always thought of strategy games as rather freewheeling ordeals in which you have some general tactics that are sound but the element of surprise, and occasional use of unorthodox or risky tactics, when a window of opportunity presents itself, can be large decisive factors.  In these MOBAs, it seems that the overall strategies are very rigid and conservative throughout setup and most of the game span.  So it's a bit strange.

The second is massive amount of clicking required.  Often quick precise ones, too.  In combination with always needing to keep one eye on the mini-map, it's overloaded my multi-tasking handicap. 

I'm gonna try to learn it again and see how it goes.  The wide variety of heroes and equipment is the draw for me, because I do like learning new playstyles on a regular basis (Alt-tastical!).

[TheCommandTent]

Watched some primer vids recently because I have an itch to play a genre that I normally don't. 
(Sorry Rising Storm guys, still haven't been in a shooter mood yet! -- Soon!™)

I think there are two facets that pushed me away before.  One is how structured the setup and gameplay is.  In a Strategy/ARPG-ish game, the concept is just alien to me.  I've always thought of strategy games as rather freewheeling ordeals in which you have some general tactics that are sound but the element of surprise, and occasional use of unorthodox or risky tactics, when a window of opportunity presents itself, can be large decisive factors.  In these MOBAs, it seems that the overall strategies are very rigid and conservative throughout setup and most of the game span.  So it's a bit strange.

The second is massive amount of clicking required.  Often quick precise ones, too.  In combination with always needing to keep one eye on the mini-map, it's overloaded my multi-tasking handicap. 

I'm gonna try to learn it again and see how it goes.  The wide variety of heroes and equipment is the draw for me, because I do like learning new playstyles on a regular basis (Alt-tastical!).

I play League of Legends from which DOTA 2 is take alot of notes and this is a interesting assessment.  While I would agree that it looks this way within the strict "meta," as it is referred to, there are lots of strategies on team compositions and items builds etc.  However, the game does require lots of percise clicking and time while maintaining map awareness versus the minimap.  Like anything else it takes practice but it is some how addictive fun.

[Sparhawk]

My son and his group of gaming buddies have been playing DOTA 2 since January while it was beta and never seem to tire of it. They do everything online and multiplayer and seldom stray from the game for more than a day or so. His computer desk is right next to mine and I can testify that his gameplay is very intense.