Dota 2 Discussion (~Boston Majors & Road to TI7~)

[Captain Shrek]

I'd appreciate getting one key thrown my way to try it out, if possible.

Send me a friends request plox.

 

[Angelo85]

See? Dear Leader already worked his magic from beyond the grave

 

[Wulfstand]

Whoever wants one just pm me their steam id.

 

[pocahaunted]

I'd appreciate getting one key thrown my way to try it out, if possible.

Send me a friends request plox.

I managed to get my paws on a key already, but I'll add you.

Thanks anyways.

 

[Captain Shrek]

I'd appreciate getting one key thrown my way to try it out, if possible.

Send me a friends request plox.

I managed to get my paws on a key already, but I'll add you.

Thanks anyways.

 

[Pika-Cthulhu]

Im not sure if its worth me trying this out. I had a friend try to get me into DOTA way back when, I actually went out and bought Warcraft 3 and TFT specifically to play it, but I had problems with last hitting creeps. He had me try Bradwarden (the centaur thing) as it was the easy beginner class to learn or something, I eventually wound up just going techies and using the bombs to nuke shit to death and suicide for first blood. Bots still kicked my arse and I was never any good, but im supposedly less of a tard these days so I might be able to at least play on beginner and learn to not feed.

I guess I should ask a question, Is the game truly punishing or is there a beginner friendly tutorial part that wont beat me horribly with clubs of sodomy +5 game after game?

 

[Merkwürdigliebe]

No tutorial in the game as of yet, though it is apparently planned for official release. However you can read this rather comprehensive guide which covers just about everything you need to know to get started. Though it does leave out more advanced mechanics. Any way it doesn't hurt to try since it's free in any case. PM on steam for a key, still got a couple left. SteamID: RemoveBagel

This warding guide is also pretty useful, but probably doesn't help much for a beginner since people at that level have zero situational awareness in any case, but potentially useful and not covered in the previous beginner guide.

 

[Pika-Cthulhu]

Cheers. I found a couple of youtube links, one was short and 10 minute the other was 45 minutes, both explained it fairly well enough to get a firm handle on how much I dont know already, but being able to make a game with only bots will help me not piss off other players due to retardation of learning should afford me a place to get a better idea of what the heroes can do. No techies though as far as I can see, but considering some discussions people will cleat and cry if they do get introduced.

 

[Metro]

Yeah just play bot matches -- the AI is solid enough.

 

[good little toastboy]

So, some of my friends started playing this and are bothering me daily to get in. If either one of you still has a key, I'd really appreciate it, Ulminati or Captain Shrek
21 Euros is a bit on the expensive side. We should be friends already, due to some blood bowling.

 

[Ulminati]

So, some of my friends started playing this and are bothering me daily to get in. If either one of you still has a key, I'd really appreciate it, Ulminati[/USER]
21 Euros is a bit on the expensive side. We should be friends already, due to some blood bowling.

Toastboy on steam? You show as offline atm.
I'll send you a key right away. I got 9 of them to spare anyway.

 

[good little toastboy]

That was fast, thanks a lot, bro!

 

[GG Rex]

Fastest route to learn the basics is to play around in practice mode (with cheats enabled). You can instantly load any hero you wish to try his abilities, animations and stuff.

No need to feel ashamed there - even the pros frequently use practice mode to try new stuff (like pulling techniques, whether X works with Y etc.).

 

[Damned Registrations]

I'd say as a rough measure of skill, you should be able to go godlike in a bot match. The bots are adept at chaining their stuns and nukes to kill anyone who gets out of position and can be killed before they can respond, but they're not very sneaky and don't handle lane harassment very well. If you're aware of how strong various abilities are and what their ranges are, you should be able to avoid ever dying in a bot match. That is basically the first step to being able to play dota competently, being able to judge when you can get into and out of a fight alive, and when you're better off just backing up before you feed a free kill.

It takes a long time to get to that level in real games though, since real games involve a much larger hero pool whose abilities you need to memorize.

Strength based heroes are generally a good bet for a new player. They're hard to kill even if you don't get farmed and aren't skilled, and tend to have a very high win rate for this reason, since most players don't know how to farm well and aren't skilled at things like juking or disjointing attacks.

 

[Jasede]

If anyone needs more keys I have like five of them for some reason. Just popped up today.
Edit: nm, seems like Ulminati has over 9000 keys; you can use his.

 

[Renegen]

I played about 10 games with 10 different heroes so far, I'm starting to dig this. Every hero is so op, it's fun to see how they are all similar to their League of Legends counterparts but on crack. There's too many carries though and I already hate drow rangers that think all the farm belongs to them. I definitively dig more the teamwork aspect of League.

Some pretty cool heroes I tried so far, Nature's Prophet, holy op! Lone Druid, double bears rushing at you. Jakiro, so much AOE. Rubick and his ult. The worst hero I played has to be Weaver. But my favourite has to be Undying. I knew it was going to be a fun hero when I started 1 v 2 and got 2 kills at lvl 2. It only got better from there, finished with 1100 exp per min and 700 gold per min, going 1 v 4 and shit. Yeah, he'll be my main.

Any codexers (and Leaguers..) up for a night of pure noobishness?

 

[Damned Registrations]

If you think those heroes are OP you should see the ults Void and Enigma have. Void's even has a stupidly low cooldown.

Drow really should get all the farm you can shove down her throat though, if the player is spending it properly. Properly farmed carries are nigh unstoppable in dota, especially ranged ones. Though in lower brackets people don't know how to farm or spend gold effectively anyways, so you can carry with anyone.

 

[Renegen]

But that's the problem, one person carrying everyone else. In League, 4 players get the farm and most can 1 v 1 the other 4.

Funny thing is I played with Faceless Void and I didn't think he was that powerful. He had a standard melee carry build, dodge shit, stun to catch and a gap closer and his ult allows him to easily assassinate people. Meh, he seemed super boring to play.

 

[Damned Registrations]

The thing is in dota to get farm on 4 people means being spread out the entire time (and there isn't that much farm on the map anyways, 2 carries can clear every creep wave and a full jungle + ancients every minute pretty much) and if your entire team is spread out it's going to be gank city. It's generally much more effective to have a hard carry that farms alone, a soft carry that gets early farm and then roams with 3 supports to make life hell for the enemy carry or bad supports that are farming the jungle alone or whatever.

This varies a lot by heroes though. Some carries specialize in getting solo kills, others in farming, others in ganking with teamates.

 

[Wulfstand]

Why are Valve so fucking lazy with the goddamn updates? Even though I don't really much play the game anymore, I'm still interested in seeing how they implement a new hero.

 

[GG Rex]

Why are Valve so fucking lazy with the goddamn updates? Even though I don't really much play the game anymore, I'm still interested in seeing how they implement a new hero.

Valve employees are on holiday.

I played about 10 games with 10 different heroes so far, I'm starting to dig this. Every hero is so op, it's fun to see how they are all similar to their League of Legends counterparts but on crack. There's too many carries though and I already hate drow rangers that think all the farm belongs to them. I definitively dig more the teamwork aspect of League.

Let me in you on a secret: in matchmaking it's not farmers that win games, it's gankers. Usually the safest and highest % route is to go 5 man gank, push towers and win game. The counter to that is teamplay, which won't exist at beginner's matchmaking.

 

[Pika-Cthulhu]

I started playing a few days ago, and my god im awful. Only vs bots, but I got destroyed repeatedly on centaur because im bad, and dithered about not knowing wtf to buy. Eventually stumbled on a Natures Prophet jungle guide, and have been trying to get better with that. Its pretty fucking OP with his teleport, push lane to tower, then teleport to another lane when resistance appears bullshit, and the guide I was looking at had almost a set item build. Have it down mostly, but I will still get my dumbarse ganked by the bots too often. Have gone to 2 med 2 easy bots my team, 3 hard 2 med bots enemy team and still managed to win even with my stupid feeding habits.

Im still very awful, the only reason I like Natures is that I get the money from the ents hitting shit, so I dont have to worry about fucking up last hits, and I can run about the jungle PvE'ing like a noob and jump in/out of fights almost at will.

 

[GG Rex]

A bit of advice for newbies willing to improve:

a) You need a bit of research into what heroes/items can do. You can pick it up as you go but it can take months if not year+, it's much faster to do so if you just boot up a practice game with cheats and load different heroes to try their skills. Here are the commands. http://dev.dota2.com/showthread.php?t=22468

b) Fastest way to improve skill even when you're very new is to play a hero with "reaction" abilities - go Puck, or Nyx Assassin, or some such. These heroes force you to react, to think on the go etc. Don't pick "farmer" heroes. Pick a hero you want to learn then play him for 10+ games and ask yourself "what could I have done better" every game. It's a long road to getting better but very satisfying once you show results.

also this, oldie but goodie http://www.playdota.com/guides/welcome-to-dota-you-suck

 

[SerratedBiz]

I'm a real noob and Dota2 is my first MOBA so I suck at all levels, though I have a couple friends who tutored me past the most glaring beginner mistakes, thankfully, so now I can scream at other noobies for fucking up my lane.

Anyways, I've taken a different approach to learning. I've tried to play most (aka 50% +1) heroes at least once so I have passing knowledge of their skillset, something you can't really infer from playing against them. Their speed, skill mechanics, usual combinations - it's important to understand how your opponents are likely to act because you can then anticipate them, which can basically add up to a kill for you or them. As mentioned earlier, the importance of an early game gank can't be overestimated and therefore it's critical that you can also avoid one.

Which leads me to the softer Dota skills. Warding, last-hitting, denying, stacking, jungling... you can't learn these things in a bot match. If you don't want to fuck up a public game, there's a lot of video material to learn from. Typing these terms on youtube will net you a lot of tutorial videos, of which I can recommend Purge and XVRogue's. Having a basic theoretical understanding of any of these is essential since, again, it's all too difficult to pick them up during a game (when you're also 110% concerned with other things, such as not dying). The exceptions to these are last-hitting and denying since bots, especially on Hard and above, are pretty exact on their calculations and so practicing against them will actually make you a better finisher. But they are still limited since they generally don't harass you and you can spot their ganks from a mile away.

The best beginner skill to learn, in the end, is how not to feed. And this one requires actual humans to learn. People are more unpredictable than bots, for better or worse. Sometimes this will mean that the enemy team fucks up and wastes an opportunity to stunlock and kill you, while other times it means that your lane partner just walked off to greet a courier, your mid didn't call mia, and you're now in the middle of a painful gangbang.

 

[GG Rex]

It's also helpful to download replays from better players and imitate what they do. At least that's how I started (from competitive replays), when I realized just grinding HoN matchmaking games doesn't really bring any progress.

You will get a feel for what it means to be a "support", or a "carry", your movements around the map etc.