Dota 2

[Zeze]

Yep. I have a million locked chests. Probably never going to open any of them. I like DOTA 2, and I like Valve, but I'm not going to pay for a *chance* at a completely cosmetic item I might not even want. POE does micro transactions right, IMO.

Dota 2 is the king of micro transactions done right. They're making absolute bank right now.

There is a flourishing trading community for Dota 2 on reddit, other sites, and inside Steam itself.

The keys are typically worth more than the items inside the treasures. If you desire a specific item from a treasure, just trade the key for that item. You can probably get few more items by trading the key than using it.

 

[Chiropteran]

Dota 2 is the king of micro transactions done right. They're making absolute bank right now.

There is a flourishing trading community for Dota 2 on reddit, other sites, and inside Steam itself.

Odd. I don't know why, but I have zero desire to really have nearly all of the DOTA 2 micro-transaction things. I guess maybe it's because I like to play all-random, or random draft, and I don't have a regular go-to champion, so I feel like buying some custom items for a champion is totally wasted since I will only ever see that champion once or twice a month.

But hey, if it's a great success for them and it allows them to give me the game for free, I have no problem with it. I just don't see myself buying into it.

 

[Zeze]

Odd. I don't know why, but I have zero desire to really have nearly all of the DOTA 2 micro-transaction things. I guess maybe it's because I like to play all-random, or random draft, and I don't have a regular go-to champion, so I feel like buying some custom items for a champion is totally wasted since I will only ever see that champion once or twice a month.

But hey, if it's a great success for them and it allows them to give me the game for free, I have no problem with it. I just don't see myself buying into it.

Yup, wholly agree with you there. I also play random so I am well-rounded.

I haven't spent a dime on Dota 2. But their cosmetics are quite impressive and people praise them for being tastefully done within their lore context. I hear HoN & LoL are criticized for ridiculous cosmetics like rainbow ponies and crap.

All that being said, I don't see how you're praising PoE micro yet single out Dota 2. They are very similar- pure cosmetics that doesn't affect gameplay. PoE even has critters that are very reminiscent custom couriers of Dota 2.

I forgot to mention why I said Dota 2 is the king of microtransactions. It's because:

1. Outside of typical cosmetic items, you can also purchase team pennants . They're banners that support the respective pro team. Some proceeds go to the TEAM, helping the eSports grow. Some goes to Valve, and the buyers (us) have an extra chance for dropped items while spectating pro games. All 3 win. Brilliant.

2. The cosmetics are about 60%~ made by community, not Valve. This crowd sourcing is amazing. As with any collective power of internet, people create amazing sets at a pace a single company could never keep up with. Once popular sets are approved by Valve, they're introduced to the game. From there, the author of the item keeps a portion of the profit from all sales! So Valve makes bank and author does too!

One of the famous cosmetic maker Anuxi must be making tons of bank, known most famous for her CM set below:

Very smart by Valve. Talk about simple yet brilliant innovation.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

Yup, wholly agree with you there. I also play random so I am well-rounded.

I haven't spent a dime on Dota 2. But their cosmetics are quite impressive and people praise them for being tastefully done within their lore context. I hear HoN & LoL are criticized for ridiculous cosmetics like rainbow ponies and crap.

All that being said, I don't see how you're praising PoE micro yet single out Dota 2. They are very similar- pure cosmetics that doesn't affect gameplay. PoE even has critters that are very reminiscent custom couriers of Dota 2.

I forgot to mention why I said Dota 2 is the king of microtransactions. It's because:

1. Outside of typical cosmetic items, you can also purchase team pennants . They're banners that support the respective pro team. Some proceeds go to the TEAM, helping the eSports grow. Some goes to Valve, and the buyers (us) have an extra chance for dropped items while spectating pro games. All 3 win. Brilliant.

2. The cosmetics are about 60%~ made by community, not Valve. This crowd sourcing is amazing. As with any collective power of internet, people create amazing sets at a pace a single company could never keep up with. Once popular sets are approved by Valve, they're introduced to the game. From there, the author of the item keeps a portion of the profit from all sales! So Valve makes bank and author does too!

One of the famous cosmetic maker Anuxi must be making tons of bank, known most famous for her CM set below:

Very smart by Valve. Talk about simple yet brilliant innovation.

Main reason I play random is because everyone assumes it's your first (or close to first) time with that hero so they feel bad about flaming you. Also because they're insecure about their abilities on their own hero.

 

[Dijeangenie]

Main reason I play random is because everyone assumes it's your first (or close to first) time with that hero so they feel bad about flaming you. Also because they're insecure about their abilities on their own hero.

Same reason I play single draft - its good for learning new heroes and finding heroes who you enjoy playing, but you still have some choice so you can avoid playing heroes you know you don't like, and you can at least try and pick a decent team composition.

 

[Chiropteran]

All that being said, I don't see how you're praising PoE micro yet single out Dota 2. They are very similar- pure cosmetics that doesn't affect gameplay. PoE even has critters that are very reminiscent custom couriers of Dota 2.

I prefer PoE's because they are more versatile. I mean it's a different game and a different way to play, but for example if I buy a special weapon glow effect in PoE it effectively can be used on any character I make (unless I try an unarmed build with facebreakers), and the "Replace Skeletons with Statues" effect is limited to summoner characters, still it applies to many of the characters I play, as opposed to DOTA2 where you could spend a lot of money just to get one set for one character out of the nearly 100 different heroes and I would never actually see the benefit of my purchase.

The extra stash pages and improved stash pages are borderline IMO, as they actually give you an in-game advantage, you can honestly farm faster and more effectively with additional space to store your findings and because of merchant recipes that combined items with the same name or complete sets of rare items it's beneficial to stockpile all your rares instead of simply vendoring them

The pets, I have had no interest in, and I find it absurd that some of the PoE pets costs $80 if you translate the GGG points into USD, but most of the rest of the micro-transactions are interesting.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

Same reason I play single draft - its good for learning new heroes and finding heroes who you enjoy playing, but you still have some choice so you can avoid playing heroes you know you don't like, and you can at least try and pick a decent team composition.

I've had bad experiences with single draft. I don't know why people flame you more than on random draft, but there it is.

Or maybe I've just gotten better.

 

[Dijeangenie]

I've had bad experiences with single draft. I don't know why people flame you more than on random draft, but there it is.

Or maybe I've just gotten better.

Yeah, just luck of the draw I guess - I haven't had much flaming (one or two idiots but nothing too bad). I do tend to play support/not carry so I suppose I am less of a target to flame!!

 

[Olikan]

but Gabe drops a Steam bandwidth bombshell, saying that one recent Dota 2 updates was responsible for 2% of all mobile and land-based internet activity at the time it was released. Guh? Is that even possible?

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/03/14/gabe-says-valves-business-grew-50-in-the-last-year/

 

[BergeLSU]

I prefer PoE's because they are more versatile. I mean it's a different game and a different way to play, but for example if I buy a special weapon glow effect in PoE it effectively can be used on any character I make (unless I try an unarmed build with facebreakers), and the "Replace Skeletons with Statues" effect is limited to summoner characters, still it applies to many of the characters I play, as opposed to DOTA2 where you could spend a lot of money just to get one set for one character out of the nearly 100 different heroes and I would never actually see the benefit of my purchase.

The extra stash pages and improved stash pages are borderline IMO, as they actually give you an in-game advantage, you can honestly farm faster and more effectively with additional space to store your findings and because of merchant recipes that combined items with the same name or complete sets of rare items it's beneficial to stockpile all your rares instead of simply vendoring them

The pets, I have had no interest in, and I find it absurd that some of the PoE pets costs $80 if you translate the GGG points into USD, but most of the rest of the micro-transactions are interesting.

Only Dota 2 could get away with their FTP method:

1. It's Valve. They already have a great reputation, and were able to pour a lot of money into the game for well over a year into beta without seeing any real profit.
2. It's Dota. The game itself was already established. Players knew what they were getting already, just in a new engine.

 

[Dijeangenie]

1. It's Valve. They already have a great reputation, and were able to pour a lot of money into the game for well over a year into beta without seeing any real profit.

The game will never make any profit I would guess - TF2 does not. Valve uses them to get people onto steam, they could pay people to play TF2, because then they go onto buy other games on steam. League of Legends makes a profit because they sell heroes and skins plus boosters. Valve sells items (which are too expensive IMO) and boosters (which you don't need because the levels don't do anything like it league). The fact they don't sell heroes is what made me play Dota 2 rather than league, and its great that they can afford to make a loss on the game- just pointing out that there aim is not to make money!

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

The game will never make any profit I would guess - TF2 does not. Valve uses them to get people onto steam, they could pay people to play TF2, because then they go onto buy other games on steam. League of Legends makes a profit because they sell heroes and skins plus boosters. Valve sells items (which are too expensive IMO) and boosters (which you don't need because the levels don't do anything like it league). The fact they don't sell heroes is what made me play Dota 2 rather than league, and its great that they can afford to make a loss on the game- just pointing out that there aim is not to make money!

Microtransactions. Not just hats, treasure chest keys, and collectible greevilings, but also tickets for tournaments and season passes. I would never pay just to get a cosmetic change, but I would consider paying for tournament passes, even though most of them eventually get uploaded to Youtube.

Also: http://gamasutra.com/view/news/164922/GDC_2012_How_Valve_made_Team_Fortress_2_freetoplay.php

 

[Dijeangenie]

Anyone here up for playing some dota? We don't need a full team, just 2 people can make the game a lot more fun by running a lane together etc - I've played around 100 games and I'm pretty bad so don't feel you need to be very good, if you are interested just add me on steam (in my sig)

I play evenings and weekends UK time mostly.

 

[Homerboy]

I totally don't get this game. Friend just gifted it to me on Steam and I'm lost.

 

[Dijeangenie]

I totally don't get this game. Friend just gifted it to me on Steam and I'm lost.

Read this guide http://www.purgegamers.com/welcome-to-dota-you-suck#.UVCLGFdjhpV

and I would suggest watching some videos on youtube - its what I did!

Then play some game vs bots on medium or easy - choose a few easy to learn heroes (mainly support heroes) and play a couple of games of each, heroes like Lich, Lina, Ogre Magi, Vengeful Spirit or Witch Doctor - before moving on to some games vs real people. (if you play the bot games first you will find it very easy to begin with, as a lot of people play a real game straightaway without knowing what to do)

 

[BergeLSU]

I totally don't get this game. Friend just gifted it to me on Steam and I'm lost.

It's incredibly punishing to new players. Eventually there will be a full tutorial and mentors, which can help, but it still is an amazingly deep game.






http://www.purgegamers.com/welcome-to-dota-you-suck

 

[Hammyton]

Microtransactions. Not just hats, treasure chest keys, and collectible greevilings, but also tickets for tournaments and season passes. I would never pay just to get a cosmetic change, but I would consider paying for tournament passes, even though most of them eventually get uploaded to Youtube.

Also: http://gamasutra.com/view/news/164922/GDC_2012_How_Valve_made_Team_Fortress_2_freetoplay.php

It's also worth noting that when you buy a season pass or ticket for a tournament some of those proceeds go towards the cash pool for that tournament. Awesome way to promote E-sports.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

It's incredibly punishing to new players. Eventually there will be a full tutorial and mentors, which can help, but it still is an amazingly deep game.






http://www.purgegamers.com/welcome-to-dota-you-suck

Second the Purge guide, he is in general pretty good. There are quite a few of his videos where he casts pubs or casts himself playing, those are generally quite good because he tells you mistakes in how pub players (who are usually pretty bad) play.

If you want to get into it properly, it's important to practice basics like last hitting in practice matches before you play against other people, though.

 

[Dijeangenie]

is there anyone who still have a dota 2 invite,,?
i need one.. please pm me..

There is a steam bot who gives them away - there are hundreds of thousands out there by now

 

[Jeffg010]

marked for later.

 

[smackababy]

Second the Purge guide, he is in general pretty good. There are quite a few of his videos where he casts pubs or casts himself playing, those are generally quite good because he tells you mistakes in how pub players (who are usually pretty bad) play.

If you want to get into it properly, it's important to practice basics like last hitting in practice matches before you play against other people, though.

Good practice in last hitting is to go into a practice game and go middle. After the 10 minute creep wave your goal is to have 80 creep kills. I do this in HoN and I imagine it would work the same in Dota. 80 is close to a perfect CS score, so it takes a lot of practice. But once you have this down, beating people in lane isn't as hard.

So, for all the games I've played of Dota 2, I still can't shake the feeling that it is slow and not as intense as HoN. I guess I should stop playing HoN, but Dota 2 hasn't grabbed my attention.

 

[OoteR02]

Good practice in last hitting is to go into a practice game and go middle. After the 10 minute creep wave your goal is to have 80 creep kills. I do this in HoN and I imagine it would work the same in Dota. 80 is close to a perfect CS score, so it takes a lot of practice. But once you have this down, beating people in lane isn't as hard.

So, for all the games I've played of Dota 2, I still can't shake the feeling that it is slow and not as intense as HoN. I guess I should stop playing HoN, but Dota 2 hasn't grabbed my attention.

Denying can be as important for a support hero -- or I guess anyone.. denying the other team farm is just as useful as getting farm yourself.

 

[Dijeangenie]

Denying can be as important for a support hero -- or I guess anyone.. denying the other team farm is just as useful as getting farm yourself.

It depends what role you are playing as to what your focus is. If you are 1 v 1 mid vs a carry hero and you are a non carry then it is probably more useful to go for the deny rather than the last hit (when you have a choice) - however if you are playing a carry then the most important thing is that you yourself get farm.

 

[BergeLSU]

There is a steam bot who gives them away - there are hundreds of thousands out there by now

http://steamcommunity.com/id/dota2bot

There's the bot that you add as a friend and message "give dota"

 

[smackababy]

Denying can be as important for a support hero -- or I guess anyone.. denying the other team farm is just as useful as getting farm yourself.

It is really just a last hitting practice. The same applies for denying as well. As any hero, getting farm is important. For carries and for support. You can't ward, up the donkey, or have any support items without farm. If you can last hit, you can deny. It is just mechanical practice in being able to kill the creeps. Last hitting, and all the strategy along with it to maintain lane control, is completely different.