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DotA To Be One of the World's Biggest E-Sports!

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ilrein

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If you have never heard of DotA, or rather Defense of the Ancients, it is a custom map on Warcraft 3. During the height of popularity for WC3, prior to WoW days, thousands of unique privately designed maps were developed to be played online -- DotA was one of those, it's popularity surpassing that of the original game. It features team based play of 5 versus 5, each player choosing from nearly 100 unique heroes and roughly 200 items, suffice to say that no game of DotA ever repeats itself.

The reason for its huge success is the nature of its development; it is done privately by a man codenamed IceFrog who is nothing short of genius; it's dynamically designed, updated with new content, balances, and big fixes with impressive frequency. The 3 MB custom map spread across the globe, sparking international tournaments while defining an entirely new gaming genre. But at what should have been the peak of DotA's status, the competitive scene -- and any hope for it's future -- had all but disintegrated.

Sadly, DotA failed to push into the mainstream gaming culture -- many factors reflect this truth, but the simplest is DotA, as the greatest game on WC3, remained limited by engine -- despite the programming freedom offered by Blizzard. Naturally, 3rd party developers, with IceFrog's approval, copied DotA and created a standalone copy. For veteran players like myself, this meant huge deterioration in the quality of available leagues, while watching the game stagnate further and further -- the only other option being switching over cheap imitators.

Until IceFrog, consistent in his integrity, announced news that shook DotA-lovers across the globe:

I have some really awesome news I'd like to share with you guys. I am now leading a team at Valve! I finally have all the resources needed to do some very exciting stuff that you guys will love. I look forward to revealing more specific details when the time is right.

Valve, the programmers behind Counter-Strike, Half Life, and Team Fortress are going to support the development of an independent DotA game -- removing all of it's limitations and opening the door to boundless improvements.

Maybe not in a year, maybe not in two, but in five years DotA will be one of the biggest E-Sports the world has ever seen. International paid players traveling across the globe to compete with the greatest players, with an unshakable fan base of players stretching North America, Europe & Asia. All the ingredients are there, we have the most resourceful Chef in charge, mark my words: DotA will be great.

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Oh good maybe the WC3 Bnet servers will have the players to do some maps -other- than DotA. ;)

But seriously, I think DotA is cool and stuff, but I was never really able to get into it in a 'ZOMG THIS IS SO WORTH PLAYING ALL DAY' kind of way. It also completely lacks story of any kind, which is fine for a mod, but it would have to have one for me to be interested in playing it as a standalone game, especially if I'm going to pay for it.

But I definitely would be interested in an Objectivist gaming team. I've already made an Objectivists group on Steam and recruited some people but that's more a networking thing. Multiplayer games, for me, are less about the game and the mechanics and more about the players I'm playing with. I think I would enjoy playing with some Objectivist friends.

And it's always fun to see a modder in the community get success.

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That's a valid point but typically games with a solid storyline make for a good single player campaign while the game's popularity is determined by the quality of its online play. Indeed, CS used to be the most popular of all cyber cafe games, devoid of any story whatsoever.

What DotA has going for it, moreso now than ever, is it's inability to ever repeat itself. When playing on a team of trusted friends, against another semi-organized team, even if you use the same bread-and-butter heroes repeatedly -- the games quickly escalate to epic proportions. DotA's future is in its medium to high level play, where minor mistakes turn the tide of battle, strategy is rewarded, and victory an achievement.

If you have spent your DotA days in the open public sphere, you have no idea what you have been missing.

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I wasn't saying a game without a story can't be popular, I was saying I don't like games without story. Even in a multiplayer game I prefer some form of storyline, especially something like DotA. The heroes could have backstories that give their move-set relevance and meaning, similar to street fighter or other fighting games.

You also mentioned one of the problems I have with the game, though. In my experience there were just a few 'bread and butter' heroes which were capable of dominating pretty much anyone (which is similar to fighting games as well) so you could mostly choose between them. Heroes weren't balanced so much to enable different players' styles of play, but more so that the players had to learn how to use one of a small group of heroes to be effective at all. Maybe they've rebalanced the teams since I played but as far as I know most hardcore DotA players had no real problems with this progression.

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Good sir, allow me to enlighten you: Evidence to the contrary

I think you may be referencing DotA RoC by Guinsoo, or at best; early IceFrog on TFT, however aesthetics is a field thoroughly integrated by this particular animal oddity of a software architect.

Not to mention, DotA 6.66b is the current standard. The days of the same fifteen heroes played over and over went drastically with the nerf of the blink dagger, the 2150 gold fabled dagger of Kelen [fastest assassin ever to walk the lands of Azeroth] created a tight circle of viable heroes capable of utilizing a fast escape tool to its potential. In roughly 6.46b, where competitive DotA was at its height, this was the norm. Things are vastly different now.

I figure that DotA on the TFT engine is nearering a masterpiece completion. This magnum opus will come out before Vavle-style DotA will. It will signify the end of WC3, within the timeframe of proximity to Starcraft 2, as the ashes of the phoenix before it rises again -- except these ashes fall and form an interactive statue depicting the creativity of man and resourcefulness as a virtue.

And if you disagree about the validity of my claims, my only possible answer is we shall see. (w00t)

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  • 8 months later...

There is actually a DotA-inspired game that I already play a lot with my roommates. League of Legends

Steve "Guinsoo" Feak, the previous designer of the popular Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne custom map, DotA Allstars, and Steve “Pendragon” Mescon, the administrator of the former official support base for the map (www.dota-allstars.com), were involved with Riot Games in the development of League Of Legends.[8] Using the original DotA created by Eul (the original Defence of The Ancients map for Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos) as a base, Guinsoo made DotA Allstars by inserting his own mix of content, largely expanding the number of the heroes, and adding recipes, numerous items and various gameplay changes. Guinsoo then passed version 6 of the map on to its current developer, Icefrog. Pendragon, who is the Director of Community Relations for Riot Games, helped create the previous DotA Allstars website along with its forum.

I'll have to admit that I never played DotA, but I really love this game. And it's also free. There's some optional content that you can pay for with real money, and that supports the development, maintenance, etc of the game and servers. Like skins for heroes and stuff. Everything that could give you more power, you can get by winning IP points in-game.

If you're interested in trying it out, I'd like you to use this referral link: http://signup.leagueoflegends.com/?ref=4ce50ebe75af8789148059

I get goodies for every referral who reaches level 10. :D

If you'd like to play with me and/or my roommates, my summoner name is Amaroq Wolf. Or Amaroq64 if that doesn't work.

If a mod doesn't think this should go in the DotA thread, please split my post off into its own topic. I'd like to play with some Oists sometime.

Edited by Amaroq
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