Dota 2

Poor Skywrath is pretty much made of paper mache and tapers off heavily in the mid-late game. Kinda sucks because I'd love his spells to have a longer lasting effect on the game, but since he's so strong early on that'd be unbalanced.

Also, if I remember correctly, one of the biggest things that killed Morphling was that his stat shift's mana cost was increased. It was either by 5 or 10, but that was pretty much the nail in the coffin for him.

Personally I can't wait for the Kot L nerf. A 50 radius reduction on Illuminate might not sound like much, but you cannot imagine the number of times I got clipped on the edge of that thing. Won't do much against the terrible due that is Kot L+PL though, since Chakra Magic is kinda the problem here.

I'm personally more excited for Bristlebog. His voicelines make it seem like he's going to be a takeoff of a Scottish football hooligan, which is pretty awesome.

It would also be fun to have Brewmaster, Tusk, and Bristlebog all on one team; I seem to do fairly well with the anthropomorphic animal strength heroes for whateve reason.

3 melees on one team? By god man, are you mad?!

EDIT: Also, please be new heroes today. It'll make up for the fact that I have to take a Organic Chemistry exam tonight.

edited 20th Mar '13 7:33:12 AM by Kev-O

I once ended up on a four-stack of people that ended up all melee (Sven, Sand King, Naix, something else). Luckily I was Warlock and carried them to victory. It's not all that impossible because Warlock.

All ranged vs all melee would be kind of fun from a thematic perspective.

Same with Fire vs. Ice, or Nature vs. Undead, or all Radiant vs all Dire.

edited 20th Mar '13 10:39:25 AM by Locoman

Themed teams can be pretty fun, and sometimes even kinda balanced.

I don't know who to blame here. On the one hand, Song of the Siren is pretty much pure evil for some teamfights. On the other hand, the player did get caught in the Chronosphere...

Well, 6.77 ships tonight.

Ding Dong!

The Drow's been nerfed.

Which old Drow? The Ranger Drow!

Ding Dong! The Drow Ranger's been nerfed.

Wake up, Omniknight, get in the game, it's time to fight.

Wake up, the Drow Ranger's been nerfed.

She's gone where the Morphlings go,

Below - below - below. Yo-ho, let's open up and sing and ring the bells out.

Ding Dong' the merry-oh, sing it high, sing it low.

Let them know

That Drow Ranger's been nerfed!

edited 20th Mar '13 6:17:25 PM by Locoman

I wonder how much freedom Valve has to do their own thing since we have stuff like Spiked Carapace and the Force Staff that has actually been rather well received.

Ah, looks like the delay on Skywrath Mage was because Valve completely scrapped his model and rebuilt him from scratch. Apparently he was "Knight riding a big bird shooting magic", now he's basically "Magical Bird Knight" with some new concept art. Still, I'm surprised Valve completely redesigned the hero this late into his creation.

I started thinking that the tournament meta was getting stale, then I realized that though I was seeing the same 20-some heroes over and over, 20 isn't a small number by any means.

So, at the risk of sounding like a noob (which I suppose I am, since I've never played it), why is it just "Dota 2" instead of "Defense of the Ancients 2"? I doubt that Blizzard can trademark the name of a fan mod...

Riot Games started the whole copyright debacle, then they gave the rights to Dot A-Allstars, LLC to Blizzard, who continued the whole thing until Gaben and friends at Valve came to the agreement that Valve would use Dota 2 as the name while Blizzard got to keep the Allstars part of the title.

So last night I played a match against an idiotic Drow Ranger. S/he continually charged headlong into fights (because apparently "only bitches run away"), bought back every single time s/he died, and continually berated us in all-text.

They won, becuase they also had a Silencer and Troll Warlord on the same team, so Drow gave both of them insane damage buffs, and Troll could elevate their BAT speeds to ungodly levels.

edited 23rd Mar '13 9:30:09 AM by Locoman

Bristleback drops tonight.◊

We're also getting a new Vengeful Spirit model.

And Wisp is getting his name changed to Io for some reason I am unaware of.

I just had a thought: If Allstars undergoes balance changes that kill it or fissure its current playerbase, will Valve be obliged to follow suit? If so, what would that mean for the game especially if it happens post-release?

^^ I can't help but think that Blizzard is still mad that Valve won the right to produce "DOTA 2", so they're threatening lawsuits over every single concept they can think of that's even remotely similar to WC 3.

Wisp is also getting a colour change to a different shade of blue. But its name was always Io the Wisp. It's just more obvious now I guess.

edited 27th Mar '13 6:42:06 PM by hass

Just finished a game.

You know, there's nothing quite as demoralizing as facing a really good Pudge on the enemy team. You start getting really paranoid, allies are getting hooked left right and center, and even if you manage to catch him in a gank, the fat bastard just commits suicide.

Bristleback patch is live.

But wait, who's this in the background? How mysterious. Totally Skywrath Mage coming soon.

Just finished a practice game with Bristleback... I like him. It's a little odd to play him; you have to feint and keep turning to the back so you can proc your damage reductions and return fire, but the quill stack and armor reductions that he hass are absolutely beastly. I finished off with a 2/7/3 KDR, which is... OK, I guess, for my first ever game. I also like his look; he reminds me of that weaselly guy in the Ice Age movie with the dinosaurs (the 4th one, I think?).

This is a hilarious little game. Can you be a TRUE SUPPORT HERO?!

I ganked mid, let Enigma escape, and made Invoker go AFK in the fountain.

feels bad, man

Remember that "Windrunner" is good against blue heroes.

And in this latest patch, we see that Slark has gained a new skill, Ice Blast. Yup, totally not a bug.

EDIT: Oh wait, that wasn't a bug at all. Dark Pact pushed him under the threshold for that ability to kill him.

edited 2nd Apr '13 6:05:51 PM by hass

Haha, look at this noob. He doesn't know you can unlock Ice Blast on Slark by using the Konami Code while singing Free Bird on a rainy day in Smarch! LAUGH AT HIM