DotA 2 announces Free-to-Play with all heroes and gameplay elements unlocked!

[Wingflier]

Without touching on the gameplay at all, I think this makes it the best ARTS out there to date.  It is literally the only ARTS (that I know of) that gives every player full access to the entire game without paying a dime.  No grinding for champions, or runes, or masteries, or heroes, or anything else.

Anything you pay for will be cosmetic and completely optional.

Valve has really stuck to their guns here in wanting DotA 2 to be the best and most competitive ARTS on the market.  It seems they've taken yet another huge step in the right direction.

Giving every player equal chances from the very beginning is what makes a game truly fair and truly about skill.  I can't wait for the full release!

http://kotaku.com/5914769/dota-2-is-free-but-you-can-buy-hats

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Taking away the grind is definitely a step in the right direction. Its why I stepped out of LoL.  But the genre as a whole is way too competitive for my tastes =\

King

[keith.lamothe]

LoL is a lot of fun in co-op vs AI with people you know (if they're the sort you like playing games with, at least), though it doesn't take long to get good enough that the AI (despite periodic improvements to it) really doesn't have a chance at beating you (on the plus side, that means you don't feel as much of an urge to spend money to get specific champions or faster access to runes: no competitive need).  If DotA2 has co-op vs AI I'll probably play it at least for a little while.

[Wingflier]

I know at one point they were talking about making the bots good enough to replace a player in the event that someone leaves.  If that's true then you should have plenty of a challenge.

Every patch they continue to make significant improvements on them. Even probably about a year from release, I think they're already better than the LoL bots. Which is pretty impressive considering all the extra activateable items and game mechanics that DotA has over LoL. On the hardest difficulty even a veteran player may have a tough time; though I'm pretty sure they cheat at that level.

If they continue to improve at this rate, I'll probably prefer them over mediocre players lol.

[keith.lamothe]

Well thanks for letting me know, I'll be sure to suggest it to my group

[Volatar]

My problem with the DotA2 bots is that they have perfect relexes and timing on denies, making it really frustrating to lane against them.

[BobTheJanitor]

But can they make it so that 12-year-old abusive obsessives don't insult my lineage when I try to play this game? If not I still don't think I'll be interested.

[Wingflier]

My problem with the DotA2 bots is that they have perfect relexes and timing on denies, making it really frustrating to lane against them.

On the bright side makes you really good at last hitting

But can they make it so that 12-year-old abusive obsessives don't insult my lineage when I try to play this game? If not I still don't think I'll be interested.

So far, of the hundreds of games I've played, I haven't really experienced that much trash-talking; though it could be because it's still in beta.

Gabe was talking about making people who continue getting reported for bad behavior have to pay increasing amounts of money in order to keep playing, as an incentive to play nice.  http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2012/04/24/valve-may-try-to-make-jerks-pay-more-in-dota-2/

Also, the current (already implemented) system of reputation, which rewards people for good behavior, seems to influence people to play nice.

[keith.lamothe]

But can they make it so that 12-year-old abusive obsessives don't insult my lineage when I try to play this game? If not I still don't think I'll be interested.

Your mom stops 12-year-old abusive obsessives from insu- y'know, that pattern really requires a shorter starting phrase

I'll be interested to see if Valve tries that "make the jerks pay" approach, and what happens.  But a rep system may well be enough.

[Hearteater]

For the most part, LoL and DotA do not require any chat at all, and personally I feel both should have chat disabled by default.  Those games are infinitely more enjoyable if you don't need to be reading the vile stuff spewed from enemies and more seriously, allies.

[Wingflier]

I have a friend who hates online games for that very reason (he's never handled criticism well at all), so when I can convince him to play games like this with me, I turn off all the chat and tell him to pretend we're playing against AIs.  It's actually quite humorous.

[Hearteater]

The biggest issue (on this topic) I have in LoL is I can't mute allies and still have their pings show up.  That is the only form of communication needed.  If I could do that, I'd have a much easier time introduction people to it.  As is, I had one friend abandon it because they refused to mute people because they didn't want to get reported.  Why did they think this would get them reported?  Because "Failure to communicate with team" is a report category.  So they literally stopped playing for fear of getting reported because of that report category.  Obviously they aren't a seasoned online game player, but they did otherwise enjoy the game.

[keith.lamothe]

I have a friend who hates online games for that very reason (he's never handled criticism well at all)

Criticism is part of it.  Some people can't handle it.  Some people can but don't want to handle it in what is ostensibly their relaxation time.  Some people don't mind the criticism (and even appreciate it if it's the kind that actually helps them improve), but do mind when voice/text chat is full of sexual metaphors for the combat taking place.

Interesting on just pretending its bots though.  Normally I'd wonder if that's dehumanizing those other players that are muted and treated (in a sense) as not-really-human, but what do you call it when it's actually more pleasant to interact with bots?

[Wingflier]

It's sort of like when people tell you to picture the audience naked in order to cope with stage fright.  Is that dehumanizing people?

I guess you could make a good argument both ways.

[keith.lamothe]

It's sort of like when people tell you to picture the audience naked in order to cope with stage fright.  Is that dehumanizing people?

I guess you could make a good argument both ways.

I wasn't making it seriously in this case; I was mainly just amused at the realization that with the stereotypical (whether or not that stereotype is right, my understanding is that it isn't really the common case at least nowadays) random MOBA player, if one just thinks of them as computer-simulated entities that would probably increase one's opinion of them.