By the way, since I haven't played Dota 2 enough, and haven't played LoL since FOREVER, how do abilities scale in those games? As I understand it Abilities (spells) are static in LoL and scale only be leveling them up and by buying items with "ability power" on them, am I correct? Are abilities in Dota 2 completely static and level only by leveling them up?
In Smite it works by splitting all gods (champs) into two categories: Magical and Physical. They deal and scale off their respective damage types. Magical users are generally Guardians (tanks) and pure casters, while physical users are Assassins, Hunters (ADC) and Warriors (Bruisers). Now the difference from at least LoL is that all your abilities have a base amount of stats that may either be completely static regardless of level (such as a slow, for instance. It's 20% and doesn't scale at all), or scales with level. So an ability might start off at 100 damage and scale up with level up to say 800 at level 5 (max ability level). In addition most abilites have "scaling" that adds a certain percentage from your physical/magical power stat. Abilities can never crit. Only autoattacks.
So as an example a physical character generally lives off of their auto attacks for damage and use their abilities for utility, CC, support, mobility etc. Some exceptions exist such as Loki who generally deals insane physical burst damage in a short time span with his abilities and finish off with AA.
Magic users tend to be for more bursty and almost all of their damage comes from their abilites, and as such, their abilities generally scale better compared to physical characters.
Naturally, there are several exceptions to this rule. Nu Wa, Zeus and Chronos are examples of very AA-centric mages and Thor, Loki and Hercules are very ability-focused physical fighters.
Unchained Key Bind: 1
Fenrir leaps forward, dealing damage to all enemies when he lands. At full runes, the leap stuns the enemies hit. If the leap hits a god, the cooldown is halved.
Ability: Line
Affects: Enemy
Damage: Physical
Damage: 95 / 155 / 215 / 275 / 335 (+80% of your physical power)
Stun: 1s Cost: 65 / 70 / 75 / 80 / 85
Cooldown: 15s
That's a typical example of a physical ability. 80% scaling is HUGE for a physical ability and most tend to hover around 50-60% if they are good. Magic abilities are often around 70-80% and in addition; magic power tends to scale a lot more into the end game. A fully built physical carry may have 200-240 physical power by the end game, while a nuke-built mage may be around 600-650 magical power.
In DotA, abilities typically don't scale with items, unless you include Aghanim's Scepter. A physical carry's abilities indirectly levels up with items, but not in a literal sense (in other words, if you have an ability giving you 100% extra attack speed, the more damage you build, the more effective that will be).
However, DotA is balanced in this fashion, and I think it allows for much more diversity and individualism among heroes than at least League of Legends.
Why?
Because by making it so that abilities don't directly scale with items, you can have a huge impact on at what time in the game each hero is the most powerful. The problem with League of Legends, at least in my experience, is that basically any champion can carry. Given enough farm, it doesn't matter if they deal AP or AD, they can do insane amounts of damage. Yet, to counter-balance this design philosophy, all heroes typically have to be nerfed to some extent.
In DotA, it's exactly the opposite. If you're a magic dealer, you WILL fall off after a certain point. It doesn't matter how much farm you have, or how many levels ahead you are, your abilities don't scale that well, and you'll eventually be defeated by heroes who do.
So why is this important? Because you can dictate at which time any given hero peaks within the game. Intelligence heroes are the most powerful early on in DotA. That's because, in spite of the fact that their abilities don't scale with items that well, they scale regularly (through levels) incredibly well. With often just 1 point in these abilities, you have a massive advantage of your lategame carry counterparts. With 4 points in these abilities, you can often kill them from full health to zero early to mid game. Strength heroes typically peak and are most effective in the mid game. Agility heroes are usually the most powerful in the late game.
So what's so awesome about this particular system is that you can build a team to focus on a particular part of the game. Do you want to win in the lategame? Pick a team of carries with a couple supports. Want to win the midgame? Pick some good strength initiators and some soft carries to demolish the enemy when your team "peaks". Want to be decent all game long? Build a balanced team of INT, STR, and AGI heroes. Having options like this (the ability to dominate a certain point of the game) is something that simply isn't possible in MOBAs like LoL in my experience. When basically every hero can be powerful at any point of the game, it actually takes away from the potential options your team has to succeed.
People who call DotA a "game of carries", calling carries overpowered and impossible to defeat because they always win in the lategame and casters don't scale blah blah blah, simply don't understand DotA. A full team of casters (so no carries whatsoever) is EXTREMELY powerful, and can win you the game within the first 20 minutes. Don't believe me? Look at the
statistics. Of all team compositions in DotA, this is the most effective statistically speaking. This is because intelligence heroes are able to use their early game dominance to shut down the other team so hard that they can't recover before the game ends. Unfortunately, team compositions like this simply aren't possible in any of the other MOBA designs I've seen.
