Author: Ian Marwong
Date: December 5, 2021
Defense of the Ancients all started as a World of Warcraft mod in 2003, created by players of Warcraft. It became its standalone game in 2011, with its beta release by video game developer, Valve. Debuting with a prize pool of $1.6 million in 2011, Dota 2 established itself on the esports scene. Ten years later, with a $40 million prize pool, 500,000 active monthly players, and a big community, Dota 2 is still going strong.
Dota 2, or Dota, is a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) where two teams of five players battle to invade the other team’s base and destroy the “Ancient”. Each player controls a unique hero with a unique skill set, and they must collaborate with fellow teammates to attack the enemies’ base while protecting their own. On the base level, Dota seems not to be very different from other MOBAs such as Riot Games's League of Legends, but as one peels back the many layers of the game, the complex structure exposes itself.
What sets Dota apart from other MOBAs is the versatility of the game. The objective and the map of the game remains the same in every game, but with 122 heroes, each with at least 4 unique abilities, there are endless possibilities of combinations that a team can choose to play. Items which are bought to improve the hero also plays a big impact in the versatility of the game. Whereas other MOBAs’ heroes are assigned a particular role with certain things they can and can not do in the game, Dota’s items allow any hero to adapt to any role. All of the versatility of Dota does create a steep learning curve for newcomers of the game.
This game can be quite challenging on the mind and the body of players. Mechanically, there is a lot a single player has to control, with most abilities and items needed to be activated by a keypress. Players often have to use the mouse to click while simultaneously pushing at least half of the keyboard. Mentally, there are a lot of things to grasp. With there being over 200 items as well as heroes having up to 14 abilities, each unlike the other, it can be difficult to memorize what everything does. Other nuances of the game adds more complexity to the game, such as varying turn speed times and animations, and the importance of the in-game clock. To evenly match players of the same skill together, Dota uses a MMR, or match making rating, system.
MMR points are gained after winning and deducted after losses, allowing for people to move according to their ability to play the game. MMR is not the only rating a player gets though. A behavior score is also assigned to each player to try to stop bad behavior from ruining the experience of well behaving players. Unfortunately, due to some loopholes and exploits, badly behaved or toxic players do find their way into games of all levels. The quality of the games also vary from region to region of the world due to different regional playstyles. To help filter the toxic people out of games, a peer based Overwatch system was created where community members can watch clips from games and determine which behaviors are acceptable and which should result in consequences. Dota is more than a game, there is an entire community supporting it from behind.
Where there is little communication from the developers at Valve save for game updates, the community steps up to assume the weight. Members post guides, both online and in-game for people to follow when playing. When Studio Mir’s Dota anime, Dota: Dragon’s Blood, was released in 2021, the community came together to create a tutorial for new players as there were no functioning tutorials for the game at the time.
Dota 2, this free to play game, is more complex and complicated than other games, but it allows for more strategy. Dota shows that it will remain as a strong game as it occupies 6 out of the top 10 highest prize pools in esports. The steep difficulty curve can be smoothen out by friends or the vast content that the community offers. As the Steam store page for Dota 2 states, “And no matter if it's their 10th hour of play or 1,000th, there's always something new to discover.”
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