Looking for MOBA style game

[select20]

I've never played a MOBA styled game until recently. Been playing Demi God for the past few days and it's been pretty fun. Everyone told me to try LoL and I have but I don't know why, but on both my PC's, a 3 year old one and my new less than 4months old, during the download and installation I get the blue screen of death and have to restore my PC's to an earlier date. I don't know what is causing this, but I'm not trying it again.

Anyways, Demigod was fun, being the first MOBA styled game I've played ever. I would like to try another. My need for some kind of competitive PvP is getting to me. I've heard about HoN, is it newbie friendly? How about some others?

[IEatRoflWafflz]

LoL - Newby Friendly (not talking about community, every MOBA has a shit community), good interface, confines you to learn a few heroes (if you like that, you can learn a few heroes at a time).

Dota 2 - Only chance at playing is beta opt in so GL ( i finally got in, YAY!) However, it is (imo) more complex, with a hero pool of 70~? atm(LoL is a big hero pool also, but you slowly unlock unlike dota where all heroes are unlocked ASAP), that you can choose from, with an array of items, which unlike league of legends, you choose different items every game for heroes.

HoN - Never played it, but i heard it is like Dota, so most likely harder to get into than LoL, but a bit more complex items etc.

Conclusion : I would try out LoL first to see if you truly like the moba genre. It is much easier to get into etc.

2nd Edit: If you happen to get a DotA 2 Beta invite, you can send me a PM with your MMO champ / Steam account (Ieatroflwafflz steam ID) and i would love to help you get into DotA 2 and would love to teach you Dota is BY FAR my favorite of the three games, and i love to follow the pro-tournaments too. Joindota.com if you want to check out some pros go at it. (VOD's section)

[ergonomic]

As mentioned above, the two current titans are really LoL (League of Legends) and HoN (Heroes of Newerth), with DotA 2 in closed Beta. These games all stem from the game that made the style become popular, DotA (Defense of the Ancients) which is a Warcraft III custom map.

I personally think HoN is a much better game than LoL, but LoL is set up WAY better for a beginner (HoN has a notoriously severe learning curve), so I think your'e stuck with the difficulty of throwing yourself against HoN or old-school DotA (not much easier to start with) if you can't get LoL working.

[Fencers]

Heroes of Newerth and DOTA2 are quite new player unfriendly. Both are sorta awesome though. Just be patient and be prepared to suck for a looooong time in those games. League of Legends is shallower than both in gameplay, but overall is probably the better designed game for newcomers. Also happens to be great "pick-up & play" fun without a lot headache.

Were I you, I would try in the follow order;

- League of Legends [Although you say you can't install]
- DOTA 2 [Need to get a beta invite]
- Heroes of Newerth [Excellent game, but the most unwelcoming to new players]
- Bloodline Champions [More arena centric than strategy map focused. High skill cap.]
- Warhammer: Wrath of Heroes [Arena-ish, needs polish but pretty fun]
- Monday Night Combat [Skirts the line between MOBA & Smash TV clone. Fantastic fun regardless]

[select20]

Yeah, I might have to start with HoN seeing as how I was having trouble installing LoL.

[Smetz]

I prefer HoN and dota over LoL, But HoN and dota is also a bit harder. And the community in HoN and dota is not newb friendly at all.

[select20]

Heroes of Newerth and DOTA2 are quite new player unfriendly. Both are sorta awesome though. Just be patient and be prepared to suck for a looooong time in those games. League of Legends is shallower than both in gameplay, but overall is probably the better designed game for newcomers. Also happens to be great "pick-up & play" fun without a lot headache.

Were I you, I would try in the follow order;

- League of Legends [Although you say you can't install]
- DOTA 2 [Need to get a beta invite]
- Heroes of Newerth [Excellent game, but the most unwelcoming to new players]
- Bloodline Champions [More arena centric than strategy map focused. High skill cap.]
- Warhammer: Wrath of Heroes [Arena-ish, needs polish but pretty fun]
- Monday Night Combat [Skirts the line between MOBA & Smash TV clone. Fantastic fun regardless]

Bloodline Champions sounds interesting. I'll have to check that too. Back during BC and into WotLK I was huge into PvP. 2v2 and 3v3, I loved it. Once Cata came out I just slowed down my gaming due to RL stuff. Recently I've had more time and wanted to get into some PvP again, something much more in depth that CoD's or BF3.

Thanks for this list though.

---------- Post added 2012-04-19 at 10:29 PM ----------

I prefer HoN and dota over LoL, But HoN and dota is also a bit harder. And the community in HoN and dota is not newb friendly at all.

Is there a way to play where you can just practice getting to know the champions a bit before you dive into playing with others?

[MiseriaScH]

If you have SC2 you can also try Storm of the Imperial Sanctum (SOTIS).


playsotis.com

[select20]

If you have SC2 you can also try Storm of the Imperial Sanctum (SOTIS).


playsotis.com

Oh nice, yeah, I loved SC2, didn't know they had anything like that. Thanks

[ergonomic]

Is there a way to play where you can just practice getting to know the champions a bit before you dive into playing with others?

Yes there is. There's also a nice ingame "Herodex" that has all the heroes and their skills and stats and recommended guides and builds.

[Deleted]

LoL install giving BSOD wtf lol

Anyways, you can try HoN for free now with their free account thing... will give you some heroes to play. I think though that as a hon paid account, you can choose to not play with free accounts. I have only played with bought accounts, not free accounts on my hon playing. So I would think the flaming and douchebaggery you're gonna get there playing with other free accounts at minimum might scale from a bit worse than paid accounts to all-out-war . HoN free account will give you a good chance to see what it is about.

LoL is like the casual, broad (1 game, some competitive), forgiving version of MOBA's.

HoN is like the cutthroat, accurate and precise, focused MOBA, in my opinion very well-made MOBA version of MOBA's.

I have not tried DotA 2.

Oh yea, about practice. You can play against the AI. As a new player to MOBA as I am assuming you are here, you can find some games in the Custom Games tab and sort them for your needs. Some games are named Noobs only or noobs welcome. I don't know if there is less douching in there though. Things are sorted by your PSI or MMR (rating for custom games and matchmaking). There is casual mode and normal mode. Matchmaking and anything serious competition happens in normal mode. Casual means you get levels, gold and items faster. Creeps and towers are easier, I think. Faster respawn maybe? Normal is the usual, standard mode.

If you want to try a hero out first and use the hero's abilities, you can click create game and make a practice game under game type or something. Then choose your hero and try his skills. Then you can go into a game and pick that hero so you know some about what your hero does and don't have to try so much on random or reading in-game.

Also, your sig made me lol a bit by the fact that in HoN you will likely meet people at all skill ranges in good numbers who would best be described as dark and red .

[Nosonia]

League of legends... 12 million active accounts agree with me.

[PACOX]

There is Realm of the Titans and Rise of the Immortals as well.

[Deleted]

All of the mentioned games here have quite steep learning curves, LoL is probably the easiest to get into, but IMO it gets boring after a while. It's just not as deep as the two other games (HON/DOTA (2)). So if you just want to play something stick to LoL, however if you got the guts and patience to learn much more beyond that, go play HoN or Dota.

[Wildmoon]

I recommend original Dota in WC3.

[KickThatGuy]

If I we're you I'd go with Heroes of Newerth.

[T87]

select20, if you want a Dota 2 key, post your SteamID, or email associated with it. Also, lemme know if you have any friends that you'd want to play with.

EDIT: I've played HoN since early beta, and Dota 2 since last summer. I highly recommend Dota 2 over HoN, from a high-level stand point.

[shimerra]

LoL is the game for people who couldn't hack it in Dota, or HoN. Some of the hero ideas for LoL are good but I just can't stand pretty much everything else about the game from graphics to items to the way they had you acquire heroes. I enjoyed the hell out of DotA on WC3 and both HoN and Dota2 are much much more true to the original.

Your best bet to learning this type of game is to get someone who knows what they're doing to play a few games with you. I taught most of my friends how to play whereas I learned how to play dota by myself. It's much easier having someone who knows all the heroes, a idea of what items to get, and when to back to avoid a gank or when to just push for the win to baby sit you while you get your sea legs.

[Tojara]

Play LoL IMO it's really easy to get into and the interface is one of the best.

They all have shit communities though.

I played DoTa on WC3 hours upon hours since it was released and couldn't stand HoN. It was messy to look at and the interface was absolute shit IMO.

My problem with DoTA and HoN at the moment is it's not even trying to be something new. As it is now DoTA2 is like DoTA from Wc3 except not even at the level of what we were left with in Wc3. It's in beta so obviously that's going to change. Whats silly is the hoops they jump through to maintain the same experience as the Wc3 version in a new generation that is made almost 10 years later. For someone who is new it's a nightmare and learning some of the meta is frustrating. Pulling mobs outside of their little box at 53 seconds, forcing them into a lane and then leashing them out of that box before the minute mark so creeps double spawn just seems so outlandish. Then putting wards on top of creep camps so they don't respawn.

Don't get me wrong I like DoTA, but some of the mechanics and metas that still exist in the new incarnation are downright puzzling. In the original DoTA one could understand as the engine was a limiting factor. The thing that's nice about DoTA over LoL (to me) is you aren't so comp locked like you are in LoL. Jungle, AD/Support bot, AP mid and a tanky top is pretty much every game. The beauty of DoTA is picking whatever the hell you want (for the most part, there are still comps but not nearly to the degree of LoL).

[Urizen]

Claiming LOLs number of players is any reason to consider it over HoN is insane,
in that frame of mind, zynga poker is the greatest game in the world..

HoN used to be $30 for an account and no cost to play,
LoL game out with a free to play model which opened its legs wide open to the masses of retards to play, but with heroes/extras you can buy that DOES have an impact on game play (this asian gaming model is fucking lame by the way)..

HoN, seeing how well this model was going for LoL changed its model to free to play and they also opened a micro transaction shop however this is for fluff things like alternative hero models or different visual taunts

Both games allow you to generate in-game currency at a super fast (slow) speed that allows you to buy stuff once every 5000 man hours played (exaggeration, but its shit slow), HoN will not allow free to play players to play with experienced players until they play X amount of games (I assume this goes for LoL too), both have practice or non-stats modes to learn on

My choice for serious play is HoN (for now)

I have played LoL - it disgusted me, its ugly and cartoony, its simplistic and boring..

I have played DotA 2 - have beta key, its color and design scheme is really bland (reminds me of old style open GL games) and I could not bring myself to like it, it also is missing a few absolutely essential hotkey-able things that HoN has and its kinda depressing that every single thing is the exact same (mechanics wise) as the original dota, a lot of mechanics were like that due to limitations of the Warcraft 3 engine but they didnt bother improving upon them or changnig things up when they had the chance, it is IDENTICAL. HOWEVER it is still beta so a lot can change, also there are still zillions of people playing dota that will likely migrate to dota 2 which means competition wise, it can probably attract the biggest prizes

Disclaimer: Regardless of which of the above games you choose -
be ready to be yelled at, spat at and shat upon,
for your mother, country and race to be insulted repeatedly in stale and fresh ways,
for your selfesteem to be crushed into a small gooey pulp,
for you to rage at and/or smash your monitor to pieces in the middle of the night waking your family/neighbours,
and for most of your spare and sleep time to be gobbled up because you are addicted to playing, researching mechanics/strats/tactics and watching streams of pros in an effort to break out of the noobzone and into the chest puffed, noob stomping elitist HoN/LoL/DotA GOD you are destined to become*.

*Don't waste your time