[Megathread] DotA 2

[Kjalar]

The amount of 'pros' who really aren't very good is pretty surprising.

'Really aren't very good' compared to who exactly? You, maybe?

[Lysah]

Top tier players in general.

[Lillpapps]

Yet every time the pro teams play with a "top tier" pub player as a standin that standin is so far away from being anywhere near the same level skillwise as the pro's. The pro's are pro for a reason.

[Hermanni]

'Really aren't very good' compared to who exactly? You, maybe?

Me? If we're talking about Airman, it is a maybe.

There are better player(s?) ITT though so you could try them for less uncertainty.

[Kjalar]

Top tier players in general.

And how exactly do you measure this 'general' skill level of top players?

My point is that it's easy to say 'this guy isn't good enough and is carried by his teammates' when watching a live stream. But in reality lots of 'pub heroes' that say such things in fact have no clue.

Also, note that, unlike pub players, pro players never trash-talk about other pros - probably because they have enough experience to realize that everyone can be outpicked, outfarmed or outplayed in team fights and that everyone makes mistakes sometimes.

[Xothic]

How the fuck do I get better with pudge hooks? It looks fun as shit, but every time I actually play in a game as pudge I usually shit everything up due to not much experience. Any general tips as pudge as well? I was kinda surprised when I found out he was the most played hero as well.

[Deleted]

How the fuck do I get better with pudge hooks? It looks fun as shit, but every time I actually play in a game as pudge I usually shit everything up due to not much experience. Any general tips as pudge as well? I was kinda surprised when I found out he was the most played hero as well.

Create a lobby
turn on cheats
add bots
pick pudge
write "-wtf"; or "-gold 99999999" and give yourself a bloodstone or something
try hooking.

General tip for Pudge is to just practice ganking lots in your games and communicate with whatever lane you're ganking as to what order of skills you're gonna use. I can't count the amount of times me and a Pudge have silently agreed to the ability order to use just to have one of us screw the order up and have "wtf noob??????" arguments ensue.
Also you can toggle Rot while Dismembering.

[Charge me Doctor]

How the fuck do I get better with pudge hooks? It looks fun as shit, but every time I actually play in a game as pudge I usually shit everything up due to not much experience. Any general tips as pudge as well? I was kinda surprised when I found out he was the most played hero as well.

In wc3 there was a map called pudge wars. Many fun.
Oh god, just googled it and new version is horrible at first sight. IIRC it was just a XvX map where everyone is pudge and everyone tries to drag enemy to their side

[Lysah]

Also, note that, unlike pub players, pro players never trash-talk about other pros

Yes they do, all the time. Well, some do and some don't, pretty much the same as any other skill bracket.

[Longview]

Yet every time the pro teams play with a "top tier" pub player as a standin that standin is so far away from being anywhere near the same level skillwise as the pro's. The pro's are pro for a reason.

yeah

its like they didn't practice with the standin

hmm

[Hermanni]

I'm pretty sure most pros do talk a lot of shit of each other, it's just that most of them are smart enough to not do much of it in public because when they do there's often a massive fallback when reddit and such go crazy because of it. And having been in pub games with most pro players I can say many of them shit talk at least as much as your average pub hero.

Like Longview pointed out usually standins don't do much practicing with the team they're playing for, which unsurprisingly results in poorer results for the player and the team. Not all of them do badly, 7-8 months ago AdmiralBulldog was just a Lone Druid pub lord who somehow was constantly invited to standin for Na´Vi, now he plays in the best Western team who just beat the best Chinese teams in a major Chinese LAN tournament.

Although pro teams are more dependent on teamwork, synergy and strategy, the disparity of individual skill between different pro players is pretty daunting. And it doesn't really take that much to be a pro if you really want it (see: EternalEnvy), hell I could maybe be one if I spent all my days playing in-leagues and hanging out with pros and begging to standin or play for B-tier teams and didn't suck too hard, and someone like Lysah probably could if only they bothered to.

[Lysah]

Well I think I've said it before but I'll say it here:

Don't ever fool yourself into thinking the professional players got randomly invited to teams out of merit. The pro scene is more akin to a social club - a huge amount of these players are on teams because they knew someone already or actively promoted themselves and begged to be on teams. Being good doesn't get you noticed, and there are a TON of extremely talented players who have never and will never be professional players. I have a DotA1 friend who is easily one of the best players I've met, certainly better than many if not most of the people I see in tournament games, yet he's not on a team so obviously he's just a pub hero! Too bad he went to fight for top 10 grand master in sc2 instead of playing dota2, I'd have twice as many people to play with as I currently have

There really is no way of knowing just how many absurdly skilled players there are out there. What you see in tournaments like TI2/3 is just what the community shows you, it isn't the best of the best and never will be. They're all very exceptional players, no one doubts that, but they aren't the only good players in the world. There are plenty of people you've never heard of who are as good or better.

If you watch closely you can see a trend with these teams - most of them aren't that special individually. Watch any of them in public games without their team and they don't stand out at all, if they changed names you'd never guess they were pros. What matters is that when they come together as 5 they have a certain fluidity that will far outshine random groups. The ability to know exactly what is expected of you as your 20% of the team is something that is of vital importance to a competitive game and public players will always lack (since they don't play with the same people constantly).

[Longview]

And it doesn't really take that much to be a pro if you really want it (see: EternalEnvy)

huh

the guy literally dropped out of uni to play for hours every day

[Hermanni]

huh

the guy literally dropped out of uni to play for hours every day

Yes, I was talking more in terms of talent and experience than commitment and used EE as an example of 'really wanting it.'

[Longview]

Yes, I was talking more in terms of talent and experience than commitment and used EE as an example of 'really wanting it.'

oh my bad

• Multiple people ganging up on you to report you in the same game has no effect on whether or not you are banned. We are looking at patterns of behavior over time only.
• If you are currently communication banned, any communication reports you receive in that time period do not contribute towards, nor result in additional bans.
• Since the ban system has been implemented, there’s been a 35% drop in negative communication interactions.
• Less than the 1% of the active player base (players who have played Dota 2 in the last month) are currently banned.
• 60% of players who receive bans go on to modify their behavior and don’t receive further bans.
• Total reports are down more than 30%, even after accounting for the reduction in the number permitted per week.

this is really fucking funny to me

http://blog.dota2.com/2013/05/communication-reports/

[Lysah]

At least they're still working on it. Like adding ping throttling, good change. Now they just need to make it so you can talk to your friends or otherwise add some option to "ignore" chat bans so you can communicate with your team if you really want to.

I don't see why there shouldn't be a checkbox in config that lets you turn chat bans off. Make them on by default so only people who want to risk dealing with the trashcans so that they can actually try teamworking with them in game will actually use the option. Hell, a change like this would let chat banned people still talk, just most people would never see what they wrote. Sometimes when you get mad you just need to type in all caps in team chat, it doesn't matter if anyone reads it.

[PizzaSHARK]

At least they're still working on it. Like adding ping throttling, good change. Now they just need to make it so you can talk to your friends or otherwise add some option to "ignore" chat bans so you can communicate with your team if you really want to.

I don't see why there shouldn't be a checkbox in config that lets you turn chat bans off. Make them on by default so only people who want to risk dealing with the trashcans so that they can actually try teamworking with them in game will actually use the option. Hell, a change like this would let chat banned people still talk, just most people would never see what they wrote. Sometimes when you get mad you just need to type in all caps in team chat, it doesn't matter if anyone reads it.

The solution I liked was that being chat banned just auto-mutes you in every game you join, and the players in the game can un-mute you if they'd like. Valve said that that solution didn't offer enough to the person being chat banned, though - part of the reason for the chat ban is the "hey, you're being an asshole. Quit it," thing.

[Kanadei]

How the fuck do I get better with pudge hooks? It looks fun as shit, but every time I actually play in a game as pudge I usually shit everything up due to not much experience. Any general tips as pudge as well? I was kinda surprised when I found out he was the most played hero as well.

Sorry if this is out of place but surely the best place would be to practice in team vs. bot games? Or even make your own games vs. bots?

Seems like the easiest way to practice hero abilities to me.

[Lillpapps]

yeah

its like they didn't practice with the standin

hmm

Practicing with the team has nothing to do with basic skills. Which every "top tier" pub player have far less then the pros.

[Lysah]

Practicing with the team has nothing to do with basic skills. Which every "top tier" pub player have far less then the pros.

What makes you so confident of this? How much time every day do you spend watching top tier public games?