[MOBA DOBA] League of Legends - Gettin' our free game on.

TyrantCow

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCPEFvysUrA

Here's your standard, wiki-stolen background:

Two main designers for the popular Warcraft III custom map, Defense of the Ancients: Allstars (commonly abbreviated as DotA), Steve "Guinsoo" Feak and Steve “Pendragon” Mescon are involved with Riot Games in the making of League Of Legends: Clash of Fates[6]. Guinsoo created DotA: Allstars from the original DotA, created by Eul, by adding his own mix of content, including over 40 heroes, numerous items, and various gameplay changes. Guinsoo then passed DotA: Allstars on to its current developer, Icefrog. Pendragon, who is the Director of Community Relations for Riot Games, helped create the DotA: Allstars website along with its forums, and is still currently working on League of Legends: Clash of Fates.

The game has RELEASED,
SIGN UP HERE: https://signup.leagueoflegends.com/

NDA is done, talk about whatever shit you want; and, post videos and pictures and stuff to your heart's content; just like this:

People that are playing, and that you might also want to play with:

TyrantCow : MooMan
FightTest : FightTest
fadingathedges : fadingathedges
undeinpirat : undeinpirat
zanmatto : ParanoidDroid
Zombiemambo : EssGee
Cohsae : Cohsae
Nisi : Nisi
Sirson : Sirson
Originate : Originate
DebaserZbs : DebaserZbs
Endomatic : Barnabus
I needed a name to post : Pterodactyl Man
Zek : Zeyk
klok : fastpaced
ParisInFlames : skoot
Stolls : Karlinn
fmz65 : SensAZNal
UrQuanLord88 : urquan
TheSuperWoot : MelancholyMark
Lehman : Draggan
CharlesVI : CharlesVI
Bendery It Like Beckham : Bendery
DustedForLife : DustedAgain
Zoelef : Zoelef
soggychicken : soggychicken
Peas : jyajin
Custom Special : F4ll0ut
alset85 : alseT
king awesome : kingawesome
Mightyhog : Agreedo
Houn : Houn
In Starscream We Trust : In Starscream We Trust
TriadFate : TriadFate
Drakmathus : Drakmathus
Bardi : Bardi
MinionOfCthulhu : MinionOfCthulhu
Hrage : friedriceyum
Esc.Hatch : Hatch
distracted : Distracted
Feldorn : Mortenya
Adus : Adus
BaronVonNub : BaronVonNub
Zero-Control : ZeroControl
RawrBear : RawrBear
hiigaran : hiigaran
Thrawn200 : Mitthrawnuruodo
Seran : Seran

Peeps usually be hanging out in the PA vent, hit it up for some games.
If you can't find any there check out the LoL vent (https://beta.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=6) and you can probably scrounge up a pre-made.

Character Builder
http://www.leaguecraft.com/
Check it out, it's fun to play with while you're at work and can't be at home playing. It's made by community members; so, expect it to change a bit behind any patches.

There is now a tutorial that new players can check out.
If you're just starting and wondering who to play (I believe you play her in the tutorial as well), Ashe is generally a good starting character: http://www.leagueoflegends.com/champions/view/22/ashe_the_frost_archer

TyrantCow

I'd love some conversation about the game, as I haven't really been able to talk about it much.

Particularly your guys' take on 'denies'. I have played DotA, and the recent HoN, and while I can see that it takes quite a bit of effort to both last-hit and deny, I think it really creates a nasty barrier to entry; and, is also a distraction.

One of the focuses I take from LoL is on PvP. By omitting denies, I think it's opened up for more character on character action starting at level 1. There are constantly pretty intense firefights going on in the lanes, that I missed in other games.

It also doesn't penalize (as harshly) new players that don't get the hang of last-hits right away.

Plus, you can still effectively deny by running off lane rivals and feeding all your creeps in to their turret while they're back healing...

Elimination

I got into this beta, though i dont think i am going to try the game. I honestly dont even remember signing up for a closed beta of this, as DoTA and this do not interest me in the slightest.

FightTest

I played DotA before it got super competitive, and really only in relatively casual games where denies weren't a big factor. Frankly I found them sort of annoying since I'd rather concentrate on fighting things than babysitting my own units. Didn't even know LoL didn't have them, sounds good that they don't.

I passed on the other two AoS games due to low hero count or just a reskinning of DotA. LoL is the only one I've been looking forward to.

fadingathedges

Thanks for the invite, DL'ing now.

I almost PM'd you a thanks, then remembered how silly that would be.

Zombiemambo

Having trouble connecting to the network. Is it down or just having trouble now that so many people are trying to jump in?

TyrantCow

i logged in just fine

gonna play a game in a few minutes

anyone feel free to add me, MooMan

FightTest

Signed up as FightTest.

Think I'm about done downloading patches, will be giving it a go in a bit.

Cohsae

I never played Dota, due to not having WC3 and also due to it's notorious jerk users, but they keep talking about LoL (and also Heroes of Newerth) on Idle Thumbs and it got me interested, mainly because LoL apparently is a bit more noob-friendly and also supposedly all the jerks went to HoN. Can anyone else confirm/deny this?
Anyway I look forward to whatever it is you actually do in this game. That's never really been made clear to me.

Roland_tHTG

thanks mooman

feel free to send me unsolicited links on steam for more free games

fadingathedges

i'm in as fadingathedges, buddy me.


e~ i seem to be not very good

BahamutZERO

What's with all these DotA clones popping up these days?

undeinPirat

downloading now, summoner name (i guess that's the name people see and use?) is undeinpirat

thanks mooman for the invite

FightTest

Played a practice 5v5 game. Two people on my team quit within the first few minutes, then we started losing and the other two guys quit. Though until that point I held my top lane solo vs 2 dudes. Played as Teemo against Tryndamere and Evelynn.

Dig the graphics and getting 200+ fps. The interface takes getting used to coming from DotA. Would appreciate a way to rebind hotkeys. So far seems pretty cool overall.

We should get some PA games going so I don't have to deal with people quitting before I even get a chance to check out a character.

Zombiemambo

This is...this is actually really fun.

zanmatto

This game is pretty good.

IGN : ParanoidDroid

Zombiemambo

Oh, and my Summoner name is EssGee.

undeinPirat

This is a really fun DoTA clone, granted I'm not good, but I feel that's just me not finding the right hero yet. I like how noob friendly the client is (not necessarily the community I found from the two games I played). I played DoTA a long time ago, so the concepts are strong in my mind but the tiny minutia such as good items and difficult heroes definently aren't (especially for a new game), so I appreciate the suggested items and hero ratings.

IGN: undeinpirat, restating for redundancy

Shamus

Still have to actually install the beta..

I've got two keys I can give out. First come, first serve. Shoot me a PM.

Cohsae

OK so I just played a round of this LoL business, seems pretty fun although I was mostly confused. Can someone give me a rundown on the basic strategy of this game? Also what exactly are 'last-hits' and 'deny's?
Also thanks to Tyrantcow/Mooman for the key.
Also my username is Cohsae, feel free to add me if anyone tries to get a PA game going.

Zombiemambo

Cohsae wrote: »

OK so I just played a round of this LoL business, seems pretty fun although I was mostly confused. Can someone give me a rundown on the basic strategy of this game? Also what exactly are 'last-hits' and 'deny's?
Also thanks to Tyrantcow/Mooman for the key.
Also my username is Cohsae, feel free to add me if anyone tries to get a PA game going.

Based on DoTA:

The idea is to push to the enemy's base and destroy a key structure, which is surrounded by unit-generating structures and turrets. Each base spawns units in waves every 30 seconds or so, which go down one of the three paths (upper, middle and lower), fight other units and damage turrets until they inevitably die.

Heroes try to 'push' as far as they can, usually by following a wave of friendly units. This usually ends up with one to two heroes from either team meeting somewhere along the path, and a little fast-paced chess game begins: the goal being to kill the other heroes, push to the nearest turret (if there are friendly units to support them) and destroy it (this usually requires a number of attempts). Heroes are highly vulnerable, so they tend to stay back, using the safety of friendly units and turrets, and wait until there's an opening to get to the next turret and damage/destroy it.

Heroes are placed in three categories: Strength, Agility and Intelligence (again, this is DoTA, so it uses WCIII hero stats). Strength heroes are like tanks, they do steady but moderate damage and, in turn, take a lot of punishment. Agility heroes are like assassins: they're built like glass, but can also kill enemy heroes really fast, sometimes less than 2 seconds. Intelligence heroes vary, some use nukes (area-of-effect damage, useful for 'farming,' or earning gold/exp by killing small units in large numbers), some use powerful direct-damage spells, and others have summons (and some have a combination of the three).

It's kind of hard to explain without going into a lot of detail, but watch others and try to feel out how the game is paced: it's very give-and-take. Killing an enemy hero is worth lots of gold and experience, so players do what they can to avoid getting killed while trying to gain footing and eventually push toward the enemy team's side of the map.

hobokent

Hmmm im quite interested in LoL and im pretty torn about whether i should convert
all my friends into playing LoL or HoN.
Though i am attracted to the summoer customization =D

Zombiemambo

I hear all of the cocksuckers from DoTA went to HoN. Even if it was the better game, it isn't anymore.

undeinPirat

Jaxe or however you spell it is pretty sweet if you grab the frozen mallet and some speed boots (also max out blink strike (i think it's called leap something in this game) and counter strike (the dodge move) along with your ultimate before you even think of empower.) I think I went something like 6-2-6 with this type of build. Team went on to lose, but oh well, the other team had a really good card guy (Twisted Fate I think?)

Anyways, compared to other heroes I tried out, he seemed pretty easy to do decently if you last hit minions and join in on ganks (alerts on minimaps really help teamwork, more people need to do it).

Cohsae

Yeah I just played my 3rd game (using Vaegir or Vaegar or whatever) and man that Jax thing was crushing me.
Also this game is pretty fun.
Oh and what is this "Ultimate" business? On the scoreboard it says Ultimate ready, what is my ultimate? I'm guessing it changes for each character, but how do you know that it's ready without looking at the scoreboard, and how do you use it?

zanmatto

Cohsae wrote: »

Yeah I just played my 3rd game (using Vaegir or Vaegar or whatever) and man that Jax thing was crushing me.
Also this game is pretty fun.
Oh and what is this "Ultimate" business? On the scoreboard it says Ultimate ready, what is my ultimate? I'm guessing it changes for each character, but how do you know that it's ready without looking at the scoreboard, and how do you use it?

Okay, your champion has three spell abilities, they are bound to Q, W, and E, on the keyboard. However, every fifth level after level one (6, 11, 16) You are able to put a skill point into your champ's Ultimate, which is bound to R. It's different for every hero, and it's more or less the defining skill for your guy.

It says on the score-board so you can tell if someone is lying about their ultimate being on cooldown, or if they just blow.

Ethereal Illusion

Cohsae wrote: »

Oh and what is this "Ultimate" business? On the scoreboard it says Ultimate ready, what is my ultimate? I'm guessing it changes for each character, but how do you know that it's ready without looking at the scoreboard, and how do you use it?

It will be your 4th skill, the R key.

The character I've been playing, Anivia, has a 0 cooldown on her ultimate so it's always ready. I'm rather liking her special abilities, though. They're kinda tricky to get working right, but I'm still learning!

Nisi

Anivia is really powerful, and a lot of fun to play. I'm really loving this game and looking forward to the release. If anyone wants to add me for some arranged team fun my account name is Nisi.

zanmatto

protip of the day : don't forget about your hero's passive! every hero has an innate passive ability that you don't level up ; it scales with you

you can find it by clicking on the picture of your hero in the bottom left.

Cohsae

I'm liking this Sion chap. He has an axe, he hits people with it. My kind of dude.

Klyka

The game is not for me. It is, literally TOO casual for my tastes.

The cel shading has way too thick black lines and the creeps look like Orko from He-Man.

I know what this game is trying to do, I know it's free and they prey on the people who want to be "special" in online games to buy their new skins/heroes. It's a good idea and will probably work out.

But the HUD is terrible in every way, it literally is made after the credo "Everything must be big so people who never played a game can see what's going on" and there are just some things that irk me about all the hand holding as a very experienced gamer. The store interface for example is a disaster. But if I told someone "buy a health item" and he clicks the giant HEALTH button and that works, well, great.

My biggest gripe with the game though is that it is too slow for my taste. That and the artstyle. But mostly the slow gameplay.

I do think their announcer is good though, I want more announcer messages in HoN, like the "HAS DESTROYED A TOWER!" message and not just the "TOWER DENIED" message.

Nisi

Klyka wrote: »

The game is not for me. It is, literally TOO casual for my tastes.

This isn't really what they're going for, despite what the graphics may have led you to believe. They want the game to be very competitive and a lot of the design decisions have to do with wanting it to be an e-sport.

Also while the interface is not quite optimal yet (it is beta), your comments make me wonder if you are using the default rez and if you know there is a UI scaling option.

And the announcer is being replaced, as the voice is not really no par with the other voice talent. Personally I find the voice annoying, though I've gotten used to it.

Klyka

They say the e-sport thing to lure in the DOTA players and the usual core people.
You know,the people who go into the spell book and actually put in runes that give you "+0.38 attack speed" and the like. That niche is for them.

Apart from that, the game just screams casual in every way. Literally screams it in your ear.

And I don't judge a game by it's graphics, but I meant the gameplay. I don't like the graphics they have going on,because of the badly used cel shading, but that doesn't mean casual to me. It just feels slow,easy and woefully uninteresting. I played a game an hour ago and it was just not my cup of tea even though I basically mopped the floor with the enemy team.

And the voice talent is ok, I'm sure the few lines they have (Ashe has like...2 lines?) per character is due to the beta. I didn't mean the announcer's voice btw, I meant the announcements. "Owned" should be removed, but all the other stuff should be kept in. Seriously though... "Owned" every time you kill a hero...I turned off the sound then and there.

And I scaled the UI, but the default size is still terrible and the UI itself is probably alpha territory and not yet beta.

Fuga

couldn't the term 'moba' be applied to many many other games?

FightTest

I don't know how it's "casual" because you think it's "slow." It felt the same as DotA did to me, there was no "screaming" casual. Also fail to see how having one shop is somehow terrible compared to having to deal with 9ish separate vendors with items randomly scattered around them.

Only thing I'd agree about is the UI is pretty wonky. I'm really not a fan of having enemy health at the top of the screen and my information at the bottom. That just creates a delay in my ability to size up what's going on with the enemy vs myself.

Nisi

Klyka wrote: »

They say the e-sport thing to lure in the DOTA players and the usual core people.
You know,the people who go into the spell book and actually put in runes that give you "+0.38 attack speed" and the like. That niche is for them.

Apart from that, the game just screams casual in every way. Literally screams it in your ear.

And I don't judge a game by it's graphics, but I meant the gameplay. I don't like the graphics they have going on,because of the badly used cel shading, but that doesn't mean casual to me. It just feels slow,easy and woefully uninteresting. I played a game an hour ago and it was just not my cup of tea even though I basically mopped the floor with the enemy team.

And the voice talent is ok, I'm sure the few lines they have (Ashe has like...2 lines?) per character is due to the beta. I didn't mean the announcer's voice btw, I meant the announcements. "Owned" should be removed, but all the other stuff should be kept in. Seriously though... "Owned" every time you kill a hero...I turned off the sound then and there.

And I scaled the UI, but the default size is still terrible and the UI itself is probably alpha territory and not yet beta.

Yeah I believe they are changing the announcement lines entirely based on the post soliciting feedback.

As for the casual thing I totally don't get that at all. Yes they are making the game more accessible to new people, but I don't think the game is very newbie/casual friendly. If you have dota experience you're a bit ahead of the game, and if you're still low level you're still getting matched against players with low levels of experience with the game. That being said level 1's still end up getting paired in games with me even at level 30 sometimes. Despite this I have had some very fun and challenging games.

And ditto on what FightTest said, it feels like DoTA except better to me. Most anyone who is playing right now will agree the UI is a bit wonky, but its manageable and hopefully they will improve it, I know it is something they've said they are working on.

Fuga wrote: »

couldn't the term 'moba' be applied to many many other games?

Yep, by their definition of it I believe Demigod and HoN would also be moba games.

TyrantCow

yeah, the announcer will change (good god, thank you)

i felt the game to be a little more newbie friendly than others; especially the item recommendations. even if you don't know what you're doing, you can at least buy the recommended items and not feel like you're wasting your gold. but, yeah, some people can still be dicks, to which i usually cut in with, "you're playing a beta, chill out. at least give constructive criticism". it works surprisingly well, and i've actually learned a bit from people after calming them down a bit, even if we are losing horridly.

i like the UI more than HoN - i don't know that i can say much beyond that. at least i can read the stuff on my screen without squinting. you can also toggle the amount of information displayed right above the character's head in the options. there's a whole sub-forum on the UI, if you want to check it out (beta.leagueoflegends.com) - seems like a constant work in progress.

P10

I find it funny that they felt the need to make up a genre name to give their game more legitimacy. Welp, game is launching now.

aBlank

Fuga wrote: »

couldn't the term 'moba' be applied to many many other games?

yes. It's a stupid name for this "genre"... it's a RTS game just not nearly as deep as an actual RTS :[

(EDIT) I should add, I'm talking about ALL "moba" games, like Dota, HON, etc... not just LoL.

TyrantCow

i thought MOBA came from something else...?

but, nope, looks like they might have coined it.

heh, Museum of Bad Art...

DebaserZbs

Crazy acronyms are the norm as far as genre labeling goes. I'm pretty sure they'd want to distance themselves from being seen as a full game based on the concept of their previous mod. Demigod was referred to by most as a DOTA clone (albeit a good one).

On a related - and hilarious - note, I was watching an interview with the makers of Dead Space: Extraction. The interviewer asked if the game was a rail shooter, and they responded very assertively by saying it's a "first person guided experience." So everyone is always trying to rebrand themselves.