DOTA 2 Catch-all

Non TI4 Post Ahead....

So video and I are throwing around the idea of a mini GWJ 1v1 tourney for some of the newer folks. There would be a purple level prize at the end. Myself, Video, Cask, and Aut would not be eligible for this, but we would be looking for 8 people from the lower tiers that would wanna have some fun, try something new, and maybe learn something. We would choose the heros for each tier of the bracket (one str, one agi, one int, and one wildcard) which would be announced ahead of time, single elimination best of 3 grand final. Gauging interest before we delve to deep into trying to make this happen.

Atomicvideohead wrote:
DanyBoy wrote:

Personally I don't like Ayesee either. I find him dry, he talks too much in a mechanical sort of way, and he makes me feel like I'm listening to top 40 radio.

RIP Casey.

*pours one out*

Happytime Harry wrote:

Non TI4 Post Ahead....

So video and I are throwing around the idea of a mini GWJ 1v1 tourney for some of the newer folks. There would be a purple level prize at the end. Myself, Video, Cask, and Aut would not be eligible for this, but we would be looking for 8 people from the lower tiers that would wanna have some fun, try something new, and maybe learn something. We would choose the heros for each tier of the bracket (one str, one agi, one int, and one wildcard) which would be announced ahead of time, single elimination best of 3 grand final. Gauging interest before we delve to deep into trying to make this happen.

I would play but it might be hard to schedule. But I am interested.

Koz wrote:

Is Tobi generally well loved? I know he's been around forever and is very knowledgeable, but I can't stand his unintelligible nasal Australian accent.

I think he used to be pretty widely hated but he made a conscious effort to improve. Of course, there are still people that don't like him just like every other caster. I personally think he's inched ahead of LD as the best of the three main hype casters (the third being Ayesee). That said, I'm not the biggest fan of hype casting and would generally prefer if a cast was mainly just former pros talking with a competent play-by-play person.

WizardM0de wrote:

I can't recall exactly which one it was yesterday (perhaps Lys?) but when any fight happened he literally stopped talking except to say "OHMYGOD!" "WOW!" or something along those lines. The rest of the commentary was rather opinionated, not neutral at all. I prefer casters of any event to understand their neutral role and communicate well first and foremost.

It was almost certainly Lysander. He's an odd caster and a lot of people aren't going to like him. He can be incredibly biased and is basically a never-ending fountain of memes. He was the main caster when BtS was covering the Korean scene and he definitely grew on me. I actually kind of like him know.

I don't think Tobi was ever widely hated, though he had a few vocal detractors. But he definitely resisted the trend towards more professional casting. Once some of the other casters started to surpass him in popularity, he started to refine his style. Personally I wasn't a fan when I started following the game around TI2, but I enjoy his casting now, for the most part.

I think a lot of Ayesee's unpopularity stemmed from his outsider status. He definitely had some issues and he's improved a bunch, but I think the self-identified "hardcore" fans reacted more to their own favourite casters being challenged. Now that he's been around for a while people have softened towards him.

So, this whole notion of "rat dota," being derogatory...how did it come about? Who was the first to complain about teams taking down towers and pushing to the ancient (aka "how you win the game") and why did it catch on in the community?

I mean, I'm watching a team with arguably the lesser draft compete through avoiding ganks and strategic pushing of towers and people are actually mad about it? Or is it all more tongue-in-cheek?

WizardM0de wrote:

So, this whole notion of "rat dota," being derogatory...how did it come about? Who was the first to complain about teams taking down towers and pushing to the ancient (aka "how you win the game") and why did it catch on in the community?

I mean, I'm watching a team with arguably the lesser draft compete through avoiding ganks and strategic pushing of towers and people are actually mad about it? Or is it all more tongue-in-cheek?

It's frustrating and boring to watch. I guess it's sort of like 'corner camping' in shooting games in the fact that it's not a glitch or against the rules, most people just don't like it. If you're referring to the Na'Vi Titan game, it's sort of rat but more of a split radiance push. RatDota is much more prominent with furion/tinker/lycan who is just off on their own pushing towers while the rest of the team fights.

casktapper wrote:

I don't think Tobi was ever widely hated, though he had a few vocal detractors. But he definitely resisted the trend towards more professional casting. Once some of the other casters started to surpass him in popularity, he started to refine his style. Personally I wasn't a fan when I started following the game around TI2, but I enjoy his casting now, for the most part.

I think a lot of Ayesee's unpopularity stemmed from his outsider status. He definitely had some issues and he's improved a bunch, but I think the self-identified "hardcore" fans reacted more to their own favourite casters being challenged. Now that he's been around for a while people have softened towards him.

Tobi actually improved a huge amount on mechanics and information, but otherwise I agree. Still, he is the most popular caster by quite a bit according to polls and stuff.

Ayesee actually was loved incredibly much earlier on when he got on the scene because of his voice, just after some time that wore off and his habits annoyed a lot of people. I personally like him, but not as much as the other casters.

@1v1 Tournament: Pff, I havent played a 1v1 for 4 years or so! Haters!

@ Wizard: About every Pub Player in Dota 1.If you ever play against Rat Dota, you know why. In Dota 1 it used to be no Backdoor Protection for a long time, So CLinkz, Furion and other Pushers Could literally rax you if you didnt pay attention, and it was extremely hard to do anything about it.
It is unbelievably frustrating to play against, because sometimes can only watch while you rax falls no matter what you do. That is no fun, and feels "unfair".
A "normal" pushing line up is not hated, it is just the typical Prophet Backdooring, Tiny Wisp or other Combos, who are widely hated because you cannot really stop them from doing it (Wait in base to defend and lose tons of gold and exp, or go out and lost tower.)

There was also Illusion Pushing, where Cancer Lancer (PL) or Naga & Co pushed the tower very slowly with illusions, and you could literally do nothing to prevent it, because you couldnt kill illusions fast enough.

Happytime Harry wrote:
WizardM0de wrote:

So, this whole notion of "rat dota," being derogatory...how did it come about? Who was the first to complain about teams taking down towers and pushing to the ancient (aka "how you win the game") and why did it catch on in the community?

I mean, I'm watching a team with arguably the lesser draft compete through avoiding ganks and strategic pushing of towers and people are actually mad about it? Or is it all more tongue-in-cheek?

It's frustrating and boring to watch. I guess it's sort of like 'corner camping' in shooting games in the fact that it's not a glitch or against the rules, most people just don't like it. If you're referring to the Na'Vi Titan game, it's sort of rat but more of a split radiance push. RatDota is much more prominent with furion/tinker/lycan who is just off on their own pushing towers while the rest of the team fights.

Yea that's the game I'm watching, and I'm not finding it boring at all. Plenty in chat are though with the rat comments. Just found it odd that at its core it is a complaint about the efficient execution of the game's sole objective.

I mean Titan didn't die for 20 minutes across multiple gank/initiation attempts while they continued to farm and kill towers. That seems like a tremendous accomplishment.

Well, Navi had literally nothing to stop them from tping, so it wasnt really Titan playing well, it was Navi not having disables. 1 disable outside of 2 really important teamfight ultis just doesnt cut it against splitpush. But if you enjoy ratdota, thats great for you, you can check out some Alliance games from the recent weeks

aut.taker wrote:

Well, Navi had literally nothing to stop them from tping, so it wasnt really Titan playing well, it was Navi not having disables. 1 disable outside of 2 really important teamfight ultis just doesnt cut it against splitpush. But if you enjoy ratdota, thats great for you, you can check out some Alliance games from the recent weeks ;)

It's not about enjoying it more than other games. I like when all the lights go off and the sounds go boom too, I'm just trying to understand the hate. They're playing for millions of dollars and need to roll with the most effective approach against a given lineup.

Isn't their approach sort of decided by the opposing team's draft? If it works out that there is a serious lack of stuns on another team otherwise strong on abilities, tanking, whatever, wouldn't you naturally want to lean to that style of play? Shouldn't these people just be mad at the silly draft rather than the style of play it takes to counter it?

Or was Na'Vi even worse than their draft? Did they not pick up the right items or switch up their own style (say, push towers themselves) in order to counter the split-push/rat dota/bore me to tears and cry me a river tactics of Titan?

They go over the origin of "rat" dota in the latest DOTA TODAY.

Wait, you're expecting civility from twitch or dotatv chat?

@ Wizard:
True Ratdota is incredibly hard to punish. You go all 5 and push highground, until you reach it one tower of yours is gone. Then you go highground and have an insanely hard time, because they have heroes who can wipe the creepwave and nuke you so you have to go back. In the meantime, you lost another tower.
Then you say whatever, storm into highground, and if you dont wipe them you lose rax. And as you could see in Navi vs Titan, if they have a good draft, they can defend really easily. That game is a bad example because Navi drafted really horribly, but other games, you have prophet taking rax while you fight 4v5 (hi LoH), you have Naga taking T3 when you go out for a smoke gank, and so on.

The problem is not so much that ratdota exists, it is that you have a hard time punishing them when they play well. But yeah, there is no reason to hate on it, it is a legitimate strategy, no cheating and completely fine. People like to see more wombocombo teamfights rather then 70 minutes rice fest with slow pushes, that is the bottom line I think.

Ok quick terminology.

Rat Dota and Ricing are both derided. Mostly because they cause long boring games.

RAT-- Mentioned above. Basically avoiding all fights with the other team, to simple push all lanes. No conflict.

Ricing-- Kinda a racist term. Refers to a tactic popular in Chinese dota, that refers to their tendency to also ignore fights but not really push lanes. In this case the tactic is to jsut farm until you have an unstoppable carry. IT refers to working hard in a "rice field" farming. Hence the kinda uncomfortable thing.

Theyre mostly hated because theyre boring in both Pubs to play and in Pro games to watch.

I’m gonna leave this here:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2014...

Happytime Harry wrote:

Non TI4 Post Ahead....

So video and I are throwing around the idea of a mini GWJ 1v1 tourney for some of the newer folks. There would be a purple level prize at the end. Myself, Video, Cask, and Aut would not be eligible for this, but we would be looking for 8 people from the lower tiers that would wanna have some fun, try something new, and maybe learn something. We would choose the heros for each tier of the bracket (one str, one agi, one int, and one wildcard) which would be announced ahead of time, single elimination best of 3 grand final. Gauging interest before we delve to deep into trying to make this happen.

I'd be interested but I won't be able to do it until August. We're moving on July 25th and I won't have time to do anything but pack/unpack from now until at least the first week in August.

The new TrueSight match stats on Dotabuff look pretty great: https://dotabuff.com/truesight

DK vs. VG:

Spoiler:

14 minute first blood + rax.

casktapper wrote:

DK vs. VG:

Spoiler:

14 minute first blood + rax.

Oh my god that game!

Spoiler:

VG's Shadow Demon ended the game Level 5 but had the most critical disruptions ever. The Lone Druid only had Boots of Speed and 2 branches. These guys are operating in steamroll mode. Haha.

WizardM0de wrote:
casktapper wrote:

DK vs. VG:

Spoiler:

14 minute first blood + rax.

Oh my god that game!

Spoiler:

VG's Shadow Demon ended the game Level 5 but had the most critical disruptions ever. The Lone Druid only had Boots of Speed and 2 branches. These guys are operating in steamroll mode. Haha.

Spoiler:

Um, and radiance on the bear

Happytime Harry wrote:
WizardM0de wrote:
casktapper wrote:

DK vs. VG:

Spoiler:

14 minute first blood + rax.

Oh my god that game!

Spoiler:

VG's Shadow Demon ended the game Level 5 but had the most critical disruptions ever. The Lone Druid only had Boots of Speed and 2 branches. These guys are operating in steamroll mode. Haha.

Spoiler:

Um, and radiance on the bear

Spoiler:

DAT BEAR

Welp. Didn't expect Alliance and Empire to be eliminated this early: they were both in my top six!

I wonder if Na'Vi can make it to the finals again. It feels like they're the scrappy underdog of Invitationals.

Deadmonkeys wrote:

Welp. Didn't expect Alliance and Empire to be eliminated this early: they were both in my top six!

I wonder if Na'Vi can make it to the finals again. It feels like they're the scrappy underdog of Invitationals.

They always seem to be. EG is so strong.

Just had a game where the other team got our throne to about a third health and decided to come fountain camp. That was probably a bad idea on their part as we wiped them and eventually won. We had been winning the whole game until our 10-year-old Slark had to eat dinner.

Double Mega Creeps! By far one of the craziest and most entertaining games ever. Both teams were super friendly, 8/10 heros level 25, most were also 6 slotted.

http://dotabuff.com/matches/774322590

Haha, anyone want to trade me some players for Bulba?

iaintgotnopants wrote:

We had been winning the whole game until our 10-year-old Slark had to eat dinner.

RD2L player sign ups are live.

Atomicvideohead wrote:

RD2L player sign ups are live.

What's that?