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Oct 25, 2017
1,071

Two new heroes

- Void Spirit
- Snapfire

Courier

  • Each player now has their own courier automatically
  • Courier now gains levels when your hero gains levels


Economy

  • Observer Wards no longer cost gold
  • Heroes now start with 3 Town Portal Scrolls
General

  • Map layout redesigned [?]


  • Heroes can now level up to 30. Once you get to level 30, you unlock the entire talent tree. XP requirement for the levels are 3500/4500/5500/6500/7500. Respawn time does not increase past 25. XP bounties max out at level 25 bounty values.

  • Removed Side Shops

Outposts

Added a new neutral building type - Outposts

There are two of these on the map, located where the Side Shops were previously. Right clicking to channel it takes 6 seconds and then you gain control over the outpost. Converts faster with more allies channeling. Having control over an outpost grants you bonus XP upon initially capturing it, and at 5-minute intervals on the game clock. It also provides your team unobstructed vision in that area and allows you to TP to it. Outposts are inactive for the first 10 minutes of the game and cannot be captured then.

Neutral Items
Neutrals now drop unique items that cannot be sold, but can be shared with allies. There are five tiers of items that drop over the course of the game. Within each tier, the odds get cut by half for each subsequent drop. Items of a specific type will only drop once for each team. Drops only begin after 5 minutes.
There are 62 unique neutral items in total.
Backpack slots increased from 3 to 4
 

iareharSon

Member
Oct 30, 2017
8,940
I just started playing again after a 2+ year hiatus, and the changes between them and now were already immense. And now you hit me with this shit? I low key feel like quitting again LOL, I already felt hopelessly behind before this.
 

Ryuelli

Member
Oct 26, 2017
15,209
I just started playing again after a 2+ year hiatus, and the changes between them and now were already immense. And now you hit me with this shit? I low key feel like quitting again LOL, I already felt hopelessly behind before this.

I've never gotten into DOTA (started with League and didn't like DOTA's individual turn rates), but as someone who hasn't played LoL since 2015ish, I feel you. I occasionally watch big tournaments and it's definitely not the game I once enjoyed.
 

DrArchon

Member
Oct 25, 2017
15,485
Holy fuck those are some changes. Free wards and couriers will make playing support a lot more enticing.

Kudos to Valve for being willing to go fucking nuts and upend their game.
 

C.Mongler

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
3,881
Washington, DC
I haven't played seriously in about a year and some change, but holy shit it looks like damn near a new game now. I have to learn 60+ new items? Woof.

Still tempted to come back though lol.
 

Anno

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,952
Columbus, Ohio
It's weird to look at patch notes for a game you've played for almost 3000 hours and not understand how it work anymore lmao. Icefrog is the best.
 

HylianSeven

Shin Megami TC - Community Resetter
Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,068
Haven't played a game yet, but really not liking the sound of this random neutral item thing. A lot of those items are so high impact that I think a lucky roll on that could easily turn a game out of sheer luck.
 

eonden

Member
Oct 25, 2017
17,087
o4j6vor8x0141.png



Icefrog knows best
 

collige

Member
Oct 31, 2017
12,772
I find it hilarious that they gave back all the removed items like PMS to neutral creeps. The outpost stuff is crazy, same goes for couriers. I don't think I'm a huge fan of removing Pudge and Abaddon's suicides though. Magic damage going through BKB seems like a pretty huge buff for Viper and Enigma.

Dota is RNG the game basically. There's always been massive amounts of it.
 

Gush

Member
Nov 17, 2017
2,096
Yeah, my main thought was how is any of this competitively viable?

Warcraft III was competitively viable with way more RNG than these new features seem to have at first glance.

Edit: The neutral items are a concept ripped straight out of WC3 so I assume they did their homework with how that stuff affected the game and avoided some of the pitfalls it admittedly had.
 

OnionPowder

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
9,323
Orlando, FL
Warcraft III was competitively viable with way more RNG than these new features seem to have at first glance.

Edit: The neutral items are a concept ripped straight out of WC3 so I assume they did their homework with how that stuff affected the game and avoided some of the pitfalls it admittedly had.

There's so much money in Dota tournaments is the only reason why i'd care about that. 1 Dota tournament has more money than probably all of WC3s prize money overall.

I'm excited for it either way. As you said, they know more than I do on how competitively viable it is. Worst case is it makes for some fucking wild matches.
 

Randdalf

Member
Oct 28, 2017
4,167

It's very interesting that they've added this. I feel people's perception (not necessary the reality) of RNG in Artifact was one of the reasons that game failed. I wonder if players will be more receptive in this case. What I don't really understand is - why? Maybe that's just how the frog croaks.
 
Sep 14, 2018
4,624
Haven't played a game yet, but really not liking the sound of this random neutral item thing. A lot of those items are so high impact that I think a lucky roll on that could easily turn a game out of sheer luck.

Yeah, my main thought was how is any of this competitively viable?

I just played 2 matches, the neutral items were littering the field, everyone was just throwing them away lol. No time to get the super items which drop 70 min in cause I was level 30 at 35 min, they fucked with xp again it may have been those outposts.
 

eonden

Member
Oct 25, 2017
17,087
This is fucking CRAZY.
So Crazy

It's very interesting that they've added this. I feel people's perception (not necessary the reality) of RNG in Artifact was one of the reasons that game failed. I wonder if players will be more receptive in this case. What I don't really understand is - why? Maybe that's just how the frog croaks.
Guess he really wants to buff jungle
 

OnionPowder

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
9,323
Orlando, FL
I just played 2 matches, the neutral items were littering the field, everyone was just throwing them away lol. No time to get the super items which drop 70 min in cause I was level 30 at 35 min, they fucked with xp again it may have been those outposts.

Instead of adding a forfeit button they just added outposts to increase XP gain on the enemy team so much that they steamroll even faster.

#bless
 

Napalm_Frank

Avenger
Oct 27, 2017
5,735
Finland
I'm intimidated to jump back into DotA these days because it has changed so radically since I actively played, especially some changes to my favourite heroes.

That said I do salute that they are willing to do radical changes to keep the game fresh.
 

Pikelet

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,401
It's awesome that they are still so willing to make such massive changes to this game
 

collige

Member
Oct 31, 2017
12,772
It's very interesting that they've added this. I feel people's perception (not necessary the reality) of RNG in Artifact was one of the reasons that game failed. I wonder if players will be more receptive in this case. What I don't really understand is - why? Maybe that's just how the frog croaks.
I don't think Artifact's failure had much or anything to do with the base gameplay. Hearthstone is RNG heaven and people love that shit.
 

Deleted member 10549

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
832
I dislike new item drops from neutral creeps. It adds a huge RNG factor to the game. Those items are powerful regardless of their tier. Outposts seem kinda pointless because the experience points gained from them aren't that great and the granted vision is also useless because it is placed on the edge of the map.

Also, couriers can use items now? Come on, this is shit.

Some hero changes are weird like Riki going back to day 0 when his invisibility skill was his ultimate. They also dropped the regen buff from him. It's hard to play Riki again without having invisibility and regen buff because he is super squishy.

Overall I'm not a great fan of this update.
 

bounchfx

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,662
Muricas
looks crazy, wish I still had the time and will to play.

this is how you keep a game going for years though, all kinds of (debatably) parallel patches, just enough to shake things up but not enough to completely change the game, but dota is definitely the game that experiments and isn't afraid to try pretty massive changes. props.
 

xyla

Member
Oct 27, 2017
8,386
Germany
Wow, I'm excited for the next Major. While I didn't play the game anymore, it's the most fun to watch after counter strike as far as esports goes for me.

When is the next Major coming up btw?
 

Tagyhag

Member
Oct 27, 2017
12,502
Woah...These changes are just nuts.

Guess I gotta give it a try just to see how much it changed.
 

Dec

Prophet of Truth
Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,535
For someone who doesn't play DOTA 2, can you put the scale of these changes into perspective?

The longer a game goes the more characters are like super heroes with a flying side kick and you have to control both. There are a million changes that can be summed up by this generally, but just the power ceiling of everyone rose dramatically.

A role that has long been undesirable in a team game(and often played by selfish players) has now become desirable to the team and potentially very game impacting.

It isn't easy to sum up a patch like this for someone who doesn't play. These changes are the opposite of safe. You would really not see this kind of balancing in any live game. Icefrog (the main man balancing) is nuts, and after all these years has earned so much trust and goodwill that seeing a patch this crazy stirs excitement in the community rather than skepticism. It wont be perfect but Valve reacts quickly and the game will change a good amount in the coming weeks/months to address feedback.
 

Dylan

Member
Oct 28, 2017
3,260
I can't believe it took them this long to solve the courier/wards problem.

Honestly, I'd say at least 1/4 of public games I've played featured an argument over who should buy wards.
 

Gorger

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,628
Norway
I play almost exclusively support and... wow these changes are going to be game changing. It is definitely going to make my life a lot less tedious. No need to spend gold for wards - holy shit that is big. No need to pass the courier for mid and carry in early game so I can get my items more quickly. There is so many radical changes that is going to change the meta and how the game works. This would probably be the best time to jump in now that these rules are fresh and new for everyone. I have honestly no idea how this is going to work out, so I'll need to test it out for myself.

I have honestly not enjoyed DOTA much lately. I don't get many good games anymore. There is a lot of flame, slurs and toxicity. And as a European I often get into games where the team exclusively speak Russian so it's impossible to work together because of the language barrier. I really wanted Valve to give us more options where we can queue up for English speaking games, which I have a vague memory was possible before.