Champion Fantasy: How League and Dota approach their character designs, and the Skarner VGU problem.
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- čas přidán 13. 01. 2023
- Skarner VGU when?
Let's take a look at what "Champion Fantasy" means, and how each game approaches the thematic designs of its characters. - Hry
Just pointing something here, Garen is definitely not Guts. Darius and Trynda are A LOT closer to Guts, Garen is simply a Paladin
Trynda is more like Guts, he even has a Berserk mode
@@west4869 the weird thing with Trynda is that he builds like an adc and is super squishy without his ultimate, Darius on the other hand is super tanky and chops everyone with his dark heavy armor and a massive piece of iron that is his axe (40kg). His lore and visuals also are inspired by Guts
@@west4869 well, after 5 stacks, Darius gets a berserker mode as well, gaining tons of AD and red aura /eyes
It feels like dota just had a rock solid foundation for the hero designs to thrive from...take it the rts elements, day night cycle, agro mechanics, etc...there r just so many ways for the heroes can find their place in the game
League has a more simplified and limited foundation so it puts more pressure on the champions to be able to stand out on their own...like u can't really put a deny mechanic in a champion that'll ruin the entire laning phase...and u can't really make complex summoner heroes coz there's no group control mechanic
Overall as an aspiring game developer...dota fascinates me in terms of its game design...how its been able to stay consistent for so long...there seems to be little to no sense of power creep in terms of the heroes...like heroes that were made from the very first iterations like dragon knight and death prophet have very simple kits but still can stand toe to toe with new heroes with complex kits like dark willow or void spirit
Power creep seems to be a problem that most other mobas struggle with and i love that dota's design just seems to be so easy yet so complex
i have no experice with dota but isnt league a bit the same. at the moment annie is super strong and has an very ez kit while more complex champions are weaker or as strong. But balance chances can chance it. Also i think easier champions should be worse then complex champions because why would you learn a hard champion if the ez champ is stronger even when you master him.
and riot is experimetning with new mechenics. Akshan has a revive Milio gives extra attack range. maybe denying farm will be a new mechenic but probbaly hard to balance. And league players complain more then every champ is getting more complex.
@@alwaysjarron6260 many of the old champions don't stand a chance against newer ones in league. Nasus for example, who is one of the few champions which have not changed a lot in 13 years, is garbage compared to Gwen, Ornn, Yone or the reworked Dr. Mundo. Akshan especially is ridiculous. His E-ability alone has more words than Nasus whole kit.
Annie is one of the rare cases and from my bare knowledge that's due to her ult being on steroids with current runes and changes over the years. Though levisamom is generally wrong as champions in LoL do get more complex. You don't need a RTS group control mechanic to make complex champions. Azir proofs that to me.
Both games are just very different in the end. Which is better is up to the player, but i don't like what happened to LoL in the past 5+ years and am thinking about picking up DOTA2.
Edit: okay i just watched the video about champion/hero complexity and Dota2 is absolutely crazy with some of them xDD
League kit design: cc with nuke, gapcloser, 3-hit passive, ultimate that's on-brand with the character theme.
Dragon knight is very versatile in the roles he can play too, hence why even though he's a oldie hero, people still play em because malleable meta. There are some heroes in dota that tends to follow a niche too hard along with the skill ceiling you need to reach to be able to play them effectively. Visage back in the old days can go mix damage/magic carry with tank capabilities, with little dependency on the summons. But I don't think I can pull off that build now xD
@@Faude18 it really depends on a champion kit itself. Most of the older adc's is still viable, same with assasins and mages, even older toplaners like sion, jax and so on. Problem with champs like Nasus is that you can't really fit infinite scale bruiser in 25-30min average game. His role just don't fit in game. Started my MOBA journey from dota 2, then switched to lol. No regrets
There's some overlap too. Nilah definitely feels like they wanted to make a melee ADC (the first of her kind) while following their internal design rules, and they came upon the laughing indiana jones adventurer/monster slayer archetype while exploring that idea. It's actually one of the reasons why I think Nilah didn't resonate with people as much as other recent champion releases. Her character fantasy is gummed up by a bit of a split focus. K'Sante was similar too, as they've admitted the idea for him came when they realized they had no high skill expression tanks in the game, resulting in a tank with three dashes, yasuo's Q, and an ultimate that converts him into a full-on DPS for a short moment. Meanwhile in DOTA I think it's indisputable that Marci was created for the anime first, and much of her gameplay is a way to convert that character as she was in the show into an interesting unit. Her E especially makes the most sense in the context of a bodyguard to the main character, and feels like it was specifically put in there to make her feel more like the character in the show.
In MTG these two types of design are often called Top-Down (fantasy and flavor first, with mechanics derived from that central feeling) and Bottom-Up (mechanical identity first, with fantasy and flavor derived from what accentuates the gameplay) design, and they both have their strengths and weaknesses.
cool!
A small side note, technically Nilah isn't the first attempt at such a design. When the Juggernaut update happened in Season 5, Mordekaiser got a rework that was also intended for him to work as a melee ADC, by basically giving him abilities that make him overpowered when played with an ally and against multiple enemies. He was broken on release, then nerfed, and nobody played him until he was reworked again.
No body
Every MOBA: "you spin me right round baby right right round like a tape recorder right round round"
I feel like League's approach is a symptom of the fact that they have more playable heroes/champions (by around 45, I think) while also having more restrictions that the developers need to keep in mind while designing the champions, due to how the game functions as a whole. Riot doesn't give players the RTS style unit selection/control, or 2 extra hotkeys for specific champions (like how DotA does for heroes like Rubick, Invoker, Doom, Monkey King, etc), and this heavily limits what champion designers can do. There's countless DotA heroes that simply can't be ported over to League without pulling an Aphelios, and making them a new hud, but pretty much every League champ with mana could work in DotA without any issues. DotA's only restriction that League doesn't have is indeed just the inability to remove a hero's mana pool, and grant them a new type of resource instead, but I'd say that League's design restrictions are more severe, without a doubt.
One thing to note too, is that newer DotA heroes do occasionally use the League approach, and old League champs do occasionally use the DotA approach.
Heroes like Marci and Dark Willow feel a lot like they weren't created to fit a certain gameplay concept, but instead, the developers went "let's make a mischievous evil faerie with a pet wisp" and "let's make a fast but friendly mute martial artist", and essentially built their kits around these character fantasies.
While some old League champs were very clearly created specifically to fill in some kind of gameplay niche. Champions like: Fiddlesticks - the fear champion, Rammus - the "stop hitting yourself" champion, Kassadin - the anti mage champion, Evelynn - the perma invis champion, Sona - the aura champion, Heimerdinger - the turret champion, Nocturne - mr. daaaarkneeeeesssss, and so on and so on. And there's a few modern champs where it also sort of felt like a unique gameplay concept came first, and then everything else was designed around that (like Sylas with his ult steals, Samira with her style stacking, Aphelios with his rotating guns, etc).
Now don't take this the wrong way, I'm not trying to disprove the video here. Your descriptions of the League and DotA design approaches generally fit with the characters of the two respective games.
I just felt like the video didn't address the fact that both games have a few exceptions, and I think there's an interesting discussion to be had around why that is the case.
And personally, I am quite happy that these exceptions exist, because it allows for some more diverse and interesting gameplay designs in both games. Restricting game designers is how you get boring and uninteresting results, so I'm glad that League's developers are allowed to occasionally make champions around a gameplay idea, and DotA 2 developers are allowed to occasionally make heroes around the concept of the character itself, and its power fantasy.
"they have more playable heroes/champions"
More than? Coz DotA has 124.
@@michawolinski314 League has 161
An exception to your exception is I think Monkey King from Dota. I think they came up with the champion fantasy and the gameplay style at the same time with him. He is already an existing character in real life mythology. His powers, looks and design are already there, Dota just adapted him into the game.
Him having a magical, extending staff as a weapon was straight from mythology.
Same with clones and transformations.
@@michawolinski314 league had 124 in idk 2014 ? lol
@@ChadKakashi Meanwhile, Wukong in LoL has nothing to do with the mythological character, gameplay wise. They made a basic fighter character with the ability to create a clone of himself and decided that he could be Sun Wukong.
LOL : i wanna make the best scorpion.
Dota 2 : just make it with sand attack that blind the enemy, poison touch and burrow skill.
LOL : and global magnitude ultimate?
LoL is just stressing out while dota shrugs and just says yes to whatever comes up.
@@TZAR_POTATO muerta goes pistol brrr and some dead relatives
@@ChasodeyPhantom Cancer and Earth Spirit: "dead relatives?"
@@Lftarded they usually don't use them as a weapon. Grim does, his wife if I'm not wrong
seeing the league and dota interface mixed up like that is so weirdly appealing.
i really wish there was a way to have league characters in dota and vice versa.
(i'm aware of a dota mod that had some league characters in it but afaik it's been discontinued years ago)
it was discontinued due to legal troubles, rip. Glad you liked my vid!
I'd say it's generally true that a lot of heroes in dota 2 have straightforward mechanics that are basically tied to their names, it's also mainly because of their adopted names from dota 1. The example you showed, Lifestealer, people who've never played dota 2 would've never guessed what the hero does if his dota 1 name was adopted (n'aix). Same goes for a lot of other heroes, like instead of Phantom Assassin, if her dota 2 name was Mortred, new players won't be able to guess what she does. Another good example of the opposite side is Puck where the character adopted the other name of the dota 1 counterpart, if her name was Faerie Dragon, you can probably have a good guess but Puck?? What even is that? I'd still say both games have a similar approach to character design.
Puck was chosen because it's the name of the mischievous fairy in Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream. PA and LS both still have those names, but the names chosen are most likely done so partially just for whichever one stuck. You still see people call Spirit Breaker, Bara, and occasionally even the odd lorthars
@@SaltedSnow good to know where Miura (Berserk manga) got his inspiration for Puck from. Thanks for that.
Its a bit more complicated than that actually. Dota 1 was a custom game for WC3, and WC3 had a very unique way of representing heroes to fit into the lore and the world. Since every WC3 game is in lore "just some battle between sides happening somewhere", heroes are basically "advanced skilled units", rather than standalone characters or personalities. For instance "Death Knight" is just a title for elite undead soldiers/necromancers, and Paladins are... well Paladins. As such these hero types are less individual heroes, but rather classes as one might find in an MMO. They all have names, but the names shown in game are just randomly chosen from a list of names, with the import distinguisher being their class type (so for instance you might have "Samuro the Blademaster", or "Conjurus Rex the Archmage".
When it came to Dota, the community transitioned to treating the individual heroes like unique characters with their own histories and personalities, and so for the most part they got rid of the randomized names in favour of a more consistent and personal names (outside of rare easter eggs/gags such as calling Razor "Gillette" or Ursa "Fuzzy Wuzzy"), however the more consistent names the heroes had weren't their "actual" names. They still all had class names that would be their primary way of identification (such as in patch notes, or when selecting a hero at the tavern). Phantom Assassin wasn't called "Mortred" in Dota 1, her name was still primarily Phantom Assassin with Mortred being an alternate way to call her that showed up on the hotbar - same with Lifestealer, Silencer, etc. Now in a few cases some heroes had names that were fairly simple and became the primary name people would refer to them as, namely Pugna, Furion, Zeus, and Puck, however those were the exception rather than the rule.
When it came to making Dota 2, Valve/Icefrog realized that keeping the 2 separate names didn't really serve a purpose, so they just simplified it and called the heroes the names the community most often called them, mainly that if their real name was simple, they used their real name, otherwise use the class name. For the record, N'aix and Mortred are still Lifestealer's and PAs real names, its just info is relegated to their bios, and voicelines from other heroes.
Both DotA and Dota 2 contain heroes with names and titles. Valve merely selects one as the display name. N'aix is always the Lifestealer.
I feel like the design philosophy of most of the original Dota heroes were really varied since the original heroes were made by a lot of different people! But they were made taking into account they were using Warcraft III models and capabilities, so that kinda reduced the relevance and development of the theme/aesthetic at first, having these as a result.
For heroes made in Dota 2 era their aesthetic/theme took a bit more important aspect but still keeping the uniqueness and relevance in their gameplay style.
Not only that, but a lot of the Fantasy and theme of older Dota 2 Héroes has really evolved a LOT, specially with the addition of more Aghanims. For example, how Necrophos gained his second skill and how he currently really feels like the Pope of Pestilence. Or how Drow Ranger came from being a buffed range creep into developing her own full identity!
Also how a lot of the simpler and cloned skills between heroes, like crits and bashes for example, has been made into more unique and akin to them and their theme.
The playable characters are
Champions in League are not only about creating and producing different types of playable characters, but the aspect champion-fantasy elevates them by *_creating an actual living breathing being with a personality_* who *_exists with purpose as a part of the fantasy universe they live in,_* so it is a lot more involved process where a lot more elements are considered than just gameplay and the set of abilities that comprise that gameplay - this ends up creating a ton of different, all very memorable and compelling characters the player can get invested in playing - but this has its ups and downs - when league *_REALLY_* wants to produce a specific type of champion-fantasy in mind, they can end up creating some *_utterly ridiculous and hilariously insane_* gameplay kits for the characters and where the champion-fantasy is the clearly the main focus..... while *_the gameplay and balance_* are sometimes just *_thrown out the window completely_* (easily by far the best example of this is Akshan) - this ends up oftentimes producing characters that are very exciting and fun to *_PLAY AS_* - but not to *_PLAY AGAINST_* , and only 1 out of the 10 players at a time get to enjoy or revel by playing this awesome character, while everyone else is gritting their teeth just absolutely hating every second they have to play against it - this also tends to create aesthetically similar, humane/anime-characters with severe main-character-syndromes, whom all are somehow the chosen one trying the save the world from whatever.... and/or they are *_sexy-flawlessly pristine-supermodels with no shirt on_* (IYKYK)..... like Yasuo, Yone, Akali, Kai'Sa, Akshan, Samira, Nilah, K'Sante *(continues on mindless mumbling and listing)* ......
Heroes in Dota 2 are hyper-focused on creating and producing a variety of different types of gameplay patterns, different playstyles and even iterations on each other. This gives them a lot more freedom with gameplay itself and different ways to interact with the game and its elements, as it takes the priority in the process. Heroes overall have a lot more variety in Dota 2 than champions in League, thanks to the much more complex infrastructure the game has. There are way more ways to interact and approach playing the game with even a single character in Dota than in League, so there is effectively a lot more to learn and to do in the game. However where as this also creates a lot more completely unique types of characters with unique gameplay, it also simultaneously ends up creating very same-y characters and characters that are one-note and aesthetically not that enticing. The problem with this thematically hyper-focused approach is that you as the player either like the whole theme it's created to embody and be focused on, or you don't like or care about the theme at all. And thus Dota 2 has umpteen characters that have a passive effect that is just differently worded *_Critical strike_* , and you have not one but two heroes with such an excitedly named ability as..... Blink - and how could we forget that Slardar's kit just a while ago had such flavorfully named abilities as... *_'Sprint' and 'Bash' and 'Amplify Damage'_* - or Venomancer, *_a venomous slithering monster agility-hero_* , who'se all about *_spreading poison and dot-effects_* - and than there's Viper.... *_a venomous slithering monster agility-hero_* , who'se *_ALSO all about spreading poison and dot-effects_*
Its easy to understand. You league fanboys always say dota2 is hard but i dont need to remember that The leap into time and space is my Blink, or Curse of the Princess' Fart is my Poison AOE lmao. DOTA2 is a lot more clear and sometimes self-explanatory. Dont need to read a manga and track the characters' family tree to understand how a hero works lmao.
@@kayosensei good answer, Sawamura
Comparing veno and viper is rather silly. Outside of the theming of 'toxic animal with dots' their actual kits are completely different, with veno being more about the actual dots and slows, often being a kamikaze initiator. Viper has a niche closer to Razor (an electrical themed hero) in that they are both anti-carries, with razor being a better counter to physical damage carries and viper to magic damage ones.
There's an actual reason for why dota heroes are named after their functions. In days of Dota 1, all heroes would have a name and an title: Mortred: Phantom Assassin, Shendelzare Silkwood: Vengeful Spirit, Traxex: Drow Ranger, Kardel: Sniper, etc. When Valve developed Dota 2, some heroes names are kept while for others, they used titles. Sniper, PA, PL are titles while Zues, Leshrac, Sven are names. I dont know how they choose whether to use names or titles. I would assume it is due to popularity at the time. I still know people that call Drow Traxex and Shadow Shaman, Rhasta. So there u go, a short explaination for Dota 2 Hero names
In dota 2, almost all heroes still have titles in the lore. The names would show up in the biographies or in voice lines though. I think it is weird how valve wants to remove the name magina though...
@@TZAR_POTATO Mangina is great name xd
Kael, balanar, furion, etc. dota 1 players still using thoses names. Dota 2 makes dota 1 a lot simplier and common sense to know.
@@EngrLau04 BARATHRUM DA BEST
A bunch of the names are basically titles, Zeus is the lord of thunder, Mars is the God of War, sven literally means strong
Great Work and Very Soothing Voice, keep it up and soon you will blow up.
My biggest fan
@@TZAR_POTATO You are connecting two communities instead of creating division and war like literally everyone else so ofc 👊
hmm, interesting on watching the companies phylosophy on how they made their champions :O
love this videos, keep doing a great work nwn
Thank you! Glad that you liked it ;)
Skarner looks cool now, finally
One aspect I think is important is that League expects people to decide to play a champion because of how it looks - for a major part of the player base, the looks need to be enough to invest the time/money to unlock. However, since the major money in Dota is locked behind cosmetics that affect spell/item effects for a given hero, players need to be grabbed by how the hero feels when playing.
Don't mind me. I'm just here to leave a like to this amazing video. I hope your channel will grow. Best of luck mate!
Thank you for the like
@@TZAR_POTATO no problem man.
Strange question but what is the ending background music? It sounds strangely familiar
Fragments - Arrowhead
League and Dota2 hero gameplay design is what DC and Marvel superhero concept designs also done, League is focused on "archetypes" or just a complete set of traits to create playstyle and mechanics assimlar as what DC does, WW is a Amazonian Goddess, Supes is an Alien with superhuman strength and stuff and thats what we are expected. Dota 2 is emphasizing on the "small but core" details first then its character and lore, additional reason is when Dota2 was made, all Dota1 lores was changed and became relevant based on to their skills/abilities so as Marvel does, like Hulk represents as a whole from a gamma experiment which is the core idea/concept. But its not always the case.
This is very illuminating. I am a former league player who loved champions who felt very "dota" before rhey were all reworked. I realzied that so many of them were gameplay first.
Stuff like old urgot was built around cool ultimate and the e and q. Old yorick was about summoning a bunch of ghouls. Old swain was avout the ult and q.
As other comments pointed out there is exceptions in both games, but the trend stays true
I have completely opposite opinion. New urgot and swain are much better designed champions. They are more fun and have more concise and unique kit. Im sorry but kidnapping someone and eating him alive is much more fun and skill expressive than pointclick swap. His Q was just a lockon spam ability. There are reworks that were pretty bad like aatrox. Not because I dont like the kot but because it was not a rework. New aatrox has nothing in common with old one. In recent years they went pretty over the top with champion designs but in general they do a good job
@@geekobgaming5647 simplicity is a virtue. New urgot is more generic due to trying to be concise. Like old urgot was q spam but the fact an ad caster had a self destructive but powerful ult made it always a gamble.
Old Swain was just more fun because it was a pile of good tools. I prefer the older more dota like characters for this reason.
I preferred league characters be one note and simple. New designs try to do so much and overcomplicate everything in the process.
I think the obsession with skill expression and dodging skills over just having fun designs is half the reason league sucks to play now. There is no soul anymore
@@abrenmam I dont think riot is obsessed with skill expression. New urgot is not much about skill. You pretty much just pop your legs and run around an enemy. But yeah ult is skill expressive because its very strong. Its also very fun to use.
Yeah swain was just a pile of random tools with no general theme. He was fun just like new one is, problem is that his trading patterns were very awkward and unfun to play against. He hit you with onclick E dot then Q and you have 1/4 health down. New swain is a battlemage from start to end, low range low cd abilities, some stun and ult drain. Its straightforward and fun. Even though I think they could make him better.
I understand your point of view, these weird characters are fun because their weird unrelated tools allow you to explore more your identity. Like what role you actually play and based on that you level and build. But the downside is that you never trully have some intended experience. Like lets take morde for example. Its very fun to really become this raidboss that melts everything around him and kill everyone. Old morde was just a weird mess. Like am I this big punch guy who oneshots with third Q? Am I mage with E R combo? Am I summoner with his R? Tank? Who am I.
@@geekobgaming5647 being a mess is more interesting than being hyper designed. Same with new urgot and Swain. Being awkward is okay. And if they have a smaller group that likes them that's also okay.
I loved all of the old charactera because they were awkward. They played and built in a unique way. old morde felt good because you had to build your play style around his melee weaknesses. You had the potential to deal massive damage but you had to play smart and have a good team. You had to know who to ult and when. Old urgot was about low IQ spam early but later on it's about effective risk management because you could take their ADC into your team but you put yourself in theirs. New urgot and morde play like generic juggernauts. Boring and bland.
Like I think dota has a lot of issues but I enjoy their designs way more for being more loose and weird. League has some sauce being a simple dota. It sucks to see it focus so hard on hyper designing characters.
@@abrenmam I played old morde, old sion, old gangplank a lot. Old nidalee as well. And I can very safely say that reworked gp, morde and sion are just miles ahead of their old designs. They are more fun, versatile and fair. I dont agree at all that old morde felt good. You had literally no gap closers and no cc all while having a kit rellying on getting close to enemies. Some matchups were just painful. His kit just felt off. Yeah he was fun, but its not even close to the rework. I dont agree that he is a generic juggernaut. He is a juggernaut so ofc he shares traits with other juggernauts but his trade patterns and itemization are way different than lets say darius or garen.
Only champion that I miss is old nidalee. Because for a long time there just wasnt any champion unique like her. Where you would focus on long range hits and poke. Most similar were artillery mages but they lack mobility and focus more on burst than poke.
I dont even understand what you mean by hyperdesigned. I would say that old morde was harder to understand than new one. Your ult puts a mark which deals instant damage, plus % of enemy max hp over time, if enemy dies during mark active, he is summoned back from dead and coppies stats of the enemy, can be controlled separately with alt + click. Compare it to: Your ult puts you and your enemy into separate realm. It ends after few seconds. If you kill him during that time you get buffed for a minute.
I started playing this game in season 2 and have lots of great memories with the old game. But I can safely say that champion design and balance was just worse, much worse in most cases. Only reason I might feel that there were more options or strategies is that noone knew what they were doing. So you could get away with lots of dumb shit. But when you played morde against actually competent players it was painful most of the time because of his design. If you played against good swain there was just no counterplay to his stupid 2 click combo spam. If you played old urgot you couldnt even get close enough to use ult on their adc. There is no need to defend this design. It was fun, but there is a reason it is not in league now
This got me thinking about how these concepts apply to my MOBA of choice, Heroes of the Storm. Blizzard's take on the moba formula pulls almost exclusively from its various IPs to make characters for their mobas (including The Lost Vikings of all things) and they seem to do a mix of both of these for their character designs. Primarily the character is designed to fit the fantasy of their incarnation from their base game. Valla is a Demon Hunter from Diablo and thus is a ranged dps with mechanics around stacking up her passive trait Hatred which gives her attack speed and damage. Sgt Hammer is a siege tank from Starcraft 2 and thus is designed around her siege ability giving her extended range and splash damage much like the tanks from the game at the cost of mobility. But the other thing that influences the design of the characters in HotS is their role in the game, be it a Tank, DPS, or Healer (HotS has far more healers than supports). Tassadar in Starcraft was an archtypal high templar, a high damage caster. But when he was ported into HotS he was labeled as a support and thus given a kit around shielding his allies with only some aoe damage through his psionic storms and a defensive escape tool in the form of his phase shift. And he was like this for the majority of the game's lifespan, a subpar support character able to mitigate some damage and assist his allies. Until he was reworked fully into a powerful ranged mage.
I'd love to see you talk about Heroes of the Storm sometime, its such a great game and gets so little love these days.
I'm not as familiar with HotS as I am with dota and LoL, so will probably never talk about it sorry. But, I invite you to make a video on hots, and you can share it with people on my discord!
It's just, not my game to cover. I'll let people more qualified than I, cover it.
@@TZAR_POTATO I'll see about that. You've inspired me somewhat. I dont think it'll be nearly as good as your videos but I'll give it a try.
@@toddoverholt4556 I only started out a few months ago, with a dream and a vision! Zero experience making well edited videos before, if you look back it's just screen captures a while ago
many league players are very affectionate to the champions' designs and looks, some are really invested into the lore as well (league lore is pretty damn good and extremely vast).
some players are obsessed with their favourite characters, to the point that they will buy every cosmetic item in game regarding them. champion skins are a really big part of league's success, everyone seems to go completely crazy over them. (i dont understand it personally because i'm a stingy mf and i dislike spending that much money in IAPs).
i'm not yet very close to the dota community as i mainly play by myself for now, so idk if that's the case there as well. but my understanding is that, as it's mentioned in this video, people pick dota heroes for their mechanics and not for their identity.
i will now contraddict what i just said, revealing that my favourite Dota hero is Marci. i had seen Dragon's Blood (very mid tbf) and i was excited when she was released because she's cute and i liked her in the cartoon. so yes, coming from League, I was drawn to my favourite character from the looks and the character design. ended up sticking with her for the fun gameplay tho. (even though i do enjoy lots of other heroes!)
i should add that the hero that got me into trying dota was Dark Willow (saw her in a video and thought she looked pretty!).
i will contraddict myself further stating that i would buy in-game cosmetic items for Marci if there were any available, and that i have bought some little things for various heroes since they were cheap.
this comment isn't particularly useful and i'm realising it just now so im sorry for wasting your time ❤
Great video❤️
Thank you!
hehehea good vid i love you potato
Thank you!
IMO the naming convention has no value as the heroes in Dota get titles based on what they are, which some League champions do too. It's just that Dota has a preference for using the titles rather than the actual names for -copyright cough cough- clarity sake.
I think if you want to analyse Dota's hero design you should be looking at the newer releases and what they want to accomplish, or heroes that don't have a specific Warcraft counterpart, or even how some heroes have changed over the years. I think that for the older heroes, they either took an idea they liked from the respective Warcraft counterpart and ran with it like Lifestealer (stealing life as ghouls can steal life) or Pudge (who is literally just Stitches), or as you said, took an idea and just went ham like PL (who's name is a pun itself "Azwraith"(As a wraith)), or Undying (who is just zombie dialed to 11).
Even for old heroes, analyzing less obvious heroes with no 'clear' concept like Tusk or Lion, or more nuanced ideas like Oracle or Pugna would make for a more interesting video.
I think Dawnbringer and Snapfire would be perfect heroes to analyze for how modern dota achieves it's "Hero fantasy"
Though I think the League analysis is pretty much on point with what actually happens, as Riot is (sometimes unfortunately) more than happy to share what goes on with every design they do.
A few things to comment on
Pudge came before stiches and the hooker hero archetype is a dota original...first made by nichus (or however u spell it) who is one of the main people who managed dota allstars along with guinsoo and icefrog
Older heroes inspired by wc3 are ones like lich who had almost a 1 to 1 but is now changed because his kit was gettingstale being mixed between a caster and a support without excelling in any...same with brewmaster who swapped his og fire breath with thunder clap which fits more for his kit as an offlaner but still was a bit stale and got changed getting more aoe in his drunken brew and fleshing out his drunken brawler more
Overall the old wc3 heroes have a more generalised kit being an rts having to manage an army so they have to be able to fit their composition while dota is more focused on hero vs hero so they can have more specialised kits to fit their roles and archetypes better
The new heroes also highlights this design philosophy with also regards to hero fantasy
pangolier is puss in boots as a pangolin so his kit has traits of both... The swashbuckle and lucky shot for the puss in boots side and shield crash and rolling thunder from his pangolin side
Mars kit is designed around his Roman god of war theme with his spear and shield gameplay and the arena of his dead soldiers fits his aesthetic
Primal beast is an unga bunga monster which rewards a reckless playstyle just like the hero itself
Recently Muerta is a right clicker who counters other right clickers
So overall the hero designs of dota being focused on the theme first is still valid
The pudge you know now was very different, he used to be a summoner that made use of the corpse mechanics in wc3, he could store corpses, eat them, summon units from corpses. A lot of the old Dota heroes had some really bizarre or wonky mechanics/abilities that got reworked over time. They eventually reworked him into the current iteration which made him one of the most popular/fun to play heroes despite being considered a troll/for fun pick for most of his lifespan aside from a few select players and periods of time. He’s the reason why so many slow, high damage potential and low range big guys in video games have hooks.
The kit for skarner will be 1 spameable skill , 1 defensive skill, 1 dash/gap closer and cc ult. It is so generic that they are stuck trying to make it intersting but this is how they make tanks.
Is this reason why LoL champs have abilities that synegize inward ? like, if you take one ability from random champ and combine it with other ability from other champ, it will not work well.
On the other hand, dota2 abilities trend to be able to work with other abilities from other heroes or items. you pick 4 abilities from 4 heroes in Dota2 and it can be the craziest combo.
there is. champions are often made to be played as if a solo player not a team player
Favorite custom games in dota is legends of dota where you can take any abilities to make your hero, it helps that very few abilities reference other abilities, besides multicast which only works for ogre magi spells.
While this is a pattern, I wouldn't attribute it to champion fantasy as much as wanting to simplify drafting, as well as not having the luxury of making all champions free. If League adapted Dota's hero design, you would run into situations where whether or not you can counter/synergize another champion would depend on owning a certain champion which would make the system even more pay to win.
This is also likely where Leagues champion fantasy idea came from, its a lot easier to sell champions off or recognizable themes, rather than gameplay mechanics.
1:07 when two best friend at the back of the classroom secrelty watching Hen Tie
great content bro! you need to adjust your mic cuz in phone the sound is kinda weird. keep it up bro!❤
weird, how? what should I do?
@@TZAR_POTATO Not that guy but my feedback to your video is that I find it hard to listen to because of sibilance. For the record I find the video fine just a tad short, since I'm sure you can go a bit more in depth with the comparisons, especially if you compare the non-ported heroes in dota to these champions in lol. But yeah, you can search for ways to reduce sibilance on youtube, either in software or some kind of a compressor should work. Cheers.
I was wondering about your sources for Riot's design philosophy of - theme first, gameplay later - because I couldn't find anything from a quick google search and I just find it hard to believe because it seems like an obviously inferior approach to me.
A mix of experience, interviewing players, and studying pro gameplay. None of my videos are gospel, think of them as entertainment! But, at least I got some evidence to support my claim.
@@TZAR_POTATO No I get it I wasn't trying to discredit anything I was just wondering if the devs themselves said that or it was your induction. Thanks.
@@williamshakemilk2192They very much focus on the fantasy of the champion, considering they stated during Aurelion Sol's rework that they wanted him to feel more like a Celestial Dragon, thus giving him the ability to breathe light.
CMIIW. I've been playing DotA since it was a mod and there are a lot of lore while I choosing my hero in the tavern. So I think back then the Sentinel and Scourge thingy was the main or even core Lore that they have. I mean the Alliance join the Sentinel and Horde join the Scourge side with heroes still have their background sometimes hit a Warcraft side. And in League of Legends their universe is huge. I think redconing a lot of older champion is a great step done by riot to ties them up together. Plus Arcane was a great hit and it pass DotA's show because Arcane really give a basic understanding of the universe there.
It's kinda funny how the champs you mentioned from DotA 2 were originally in DotA 1 (WC3:TFT), where they had to use existing character models to fulfill the character concept they thought up. Nightstalker used a Dreadlord model. Anti-Mage was an armored Blood Elf who had anti-magic skills. Lifestealer was just taking the Ghoul Model and amping up its character concept. Tinker was just a crazy goblin in a partial mech suit. Sniper was a Dwarven Rifleman.
The end result was exactly what you said. They thought up a cool idea, built the mechanics for that character, and selected one of the models they had available to fit that character. Then when DotA 2 came about, the devs just maintained that design philosophy.
League of Legends, on the other hand, started as its own game, so they had to build their lineup from scratch.
Basically, though you could have just said that am is illadin/demon hunter, instead of "armored blood elf" after all, demon hunter is notably LACKING any armor. The armored blood elf, for Silencer, was originally Spell Breaker, I think that fits your description better.
@@TZAR_POTATO Definitely meant Silencer, no idea why I said 'anti-mage' for Spell Breaker model. That was an oopsy on my part, and I appreciate the correction there.
Watching your vids is getting me back into DotA and it's a bit of a jumble up there lol
@@Shroudedentity Jumble? Back into? What, you haven't played in a bit I take it?
@@TZAR_POTATO About 8 years or so, yeah, lol. Took a break and played a lot of LoL, then played HotS with some friends, and Smite. Now I've been toying with Predecessor, Smite, and DotA again to feel it out.
@@Shroudedentity Well, if you want some help i can point you in the right direction
Can you tell me why Necrit inspired this video ?
Couple of things. First, he regularly talks about the lore and themes of champions, and second but more relevant, it was his rant that, through focus on the vgu, got me thinking on the topic.
this remind me, old dota use archimonde from warcraft as arc Warden. then changed to kobold a two legged hyena.
Your theory might not far off. Icefrog create hero what he need (intended role) first.
one thing to point out is that dota doesnt use the most of heroes names but their hero title, thats why their name is pretty self explanatory
like lifestealer , just based on that you can easily tell what he does
but his real name is actually naix
another example but this time a hero doesnt use his hero title
when you see riki waht do you think he does???
theres noway to know without previous info
rikimaru the stealth assassin, true fans know
A large percentage of dota2 foundation heroes have reference which is dota from warcraft3 so theres that.
Although i dont know if dota from wc3 also have their reference lmao
Lich's skills used to be the exact same as WC3 Lich besides the ult, which Enigma has it as a basic ability
I haven't played league enough to know much but credits to league design that sometimes champion didn't even have mana pool instead changed to mechanics specific to that characters. This would be impossible design in dota heroes.
Sett is Dio
based
garen is guts??? what does that make darius
nothing wrong with multiple "world of warcraft warrior spec" guys at once... but darius uses an axe, so clearly not guts
@@TZAR_POTATO makes sense, sword diff
La muerta al parecer sera como un heroe de lol
Lina is the first hero come to mind when you explained how league design their champions she is straight up designed from an anime waifus lol Lina Inverse.
So is this why Skeleton King easily converts into a Wraith King in transition back in the day? Or maybe Icefrog just doesn't care, as long it's cool? XD sometimes the updates in dota make me think the main dev is snorting crack before coding.
He went off to be Wraith king because of two factors: One, Blizzard was not happy getting their IP borrowed. Two, old skeleton king was heavily modified to fit chinese audiences.
gaben make wk skeleton arcana
For me personally, the fact that league makes the champions fit a theme visually is what draws me to the game. I can easily tell who is who by just shadows as they all stand out. Dota...kinda feels more generic
ok ok never compare Garen and Guts again plz
nice video
ok
Viego. That's all I'll say.
Not even close to his counterpart in dota.
@@TZAR_POTATO I mean as far as a champ fantasy giving rise to bugs. If they just made viego the "long sword, %hp, and stealth" dude he wouldn't be nearly as buggy.
I have to agree and disagree.
Dota in its wc3 conception was a community driven game. Very often, the designs and abilities of heroes were a direct reflection of the design philosophy of each game designer. Take Lina Inverse for example, her design is clearly more League-like, it is based on Lina from the anime Slayers and her abilities are themed around her anime abilities. Many of those VERY early additions to Dota All stars were designed in this fashion. Rikimaru, Rylai... and many of them simply followed the abilities their character model normally had in the WC3 RTS games.
Throughout the many years, many heroes went through A LOT of design changes in their abilities under different leads, to the point that they are hardly the same hero anymore. This is because, later leads such as Guinsoo were more concerned with gameplay to make the game more interesting, playable and competitive. Icefrog followed this philosophy. And it is not hard to see why. They were limited by the WC3 engine, and thus the amount of character models and themes were limited anyways. All they could do is create interesting gameplay designs for the characters. You also have to consider that many later heroes that were added were also often pulled from the community forums, and more often than not, interesting heroes concepts with good gimmicks were picked.
However, if you look at more recently added heroes, unique to Dota 2, you can see a slight shift in design philosophy. Monkey King, Mars, Hoodwink, Void Spirit, Hoodwink, Marci, La Muerta are clear examples of heroes that their character theme had a lot more importance than their gameplay gimmick.
In the case of League of Legends, this shift in design pattern can also be seen. Early on league of legends, many of the first champions introduced relied heavily on a "gimmick". However, due to the existence of Dota they had to be more creative with their character designs to avoid being called copycats. The skills had to be highly thematic or else they would be accused of plagiarism. The very recent champions introduced feel like there is an independent design process. The character design process and the gameplay process feels very much disconnected. Rather than character/theme >>> gameplay, it feels like these two components are design separately and then fused together by force.
League of Legends extends the infinities of MOBA while DOTA retain its insanity.
I think this is not only a massive oversimplification, but also a very biased selection of data to support your argument. All the dota heroes in your video are heroes that were created 20 years ago when the game was a custom map mod for wacraft3. If you had used any of the new heroes created by valve's devs the story would be very different. Monkey king, snapfire, hoodwink, mars, primal beast, marci, dawnbreaker, etc, almost all fit that same model as you state riot uses to create it's heroes.
I'll try to address all your points with my reasoning for it. All of what you said was true btw, but I had good intentions.
1. It's a massive oversimplification because the video would drag on if I didn't. Keeping things simple keeps them bite sized for the audience.
2. very biased: yes, I only chose from the majority set.
3. 20 year old heroes - true, though many of them have had reworks since. The new heroes are the exception to the rule and not its followers. As stated in the video, there are exceptions. All of the new heroes closer fit a theme that isn't a simple mechanic.
4. Most of the heroes, by a large margin, are pre-valve.
His point still stands imo
Snapfire being a grandma with a gun has abilities to support through grandma stuffs with *a gun*
Woodwick being an animal robin hood has her central gameplay near places with trees
Mars is a God of war has abilities for battle, but his ult is a massive "you can't get away from me" fit.
Dawn breaker being hot mommy, *cough cough*.
I can go on with dota but let's see with League's new champion
Bel'veth being a *the swarm* has a bruiser/diver kit (like OOF). Not correlating with her lore per say.
K'sante being a monster hunter has Yasuo's q... also can knock you through mountains.
Nilah being nilah... like why even? Come on...
My point is. He still has a say on this even for new champions. You may accuse me of the same thing potato guy did; for that I must confess, even I just picked the handful of champions I can think of.
Samira fits devil may cry appearance and gameplay at the same time. Feeling like gameplay was made first before appearance.
Gloomy yordel fits due it feeling like gameplay was made first. OR the appearance was just that easy, development team had an easy time making her. Like cmon, who wouldn't make anti-movement stuff on a hero who doesn't like active-things
And that you can argue dawnbreaker felt more appearance made before gameplay (or dota team just gave up)
But oh well. I play both games and I'm just here to see their similarities and design philosophy, not what's better or worse
Yeh and they kinda suck in fitting the overall Dota design, except for Mars
Wrong, the reason is simple. They don't want to make China angry, since ages they have stopped producing anything for champs or champs itself that aren't pretty faces, not even normal looking chars, something cute, something extremely rude and of course even less something that fits beasts or monsters. They just don't care nor won't bring the changes, and if they are doing it. It is clear that they either forgot how to do to this new policy or are having huge conflicts since they try to make it appealing for both China and normal people
Dota Characters:
SCP creatures + Greek/Roman gods and mythology
LoL Champions:
Dota characters
Anime characters
Disney Characters
lots of furries and waifus
And the occasional monster from a halloween store
+ tiktok pop culture glamor fest
naafiri is like a bone's throw compared to every champion post-netease@@TZAR_POTATO
again dota 2 better free to use all heroes King of moba
this why people always joke that LOL characters have "Stun" and "Some Slow" as their skills, since 90% of LOL chracters boring.
Dota > HoN > LoL
That's why Lee Sin or Jhin are well designed in LoL, and Marci so badly designed in Dota. They switched roles, LoL thought of gameplay concept from which they create an aesthetic before and Marci comes first as an aesthetic then becomes a gameplay concept
meanwhile THAT mobile moba game
1. pick 1 or 2 random league champion
2. combine it into one hero
3. tweak it a little bit so they don't get caught
Excellent! I always advocate for adopting what works in some games to yours, and trying to make the best product.
Looking at first seconds of vid and thinking that skarner looks pretty solid still, wonder why they waste a year on him when theres dozen of horrible looking champs
It's not on aesthetic that is the issue, it's that people aren't playing him. So like, they can't make and sell skins very profitably.
Biased.
Lol design = what will weebs buy
For me, the main problem with Dota heroes is that they have no personality. They are just a model with some skills and a small piece of lore. In Lol champions skills and gameplay based on their personality, their look, and lore. For example: Sett is wrestler mafia boss. He is tank, who absorbs damage and can 1v2. Viego is a wraith-king, who control Black Mist. He uses mist for stealth and after enemies death he can posess their bodies. In Dota Wraith king is just a guy who autoattacks and summons minions. The only wraith ability is his Reincarnation. Also WK has no lore as most of dota heroes kekw. Just my opinion.
Sorry for bad english
Dota has really crappy lore in general for individual heroes. It's more interested in high quality gameplay at the cost of shitty lore, while league tries to put lore into its gameplay
Imagine you're new players. You have no knowledge of the game whatsoever. Then people introduce you to the characters. "Hey let's play Sett, the westler mafia boss". Do you play champions based on their lore or based on your prefered playstyle? what does name Sett remind you about, anyway? Is there any resemblance between the name and the champ? Oh this is the mafia boss westler Sett, or was it Vayne, or Darius?? Huh, I'm sure it's not Ahri or Annie. Naming champions with everyday dude name is kinda lame and confusing.
@@amirulhakim9898 Dota does that too, but it also has profession names, just nobody knows those half the time. For example, Rikimaru the Stealth Assassin, or Mirana the Princess Of The Moon, or what about Meepo the Geomancer?
@@amirulhakim9898 his second name or idk how to call that is "mafia boss" and he looks like big buffed guy. Also you can see how his abilities work. So when you see him it is like "oh big buffed dude with wrestler`s abilities. maybe he is fighter?" Same with Darius or Mordekaiser. When i played Dota i saw the picture of Morde. Im a great fan of Lich King concept, so when i saw Morde and Viego i thought " oh, they are looking like my favourite kings of death, i should try them" So here i am playing Lol. And if someone told me "Hey let`s play Mordekaiser. He is Sauron-like Lord of Death in iron armor with huge weapon " i would be interested to play even without knowing the lore. And what about Undiying? His is not immortal at all. WK has Reborn but undying not. I was quite dissapointed when i realised that. So, his name is a lie?
@@chuvits217 My point is that naming your champs like that is lame and forgettable, hey lets play Joe or Pedro or David? Might as well name your champs like that.
Undying is named like that not because he can't die, how tf do u balance a MOBA when you cant kill one hero. Un-Dying is named because he was dead, but his death was UNDONE by the Dead God, if you want to be lore accurate. He has another epithet, Almighty Dirge, and he also has reincarnation as talent FYI.
I still stand by my point, if you want to play a champ named Viego or Annie or Diana, might just name them something like Peter or Jeff next, what a lame ass naming.
DOTA 2 > LEAGUE OF GAYS
yeah keep playing ur dead game
@@tuanduongminh1368
>dead game
keep coping
@@tuanduongminh1368 what does a 'dead game' even mean. Does a game have to have millions of players playing it everyday and have a kpop group in it to be considered an 'alive game'? Who cares hahaha
@@kayosensei Their logic is that if Dota doesn't collect same number of players as League then its a dead game. So League is a dead game compared to Fortnite for example.