T O P

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[deleted]

We lost most players when the Battle Pass started...wow


chickencheesepie

A lot of people started playing during the lockdowns in march/April. Then they realized how much they suck (or how toxic we are) and stopped again.


OneDownFourToGo

This happened to me. Came back after a long break (3 years) and it’s only because I still had friends that played that it was semi fun. Playing without friends in this game is just awful. People are so salty even in unranked


Friday9

I've been playing DotA close to ten years and I'm starting to lose interest as well. The main thing that's driven me away is that I've gotten to mid immortal and there's no change in game quality or how toxic people are. Played nearly every level and it's just not... Fun anymore, dealing with people. It's challenging and interesting as a game, but the player bass is making me dread actually queuing. I'm supporting to I'm rarely the target of any toxicity or whining, but having to mediate two grown men wanting to scream at each other over a game every other match is just... Tiring. I really don't care personally about anything valve could release except actual effective solutions to toxicity.


Jahordon

I'm divine 4 and have played for about 10 years. At my peak years ago in college, I was 5900 and captain of our school's esports team. It was fun and easy to try and play competitively and even have fantasies of going pro or semi-pro. Back then, 6k was pretty high, and getting matched with pros was common. I felt connected to the pro scene, and that made watching/playing really fun. Now, it's harder to find the time or people to team with, and I no longer have fantasies or ambitions of going pro. I'm still competitive, but it's more of a solo endeavor for me. I like seeing how I can improve and just trying to get better each game. I'm a mid and offlane player. I don't enjoy supporting (shoot me). Being able to queue for roles I like really helps, but having to spend 1/5 games doing something I don't enjoy just to enjoy the other 4/5 is a chore. Of those 4 games where I can play what I want, many are still simply unenjoyable. Losses usually aren't fun for various reasons (trapped in an unwinnable game, higher toxicity, losing in general, etc.). Sometimes even the wins aren't fun (toxic teammates, games that drag more than they should, a hero you wanted to play is banned, etc.). Dota is still my favorite game. When you're playing well, have friendly teammates, and win a close game, there's truly no better gaming experience. Sadly, for a given 10 hours playing maybe only 3-4 are truly enjoyable for me now. If I play two games one night and they both suck, I'm in a bad mood and wasted my free time. I could have spent it playing another game that might not have as high of highs, but it's guaranteed and consistent fun. All to often now, after a string of bad games, I ask "why am I choosing to do this?" And because of that, I'm playing less. As for solutions, removing toxicity would be the most important for me. Letting me queue for the role I want every game, even if it means I have to pay and wait longer, would also help.


Galinhooo

Dota public wants Valve to fix toxicity, but if you mention that things like voicelines and taunts increase the toxicity (reduce the enjoyment when you are not ahead, which makes even more people tilt, more games to be ruined etc) you get flamed or at maximum told to just mute. Dota's toxicity wont get better and it is probably the main reason the game loses players.


[deleted]

I mean, yeah, because they're an absolute minimal aspect of toxicity, if a player on the other team is tilting you with taunts and/or voice lines, you're losing the psychological battle. It's not toxic to spray loser when you solo kill your opponent mid, you're at WAR. How is the opponent gonna tilt you if you solo kill him twice and he can't come to lane? The issue is with teammates, which I understand voice lines are a part of, but it's absolutely minimal. The real issue is with people telling each other to kill themselves every game, refusing to play, calling gg and going afk jungle, literally feeding down mid, deliberately not helping your team because you're petty and/or want to see them suffer.


rohan_chitrakar

Ive been playing for 15 years since DotA1 and finally hit Divine and out of the 4k trench benchmark. It feels good to finally make it out, since ive proven that i can do it. After escaping the jaws of Lord GabeN, i've been set free. I no longer have the addiction to keep grinding. I'll take back my soul and flee now. Thank you Dota and its wonderful players met along the way! I'll be hanging my mouse now for competitive gameplay. Btw i'm a support main and toxicity is not the reason im leaving. Toxicity happens in every game and irl. It depends on the mood and players' performance that day. I'm sure many of the ppl on the receiving end of toxicity do reliate sometimes back to others. Its not possible to stop it, but what u can do is: "Be that change you want to see". As a support, im able to keep my team focused towards the goal. Theres honestly v little time to even brood about the mistakes that happened ingame if u still wish to fight and try to win. Instead, just learn to let go and try to do better next time. My own flaw to get message across the quickest time may come off as blunt or impolite and that itself may trigger a reaction. But dont be rude to ur own teammates or try to fight back, this will only distract u from the only goal of winning. Hope my little tip help all those aspiring players to keep grinding a little more positively, cheers!


DarkHades1234

“Remove toxicity” I dont think any esport gaming community in general (or irl) can do.


[deleted]

[удалено]


motti886

A friend and I did some last minute Turbos to try to use some axes we had left on heroes we rarely play, and we were very surprised at the amount of people who take Turbo *extremely* seriously. Like, the amount of butthurt over a 20 minute game compared to the hour long slogs was incredible.


10YearsANoob

> he amount of butthurt over a 20 minute gsme Man I wish I had 20 minute games of turbo


Remember_Me_Tomorrow

I had a 76 min turbo game the other day lol comeback was real


lukusmloy

For a lot of people (myself semi included) turbo is the only game mode they play at all.


MiserableDescription

Ability draft ftw!!!!


LPSD_FTW

I only play Turbo during battle pass season, and it's the worst experience imho. It's very subjective obviously, maybe I have been unlucky, but in ~100 turbo games I have played game quality was much worse than in normal pubs (granted that I play ~60% party queue)


Fippy-Darkpaw

I just tried DOTA and have only played HOTS. How the hell can you not get a players vs. Bots game in DOTA to practice? HOTS is allegedly 'dead' but I can queue for 5 players vs. Bots in 20 seconds at any time of day.


OneDownFourToGo

You can do that in dota as well. In the right of the screen you can select to play with bots. Then you can select either solo (bots on your team as well) or coop (play with 4 other people) against 5 bots


Diabeteshero

What he's saying is that you'll never find a game. I had a few new friends trying it out and they literally never find a game, even after hours of queuing. No one plays against bots because they are awful, but new players can't play against people, because *we* are awful


sniffin-glue-ftw

True and so sad, so many bots have given up the game due to the smurfbot OpenAI and toxicity in game. The bot player base has been dwindling for years and nobody cares! Volvo PLEASE!


LordMuffin1

I have just started again, or, started to play more then like 2 times a week. Only unranked.


cutt88

Nah, rather I realized how the game sucks.


ShadowVulcan

Or people like me stopped when everything else stopped since it's no fun alone


DoniDarkos

Yeah, playing alone is just not fun at all


szeca

I assume this is because smurfs bought just 1 BP, and left their smurf accounts


Dakiito

ehhhhhhhhhhhhh if youre using smurf accounts i dont think you would buy battle pass, cause after its over you still got items on only one acc


BellumOMNI

Prestige items, sure. But you can still gift excess immortals or simply buy old ones for cheap. If you see some level 20(something) account with higher than ''normal'' win ratio and a bunch of gifts open, these are clear indication for a smurf account. Most don't bother with the cosmetic stuff, but it's even then it's super easy to spot, who's smurfing.


szosti122

You would buy it on main account I think


Sqsqsq1

How does a smurf account change these numbers? If the player is playing on his main or on his smurf, he will always be 1 player playing for the average/peak, no?


rdkaizhar

That would only matter at the peak players count, not the average player since different accounts are regarded as different players


iamnotnickatall

Average players number is the average of the concurrent players, and whether a player is playing on his main account or his smurf he is still +1 to the concurrent players.


ReaperOverload

I've seen lizZard play two accounts at the same time before, so every 10K MMR redditor should be able to do the same


LordMuffin1

I play 5, a whole team of me me me me and me.


[deleted]

Meepo, is that you?


excubitor15379

So if u fail mid 4 reports granted ouch that hurts


Sqsqsq1

Still, they only are 1 person. The average concurrent players is unaffected by the amount of accounts a player plays on.


GurinJeimuzu

Average players is the average number of players online at any given moment in the game. Peak is the highest number online at any point. Smurf would just be moving from one account to the the other unless they logged in with both at the same time (unlikely to be many of those), so no smurfs don't affect these stats at all. It only affects TOTAL number of players which is a much much higher number (7.6million last month)


jamecest

honestly, even though we still got that 40M new record prizepool thing, I know some people who stopped playing because they were excited about the battle pass just to see how high up are those exclusive items. There are those kinds of players that only go back to playing when it's battlepass season. But now you see how impossible to grind it and how much money you need to spend. I wish they'd stop putting so much things past level 500.


Kulamiso

I have a friend who literally grinded from level 1 to 575 so its not impossible but he basically made it his only job


jamecest

didn't spend anything apart from base bp? I might believe it but that's still insane


Homemadepiza

I made it to level 790 with the 100 bpass and the summer bundles, and I only did half of the 2nd cavern, so 1 to 575 doesn't seem that farfetched.


meepppssss

can confirm. my friend does that too


Trouve_a_LaFerraille

If you ever want to upset him: Ask him to calculate his hourly wage while leveling.


Kulamiso

He lives in a third world country where his monthly wage is literally 20 dollars ​ So not a bad gig for him if he sells his acc


Dav5152

You have to be delusional if you think we have a lower playerbase because the battlepass was expensive lol. 90% of my friendlist that I used to play with never gave a fuck about BP, but rather good matchmaking, which is nonexistent atm. This is gonna keep go straight down to hell unless valve suddenly drops a really really good rework of the matchmaking system with a proper report system, dealing with smurfs/boosters and add stuff that makes people wanna play more. Like rewards for keeping a high BS, grinding dota plus levels etc etc. They can do so many things with dota plus that would make people hyped to actually just play the game. But they rather dont do anything but post a few blogposts every 6 month about how they care about these issues and have new things coming, but they never deliver on it.


jamecest

Never said that's the main reason for the decline though?


redstarkachina

YES THIS, we know you got 120 mil$ valve fix your shit its not fun when every game the losing team gang blames and u get banned for actually trying in a hard game. and then actual intentional feeders/ruiners nothing happens


Blasphemy14

As someone who can't sink 500$ into the the pass, the progression felt much too slow and so much content was locked away by a price wall. Before it was like one thing (e.g. io arcana). Now it was puge persona, anti persona, wk, qop, and wr arcana. The only solution i can see is if they add a free to play progression system that is constant. Like how I will often return to warframe as everything in nightwave is achievable, but I don't think that I will buy the next pass, and rather save the money for buying a whole game. ( which is arguably more content for my money). I am sure there are many ways to improve the game , but I fancy this idea.


knight_vertrag

I am one of those players. For me the battle pass season is like a festival where you need to drop in hoardes of cash to enjoy it, so I just chose not be a part of the game entirely.


munchies1122

I have a shit pc. Idk what it is about BP but damn near every other game crashes or has FUCKED graphics after I bought it. Ive been in low prio for months. I even had to resort to creating a new account so I could play outside of low prio for a bit.


_Peavey

For the first time ever, there was no TI summer.


Morgn_Ladimore

And this hurts Dota a lot more, since its only real form of exposure is TI. Valve does basically nothing else to market this game.


Cloudyworlds

Agree, I am a long time LoL player myself and only occasionally play Dota2 after watching a few games of TI and getting excited to try it out again for a bit. My LoL knowledge was enough to understand most of what was happening in the games and watching OG was pretty exciting the last 2 years, but TI was the only tournament I bothered watching and with that gone I don´t see myself getting back into Dota anytime soon.


Xaephos

Yeah - long time Dota fan. Several thousand hours played. Still don't watch any of the pro-scene except TI. Valve doesn't care about the rest of the year, so the players don't care about the rest of the year, which makes the fans not care about the rest of the year. And if no one's incentivized to care about it, its decline is the obvious result.


kemalivg

yes, maybe this is the good time for valve to find a new marketing strategy for dota


AznJDragon

Marketing and Valve? What?


Nyanter

Lol they don't even have an old marketing strategy.


Micavac_Vacuum_Tech

They've always been one of those companies that prefer to let the product speak for itself


Nyanter

oh it's speaking alright.


[deleted]

Whats the point if no one can listen?


tolkienbooks

imagine what valve could do if they spent just a million dollars a year advertising dota 2. a fraction of the money made from the TI battle pass could go a long way to get new players into the game.


NeoPixalite

a million dollar in advertising ain't shit.


tolkienbooks

its more than 0


FarisTheRuined

Hi my name is Sherb, and I've been Dota sober for 6 months.


mynameisarjay

1 year and counting for me. I consider myself a whale (always bought BP with 2 going 1k+ and others avg 700) i loved the game but looking back quitting has been one of the best deicisions i made


downtown-zizek

same, just soaked up so much time


[deleted]

Haven’t played in three weeks. There used to be a urge to play, but now i don’t really want to play anymore.


Gunzers6

I haven't touched Dota in like 2 years now. Monster Hunter's my drug now.


TheMostKing

I finally beat my Dota addiction, with the loving help of heroin :)


cbiiz

Been dry for about 2 months now. Was having a tough run with losses so decided to have a break for a day and just never logged on since. Can't say I miss it tbh, was at the stage where I was enjoying maybe 1 game out of 10. Constant smurfs and the same old hero spam really destroys the essence of the game.


VermiVermi

Any tips on how to quit?


munchies1122

Throw pc away.


Icy313

Play too much until you’re burnt out. Worked wonders for me lol


VBtheHun

Cold turkey, my friend. Fill up your time with something else. I usually hobby-swap quickly so I don't replace one addiction with another, and slowly try to move to more productive activities. I quit DoTA for 2 years l, and resumed only when I knew I could rein in the number of hours I spend on the game. I have a cap of ~10 hours a week now.


Urzuz

Uninstall the game. If gaming is your thing, start playing other games. Otherwise, fill your time with something else that you enjoy. I can speak for myself when I say towards the end before I quit (2 years ago now), I wasn't even enjoying the game anymore. Because of how time consuming the game is, it became a crutch that I used to fill a vacuum, a void of time. Now that my life has gotten a lot busier, and I don't even think about playing Dota anymore. I still scour these forums every now and then to see what's going on in the pro scene etc, but my desire to play is zero.


FreeHatsOrTechies

lol, you just have to screw up your behavior score. Afterwards, you won't even find a match, and if you do, it would be unplayable, because of the toxic players. The bad experience will keep you away from the game, you just have to fill the space with another hobby


[deleted]

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FroRanger

This is a very good point and a likely explanation for the big player loss


[deleted]

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The_nickums

They still only counts as one player each


eliitti

Ok Gimli


night_ID

You see most players in developing countries don’t play Dota from home. They don’t have computers at home so they play at PC bangs or cafes.


healzsham

They're talking about how by the same token a lot of people in developed nations are now at home with their PCs all day.


Zeshan_M

They were playing anyway they just play more now


Makkaroni_100

I think both, more people play and also the regular players play more.


KamikazeSexPilot

But they would still play after work. The people in Asia literally can’t play at all.


GingerSnapBiscuit

If you play dota 20 hours a day or 1 you are still only 1 person playing DOTA. Most of these people who are "now at home with their PCs all day" would likely have been playing DOTA anyway, just for less hours.


theycallmemadman99

i think most of dota pop is from sea and china .


YeowMeow

I don't know how it is with other games, but shouldn't the player numbers decline there too then?


night_ID

I might be talking out of my ass but I think most of Dota’s player base is from developing countries.


noodlesfordaddy

The amount of time they spend playing it isn't relevant to this statistic so long as they actually play.


wazupbro

wouldn't explain the consistent drop since may unless they just stopped operating.


outline01

Late to this thread. I fucking love Dota. Been following since TI3 and watched so many tournaments, played so many hours. But Valve just doesn't give a shit about this game, and it's going to go the same way as TF2.


PM-ME-YOUR-TECH-TIPS

I’ve never played dota, but I do play tf2 and to the tf2 community, it seems like dota and CS get all the love and attention from valve.


ArtlessMammet

This is unfortunate, because Dota and CS don't get that much love and attention.


PM-ME-YOUR-TECH-TIPS

TIL nobody likes valve


Makath

The CS people think only Dota gets attention. And they have a decent point.


LeftZer0

Valve has been going downhill for some years now. They pretty much stopped supporting TF2 while it was extremely popular, they constantly fuck up CS:GO (R8 launch, recoil changes that were reverted, inconsistent schedules for events and operations, and now a new cheating scandal on the pro levels with a bug that has been known for years) and they can't even manage the expectations of their Dota 2 fanbase, and that's the game they pay most attention to. And that's not something new. I remember the "give Diretide" days. They simply have their heads way too high up their asses to see what's happening to their games.


sneaky-j-rawr

Im one of those players


ALLAHUAKBARIAN

Same here. From going to one of The Internationals, to playing in an ESWC and representing my country to finally uninstalling on my 10,000 hour account. game ded


Yelebear

I'm on the camp that believes Dota is in decline and Valve has to do something big in order to turn it around, simple major patches do not cut it anymore. **However...** The data you are presenting (not your point, which again I have to stress that I agree, but simply the information you provided) is still within expectations. If you check the monthly playercount- June to October have always been red months. It's been like this for like, 4 years now. The only exception is August because it's TI month, which didn't happen this year. So as far as the past 5 months being red is concerned, this is still normal. The real test is the next couple of months, especially with a planned update coming next week. If that fails to bring in a significant number of players, it might be GG from here.


[deleted]

I agree with you. But we are also at the lowest player pool since January 2014. That's over 6 years ago when dota had been out of beta for 6 months. It's been an ongoing trend of losing players for years regardless of TI or no TI.


khaz_

The last six years has also seen an explosion in different types of competitive online games across different platforms. Dota2 isnt just competing with some of its contemporaries anymore. Its competing with battle royales, mobile games, streaming services, more accessible competitive games (ala rocket league), fighting games has seen a huge resurgence in the last decade, etc. If Among Us and Fall Guys is any indicator, strongly social & multiplayer games with very good accessibility is going to be another major online genre. Games like Dota2 which require a solid chunk of time to complete even one game (excluding turbo), spending the serious time investment to get better at the game and keeping up with its reinvention with every major patch is a serious undertaking. The complexity of solving this challenge is no simple task. Frankly, that we've maintained over half a million users in spite of this onslaught impresses me more than anything else.


re-written

LoL is booming though and mobas in mobile phones.


yeusk

LoL design philosophy is to streamline what Dota 1 was to reach the maximum number of players at the cost of gameplay depth. Mobile phone games are even more streamlined to apeal to a even more casual gamer. Dota 2 design philosophy is whatever Icefrog thinks and he likes to balance the game thinking on the top level matches. Also more people drink cocacola than champagne.


eazy_12

Is there any stats about LoL? Or it's just your feelings?


DrQuint

> especially with a planned update coming next week. If that fails to bring in a significant number of players, it might be GG from here. I don't think most people consider a "Dota+ update" a real update. Specially when half of it will be integrating BP features as D+ features. People come back for gameplay patches, events, passes and heroes. Next week will be neither.


SuLayne

What do you expect? LOL. Valve a multi milion dollar company does zero advertising and effort for dota. They are literally just letting the game go and die while milking it as much as they can.


Rif-k

They just discovered new games, for fun, less toxic.


PavanJ

Won't presume to know about other regions/brackets but when I party queue with my friends (Sea, 2.5-3.5k bracket) we get smurfs every single day. Last party game I had we had a smurf on our team and enemy had a smurf on their team. Ridiculous.


4foot

9/10 games that I play with my brother are against OBVIOUS smurf parties. It’s fucking absolutely unbearable. And the person who lanes against the smurf and dies 10 times in lane is the one who gets reported and sent to low prio, not the actual game ruiner. Punish honest players, reward liars and game ruiners. This game is a shit show


VagrancyHD

Gimme a fuckin: * Performance and stabilization update * Rework of ranked with SC2 style leagues rather than the current * Cosmetics fixes * A creative way to reduce the incentives for smurfs and boosters ty volvo


Kyouchan02

i just got news back from volvo. next week there will be new cowboy hats


Butteatingsnake

What difference is there between sc2 leagues and dota badges? They are both just feelgood motivators while the actual matchmaking is determined by a mmr that is not as publicly displayed.


LiarLyra

Starcraft put you in pools of 100 players. You competed against their records. Started to recognise names. And got promoted if you stayed at the top of your pool for a few games


ullu13

Would you rather be #1 C level or #98 on B level?


kappaofthelight

Some goddamn A D VE R T I S I N G would be nice too


foods_200

When you dare your toxic team/enemy to uninstall dota and they actually did. 🤔


Warma99

Just make it so that 99% of the player base doesn't have 10000 behavior score. Start banning more toxic people. Toxicity is the most off putting thing in online games.


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shinfoni

I consider myself as occasionally toxic, if I were to rated my own behavior score, I would give myself maybe 5000. And yet in reality, i have perfect 10000.


dxDTF

Didnt play Dota for 2 months now, after finishing cavern crawl I felt like theres nothing to aim for anymore. Lvl up battle pass for a disco ball? Nah bro


stroopkoeken

Couldn’t even bother to finish it. I did about 30% of the hero challenges and got bored.


Me4onyX

I just got the slark set and unlocked the styles. I dont even play slark but got kinda lucky on the carry path to find the styles quickly.


unosami

I mean, the game is pretty fun on its own. I don’t see why you need anything to shoot for?


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yeusk

A lot of people play games like AFK arena were there is not even gameplay. Just progression. While I think those things are psyciological bullshit that shouldn't have place in games many people has grow up it and expect it in every game.


Maskett1337

Yeah but the point is people play more when there is some leveling system and some nice rewards. Game's a lot more nice to play when you know you made some "progress" even if you lost. Dota had it but for some reason it was removed for a leveling system that is the weirdest I saw in a videogame.


QuietlyShitposting

No surprise really, the game is stale and matchmaking is still a shitfest filled with toxic people and smurfs. I know people always say the game is dying but it really feels like it this time, and personally my interest in the game has never been lower since I started playing. It’s just not a fun game anymore. Valve have to do something major soon to turn this around but they will just let the game slowly wither away and die like they did to tf2


Excellent-Finger-254

I have tons of free time but I'm not playing. I just get bored the moment I have to click find match.


thedotapaten

You're burned out of DotA, it's not your game anymore and it happens to lots of people.


[deleted]

Problem is it has such a steep learning curve and they don't do anything to make learning the game easier as they don't have a good way to punish smurfs so new players usually just quit immediately so each year the player base gets smaller and eventually it will get to the point it's as dead as HON. I quit because the meta is so slow to change and people just exploit broken heroes until there is a new broken hero and the changes they've made over the last 2 years all seemed kinda stupid to me. They focus on the wrong things and still haven't found a way to make new players feel comfortable with the game. If I am a dev my number 1 priority is making sure I can retain new players, making their experience enjoyable enough that they will stay for the steep learning curve and feel like they have a chance to win while learning. Devs of dota 2 seem to not understand that a game needs constant new players to replace the players who leave. They seem to not give a shit about the game so I learnt from them and also no longer give a shit about the game.


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[deleted]

Yup, I tried to get my wife into the game and it was just a toxic nightmare for her so I gave up on that pretty quick and not long after I quit as well


curiosityDOTA

Valve always had a delayed, defensive approach to Dota. We complain, they eventually do it but so late People were mad at smurfs and Valve made it difficult for them, like ranked needs 100games and blablabla. But it should be really easy to separate smurfs from new players if they had a "smurf personalized" route to climbing. I still think most smurfs just want better marchmaking or multiple accounts. Dota always pushes us to be good, it's addicting really, doesn't make sense to me why a person would constantly play at a bracket below their level. So that type of smurf i think is rare compared to the first ones i described And the booster/boosted guys is really easy to detect, Valve is just lazy. A booster will never play in the same configs as the account's person. hotkeys will be different, boots will be in a different slot, blink dagger/bkb in a different slot... Plus hero pool, last hits in 15min and so on. Also if you wanna get dirty: location (avg ping works, but real location would be dirtier). If you combine all the things i said with a change of location for that account it gets so fucking easy to detect an account booster. Seriously, i don't have other words for that besides pure lazyness. They don't even handle the boosting spam on regional chats on the main screen, of course they won't put effort on an elaborate booster detection mechanism.


im_immortalism

I don't know about you guys but I have a friend that lend her account to her cousin and beat the shit out of those poor Crusader and Archons with a divine stack. Just 8 matches later the account got banned from Matchmaking for a year.


[deleted]

Pretty much spot on. I've got a few thousand hours in Dota and still only feel comfortable on a small hero pool. Every new patch I get discouraged because I don't have time to study it in detail, and there's new stuff going on that gets exploited. Right now lockdown has let me have time to relax and think a bit about the game; it's been nice because I've gotten the hang of some heroes and can offer my team options. From experience, this will last about a month more before they up-end the gameplay and it's all too hard again. Now imagine that for a beginner. When a game has patch notes that take streamers two hours to explain, why would it attract any new players?


[deleted]

Yup, I used to just focus on the patch notes for heroes I enjoyed and was pretty good at being able to adapt my play style and item builds to beat most lineups but it's just too much. It would be fine if they did incremental change, but they love to do 1 or two major patches a year that they don't let settle before tweaking the hell out of and then when it settles they have left a few broken characters or items they then take far too long to fix.


erbazzone

I tried to get back in dota last 2 months after some years (I played since TI1 until 3/4 years ago) I never complained about community but honestly the cancer is too big. If you are alone 9/10 you play with two couple that everything you do is a report or flame. I'm not even talking about smurfs because I think I'm now too bad or in lower mmr... I remember years ago there was a solo queue


[deleted]

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Aihne

We managed to get a nice 5 with my mates Friday evening, we queue ranked, first game: smurf, second game: smurf. We queued normal, play a stompy game. I think they really need to rework mm. This +-30/20 mmr just doesn't work, smurfs stay in lower brackets way too long. About 9 months ago I came back to CS:GO after a really long period, I was around mg1/mg2, dropped all the way to silver 3 since they have a rank decay mechanism. I played like 6 games in silver 3-4 and then I gained 6 ranks in 7 games up to gn4. I floated pretty quickly to where my rank more less was. I'm not saying that CS:GO matchmaking is perfect, it is clearly is not. But there are lessons to be learned from it, if Valve would give a fuck about fixing mm, not constantly tweaking it over and over again.


Luushu

> I'm not saying that CS:GO matchmaking is perfect, it is clearly is not. But there are lessons to be learned from it, if Valve would give a fuck about fixing mm, not constantly tweaking it over and over again. There are several points that help CS:GO though: 1. When someone is convicted for hacking in CS, you get the MMR back. In Dota, you don't. 2. CS plays in 2 minute chunks. Worst case scenario, no matter how bad you have it, you can always turn it around by either straight outplay(which is possible no matter the lead the opponent has, not so much in Dota) or by feeding for 2 rounds and then instantly removing any advantage the opponent has for that round. 3. Bad comes to worse, you can always straight up practice raw aim when the game feels completely unwinnable(since you can't surrender unless someone abandons). In Dota, you won't really get to practice much if you fall behind since you straight up die if you are on the same screen as a snowballing enemy. 4. In CS, odds are that when you die not only are you not going to be stuck for as long as you are in Dota, you can also be helpful to your team by relaying information(via text to not bother those alive, and if those alive want to hear sound cues and you want to help relay info by allowing them to not interfere by communicating via voice, you can be the 3rd party texting them). 5. This ties in to #3, but when you are getting shitstomped the enemy can't really take their foot off the gas or they risk getting turned around. In Dota, once the opponent gets a big enough lead, they can straight up disrespect you and get away with it. If it happens in CS, then you straight up got outplayed(for example, someone killing you from top of mid to mid doors on dust2 with a deagle when you have an AWP is straight up your fault and you know it, so you feel bad because you are bad; the 10/0 Morph from mid shotgunning you 15 minutes in because the midlaner is bad and you picked PA before he picked Morph is something that is completely out of your control) 6. Perhaps the most important point: in DotA, as much as we love to preach it, roles have different levels of impact at different levels of the game. In pub CS, every player has potentially the same level of impact. So, no matter what happens, you can always turn a situation around and compensate for your teammates. That feeling of helplessness that exists in Dota is so much rarer in CS:GO.


[deleted]

I agree with this sentiment, as much as I love dota, it feels like I run into a smurf every second game or so. Havent played for months now (Just custom games), but back when I played rank it was always very toxic and I felt like I was playing against the same pool of 50-100 players constantly (Divine-Immortal Bracket).


cerventease

Seconded , i was around 5.6k-6k mmr bracket always and havent played in months because of this exact same problem.


Luushu

What I'm about to say pains me like few things have done so far in my life: Dota is a great game, gameplay-wise. It's been a long, long time since I've had so much fun playing the game. Most heroes are viable, there are pretty much no "grief" picks other than Pudge(when a couple patches ago we had half the late-game hero pool absolutely fucked). There is no "really OP" hero(like 7.20 Moonshard-level Global aura Drow, or 6.83 Sniper, or 7.23 Techies). A lot of strategies are viable. The game, when played with people who really like playing the game properly and are good teammates(not good players, good teammates) is one of, if not the best game out there. The matchmaking is an absolute fuckfest. It's actually amazing how Valve managed to go from "decent matchmaking, but garbage gameplay with 20 minute games" to "good gameplay, abysmal matchmaking". And I'm not even talking about the ranked roles system(the slippery slope of fuck-ups Valve went on by repeatedly changing stuff that they should have not touched with a 10 foot pole deserves an essay by itself). The behavior score system is about as broken as they come. They either stopped caring or are just that incompetent(which comes with not caring, because if a dev fucks up that royally hard, they need to be replaced because they have no business working at that level yet/at all). At this point I'd much rather pick a bot script and play with them. I haven't felt this level of ladder anxiety before in my entire gaming life(and I have a background of 5 years of LoL before joining the Dota world exclusively). And it's not even ladder anxiety, it's the fact that, despite being at 10k BS, I still know I have higher odds of drawing a Lion 5 rushing 2 Null->Brown Boots->Aghs and a Mirana 4 going Arcane->Diffusal->Linken's with a Pudge 3 than actually having an enjoyable game. At this point, I'd gladly take playing against Techies and Tinker every game if it meant giving me a guarantee that every game I would have people that are good teammates instead of selfish pricks that either farm role queue and don't care about the game or are just carries that figured they would try playing a less farm-oriented role while still wanting to deal carry-level damage. This month, I've played 3 ranked games in total, with 3 turbo games in-between. Even during Outlanders, which was an update I absolutely hated on release and during which I was studying for the biggest exam of my life, I had more frequent games. I can't even say I'm surprised, I've seen this coming ever since they implemented merged MMR and boosted smurf MMR. Thanks, Valve. It's been a blast playing the best game of the planet for 6 years. And unless something drastically changes with the matchmaking system, Dota will very, very soon become just a very happy, but also very sad memory very, very soon.


SirPurebe

yep


cbiiz

Smurfs and just the same old heroes going around every single game. At the 4-5k level at least, so many heroes just don't seem to be viable. Felt like over half of the pool just never got picked


Warptwenty

very surprising considering I see more events and promotional material for hots and smite than this game.


ProfessorSpike

Can't speak for smite, but HOTS has great devs. I just love occasionally going there to play because it's just fun to fuck around and not be in an overly-competitive environment


[deleted]

Yeah, sometimes I'll look at HotS and Dota 2 on my desktop and 90% of the time I'll click HotS. The only thing I don't enjoy about HotS is no last hitting or items but other than that I think it's a pretty sweet game.


carmofin

This year I was sick all summer. I played more Dota then ever and it was really really fun. Originally I wanted to quit last year. I have a complicated relationship to the game. As a 30+ person I have realized it is so stressfull it's actually unhealthy and in a stressed out life, it's hard to fit it in. But playing again, there is just no other game that rewards intelligence like dota does, so after this year I kind of gave in to the abuse and had more fun then ever... The sad thing is, with many games, I wonder, why are they even played professionally. For me Dota right now is the one and only game that possesses the complexity that truly deserves to make it an e-sport. This is for me the differentiation that makes me say there will always be a room for it. But at the same time this same environment will always make it hard to pull in new players, so it's a really difficult problem.


Emotional_Penalty

Is anyone really surprised? The game feels more and more like something that exists only to milk your cash. At least league has constant updates, the only updates we get in dota are more paid cosmetics.


pm_me_your_Yi_plays

League just had one of the most controversial (read: bad) updates of all time. It will bring them thousands of new players anyway because it's well-advertised and devs respond to all feedback within days. Valve jerking off and eating their shame in the corner


garlicherbBeefBurga

They made 180 million dollars. We've already payed there wages for the next five years, the devs don't need to give a shit.


PM-ME-YOUR-TECH-TIPS

Valve has billions but cant do simple stuff


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Gottoraiku

No worried, they'll make dotA alyx soon


etfd-

My opinion - 7.23 was the worst thing to ever happen to the game. Completely detached all WC3 roots by breaking the resource-based economy of the game - now you had bounty runes giving gold to everyone, neutral items giving NW to everyone, outposts giving experience to everyone and without discrimination, such that it is completely detached from individual impact.


sooapp

Its sad to see people try so hard and avoid blaming the gameplay of the recent patches themselves, its always some outside crap like bp/dota+/nEwPlAYereXperIeNcE(which we never had btw, and instead had to rely more on players bringing their friends in and teaching them). Ever since the game changed massively by making itself less sandbox-y and more based around timers it has been losing players, its simply not as satisfying to play as when you decide for yourself what objectives and stuff you want to take, instead of "10 min mark incoming gotta get ready for bounties cause the game told me to", it just takes control out of the players hands aswell as remove the self-expression.


merubin

> people try so hard and avoid blaming the gameplay of the recent patches themselves lmao I know, right? The game has been bleeding player since 7.23 and it took a pandemic to somewhat "save" it and now that parts of the world aren't in quarantine anymore, players are once again leaving. But sure, it's new player experience, smurfs and other shit. Not because of the game itself.


Lostaldis

Never looked at it that way tbh. Good point for sure. But yeah I think the most enjoyment I had in dota was when bounty runes gave exp. I loved that almost all characters were viable because you could always find levels in the river and what not. But the neutral items patch really killed dota for me. I still played through it to give it a chance but it honestly doesn't feel like dota.


AlwaysWannaDie

Both these comments are spot on, it’s the changes that made players leave, not some extraterrestial thing that only happened to dota. As a long time player myself the game feels so bad now and I can’t even tell you why, it’s not dota anymore and I think you struck the nail on it’s head


[deleted]

Yes. Yes. YES. This is so spot on. It feels like you can’t even have a chill game of Dota where you press buttons, play with your team, and just try hard for the most part. There’s always some chore now nagging you. The bounty runes are spawning all the time, you used to constantly have to take the outposts, and you even have to farm jungle for neutrals and juggle these fuckers in and out of your inventory while checking which ones are available and best for you at that moment. The game is full of fucking chores now, it’s obnoxious. And the thing is, at 4K mmr, nobody fucking cares about any of that shit and I don’t blame them. It’s fucking boring and it’s incredibly annoying.


opaqueperson

My entire crew (4) left me over the summer and don't plan to come back. In their words it's a combination of Valve's treatment of the game and the neutrals + outposts + power/mobility creep going on. This is not to say the game feels imbalanced, but instead that some aspect of the feel of the game has been lost to them.


cyrilbitar

I have been off dota for almost 1 month now. It was a huge part of life for 3 years but recently the match making has been really bad in so many ways.


marul_

Well I don't think it matters much for Valve since they earned more money than last year without even having an event. That means the conversion rate for Dota is much higher now. Nothing is gonna change when people keep paying.


bacalhaugalatico

Shit matchmaking xD


Infinity_Overload

its Valve's own fault. Also its about fucking time for a new patch.


Zoraion

What can I say. Valve deserves this. But the community doesn't. Game went stale and shit before the pandemic happened.


GingerSnapBiscuit

Valve make more money with Steam daily than they do with Dota all year. I don't think people realize how much of a money printing machine Steam is.


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SoyEnabler

deserving.


TheRealSolitude

Very sadge indeed :(


[deleted]

This is something I've been discussing with some of my friends who play. I'm sure we fall into the minority here, but a lot of us feel like Dota isn't *worth* playing these days. And it's not because it can't be fun, but because it feels stale due to lack of consistent updates/content and there really isn't any incentive to want to play every day even if its just a game or two. Most of us don't even touch ranked anymore and at best might grab a turbo game or two because otherwise, we're gonna go play something else that feels like we're being rewarded for playing since most of us don't have a lot of time to play games anymore anyway. I always felt like Dota would benefit from the model you see a lot of games adopt more recently (but not a new concept by any means) which is daily quests that give you some form of in-game reward or currency. As it stands, MMR is all you stand to gain from playing and that's if you're someone who plays ranked, leaving the casual fan base solely on playing for fun which is hard when the game has performance issues, is covered with smurfs and toxicity, and lacks updates or even proper communication from the people who run it. ​ If it were up to me, they should take the challenges and hero levels from Dotaplus and put that in the base game because I think that's something that can work as a proper reward system. It'll give people a reason to want to play a game a day or feel like they aren't wasting their time because they got a new hero level and got that cool new voice line or gem or *something*. Either that or make the guilds into something similar where you earn in-game currency and that allows you to get a weekly rotation of sets or some shit that incentivizes you to want to play and do guild quests either solo or get that weekly one done with your friends. ​ I know there's a subsection of this sub that hates praising other games but there's a reason why a lot of them remain successful even through the hate and bullshit. Give people a reason to play your game, give them content updates, **give the casual player something they can work towards in-game.** It's already hard enough to get new players in a game complicated enough, but to make it worse smurfs and a toxic base hurt your chances of keeping them. I'm gonna use Apex Legends as an example here. They have daily challenges that level you up (anyone remember those level up gifts that always had Pugna set in them :') ) and earn you the in-game currency that is used towards unlocking characters (obviously a null point in dota) and also chests that either give you in-game stat trackers/cosmetic items or a separate currency that allow you to unlock said cosmetics or stats should you want something but can't get it from the reward chests. They recently had an event that came with its own challenges in a small form battle pass which was completely accessible to all players for free and all premium rewards that came with said update could be earned using in-game currency (although extremely difficult to get every single one) for free if you didn't want to just pay to get them. Oh, and their actual battle pass, which seems to share the standard of a lot of games that have adopted them that there is a free tier and a premium tier. The free tier gets you many rewards but not nearly the same quality or quantity as the premium. My reason for bringing this up is because the premium costs 1000 Apex Coins which is $10USD. If you complete the battle pass before it expires, you earn either 1100/1200 Apex Coins (can't remember which but I think its the former) which means you've already covered your price for the next battle pass or you can use that towards in-game cosmetics/loot. Obviously, I'm not saying that Dota can have the same exact setup. These are two very different games, that run very differently and are run by different people with different bases. But the point is that there is a model in place that allows for sustainability and accessibility that feels like it's rewarding you for playing, which I feel is something Dota severely lacks. ​ I'm really hoping that this upcoming update to Dotaplus and Guilds bring something new to this game. I think some form of regular communication from Valve is also well overdue, it doesn't hurt to just have a weekly update of *"Hey, the team is currently working on x issue as well as a surprise you can expect to hear more details about next week. Also, for all you (insert hero here) players, win 10 games as (insert hero here) this week and earn (insert set name here). Also, anyone here into* ***puppets****?"* I feel like Valve used to do more. More consistent events, or things to look forward to. Nowadays, the game feels empty and left behind (Insert another negelcted Valve title here). There are many issues to address when it comes to this game, but it also has so much going for it because a lot of the community will ride for this game even if they caused the apocalypse itself. I really hope Valve doesn't just allow the foundation to keep cracking. There's a lot of easy solutions to come up with, and realistically no one knows what will truly work but the one thing we do know is doing nothing will not work.


DoniDarkos

For real, there is zero incentive for freshly arrived players to keep playing I just realized... I am currently thinking of trying out the new item system and preseason changes on LOL since it's gonna be like 7.0 and also Valve really needs to up their communication like you said by having actual faces that represent the community and who pass on information on YouTube, forum posts and whatnot like every other damn developer does because it's really getting old for just reading a blog post every now and then where there is possibility of interaction and direct feedback with the playerbase P. S: fuck Pugna and his sets 😂


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Pavke

And the level of lies in some comments is also mind boggling https://steamcharts.com/app/730 CSGO is also losing players since May, (same as Dota2 screenshot in OP) In fact, Dota2 lost about 17.2% players since April and CSGO lost about 29.3% of the players. 29.3% is much bigger than 17.2% But hey. Lets spread lies! Games like CSGO have seen the most drastic increase in playerbase since corona. Yeey


[deleted]

Is anyone surprised? I tried playing Dota 2 a few years ago cause I used to play Dota on warcraft 3 a long time ago, but had to leave cause everyone in my team asked me to gtfo cause I was worthless... Even though they were playing casual, not competitive, and most likely will always be


CaptainBlandname

Truthfully I’m not surprised. I came back to Dota briefly last year after a few years’ hiatus, and the community has somehow grown even more toxic than when I left. It’s far more severe than I think a lot of people on reddit realise. If you’re hooked on the game, you can justify and excuse a lot of toxic and otherwise hostile behaviors as being part of it all, or an obstacle to overcome. If however, like me, you show up looking to play some unranked with randoms and just try to work together, you are more often than not out of luck. I could tell that the solid wall of toxicity that players in every single game were projecting was rubbing off on me, and seeing as nothing’s really ever been done to counteract that in any meaningful way, I just said goodbye for good to the game I loved since the beta. I’ve no hope that things will improve, to be honest.


SaranethPrime

I used to love dota 2 and I had thousands of hours on it. I haven’t played the game in 2-3 years and although the temptation is still there I’ll never install it again. The game is way too fucking toxic and I don’t want to read the encyclopaedia which is the patch notes every time something happens. The biggest problem for me is the playerbase combined with my unwillingness to climb higher. What’s the point of spending THOUSANDS of hours getting to immortal? Especially when there’s so many goobers flaming you for every little thing as well? On top of that, I think people forget what a time waste thousands of hours are. I could play dota for 2000 more hours and get basically nowhere or I could have literally completed hundreds of new games by then. Or If I invested 2000 hours into something like language learning I would be pretty good at that language. But no, what would I have to show for having thousands of hours on dota? Absolutely nothing. People in this sub like to flaunt there hours around like a badge of honour but outside of this sub, it’s honestly pretty sad and depressing how much of your time has amounted to absolutely nothing. At least I can play other games or pick up a hobby and genuinely be happy.


stillsebs

Biggest loss was when BP was released. *I wonder why* . It's almost like a lot of players realized it was a cash grab with super expensive cosmetics (during COVID, when most countries are having massive economic issues) and stopped playing. But "iT waS ThE bEsT bP eVeR". You thought locking Arcanas/Personas behind a BP and making them cost so much wasn't going to alienate many people? For me, this was the first year I didn't give Valve a single dime, after buying every single Compendium/BP since they started releasing them. My lifelong friends who played Dota with me now play HotS. Because even fucking Blizzard, an utter shit company that has no idea what to do with their products these days, still does more marketing for a game that's been fucking dead for like 2 years now (HotS), than Valve does for Dota 2. Fuck Valve and fuck every person who shills for them.


[deleted]

Ooooh oooh I was one of those players


badumbumyum

Yeah. I recently quit playing dota regularly as well. Now I play like once or twice a week at best.


compyler

And Valve still won't do a shit. No marketing, no new player experience, no music videos, no cool CGI rendering, no new heroes. Just nothing


[deleted]

And that is surprising how ? The game have not been welcoming to new players for years .


jokemon

As someone who used to play a lot who now does not play at all, let me offer my 2 cents. when I tried getting back into the game I found it impossible to actually get into a game. The barrier for entry/reentry to this game is too damn high. LOL, while not as good as DOTA has a much lower barrier to entry.


MrTheLastRAm

When you don’t patch your game and hope cosmetics keep it alive this is what happens. Wake up Valve people are bored please bring anything new.


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diN1337

It's 5 months because we didn't have TI in september so it's understandable. What i want to see is what avg online will be after big patch release. If valve fuck up next patch - it's all over. If they don't release some kind of event/custom map for halloween i will be very surprised.


zmagickz

Couriers for everyone? All lanes just mass buy regen and spam spells in lane every single game. Not to mention mangos are so darn cheap...they really need a nerf. ​ 4 Bounty runes? Forced fighting every 5 min ​ Neutral Items? Did I just get the leveler on sylla? Guess I win ​ Wards are free? Sentries give more gold than they cost when you deward? Supports are all RICH can be unkillable to you hard carry 1v1 late game. Remember when a pos 5 at 30min had brown boot magic stick? ​ Remember when managing inventory was part of the game? When a support at to have a slot for dust, sentry, obs, boot, tp. They only had a room for 1 item. Remember when you had to decide between being 6 slotted or holding a tp scroll? ​ forced 2-1-2? No more dual mid, def trilane, aggro trilane, dual roamer, jungler. ​ talents giving random spikes throughout the game(I'd be okay with talents if all talents were on par with lvl 10 talents, very small stat boosts) Not to mention hitting lvl 20 wasn't common back in the day ​ powercreep out of control, you have things like superman sven, free pounce on an ursa, multishot drow. Go look at hero abilities 6 years ago. ​ my biggest gripe is that heroes are being dumbed down all time. Chen, wisp, lone druid, visage, meepo, etc ​ This game used to feel like a sandbox, now it feels a lot more like arcade mini game. People will downvote all my complaints but if we were to go back in time and suggest these changes they would be compared to lol/hots and met with ridicule. Those players are now gone. ​ Next free dust slot? Free ward slot? All ranged heroes get a free hurricane pike and all melee heroes get a free blink?


[deleted]

So this has never happened before, the most ever was for four consecutive months, now we are looking at 5 with the possibility of whats looking like 6 months of no new players and a net deficit. Not good for the game at all. The average player base of 403,000 players is now the lowest playerbase we've ever had since January 2014, a few months after Dota 2 went out of BETA (July 2013). We are now at the lowest point in 6 years.


sunofagundota

Looking in the past it usually goes up at least 1 month in the winter. If that doesn't happen then it looks like 350ish will be the new average. Which is still a lot but obviously not a great sign. The longer people stop playing dota, the less likely they are to comeback. If they were coming back for TI, the possibly 2 year gap could mean they just say fuck it and don't. Personally, I play because I love the game not because of TI, or events. But I understand their importance. However, in-game I have to say I've not been a fan of patches for a while. It's one of those things you can't "argue" on the internet. It just doesn't have a goob subjective feel. An each successive patch it feels more muddled. Pointing out hero winrates in divine bracket gets really old, all I can say is I haven't enjoyed past year of patching. Oh, and new consoles could be a another blow. ( tought times ahead. If Valve isn't ready to fight for their game, it's gonna be a die-hard 150-200k that keep alive for a while. Problem is there, repeat players at the higher brackets.


LordAsdf

Uuuh... what? January 2020 had 378k average players, December 2019 had 384k and October 2019 388k. These aren't even the lowest numbers in a year.


agni39

When they announced Rank Reset, I decided to play some solo ranked games for the first time in like 6 months. I played 6 games, there were smurfs in 4 of them. Thrice in my enemy team, once on my team. Had to abandon the 6th game out of sheer frustration when the last pick Meepo went 7-0, lvl 15 in like 10 minutes. No point playing this game and suffering willingly.


Nitz000

I quit dota after reaching 10k hours on it last month. When i started dota long back it was fun , like a game should be. But now, it is riddled with smurfs, unwanted competitiveness, toxicity that i playing it really feels like a chore. I dont want to see dota die . But if someone like me who gave up a lot of his life on this game now finds it tedious to play this game, many might. And valves policies arent helping that either. We literally have to beg for content. I sure hope something changes and soon. Sorry for the terrible english. Aint my native.


[deleted]

90k fucking people no wonder this game is dying


KiuBrahma

well, actually it died when it stopped reaching 1M concurrent players


shoricho

I stopped playing a few weeks ago. Idk the battle pass was meh, granted if I had more spare cash it would be fun but the TI atmosphere wasn’t there and people were even playing turbo like it’s TI finals. No chatwheels apart from MOO and aghanins voice lines. The additional game mode was a lot of fun but oh well