Dota 2 on Reddit

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The original was posted on /r/dota2 by /u/fierywinds1q on 2024-12-05 15:40:16+00:00.

Very long post ahead, with a lot of effort put in.

In the past few years, Dota has been focused on adding more more more. Facets, innates, neutral items, tormenters etc. All these were great additions.

But I think it’s time we focus inward a little and pay some attention to what makes the game so great to play:

The dota interface has to feel clean, smooth, sleek and responsive to play.

That is a core fundamental of any game and I feel for Dota, it has been neglected a little bit, in favour of just adding more more more content to appease the masses.

Before I start, I just want to say that a lot of these issues are small issues individually. None of these issues individually will ever get any attention if posted on this reddit because they seem too small to matter (and only memes and shitposts get to hot page). But the collective effect of ALL these issues is a general sense of clunkiness and unsmoothness that is invisibly detrimental to the game. People may not realise exactly why the game feels clunky and unsmooth but it will just be a general sense of unease and annoyance. Through this thread I hope to capture some of these issues. Let’s get started

Visual clutter

Visual clutter is getting quite obnoxious. Every single turbo player has long ago subconsciously learnt to tune out the sound of neutral item notifications. The spam of neutral item notifications at the side bar is constant (they drop non-stop in turbo) and is also completely pointless.

What’s the point of a pop-up informing me my teammate has returned a neutral item back to their stash? I CAN’T EVEN USE THEIR NEUTRAL ITEM, this is simply just a completely outdated pop-up mechanic from a time where neutral items were shared!

Meanwhile for actually gamechanging events like Alchemist gifting you an aghanim’s scepter, there is 0 notification?

Dota needs an OPTIONAL “no pop-ups” mode where players who select it don’t get harassed by notifications ever. That means:

1. No notifications when teammates return their own neutral items back to their stash
   1. Because no one cares
2. No notification of “5/5 tier 1 neutral items found”
   1. Because no one cares (and those who care check it on the neutrals tab)
3. No notification when every single neutral item is found
   1. Because no one cares (and those who care can check it on the neutrals tab) for available neutrals
4. No notification of every talent taken by teammates
   1. The game doesn’t inform me when my teammate levels up black hole or warlock golem, but it informs me when my teammate takes a “+40 illusory orb damage” talent? For what?? I can check their talents anytime myself
5. No notification of items bought by teammates
   1. I don’t need a pop-up telling me PA just bought a battlefury, if I wanted to know I’d click on the PA to find out
6. No notification of every observer ward, sentry ward, dust and smoke
   1. I don’t need a pop-up informing me of every sentry ward purchased, that’s just absolutely ridiculously pointless, THINK about how many sentry wards are bought in the course of EVERY GAME and think about how many pointless pop-ups that was
7. No notification of other random stuff like Rubick spell stolen (there’s a pop-up for every spell stolen) and all the other random rubbish
   1. This Rubick pop-up is at least kinda useful, but some players like me will still prefer a pop-up free gameplay experience, I can click on Rubick to see the stolen spell
8. No pop-up when pinging heroes at the top bar
   1. When you hold alt to ping a hero at the top bar and your mouse hovers their facet, you will summon a pop-up to block the screen, containing information about their facet.
   2. Remove this pop-up, I can check their facet via the scorescreen, I want to ping freely when in game
9. No pop-ups when I click on a hero effigy
   1. The hero effigy details can appear at the area in the picture below where the red arrows point, just like when you select any other units. It doesn't have to be a separate pop-up. Like this:

If any of these suggestions trigger you for whatever reason, remember that the setting is meant to be OPTIONAL. Those who check the box can enjoy a pop-up free experience, those who like their non-stop notifications can continue to enjoy it.

Pathing

It's been so long since lotus pools were added and heroes STILL don't walk in a straight line towards lotus pools.

I made a thread with videos here 1 year ago: 

But don't take my word for it, go test it yourself in game, the pathing issues are still there.

Also, when you right click to move into enemy base, instead of pathing the correct way, your hero will move towards the enemy barrier at the side of their base (the one they can't even pass through, only enemies heroes can pass through) and start derping around in front of the barrier trying to walk through it.

Another thing is, for huge objects like lotus pool, when issuing a move command, your hero should try to move as close as possible to where your mouse cursor clicked on the lotus pool, and not where the center of the model of the lotus pool is invisibly coded to be, wherever that may be.

And also the pathing when trying to juke in trees is sometimes super weird too.

Ability to move freely in game

The most fundamental thing in Dota is the ability to click around the map to move and attack move freely. The game cannot simply ignore your move and attack move commands, it would make the game super clunky.

Can you imagine, you right click on some impassable terrain like a tree or a cliff and instead of moving as close as possible to that spot, your hero just ignores you and doesn’t move at all because the terrain is impassable? That would be HUGELY annoying wouldn’t it?

Well, there are some bullshit in Dota that does exactly that, ignore your move and attack move commands.

The annoyance factor of this is multiplied 10x when you are playing illusion heroes like Naga and clicking really fast to split your illusions around your map, then you discover 10 seconds later your illusions ignored your move or attack move command

1. Lotus pool --> you can’t issue a move command on empty lotus pool.
   1. I know this is because there are no lotuses to channel but AT LEAST your hero should MOVE towards the empty lotus pool if you right click on it. And not just completely ignore your right click move command.
   2. Your hero already MOVES towards all other impassable terrain when you right click, why should lotus pool be the only exception?
2. Enemy team outposts --> you can’t issue a move command on enemy team outposts
   1. Again, your hero already moves towards all other impassable terrain, why should it ignore your move command when you right click an enemy team outpost? Even if the outpost can’t be channeled, your hero should still MOVE towards it
   2. The worst part is, the behaviour is inconsistent. When the enemy t2 tower falls, your hero can actually now move towards enemy team outposts because now they can be channeled
3. Watchers --> attack move command gets ignored
   1. When I say “attack move”, I mean pressing the attack button and clicking on ground. Attack move command works on any impassable terrain like cliffs and trees. Why doesn’t it work on watchers??
   2. Now before you say “well watchers can’t be attacked, so of course attack move doesn’t work on watchers”, realise that attack move commands work on enemy outposts if they can be channeled. Your hero actually attack moves towards the outpost, which is EXACTLY HOW IT SHOULD WORK instead of the command getting completely ignored
4. Twin gates --> attack move command gets ignored
5. Lotus pools --> not only blocks move commands as per above, but attack move command also gets ignored
6. Secret shop --> attack move command gets ignored
7. Outposts --> attack move command gets ignored if it can’t be channeled
8. Random invulnerable couriers flying by in Turbo --> attack move command gets ignored
   1. In Turbo there are a lot of invulnerable speedy couriers flying around, and occasionally your move or attack move command will click on a courier and your hero will just stand there and completely ignore everything instead of beginning to walk in that direction
9. Invulnerable buildings --> you can’t issue a move command on enemy invulnerable buildings.
   1. The game should obviously let you move towards it even if the building cannot be attacked, that just makes sense
10. Neutral items and neutral item tokens on the ground --> blocks attack move commands
    1. Hero should just attack move towards that neutral item as if an attack move command had been issued on the ground
11. Other items on the ground like gems and rapiers --> blocks attack move commands
    1. Hero should just attack move towards the items as if an atta...

Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/1h7bzy2/crownfall_is_great_but_time_for_springcleaning/