hmm  does so much better i dont think that makes sense   

 

i may not use punctuation but atleast i dont do cockups like that

and  nah demigod is bettter  it is just new  like anything new it will expand and grow  and get better and better

 

I dont think anyone wants this to become wow-like  with dozens of triggerable abilities. That "with three or four builds per hero" part of the quote is imo where our opinions differ: I want fewer DG's with way more then three or four builds. (and at the very least WAY more then the 1-2 you seem to be suggesting as the optimal number). I don't think you need dozens of abilities for that. What I'd prefer is for the depth to come from using the abilities for the right reason at the right time. For that the abilities should be multipurpose and customisable and work in diffrent ways in diffrent situations. Imo there are a few abilities in the game (that I can think of offhand) atm that are multipurpose and usefull in diffrent situations:

Penitence - damage, vulnerability, slow and interrupt. All are useful at slightly diffrent times so you gotta choose when to use it. More damage on the rook or save the interrupt for the hammer or transfer?

Structural transfer (combined with the towers) - Need the tower or hp? Also veeery vulnerable on interrupts.

Bite - more damage (and slow and....) or wait for a few moments for the heal?

The Erebus' teleport (bat swarm or something?) - damage or a fast getaway? or try to get both? perhaps save for when the opponent runs..?

Deep Freeze - interrupt and all abilities on cooldown for the target or good damage if you can get enough  effects on the target?

 

Then there are a couple that are always good but use so much mana, that you gotta choose between having mana for other things or them such as:

Oaks AoE thingy

Mist

These are the ones that add depth to the actual combat. Not having gazillion choices of extra powers and heros to use them. The map useage simplicity is something I already said needs to get more complex. If you add more conflicting effects to powers, you have to think more and more when using them. Combat shouldnt be decided by who's got the best build or who picked the right gear (tho naturally both need to matter), but by the choices you make IN combat and directly before. Also there needs to be more abilities with big cast-times and visible animations to make interrupts better since it lets make powerfull abilities that are balanced by being vulnerable.

 

The tl;dr version: There is no point in adding a lot of abilities into the game (with or without new demigods to use them). What needs to happen for depth (that you need for long term enjoyment) is for every single ability use to be a choice and not just something automatic to do every time you see an enemy DG. Something needs to be done about maps as well to make matches not go the same way every single time.

removeme

 

Could you please elaborate?

Tell us how demigod is better?

better graphic more attention to detail  not as many assholes

Nothing of that has anything to do with gameplay, my question still stands.

 

I have mixed feelings concerning that quote -- from the CEO of Stardock.

On the one hand, it's refreshing to see that he dares to express (relatively) strong emotions (such as loathing) on a forum visited by users of very different psychological makeups -- some of them very immature.

On the other hand, more than a few posts, on this Forum, are composed by rabid Demigod-and/or-Frogboy fanboys & groupies who pounce on rationally formulated, critical posts to vomit nasty sarcasm on their authors. They, also, might be branded as "total jerks".

But since they pa-troll the threads as self-appointed Demigod "bouncers", they get +1 karma and are not told that :

« Posting is a privilege. Could you find another forum to troll in ? »

I loathe those Demigod fanboys who act like total jerks. 

But allow me to soften my thorn :

 has had a huge month of hardship, in April ... and May doesn't look any easier. His posts, on this thread, even if they make me feel perplexed, inspire me to also feel « awe »  for his passionate dedication. Certainly no "loathing" here !

 

 

 

Happy to help. Then again, theres a reason why the DotA community has the stigma it has, and I have no issues with calling it as I see it. Like the World of Warcraft community, DotA is full of whiney and annoying people who view new members to their community as a plague that needs to be stopped or shunned.

If you asked this question in the DotA community you'd be black listed for life. Luckily, this is not that community. Anyway, apart from really horribly named techniques...

Jungling is a tactic whereby a player farms a stronger-than-creep neutral unit on the DotA Map to gain a level advantage over his opponents. This tactic involves them avoiding their enemy, kiting the unit into an wave of their own creeps and kill-stealing the unit from their own Team members to ensure they are able to dominate an opponent with a level advantage as early as possible. Basically, they don't fight the enemy - they fight the AI controlled characters to level up so that they don't have to worry about outplaying their opponent - they can just brute force them. Being as this was implemented in Warcraft III, and done better, and appropriated by DotA I don't consider it a staple of the DotA model.

Juking is actually two things, technically. It is using the LoS of the Warcraft III Engine to your advantage when attempting to Gank or escape from a Gank attempt. I will concede there is certainly some gameplay depth in this technique, however I still view Ganking in DotA the same way I view Ganking in World of Warcraft - a bad players way to taste success. Demigod removed this issue almost entirely. You have to face your opponent.

Counter picks is forcing an attack on your own Creeps to rob your enemy of the advantages given to them by a killing blow. This is a left-over engine feature from Warcraft III, whereby forcing an attack on your troops was allowed with the attack command. I don't view this as strategic depth but rather the limitations of a Mods capabilities being exploited. Demigods percentage based system works much better and as such keeps the focus where it needs to be - on fighting your enemy.

If you'd like I can explain how and where each technique is used on the DotA Map?

Advantages of playing against human opponents really. And they're not unpredictable if you play long enough. One of the reasons I left.

The Map suffers from shallow strategic depth as a whole - there are only a few limited ways to play the Map due to the fact so few of the Heroes are worth using. Items provide slight variations on this, albiet a few do open up some interesting mechanics so I will concede that point. As a whole, I got bored with DotA because it was essentially the same three or four matches played over and over and over; only the names of my opponents and team members changed. And as it has become with Starcraft, where people watch replays and re-enact the minute-to-minute gameplay of Professional players, the 'best' tactics have surfaced and these are now used by all players. Don't confuse the possibility of Depth with actual Depth. Look at The Rook - he can be played many ways, however the Tower Rush strat has already surfaced as a pretty much unbeatable strat if used correctly. This character lacks depth because this one strat is "the best". For depth to exist, multiple paths must be able to be used with the same level of success - then it becomes of a matter of which strat to use when, creating depth.

wrong, thats denying, but ok.

 

Right and wrong, because the truely great players use it in great and innovative ways, juking can be used to save your life in an otherwise lost situations, the map have several "jukespots" where something is put in to block your line of sight, this makes a great tool for innovative play, and I think everyone have heard of merlini's insane line of sight ownage.

That is an outrageous lie, all heroes are at least playable, some may be more competitive when it comes to the best players with extsensive knowledge of the game, but to even claim that is as allready stated, at best being uninformed and at worst be an outragous lie.

Please tell me what a few means, the items make for great depth in dota, you sometimes have to go skillbuilds to counter your oponents pick of hero and items, it allows for great depth on a higher level of play.

but this is the difference between the noobs and the pros, the pros make new strategies all the time to suprise their oponents, the "noobs" doesnt grasp the core mechanics and copy others strategies.

 

I am a noob at Demigod and DOTA, and I will admit that. I havent played years, hardly even months of DOTA, and only a few days of Demigod.

I can honestly say from what I've played, DOTA had a ton more depth than Demigod. You took apart just 3 (out of the many) strategies in DOTA and loosely explained them, and why you think they aren't relevent. Well, I'm sorry you were unable to use any of them effectively to see the depth they added to DOTA. There is absolutely no depth to Demigod. All you get to do is attack your opponent face to face (which you so clearly point out a few times).

Could you give me any examples of the depth of gameplay that is found in Demigod but not in DOTA?

In all honestly though, I think Demigod plays a lot more like the Hero Wars mods in WC3. You have limited paths and choices to make when confronting your enemy. There is only one way to level up and that's by fighting your enemy face to face. There is hardly any suprise element because of the lack of a good fog of war.

I got bored very easily playing a few games of Demigod...I could actually play Hero Wars longer, and that's because there is more of a variety of heroes to choose to play. The only thing Demigod has on DOTA or even Hero Wars is graphics...and those only add to the gaming experience if there is good gameplay.

Sorry Demigod, you've got a while to go...keep trying and good luck

 

~Krith

I am also quite curious. I'm very experienced in both RTS and RPG games and where as this may be a hybrid of both and based upon DotA, it is worse than the sum of it's parts.

If all you insecure Demigod players can stop crying when someone mentions DoTA and just try and help the DotA players on this forum understand what is supposed to make Demigod more in-depth and fun to play compared to it, maybe it will be easier to convince them to give Demigod a chance.

I'm certainally no expert at either game myself, so we're probably on the same page in both games which is good because this provides an interesting view point from players who clearly like and dislike the opposite game/mod in this situation and have equal experience at both.

I took apart the three I asked to take apart. If you'd like me to briefly explain others I'd be happy to.
I found a great deal of success if using the above techniques, Ganking is incredibly effective in DotA for example and I was actually very good at it. But I grew bored of this, and eventually came to realise it's a fairly cheap method of winning the match. Playing the Map I learnt that it unfolds in a very limited number of ways over and over and over and this bored me very quickly. Same map, same heroes - all I had to do was figure out which of the variations I was experiencing and play accordingly.

To be fair, Counter-Strike is simillar on some maps (Dust plays out in only a handful of Variations) so DotA is not the only game to suffer from this. The reason people keep playing these games year after year is that they enjoy the setting, or the characters or just the sheer gameplay mechanics. DotA got stale for me and it's at this point I realised how shallow it was. It's why I began looking at other options both strategically and gameplay wise. I wound up here in the Demigod community after realising DotA is fairly limited in both. Demigod forces you to use creative thinking of your environment and abilities to outplay your opponents (minus The Rook strat I listed above) in combat as opposed to just being a higher level or ganking the hell out of them. The maps do unfold in simillar ways, however the number of variations per map is significantly higher than DotA because of the way the Demigods are designed - the exception being The Rook (as mentioned above). I've played the same maps on Demigod many, many different times (offline and online) and am still coming up with completely useable strategies as opposed to the handful that were useable in DotA. It's not just the mechanics that come into play, it's also the balancing. DotA abandoned attempts at balance and just added bucket loads of Heroes.

To be fair Demigod outright steals the general concept of DotA, so a lot of the depth comes from refining that model. The Flags were a suprerior addition with their benefits because instead of fighting over the Jungling locations players are fighting over flags which slightly tip the balance of favour for the whole team as opposed to simply powering up one Hero. It's a lot less focused on "Me and my Hero" than "My team and I" which is why it works better as a multiplayer game. Demigod's depth comes from creative thinking and useage of your Demigods as opposed to refinement of the same strategy game after game. The removal of Ganking from Demigod works for the game as it forces players to understand their situation - rather than their stage in their pre-approved strategy - and judge things on the fly, making for a much more exciting game, at least for me. While it can obviously be argued that DotA has the exact same depth and strategy, I personally found that each game played out remarkably similar, which showed me the game lacks depth as the "best" Hero combinations, strategies and item combinations were possible; balance occurs when no one of any is "best". Demigod, with a few exceptions (Heart of Life anyone?), has no "Best" of any - all Hero and most item combinations are functional and creates additional strategies that are useable. DotA lacks this.

The higher variety of Heroes is a valid point; more Demigods correctly balanced would mean more Strategies, the problem with DotA however is that despite being over 90 Heroes, they are not 90 uniques gameplay methods or 90 different strategies - some Heroes are extremely situational and as I mentioned above with the limited number of ways the matches play out, their situations never arise negating their purpose.  Each Demigod has variations on their general play style - not significant to say that it encompasses an entirely different method of play - which opens up their usefulness in a much wider range than the specifically designed Heroes of DotA adding much more Depth. Demigod might only have 8 'Heroes' but we get a lot more out of them than the Heroes of DotA.

Might I suggest heading over to the suggestions forum and making a post about what you think would make Demigod a better game? As a fan of the model - hence playing both DotA and Demigod - you'd be the ideal candidate to recommend changes to make the game better.

I have to say that we can still gank in Demigod. It's just harder to do and you need to clear out some towers first. Cuz towers in DG are positioned a lot closer than Dota. Also noticed that not all the area is on the reinforcement paths, which lead to you be able to sneak into those area and wait for ambush.

Imo, depth is game specific. It's not that certain game don't have any depth, it's just that the game have similar depth compare to other game. You can get more depth in DG in the decision of upgrading citadel or spending on your items which Dota don't have. But you can get more on jungling and creep manipulating in Dota. I don't want to say some games have more depth than others, it's just "different", as in colors, you can't say Red is better than Blue. Heck even game like Pacman also has its depth, you need to calculator shortest route and such and recalculate your route according to the enemies spawns.

graphics make more people want to play

assholes make people stop playing

plus this game has alot off backing so it can only get better so it will be better then dota in the long run

Wrong. Eye candy graphics only attracts people in the short run, on the long run gameplay counts and only it has the power to keep people playing that game over the years. DOTA, WoW and Team Fortress 2 are perfect examples for this.

WoW is boring i didn't like playiong it one bit

eye candy atracts people to the game and if it is a good game it will keep them  aswell  u iddiot

wow i got bored off within a hour  didn't like the game at all

Hey Frogboy, look, another jerk/asshole, and it's not from the DOTA community, it's from your community.

Wow, what a surprise...

 

 

And we should care about your personal opinion about a game why?

Fact of the matter is that WoW does not require a high end computer, yet it is a huge hit one of the biggest in retail online games afaik.

The game is also sold by the travelling word of gamers, and at the moment more and more people are getting scared away from demigod because of no indepth gameplay, shoddy connections etc.

 

It appears you did not play in very organised teams in DotA, because games where people killsteal, steal creeps and jungling spots are most likely pubs, and public games are generally shitty.

You seem to argue that in DotA the game is about you and yourself, it is not, it is about having a good mixture of heroes, know where you fit into your teams strategy and pull of everything in a skillfull way, yes, carries are given killing blows alot of the times, but as long as it benefits the team right?

 

not true at all with all the unique hero and item combinations available DotA get FAR more out of their heroes as a teamgame.

Come again? Youre saying killing your enemy proving superior since he has no map awareness is a cheap method of play? This isnt hello kitty island you know:)

again, you must only play pubs, since going one item build works in publics.

 

you type too much dude  i would rather have  8  different  well thought out  well made demis  then 100ish  that are similar

hmm did dota in the begining have connection probs/bugs

man  if your going to bitch about a game then leave go back to dota and dont look back  people who bitch about games  and still play them are the worst you can bitch about a character you can bitch about a map

but bitching about a game just seems stupid  if you dont like it then dont play it and dont talk about it

i think this thread has gone the way of the toilet

 

I have to respectfully, but strongly disagree in saying I think as many unique Demigods as financially viable would be the way to go. As long as you can keep making unique aesthetics / play styles, I would say to keep adding more.

 

I think GalCiv is a different enough genre that it doesn't really apply. I'd use DOTA for the comparison which is perhaps a little too far on the stacked side, or even pen and paper Dungeons and Dragons. With their fourth edition, they started with 8 classes in 2008, have added another 8 classes in 2009, as well as expanding the existing classes signficantly, and plan to continue to add more classes in the future (at a guess, another 8 or so in 2010 or 2011, probably including a Necromancer and Monk, among others). These are characters you might end up playing one exclusively for a year even, and yet they keep adding fresh choices because they know people really enjoy the new feel.

 

I think a moderate amount of depth and a large amount of breadth is ideal, because it allows you to appreciate significantly different aesthetics (fighter vs. wizard vs. walking castle) with also some meaningful choices once you've chosen your characters. I like playing a Necromancer one map, and then an assassin the next. The choices feel more different than they are when they are different characters, which is good.

 

Though incidentally, I still say an "easy" way to increase how far these characters will go would be to create good / evil versions of the existing characters. Same balance, different skins, sounds, and effects. I think, say, a giant white lion would be an excellent alternative to Unclean Beast. It'd lessen any balance issues in Panetheon too.

 

Also, I know a large number of people who are pretty unimpressed with the number of demigods. I think they are being a little unfair, but I do agree with them to the extent I'm hoping the eight we have now are just the beginning.

i would say expanding the amount too mcuh will make people think  man wtf  i got to learn all of these or haveing 1 dude klike reg with  fighting someone u have never seen so you wouldn't know what your up againist

which would be a hassle for new people  joining the game in the future  it took me about a day to get to grips with all the characters  debuffs skill and abilities doesn't mean i can win all the time

but it took me 1 day to learn them all  and know what to try and avoid

but if u have like 80 dudes and u newly join ur proberly going to get creamed for 2-3 days  straight  which would be annouying

 

so i think stick to having 12 this year and  16 the next and 20 the next    so 4 new ones each year  seems about right 

with 5-8 new maps each 6-9 months 

 

this game is already a great game  so lets keep it great as the time passes

 

So it takes you a year to learn 4 new characters? Nice.

I'm also curious to see why when people mention adding more Demigods everyone is like "80 or 100 IZ TOO MANY WTFZOR SO MANY CANN0T L3ARN DEM ALL!!!1" Have you ever considered a middle ground? I will even admit that even half of that number is too many. But i think that 20 Demigods is a very respectable amount to achieve by the end of this year, any less is just being lazy. The engine is built, the network issues are almost corrected, the developers should have full resources soon to produce content and if this content means 2-4 Demigod and 2-4 Maps for a whole year's worth of content, then i think they are just insulting the worth of their customers.

I know most people will be like "OmGz 2 new Demigods after 6 months Thank you so much you guys are teh best!!!1" just because you are happy for any content, but the fact that there are 2 large developers working together on a very minor title compared to their previous individual games... there should be no excuses for a larger amount of content by the end of the year.

If you want people to listen you, listen to them. I don't agree with your assessment of Demgiod and am happily discussing the matter with you, however please don't shut down other people by saying their personal opinion doesn't matter. A personal opinion is exactly what you've been putting forth in this thread. They do matter.

Anyway, the number one reason people are shying away from Demigod is because of the connection issues. There have been several posts from people simply asking if these issues are fixed and if they can start playing. No one has asked if more Maps, Demigods, abilities and balancing has taken place for them to come back to the game. They're not staying away because it's shallow, they're staying away because the online multiplayer needs fixing.

I played with several different pre-arranged teams against several pre-arranged teams and also organised a 'tournament' style series of practice sessions between myself and my online friends during my time with DotA. I did play many public games - more people to play against should equate to many different play styles. The problem, however, is that while DotA has many different play styles available only some of them are viable for online play - taking into consideration item and hero combinations, including Team Make up and their possible counters, and you'll notice a handful of combinations dominate the online environment. It doesn't take long for a community as small as DotA to pick up on what works, what works well and what works the best. The issue isn't about "ZOMG n00bs cant play teh game they r the suxors!!11!" rather the balance issues within DotA, which allow for these "best" combinations to work and work so well. Player skill certainlly comes into play, the more skillful a player the better they are able to make certain combinations work, however the fact that these "best" combinations are allowed to exist within DotA shows that the game lacks depth; if the object of the game is to win, then why use a combination that works 50% of the time when you can use one than works 90% of the time?

Manipulating the game's mechanics to attack a player and attempting to ensure that they can't fight back is a cheap method. You haven't defeated the player, the game mechanics have defeated the player. Going 1v1 with someone, both having full Health and Mana and both fully prepared for the fight, is a much better indication of who's the better player. The problem with this is that in DotA it reveals the skewed balance; Demigod uses a somewhat Rock/Papers/Scissors balance system that still encompasses abilities and items to minimise the weaknesses of any particular Demigod when facing it's counter. For example, UB would Destroy Rook in a 1v1 thanks to the Rooks limited movement speed and Melee attacks vs UB's faster movement speed and Ranged abilities. Give Rook the plus Speed Boots and Boulder and he's now able to much better counter the UB's primary method of attack and this levels the playing field. DotA doesn't feature enough of this kind of flexibility for me as each Hero is based around a particular mindset; Fast Melee, Slow Tank, Minions, Fast but weak Ranged Attack, Slow but Strong Ranged attack etc. The items in DotA don't do enough to drastically alter this depth, and as such DotA added more Heroes - got destroyed by a Slow Tank? Use a Fast Ranged Hero next time! - to counter this lack of Depth. The problem is that many of the Heroes simply don't function well in a team environment when you take into consideration what works and what doesn't work. The viable combinations are fewer than Demigods.

Interesting. Designing 12 new Demigods ensuring that they are balanced enough at their release to fit snugly into the pre-exisiting structure of the game while also ensuring that they are unique and add something to game rather than just added for the sake of another Demigod in the list would equate to, assuming each Demigod requires equal amount of work, roughly 3 weeks (no weekends off either) of contiual work on each Demigod. The balancing act for each new Demgiod would also increase in difficultly for each additional Demigod released as additional factors would need to be considered when balancing or designing their abilities.

So, designing, modeling, texturing, animating, coding, balancing, testing, bug fixing and patching in 15 working days, from scratch? I'm assuming the entire employee roster of both companies aren't working soley on these new Demigods of course (if I remember correctly, the guys at GPG are the ones working on content anyway, not Stardock). Plausible? Hardly. I'll accept 12 excellently designed and perfectly functional, not to mentioned balanced and viable, Demigods rather than 8 great Demigods and 12 rushed, steaming piles of shit. But thats just me.

Ok so how do you go about this fight in Demigod? (i am curious on these more complex aspects of Demigod's gameplay).

From my experience it would go like this, assuming this fight 1v1 takes place on a flag somewhere on the map.

1. You meet up with the enemy and use your first choice of ability against them
2. You proceed to auto attack them or use your next choice ability
3. You proceed to auto attack each other
4. You evaluate whether you are winning the fight from this point and choose to continue to fight (with the assistance of potions) or run away.

That is generally speaking, based of what the mechanics of the game allow you to do. Feel free to redraw that scenario with your experience.