Dota 2 v. League of Legends

Apologies to pro as some of my contentions will seem like refutations but they are not. You just cannot prevent a crossover when doing a discussion like this. C1) Complexity and More StrategyA noticeable difference in between Dota and LOL is that Leagues has an entire system dedicated to runes and masteries. The typical rolls in both games are pretty similar in regards to competitive game play . You have an ADC, Support, Top lane, Jungle, and Mid. Runes and Masteries open up an entirely new element of game play. Different champions operate differently with different runes and masteries and it makes for complex strategies and match ups. If you were to take zed mid, you could change his base runs and masteries in order for him to have reduced damage against ap carries ( if you are against an ap carry). If you are fighting an ad, you could do the same and rotate his skills to fight against an ad champ. Where this varies from dota , is dota does not have it at all. Champions have base stats that remain the same which makes the match ups less fun. If someone picks a champion in Dota, you can expect a certain outcome to the match and the counter pick. Leagues gives you the option to counter champions and actually increase your base resistances and powers. This opens up a variety of champions in different lanes. Instead of running you traditional AP mid or tanky bruiser top, the runes and masteries system gives more depth to other champions and opens up new and unique champions to be played in different ways, making for more interesting match ups. a) ItemsItems in leagues have both passive and active effects. The depth to the items exceed that of dota though. You have anything from BOTRK, which pops a slow on your adversaries, deals 10 percent of their max hp in dmg, and even heals you for the same amount. This items has to be popped at the right time because of the cooldown duration. You can use it at the start of a fight to try and zone a carry from the fight, or you can use it at the end of the fight to chase down the people who were not wiped out. This is just one item, there are countless more. View this chart just to see a few of these items These items rotate between passive and active powers. Passive meaning it gives you bonuses that are always active without having you activate them, and active meaning you have to manually active them for strategic purposes. Active items can be anything from support items like Locket of the iron solari which gives a shield and reduces damage from incoming attacks. It can be to quick silver sash, which removes all debuffs applied on a champion to allow them to move freely without being debuffed upon activation. There is even an item that prevents turrets from firing that is called ohmwrecker. There are so many items, that some even make you invulnerable for a certain period of like zhonyas hourglass. These active and passive items, add an entire new depth to the game that cannot be contested. Proper activation requires player insight and the ability to be aware of what you need to do and when you need to do it for maximum efficiency [1]b) SpellsSpells in leagues exceed that of dota, with a variety of champions and abilities that cannot be surpassed. Some spells allow you freeze enemies in their tracks, others allow you to apply debuffs, other do knock ups, and others can apply mass CC effects(this is just some, there are thousands). Some spells even chain off other spells. Take Yasuo for example. His ultimate requires an enemy to be in the air for activation which can chain with other champions abilities like malphite. Malphite ults into a massive aoe knock up, into a yasuo ult that hits everyone in their air within the aoe effect. [2]http://www.youtube.com...As you can see from the source and video ( see top of page as well if you did not check the source, it's the first video). Proper use of ults allow you to turn a fight that could otherwise be a wipe, into a gain for you team. Timing with spells is imperative to succeed in leagues. c) Lane match upsThis plays in to what I was stating before, but lane match ups are an essential part of leagues. Winning your lane can snowball a game if done properly. Winning your lane requires proper use of runes , spells, and knowledge against the champion you are facing. You can deny creeps from mitigation. Meaning you can last hit a creep in order to get CS but that is not the ideal way to win lane. You are often left with choices about whether or not you want to get each and every CS or try and miss CS in order to make your adversary miss even more than you. Think of it like this. If you are farming perfectly and you break nearly even in lane with your adversary at 92 to 93 cs at the 10 min mark, you have farmed perfectly. The issue is that he is just as farmed as you. If you miss CS and drop to 82 cs in order to make him back because you damaged him, you can effectively reduce his overall cs down to around 60. Choices make the game. Knowing when to use spells, when to go in, and when to use your items, plays into your lane match up which is much more complex than dota due to masteries and runes that accompany it. Each person plays different runes and masteries. Meaning you can play someone with an all AD kit or someone with an all armor kit and even do so with the same champion. Knowing what to do and when to do is along with optimizing your runes and masteries makes leagues a much more complex game. C2) Team Fights are more advancedFor all the aforementioned reasons league of legends thrives off team work and team fights. You can not individually carry matches in high elo sometimes, and it requires for you to work with your team and have proper amounts of game knowledge. This goes back into C1. Proper use of spells, abilities, and items all play a factor in team fights. If you view the yasuo video (first video) you can see an example of a team fight turned around because of two amazing ultimate's that were timed perfectly when combined with active item usage. The depth and strategy in team fights makes leagues a much more amazing game, as it requires your entire team to work together in order to achieve an objective and win. C3) MapLeagues has a much more simpler map than dota. Dota's is slightly larger while leagues hits the key features (such as proper jungle camps) while mitigating the size of the map. The smaller scale map of leagues helps improve the overall team fight capacity. Meaning you can roam from mid to bottom if your lane is backed. You can roam from mid to top, or top can roam to mid. It makes for easier jungle ganks and jungle paths that invoke a more team oriented game. With the smaller scale map you have to be aware of your surroundings, and what is around you. You have to have wards up at the right time in order to see ganks coming. The map itself is the perfect size and requires you to be very aware of everything near you and around you.Leagues Dota The smaller map also pushes for a faster paced game in most cases. People are able to take turrets and rotate faster on LOL, invoking yet again more team fights. Bigger is not always better in some cases and this is definitely one of those cases. C4) Character SkinsLeagues gives you the option to purchase aesthetics if you wish. Nothing about leagues is Pay to win but it does allow you to purchase visual upgrades which makes it more appealing to users. You can find sexy outfits for the girl characters or some cool looking stuff just all around. The amount of customization in leagues far surpasses that of Dota. C5) More fun and More competitiveLeagues wins on both fronts. It is without a doubt the most competitive moba because it incorporates all the features that I mentioned before. The complexity and the ranking system allows you improve and keeps you where you belong. It's not a type of game where you can spam matches to improve your rank, you actually have to consistently win and improve your MMR to get your elo and division. The massive amount of users that come to leagues, along with it offering a 1 million dollar prize yearly for worlds, makes this game top of the competitive scene. The best players and users, from all around the world come to leagues with the hope of being the besta) FunFor competitive as it is, you can also just shoot the breeze and troll and have fun in norms. Leagues has nearly 27 times the amount of active users daily compared to dota [3][4]. This speaks volumes for how fun it is. The skins, customs skins you can make, along with just enjoying the feel of the game leagues is all around more appealing the masses. We can only judge this by which game people play. People would not play it if they do not like it. Most people attest that leagues is better than dota so they enjoy it more. C6) More sexually aesthetic and pleasing characters Need I say more[1] http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com...[2] [3] http://www.forbes.com...[4] http://steamcharts.com...