League Of Legends going to be added to MLG Raleigh

On July 10 2011 03:28 r33k wrote:
So... It looks like I'm coming to Raleigh.

On July 10 2011 03:30 EtherealDeath wrote:


From Italy?

On July 10 2011 03:32 r33k wrote:

I went to columbus this june.

On July 10 2011 03:34 broz0rs wrote:
this will be interesting because there's a lot of discussion of whether the stream numbers that RIOT pulled off in DH were legit since it was on own3d.tv. Assuming this LoL tournament will be on MLG's stream, the talk of whether it will go over 100k unique viewers will finally be put to rest.

On July 10 2011 03:32 r33k wrote:

I went to columbus this june. It was cheaper than going to sweden for dreamhack no shit.

On July 10 2011 03:40 LoLAdriankat wrote:
Another great move by MLG. More than half of the unique viewers of MLG tuned in for Starcraft. Imagine if LoL was in the equation.

I sure hope they're prepared for the large influx of LoL viewers. No one wants to see a repeat of MLG's last disaster.

On July 10 2011 03:41 Torte de Lini wrote:


QFT.
Who will they have as casters though?

On July 10 2011 03:41 Torte de Lini wrote:


QFT.
Who will they have as casters though?

On July 10 2011 03:42 r33k wrote:

Dropping either of the kids' fps would be the best choice, everyone knows that. Picking the fastest growing game in the business is the second smartest decision they could make.

On July 10 2011 03:45 Woony wrote:


Theyre not going to drop Halo as it's been the core game of MLG for 9 years or something and it still draws a big live audience even if it probably doesn't have the biggest stream numbers.

Call of Duty, uhm maybe I mean it has a big potential audience but no Idea how many people of that rather casual audience actually tune in/show up.

No idea about GoW, is that even on the circuit anymore?

On July 10 2011 03:45 Torte de Lini wrote:
I didn't even know DJWheat casted LoL as well O_O

My real concern is that MLG already gets outsold within days, with LoL coming, will they go for a bigger venue?

On July 10 2011 03:49 Woony wrote:


He doesn't but he's casted like every game in existance over the last 10 years so it's a possibility. But I don't think he even plays so probably not.

It's probably going to a Riot employee (Phreak/TreeEskimo) and probably a caster from the LoL community (Colbycheeze? Grackis? maybe someone from a pro team?)

On July 10 2011 04:10 Mordiford wrote:
I'm not really a big fan of competitive League of Legends, great game to play for fun, but watching it competitively is quite dull to me. I'd prefer Heroes of Newerth or DotA as a spectator but obviously both of those have much lower player bases, particularly in the west.

League of Legends sort of falls into the same vein as Call of Duty: Black Ops for me, I see it has a huge player-base but it just doesn't seem competitively refined or make for a good eSport.

I've started to like competitive Halo: Reach though, I first gave it a look at Dallas and it was quite sick. League of Legends and Black Ops, not so much.

On July 10 2011 04:15 PassiveAce wrote:
I think the biggest issue with LoL as a spectator sport is that not only does the spectator need to understand the abilities of A LOT of characters to understand what is going on, but teamfights are just downright confusing and hard to follow, even for players sometimes.

-Edit, obviously i dont mean pro players, but newbies can have trouble keeping up with the action of teamfights when playing.

On July 10 2011 04:15 PassiveAce wrote:
I think the biggest issue with LoL as a spectator sport is that not only does the spectator need to understand the abilities of A LOT characters to understand what is going on, but teamfights are just downright confusing and hard to follow, even for players sometimes.

-Edit, obviously i dont mean pro players, but newbies can have trouble keeping up with the action of teamfights when playing.

On July 10 2011 04:18 Woony wrote:


I played Dota for ages and HoN in beta and while I agree that LoL is currently lacking some things, both in the client/infastructure and gamedesign (too passive at the moment), Riot is working on it (even tho quite slow sometimes...) and LoL definately has the potential to be a valid E-sport title. This, of course neglecting the fact that no matter how good or bad LoL as a game is, it would be stupid to not add LoL in MLGs position with the amount of viewers it pulls.



Does it matter if so many people watch it? A viewer is a viewer, who cares if he plays the game or not.

On July 10 2011 04:05 MetalLobster wrote:
I'm not a big fan of LoL but this is a great move by MLG.

My hopes are that the SC2 scene will benefit from this as LoL players/watchers might see how awesome the SC2 scene is and maybe start following it. (Me wishful thinking xD)

On July 10 2011 04:28 Frolossus wrote:

a reasonable portion of the LoL community already does follow SC2

On July 10 2011 04:28 AsianEcksDragon wrote:
The main problem with LoL is that everyone plays really passive and safe. Wards make ganking really tough and if your team does give up a kill then you lose a dragon. A typical LoL game usually ends with the highest score being 7/0/x from the winning team. Nothing really happens outside of fights for drag/baron and the game just turns into a farm fest

On July 10 2011 04:51 Talin wrote:
So much for my hopes and dreams of MLG eventually becoming a Starcraft-only event once CoD and Halo fade into obscurity.

On July 10 2011 04:51 Talin wrote:
So much for my hopes and dreams of MLG eventually becoming a Starcraft-only event once CoD and Halo fade into obscurity.

On July 10 2011 04:55 BlueBird. wrote:


Why would you want this to happen? Seems kind of silly, Halo has been their long term game, and has what made them what they are. Why cut the game that has brought them this far, and still has tons of fans/players/followers.

Sure SC2 is currently their new crown jewel, but MLG is looking to expand their horizons beyond these games, and become even bigger and better.

On July 10 2011 05:17 Talin wrote:


I'm not advocating cutting anything, but eventually the popularity of those games will drop enough for them to not be a viable choice for MLG anymore. In a year or two, it will just happen on its own.

I see your point, but my concern is mainly for Starcraft. Nothing against these other games, but as a Starcraft fan I just want to see most (or all) of MLG's prize pool go into that. Obviously this is extremely unlikely to happen, but it doesn't change the fact that I personally want it to happen.

On July 10 2011 05:21 nathangonmad wrote:
Not to sound negative and bring up an old argument. But I really don't see the attraction of LoL. It just seems to me like a Dota with not as much skill req.

On July 10 2011 05:21 nathangonmad wrote:
Not to sound negative and bring up an old argument. But I really don't see the attraction of LoL. It just seems to me like a Dota with not as much skill req.

Then again if Riot offered MLG a bunch of money they'd be idoits to turn it down.

On July 10 2011 05:47 taLbuk wrote:
I don't see where the whole "league takes less skill" comes from.

It's very comparable to BW and Sc2, going from DotA to League means alot less mechanical involvement in the game, whether it be lack of denying, less map awareness due to the crutch that is flash and other summoner spells etc.

But that doesn't mean the game doesn't need top notch strategy and teamwork. Its like people saying sc2 is mechanically inferior, sure it may be, but the best player (team) will almost always win going into a BoX series. People also have to remember that the company behind League (Riot) literally has their full attention on changing the game to fit eSports as best as possible.

Ive played competitive DotA for years under clan NiN in TDA season 1-3 and cal seasons 1-3, and I can tell you that most the people who say League takes no skill etc are ignorant and have probably never played either game at a top level, its the same people who claim sc2 takes no skill, and the same people who says wow takes no skill etc etc. Any game that has a good skill ceiling is tough, especially at the highest levels.

The only thing I see truth in is the fact LoL attracts more casual audiences, not only due to the cartoonistic nature, but also the fact the game is free to play.

On July 10 2011 04:51 Talin wrote:
So much for my hopes and dreams of MLG eventually becoming a Starcraft-only event once CoD and Halo fade into obscurity.

On July 10 2011 05:47 taLbuk wrote:
I don't see where the whole "league takes less skill" comes from.

It's very comparable to BW and Sc2, going from DotA to League means alot less mechanical involvement in the game, whether it be lack of denying, less map awareness due to the crutch that is flash and other summoner spells etc.

But that doesn't mean the game doesn't need top notch strategy and teamwork. Its like people saying sc2 is mechanically inferior, sure it may be, but the best player (team) will almost always win going into a BoX series. People also have to remember that the company behind League (Riot) literally has their full attention on changing the game to fit eSports as best as possible.

Ive played competitive DotA for years under clan NiN in TDA season 1-3 and cal seasons 1-3, and I can tell you that most the people who say League takes no skill etc are ignorant and have probably never played either game at a top level, its the same people who claim sc2 takes no skill, and the same people who says wow takes no skill etc etc. Any game that has a good skill ceiling is tough, especially at the highest levels.

The only thing I see truth in is the fact LoL attracts more casual audiences, not only due to the cartoonistic nature, but also the fact the game is free to play.

On July 10 2011 04:51 Talin wrote:
So much for my hopes and dreams of MLG eventually becoming a Starcraft-only event once CoD and Halo fade into obscurity.

On July 10 2011 05:47 taLbuk wrote:
I don't see where the whole "league takes less skill" comes from.

It's very comparable to BW and Sc2, going from DotA to League means alot less mechanical involvement in the game, whether it be lack of denying, less map awareness due to the crutch that is flash and other summoner spells etc.

But that doesn't mean the game doesn't need top notch strategy and teamwork. Its like people saying sc2 is mechanically inferior, sure it may be, but the best player (team) will almost always win going into a BoX series. People also have to remember that the company behind League (Riot) literally has their full attention on changing the game to fit eSports as best as possible.

Ive played competitive DotA for years under clan NiN in TDA season 1-3 and cal seasons 1-3, and I can tell you that most the people who say League takes no skill etc are ignorant and have probably never played either game at a top level, its the same people who claim sc2 takes no skill, and the same people who says wow takes no skill etc etc. Any game that has a good skill ceiling is tough, especially at the highest levels.

The only thing I see truth in is the fact LoL attracts more casual audiences, not only due to the cartoonistic nature, but also the fact the game is free to play.

On July 10 2011 04:26 Mordiford wrote:


Oh, don't get me wrong, I absolutely understand it from a business perspective, but I just mentioned why I'm personally not very excited about it, or interested in it. In comparison, while NASL's decision to pick up HoN for Season 2 might not have been as productive business-wise, I was more interested in that.

I'll still likely be watching MLG for Halo and Starcraft 2, too bad that they pulled Tekken 6, otherwise I'd be watching that as well.

On July 10 2011 06:09 sermokala wrote:



NASL is picking up HON for season 2? never heard that where'd you get that?

On July 10 2011 03:32 r33k wrote:

I went to columbus this june. It was cheaper than going to sweden for dreamhack no shit.

On July 10 2011 06:54 Greatness wrote:
Played LoL for 10 minutes.

Then I deleted the game.

It's such a insult to DOTA.

On July 10 2011 06:54 Mordiford wrote:


Yeah, I'm sure you got an adequate impression of the game in 10 minutes. Don't be an imbecilic fanboy.

On July 10 2011 06:54 Greatness wrote:
Played LoL for 10 minutes.

Then I deleted the game.

It's such a insult to DOTA.

On July 10 2011 06:57 Senx wrote:


Millions of people seem to enjoy insulting DOTA then, herp.

On July 10 2011 06:57 Greatness wrote:

It's like comparing BNET of WC3 to SC2, ie Dota to LoL, less features=what's the point?

I've played HoN when it was in Beta I believe, it was fanastic after the first 5 minutes because it represented was Dota was all about, graphics, gameplay, and denying creeps.

On July 10 2011 07:00 Mordiford wrote:


So your judgement is based on, "I played X game, but it wasn't like Y game so it was garbage". League of Legends really isn't trying to be DotA anymore, it even takes potshots at DotA when it can, which I find quite insulting considering it used DotA's success to gain early recognition.

Regardless, playing a game for 10 minutes and judging it as garbage because it's not like DotA is blatant fanboyism.

On July 10 2011 07:02 Kipsate wrote:
Lmao I knew this was going to devolve into a LoL bashfest, get over it. It is casual, thats how it grows, just like SC2 is a casual version of SCBW so is LoL of Dota, both are easier and attract more viewers, which is good for E-sports.

I don't see why everyone has a problem with this lol.

On July 10 2011 07:02 Greatness wrote:

Instead of calling me a fanboy, convince me otherwise. The game has bad graphics and I didn't like the gameplay because it brought nothing new to the table.

On July 10 2011 06:59 Greatness wrote:

Yup, those are the same people who play Modern Warfare.

On July 10 2011 04:54 Mordiford wrote:


MLG was essentially founded on Halo, and Halo is actually a pretty good game competitively from what I've seen so far.

On July 10 2011 07:08 Shagg wrote:

Sorry just have to say it may have been ok when it was Halo 3 but in Reach the bloom effect makes the gun fights just RNG and makes you either win by spamming and getting lucky over the guy who fired perfectly or the spammer losing the fight. Dont see how that adds any competetive elements to the game :/

On July 10 2011 07:14 Phaded wrote:
they better not drop MK9 for it. It has way more potential than CoD ever will.

On July 10 2011 07:35 zoLo wrote:
The only reason why LoL had a huge viewership on the stream was because the developer integrated LoL TV in the game didn't they? Like they had a live stream window in the game's main menu, which explains why there were so many people watching the stream. Blizzard should do something like this because even Naughty Dog (console developer who made games like the Uncharted and Crash Bandicoot series) have implemented Uncharted TV in Uncharted 3.

On July 10 2011 07:14 Denzil wrote:
I'm worried for SC2 because at Dreamhack it sounded like the LoL viewership dominated. Will LoL become the mainstage sport of MLG?

On July 10 2011 07:04 Greatness wrote:
For LoL, it is dumbed down, they took out denying creeps, what's the point then? you just hit each other and snipe the creeps for gold, they took out a major aspect of the game.

On July 10 2011 08:44 Gamegene wrote:


90% of the DH LoL stream was inflated by Riot Games.
Without the company redirecting players to view matches on their homepage, LoL's total share of the E-Sports market vanishes instantaneously.

On July 10 2011 07:20 ComusLoM wrote:

I don't think it will have the same rabid fanbase. They love watching the game they love right now more than the players themselves. There isn't that cult of personality that we have in SC2 yet.

On July 10 2011 08:44 Gamegene wrote:


90% of the DH LoL stream was inflated by Riot Games.
Without the company redirecting players to view matches on their homepage, LoL's total share of the E-Sports market vanishes instantaneously.

On July 10 2011 08:48 TheYango wrote:

For SC2 it is dumbed down, they added MBS, what's the point then? you just press your hotkey and make all your units without looking back at your base, they took out a major aspect of the game.

See what I did there?

On July 10 2011 04:28 AsianEcksDragon wrote:
The main problem with LoL is that everyone plays really passive and safe. Wards make ganking really tough and if your team does give up a kill then you lose a dragon. A typical LoL game usually ends with the highest score being 7/0/x from the winning team. Nothing really happens outside of fights for drag/baron and the game just turns into a farm fest

On July 10 2011 09:20 starcraft911 wrote:
Why LOL and not HON... such le dissapoint!

On July 10 2011 08:51 Cel.erity wrote:


That's completely false to say the viewership was "inflated". Riot encouraged its players to watch a huge eSports tournament featuring their game, oh no! Vile corruption! They're actually trying to get people interested in competitive gaming! And just so you know, the most popular LoL streamers still get more viewers than the most popular SC2 streamers, without the aid of Riot.

Still, objectively, SC2 is and will always be the bigger competitive game. Its fanbase is built around competition, whereas LoL has a bigger fanbase but they are primarily casual. LoL will never overtake SC2 as the main attraction, even if their stream gets more views. SC2 will always have bigger prize money and more name power.

On July 10 2011 06:54 Greatness wrote:
Played LoL for 10 minutes.

Then I deleted the game.

On July 10 2011 09:26 Scio wrote:Again im not that much into LoL but it seems they just got less players streaming so the viewers concentrate on those few streams.

On July 10 2011 09:43 dicey wrote:



Good for you. It takes 5 people for a team-game, which some people tend to forget. Which likely are the same people to say it's a skillless game, because they lack the possibility to decide the outcome of a match on their own, where 9 other people are involved. Try it for good with friends and realise properly where the skillcap is.

Probably most important thing about viewers is not the quantity but the type of viewership. LoL probably will be the game to bring girls to the eSports scene. When was the last time you heard a girl playing SC2, even in a teamgame with other streamers - not to mention pros. Just gonna say it's not rare for LoL. On a similar note, LoL has a massive playerbase in Europe, where nobody is really aware of HoN and from what I can tell, few have played Dota. For an American event, MLG is probably fond of expanding their viewership more.

On July 10 2011 06:54 Greatness wrote:
Played LoL for 10 minutes.

Then I deleted the game.

On July 10 2011 09:44 dacthehork wrote:


just an aside on the girl note

60% or so of the SC pro gaming fanbase in korea is girls. It just takes attractive players and time.

On July 10 2011 09:43 dicey wrote:


Good for you. It takes more than 1for a team-game, which some people tend to forget. Which likely are the same people to say it's a skillless game, because they lack the possibility to (easily) decide the outcome of a match on their own, where 9 other people are involved. Try it for good with friends and realise properly where the skillcap is.

Probably most important thing about viewers is not the quantity but the type of viewership. LoL probably will be the game to bring girls to the eSports scene. When was the last time you heard a girl playing SC2, even in a teamgame with other streamers - not to mention pros. Just gonna say it's not rare for LoL. On a similar note, LoL has a massive playerbase in Europe, where nobody is really aware of HoN and from what I can tell, few have played Dota. For an American event, MLG is probably fond of expanding their viewership more.

Edit:


Well you're comparing a more than 10 year-old franchise to a 1 year-old (bit more?) game? Even for that LoL still gets comparable amounts of viewers and is likely to have about the same overall player count, if not higher than SC2.

On July 10 2011 09:26 Zdrastochye wrote:
Are people that insecure about the future of SC2 that they wouldn't want a single viewer to watch LoL when a game of SC2 is going on?

On July 10 2011 10:22 Bona Fide wrote:
Is it insecurity, elitism, or just pure anger that drives the LoL/SC2 bashing? It's amazing how similarly the two are hated on.

[LoL|SC2] is inferior to [DotA|SCBW], I have no idea why it's getting so much attention. I mean, they've basically dumbed down the original and there's no skill involved. Things like [no more creep denying|multiple building select] have made it so easy to be good. And you have things like [Flash|auto-mine] making it so much more forgiving for ADD players.

On July 10 2011 10:33 Khaymus wrote:


The difference here is:

HoN/Dota already have a retardedly low skill cap...and LoL is even lower.
SC:BW had an unlimited skill cap...and SC2 is damn near close to that.

LoL is a joke for a competitive game.

On July 10 2011 10:33 Khaymus wrote:


The difference here is:

HoN/Dota already have a retardedly low skill cap...and LoL is even lower.
SC:BW had an unlimited skill cap...and SC2 is damn near close to that.

LoL is a joke for a competitive game.

On July 10 2011 10:33 Khaymus wrote:


The difference here is:

HoN/Dota already have a retardedly low skill cap...and LoL is even lower.
SC:BW had an unlimited skill cap...and SC2 is damn near close to that.

LoL is a joke for a competitive game.

On July 10 2011 10:56 LoLAdriankat wrote:

Poker and chess have "low skill caps" and they're among the most renown competitive games. I heard decision making, risk calculating, and situation assessment are pretty important.

On July 10 2011 10:33 Khaymus wrote:


The difference here is:

HoN/Dota already have a retardedly low skill cap...and LoL is even lower.
SC:BW had an unlimited skill cap...and SC2 is damn near close to that.

LoL is a joke for a competitive game.

On July 10 2011 10:56 LoLAdriankat wrote:

Poker and chess have "low skill caps" and they're among the most renown competitive games. I heard decision making, risk calculating, and situation assessment are pretty important.

On July 10 2011 10:59 paper wrote:


I don't think you know what "skill cap" is lol

On July 10 2011 09:20 starcraft911 wrote:
Why LOL and not HON... such le dissapoint!

On July 10 2011 11:16 Lobotomist wrote:
Hm. How balanced do you guys feel LoL is? In my experience, with the aggressive release schedule for champions (1 every 2 weeks) it never really seemed to stabilize. Back when I played DotA, a new hero being released would completely change the hero-picking metagame, and took quite a bit of effort to balance.

On July 10 2011 10:33 Khaymus wrote:


The difference here is:

HoN/Dota already have a retardedly low skill cap...and LoL is even lower.
SC:BW had an unlimited skill cap...and SC2 is damn near close to that.

LoL is a joke for a competitive game.

On July 10 2011 11:35 Hakker wrote:
Why does skill matter at all lol? It all depends on what has the better entertainment value. Baseball doesn't take as much skill as soccer but it's still the most popular game in the US. BW takes more skill than SC2, but BW is all but dead outside of korea and has been for ~8 years. Poker is not a hard game to play at a competitive level, and its probably the most popular strategy game in modern culture lol.

It all depends on entertainment value, and according to dreamhack numbers, LoL has proven to have the higher entertainment value of the other options MLG had.

On July 10 2011 03:36 Woony wrote:


The numbers were legit, the whole discussion about that was pretty damn stupid. Listen to the Lo3 episode with Matt Marcou if you want to hear it from the ESPORTS council yourself.

On July 10 2011 11:55 wonderwall wrote:
Lol has some solid gameplay and a massive playerbase to draw upon. It seems like they'd need a few more basic things to make it competitively viable though. Stuff like

-A dedicated spectator mode with the ability to swap perspectives
-A pause function
-A replay function

On July 10 2011 11:56 Gimmickkz wrote:


They have a dedicated spectator mode and a pause function would be under replay wouldn't it? Unless you mean an ingame pause.

They have a dedicated spectator mode and a pause function would be under replay wouldn't it? Unless you mean an ingame pause.

Obviously in game pause in game in matchmaking could be abused, I just want one on the tournament server.

On July 10 2011 11:59 wonderwall wrote:


It works fine in Hon. Requires all of the players on the team -1 to agree to the vote to pause. The other team can unpause it after 30 seconds.

They could always just add lan instead -.-

On July 10 2011 11:51 DiaBoLuS wrote:



if they were - why did the stream still have 80k a day AFTER the event?

On July 10 2011 11:51 DiaBoLuS wrote:



if they were - why did the stream still have 80k a day AFTER the event?

On July 10 2011 14:00 Iplaythings wrote:
It might be worth watching MLG then

Interesting ^^

lmao, so many lol-bashing, fun that they compare dota to LoL the same way I compare BW and SC2..

And sheesh guys, be happy for esports

Fyi since people seem to mention the lack of deny; there is hard enough lane domination as it is, I would be scared to death of a caitlyn with deny, for instance.

On July 10 2011 14:21 GaurdKnight wrote:
Like it or not LoL does infact have a decently high skillcap.....

On July 10 2011 11:55 wonderwall wrote:
Lol has some solid gameplay and a massive playerbase to draw upon. It seems like they'd need a few more basic things to make it competitively viable though. Stuff like

-A dedicated spectator mode with the ability to swap perspectives
-A pause function
-A replay function

On July 10 2011 14:25 brazenraven wrote:
incidentally, does anyone know why wow got cut? i kinda liked it.

more than cod, at least.

On July 10 2011 14:46 Iplaythings wrote:

I assume you saw WCG and not dreamhack, since dreamhack was anything but passive compared to a slugfest like WCG.

And flash adds A LOT of good things as well to the game, dont act like it's a bad thing since alot of champions dont benefit nearly as much as others do

On July 10 2011 15:03 Hakker wrote:
problem with flash is that so many champions rely on it to be useful. Without flash Janna/Alistar/malz/fiddle/virtually any ranged ad would be SIGNIFICANTLY nerfed. With the way gap closers are it would be pretty much unviable to play any ranged carry besides corki if flash were removed.

I think flash definately needs to be removed. Its probably the most poisonous aspect of gameplay atm, but i see why riot has such a hard time doing it because it just creates a balance nightmare.

On July 10 2011 14:23 Mordiford wrote:


I don't know, I think depends on what you really consider "decently high", that's a pretty vague term.

On July 10 2011 15:10 TheYango wrote:

High enough that people at the top are still getting better at the game, and high enough that skill differentiation between teams of different skill levels is fairly good.

Those are the two relevant issues with the skill-curve--do we hit a point where people stop getting better, and do the better players usually win fairly often? Both are true with LoL, so any other subjective assessments of how "hard" a game is are irrelevant.

On July 10 2011 15:16 Mordiford wrote:
I don't know if we've seen enough play to really say if players at the top are still getting better to be honest, I watched WCG and then watched Dreamhack and it seemed like the level of play was the same, just with different strategies because of the forced metagame changes as a result of Riot's addition of new champions, power-creep and balance changes.

On July 10 2011 15:16 Mordiford wrote:
Also, from the level of competitive play we've seen so far, I don't know if the better players really do win, but there were a bunch of mishaps and Dreamhack which likely changed the outcome of some games. Also, I don't know if there's really much telling who the best players are and whether they're winning over the other almost best players, most games have a level of skill differentiation where good players win over bad players, there exists some in League of Legends, but not enough to tell in that regard.

On July 10 2011 14:25 brazenraven wrote:
incidentally, does anyone know why wow got cut? i kinda liked it.

more than cod, at least.

On July 10 2011 15:25 Ansinjunger wrote:
Do high level profession matches of LoL or DotA have situations where a defending team that can't farm nearly as much money can make a comeback? I've obviously had such comebacks in pubs, but that's because pub players are cocky (me included) and make rash or stupid moves all the time. I don't know how really high level games play out, but I feel that the way they should play out is that one team basically gets an insurmountable income advantage, due to map control where one team fears to move out because the other is basically stronger in a straight up fight. Or do I simply not experience a high number of very close team battles in pubs simply because there's always one player bad enough to do bad things like chasing, not helping, or being a bad farmer, etc.?

That's a small issue i have with DotA, though, and I hope the following issue is less a problem with LoL, as I want to try it out, but it's also a reason I have a hard time wanting to support a competitive DotA scene. That reason is that the DotA community (from a pub perspective) is an absolute joke. In my 3,000ish ladder games (2k solo 1k team), I've probably been BM'd about 20 times. In my 7 years of DotA allstars (since version 3.2j, yup), I've seen BM as well as a lot of crying and whining in about 90% of all games. Yes, I've contributed somewhat, although I generally defend myself explaining to my ally why he got killed and why even if I helped it was a bad decision, and rarely do I go on the attack unprovoked, and I find trash talking almost entirely distasteful. Yet these are the linchpins, the hallmarks of going onto bnet and acting "big." I've seen some people who seem to have an entire routine worked out, including many people with real or "for the lulz" racial vendettas. The worst by comparison I've experienced on SC2 is that a lot of people like a certain portrait (no, I haven't watched Destiny's stream).

Is this possibly unfair to LoL or good mannered players at the top of the DotA/LoL scenes? Of course it's possible. But perhaps that explains my and some other people's skepticism regarding LoL, although I've noticed a lot of people simply saying that LoL is too easy compared to DotA. That doesn't rule out those like me who just feel that genre is currently too bad mannered compared to SC2. I hope LoL proves me wrong, and I'm actually interested in trying out it and HoN (I actually only found out in the last couple weeks those are dota spin-offs). But my years of DotA really put me on guard for a "shining well-mannered" experience in anything DotA related.

I'm not against all BM, Idra, MC (both of whom are really quite lovable, after all), but the garbage I've endured online (@DotA) is not how I'd like e-sports to be presented to any newcomers. There's times I want to show my parents/friends how awesome SC2 is, and there's times I don't want them reading the chat when I'm playing DotA, including things I've said.

Sorry this post is part of a somewhat bigger discussion and in spite of my fears, I'm actually optimistic about LoL at MLG, as long as SC2 remains main stage <3.

On July 10 2011 15:24 TheYango wrote:

You can pretty definitively say that the players at the top have gotten better, because CLG, the team that won WCG last year, has pretty certainly not gotten *worse*. And while they placed a pretty convincing 1st at WCG, they placed 5th at Dreamhack at an event with only 8 teams. What's more, I'm pretty sure many people will agree that watching their play, they had no real chance of beating Fnatic, who took first. It was not close. Fnatic's coordination was just *that* much better.

So yes, players at the top are getting better--to the point that the team that was convincingly best in the world a year ago has almost zero chance of winning a series against the team that's the best now.


IMO pretty much the only unexpected result of the tournament was that of EG vs Fnatic, and that was because of the disconnect (which, admittedly, was a complete farce). In most of the other games, the team that won was pretty noticeably the team that played better.

On July 10 2011 16:01 Skyeye wrote:
OMFG the LoL numbers were every single person who logged in to play that day...anyone who thinks it really had 100k viewers is an idiot...how can a less popular game have more viewers than SC2...freaking morons in this world...

On July 10 2011 16:01 Skyeye wrote:
OMFG the LoL numbers were every single person who logged in to play that day...anyone who thinks it really had 100k viewers is an idiot...how can a less popular game have more viewers than SC2...freaking morons in this world...

On July 10 2011 16:01 Skyeye wrote:
OMFG the LoL numbers were every single person who logged in to play that day...anyone who thinks it really had 100k viewers is an idiot...how can a less popular game have more viewers than SC2...freaking morons in this world...

On July 10 2011 16:01 Skyeye wrote:
OMFG the LoL numbers were every single person who logged in to play that day...anyone who thinks it really had 100k viewers is an idiot...how can a less popular game have more viewers than SC2...freaking morons in this world...

On July 10 2011 15:49 JBright wrote:


Doesn't the defending team have a easier time farming up? The minion waves are pushing towards your base, so you get safer access to them; the leading team will have better control of the jungle and the buffs. A lot of the tournament-level games are usually pretty low on kills, so one good teamfight can really bring a team back.It all really comes down to communication and coordination.

I haven't seen too much outward BM from the top players at the few big tournaments. They might argue amongst teammates on vent or something, but rarely anything go on chat. Riot knows these games are broadcasted and they probably talked to the players beforehand for Dreamhack/WCG. And since LoL is easier compared to DotA/HoN, there are a lot more people who play it casually and there tend to be less ragers.. There will always be assholes in every multiplayer game, but I think LoL has a smaller percentage of them compared to other DotA-like games.

On July 10 2011 16:26 shawster wrote:


naw it's way worse being on defense. you can't ward since you're stuck in base, and you can't do dragon/baron/anything(even your own buffs if they ward hard) since the reason you're stuck in base in the first place is cuz you're weaker. but if you have a strong lategame it may be viable to turtle.

riot decided it needed to create action by putting in npcs that give buffs/exp/gold when you kill them. they're in the jungle. if you're defending you have like 20% chance less of winning a teamfight(not when next to tower) because of the extra buffs/exp/gold. but at the same time if the team on offense fucks up they give all the buffs away(except baron).

not dying in lol is so crucial that it's what kills aggression. if 1 guy dies they take dragon. after that they have a big advantage, not just 1 kill. after the same team gets 3 more kills it's almost over. the other team has to resort to hard defense since that team has taken another dragon, their buffs and has gotten a tower as well probably. also with summoner spells it's impossible to gank anycompetent player. it's ironic. the philosphy behind lol was to encourage action, you get more gold by killing players than killing creeps(people just farm all game), you don't lose gold when you die(encourages noobs/casuals) and buffs promote action (promotes safety as well).

of course at low levels the game is fun as hell because everyone just blows

On July 10 2011 16:13 Hakker wrote:


Source?

According to Xfire LoL is THE most popular pc game in the western world right now. Bigger than wow or cod. Sc2 is actually relatively low on the list.

The rest of your post is so retarded it's not even worth mentioning.

On July 10 2011 16:28 Proxity wrote:



Not every person uses Xfire.

On July 10 2011 16:01 Skyeye wrote:
OMFG the LoL numbers were every single person who logged in to play that day...anyone who thinks it really had 100k viewers is an idiot...how can a less popular game have more viewers than SC2...freaking morons in this world...

On July 10 2011 16:00 Mordiford wrote:
See, I don't know if one team being first at one event and 5th at the next event proves that the skill has gone up, I watched some of those games at both events and I don't really know if the team that won was playing that much better than the other team in some of those games, I mean even the players themselves seemed to attribute so much to the picks that it was ridiculous.

On July 10 2011 16:00 Mordiford wrote:
When being interviewed, HotShotGG basically said, "Yeah, they played well and we just got totally out-picked, we tried some new strategies and it didn't really work out", when asked to elaborate he basically said the strategy was, "Going mundo" and that didn't work out. There were other players sort of suggesting that picking was pretty much super-integral which is largely because the game's skill ceiling has effectively been reached by many of these top players, so apart from royal screw-ups and major suckage, the picks are effectively the major deciding factor in my opinion, they can be overcome, but the aforementioned design issues make them a huuuge hurdle. I also remember someone cited another team's player sitting on the sidelines saying, "That's it we've won" as their last player locked in, I can't remember who it was though.

On July 10 2011 16:00 Mordiford wrote:
Also, I don't know if CLG was convincingly the best in the world a year ago, they just knew how to farm and it was pretty apparent that that was resolved early on by other teams. I don't really recall Fnatic's coordination being that much better either, it just looked like standard League of Legends, the same stuff I've seen and played like 6 months ago, just with different champions.

On July 10 2011 16:13 Hakker wrote:


Source?

According to Xfire LoL is THE most popular pc game in the western world right now. Bigger than wow or cod. Sc2 is actually relatively low on the list.

The rest of your post is so retarded it's not even worth mentioning.

On July 10 2011 16:43 legatus legionis wrote:
I liked reading TheYango and Mordiford talk. I'm more on Mordiford's side though.

I feel it's a game that will converge in a similar fashion as we have seen WoW do. There is very little for a single player to really add to the outcome of certain encounters. It's mostly a back and forth because everyone can negate everything, and it's the mistakes that really allow something to happen.

On top of that, when you add the team aspect into that. Obviously that is going to add a dimension of aptitude. However it's a very hard thing to really value. It's much less easy to spectate and be amazed by teamwork and coordination. Makes it harder for anyone to compete because they become dependent on others. And it has little to do with the game in the sense that it partially happens "outside" the game.

To come back to the point with WoW. As time went on, everything was so figured out, even running out of mana didn't decide the winner anymore. Because they figured out how to always be able to replenish it back enough to be able to continue long enough to be able replenish it back again. Wins came from mistakes, critical spells failing. Or a burst of crits that pushed it just over the back and forth edge of balance.

I quit playing LoL because eventually it started playing exactly like this. And I didn't have compenent friends nor the means or desire to pursue other ones to play this game competitively. I won't be watching streams of this game, other than the quick browse to see if I'm not mistaken and there are things for me to enjoy. But in general I just can't enjoy the game itself as a spectator.

Isn't that partially due to the game itself? Many people always said, unless you play WoW, you don't know what's going on and can't enjoy it. I tried to get friends to watch sometime but they couldn't stand it. Only after I had quit and watched a new event did I realize why. You are not connected at all because almost everything that happens is invisible.

To end, I do want to say that I hope LoL will do well and that the developers will change and implement what the community wants. I'm sure it can improve a lot more and those that play at that competitive level might know if that's true or what would be needed to move towards that.

And let me leave this for the LoL players. Part of the reason I would assume outsiders get mad is because of the whole esports thing. At least for me I can see that being valid. If this is how they see esports for the first time, I don't think they would be interested or it would leave a good impression.

I hope people will stop bashing your game with fabricated assumptions (the game is very popular and it's easy to understand why, its fun, its free, its low requirements to run, you can play with your friends and more).
I hope some of you guys continue to represent your game well and or support others to do the same.

Best of luck, and cool your game is going to MLG

On July 10 2011 15:25 Ansinjunger wrote:
Do high level profession matches of LoL or DotA have situations where a defending team that can't farm nearly as much money can make a comeback? I've obviously had such comebacks in pubs, but that's because pub players are cocky (me included) and make rash or stupid moves all the time. I don't know how really high level games play out, but I feel that the way they should play out is that one team basically gets an insurmountable income advantage, due to map control where one team fears to move out because the other is basically stronger in a straight up fight. Or do I simply not experience a high number of very close team battles in pubs simply because there's always one player bad enough to do bad things like chasing, not helping, or being a bad farmer, etc.?

That's a small issue i have with DotA, though, and I hope the following issue is less a problem with LoL, as I want to try it out, but it's also a reason I have a hard time wanting to support a competitive DotA scene. That reason is that the DotA community (from a pub perspective) is an absolute joke. In my 3,000ish ladder games (2k solo 1k team), I've probably been BM'd about 20 times. In my 7 years of DotA allstars (since version 3.2j, yup), I've seen BM as well as a lot of crying and whining in about 90% of all games. Yes, I've contributed somewhat, although I generally defend myself explaining to my ally why he got killed and why even if I helped it was a bad decision, and rarely do I go on the attack unprovoked, and I find trash talking almost entirely distasteful. Yet these are the linchpins, the hallmarks of going onto bnet and acting "big." I've seen some people who seem to have an entire routine worked out, including many people with real or "for the lulz" racial vendettas. The worst by comparison I've experienced on SC2 is that a lot of people like a certain portrait (no, I haven't watched Destiny's stream).

Is this possibly unfair to LoL or good mannered players at the top of the DotA/LoL scenes? Of course it's possible. But perhaps that explains my and some other people's skepticism regarding LoL, although I've noticed a lot of people simply saying that LoL is too easy compared to DotA. That doesn't rule out those like me who just feel that genre is currently too bad mannered compared to SC2. I hope LoL proves me wrong, and I'm actually interested in trying out it and HoN (I actually only found out in the last couple weeks those are dota spin-offs). But my years of DotA really put me on guard for a "shining well-mannered" experience in anything DotA related.

I'm not against all BM, Idra, MC (both of whom are really quite lovable, after all), but the garbage I've endured online (@DotA) is not how I'd like e-sports to be presented to any newcomers. There's times I want to show my parents/friends how awesome SC2 is, and there's times I don't want them reading the chat when I'm playing DotA, including things I've said.

Sorry this post is part of a somewhat bigger discussion and in spite of my fears, I'm actually optimistic about LoL at MLG, as long as SC2 remains main stage <3.

On July 10 2011 03:41 Torte de Lini wrote:


QFT.
Who will they have as casters though?

Riot have their hearts in the right place, but it goes without saying that hero balance in the game as well other technical aspects are holding it back and they are going to punch themselves in the face when they realize that just maybe that 43rd Teemo skin wasn't the best time investment and it gives more time for DOTA to prepare.

On July 10 2011 23:37 WinteRR wrote:
I still find it sad that LoL actually gets taken seriously when there's HoN around..

On July 10 2011 23:38 Angra wrote:


The unfortunate fact is that it doesn't actually matter which game is more competitive when it comes to a game becoming competitive and popular. All that matters is how well it's marketed. :/

On July 10 2011 23:42 antelope591 wrote:


If LoL cost 20$ it would have like 5k players max. But Riot's pretty smart with the huge playerbase they've prolly made more off skins alone than s2's made off selling hon.

On July 10 2011 23:42 antelope591 wrote:


If LoL cost 20$ it would have like 5k players max. But Riot's pretty smart with the huge playerbase they've prolly made more off skins alone than s2's made off selling hon.

On July 11 2011 00:02 canikizu wrote:

Yeah S2 needs to give HoN for free. That's the only way to get more people interest in HoN. HoN's player base has been stale for a long time now.

On July 11 2011 00:08 antelope591 wrote:


At this point its prolly too late for HoN...its too good a game to be free to play but not good enough to be worth 20$. Maybe cut the price to 5-10$....but with LoL having so much of the player base I don't think it will make a difference. You go on HoN and there's like 10k players compared to like a million for LoL...S2 just got outplayed by Riot on this one. Best thing to do is wait for Dota2.

On July 11 2011 00:02 canikizu wrote:

Yeah S2 needs to give HoN for free. That's the only way to get more people interest in HoN. HoN's player base has been stale for a long time now.

On July 10 2011 03:45 Kisra wrote:


Phreak tends to cast everything, Riot is happy to ship him all over. I'd love to see TreeEskimo sent with him to cast it, he knows his stuff and is pretty good to listen to :o

On July 10 2011 16:28 StyLeD wrote:


aka hour long turtlefests. sort of lame for an esport.

On July 11 2011 00:45 KinosJourney2 wrote:


I hope we get Phreak and TreeEskimo, they are really good casters. Rivington and Zenon arent bad either.



If turtlefests are such a bad eSport shouldn't you be hating Starcraft too?
Some games people sit and macro nonstop for 20+ minutes and noone even attacks the other player except for the occassional drops.
All LoL games arent turtlefests, something tells me you just made a uninformed opinion cause you saw a single professional LoL game where they didn't tower dive all the time.