MOBA history:

Defense of the Ancients (DotA) pioneered the Action RTS genre, Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA). DotA began as a mod for Warcraft III, created with the map editor by the developer known as Eul, and it pitted two teams against one another with the ultimate objective of destroying the opposing team's heavily guarded home base structure, the throne of their Ancients. MOBA's typically have a mirrored map structure with 4 tiers of defense towers on each side as well as three sets of barracks inside each base, a river dividing the two teams, a jungle, neutral and team-aligned creeps, and 5 player controlled powerful units called heroes on each side (details on each provided in specific guides). There have been a number of variations to DotA, most notably League of Legends (LoL) and Heroes of Newerth (HoN), which change the specifics of each of these essential game components, but overall keep the same structure. DotA is typically seen as the most competitive and hardest to learn and master, although every MOBA is demanding. The timeline of the release of each game is as follows:

DotA - 2003
League of Legends - 2009
Heroes of Newerth - 2010
DotA 2 - TBD 2012 ( Valve Time correction: 2013-2014 :p )

IceFrog is the lead designer of DotA 2, and has never publicly disclosed his full name. He joined as the lead developer of DotA in 2005.

Yeah I was just trying to bang it out at work and I must have misread:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Legends#Development

That's why I posted it here as a rough draft.

This one got a little dry, but its a rough draft. I plan on adding pictures and such.

Map Introduction:

As mentioned in the brief history of the MOBA genre, DotA 2's map is, for the scope of this intro, symmetrical. Starting at the bottom left corner of the map is the Radiant, and on the top right corner is the Dire. From the perspective of the Radiant, each of the five player-controlled heroes' point of origin and respawn location is the fountain. The fountain houses an item shop and an incredibly strong defense mechanism which will rapidly fire against an enemy that enters. The throne of the ancients is the next structure encountered when moving out from the fountain towards the opposite corner of the map. This is the large structure that the heroes must defend; loss of this structure results in a loss of the match. Continuing along that diagonal are two tier 4 towers. These towers have XXXX health and there are only two of them. They mainly serve to defend the middle lane, which is much shorter than the two sidelanes. Next are small fortifications that do not hold any defensive significance, but, when they are destroyed by a hero, dispense about 100g to each team member. After that there are two sets of barracks, one for ranged creeps, and one for melee creeps. It is important to note that when one of these barracks is destroyed, your base will still spawn creeps. The significance of the barracks is that when they are destroyed the opposing team gains mega-creeps, which are significantly more powerful in hit points, damage, and when killed give half experience points and half the gold of regular creeps. Tier 3 towers, one per lane, fortify the open-gated entrances to the base. Heroes inside the base have height advantage which gives them sight down the stairs, and anyone sending right-click attacks from the lower ground has a 25% miss chance, and cannot see beyond the top of the stairs. Following that on the two side-lanes there are another set of stairs. All three lanes next have a tier 2 tower in front of the jungle. The jungle houses neutral creeps that can be used in some early leveling strategies for certain heroes. Each separate camp has creeps that vary in strength and hitpoints, which will be detailed in the jungling guide. The lanes continue towards the opposing side finally reaching tier 1 towers, which have the lowest amount of hitpoints. It is important to note that both of the side lanes are not identical in size, which will be detailed int he laning guide. Finally the river divides the two teams territories. In the middle lane the bridge over the river has been broken, which gives the aforementioned disadvantage and if a hero walks along either direction of the river they will be in the center of a ravine without sight, while any hero on the banks will have sight of them. At the midpoint between the middle lane and the side lanes sits a rune spawn point. Runes will spawn at a game time of 0:00 and every subsequent 2 minute mark. Runes will be also detailed in a separate guide, but keep in mind that they are important for effective play. Finally on the dire side there is a small pit southeast of the middle lane where Roshan, a very large neutral creep, spawns. If players kill him he will drop the "Aegis of the Immortal," which will provide the player who picks up the item an "extra life" where they will resurrect upon death with full hitpoints and mana. Further details on Roshan will be in a separate guide.

The base provides all essential functions for the team. The spawn location is known as the fountain. Within the fenced area of the fountain players can purchase and sell items from the main shop (there are two other external shops, the secret shop and the long lane shop). Some items, noted with an "S" at the bottom of its icon are only available at the secret shop. All other items can be purchased here and either picked up by a courier or the hero themselves. Its important to note that you can buy items from the gold-colored shop button on the bottom right of your user interface anywhere on the map, but if you are not within range of the fountain shop you will not be able to recieve the item. The game tells you are within range by highlighting the shop button in a brighter gold and playing the sound of a bell. Any enemy that enters the fountain will be destroyed quickly by the fountain with a ranged attack.

As mentioned before the Tower of the Ancients is the structure just outside the fountain that your team must defend. Loss of this structure is the only way to end the match. The exception to that rule is if one side gives up and all players completely disconnect, the other side wins.

The other small fortification surrounding the ancients, aside from the two tier 4 towers, are structures that will dispense about 100g to the hero that gets the last hit in destroying it. They are fairly weak and easily destroyed, so it provides an added bonus to the invading team.

The tier 4 towers [ADD STATS] are directly in front of the Ancient structure and are your last line of defense fortifications. There are only 2 tier 4 towers, so if a side lane has been completely destroyed and pushed, the invading creeps will be attacked by the tower before the creeps reach the Ancients and the they will begin attacking it, as they are programmed to respond to the source of damage recieved.

There are two sets of barracks, one for ranged creeps, and one for melee creeps for each lane. It is important to note that when one of these barracks is destroyed, your base will still spawn creeps. The significance of the barracks is that when they are destroyed the opposing team gains mega-creeps, which are significantly more powerful in [ADD STATS] hit points, damage, and when killed give half experience points and half the gold of regular creeps. When seiging an enemy base it is absolutely imperative that the team focuses on destroying the MELEE barracks and not the RANGED barracks first. The reasoning behind this is that with each creep wave there are more melee creeps than ranged creeps and the lane will push more effectively with only mega-melee creeps than with only mega-ranged creeps. This is an easily correctable mistake new players make, so try to focus your team on the melee barracks by pinging or text/voice communication if they are attacking the ranged barracks.

The tier 3 towers [ADD STATS] are positioned at each of the three gates, one per lane. They are the final fortification before the enemy team can damage the barracks. It is important to note that you should never deny a tier 3 or tier 4 tower. The 500g saved by doing this is simply not worth the defense benefit the structure provides. Tier 1 towers and tier 2 towers are typically destroyed at a point in the game where the 500g might outweigh the tower's defensive benefits, but this tapers off as the game proceeds to levels where tier 3 towers are capable of being destroyed.

The final thing to know about the base is that it is on elevated ground. Heroes inside the base will gain [ADD BENEFITS IF ANY] and have vision down the stairs to the lower ground. Heroes outside the base will not be able to see above the stairs and also have a 25% miss chance [ADD ANY OTHER DEBUFFS]. This means that in order to effectively defend the base the defending team wants to force engagement while the team has the high ground advantage. The opposing team may try to run up and down the stairs in order to bait a hero to follow them and drag the fight outside the base, so be careful not to fall for that as the defending team loses all of their positioning advantage this way. Be patient and wait for a proper opening. Melee heroes may have to run down the stairs in order to initiate, but if possible try to keep enemy heroes within ranged distance of allies with the high ground advantage.

Also, remember that if the enemy team has the advantage of numbers do not try to engage fully engage them on your own. You can try to scare them out of your base, but know that you should likely wait until your team either arrives or respawns before engaging as you will likely lose in this situation if you are outnumbered, especially if the opposing team has strong stunning power. Few heroes are able to defend while outnumbered, such as Dark Seer (at time of writing) whose ultimate, placed properly and at the right time, can stop a team push.

Like Alv said, if you view any Dota profile in client you will be able to view all of your previous match results. If you click on a match result the ending stat screen will appear and you can hit "Download Replay." Sometimes it takes a while after the match has ended before the replay is ready for download, but just give it some time and it'll come up.

Private games are only seen by you and the other players in the game. Matchmaking games are seen by everyone, so you can find your favorite pro's account and download their MM replays.

I don't a whole lot of experience with DOTA, but I have a lot of experience with teaching. Not sure if I'll be around for the training thing this weekend, but I'll try to make it. If you have any questions about how to teach, just ask.

Creep Intro:

Creeps are non-player controlled units that are spawned at certain intervals across the DotA 2 map. [SOMEONE FILL IN IF THEY KNOW WHY THEY ARE CALLED CREEPS] The most important creeps are the Lane Creeps which spawn every 30 seconds at three locations within the base near each set of barracks for each team. They are programmed to march down their set lane and attack the first enemy that they encounter. There are three types of Lane Creeps with stats that increase at certain intervals. Melee Creeps spawn in the greatest number every wave, they deal less damage than Ranged Creeps, and they have more hit points. Click here for a breakdown of the stats (http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/Creeps#Statistics). Seige creeps spawn every 7th wave starting at the 3:00 mark.

To scale the Lane Creeps appropriately to Hero level progression and game flow the number and stats for the Lane Creeps increases at certain intervals. Follow this link to read about the specifics: http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/Creeps#Mechanics

If a team loses a barracks, the opposite team then begins to spawn Mega Creeps for the corresponding barracks. If the Melee barracks is lost on the top lane of the Dire, the Radiant team's top lane will spawn Mega Melee Creeps. Once the three sets of barracks are taken out, then the Mega Creeps become Upgraded Mega Creeps, which are even more powerful. Currently at the time of writing the client makes a sort of confusing statement when your team destroyes all three sets of barracks and says "We are not spawning Mega Creeps," which is sort of misleading since there is no actual distinction in game between Mega Creeps and Upgraded Mega Creeps other than their stats, which aren't immediately apparent when concentrating on a match.


Neutral Creeps, which are spawned within the jungle, are secondary to Lane Creeps, and can provide additional benefit to Heroes. A hero with proper abilities such as Lifestealer, Dark Seer, and Nature's Prophet are able to spend the entirety of their early game running through the jungle and killing Neutral Creeps for experience and gold and still keep up with their teammates who are in lane. This is known as Jungling, and works well in certain team setups. The major benefit is that if there is one team member who can solo a lane, usually facing two other heroes, they will gain more experience with each kill and level up faster since experience is divided between all heroes within experience point range of a kill.

There are four types of Neutral Creep camps, small, medium, large, and ancient. As the names suggest, small creeps are easier to kill, and deal less damage, but yield less gold, and less experience with each kill. As the size increases, the difficulty of killing each camp increases as well as the reward. Ancient Ceeps are the toughest to kill as they are immune to magic damage.

Roshan is a special kind of Neutral Creep. If killed he drops Aegis of the Immortal for his first two lives, and on the third he drops Cheese. Aegis of the Immortal has one charge and activates when the hero holding it dies, ressurecting them with full hit points and mana. It cannot be traded once picked up. Cheese is an item that must be activated before death and instantly grants 2500 hit points and 1000 mana points. Killing Roshan can be a very delicate matter that, if done improperly, or at the wrong time, can result in the death of your entire team. Read the detailed guide on Roshan to learn about specific strategies for killing him as well as suggested circumstances where it is important or necessary to kill him and get the Aegis.

Once you are comfortable with this information take a look at our more in-depth guides on Creep Stacking, and Creep Pulling.

So I take it people aren't too excited about the one I made with the gem of true sight?

No, I don't take any offense, I just didn't receive any feedback on it so I had no idea what the opinion of it was. If its not what everyone wants, that's fine, I can take the criticism. I've a degree in art so I'm used to it. Drawing isn't my strong suit anyways, although I am learning.

Yeah, I posted it in the new logo? thread. We need two things, a banner and a logo. The gem and the old reddit icon work as a logos, but not so much as a banner themselves. If you take joindota.com as an example, they have Bloodseeker as their banner and jD as their logo. I think we should incorporate a logo into the banner as it will be a recognizable icon, but I won't be too broken up if Arafelle designs something else other than the gem.

Hero:

Dota 2's heroes are the player controlled characters. They have at least 4 abilities, they gain experience, collect gold, and purchase items. In a full game of Dota 2 there are 5 heroes on each side, making 10 heroes on the map in total. Each hero is based on one of three attributes, strength, agility, or intelligence. Strength-based heroes will typically have the largest pool of hitpoints and will deal the most damage with each single right-click attack, agility-base heroes will be faster in movement speed and attack speed, and intelligence based heroes will have the largest manapool and the most mana-intensive spells.

Each hero typically fits into a certain role, either the hero is a carry, ganker, support, initiator or pusher.

Carry:
A carry is a hero that is weak early game, but very strong later in the game. They should take priority on as much of the kills, gold, and experience as possible. They are called a carry because they will carry the team to victory, but must be carried by the rest of the team until they reach a sufficient level. Items are very important to these heroes as they will need the right build in order to succeed in most situations. Carries are usually the most popular heroes amoung Dota players as they are the ones making most of the kills and big plays during a match.

Ganker:
Firstly, a gank the term used to define the action of a hero travering the map with the specific intent of making a kill. Gankers are the heroes that are most capable of doing this. They are able to quickly deal damage in large quantities, but are vulnerable to attack and need to be protected. The specifics of ganking are intricate and detailed for various situations and will be outlined in later guides.

Support:
A support is the most useful and most underplayed roles in Dota. A support doesn't typically make kills, but is the key hero that helps the carry grow early in the match, and keeps the team alive in the middle and end of the match. Supports must take the obligation of buying and upgrading the courier, as well as buying and placing wards on the map. They are typically not item dependant and do not require gold or kills to be useful and successful during a match, so they should focus on denying and keeping opponents away from the carry in the early game, giving the carry as much of an opportunity to get as many last hits as possible.

Initiator:
The initiator is one of the trickiest roles to play. An initiator is a hero with abilities that provide them with the "first strike" advantage in a team fight. They can be killed easily, and can cause an entire team to lose a battle of they initiate at the wrong time. The complexities of proper initiation require careful observation of positioning of both the enemy and friendly heroes and will be outlined in more advanced guides. They are similar to the support role but instead of keeping the team alive, they are focused on throwing the enemy team off balance during fights, giving their team the advantage.

Pusher:
Pushers are heroes that have abilities which are centered around dealing damage to creeps and towers rather than heroes. Their role is fairly straightforward, to take down towers as soon as possible. Pushers require a specific strategy and team composition in order for them to be most effective. If the team's setup is one that is going to require that the team play defensively so their carry can gain the experience and gold that they require, then it wouldn't make sense to chose a pusher who will be pressuring the enemy team early on. Pushers are suited well in setups that aim to finish the game earlier by keeping pressure on the enemy team.

I think some of my guides have been getting a bit too detailed for the basic introduction I'm trying to get across. I think reorganizing the structure would allow me to create guides that explain the very basics of "what is this thing" and then provide details such as stats and mechanics later, once the users get a bit more grip on how the game flows. Also, I think I'm going to just open a Google Doc and compile all of this information so that I can easily rework it as I think of better ways to organize it.

My suggestion for revised guide structure:

-Moba – Brief history and introduction to the genre

Game Basics (No numbers or stats)

*Map Introduction
*Lane Intro
*Base and Tower Intro
*Jungle Intro
*Creep Intro
*Hero Intro (what is a hero, this is you etc)
*Abilities Intro
*Item Intro (basics of items)
*Game stages breakdown
*Essential Terminology

Technique

*Hero Roles Intro
*Lane Selection and Control
*Earning gold
*Courier Usage
*Jungling and pathways
*Warding
*Micromanagement
*Roshan


Resources - Links to pages detailing stats on dota2wiki.com, all dry data

*Structures
*Lane Specifics
*Lane Creeps
*Neutral Creeps
*Damage-type Breakdown
*Roshan


Items (No specifics since there is no one right answer. Give information so that players can make their own item selections, rather than dictate what to buy)

*Shop Locations and Differences
*Recipes and upgrading
*Explanation of Item Selection
*A few examples of item selection dynamics

-Strategies

*Heroes
>Carry
>Ganker
>Support
>Initiator
>Pusher

*Early Game
*Mid Game
*Late Game

*Roshan

*Examples of Good/Bad Synergy

Yeah, that's the idea I was going for. I think if we do choose it, we'll have to switch our color scheme a bit to better fit with green.

Sure, you can take it and rework it.

We can probably fix your account if the problem is still occurring when you get home. Catch one of the admins in Steam or in Mumble. I'm currently "at work" as well, but will be on later tonight.

I'm way too intensely focused on the game to listen to music.

I don't think we should run a thread on this if it is visible to the public and Google bots.

Yeah a members-only forum would probably work.

Instead of a trading thread though, we could ask valve for some keys that will be given out as we broadcast the last hitting tournament.

I'm just going down the line writing whenever I have free time. Contributions will be added as they come in. If it becomes a problem I'll post what I'm working on, but right now that doesn't make sense for my work flow. Even if something is written twice, I think one will be able to inform the other.

Here is the link to the document:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zn5NOKMzbhFHEeC6UX-C6jK8o3_9XmWGRlfTMx2hZd8/edit

Post contributions here and I'll add them in.

Please keep in mind that if you are making a contribution you must treat it as if you are writing something you are planning to publish. Spellcheck, re-read, and format. Remember that these guides need to be accessible to people who have absolutely zero experience with the game.

Since the document is basically a very long research paper to me I need to be able to keep track on all of the changes that are made so I don't get lost or confused or have something overlooked. Small revisions can be posted here and I'll change them. If someone contributes large sections of information I'll add them as an editor.

Keep in mind that this isn't the final format for the information, so there's nothing stopping people from creating their own documents which will be incorporated into the wordpress site. I'd just like to keep control of my own document for my sanity.

The only thing we need to adhere to is the structure that I've outlined. If someone wants to claim a section, they can just let me know and I'll put their name in the outline.

If you haven't already you should check out this post: http://board.dotanoobs.com/thread.php?id=84

It sort of outlines what we think the community should be and what it should provide, and I think its in line with your goals .

I'm definitely getting a bit burnt out writing these guides. Any help will be appreciated.

I almost have the intro finished as outlined in my google doc.