Talk:Aatrox/@comment-Roxai-20130511072839/@comment-Hypercarrot-20130513043803

@SimplyCactus Dota 2 player here. And while I appreciate the uniqueness of many Dota heroes, there are also downsides to the uniqueness. Riot's design philosophy is to keep the game manageable for newcomers, which is why some of your examples wouldn't be seen in LoL. They require too much pre-existing experience.

1. Invoker: I agree that his design is awesome, but as you said so, 14 spells is hard to manage and easy to screw up.

2. Rubick: to play him you need to know just about every non-passive spell in the game. To make matters worse, many Dota spells are not immediately obvious as to what they do (for example, you can see that Bloodseeker's ult makes you bleed. What you can't see is that the bleeding stops when you stop moving. And if you're getting chased by Bloodseeker, standing still is the last thing on your mind)

3. Morphling: no argument here, the concept of being able to shift from squishy carry to low damage tank would have no trouble working in LoL.

4. Meepo: I'm just gonna say that, there's a reason Meepo is well known for feeding...

So that's basically it. Many of these super unique Dota heroes are pretty hard for newcomers (did you know that Wisp has 3 out of 4 spells that need a nearby ally to work best?). Some LoL heroes do have steeper learning curves, but none have the "learning cliffs" seen in some Dota heroes. Of course, at the other end are super simple heroes, like Skeleton King with his 3 passives.

I think Riot has done a good job despite being limited by their design principles. Look at the alternate resource systems they've come up with: Energy, Heat, Fury, Ferocity, all with advantages and disadvantages compared to mana users. Champions whose playstyle revolves around controlling both themselves and an object (Orianna, Syndra). Lee Sin. Jayce and Elise (and maybe Kayle and Nidalee), the "ranged, melee, tanky DPS, assassin, mage, tank, support, jungler" champions who are versatile enough to do anything. Thresh's soul system. Udyr's lack of an ultimate, and also him and Sona's stance-switching playstyle.

There's a lot of unique design if you know where to look!