"Seriously, two heads must be smarter than one!" Hannah, sitting next to me, giggled a couple of times.
As she spoke, the Ogre Magi in the game responded with a classic line.
"We're very smart, right?" "Of course!"
"But this hero's skill growth probably isn't that high. I'm guessing the core skill is your third one, and you'll be a buff bot later." Even though I haven't played games like DOTA before.
The beginner's tutorial and experience from other games have given Zack some ideas.
He couldn't quite figure out the Ogre Magi's ultimate skill yet.
But the first and second skills seemed pretty average. The third skill, however, provided attack speed and movement speed buffs that, when compared to shop items, essentially gave the core hero a few thousand dollars worth of attack speed gear for free.
This is clearly one of the reasons why the Ogre Magi is designed as a support. Its early toughness also helps the main hero take damage.
Looking at his three skills and the skill point recommendations, Zack decided to learn the third skill, Dragon Blood, after some thought.
He felt this hero should focus on leveling the first and third skills, as the second skill's improvement wasn't as significant compared to the other two. He'd put one point into it later if needed.
"The horn of war sounds across the battlefield..."
As the announcer's voice chimed in, creeps consisting of three melee and one ranged unit soon appeared from the top, middle, and bottom lanes, marching along their designated paths.
Following the creeps to the middle junction, Zack saw the enemy computer heroes.
Sven the Warrior and Windranger. But what really caught Zack's eye wasn't their skills or stats.
What he was really focused on was their cosmetic items.
"Whoa, the computer has cosmetic items too? Those enemy heroes look so cool!"
Zack was stunned.
The Sven on the opposite side held a mighty cleaving greatsword, wore the Pirate's Grip armor, the Hawkhelm, and on his left wrist, he had a Moon Guardian's Seal strapped on.
The other Windranger sported a treasure called the Zephyr's Folly. Her orange-red hair, paired with white stockings, left a small trail of white whirlwinds on the ground as she walked, looking incredibly cool.
Zack had originally thought his Dragon Knight, Davion, looked pretty awesome.
But he never imagined that the computer's heroes in this game would have all their cosmetic slots filled.
Why do it this way?
The answer was obvious: to encourage players to spend money.
Look at these cool particle effects and unique designs, don't you feel tempted?
Don't you feel like attacking with these cosmetic items makes it hurt more?
Lucas used a random combination mode for the various cosmetic items in the game.
Of course, the item pool mainly consisted of pretty good cosmetic items.
Particle effects and skill effects are definitely basic necessities.
Likewise, the computer's couriers also had different styles.
"But they really do look good, and the accessories on each hero are different, just like in World of Warcraft," Hannah commented.
Earlier, she thought her Ogre Magi's treasure was quite cute, but after seeing the white-stockinged Windranger, she suddenly felt that her Ogre wasn't attractive at all.
She also switched her view to other lanes. The bottom lane had a Crystal Maiden and a Timbersaw. She didn't pay much attention to Timbersaw, but she noticed that the Crystal Maiden on the opposing side also had a full set of treasures, and a very cute dog was following behind her. It was absolutely adorable.
"So, you can customize freely in this game. Isn't this just a dress-up game!" Zack couldn't help but complain. He could already imagine that if this game became popular, many players would have tons of cosmetic items but not much skill.
While musing, Zack controlled his Dragon Knight to last hit creeps.
The beginner difficulty bots still offer a good experience for last hitting. They only last hit and don't deny.
They also don't frequently use skills to harass enemies.
Zack controlled his Dragon Knight to last hit. Being a melee hero with a decent attack power, and with his prior experience in Warcraft,
Warcraft also had the concept of last hitting. When controlling heroes like Demon Hunter or Blademaster to chase others, you sometimes had to pay attention to last hitting creeps to gain experience and bounty from neutral monsters.
Zack diligently last hit and also tried to deny creeps as he had learned. Although he missed quite a few, he was doing a passable job.
Hannah's Ogre Magi stood next to Zack. When an enemy hero approached, she would hit them with her hammer. Although she drew creep aggro, Hannah didn't seem to care too much.
Even though the beginner tutorial mentioned creep aggro mechanics, many beginners easily overlooked this point.
Also, one of the Ogre Magi's characteristics is its toughness.
In addition, due to Lucas's design choices for the game, he hadn't included the Ring of Protection from his previous life in the current version. However, since neutral items were not included, Lucas kept the Ring of Aquila.
This item was a versatile transitional item. Although it was removed in his previous life, it was added back as a neutral item.
And there was the Hunter's Machete, suitable for all-attribute heroes, to replace Ring of Aquila's position.
This meant that heroes in the current version all had damage reduction and blocking abilities.
As a prime example of an intelligence hero, the Ogre Magi's unreasonable 7 base armor and 5.5 base health regeneration could only be described as domineering.
After Hannah used her Tree Spirit to consume a tree, she gained 10 health per second. Even when drawing aggro, it felt insignificant.
Zack was similar. He had chosen Dragon Blood early on, and with the skill buff, he was even tankier than the Ogre Magi. He could tank a wave of creeps just by eating a tree. Plus, the easy bots didn't attack and harass like real players, making Zack and Hannah feel invincible!
Their health bars barely dropped.
But clearly, other players didn't have the same experience as these two.
Just as he reached level 4 and noticed the enemy's health was running low, Zack prepared to call Hannah to cast their skills together.
At that moment, a "FIRST BLOOD" announcement echoed across the battlefield.
Zack blinked in surprise. Upon closer inspection, he saw that on the bottom lane, Mirana and Terrorblade were fighting Timbersaw and Crystal Maiden, along with a wave of creeps.
However, their focus wasn't on Crystal Maiden, but on the Timbersaw in front. And Timbersaw's passive had already fully stacked.
Although bots on easy difficulty rarely used skills proactively to harass in the early laning phase unless they were at very low health, these two brothers were unlucky. They ran into the tankiest hero in the early game, a fully geared-up Timbersaw.
While under creep aggro, Terrorblade and Mirana found their health dropping faster than Timbersaw's.
With low health, Timbersaw used Chakram, supported by Crystal Maiden's Frostbite and auto-attacks, instantly taking down Terrorblade. Mirana only managed to escape with two leaps.
Zack was about to offer some encouragement. It was a bit embarrassing to lose the first blood to an easy bot.
"That Timbersaw is so strong! But no worries, I'm the late-game carry. Once I get my Butterfly, Daedalus, Eye of Skadi, Manta Style, and Black King Bar, I'll crush that Timbersaw!" Contrary to Zack's expectations, Terrorblade's mindset was surprisingly positive.
Although he didn't know what these items did, the recommended items told him they were for his hero, and he figured picking the most expensive ones was the right way to go.
"...Good luck." Zack clicked on Terrorblade and, seeing he had bought a pair of boots and had only 10 gold left, felt speechless.
Due to his lack of familiarity, he missed a lot of last hits, but he had accumulated about 1100 gold. Terrorblade only bought boots and had 10 gold left, meaning his economy was half of Zack's?
Following the system's recommended build and looking at the shop interface, Zack used the courier to buy two Bracers.
Zack found the item system quite convenient.
It was divided into four modules: starting items, laning items, mid-game components, and ultimate items.
Each module also had detailed descriptions, such as for Black King Bar, Eul's Scepter, and Assault Cuirass, clearly indicating their functions.
The specific effects might not be clear to new players.
But the simple descriptions were very direct.
Attack items like Daedalus and Desolator.
Attribute items like Eye of Skadi and Twin Blades.
Defense items like Assault Cuirass and Heart of]]) Tarrasque.
Special effect items like Black King Bar and Hex.
Combined with the text descriptions, it was clear at a glance.
Of course, if you still didn't understand, you could just follow the recommended items one by one.
While DOTA's biggest feature is item choice, in most cases, a formulaic build doesn't cause significant problems.
(End of this chapter)
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