By the time you play games at a level where extra seconds spent in the shop cost you the game, you already know all the recipes.

In noob games those extra seconds will not matter.

Call of Duty 4 is every bit as difficult and unfriendly to new players as Counterstrike.  Probably even more so, since everything is brownish-grey and you can't actually see your enemies.

Over-complexity != depth; struggling with the interface != challenge.  Often the old games that people nostalgicly refer to as 'deep' actually just had loads of stuff thrown together without any thought to game balance.

Well, I can't speak to the shooter genera.  Yeah, I play shooters every now and then, but I mostly play other games.  The most I know about the shooter genera is that Demigod and DotA aren't part of it, so...  From what I've seen, every other genera out there has gotten more complicated over time.  Fine, maybe they all haven't, but on average things are getting more complicated.  There's always an exception to the rule though.  (I do agree with you that auto-heal is overused these days.  What happened to health packs?)

I fail to understand what is wrong with an economy that all you need to know is "when to expand."  Can't all economies be broken down like that if you think about it?  One main challenge in every RTS game I can think of is balancing your economy with your defense/offense.  Regardless if you are offensive or defensive, you need to make sure you do not fall behind in either your military or your economy.  Offensive rushing players often easily fall behind in their economy, but they plan to make up for it by damaging the enemy economy more than their own.  Defensive "teching" players have to remember to take time out from their economy to make sure their base isn't getting blown up.

By SC to WC, I assume you mean StarCraft to WarCraft.  I am not really familiar with those games (I have played StarCraft a bit, just not in a long time, and while I've played DotA many times at different places, I do not own a copy of WC3).  What did they do to the economy that is so horrible?  If it’s so horrible, I'm sure it should be easy for you to spell it out for me nice and clear.  And iirc, the original WC came before SC, so I assume you mean WC3.  Finally, as far as I know, SC is not praised for its amazing economic system.  It is praised for having three factions that are both unique and balanced.  It supports a variety of effective strategies, and it boasts more post-release support than virtually every other RTS game out there.  I hear the single player was pretty good for an RTS as well.

Just quoting so you know where I'm looking right now.  As I said, I agree that the auto-heal system is overused these days.  At least Halo makes sense, being a super-soldier in a shielded armor suit.  CoD4 is just a random marine who can take 300 bullets before dying, as long as they hit him a few seconds apart.  Lol.  Anyway, it is a valid game mechanic and there's nothing inherently wrong with it.  That is more of a design choice than a goal to make it less complex.  UT3 and TF2 both use a good old fashioned health bar system though, so it’s not like the entire genera is plagued by these "horrible" things you are complaining about.

I do not know about competitive FPS games because I don't play any FPS's even remotely seriously.  As part of making it "less complex", they do allow the average Joe can come home from school and mindlessly shoot stuff.  Although, you have to remember that people take Halo and CoD4 very seriously, and they consider that game play style to be part of their tactics and strategy.  And trust me, if the average Joe goes up against a pro, you can bet the pro is going to win.  What does this mean?  It still takes skill to play using that system, and people disagree with you in serious FPS gaming!  In this context, we are discussing design choices.  With all the FPS games out there, I sure hope there are a few variations between them.  If you don't like auto-heal, go play UT3 or something.  There's more than one game for a reason.  This is different from needless complexity, this is a design choice.

And don't go off on how it is an inferior design choice and all those pros are n00bs.  It is a change to the core game play that you apparently disagree with.  That in no way makes it inferior to whatever you like, that is a matter of personal preference.

This actually brings me back to my original point at the start of this thread.  If you love recipes so much that you cannot live without them, then you can go play LoL.  If for you, removing recipes is a core game play change that you cannot live with, then DG and LoL will (hopefully) be very different games for you.  For the first time in this genera, it looks like we will have two good games at the same time.  I surely hope there are differences between them.  In fact, my first statement in this thread was, "With any luck, this will further encourage GPG to make DG different from the exact DotA formula."

Ummmm, lolwut?  You can't hit anything in CoD4 unless you're standing still, crouching, and zoomed in.  And don't tell me grenades are a poor gameplay mechanic.  Please, just stop there.

All quoted for epic truth.

Those extra seconds will always matter.

Just throwing it out there, none of you have actually given me an advantage to recipes over blacksmith upgrades.  Sure, the inconveniences can be worked around, but why put them there if you don't have to?  Why would you intentionally want the game to be more difficult to pick up when it doesn't have to be?  Answer this question in your next reply.  Seriously.  Do it.

Anyway, I have three main points that I am discussing right now in this argument.  Firstly, blacksmith upgrades are more user friendly than recipes, and that is a good thing.  Second, in switching to blacksmith upgrades, none of the advantages that recipes provided to the core game play will be lost.  Finally, blacksmith upgrades actually improve on the core game play by allowing the game to proceed dynamically.  You have yet to say anything that actually refutes the first two points.  If you could elaborate on either of them, it would be greatly appreciated.

The third point you have specifically mentioned.  I have found your words very interesting.

So, you are essentially saying that the challenge behind the game should be building your character.  What it should come down to is that your team has the perfect build.  Well, there is no "perfect build" so the build must at least be better than the other team.  After that, all that's left is micro skill and battle tactics.  There's no mind games or prediction or scouting at all, right?  After all,

Right?  What you take DotA as, is a game where preset builds clash against each other and the battle of micro decides the fate of the game.  Correct me if I am wrong on that point, because it sure sounds like that is what you are saying.

That's not good enough for me.  I like to think of myself primarily as an RTS player, and I know that there's a critical aspect of RTS games that this is missing from this picture.  Yes, tactical micro is very important, and as I said above, strategic macro between your economy and your army is important.  What else is there?  Well, it’s one of the simplest things that almost every pro player in SupCom will tell you first thing.  Scouting.  This actually falls under the second point (strategic macro).  RTS games are not like you claim in that last quote.  You do not just pick a direction and walk, hoping you find the enemy with his back turned to you.  You approach your enemy from behind while he's sleeping, because you know that's the only way to shank him.  Even if you are the perfect ninja who can get anywhere, it doesn't do you any good unless you know where the target is.

Ok, that last analogy was a little far out there, I admit it.  Back to video games.  Where were we, Tekken?  Forgive me for not being familiar with that series.  I am most familiar with Smash Bros., although I know a fair amount about Street Fighter.  I'll discuss Smash Bros however, as I know it the best.  Despite the fact that it comes across as a simple, straight-forward fighter, there are a number of advanced techs that required a degree of technical skill to pull off.  For example, Sheik is a personal favorite of mine (because she's fun, not because she's good).  Sheik happens to have one of the more difficult DACUS's to pull off.  (For those of you who don't know, DACUS stands for Dash-Attack-Canceled-into-Up-Smash, which basically allows you to charge your powerful up-smash attack while moving very rapidly across the stage at your opponent.)  Frankly, I'm pretty bad at it.

My friend, however, can DACUS much better than I can.  Granted, he does it with an easier character, but he can still do it better than I.  Has he ever punished me by using the DACUS technique?  Yeah, you bet he has.  Better question, have I ever punished him for using the DACUS technique?  Again, the answer is yes.  Heck, I can beat a different friend's Meta Knight (agreed to be the best character and is thus banned in Italy, lol) using Captain Falcon (arguably the worst character in the game).  Yes, I know my second friend sucks at the game, but the point stands.  Just knowing characters and being able to tech everything until you break your controller will not win you anything.  What the game really comes down to is predicting what your enemy is doing and punishing him for it.  At any given time, you have to know how he can attack you and how you can attack him.  Yes, a huge part of the game is knowing what combos you can pull off and how all the different characters play.  However, you cannot ignore the fact that predicting your opponent will win you more matches than knowing exactly how big Lucario's forward-smash hit box is.

For all I know, Tekkan and VF could be entirely different, but I know that Smash and Street Fighter both have mind games and prediction as a huge part of their core game play.

So what does that have to do with DG, DotA, LoL, and recipes?  Well, how about we apply it a little closer to home in Supreme Commander.  Now, the games are in different generas so there isn't a direct translation.  Instead of prediction, the game relies on solid evidence via scouting.  You can only get so high on the ranked ladder if all you try to do is make more tanks than the other guy.  You can be the best spammer in the world, but if you have no idea what's going on, the other guy can still pull ahead and win.  There's a reason why even the most elaborate Build Orders stop a few minutes into the game.  What you do is entirely dependent on what your enemy does.

For example, you send out an early scout to your opponent’s base.  You're planning a nice, easy match of T1 tank spam, at least for the first few minutes.  Your scout shows up and, holy crap, they're doing a Jester (T1 gunship) rush.  You can try those tanks, but it isn't going to help you at all.  What do you do?  Obviously, you build AA units instead of tanks and put an air factory (for interceptors) as your number one priority.  If there was no adapting, then what would happen?  Well, you get the rock, paper, scissors situation you were just complaining about.  The interceptor rush beats the Jester rush, which beats the tank rush, which beats the interceptor rush.  How's that for strategic diversity?  That game would never fly competitively.

Similarly, such a concept can be applied to DotA.  If you know an anti-mage is hanging out in the middle path, then deploy your mage on one of the flanks.  Remember, that if they figure out where your mage is, then watch out, because that anti-mage might just pop out of the woods behind you.  I know I am not really up on DotA balance and I don't really know how scouting works in that game, but what I'm talking about is perfectly realistic.  You share LoS with your creeps, so you can usually see who’s on the front lines.

In DG, I know that scouting is important and possible.  The Totems of Revelation are already in the game, Oculus has some kind of "eye" he can deploy, and one of the original twelve Demigods (presumably the four beyond the currently confirmed eight are to be added as dlc) has two birds that would probably give her some kind of intel skills.  Are you going to charge your glass-cannon Regulus at the Unclean Beast?  No, the Rook's on the other side and he's a much easier target for Reggy.

Now let’s take it one step farther.  Let’s use hypothetical balance, as there's not really a whole lot of variation in the current build due to most of the items being removed at the last second.  You are going for a Torchbearer Ice/Crowd Control build.  In addition to the skills, you are getting items that work toward a high level recipe that focuses on extending the duration and effectiveness of debuffs.  The enemy Rook, however, is focusing on building Towers of Light, and Deep Freeze and Rain of Ice doesn't even matter to his defensive build, as he has enough health to tank the weak RoI and he has no reason to run anywhere, so Deep Freeze won't slow him down.  Well, buffing your debuffs isn't going to help you there.  You need to be able to blast through his towers faster than he can build them.  You would have been fine if you went for that item line that increased damage on spells, but now you're screwed over.

Is his build superior?  No.  If he had used a "normal" (for the sake of argument using the hypothetical balance) Rook-Roll + Hammer Slam line, you would have been able to slow him down as he ran from the heat of battle to finish him off.  The new damage increase build wouldn't have lasted ten seconds against the superior damage output of that Rook build.  So what do you do?  In this hypothetical situation, you guess and hope you guess right.

If blacksmith upgrades were implemented, the game would change.  It wouldn't simply be, "oh no, he picked a build that counters mine, I'm dead now."  One side would try to get an advantage over the other side, who would in turn try to gain an advantage over the first team's new strategy.  Then the first team would react to the new change, and the cycle would continue.  Demigod builds and games would be more dynamic, which greatly benefits the game play.

There is one obvious flaw in my argument.  If you believe that locking people into builds at the start of a match is an advantage to recipes, then you would be opposed to blacksmith upgrades.  This, however, is a core game play change.  While I strongly believe that adaption is a key part of any strategy game, some people might not share those thoughts.  If you are against dynamic Demigods and fluctuating strategies within a match, then by all means, go play LoL.  While I cannot guarantee that Demigod will have those traits, I can assure you that LoL will not.

Recipes in DotA do not only add depth to the game. They add a huge bottomless pit of despair and hell where many new players fall and are never seen again in the DotA scene.

After a reasonable number of DotA games (like 40-50 I'd say) I still cannot remember where are all the items, what they are called, what they look like, how much they cost, what are their stat boosts and what are the hidden things about them (item A doesn't stack with item B, item C gives boosts to some ultimate skills, but doesn't say clearly which, item D recipe can be bought many times improving the stats of the item with each purchase etc...)

my impressions of this derail:

A:  "I'm an Angry Internet Man and Recipes are easy, unless you are a complete eejit"

B:  "No they aren't"

A:  "Yes they are"

B:  "Fine.  Recipes are easy.  We've come up with even easier methods for doing the same thing recipes do.  How does that make you feel?"

A:  "Recipes are easy"

B:  "Right, we got that.  What if we made things even easier?  What if recipes were a fairly convoluted way to get around the hard mod limits imposed by an ancient game engine, and there were now better, more accessible ways to add the same degree of depth to the game?"

A:  "Recipes = easy"

B:  "Yes I know, R = E...I hear you - do you hear me?"

A:  "Easy, or you are an eejit"

[B decides A is an artificial intelligence trying to pass Turing test, failing...]

LOL that's really funny! But you forgot the part where some random dude walks in and tries to post something witty but fails since he didn't read anything that was said past the first line!

Lol, sorry about that.  Couldn't resist, but I was definitely baiting.  Mea culpa.

Sigol, I did read every line.  I actually agree with you and Drex that DoTA recipes, while baroque, have added to DoTA gameplay.  I also tend to agree with Random_Guy that there is a difference between complex and merely difficult systems, that it is possible to make something deep while maintaining accessibility, and that with your help and mine the devs of *this* game will be able to strike the balance.

Peace, some random dude

Lol kestral man, this is why i hate living is australia sometimes, i just missed that whole debate.

People rage on recipes alot because the way they are represented in DotA is limited by the engine, a tree style thing would work great and would let everyone know how to use it easily. If upgrades do work as well as recipes then i agree try them out but they will be laid out alot easier and i bet that if you lay out recipes the same way neither would be better than the other.

dude, u are clearly noob, play the game before you pretend ur an expert

I rekon u got the right idea man, spend a bit of time before hand and recipes wont matter. People tend to complain about recipes because they had a bad experience with them, like they got raged for being noob, which is not a legit reason to dislike them. If you join a team game like DotA (a non-noob one) with no idea how to play you've got to expect that you will get raged bad. If you are noob then you should join a noob game and you will get alot of helpful people who wont rage you and you will have a fun game.

Heh, sorry about the long posts.  I tend to go on, and on, and on, and on...

Anyway, I think everyone gets the idea I'm trying to convey at this point.  Ke5trel summed it up pretty well in an awsome post.  I lol'ed.

Just throwing it out there, in the recent IGN interview it was specifically stated that accessability was one of their primary goals.  Doesn't say anything for certain, but it sounds like a step away from recipes.  I know the context was different, but face it, there's a lot of people out there, "eejits" they may be, who are turned off by recipes due to lack of immediate accessability.  We don't know anything for sure though.

And Sigol, just shut up please.  You've professed that the only reason you're even here is to insult people who find recipes difficult.  If existing to insult people isn't a perfect definition of trolling, I don't know what is.

"
Well, I can't speak to the shooter genera.  Yeah, I play shooters every now and then, but I mostly play other games.  The most I know about the shooter genera is that Demigod and DotA aren't part of it, so...  From what I've seen, every other genera out there has gotten more complicated over time.  Fine, maybe they all haven't, but on average things are getting more complicated.  There's always an exception to the rule though.  (I do agree with you that auto-heal is overused these days.  What happened to health packs?)

I fail to understand what is wrong with an economy that all you need to know is "when to expand."  Can't all economies be broken down like that if you think about it?  One main challenge in every RTS game I can think of is balancing your economy with your defense/offense.  Regardless if you are offensive or defensive, you need to make sure you do not fall behind in either your military or your economy.  Offensive rushing players often easily fall behind in their economy, but they plan to make up for it by damaging the enemy economy more than their own.  Defensive "teching" players have to remember to take time out from their economy to make sure their base isn't getting blown up.

By SC to WC, I assume you mean StarCraft to WarCraft.  I am not really familiar with those games (I have played StarCraft a bit, just not in a long time, and while I've played DotA many times at different places, I do not own a copy of WC3).  What did they do to the economy that is so horrible?  If it’s so horrible, I'm sure it should be easy for you to spell it out for me nice and clear.  And iirc, the original WC came before SC, so I assume you mean WC3.  Finally, as far as I know, SC is not praised for its amazing economic system.  It is praised for having three factions that are both unique and balanced.  It supports a variety of effective strategies, and it boasts more post-release support than virtually every other RTS game out there.  I hear the single player was pretty good for an RTS as well."

What they did was in sc u could have any number amount of people mining from a mineral source and there would be no delays from 1 gather from mining. in wc you can have 5 gathers per mine(1 per base) before your gathers stand and wait for the next guy to leave. So in sc you can see up to 20 and 30 gathers depending on expansions. Some strats you need a 7 gather build some require more or less. When u put a expansion up in sc u transer some of your gathers from ur main to the expansion. You need to know how many to bring with u, and when in the building of ur fortress to send...so they dont spend 1 second longer then u need to waiting for your fortress to complete building. And all that changes on every map and every expansion.

Also which mineral patch to mine first, how many gather's per mineral patch, if you need to build a building in a certain spot in your gathers route to speed up his routing path.

in wc you have to worry about none of that. Which in a casual game those seconds and 1 extra gather wouldnt make a difference but makes watching a pro match so much more exciting with all the drops people do to attack the economy. Ive seen some matches where some1 was about to lose did a awsome drop on the guys gathers and took out enough that he couldnt keep pumping out units to replace his lost ones.

"
Just quoting so you know where I'm looking right now.  As I said, I agree that the auto-heal system is overused these days.  At least Halo makes sense, being a super-soldier in a shielded armor suit.  CoD4 is just a random marine who can take 300 bullets before dying, as long as they hit him a few seconds apart.  Lol.  Anyway, it is a valid game mechanic and there's nothing inherently wrong with it.  That is more of a design choice than a goal to make it less complex.  UT3 and TF2 both use a good old fashioned health bar system though, so it’s not like the entire genera is plagued by these "horrible" things you are complaining about.

I do not know about competitive FPS games because I don't play any FPS's even remotely seriously.  As part of making it "less complex", they do allow the average Joe can come home from school and mindlessly shoot stuff.  Although, you have to remember that people take Halo and CoD4 very seriously, and they consider that game play style to be part of their tactics and strategy.  And trust me, if the average Joe goes up against a pro, you can bet the pro is going to win.  What does this mean?  It still takes skill to play using that system, and people disagree with you in serious FPS gaming!  In this context, we are discussing design choices.  With all the FPS games out there, I sure hope there are a few variations between them.  If you don't like auto-heal, go play UT3 or something.  There's more than one game for a reason.  This is different from needless complexity, this is a design choice.

And don't go off on how it is an inferior design choice and all those pros are n00bs.  It is a change to the core game play that you apparently disagree with.  That in no way makes it inferior to whatever you like, that is a matter of personal preference."

The average joe can come in cs1.6 or more so source and play vs peopel and still have fun. There are alot of pubs filled with bad people any1 can pick up the game and compete. but it removes the whole guys in a tournament finals with 14 hp left vs 4 guys...hits all of his shots and wins the round. makes it that much more exciting then if he woulda regenned all his hp.

Now cod4 competitives base compared to cs is very small. But halos is pretty much the same. I dont have a huge problem with the health regen thing. Health bars worked wonderfullly why change it. but Halo you see people running/jumping and shotting all the time in major matches. And i guess if everyone does it it makes the game even. And with it being futuristic it can be meshed into it without a problem. but i like having to tap the opposite direction of your movement and then having to flick and then chosing what kind of fire you wanna do hold down spray. 2 shot/3 shot burst or single tap. its takes little more thought then just holding fire as compared to the other games.

i wont even touch how bad fps's are on console.(not bad but just dont offer the best platform for the most control in a fps) ill leave that for another day

"
Ummmm, lolwut?  You can't hit anything in CoD4 unless you're standing still, crouching, and zoomed in.  And don't tell me grenades are a poor gameplay mechanic.  Please, just stop there."

zooming in is true. But if ur zoomed and running/shotting its still pretty darn accurate. I know with a burst fire m4 theres almost 0 penalty. I never said grenades are a bad gameplay mechanic. i said if they were in a game like cs it would. Because cs is more choke point oriented where cod4 isnt as heavily oriented that way. Like u dont have entire terrorist teams running through 1 point and theres only that 1 point to get through.

"
Those extra seconds will always matter.

Just throwing it out there, none of you have actually given me an advantage to recipes over blacksmith upgrades.  Sure, the inconveniences can be worked around, but why put them there if you don't have to?  Why would you intentionally want the game to be more difficult to pick up when it doesn't have to be?  Answer this question in your next reply.  Seriously.  Do it.

Anyway, I have three main points that I am discussing right now in this argument.  Firstly, blacksmith upgrades are more user friendly than recipes, and that is a good thing.  Second, in switching to blacksmith upgrades, none of the advantages that recipes provided to the core game play will be lost.  Finally, blacksmith upgrades actually improve on the core game play by allowing the game to proceed dynamically.  You have yet to say anything that actually refutes the first two points.  If you could elaborate on either of them, it would be greatly appreciated.

The third point you have specifically mentioned.  I have found your words very interesting."

Blacksmith upgrades are more user i guess. but recipes just have everything in a town and on the recipe put what building that item is found in. That removes the user unfriendliness of them as they currently are.

I see upgrades as making the game to reactionay. You have to wait till they actually buy the upgrade to actually buy anything to counter their purchase. With recipes you could see ok they're getting this and this item. That means they're making this...i need to get this to counter it.

Now 2 points. yes in dota items really werent counterable all the time. But this game can fix that. And second being able to see what you were building ahead of time also brought in a extra element of strategy. Can u just save your money and buy everything at once and catch them off guard/buy items and place em in your base and then pick em up when ur ready? Should u take the gamble...it may be a big payoff, but if it fails its a big hinderence.

I really dont see how recipes dont allow the game to carry out dynamically.

"
So, you are essentially saying that the challenge behind the game should be building your character.  What it should come down to is that your team has the perfect build.  Well, there is no "perfect build" so the build must at least be better than the other team.  After that, all that's left is micro skill and battle tactics.  There's no mind games or prediction or scouting at all, right?  After all, "

to a degree. but then people have to spend time finding out all the build mixes. if you do this build what build can counter that. You have to scout and play mind games to either throw off them from your build so they cant counter it or better make sure you know what they're doing so you can counter them. And that side game would be throughout the whole game.

"
Right?  What you take DotA as, is a game where preset builds clash against each other and the battle of micro decides the fate of the game.  Correct me if I am wrong on that point, because it sure sounds like that is what you are saying.

That's not good enough for me.  I like to think of myself primarily as an RTS player, and I know that there's a critical aspect of RTS games that this is missing from this picture.  Yes, tactical micro is very important, and as I said above, strategic macro between your economy and your army is important.  What else is there?  Well, it’s one of the simplest things that almost every pro player in SupCom will tell you first thing.  Scouting.  This actually falls under the second point (strategic macro).  RTS games are not like you claim in that last quote.  You do not just pick a direction and walk, hoping you find the enemy with his back turned to you.  You approach your enemy from behind while he's sleeping, because you know that's the only way to shank him.  Even if you are the perfect ninja who can get anywhere, it doesn't do you any good unless you know where the target is."

my last point did kinda come out wrong. I'm very familiar with rts scouting i love following korean starcraft tournaments (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awLhqANSprE). but with rts you cant deny you go into the game with a set plan in mind. And until you get a good scout in thats when you start deciding what you need to tweak

Like imo the buildings in a rts  are like the items in dota and the recipes are like the units. Both can be scouted out and if you see what buildings/items your oppenent is using you know the direction they're going. When you see that you can then be proactive to it...instead of waiting for an upgrade from a blacksmith and be reactive. It would be like playing a rts where you only build units from 1 building and then having to react to the units coming out.

"Ok, that last analogy was a little far out there, I admit it.  Back to video games.  Where were we, Tekken?  Forgive me for not being familiar with that series.  I am most familiar with Smash Bros., although I know a fair amount about Street Fighter.  I'll discuss Smash Bros however, as I know it the best.  Despite the fact that it comes across as a simple, straight-forward fighter, there are a number of advanced techs that required a degree of technical skill to pull off.  For example, Sheik is a personal favorite of mine (because she's fun, not because she's good).  Sheik happens to have one of the more difficult DACUS's to pull off.  (For those of you who don't know, DACUS stands for Dash-Attack-Canceled-into-Up-Smash, which basically allows you to charge your powerful up-smash attack while moving very rapidly across the stage at your opponent.)  Frankly, I'm pretty bad at it.

My friend, however, can DACUS much better than I can.  Granted, he does it with an easier character, but he can still do it better than I.  Has he ever punished me by using the DACUS technique?  Yeah, you bet he has.  Better question, have I ever punished him for using the DACUS technique?  Again, the answer is yes.  Heck, I can beat a different friend's Meta Knight (agreed to be the best character and is thus banned in Italy, lol) using Captain Falcon (arguably the worst character in the game).  Yes, I know my second friend sucks at the game, but the point stands.  Just knowing characters and being able to tech everything until you break your controller will not win you anything.  What the game really comes down to is predicting what your enemy is doing and punishing him for it.  At any given time, you have to know how he can attack you and how you can attack him.  Yes, a huge part of the game is knowing what combos you can pull off and how all the different characters play.  However, you cannot ignore the fact that predicting your opponent will win you more matches than knowing exactly how big Lucario's forward-smash hit box is.

For all I know, Tekkan and VF could be entirely different, but I know that Smash and Street Fighter both have mind games and prediction as a huge part of their core game play."

As long as their educated predictions thats fine. but in doa its 100% guess work. yes theres a little mind games involved. But you either block and take 0 dmg. Or try to counter hig mid or low. And hope you hit the right one because theres no way of knowing which way your oppent will attack.

In vf its more of a matter of building up a frame rate advantage and using that advantage in ur favor. But if you build it up your oppent will know the frame advantage and have a good idea of what ur doing. And it comes down to if you can defend it well enough. but fighters are no where near my expertise im a fps/rts man. 

And i think the middle of my post addresses the rest of yours

Btw i dont play professionally anymore i got to old to fast and never got good enough so right now im in the middle of setting up a team for me to manage. cs and css, cod4, sc and wc. Hopefully getting my cs guy to compete with korea.

Now i did say sc was a much more  complex game...anyone can pick it up and play it for fun and those lil details wont matter becuase ur oppent wont matter and they can and did was a best seller in its time. but in pro matches it does. And thats why the world plays wc because no1 took the time to learn those little details. Except for korea, which made sc into a huge industry in korea and no foreigner can compete with them(and yes in sc if ur not korean ur a foreginer) because they know all those little details.

and on a side note i quess (quote)(/quote) was a bad system so they changed to this weird ass one lol

My apologies for writing comprehensive, thought out responses .

Ok, so the game play is changed a lot.  I've always felt that WC was designed to be more accessible for casual players, while SC was the primary competitive platform.  However, you again discuss core game play changes.  I don't really see how its a problem.  Limiting the amount of workers per resource deposit sounds like an attempt to force expansion over porcing.  In WC, I imagine that you would go about it a different way.  You would build fewer gatherer units, expand greater distances, or space your gatherers so they don't spend time waiting (one gathers while the other moves).  It sounds like this is simply less hassle to support an economy by forcing you to build military with the resources you have instead of balancing it between your war effort and your economy.

There are two major differences between this and recipes.  The first is that this simplification (SC -> WC) appears to greatly alter the game play.  It removed the balancing act between economy and military to some extent.  While this simplifies things, it actually decreases strategic options.  (It sounds like) you cannot make builds based on sitting in your base expanding your defenses and economy in WC.  This changes the game balance greatly.  Having multiple effective strategies is a positive trait to look for in RTS games.  Recipes/upgrades themselves actually provide the versatility in their existence.  By switching to upgrades, you would not sacrifice any positive game play elements.

The second difference has to do with simplicity.  In SC, you mentioned how you had to know how many gatherers to send, where you were sending them, and when you were sending them in order to be effective.  There is a fundamental difference between this and recipes.  The gathering of your economy has a direct impact on the game.  In fact, the total numbers are always right on your UI.  You can see if you need a stronger economy, and thus know you need to have a greater (or smaller) number of gatherers on the field.  I do not claim to fully grasp SC mechanics, but I imagine that how many gatherers you would send to different places would depend on either too many units crowding the same place and therefore taking longer or the rate at which resources are used, both of which make it easy enough to figure out how many gatherers to send out.

Obviously you won't do things perfectly the first time, or even the second.  However, you can play (for quite some time) using flawed economic mechanics.  Even if you aren't perfect at what you are doing, you can play the game effectively.  You aren't eternally screwed; you just have a slightly weaker economy.  Recipes, however, have no direct impact on game play.  Firstly, it is possible to play almost an entire game without realizing that you have the wrong recipe items.  You won't know until you go to buy the recipe, instead of an economy where the game provides direct feedback regarding what needs to be changed.  This allows you to climb out of the holes you are digging before they get too deep.  Also, recipes kind of have to be perfect.  There is no balance.  You must simply get the proper items when you have enough gold.  You will either do everything right or something wrong, and if anything is wrong you're screwed.  I am not so much concerned with which item goes with which character, as I believe that is an unavoidable difficulty no matter what system you implement.

If there are pubs filled with bad people because anyone can pick up the game and compete, then how does whatever you’re complaining about pertain to the original complaint (games being overly simplified).  I get it that you disagree with the changes and you think that the genera would be better without them, but I fail to see any correlation between that and this.  You profess that anyone can play the game (and to be honest, I never remember anyone ever complaining about complexity in an FPS game) so what does this have to do with user friendliness?  Regenerating health adds to tactical combat, while health bars add to the strategic picture.  Either way, something benefits.  As neither is apparently easier to understand, the only difference is the core game play changes.  I am not here to argue for regenerating health instead of health bars, so you can take that gripe someplace else.  I think they both have a place in the genera.  (As a side note for the record, I think secondary fire options on weapons are awesome.)

Ok, so it is possible to work within the recipe system with foresight and strategy.  However, it appears that you are going to great lengths to incorporate this into the system.  What you are talking about is not dynamism.  You are not altering your strategy as time passes.  You are simply waiting around and then countering the enemy strategy after it is obvious.  You cannot really change your strategy once you have started purchasing items.  As you said yourself, you can tell what someone is building up for based on their early items.  Doesn't that imply that early items essentially lock you into what you are doing later?  You complain about upgrades being reactionary, when this is the best system you've worked out for recipes?  Waiting and reacting?

But are upgrades reactionary?  Is what you do entirely dependent on the other person?  Well, obviously not, because someone has to start it.  The initial game play would be determined by the initial builds that people decided to go for.  The difference between this and recipes is that, as the game progressed, people would be able to alter their builds.  The first item they got and began to upgrade would decide how their early character would play.  While it would carry over into the late game, many other decisions, most of them based on what the enemy did, would also characterize your endgame Demigod.  It would not be entirely reactionary, as there is plenty of room for independent strategy.  However, elements of something being reactionary are not necessarily a bad thing, as that definitely adds dynamism.

 

Cool.  We're tricking them into thinking we're using a different build.  Or, perhaps, we just build our build around their build.  But wait, "With recipes you could see ok they're getting this and this item. That means they're making this...i need to get this to counter it."  So which is it?  Can you change your build to something different after you see what they're doing or can't you?  I don't think you can.  You seem to agree with me in that quote, as you say that you can figure out their final item by the first few items they buy.

 

Yeah, you do.  You do that with both upgrades and recipes as well.  The difference between them is with upgrades you can change your path as the game progresses.  With recipes, you are locked into your final item soon after the game starts.  Even with upgrades though, you would come into the game with a plan in mind.

Not really, no.  Your analogy works (buildings : units :: items : recipes) however you are representing the units incorrectly in your explanation of the analogy.  In recipes, you can really only work toward one or maybe two different final recipes with your early items.  The way it works with recipes, is that in order to get Unit 8, you have to have build buildings A, B, Q,  and W.  You spend the match building the buildings in order to get the final unit.  This works with your analogy.  With upgrades, the units are different.  A more appropriate analogy would be buildings are to units as items are to the effects of those items.  When you get a different item, you build a new factory.  Each new factory allows you to produce different kinds of units.  This means that, as the match goes on, the units available continually changes (which is actually a lot more like an RTS).

Now, at first glance, this sounds as though you are actually correct.  Recipes appear to be more proactive, and upgrades more reactive.  After all, for recipes you can see the final product coming from a mile away, while those fickle upgrades are constantly changing.  First, you must ask yourself how you are going to be proactive with recipes.  You are also using recipes, and you will fall into the same trap that your opponent did.  You will be stuck from your first few items onward, thus preventing any adaption regardless if it is proactive or reactive.  On one hand you are claiming that you can predict what your enemy is doing because he can't change, but on the other handy you are claiming that you can change in accordance with what he is doing because you can change but he can't.  Does not compute.

Second, you must ask yourself how much upgrades can change things.  Demigods are supposed to represent classes like in a typical RPG (instead of individual heroes like in DotA).  That is why there are so few of them.  That largely limits what they can do.  Obviously one Demigod will be capable of many times that which a DotA hero is capable of, but it is still limited.  Also, as time goes on, the skills will also be decided.  This will continually limit the possibilities as time goes on and the skills are decided.  Not a main point, but it’s worth considering.  It’s not like full Rock, Paper, Scissors.

Finally, you must ask yourself if there is really no way to be proactive about upgrades.  Here you get into where it’s really dynamic.  You see a Regulus and he's put points into Snipe and gold into items that increase range.  It sounds like he's going for a kiting/ranged/sniper approach.  You have the Torchbearer and have put items mostly into spell damage buffs so you can sweep through people better.  What do you do here?  You can buy an item that gives you increased speed so you can close the distance rapidly and begin laying on the pain or perhaps you could start buying items that buff debuffs like Deep Freeze so he can't keep running.

Now a better question:  What happens if that Regulus anticipates what you are doing.  He knows that you will have to close the distance, so after the first few item upgrades (which will continue to benefit him) he gets another item and upgrades it for stun duration increase or spell damage increase.  You charge up and BAM!  You walk into a field of mines!  You're stunned, you can't move, and every step you take removes several hundred HP.  Plus, Regulus is shooting at you.  That didn't go well.  So yes, there is still tons of proactive dynamism, you just have to think a little harder.  Plus, reactive dynamism is abundant as a bonus, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Indeed, most of the argument was in the middle of the post.  However, your last comment is the difference between a combo and a string of moves.  A true combo is when you hit someone repeatedly and they have no way to escape.  They are in hit-stun the entire time, and no amount of user input on behalf of the player being assaulted will stop the combo.  A string is when a series of moves hits by the use of mind games and prediction.  You can break out of a string at any time as the goal of a string is continually getting the opponent to do what you want so you can hit them again.  As I like to say, "Combos end with XYZ, strings end with Falcon PAWNCH!"

So what does this have to do with what you just said?  Well, there are obviously no true "combos" in RTS games.  At least, not in the strategic sense.  It does have strings, however.  These would be accomplished by scouting, traps, kiting, etc...  It is damage to the player that is caused as a result of his own mistakes because his opponent capitalized on the weaknesses shown.  It’s called strategy, and its fun.  What exactly are you complaining about?

Good luck with that.  Wait, that sounded sarcastic.  Well, it wasn't sarcastic.  Good luck.

GJ with beaking the forum again