yea play in single player mode take your time first at the item shop dont worry if u lose that 1.\

to look at abilities and go here http://www.demigoddb.com/

that will allow u to lay out a lvl 20 guy and look at what the skills do put on the items and look at what damage etc...

Ridiculously easy. I think the only people who would have trouble (or claim to have trouble) learning this game would be complete newbs to the genre (and gaming in general) or lazy people who lack imagination and cant seem to grasp simple concepts like playing an easy single player match and rolling over all powers and abilities (which one would have to do anyway regardless if there is a tutorial or not). DG is one of the easiest games to learn (except for maybe pong which some people still have trouble with).

This whole argument of lack of tutorial is moot because the game itself is so simple. There just seems to be too many kiddies who need mama to hold their hand every step of the way in order to learn the simplest of tasks.

Now I could see if the game was as complex and involved as say Sins of a Solar Empire (which does have fairly decent tutorials), but DG is just straight foreward and simple in its execution that a tutorial would be redundant and useless.

To be honest the only time I ever use a tutorial is if it is part of the storyline (like alot of older titles had), but if I have the option to turn it off, I take it. I prefer figuring things out for myself by trying everything in the game through trial and error methods. It makes the game last that much longer and gives a good solid feeling when the game is actually played for real.

I will, however, admit that some games would benefit from a tutorial. Guild Wars for me took months to get the hang of the balance, economy, story progression and things like that, but that was more due to the fact that there is no other game that really even comes close in comparison. But 3+ years later, the game is pretty straight foreward and the many additions to the original game have increased its "pick up and play" immensly.

Two different groups... Either Newb to genre or Lazy, not necessarily both. Note, I didnt say Noob, I said Newb as in new to the particular play style, not noob as in childish ignorant people who refuse to necessarily learn the game (which I guess I did elude to later in the post). So I suppose there are 3 distinct groups of people iterated within my post.

Okay I tried setting the game speed to 'Adjustable' but when I went back into the game, pressing "-" only ended up zooming out the view of the arena. It did not slow the game down. Any suggestions?

(edit)

Okay figured it out. If anybody else encounters the same problem, it's the "-" key on the number keypad that works to slow the game speed down. (I was trying to use the "-" key next to the "0" key on the number keys running across the top of the keyboard).

And as far as learning the game, slowing the game speed down to -10 and then turning the master volume to 0 and then just spending about an hour or so going over everything in the skill tree, everything in the item shop, all the upgrades in the citadel and just simply hovering over each object in the arena to read and absorb all the tooltips made a world of difference for me. Having to learn all that on the fly at regular game speed and then putting together a build was out of the question (and somewhat ridiculous). Just won my first match in skirmish. What a rush. Great game.