Is Summoner's Rift the Apex of MOBA Gameplay?

McKeifus·Apr 4, 2016·3 votes·358 views

Is it possible to improve upon Summoner's Rift? It seems that every MOBA has doubled down on the original DotA map, with very little in the way of improvements or changes through the years. HotS has added more bells and whistles(as Blizzard is wont to do), but has the same basic structure. Attempts to vary the map have met with varied success, ranging from the ever popular teamfighting twitchfest ARAM, to the now defunct Dominion. With rotating game modes Coming Soon(tm), is it possible that we might find a better competitive game type than 5v5 SR Classic? If so, what might that look like?

7 Comments

MinardeApr 5, 20162 votes

is it possible that we might find a better competitive game type than 5v5 SR Classic? If so, what might that look like?

Yeah, it was called Dominion. More riveting gameplay than Classic SR with minimal snowballing. On the other hand, Dom was much harder for beginners to get into than SR.

Seriously, how do you define "better"? Any changes are much more likely to help some things and hinder others than be unquestionably positive. SR isn't necessarily the best; it's the standard mostly due to having an inherited and established playerbase.

McKeifusApr 5, 20162 votes

I loved Dominion. I thought it was much more strategic, with more of a focus on resource allocation than farming. Pro players claim SR is about Resource management - and it is, to an extent - but a big part of it is managing minions and getting farm. Dominion was just great.

ValyrianBladeApr 4, 20161 votes

I'd like to see a map where there are MORE resources than there are champions.

I.e. on summoners rift, there are 3 lanes and a jungle (so 4 resources) but 5 players to share them between. Which means you need to best choose how to use that fifth player without a resource.

I'd be interested to see how it would work out if there were only 3 people per team on summoners rift for example. Would there be no jungler? Or would a lane be left empty and players would rotate to fill it as desired?

Of course the concept would work better on a map where rotations could take place more quickly, but the overall idea of more resources than players is something I haven't really seen. I guess balance would be hard though - anyone that could double dip on resources effectively would get ahead pretty easily.

McKeifusApr 5, 20161 votes

We really don't need another way for Yi to get fed, now do we!

Srsly tho, Dominion was kind of like this, and it worked well IMO. 5 points for 5 champs. If someone doubles up at a point, you have to either stall them or double up, or succeed 2v1. And the towers were actually scary if you couldn't get them shut down.

HotS does this well, with mercenary camps and secondary objectives. That game has its own host of problems, but the maps are much more interesting.

Miku Lv99Apr 4, 20161 votes

I think SR has the right idea, but it'd probably be more fun if there were some way that it wrapped around and you could get between the top and bottom lanes quickly. It kinda bothers me that mid is like the super roam lane and that the other lanes aren't allowed to participate in a lot of stuff that goes on in the lane far away from them.

McKeifusApr 5, 20161 votes

I actually kind of like Top Lane because of this. It is safe and quiet for when I just want to farm my life away.

ErockandrollApr 5, 20161 votes

[{quoted}](name=Miku Lv99,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=mzTE5O3K,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2016-04-04T23:10:42.356+0000)

I think SR has the right idea, but it'd probably be more fun if there were some way that it wrapped around and you could get between the top and bottom lanes quickly. It kinda bothers me that mid is like the super roam lane and that the other lanes aren't allowed to participate in a lot of stuff that goes on in the lane far away from them.

That might create a reciprocal problem of "mid lane becomes the island." if you could rap around like that.

That said, Use of TP allows you to quickly move across the map, in a controlled way. And in the duo lane, the support can usually be freed up to roam.

{quoted}

I actually kind of like Top Lane because of this. It is safe and quiet for when I just want to farm my life away.

That's the part that makes top lane scary. Because you spend the most time farming, you often end up with more gold and levels than any other role. So if the top laner get's ahead, they become ahead of everyone which can get frustrating, especially against duelists like Fiora.

That said, accomplishing that in YoloQ can be difficult. If your Mid and Bot lane get behind, the enemy Jungler will give you their undivided attention.