I REALLY like how the stats, weaknesses, planning and tactics are so involved with dota, but I'm solo. I have spent hours reading about how to play, practicing with bots and enjoying myself. But I have a horrible win/loss ratio because almost every game I'm in can be (and is) ruined by just one bad player and it happens far to often(auto-attacking, feeding, etc). I'm still very new to dota but I can see why LoL is more approachable since there isn't as much doom and gloom over picks and actions, especially for us that are new to mobas.

Am I off here? I'm I not taking enough time to level up in dota to get better match making? Give me a light at the end of this tunnel, because I can see really liking this game. Am I not looking in the right place. Is there a missing piece of the dota social circle that is keeping me from finding the right place?

@kenobi: learn to carry, and then carry yourself to high bracket where there are less of those sort of people. Only way.

OR, play with friends.

Practice more co op with bots at normal and then the hard level with a few heroes that you are comfortable with. I only play as Queen of Pain (150+ hours of just playing her) and I do fine. You just need to see more guides on how to play your selected heroes and then take them out into the field.

I've been playing mostly by myself and my win-rate is acceptable (about 45+%). The MM can be frustrating at times though, but if you play well most of the time it all evens out over time. You will have days where every game is quitters and feeders and then after a bad loss-streak you're set up against stacked teams with way more experience than you, but on the other hand you'll also have days where the opponents are feeding and you get excellent team-mates. In the end though, as long as you play well you're increasing the chance of the game being a good one, as there's one less person who could possibly ruin it for everyone.

Also, I dunno if this still going on, but when I jumped on the bandwagon there were some regular noob inhouses in the GB chat. Playing those helped me getting into the game a lot, without having to worry about any of the meta stuff. As mentioned in some other thread here, the game has a lot of tough lessons to learn, and getting past them will in most cases take a good portion of failing before you start seeing results. If anything I'd say the bright light at the end of the tunnel is the feeling of mastery you get once you get into good games and see all the stuff you've learnt actually pay off.