Thank God It's FriDota: The All Hero Challenge 07/21/17

Glad to see DOTA 2 content back on the site.

Love the new Dota content! Keep it coming Ben and Brad.

Tried a few MOBAs but never got in to any of them. This was a really cool feature to watch and can't wait for more episodes! It's nice to see some of the west coast staff really passionate about a game and it's also nice that Ben can give direction while Brad can just chill and play and not feel too much pressure.

I almost want to go play some Dota 2 now.

Almost.

But no, seriously, this is a great format and wise Ben on the mountain puts out exactly the sort of tone that makes Dota feel like something other than just a giant pain in the rear for everyone involved.

@bucklebutt: yup, the same thought crossed my mind!

Glad to see a new series! I stopped playing DotA a while back after 9 long years, but this was entertaining.

@passivespiral: No, it's really not a repackaging. Daily Dota was simply an informal stream of matches with friends. By way of committing to the All-Hero Challenge and putting Ben in the coaching seat, this series fits into a much more educational mold. Brad will actually be branching out of his comfort zone with the help of Ben, and the audience will be informed along the way.

I really enjoyed this video. As someone put it above me, Ben being the one who's mainly talking and Brad playing made it that much better. I'm excited for this as I always love to watch DOTA 2 being played, whether its from pro tournaments to videos like this.

i was just thinking about how much i missed the daily dota.

Ben seems very knowledgeable about the stuff he talks about I noticed. Big plus for him. Nice video.

@agemyth: Was funny to hear almost everyone in the room ask Jeff to turn off the colour blind mode on Doom when he was playing on a UPF, it looked completely normal to me as it does Jeff unsurprisingly.

This was more fun than I'd expected, and Ben did a great job!

Every year around International time, I feel like I should be playing some Dota, but I know it's ultimately a bad idea. This series will be fun to follow though, if for no other reason than to see if the quality of this first match was a complete fluke or if the toxicity is maybe somewhat overblown.

Godspeed, rudds.

This made me want to try dota now i dont know how i feel

@oni: Hey i kinda agree, West hasn't really but out any series in a while besides ranking of fighters and its been months since the last one of those.

I feel that is just leading into a semantics argument - it would be like trying to tell someone who isn't interested in Hitman that the videos where they do the Elusive Targets is completely different than the ones where they did Featured Contracts. Sure, they may have put a twist on it, but it's still them going back to play more of the same game. It's fine, I knew the day Ben got hired and I read the bio that Vinny wrote where it said Ben has played like 5000 hrs of Dota that this would become a thing. I'm actually surprised it took them this long to get around to it. Personally, I would have preferred something new instead of a variation of something they've already done, but that's just my opinion.

Edit: To be clear, this is not a Ben or GBWest complaint. I felt the same way about GBEast when they decided to do a Yakuza series as a follow up to the Shenmue ER.

I don't play DOTA but I'm always fascinated to see people play and dive into very technical games. I can get down with a weekly FriDOTA.

I have no interest in, and know nothing about DOTA.

Enjoyed this because Brad and Ben were obviously having a good time.

This turned out to be really fun! It started out a bit shaky, but once Brad had the hang of the hero, he threw out some game winning ults. Having Ben pointing out the general outlines of how a game should go made Brad play pretty damn good for the first time on Disruptor.

Pleasantly surprised with Ben's coaching as well, making the connection between good warding spots and objectives instead of just pointing out some spots, is something that slowly will start to stick with Brad whenever he wonders where to ward. The item choices were excellent as well; Most people don't like to buy a ghost scepter because it's such a one dimensional item that doesn't really makes your hero progress, but against this lineup it was amazing. It's real easy to stop thinking about the matchup and follow a guide for items regardless of what your team needs. Having Ben give suggestions helps a ton.

Brad just needs to get a bit more used to recognizing when his items are needed. And look for allies he can force staff away from lifestealer. The beauty of disruptor is that you can be rediculously far away from most damage dealers, which means your items can be mostly used to keep your allies safe. Having a button dedicated to a defensive item and a button dedicated to your main utility item is real useful to get that muscle memory down. I use two sidebuttons on the mouse for this.

@benpack In the future, maybe start the episode by covering what each spell does and how it is typically used. It's educational for the non-dota people and Brad would probably enjoy it too since he didn't know how most of the spells worked or how the thunder strike and glimpse could be used effectively together. Knowing that Q and E give vision would be pretty huge for him in some of these fights, where he goes out too far in front because he has no uphill vision. Thanks for the awesome episode!

I have never played DOTA and have very little interest in the game but this ended up being a lot of fun to watch. Ben and Brad have a great rapport and Ben's doing a good job explaining things, I actually know stuff about this game now.

@passivespiral: :shrug: If it feels semantic to you, that's fair. To me, it's semantics for Beast In the East to be a separate series from Endurance Run when all they changed was the release schedule. Features like Steal My Sunshine and the holiday Hitman special *do* feel different and more engaging to me -- despite not liking those games -- because they have a specific conceit.

I will probably never ever play Dota because I don't have the time or patience to learn it and don't have friends who play it, but I weirdly enough love watching Dota content on this site. This was a lot of fun.

@oni: You were in the chat during the livestream saying similar things, if I remember. Again, as a few people said there - there's a myriad of content out there that you might like or not like man, but there are plenty of others surrounding you which do enjoy it. No one person is going to have all of their interests met and/or aligning with the content on the site.

Also I love this hashtag content give me more of it directly into the eyeballs pls

Good stuff, seems like a fun show.

I've Ben waiting for this feature to show up. Excited to watch it. Hope it doesn't end up b(R)ad.

I don't like DoTA and I haven't liked DoTA content on this site before but this format is really good. Watching Ben spectate and coach Brad is so so much better than watching Brad play straight up it's not even funny. I'm actually looking forward to the next episode so good work guys.

I really enjoyed this even as an outsider to Dota and having someone like Ben who knows what he's doing (or at least sounds like he knows what he's doing to me) really helps me understand a lot of what's going on here. I like a lot about Dota aesthetically but this seems too complex and with that dizzying number of heroes and a purchasing system during the match it overwhelms me a bit.

I almost kinda wish there was someone on staff who was into Overwatch this much as that is my particular brand of team-based fun times.

Good video; glad to see dota content back on the site. Ben is a good/the worst influence.

I think the dynamic between the two of them is really solid, and I look forward to this series several episodes in as Ben gets better and better as the cameraman.

@oni: Not all content is going to be for everyone...

I'm a HotS casual but this was really fun to watch, should be a great series! @benpack I noticed you have Warframe installed, that game rules and there's an active GB clan, would be cool to revisit some coverage since it's been through a million updates since the site first looked at it.

Generally speaking the West crew's tastes and mine don't align as I don't care for wrestling or fighting games and I thought a DOTA stream would also be outside my interest but I enjoyed this feature. I watched the Daily DOTA back in the day but it was hard to figure out what was happening so having Ben give coaching to Brad helped bring the game down to my level of understanding. Good job guys.

I think it would be cool if after the live stream you could find this game and spectate it while sync'ing up the video so you could listen to Ben and Brad but have control of the camera to watch the game, extra credit for watching in VR via the Vive too.

I love this series idea, what a great pilot episode.

The problem with Dota(theonly one I swear) is it doesn't seem to allow you to casually experiment with heroes. Or mor the community doesn't even in non ranked matches. Pick the right hero or else. Or stick to praticing against bots for eternity to learn them all, I suppose,

@chumm: Not to mention the game is getting a semi-open world update in the future (this year I hope) which looks awesome.

I really like all kinds of Dota 2 content, so I'm glad you guys decided to start this series.

You could have called this series Rise of the Tryhard. That's really all the input I have. Glad to see some Dota stuff on here!

Edit: Ben, if it's just you and Brad, the chat does not matter at all. Camera is everything. Missed like 3 fights..

Dota 2 is intimidating as hell, thankful I at least have Heroes of the Storm where I don't suck quite so bad. Dota 2 always seems so overwhelming so I wouldn't mind seeing more Dota on Giant Bomb to learn some things.

Yay more DOTA 2 :]

The mini map on the bottom Right is driving me crazy!

What's with the groupies in here sucking on the GB stick??? Constructive criticism, freedom of speech and the possibility of this not catering to all is suddenly to be censored? Oni made a valid point and all of the sudden he/she gets rushed by a pack of wolves for having a pair? Man f#@k this shit, If you want to argue a point, STAY on point. Dont belittle his/hers with irrelevant and unjust comments that weren't in anyway stated. Dude laid it down as day 1 member, stating GB East had the juice, and lately many others think so too. That's all in the spirit of this community to yield out and speak your piece, as GB West can consider all inputs and work on their content. Making someone sound like they are a crazy individual and outright unfair in their criticism is just abominable. Be it a minority that feels this way, it's still something to take in consideration and a voice with equal rights to yours. FFS

@Billvok and sundancer in particular.

@sirpsychosexy: You can see it at the end of the video he is 2.9k.

I'd like to see Ben explain some the the terminology from time to time, cause it does get a little confusing.

more dota pls <3

I don't care about DOTA.

But I'll watch the crew play their favorite games. Brad and Ben had a great time and the video was fun to watch. I'd watch another one.

finishing the all-hero challenge is the closest feeling to "beating the game" that is dota2. After winning with every hero i now main roaming supports, murdering the actual players is fun'r to me than creeps :D can't wait to see your Meepo i mean micro but im fairly confident in you being as you were like diamond StarCraft and invoker is ez just play the fire spirit one and sunstrike sure things like legion duel, chrono, or long stuns. loved this, need more !!

I don't play DOTA, but I had a very enjoyable time. Ben and Brad are great at hosting DOTA matches. I found it to be engaging, and informative.

I think this really needs someone not into DotA so that none dotaers relate to someone. I love this so much tho. Keep up the good work.

@bamse:

.....Not really seeing that? Maybe one dude calling him out for complaining in the chat? I'm not saying @oni shouldn't be able to voice his opinion, I think it's his comment just it doesn't really serve anything it's not really criticism. Wouldn't the survey/forum be a better venue to discuss these things? The point is, I don't care if you don't like Dota 2. The same way I am positive you don't care that I loathe SM Sunshine, it doesn't mean I'm going to go into the comments and leave "constructive" criticism.

I probably shouldn't have watched this. I've been clean for about a year now but watching this video is giving me the itch to get back playing.