League of Legends

You probably won't get a lot of loving responses here, as Stardock Made Demigod and lots of the the fans here think that If you are a fan of any other DotA style game you are a traitor. Regardless I love LoL, I play it all the time, I've been playing since the beta. If you want help I'd ask around on the official forums; they're very good and have some stickies in the guides section with basic tips for new people. Good luck!

I used to play it quite a lot until my old video card fried while in League of Legends( my advice, don't ramp up the detail, it will murder your top of the line card, no joke, keep the settings low). I especially loved the variety of the classes and they way they could be used to work with each other. I kinda hated the really cheap classes, like the ones that have near permanent stun. But they've probably balanced the classes over the last year a lot better.

In the end, it all comes down to team play. If your team, as an element, gets along well and plays well, you will win. But if there one guy, that one guy, that does everything in his power to get himself and yourself killed, it's just about game over.

My recommendations for  characters, if you want a great tank/damage dealer try Mordekaiser. If you want a really cheap, easy to play, ranged damage dealer, go for Ash, Morgana is a great support character, also Heimdinger and his sentries is fun. 

Also, don't call it an RTS, it about as RTS as Diablo. And again, keep the video settings low. 

Stardock did not make Demigod, it was developed by Gas Powered Games and published by Stardock. (edit: Stardock did do the netcode, so they didn't just publish)

The worst part about LoL and HoN is the excruciatingly bad community, which is easily the worst I've come across in any game. For some reason that type of competitive game attracts a lot of ragers. However, the gameplay is superior to demigod in many aspects (most importantly depth and character variety). Demigod only wins out in the graphics department.

I like LoL, however, sometimes the devs just randomly decide to totally revamp the flow of the game and in may cases the rest of us are just going...wtf... was that supposed to improve something?  Other times their changes increase whatever issue they tell us they are trying to decrease.  Oh well though.  LoL is generally a good game.  Since it is free, i would suggest trying it.  It has an item shop style set up however; you can not buy ingame power, which is not available for free, with cash.  You can buy new skins and unlock new champions with cash, but you can also buy all champions with IP points which you gain from playing the game.  Runes which give your champion a small ingame boost can only be purchased with IP.  Recently they dramatically reduced IP gained per match so they are clearly pushing players towards buying new champions with cash.  The up side is that since new champions are their main income source they are constantly putting out new ones.

its called balancing

I love this game! I play it since beta (and i`ve also played a bit Warcraft 3 Dota Allstars).

But as unacomn said

I`m playing almost only with my friends since half a year. If we meet unfriendly people (in about 70% games this happens... ), we just make brutal jokes  Worst thing it is to have "pro" or just uneasy person in your own team. This turns game to be a bit nervous.

So if you like to play with someone nice and friendly just type my nick in game.

Never dared to play since you have to pay monthly fee I believe... Therefore:

League of Legends is free, there's no monthly fee.

Not just free, but one of the more balanced pay versus free models. The only thing truly exclusive to people who pay are different skins. Otherwise, everyone has access to the same champions, etc.

is that true?  I thought you could buy champions and then they were yours forever.  After that, there is a rotating roster of champs.  So, if you are awesome with 1 champ and you bought, then you can keep playing that champ over and over.  I'm pretty sure that is how it works, but not 100%.

At any rate, the free to play model is awesome, imo.  Ask me if I wish Demigod was free to play (as I suddenly notice a balance/bugfix patch being released - oh wait...).  Anyway, the biggest adv of the free to play model is that the games generally receive updates that are free to users LONG after the game has been launched.  In standard (non free to play land), the game reaches that "NO MORE PATCHES" realm that signals the end.  This is because the model is drastically different.  With normal games, it generally does not pay to have a staff releasing continuous updates ad nauseum.  I mean, there is a point where it becomes unprofitable for a dev to crank out patches.  In the free to play market, that point comes AFTER the game is dead.  And even then, that happens much later because the initial release is not viewed as 50% of the profit base.  Its a long term commitment to updates to a game.  Anyway, I wish demigod was F2P because we'd still be seeing updates.  I'm pretty confident that I could develop a F2P version of DG that would rake in the dough... but perhaps I'm crazy. 

While there is some truth to that, it isn't entirely accurate. LoL's real problem with the community is that the majority of the leavers and ragers end near to the bottom ranks of the game, just where new players are placed. So the first real introduction new player get to LoL is one of hate-spewing poisonous wretches. When (if) you start getting into the game you will find that leavers, AFKs, and ragers become less and less common. Of course, it seems a lot of people either A: give up and leave, or B: become ragers themselves, long before they escape the lower ranks.

Yes, every week there is a rotating roster of (10 or 12?) free champions to play, and you can buy champions which are then unlocked forever. However, you can buy them with bough the premium paid currency or the regular currency you earn each map. No champions are exclusive to paying players, merely the unique skins.

I have to agree. Free-to-play games are certainly shaping up to have longer cycles of developer support than traditional games. They seem to straddle the no-man's-land between AAA games which are barely out of the gates before the team moves on to the next iteration, and open source or otherwise truly free games (such as Dwarf Fortress or Wesnoth), which look like they will never truly die.

Agreed - I honestly can't imagine a hard core LoL player that wouldn't buy a character that they loved (be it with IP or currency... and I believe that the recent changes that make it more difficult to buy with IP are for the better.  Why shouldn't you be willing to pay a few bucks to use a character that you love when you really enjoy the game (and didn't pay a dime for it)?  The same would go for me if DG was F2P.  I'd eventually buy up all of the characters for variety sake.  Each character in DG has something unique to add to the mix.  I assume that's the same for LoL. 

LoL has a lot of variety with no more overlap than can be expected of that arena-type game. That said, some characters are so geared towards a particular play-style or mindset that they just aren't my thing, and I can't see myself ever picking them up for actual cash. With IP, when I've exhausted all other options? Sure, why not.

Oh so it's free? Then I might give it a try... but ya, I've heard that the community is pretty harsh ! And new comers have a very hard time.

I don't know if I want to play a game where newcomers are treated harshly and dismembered immediately to make them hate the game at their first play

So, do the poeple who doesn't pay have a big disadvantage towards poeple who pay? That's how it happens in the Free to play usually, you're kind of forced to pay if you want to follow up with the other.

Oh well, if not, I'll stick with DotA on SC2, they did a pretty amazing job with that one... It just get very repetitive since there's only one map, the same old map you know by heart with Protoss against Zerg.

Before lvl 10, you won`t meet many harsh people (because of matchmaking system. You can`t be linked to "pro" on low lvl).
After lvl 10, play with friends

Transaction model in LoL is the best one i`ve seen in online games. Poeple who don`t want to pay, have no disadvantage! Ok, maybe if you want to have all characters from start, and all avaliable skins...

It would be quite nice, to form a LoL team from this forum (especialy that this online community is one of the best i know). Just don`t tell Lord Xia about this :>

It is free, and no mechanical advantage is bestowed upon players who do pay. The closest paying players get to an advantage are experience and IP (the earned currency) boosts. While these boosts will help paying customers unlock content faster, it doesn't give them access to any abilities, champions, etc, that are superior to those available to everyone else.

In fact, runes, which are the primary currency-sink in the game, can only be purchased with IP. These runes are the most powerful way to customize your champion, and are the foundation of pretty much every champion strategy. You achieve wildly different builds on the same champ by switching up your rune set. This really helps to keep a balance between paying an non-paying customers; The most powerful items can't be purchased with real-world cash. You have to play to get them.

And while buying an IP boost WILL speed things up, you are still limited by how good you are and how much you play.

Back to the LoL community. You will run into griefers, quiters, and ragers, and earlier rather than later. All I can really say is it does get better as you traverse the ranks.

As with all communities of games of this types, you will run into griefers and 12 year old internet tough guys.  Just use your ignore function.  Once you start doing that its really not so bad.  Especially in normal mode, most people are really just fine.  Ranked is a bit ragier, but you dont have to play ranked if you cant handle that kind of nonsense.

If I play it's for fun, I'm no rager who target the 1st place !

I'd be up to try playing with some of you some friendly games here and there if we can setup a timeframe etc. (because I have a wife and kids so I need to plan a lot those stuff in advance)

I'll weigh in since I have played over 1600 games total.  For reference games are typically 20-60 minutes each.

Pros:

It's free

You can't buy power

Always a game available

Quick match making (solo or with friends)  <--- Lacking this feature killed Demigod in my opinion

Lots of variety

Subtly complex

You can ignore people in chat

Cons:

People like to talk trash, are rude, etc.  (you get crap from your own team too)

Leavers and people away from keys (less of a problem at higher levels)

First few level are not kind to new players (experienced players create new accounts to pick on new players - down side to free account creation)

I've spent more time and money on this free game than any game I've ever played.  I feel good about supporting them with money because it's my choice and i want the game to continue to grow.  However, money is not required.  Spread the word.  It's a great game.

I'll be willing to play with anyone here. While I've only got about 300 games under my belt, I'm not terrible

iam on eu

Okay, I've done the tutorial and 2 games against the AI with a team of random players and I really liked it   but the computer kicked our ass both time ! lol

That DAMN Annie !!!! Gosh she's awesome I think !

I think it's a great idea to have players vs. AI, that's what I like in games and force players to be more friendly and work together... And it's only recent from what I understood so Thumbs up !!!

I would be ready to form a team with any of you and plan a game against the AI.

I seriously think about spending some money to unlock some characters. There's a bundle with the favorite characters from players which seems quite incredible.

I did not understand the rune system yet and did not decide where to spend my skill points and in what tree... I'm waiting to have more experience with the game for that.

So, I'm waiting for you

Dont buy runes until you hit level 20 and can use tier 3 runes.  You are wasting IP otherwise.  Where you put mastery points isnt a huge deal early on - just go with what makes the most sense and dont stress out about it.

Annie is indeed good and is a good character to learn how to play with.  She farms well and her skills encourage you to last hit properly.  Plus she is strong in general.