Thundercles

I think you make some interesting points here.  Absolutely, I agree with you that there remain balance issues with the game.  Certain demigods (Rook, QoT) need some buffs and many items need slight adjustments (lower cost, stronger effects) to make them more valuable and competitive. 

Just as a quick example:  I can look at the Armor items and see a use for every single one.  In fact, I think I've used all of them at one point or another in various games and thought them useful.  But the same cannot be said for the Helms, or Trinkets, or Artifacts for that matter (not that the Artifacts aren't all useful, just that a couple seem to be used far more often than others). 

But really, what I wanted to say was that balance is a slow and careful process that definitely takes time, and involves the entire community of players.  DG has only been out for a few months, and while that may seem like an eternity to those who play daily, I tend towards more conservatism in the whole "nerf-this" "buff-that" anger that infests the player-base with odd regularity.

I hope that 1.2 makes some balance changes that we can all agree on and that players continue to offer constructive feedback about exploits and tricks that the developers just didn't have enough time and play-experience to predict would occur (e.g. Horn of Battle).

I'm also hoping that by removing Custom games from any sort of ranking system (maybe not now, but one day soon), players will be more willing to experiment with different DG and item builds.  Of course, there's always the competitive spirit to drive people to always want to win, and for that, we definitely need some additional balancing.

  U Sir r right (the OP). Can't add anything else. And thats why "elitist" players ask to balance the game on the competitive lvl of play and not on the casual lvl. Well, lets hope things change in the future

I stop reading at this point. The OP is talking about competitive lvl of play, not pubstomp. There is no good Regulus there, evenless a Cloack of the Night Regulus there.

who ever told you that is a noob. although if the people at the highest level are choosing the same items over and over again, there is something wrong with the games mechanics.

Personally I think the problem is rank 1 monk idols, not BotF itself.

Regardless even in high level matches I still see a good selection of items. BotF may be the most popular, but others have their strong points, albeit not on all maps.

I would say that for anyone but UB the Staff of Renewal is superior to BotF, on Leviathan the Cape of Plentiful Mana is superior situationally, Heaven's Wrath gets use on the larger maps, etc. etc.

There is variety, but if you wanted even more I think even a modest nerf like dropping BotF to 700 or 650 HP would be sufficient.

I'm with you.  Why worry about creating new imbalances by getting rid of old ones?  If anything it seems like that would freshen the game up by making people think up new ways to win.  Also, I remember how freaked out people were when Bite was overnerfed.  A shame how that made the few people who still play Erebus nowadays <--sarcasm--> never use bite anymore.

Seems like most of those alternate favor items are assassin only.  My original post wasn't very clear, but I meant the Monk/BloodOTF combos early/mid game dominance.  I'm probably not a good enough player to even be commenting on this subject.  All I know, is the few times I've been in games with really good players, I could hold my own a lot better with BotF which coincidentally was what they all seemed to be using if they were playing generals.  When I had cloak, all I used it for was to blink away to safety cause I couldn't hang near the fight.

I know you have an extremely effective late game with Rook using staff of renewal.  If it works for you in top level games, then right on.

I was referring to the video of SD vs PCG.  I thought I saw Frogboy buying Vinling Helmet on Cataract but I must have been mistaken cause I've played with him before and he seems like he knows how to play the game pretty well. 

I crunched the numbers though, and Vinling ain't that great even on Leviathan.  Am I missing something?  Once you have Plenor (which I assume you would already have, since its better and costs half as much) you're almost always better off by getting Vlemish.  I mean, I guess if you were a level 10+ TB who had Essence of Magic it would get you slightly more mana per sec but it would still be more expensive.  Did you mean in addition to the Plenor/Vlemish combo?  Cause thats a lot of mana slots...

Sedna seems so dominant early game maybe she's the exception.  Or more likely, I just don't know what I'm talking about.

You're right that Cloak is better late game, but try playing with other generals and see how fun it is getting pushed off the lane over and over, and always losing fights over flags cause the other guy has 60% more HP than you (which means his monks are healing for 60% more as well) and see if you're using your Cloak more as a finisher or an escape mechanism later in the game.  In my experience, its been the latter.

My bad, I thought we were talking about the 1500g helm, not the 3300 g helm.

I've seen Erebus getting Cloak with some success. Oak and Queen... not so much. For Sedna, though, it becomes a nice utility. You can blink-heal, blink-pounce, blink-lock... etc. The monks don't keep us (bad) and there are other issues, but since Sedna is so powerful early game, and the small mana boost the cloak gives you == heals (roughly one heal, so that's a 600 hp extension, almost as good as Blood),

However, if you're using Cloak as a finisher, there is still something wrong with that. it's not a finisher, or any sole role. It's a utility ability that fulfills many uses (dodging Rook attacks, cancels snares, covering small ground fast, etc).

I consider myself as a good player and i usually never play BotF and take anklet instead. I just love being fast and have a free slot without need to buy boots of speed. The lack of HP at the beginning is not a problem at all, just buy Unbreable Boots after 1 or 2 minutes and ur fine.

I played another nameless game. I came back for a game of Demigod and made me realise the strengths this game has (I played one of my best games ever, where we came back from a first half bashing, caught up, then narrowly snatched the victory).

This game is very strategic.

The problems it faces is that it is very limited, for a beginner it seems like a big learning curve, however after about 1 month of play, most players will be aware what works and what doesn't.

Given the type of genre, I think this is a big weakness. Unlike pure strategy games, you cannot go into the depth of improving your game over time. This game has a very steep initial curve, then plateaus out, as the emphasis is closely on team work in small teams. Having a high APM in Demigod is no real advantage, it is pretty streamlined, there is no micro to take care of. You cannot really improve your skills through practising micro.

Part of the attraction of playing traditional strategy games, is that as an individual player you can practise and improve by using micro and advanced techniques, like dancing chars to avoid damage, combining abilities from different units or co-ordinating attacks in two different places. This game misses that to some extent, it would be nice if there were more options, I don't think we will see them though. The game has gone into a critical non-mass.

It is a nice looking game and I will still pop on for a game or two, especially with the new DGs, however, this game will unlikely become competitive. I don't feel there is enough depth in the mechanics to allow that. That will appeal to some players, I would imagine to the more casual community.

DG is a great intro to the emerging MOBA genre, however, it would need to significantly increase on it's depth of gameplay to become a big multiplayer hit. Perhaps with DG2 if they have made enough money on this release.

I extensively use the Cloak of Night with my Shield Queen build and it has saved my life very, very often because QoT is so slow that practically every Demigod but the Rook can chase her. If the Rook gets Poisoned Arrows, even he will be faster.

Its mana regeneration (+4mana /sec) is enhanced by the closed mode mana regeneration bonus (+50% mana regeneration) and you can also use it to rarely get very nice teleport kills. On Crucible I also use it to quickly get to the gold flag in the beginning or to go back to the shop.

You can not use it to cancel snares and I was almost never fast enough to avoid Hammer Slams. I'm better at anticipating Slams and avoiding them by crawling around directly beneath the Rook.

I agree there is some truth to the premise of this thread.  I don't agree with the specific example of BotF though.  I only have one build that uses that, which is my health stacking Sedna.  I want so much hp that I only need my priests healing me to keep going.  Outside of that there are so many better options depending on the DG you're playing.

There are still far to many useless items, and favor items in particular could use a going over.

Ok, I concede that I'm prone to exageration and have no business commenting on the choice of favor items for top level players, since I don't  play those guys enough and am far away from their level.  Can we please forget about what I said about Blood Of The Fallen.  Apparently, it is not the primary choice of favor items for top players, just the only way I've personally found to stay competitive against them for the early game at least.

I still believe I have an excellent point in the overall balancing of the game and perhaps have hit upon the reason for it so hopefully we can talk about that instead.  So let me break it down:

-As the competition level in this game increases, your options for viable items and builds and some would say demigods diminish.  Some guy with 50 games under his belt picks the goggle favor item when playing with people with similar experience, I'm not sure its going to make that much of a difference.  IamKira plays Ivorgor using the goggles... ummm, ass handed to him on a silver platter is the expression that comes to mind.  Everyone agree, or is that just my theory?

-Frogboy and Stardock are not in charge of balancing this game.  GPG is but I don't know anyone who actually plays the game they developed online, maybe they do it ingognito so pricks like me won't use their gameplay as an example.  However, Stardock is this forum communities only bridge of communication about issues such as balance, so its interesting to hear Frogboy talk about their match with PCG and mention the key to Team PCG's victory being flag locks and map control.  When I watched the replay again and noticed Frogboys first mana item pickup was the Vinling Helmet, I thought to myself that would be a much better indication of why they lost.  Do the folks at GPG also think that Vinling Helmet is a usable item?  If so, I guess the game continues as is:  A lot of useless items and a few useless demigod skills, but still a lot of fun.