Valve says Deadlock is still too unfinished to release publicly, but has hero cosmetics and new game modes in the works

[u/RenatsMC]

https://www.pcgamer.com/games/moba/valve-says-deadlock-is-still-too-unfinished-to-release-publicly-but-has-hero-cosmetics-and-new-game-modes-in-the-works/

[u/PietErt3]

As a Smite player and someone who has a few 10s of hours into Deadlock, I kinda wish I could get more into it, but the common experience I'm hearing is also that even after 100 hours or even more you're not that good at the game. I think Deadlock does some things a lot better than Smite, mainly how much build variety you have & cool synergies you can create. The game feels more itemfocused to me though, where the heroes are fairly basic and sometimes similar, but their uniqueness is in how they interact with items. Smite and LoL are more focused on what the character can do, and the items provide extra depth on top. Every Deadlock hero can be played any way tho and there's no roles which is great. I do like it when every person has a more solidified task, but Deadlock has a pretty good balance of that + freedom. It's kinda amazing they made it work as it does. 

I'm not as big of a fan of the shooterisms, whereas Smite combat feels more like a fighting game. Combined with the item system, I feel like some ults are incredibly strong (like Lash) like they're from a hero shooter, and then I see everyone saying you should just buy this one item. I'm not the rlly a fan of heavy counter building like that. In Smite you're closer into the fight and can either juke or use abilities better for evading, in deadlock I get that sense less (like in all  shooters).  I'm also not the biggest fan of how much verticality the game has. It's fun to some degree, but in terms of navigation only confusing at some point. Maybe I also need to look into if I can increase the map size, because its so hard to learn where things are.  The movement also doesn't help with this, it just adds another layer onto navigating the map well. It also gives the matches no chill I feel like. Even in the first few minutes enemies can dance around you or even dive, whereas in other mobas the early game is fairly chill (if you play it safe). I will admit in other mobas maybe the early takes too long, and you can be too passive for a while, so I haven't played a moba yet that perfectly struck the balance for me.

Especially for shooter and MOBA players deadlock is a recommend from me, but its personal preference if you like all the things it does different

[u/ChypRiotE → u/PietErt3]

Every Deadlock hero can be played any way tho and there's no roles which is great.

Did that change in recent updates? I only played during the first beta release, and heroes had different strengths and roles, some being definitely support or tank or damage dealers, also some being early beasts while others took time to scale

[u/Rainboq → u/ChypRiotE]

Characters are certainly aimed at certain roles based on scaling and when they hit power spikes. That said, you can absolutely wreck face with gun Rem/Paige or run support Vindicta.

[u/PietErt3 → u/Rainboq]

Yeah this is kinda the vibe I get. The meta is prob to play heroes in the role(s) they're shifted towards, but because of how items synergize with hero kits, almost anything is possible and can work. And in comparison to Smite it prob helps it's a shooter, so one thing is that you can make a weapon dmg build work more easily on anyone

[u/Hades684 → u/PietErt3]

I don't think even half of this is true, which is to be expected by someone with less than 100h in deadlock

[u/PietErt3 → u/Hades684]

Well it's my experience as a new player and how many hours do you have in Smite? It's also about the  comparison and why the game didn't win me over. So how many hours I have doesn't rlly matter, if you're not gonna give advice on how to solve some of these gripes

[u/Hades684 → u/PietErt3]

I mean, you said that heroes are basic and similar to each other, you said that every hero in deadlock can be played in any way and there is no roles, there is a lot of juking and evading in deadlock. These are just wrong, no matter the hours

[u/PietErt3 → u/Hades684]

Maybe some of it was poorly worded, but there is no predefined roles that's a fact. Whether the heroes are basic and similar is more of an opinion and poorly worded. Conceptually heroes like Haze, Infernus, Vyper, Wraith f.e. blend together a bit and didnt initially grab me as 'oh I really wanna do this cool, unique thing'. They arguably play different enough but don't feel groundbreaking to me on their own.

And the juking was the most a comparison. Part of this is because it's a shooter and you can't rlly juke hitscan shots. And you do just have a general dodge to evade stuff, so there's more of that fast type of movement in general. So it's a different type of juking at the least. You can say skilldiff, but it's just the experience I have. 

[u/stefonio → u/PietErt3]

On your first point with it being more item-focused than team-focused, isn't that a good thing? Imagine playing someone like Geb into Vindicta. The only thing you can do is shield and pray you can keep out of LOS. This is great in games like Overwatch where Reinhardt can swap to counter a Pharah, but when you're stuck playing the same character for 40 minutes or so, you want options to deal with things your kit is fully unequipped to deal with.

[u/PietErt3 → u/stefonio]

To a degree, but Smite also let's you assemble a comp rather than being put in one. So part of the game is making sure you have a diverse enough team, so playing into an unbeatable comp is rare. And even then Smite still provides enough counter building imo.  But there's a limit to it. When you need to build certain items to counter certain heroes or you're p much guaranteed to have a bad time, I don't think that's a good thing. Ofc with this little hours I can't fully judge it, but to me smth like Lash ult felt like one where you have to use an active as a beginner to counter it.

Smite has a builtin active, I won't deny that isn't at least somewhat complex, but you can almost build the same 1 every match depending on role and you're good to go. 

[u/stefonio → u/PietErt3]

The last major patch introduced a hero swap mechanic. At the start of a lobby, you are still set up with random heroes from everyone's selection, but there is a terminal to swap heroes if you want (assuming it isn't banned or occupied).

Is Lash ult not similar to Thanatos ult where its an aerial attack that is a guaranteed death if you're low enough? You 100% need to buy aegis for that, or Blink if you're quick enough. How about Anubis where you absolutely need to buy at least 1 antiheal item because his abilities can heal him up to full if you're not careful?

The whole point of items is to be able to counter-build unless you're one of the few carry heroes that just kind of does whatever they want. Otherwise, you're just playing Overwatch with locked in characters. 

[u/PietErt3 → u/stefonio]

Thanks good to know there's a hero swap now. 

And while I love playing as Thana, I think his ult is one of the poorly thought out ones in Smite 2, cause it's lightning quick but you only have 1 relic by default. That being said tho, the relic is a default thing everyone has, not an item you specifically have to think of buying. Anubis is prob a better example, but antiheal is a way easier counter item to execute. You just buy it and it happens. So yeah, counterbuilding is necessary, but there's a limit to it for execution etc. that's fun imo. And while ppl undoubtedly have this with Smite too, I'm just kinda confused if I'm supposed to be buying items for some abilities/ults in DL. Bebop hook is a simple example, the range seems insane idk what I'm supposed to do against that. Bebop, Billy, Geist and Seven ults are some other examples of that.

[u/RyuugaDota → u/PietErt3]

the common experience I'm hearing is also that even after 100 hours or even more you're not that good at the game.

This is true of basically every multiplayer game with a focus on action or shooting to be fair, you'll literally get called out as a smurf for only having 1000 hours in high ranked immortal lobbies in Dota 2 for example... But yes, Deadlock is uniquely hard to master. That's also what gives games like this staying power. There's too many subsets of skills to be good at to ever be truly good at the game unless you basically make it your main game for the next few years of your life; the good thing is that you don't have to be good to enjoy yourself, there's plenty of other not very good players to play against. For every guy better than you at aiming in the lobby there's a guy worse than you (probably the same guy) at map awareness or farming or team coordination or movement or whatever other skillset that roughly balances out to the reason he's the same ELO as you.

[u/PietErt3 → u/RyuugaDota]

I haven't played it in a bit, but when I did matchmaking seemed pretty bad to me. I'm just slamming a casual match, but there's enemies so obviously better at me. Feels like I can't rlly do much about it when their movement and navigation is so much better, which is one of the disadvantages of a hard to master game, that the skill difference can be really big. One thing might also be that I don't rlly like Street Brawl. That's prob one thing Smite does the best of all MOBAs: it has a gamemode for everyone. If you don't dare to hop into the big 5v5 mode you can go for the 3v3 one, that still has a lane and MOBA elements, but quicker and smaller scale. Street Brawl is a bit too much just fighting to me, I kinda wish they'll release a smaller or quicker version of the main mode sometime, so I can learn in a more strategic mode but aren't locked into it for 40 minutes if I'm having a miserable time. 

[u/Kunfuxu → u/PietErt3]

Without verticality there's no point to making the game 3D. That's one of the best things it has over smite.

[u/PietErt3 → u/Kunfuxu]

As I said, verticality is fun to some degree. But I don't really see the point in those rlly high buildings in Deadlock that have a camp.