Dota 2, explained without the jargon.
Two teams of five. One map. A building at the back of each base that the other side is trying to knock down. Everything else in this game — the heroes, the items, the forty minutes of arguing — exists to serve that one sentence.
I am building a roster, and I want you on it.
Five salaried places at RM 100,000 a year. Full-time training, with me in the lobby — not watching from the side. One target: win the tournament.
The short version
If you only read one part of this site, read this bit.
Two teams
Radiant on the bottom left, Dire on the top right. Five players each, every one of them controlling a single hero for the whole match.
Three lanes
Three paths connect the bases, with a forest between them. Towers guard each lane, and a river cuts across the middle of the map.
One objective
Destroy the Ancient in the enemy base. Kills, farm and items are all just ways of getting close enough to do that.
One hero from each attribute
Every hero has a primary attribute — Strength, Agility, Intelligence or Universal — which decides what growing a level actually gives them.
Axe
Off lane · pos 3Walks in first, and wants to be hit.
Juggernaut
Safe lane · pos 1Spins away from trouble, spins into it too.
Lina
Mid · pos 2Two spells, one dead hero.
Windranger
Mid / off lane · pos 2-4Pins you to a tree, then reads the patch notes at you.
Why anyone puts up with it
Dota is famously unfriendly to beginners, and the reason is the same as the reason people stay: almost nothing has been taken out. Over a hundred heroes, two hundred items, and every one of them still interacts with every other one. A match is less a contest of reflexes than an argument about which of those interactions matters right now.
That is also why no two games feel the same. The same hero can be a farming carry in one match and a roaming support in the next, because the thing that changed was not the hero — it was the other nine people.