International Battle Pass + Compendium

Pretty much. I'm not saying that's happening, just that I'm suspicious Volvo has been wanting to do that for about a year now. This way we know exactly the right moment to start a riot :)

Are you implying that unlocking gated content like Champions isn't as bad as an occasional MMR reset? I beg to differ, one DIRECTLY affects gameplay while the other is just a paid chance to try and calibrate worse, the same or ideally higher. Like seriously if this is a chance for anybody to calibrate higher and never play ranked again then you don't belong at that MMR range anyways. I get that a lot of people are pretty hyped about the recalibration but let's step back a bit and try to understand it better.

Paid calibration is no different than if you made another account and grinded games to play ranked. Paid recalibration just saves time and whatever fluctuations there are will even out. Did everyone forget about that experiment where serveral players were given accounts with MMR far low or higher than they actually are? Dota 2 doesn't even reset their MMR until only recently but even then that paid recalibration takes into account of what your hidden MMR is and LETS you choose if you want to keep it.



Valve has always been transitioning to selling features like that, remember the "Infused" items or the Prismatic Gems? As long as Valve doesn't **** with the core gameplay and competitive integrity like Riot does with their game, I'm fine. They're a business, Valve invested a lot of resources into making Dota 2 and basically anything they do at Valve. There has to be a return of investment.

Where did I ever imply anything like that? I didn't. I said that what's becoming a paid feature of dota is actually free in LoL.

I said it's exactly the same thing to me. It may look like it's not as bad in dota, but the fact that Valve is starting to copycat LoL's business model implies that they'll continue doing it.



Except you have no reason to care what a prismatic gem is, because it's just some cosmetic stuff.

Paid recalibration has nothing cosmetic about it. It's a premium feature. And I expect others to pop up eventually.




For some reason I think we're already way past "return" on investment. I wonder why.

You still have to play the games to recalibrate. So the MMR grind part is still there.

im gonna tell you some things... This new mmr bs.. im mean its ****ed up.. the only people who play it are so ****ing bad.. you have to carry them if you want to win.. i just played a game with ember and went like 36-7.. 2 divines.. and we still managed to lose cuz others were really bad... idk about this, but im not playing this ****.. its all just a scam.. you will hardly get your mmr boosted in solo.. maybe party mmr. that would be probably easy since they dont what the hell is going on in the game.. havent tried that yet.. i played 2 games http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/2371787435.. this one ive won..hardly

You just agreed that they're as bad or at least in the same league; they're not and there's a misconception here. Do you know what LoL's business model is? To sell champions, skins and alternative ways that boost sales of selling more champions and skins. There's a reason why there is less than like 50% of viable champions. What Valve and Riot shares in common is selling skins, not selling characters that inherently and directly affects core gameplay. Now instead of alternative ways to boost sales of selling more champions and skins, it's alternative ways to sell more skins and features, so far iirc it's just calibration so far. So while they're quite similar, being Free to play, they're both inherently different.

Both companies are here to make money, make an investment and get a return. The return of investment doesn't stop once your profits match your investment; that wouldn't make sense if it did.



You don't think Prismatic Gem is a premium feature? Valve can just make it so for each item you can cycle through different colors you want for free if they wanted to but they didn't; similar to the different styles you can either get for free or pay for. Samething for the coloring of the river, you used to be able to do that in Dota 1 but it's now something you get through the compendium. You do care for it if you have a reason for it and in the case of Prismatic Gems; if you want to change the coloring of an effect of an item. Same idea applies to calibration, if you have a reason to recalibrate then you would do so and in my opinion it changes nothing. Both could be free and the only difference between the two is how many people want it.

Recalibration is useful for those that play a lot more normals than ranked, where they may or may not have significantly increased in skill. If you've already played 1000 ranked games and you're still stuck at whatever MMR you're at; well that's where you belong. Same idea applies in normals and if recalibration uses your normal MMR to calibrate your seasonal "International Ranked". Recalibration is a non-issue to me since it's just something that is no different that what you already can do.

What other features are there that are going to be paid and why is it going to be bad if it's an extra-type of feature? So far the features I can think of is Heroes (free), Replays (free), Matchmaking (free), Spectate (free and sometimes paid depending on tournament), Sandbox mode (free). Notice how many of these features are integral to having the strong competitive side of Dota 2. Features like Re-calibration is an extra that is NOT crucial, just because a lot of people want it doesn't always mean it's a crucial feature like... voice-comm. You see it in other games like HotS or LoL because that's how their match-making works, not Dota's (Not in CS:GO's either).

If it's a feature that is just an extra, not something that is crucial, and Valve decides to make it paid then I'm ok with it. If for example, I have to pay to play a hero; then I am strongly against since that affects competitive integrity (which Valve is so far maintaining). As long as Valve maintains this stance on competitive integrity, I'm perfectly fine as long as they don't add features that undermine it. Do you work? You get paid correct? Why should someone pay you for work you've done? This is what this conversation feels like, semantics.



That doesn't mean Valve should stop all efforts to make a ROI, that doesn't make sense as a business. If you don't like the idea of paid calibration then don't buy into it or don't play it. If you don't like any future ideas that are going to get paid then don't buy into it. The base game and crucial features like Replays, Spectate, Voice-comms, etc are free and that's a lot more than LoL; the other game you've made a comparison to where Riot made most of their content behind a paywall. If Valve however make something like replays a paid feature then I'd argue against that but they didn't.