Dotafire is going into a bad direction

hai gais.

I'm see this thread and come back to live <3

i sortoff weaned off dotofier for the same reasons :c

Okay, first off thanks Michi for starting this thread, this was well needed because if there is a problem we need to discuss it not keep it bottled up and have it spam other threads.

This is sadly a common pitfall of closed systems, where there are few people, few new people coming in and a certain lack of new ideas. There was this problem in small villages a century ago with all the bad gossiping, there is this problem right now inside small teams at the workplace, etc. Small groups tend to lead to clan wars, that's just how humans work...

Also there's the issue of the salt from the game itself rubbing off on the members. It's pretty hard to keep a perfectly salt-free placed called dotafire from the ocean of salt called "solo queue ranked". Some slip-ups can happen and this explains at least the ranting. I agree that ranting can be annoying at times, but it doesn't target anyone personally besides the Frog, so I don't think anyone here should take offense from that (unless they're secretly Icefrog of course XD).

Also in my opinion there is no reason to be afraid to post because of fear of creating text wars. We have moderators to deal with that kind of thing. Janitsu and Hades are here to ensure that the arguments remain within the bounds of polite discussion : disagreeing with someone is fine and can even be really constructive in some cases, however any kind of personal targeting, even indirect, is for moderators to deal with. So don't be afraid to say what you want because you're afraid of getting flamed...there are mods to protect you from that and so far they're doing a pretty good job at it.

As for how to deal with this issue, I'd say inhouses and in general playing games together as a community, not within a small circle of friends. For example I was always surprised that there wasn't some sore of lobby with forum members to play 5-stack pubs with. There is the inhouse lobby, but we could say this is a meeting place for all members to meet up and play pubs at any time for example. This would be a great way for new members to socialize for example.

For inhouses, I feel a lot of people want to make one but they don't because they feel some sort of "big wig" needs to step in to make one. Anyone can make a thread. I'd actually make a lot of them myself, the only issue is that I don't have time to join right now.

Ty all for your responses!
I might not be able to answer every response but they mean a lot to me!

Sorry to hear you feel this way Michi. Over the many (!) years I've been here there's always been highs and lows - golden times and ones that were less so. The way we're feeling about the game can also make a big impact.

Things can be rough and tumble at the moment, and I think maybe we need to consider how we talk to each other and be more thoughtful about how our messages can come across. Less about "winning" the discussion than having a good one.

We also need to strongly consider how new people feel when we respond to their posts in particular. If they see it being derailed or become aggressive, they probably think "uh oh I'd better shut up" and go back to lurking. This certainly doesn't happen every time, but it's something to consider before hitting the post button.

Unfortunately I just don't have the time to contribute like I used to, but I definitely like to check in regularly and join in where appropriate. Over the years various other sites have tried to recruit me, often with monetary offers, to write or make videoes for them. Even then, it takes so long to do I've never really got involved.

The new Discord channel may help us get more games together, and we should probably all make more effort to work together to make this a good place to be.

Honestly, I don't know what changes myself, and it does sadden me so that some people might think like you Michi, probably even I do unwittingly.

You know, even if I rarely post anything I'm always around, like every day I read every new thread in this forum, each drama and people fighting each other, just... I can't particularly bring myself to post here.

Even then, I still feel Dotafire is like my home. I'll try and do anything to help getting it back there.

Please, don't give up on this site guys.

That is what happens when forums stagnate and there is no new people in my opinion so you're going to immediately see these type of discussions. Sure we get like one or two new active users every full moon but it's going to be the same 10? people most of the time. Why this is important because the very thing you want to see in forums are only going to progress into this type of discussion if there are no new people visiting Dotafire imo. Players are going to get better so the discussion will go into things that start to make sense for people and not just theories.

I personally haven't been paying attention to many of the discussions here, why? None of it is new discussion for me or topics that I really care about so the only threads I usually go into are people asking about certain questions and what not.

So it's a combination of things imo, stagnation and players getting better thus a "new direction" in topics. I'm only still visiting this site because I've met some long lasting Romanian punks here but I've practically have no hope for this site to grow unless the owners of the site give a ****. I'm not talking about visual updates like the one we had, 1 or 2 years ago. I'm talking about creating content like video guide contest or what not to spark interest in forums. I've been on this site for like 5+ years and there is no progress at all.

Dear michimatsch,

I hope you're doing well, thanks for passing by and telling us how you feel, I really appreciate it. I honestly care and miss every member of this community that had an impact over our community; bad or good, they shaped us in a way or another.

I understand your concern, it always brightens my day to see that people really care about our community, after all, it's hours of time and dedication we're spending here.

Please, DOTAFire was always about friendliness and free speech, people come here to form friendships and speak their mind without people judging or flaming them, even if some times people disagree and turn "competitive" and start a war, it's no reason to be sad. If someone is hostile and disagrees or simply doesn't like you or your views, just ignore that person and stay with us.

Don't let a conflict or an user make you feel fear to post or make you stop posting at all, ALWAYS when you feel like discussing or simply talking freely about your dota needs or even your mind, DOTAFire is always here, listens, discusses and shares.

We've always been friendly and non-toxic, at least that's what I've always believed and that's what made me happy about this community; it's unique in a good way.

Recently I've came up with some good ideas and thoughts to boost up the morale and status of DOTAFire, but I cannot make progress without the members of DOTAFire.

Also, even if I don't post much, I'm still here whenever anyone needs me, so if you have something on your mind that you think I could ever help with, feel free to let me know!

Thanks once again for sharing your mind, I don't know if this post will help, but these are some of my views and feelings.

P.S. I've just created a Discord server for DOTAFire, I dream of the days when people will gather here, play together and always be online to chat! :D (and share a meme or two); PM me for an invite!
P.S. I sometimes have my negative pessimistic depressive thoughts and stances too, it's fine, it happens to people that overthink and care too much, it's not bad, you just have to talk to someone and realize that everything's going to be okay! :D

You're right in every regard. That's part of the reason I have left Dota and started up League; all my friends play League and not having the community here to just talk with about Dota has really made gameplay less enjoyable. This used to be a group of friends just having fun with a game and now its... not.

Note: Mobafire is a *cluttered* website to say the least where the only threads that get attention are the ones that have some form of arguement or they have 200 pages. Impossible to get your guide noticed... thats where I see Dotasfire going at the rate its going.

Hey Michi. I'm glad you're doing okay. I did kind of miss you, in my head I was like "where is Michi, he is usually engaged in this stuff".

But if you're looking for why Dotafire changed... Well, the site brought us close, and we made the friends we wanted to make. Now we stick in our own groups, we don't view ourselves as one collective anymore, we've chosen our favorite people and now just kinda hang with them. That's why a lot of the people don't really joke with each other anymore (memes don't count, if it took no creativity, you're not exerting effort towards building friendship).

We don't have many open discussions as of recently, it's just declarations. A lot of people who speak never ask others what they think and why, they just drop their opinion into the well and leave. This scares people off from wanting to speak, since it kind of gives the vibe that we will not yield our thoughts, after all, who wants to discuss things when the impression is "If I can't get this person to change their mindset, what is the point of talking on the forum?". So now there is kind of a path towards an echo chamber. As part of everyone kind of knowing each other now, we know who is and isn't prone to having open discussions.

You're not the only one that's left too. When was the last time you saw Bunkan regularly? Or BKVoiceOver? Or Yzreel? Or Smuggles? They aren't gone, they're still playing Dota, they just don't really consider this their home anymore.

And hey, we never had to be a forum. Dotafire at its core was that really good guide site. Everything else was optional, and the fact that we ever had some kind of successful forum community is something to be proud of, even if it wasn't gonna last forever.

Still, here's to hoping that some of our new members stick around, maybe they can give Dotafire's forum a new identity.