Ideas for a DotA Style game

Right right, Here's what i don't need, people telling me that I shouldn't waste my time on a map like this. I will make it, No matter what. But here's the basics, I need some really good ideas. The basic premise I have is that it is an all out war between haeven and hell, and PLEASe give me some positive feedback.
And I am not really trying to compete with DotA anyway. I would just like to see my map on the list a few times a day.
:god_help_us:

Well, a decent amount of crafted items will help (around 20-40), special effects added by triggers when using one are always fun :)

Some set items would be cool, but not really needed.

Large map with many vantage/attack points for players units/heros.

Maybe a side-boss or two that you can face.

Have random spawnings of powerful creatures for each side. Like the hell side can occasionally spawn an Overlord or the heaven side could spawn an Arch-Angel ever so often.

A variety of differen't heros, try not to repeat tactics or abilities with the heros. Diversity.

Thats about all I can do for now besides saying you should play DotA more and pull minor ideas from that. :)

And otherwise goodluck with this because you will need it with the competition in this category.

Latez,
~Valdez

- You should make difficulties.
- You should make it so after about 10 mins of game play, the units change and get harder, so the heroes don't overpower the regular units.
- Make the terrain look good. (I am a fan of very well done terrain)(Look is everything)
- Make the abilities the units use should be flashy. Like when you cast a fireball, flames should surround him.

Thats my suggestions, I'll add more later.

What about Custom Skins? Those are always great! :D

And the rest have already been said

Eeeeh. I'd avoid custom skins. Unless they're really good, they can make a map look worse, and they raise the map size, which raises the DL time, which decreases the number of people willing to wait and play it. I'd also repeat what was said earlier:
DO DECENT TERRAIN!
Look at DotA! Some of the ramps have huge gaping black holes in them! I can terrain better than that FFS!
Bad terrain really spoils your map. It isn't the most important aspect, it doesn't need to be elaborate and full of doodads, look at footman frenzy! It's not GOOD terrain, but it's a damn slight better than DotA, because it's smooth, the ramps join up properly, and they vary the tiles used, rather than making it all one tile.

I'm working on one right now, but it'll be in Portuguese (so u guys probably won't play it hehe). I based it on D&D, I'm creating heroes with this theme Very fun. I'll keep an eye on this thread, since my last one about taverns didn't get an answer...hope it'll be answered here ^_^

Very true, that's what you need if you want people to play the map. Lure them in with style, and when they have played the map more hopefully it has enough substance to keep them around.

thanks for the tips, keep them coming! I am not very good at terrein, but i will try my best. As for the abilities, I'll try and make 'em flashy.

Make a translation! I would like to try it. ;)
I agree about the flashy skills and good terrain, im trying to do both for my arena.
Skins should be included, (at least a few) no models if you want the map to be small though.
Good luck with the arena, Im going to try it when its released.

Yeahhh. DOTA is so popular ..... Well, I'm working on it too. But my idea is that a hero can only have 1 weapon, 1 armor. And every damage from a spell is base on your intellegence of the caster. So it's not damage 100 for level 1, 175 for level 2 etc .... But 2 times intellegence for level 1, 3 times for level 2 ....etc. What do you think ?

aeon of strife has been done so many times. i dont think there is any chance to do something the Defence of the Ancients, Dota: Allstars, Eve of the Apocalypse, and Tides of Blood have not done. not to mention The Great Strategy.

but, the point is that play those maps some times and list things which could have been done better or things which are missing whatsoever.

In my opinion, you'll need like lots of items - that gives the game some degree of re-playability - cause you'll want people to keep coming back to it. Further, I reckon some custom skins may be nice - but it is important that the map does not become to "flowery" - everything must be clearly visible, and coded well (for example, someone recently posted a map around here called Holy War, a dota style map, which in my opinion, is nice graphically to the extent that it is too flowery, and players may have trouble distinguishing hero from units).

One pickle I have with dota allstars 5.84b is the terrain - in my opnion, I reckon it is unfair - I have several gripes, but the main one is the kink in the centre lane near the Sentinel's side. It often becomes a bit of a death-trap there - and yet the Scourge don't really have an equivalent trap on their side. I guess the lesson to be learnt there is to make sure there is some degree of symmetry so that it is fair no matter which side you play from. Fairness is an important issue - ie hero balance etc....(I've not played dota allstars 6.01 but my friend assures me that he finds one of the heroes insanely powerful, especially at the beginning when no other hero will be able to face this uber-powerful guy)....while each hero will be different, it is of importance that you can essentially succeed with each and every hero.

Here's one thing. In the other DOTA's, as in 6.03 and 6.02, the older heroes look stupid in front of the new ones! I'm serious! Make sure that the older heroes are equivalent in power as the newer heroes that you add.

I don't care about custom skins really. Maybe you could do what 5.84c did, as in, making the downloading time really fast, instead of waiting for 4 minutes.

I plan on Having two version, A fast version with no custom skins, and another version, with a bunch of custom graphics and skins, that way everyone will be happy.

what's bad about dota is that it is unbalanced, it does not offer replayability after 2 or 3 games, it does not offer too much strategy, spells should have been more levels up and it is really unbalanced, the creeps are boring, the terrain is boring, not much penalty if you die,arghh! that's why i really hate dota so much and almost curse all those who have fun playing it.

anyway, as a tip for your map, try to counter those. i'll really be happy for that. :D