Toby “TobiWan” Dawson says Dota 2 state is close to its “breaking point.” The game’s general state including the competitive scene will either go stale unless Valve reboots the community. TobiWan has been commentating and casting Dota 2 professional tournaments including the annual biggest esport event, The Internationals.
We are rapidly approaching a breaking point for @DOTA2 where we either go stale or reboot our community. Valve’s decisions dictate the road
— Toby Dawson (@TobiWanDOTA) June 16, 2017
On the Dota 2 subreddit post, Tobi justified his claims by stating multiple issues that may have caused stagnation. According to him, all tournaments are eclipsed by Valve tournaments and crowd funding is now exclusive to Valve events alone.
“Crowd funding was one of the greatest things ever, it helped tournaments to close the gap between The International prize pool and their own. This was very important in the early days as reaching even 50k prize pool was a struggle for most organizers… This support no longer exists.”
Another reason he brought up was the issue between Valve and workshop artists who threatens to leave the community if not being compensated or credited well. Cosmetics is a big factor that keeps Dota 2 revolve. Few months ago, a series of threads on Dota 2 subreddit tackled about the “dying workshop” and how artists struggle to keep contributing. Cosmetics are also the primary means of crowdfunding and the best example of this was when DotaCinema released cosmetics of Juggernaut that blew up Captain’s Draft prizepool.
Lastly, Tobi talked about how Majors and TIs are being done by contractors and not by people who are building sustainable Dota 2 communities, causing a situation where the casters, analysts, and crews are becoming “hired guns.” There were also several past issues discussing how the crew receives lesser importance and not being compensated well during events where in fact they are ones who mostly build Dota 2 communities.
Ultimately, TobiWan expressed ideas that might solve the problem. This includes giving workshop artists the compensation they deserve; Valve no longer running while label “Majors” but instead, they make it a brand as an incentive to well run events not just regional partners; and making crowdfunding available for third party events with streamlined ticketing system. He also added that Valve can make compendiums available for third party events and not just during Majors or TIs. Lastly, Valve needs to get rid of the invite system during Majors or TIs and make more structured qualification system rather than “playing a guessing game”.
Tobi’s concern has brought enlightenment and opened up debate in the community. Many people have also voiced their opinions – some agreed, some disagreed. But surely Valve knows what the problem is and will bring solution to keep the game alive.
