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January is a popular time for doubling down on our goals. With a fresh calendar and all the promise of a new year, there’s no better time to take stock of your life and pledge to “do better.”
But what does doing better look like in a Dota 2 context? I want to focus on some specific resolutions or goals that I (and you!) can set to make this year our best year in Dota ever.
Play better
Playing Dota is an important part of being a fan. Not everyone plays, of course, some of us watch the professionals and streamers. But if you do play, this year set your goal to learning or improving an in-game skill. Think about warding/dewarding, more last hits during laning, better team fight positioning, using smokes more effectively, more efficient farming rotations or simply getting more comfortable with a pair of new heroes.
The important thing here is to focus on skills rather than on MMR. While it’s easier to say, “I’m going to hit 4K MMR” and measure progress toward that, I believe that you will quickly become frustrated with that goal. Because so much of each Dota 2 game is beyond our individual control, it’s important to focus on how you can individually make a difference on the game. If you improve your skills, your MMR should climb. But don’t use that MMR climb as a measure of success. Instead, focus on measuring your progress in other ways such as by total last hits at a specific point in time, number of wards you placed or dewarded, how much you achieved with each smoke, and so on.
Be kinder
Try to be kinder to other players in the game. Some people will be worse at the game than you, others will have a different concept of how to play it. Getting angry at them, chewing them out just escalates a bad situation into a worse one.
Connected to this is the idea of not playing maliciously. Don’t deliberately ruin games. It’s one thing to be genuinely bad, it’s another to run down mid until you die by tower or enemy hero. Don’t waste your time and that of other people—life’s too short!
Learn more about another region
With six regions to follow, Dota has something for nearly everyone. But what about those of us who want a better grasp on the broader picture? This year consider learning more about a region you don’t normally follow!
For me, I never know as much about the Chinese teams as I’d like. Because of time zone issues, I rarely watch China’s regional tournaments, which means I’m missing out on a huge part of what’s developing in China. This year, I’d like to brush up on the history of the bigger Chinese teams and then dig into what’s happening in the tier two scene right now.
Support a team ALL SEASON
I see you fellow bandwagoners. There’s no shame in hopping on the hype train when a good team speeds up toward greatness. But there’s also a lot of joy to be found in cheering on a good team when they’re struggling. Each win is worth celebrating!
This year pick a team that looks promising and commit to them! I may even buy some merchandise to show my support.
Watch an entire tournament
This is for the huge Dota 2 pro scene fans out there. If you’re anything like me, you put a lot of games on as background noise. Maybe you tune in, but then you fire up a video game while you’re watching. You get the gist of the event, but maybe you don’t catch all the fine details? Yeah, I get it.
These days I usually watch the majority of games in each big tournament, but I still miss a few here and there, especially if the time zone for the tournament doesn't line up well with mine.
What would it be like to sit and watch every single game from group stage through playoffs? To go on the entire journey of the tournament? Let's find out!
This year, I want to consciously decide to sit and watch every game from a tournament. Full stop. This may mean catching some on replay after the day’s live games are finished—fair enough. I’m not going to judge. Replays count. The important part is experiencing the entire tournament from start to finish (with replay-zig-zagging as necessary).
Your Goals?
These goals are not one-size-fits-all. You can take or leave as many as you like. I’m going after each of them. At the very least, I hope in 2019 we can all play and watch more Dota 2. Treat the start of the year as a fresh start and who knows what we can all accomplish!
Let me know in the comments if you have Dota 2 resolutions or goals this year and what they are!
