By leep

Mads Nielsen

Dota 2 - Never give up

Dota 2 - Never give up

Never give up, never surrender. You’ve probably all heard this sentence before. And let me just tell you: coming back from a supposedly lost DotA game is one of the best feelings the game can bring. It is one of the best feelings any video game can bring.

Though I often ask myself, if comebacks are so great, how come most people give up before the game is over? When I play solo matchmaking, more often that not will at least one player call “gg im afk” before losing a rax. And I ask myself, why? Why would you open up Dota 2, join the matchmaking queue, find a game, pick a hero and play, only to then assume that the game is lost when your team is behind 5 kills. It doesn’t make any sense to me. Which is why I will talk about comebacks today and why you should never give up. Because comebacks are great when they happen, but they are not easy to pull off. And the first step to a succesful comeback is to never give up and never surrender.

Image courtesy of http://c3connections.wordpress.com/

Why you should never give up

Regardless of how far behind you and your team are, a game is not finished until the Ancient is destroyed. That’s a fact. Now I’m not saying that a game can’t feel like it’s over before the Ancient is destroyed, because it can, and it does sometimes. But more often than not, good teamwork and spirit is enough to turn a game around and go from being down 15 kills and 4 towers, to suddenly wipe out the enemy team and push a barracks. You always have to account for the “throw-factor” of the enemy team. It is always possible for the enemy team to throw parts of their advantage away due to sloppiness. They might think the game is over. They might think that you’ve given up. And this is your chance to strike.

DotA is a game played in the mind. If you think you’ve lost, then you probably have. If you think that you can still win, then you probably can. The key is to always believe that you have a chance. And to convince your team the same. This can be rather tricky, because there are disturbingly many quitters in public Dota 2 matchmaking. Which is also why I'm writing this article: People need to stop giving up and start playing DotA like men. Good teamwork combined with high spirit and the possibility of your enemies throwing the game away can rather easily turn a game around to your advantage.

Image courtesy of godisaverb.com

You might think the game is boring. You most certainly will find the game boring if you’re 0-6-1 and can’t leave your base, but you can’t let this stop you. You might feel the urge to leave or go AFK until the game is over so you can start anew. But who says that the next game will be better? You might go 0-15-0 next game.

You might end up getting so mad that you break your keyboard. Or you might not. Who knows. Point is, there’s no guarantee that the next game will be better than your current game, so there is no reason not to give it 110% until either Ancient is destroyed. There will be setbacks. You will get behind in DotA games. But you can not let this stop you.

If you are one to give up easily, you won’t get far. Not in life, and not in DotA. The reason Dota 2 doesn’t have a forfeit option is because Valve shares the same opinion as me (I’m guessing). Don’t get me wrong, there are times where you’re getting steamrolled and you really just want to let the enemies finish and go to sleep or whatever. But if that’s the case, just leave the game. Don’t start nagging on your team for not giving up. Don’t try to convince them that the game is over. Let the players who believe in comebacks play it out. Let the real men play until one of the Ancients are burning. Never give up, never surrender.

-leep

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