Guide Police Council

For the sake of discussions: http://www.dotafire.com/dota-2/guide/you-cant-tame-the-lion-878

-incredibly short (con or pro?)
-lacked formattings
-core phase boots
-core lion gameplay

Sure refresher is a late game luxury and you probably can't afford it, but it's without question a good item on the hero.

I'd take a refresher Lion over a refresher Zeus anyday.

You get in the mood, very quickly, mr. Hamster. Romark already answered - Lion is no core, how is he going to get those items? Even though it can be legit by the possibility of perma-stun. Refresher is an item for position #3 heroes and higher, it is impossible for supports to get it. The guide is bad too, Unscathed linked it here.




Well, we don't need just top guides and guides for competitive play, we need plausible ones. How's Shadow Blade and Abyssal Blade are plausible options in a Sniper? How's Refresher Orb is plausible on hero that is meant to be played as support, and consequently won't be able to farm?

No problems if the guides is meant for trench tier, but it needs to be plausible at least.

Abyssal Blade is 100% legit on Sniper, u fckin wot m8?

Are you talking about competitive, or about pubs?

In competitive, supports can't get that kind of farm.

In pubs, a support can get 2-3 late game items very easily in a long game. So blink-sheep-refresher is completely possible.

I call the police upon you all. Kappa.

It is not necessary to hide/kill those "are-you-trolling-me?" guides. When meta changed, everything will be changed as well so there is no "legit" build nor "best" build, there is only "better-safe-than-sorry" build or build that fits the hero most of the times. You may say that giving Lion the dagon, Refresher Orb, Ethereal Blade and Aghanim's Scepter is a totally bad idea because he wasn't suppose to farm that much and will be owned by a Black King Bar, but sometimes it works amazingly well because the other team gets absolute zero farm because all of them can't stand his combo and turtle in base forever.

My suggestion would be putting a "suggested" tag which recommends those newcomer to learn their favourite heroes, while other still can rethink their strategic or try a silly build from those "troll" guides.

I quite like this idea. A tag system where your guide can be tagged by one of the elders as either Standard (recommended for learning), Core (usual guides with advanced options), Situational, Theorycrafting and Troll Guides (not a guide that trolls, but a guide to troll with a certain hero) (for when you are wanting to take a core Lion or have some Low Prio fun).
Then you can look at guides and base your decision around it. That Lion guide i would definitely downvote, but if it was intended as a Troll guide i'd upvote it as the combo it put's out is superb.

This is similar to the scout system we have on Mobafire. It doesn't work too well at the moment though becuase of different opinions and activity issues.

Length is not an issue, it's only important that you get all necessary information across to the players, i.e. why Refresher Orb on Lion?

He makes it clear that he's buying Refresher Orb for extreme Burst Damage, but he doesn't discuss the potential lockdown that Hamstertamer suggested. He doesn't give any indication as to why double finger is better than the similar Finger of Death + Dagon, and he doesn't advise on how you're supposed to Farm this item, let alone when you would (be able to) buy it.

The fact that it's a Core Lion with Phase Boots is irrelevant as to how good the Guide is (also, bear in mind this was published more than 2 years ago). The question is:

Does it provide enough information for the player to make their own decisions about Lion?

Skill and Item Builds need to be adjusted during Gameplay, and while it's fine to suggest a cookie cutter build to newer players who aren't ready to adapt to each game, you need to provide them with enough information for when they are ready to make these decisions. Don't just say "buy X every game", explain why "X" is so good on this hero that you think it should be considered above all other Items.

Also, you shouldn't just limit yourself to explaining how to Skill or which Items to buy, give general tips on how to Farm (even Supports need to Farm their Blink Daggers/ Urn of Shadows/etc. ). Are there any particular tricks to improving your Farm on this Hero, e.g. using Stifling Dagger to Last Hit, when do you use these tricks, is there a downside, e.g. Mana problems? and if so how do you combat them?

Then there's the more obvious needs such as "What should I be doing in a Teamfight?". If anyone can give clear instructions on how to do this, you know the guide is good. When to jump in, when to stay back, what to look out for, how to decide when to use which Ability on who, etc. are all vital concepts that new players will struggle with, so it's important that guide writers try to break things down. Let's take Lion as an example:-

In Teamfights, the first thing you need to do is Hex the most dangerous target. Being able to stop powerful Ultimates from being used, e.g. Guardian Angel, Omnislash, etc. can help your Team win the fight. If they get these Ultimates off an provide no other threat, then switch your focus, do they have a strong Damage dealer like Phantom Assassin or Troll Warlord? If possible Hex them so they're much easier for your Team to kill.

Not my best work (don't take it too seriously ^ ), but it shows how to break down how a Skill should be used in a Teamfight and anyone who can pull this off properly in a Guide deserves special recommendation. <}3

---

Getting abck to this, what I'm suggesting is a thread containing Hero Guides that fit the following criteria

• Do they explain how to Skill and when to buy which Items clearly?
• Do they give you a good idea of what you should be doing at all stages of the game?
• Do they give a good explanation of what you should be doing in a Teamfight?
• Do they give tips and tricks on how to get Farm (especially for Support Heroes)?
• Are they well formatted and easy to read?
• Is there good Supporting material to enhance the guide, e.g. useful images/videos/links/etc.?
• Can someone who's never played DOTA 2 before understand this Guide?

...as well as non-Hero guides that provide clear information, e.g. a Drafting Guide should show the current most popular Picks and Bans of the Meta and explain why these are poopular as well as breaking down how to decide what you're going to Pick/Ban each turn.

There can be more than 1 Guide for each topic, but only if the guides each offered something that the others don't, whether it's a differing opinion on how to Skill/Itemize/etc. or even just a different writing style.

We could also probably do with a stickied thread where people can ask for/give advice on how to improve guides in general in each area mentioned.

---

Currently when browsing a guide, it shows the date it was last updated in grey (on a grey background...)


...or we could just post the "Fire" icons from the threads applied to guides as well.

Personally i just want something that clearly shows a guide is outdated. Innately bad guides will be downvoted anyway, so we dont have to worry about that.

Right now its just not clear for new people what guides are up to date. They wont see the date and think THIS ONE IS OLD AND DOEST WORK ANYMORE. They will see a big clear piece of text that says a guide is outdated and not updated for 2 years.