Dota 2’s latest update, Dueling Fates, went live last night. As with any major update, there’s a lot to unpack, but one thing has caught the eye of the community.
Dota 2’s 7.07 update, Dueling Fates, is now live.
A line of text in the updates refers to a new game mode, accompanied by a couple of sentences about what exactly that is. ‘Spa Mode’ would allow players to “Play a 1000 MMR advantaged game against muted low-pri players. For when you want an easy game. But if you lose, you let them out of low-pri!” The idea is that you, as a team (or on your own) would be able to face off against a group of less co-ordinated, less capable players, purely to punish them for their sins.
Low priority queue is Dota’s very real version of Elo hell. It traps toxic players in solo queue, increasing matchmaking times, disabling item drops, and means that they can only play with or against low-priority players, so everyone in the game is just as bad for the community as them. The only way out of low-priority queue is to win enough games, but every subsequent infraction increases the number of games you’ll need to win to progress.
It’s very unlikely that this is a real thing, as encouraging players to reform is probably more helpful than heaping never-ending punishment upon them. But, you know, here’s hoping.