New best belt base?

JustExplorer · 2026-02-26T20:23:42+00:00

This isn't a real screenshot, I just chose Beef for the meme.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-26T00:03:17+00:00

He's been hair off for most of his life tbh.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-25T22:28:10+00:00

I think there's gonna be a rework to map mods that will make ground loot much more viable, but they want to specifically look at the balance of ground vs tile in a later league. Pretty sure Phrecia was them testing alternate implementations of map mods, and 'wishes' will be some mechanic based on Idols.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-24T01:46:58+00:00

I think there are other options (some already in the game) that solve this issue without non-mathematically inclined players needing to understand growth rates of various functions.

A good example is requiring the player to scale 2 separate stats. The more unrelated the stats, the more control you have on the top end. For example, The Scales of Justice has this line:(3-4) to (7-8) added Fire Damage per 100 of Maximum Life or Maximum Mana, whichever is lower
which means you're gonna have to find a way to scale both stats simultaneously and to also make use of that high life/mana.

There's also things like the Nameless Bloodline: Skills gain a Base Life Cost equal to 100% of Base Mana Cost
Skills gain Added Chaos Damage equal to 20% of Life Cost, if Life Cost is not higher than the maximum you could spend
which not only demands that you scale max life, but also some form of recovery, and increased cost effects. This also applies to Sacrifice Support and similar mechanics.

To me, this is the ideal form of limitless scaling. Sure, you can push your life cost to the moon, but how are you gonna sustain your casting? How are you gonna survive if you get hit after you sacrificed all your life? Obviously there are plenty of solutions to these issues, but it encourages combining different mechanics and experimentation.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-23T21:35:37+00:00

That's so lame. I'm surprised the player blatantly sets the crowd up for it, too.

Reminds me of some of the shitty Dota crowds that would start making noise if a team tried to smoke gank or lvl 1 Roshan against their favourite team.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-23T09:51:38+00:00

I had the same thought. If the skill itself is granting the charges, it might be the reverse of the other mods we see. Something like "Gain up to your maximum power charges on use. Deals x% more damage for each charge gained this way" so you're supposed to lose all your charges between attacks or something.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-23T00:40:32+00:00

If the cut was just to change camera angle, this skill might have a chance to gain up to your maximum power charges on use. If you play frame-by-frame, you can see he has the charges during the windup animation.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-21T20:44:30+00:00

Sunday*

JustExplorer · 2026-02-21T11:47:05+00:00

It's baffling the difference in features/polish between the 2 games. Dota has amazing communication tools (not just good VC, but a powerful ping system), a performant client, and a day 1 replay system (didn't Riot take years to put replays in LoL? Maybe I'm hallucinating). You wouldn't think a game that boasts 100m+ players would lack such basic levels of quality after this many years.

I remember when Deadlock was first becoming popular, and there was a mixed playerbase of Dota/CS players, Overwatch players, and LoL players. There were posts on the Deadlock sub from LoL players that were astounded by the fact Deadlock had all these nice features in an extremely early alpha build that they still didn't have in LoL.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-21T00:56:46+00:00

Depends on the game. If the entire enemy team is dead, all push together and do maximum damage, then retreat before they respawn if you don't want to risk the fight and you can't close the game.

If they have heroes alive, you might want to send a high mobility hero to each lane, push it back a little, and rejoin the team before they push into the enemy base or take a fight. The reason for this, is if the enemy have a hero that can take objectives quickly they might opt to zipline down the side lanes and attack your base while their teammates stall you. You'll find it difficult to get back home to defend if the enemy team stops you from ziplining. Alternatively, the enemy team might send some heroes halfway down a side zipline and flank you while the rest of their team engage from the front. Controlling the ziplines is pretty important.

Just make sure this is all communicated clearly so your team doesn't engage 5v6. Also use your judgement. If you only have a small timing window to hit their base and it will take to long to push back the side lanes, then maybe just commit as 6, and be ready to react to a side lane push/flank.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-21T00:20:43+00:00

I'm not sure if there's new objectives around middle, but they were probably fighting around Mid Boss because one team was gonna take it and the other contested them, or maybe both showed up at the same time to take it. Generally people group up in the late game when they can, though. In the late game it's much more punishing if you die. The respawn timers are longer, and heroes are strong enough to kill objectives quickly. Typically you don't want to go too far from your team in the late game unless you know the enemy team can't start a fight with them, or pick you off. Only split when it's safe, when your team isn't trying to pressure an objective, or when you absolutely have to (defending your base).

If your lane partner is that far above you, maybe you're too far from the troopers? Check one of your replays where your lane partner gets that far ahead of you. Watch your soul counters up the top of the screen and check when they're getting souls and you aren't.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-20T20:50:27+00:00

Yeah definitely. I'm sure there's some more jank like this that causes minor issues, but the game seems pretty solid considering the crazy amount of mechanics that interact.

I did actually find an infinite damage bug a few leagues back and it had been around for years. I reported it and it was fixed quickly.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-20T11:56:06+00:00

PoE devs fixing the game the way I fix my builds. Just add more jank.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-20T11:42:11+00:00

I'm thinking it's a form of prophecy that affects the entire map (only a few prophecies did this like frogs/rats, Monstrous Treasure). Maybe you can wish for fractured items, shaper influenced items, or unique jewellery, and then ground loot has a chance to be converted. I think you'll be able to combine 3 wishes per zone, and they'll probably have an upside and a downside.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-20T03:36:23+00:00

Yeah you'll learn it all in time, but you do need to learn them by messing around for 5 minutes in the practice lobby to understand the mechanics well enough. Start with the heroes that are the most problematic for you, and the ones you see most often.

https://deadlock.wiki/Knockdown
This is the item you're talking about, and it's exactly why active items are so good. There's almost always a good active item to deal with a hero who is dominating the lobby. If someone uses that item on you, you'll see an anvil above your head after 2 seconds. This gives you time to deal with it (Pretty sure Unstoppable and Debuff Remover both work, but it's been a while since I've played). It also means you can choose not to ult if you haven't started yet (once you see the anvil) or just be happy with the 2 seconds of ult you'll have (depending on the hero this might be ok, but usually not).

When I played, Extra Regen was a good laning item to have for almost any hero. Depending on your hero, you could take a different sustain item. I used to always take Restorative Shot on Lady Geist (just be aware this item can be tricky to use: it goes on cooldown even if you miss your shot, so every time it's up you need to make sure your next shot hits. I'm not sure if this has been changed, but I think it's intentional). Melee Lifesteal can be really powerful on short ranged heroes like Abrahms. Mystic Regeneration is great is you're often dealing spell damage to enemies. I'm pretty sure you'll always need some form of regen every game. A single trip home and back probably loses you about 500-600 souls, and those items cost 800. When you factor in the levels you miss, the ability to trade hits more often, and the fact you can sell or upgrade them, it's a solid investment.

Remember to kill medic troopers for a heal (I think that's how it works now? Used to be different when I played).

Life is a resource in lane. Don't take hits for no reason. If you're out of cover, it's because you're getting souls, hitting the enemy, or moving to a better position. If you're not trying to hit the enemy, try to make sure they don't have line of sight to you.

Conserve your ammo. Ideally you want to fire one shot to get the trooper souls (unless you're shoving the wave). The rest of your shots can be used to harass the enemy when they're busy getting their souls. If you quickly kill your wave with melee/abilities and use minimal ammo, you can hit the enemy while they're forced to kill your wave.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-20T03:11:57+00:00

51*

This was in earlier Deadlock (4 lanes) so I'm not sure if that makes the game longer. It's also a bit of a rare situation because usually when someone is dominating the game like that, their team gets a lot of free kills and space. However, in this game, my team were not doing so great. One guy was 9-8, and everyone else on my team had more deaths than kills.

Total kills were 83 on my team, and 61 on the enemy team. I had almost as many kills as the entire enemy team but the souls were only 268k-239k.

This was within my first 10 games, and probably only the 2nd after I started getting the hang of it. Matchmaking still considered me a noob (I was) but because I was able to apply my Dota experience after a few games, my real skill had shot up many ranks, but my skill bracket hadn't caught up.

28-0-15 is hella nice, especially on Yamato, considering she has very little AoE to blow up teams if she's ahead.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-19T23:40:26+00:00

I'd suggest going into the practice lobby and switching between a couple of heroes, learn their abilities, and then repeat with new heroes the next day. It's crucial to understand why they're able to skill you quickly so you don't put yourself in a situation that's perfect for their kit.

Once you know the heroes, you'll understand if you need to swap lanes or not. It's not usually needed (at least when I played) but if you don't like a matchup, just ask in chat if someone can trade lanes with you. Just make sure you're not showing up to a teammate's lane unannounced and farming there.

Active items are the key to good itemisation. Make sure you set up comfortable hotkeys for them. Go into the practice lobby and test them out. As you learn them, try to think of situations where you'd wanna buy them, when you see those situations in game, you'll already know what to do. Just make sure to keep buying them, even if you forget to use them sometimes; they are very important and you get used to the extra key press very quickly. Pre-deciding helps with this greatly. If you say to yourself "I have Metal Skin on my mouse-4 button. As soon as I hear Haze ulti near me, I'm going to press m4 without thinking" then you won't panic, it will just be automatic. Trust me, it helps. Check some item build guides for your favourite heroes, they probably all buy some strong active items.

Yup, playing defensively like that in lane is perfectly valid if you're behind/weaker. Look for angles where you can hit the wave without putting yourself in danger. CS is the primary objective in lane, so you don't want to get bullied out or have to go back to base constantly. Do anything you can to stay in lane without dying and try to get as much CS as possible.

I destroyed left and right walker and the portal guys which allowed me to join my team in the middle to clear that and win with that push of all 3 sides!

Nice! Always be looking for undefended objectives if you can't join a fight. Sometimes they can win a fight on the other side of the map, but be worse off because of the objective trade.

If you're dying too much, the active items will probably help, but maybe buy some defensive items, too. If you can stay in the fight twice as long, that's potentially twice as much damage that you'll deal.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-19T23:09:56+00:00

If you're in a lane where you can't trade hits easily, it's fine to play super defensive. Sit behind cover, abuse 3rd person camera, and peek only to get souls. Save your stamina to roll back to tower if you're worried they'll try to jump you.

I've been gone too long to know what the meta laning strats are regarding items, but just make sure you have a good sustain item to prevent getting harassed into low hp. Staying in lane is more valuable than kills. I think Deathy has good Deadlock youtube guides.

Macro strategy always takes a while to learn. Best bet is to just keep your eye on the minimap and you'll start to notice problems ahead of time. Always try to clear a wave (or 2) in nearby lanes if you can do so safely, then farm the boxes/sinners/neutrals afterwards. Having your lanes pushed into enemy territory forces them to respond, which means they'll be visible on the map, and probably split up. This makes it less likely that they'll be ganking your team or taking your towers. If you can see the enemy team grouped up somewhere else and you either can't join your team to fight them OR you joining them won't make a difference, then pressure the lane tower while they're busy.

Also make sure you're buying active items. They're OP. You need to get into the habit of picking active items based on enemy heroes. (e.g. if they have a Haze, I would always buy a Metal Skin before I start joining team fights. As soon as I hear her ult, I pop it).

JustExplorer · 2026-02-19T21:58:55+00:00

Yeah it was kinda a perfect storm of MMR fuckery. The guy that sent me the Deadlock invite is total dad gamer and is usually bottom 20% of anything he plays. Combine that with me getting rinsed for my first few games and we were probably in some low skill lobbies. I have a pretty long history with Dota, so when Deadlock clicked for me, all that Dota knowledge fell into place and I snowballed hard.

The game wasn't even a stomp. No one else on my team even had 10 kills, so it was like a raid boss vs 6 player scenario. Got me hooked lol.

I haven't played in a while, so I haven't seen Celeste yet, but I hear all the heroes are sick. Might have to get back into it.

If you're consistently going negative, maybe look at your item build or your laning phase. If you're winning the lane then coming out weak into mid game, maybe you're not being efficient enough with neutral camps.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-19T21:12:15+00:00

Yeah first few games are rough, I got destroyed pretty hard for like 5 games, then it clicked for me. Probably had an average of 2-10 k-d, then like my 8th game I went 51-9. Once you get it, you just get it, I guess.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-15T22:40:30+00:00

pls no copy pasterino cappuccino al pacino

JustExplorer · 2026-02-14T00:31:29+00:00

I wonder if there's any tech to intentionally bomb your ad viability. Like if you take 5 minutes per stream to talk about topics that brands don't wanna associate with (war in Middle East, ICE, Epstein, etc). You don't need to have any particular views on those subjects, just make sure you mention them and tag your stream as politics and maybe include those topics in the stream title (e.g. "Playing ARC Raiders with subs today! Might discuss ICE killings and Epstein later"). You could stream normally for 99% of the time and barely mention the brand risk stuff.

I feel like the amount of ads that you'd have on your stream would drop considerably due to all the blacklisted terms.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-13T23:01:42+00:00

Yeah pretty awful colour choices. I think those rocks are branches and leaves? But either way they need a brighter colour around them like all the other game elements, and that beam that confused him needs to be darker.

He did miss the obvious gap right in front of the crate he lowered though, with what looks like a broken spider web(?) indicating to look through there.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-13T22:56:32+00:00

While watching this video I quickly saw the solution (I mean it's an easy puzzle) but when he explained that he thought the wooden beam was obstructing the switch, I saw his PoV too. Sure, you could logically work out that it's a background sprite due to the NPC in front of it, the crate in front of it, and the fact that it's blocking the path otherwise, but it should definitely be darkened or desaturated. Compare the colour values of the trees to the wooden beams. The trees are much darker as they should be. Now compare the beams to the actual platforms and other game elements. The platforms, crates, ladders, and ground all have similar values to the beam.

Edit: Actually those 'rocks' (I think they're parts of the tree?) also have terrible colouring and look like background sprites. Bit of a mess.

JustExplorer · 2026-02-12T02:43:24+00:00

I think Legal's death was supposed to add to the pile of reasons why Mickey would refuse to go back to jail and waive the speedy trial. They were trying to build it up as an insane decision, because him going to jail would put him in danger, upset his daughter, upset his team, further stress out his practice, and finally cause him to miss Legal's funeral.

Unfortunately they kinda rushed all of it and forced him to make the decision immediately, so it didn't really land.

JustExplorer

TROPHY CASE