Riot

You’ll know Bloodseeker, even if you think you don’t - it’s his ugly mug Valve use to promote Dota 2. Big bloke, awful teeth; imagine the Mouth of Sauron packed in the day job and turned quarterback.

Like all Dota heroes, Bloodseeker has an ultimate. His is Rupture - a ranged attack that splits open its target’s skin, causing massive damage if they try to move. It’s popular - but League of Legends developers Riot have no plans to implement it, or anything like it, in their game. Here’s why.

In a post on LoL’s official forums (edit: written in 2010! So bear that in mind), Riot VP of game design Tom Cadwell explained that Rupture was guilty of a fundamental design flaw, or ‘anti-pattern’. He reckons ability places a ‘burden of knowledge’ on its victims that can only result in frustration, especially for new players.

“This pattern is when you do a complex mechanic that creates gameplay -- ONLY IF the victim understands what is going on,” explains Cadwell. “With Rupture in DOTA, you receive a [damage over time effect] that triggers if you, the victim, choose to move. However, you have no way of knowing this is happening unless someone tells you or unless you read up on it online.”

Cadwell admits that all MOBA abilities place some burden of knowledge on the player - but says the too much of it can only result in “extreme frustration” for newcomers. Though there are partial solutions to the problem.

“Good particle work and sound - good 'salesmanship' - will reduce burden of knowledge (but not eliminate it),” continues Cadwell. “We still would not do Rupture as is in LoL ever, but I would say that the [Heroes of Newerth] version of Rupture, with it's really distinct sound effect when you move, greatly reduces the burden of knowledge on it.”

In the end it’s a question of balance. “If we get a lot more gameplay from something, we are willing to take on more burden of knowledge,” he concludes. “But for a given mechanic, we want to have as little burden of knowledge as possible.”

Rupture, sadly, is right at the other end of the spectrum. How many of you are Bloodseeker veterans? How does your experience match up with Cadwell’s assessment of Dota’s vicious hero?

http://www.pcgamesn.com/leagueoflegends/why-riot-think-dota-bloodseekers-ultimate-ultimately-bad-idea  

In response to this post. Riot thinks Bloodseeker's Rupture is Bad for the Game or for any moba / rts in this case, I feel that its not the case with DotA and said from a point of view or a player that did not venture truly into the different aspects of DotA 1 or 2. He claim that this 'burden of knowledge' is what makes DotA unbearable for new players resulting in them looking for other alternatives.

Dota2 is a game where a player can choose from over 100 different Heroes to play and control, use their skills and attacks to defeat enemies and ultimately take down their Ancient. Players can buy items and work together with their teammates to achieve the common goal of winning the round. This concept is the same for any MOBA/RTS, the only difference is the Heroes and items and several mechanics. The way each game such as HoN, Dota2 and LoL distinguish themselves makes them unique and to suit different type of players.
Regarding that skills such as Rupture and many others such as Lich's Chain Frost, Puck's Dream Coil require some form of knowledge or idea of how the Hero works to be able to avoid taking full damage from a spell and ultimately prevent being easily picked off by another Hero. The case of Bloodseeker is in the west case scenario a new Player being Ruptured by the first time will undoubtedly run for the full duration of the spell as its normal human reaction to get away from the place of danger when taking damage unless you feel you have substantial power to challenge the opponent ( If someone shot you with a gun you will run as far as you can if you are unarmed).

What the post was trying to reinstate is that by including skills such as Rupture in the game it will create a 'Newbie-Unfriendly' environment. Because of this imperfect knowledge of the game a player has a significant disadvantage compared to a player who knows more about the game. I completely disagree to this. I believe its because of the complexity and difficulty of the game is what makes its player base huge.
One point about having the burden of knowledge is that it will encourage the player to find out what happened. In his mind he would think,"How could this Hero be so terribly broken that every time he used a single skill on me I would take a huge amount of damage and die." Reading the death log would see he would take a huge amount of damage from Rupture and would most likely take a look at the skill's description. " Oh! So if I stop moving I would stop taking damage as well." Its that simple ! There are other ways to finding out information the Hero as well. And if other players see you making a stupid mistake they would most likely tell you to stop doing it ( sometimes in a harsh way). But still you will be learning. So as you play on, you will undoubtedly learn more and improve, reducing the gap of knowledge between the new player and an average player. The negative aspects of the burden of knowledge is only in the Short-term but in the long term it adds complexity and diversity to the game which keeps players playing on.

Furthermore, many statements made in the posts were either incorrect or outdated. "but I would say that the [Heroes of Newerth] version of Rupture, with it's really distinct sound effect when you move, greatly reduces the burden of knowledge on it.”"  This is no longer true on Dota2 where an impact sound can be heard once Rupture has been cast and its annoying loud. However I do not see how does having a sound changes the fact that there is a 'Burden of Knowledge'.

Let us reflect, is it worth sacrificing important and diverse game content just to make it easier for beginners to play? Beginners will eventually learn to play the game as they want to play it because of many other different factors for us to look at. Personally when I started out I was tired of losing so I went to look up many guides and information for me to improve and it was still on Dota 1 on Warcraft 3. It was difficult. But Dota2 has provided us a platform for us to gather information quicker and more efficiently. This has successfully provided us a better gaming environment. 

I am unable to judge LoL's part as I have only tried the game and never really ventured deep into it. However I cant say which game is better in this aspect, however I defend Dota's idea and concept of complexity into the game.