What's A MOBA?

     A Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (Abbreviated as MOBA) became popular from a custom game called Defense of the Ancients (DotA) that was run under the Warcraft III engine made by Blizzard Entertainment. Although the MOBA genre has been around longer than DotA, the Warcraft custom game was the first game to really hit gold in popularity. Being that there are many MOBA games now on the internet, it is hard to say exactly what a MOBA is. However there are a few main points that really classify a game as a MOBA.

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     "In a typical MOBA, the player controls only one unit or hero character much like a MMORPG or RPG. It may have some sort of summoning skill to break this rule and offer control to another unit or two but in general the player is only in control of his or her one heroic unit. These hero characters can level up, gain new abilities and skills, and deck themselves out with new gear typically obtained through store purchases but also sometimes found off neutral monsters or bosses. Like a MMOPRG character development is a large part of the game, but designed to evaporate after one game – so you go through your levels much faster than say, World of Warcraft and cap out in about 40 minutes, and start the next game back at level1.

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​     The core of a MOBA is centered directly around player vs player team based combat. 1v2's, 3v3's, ganking, pvp action makes up roughly 90% of the game interaction. Teams are typically 5v5. Whether or nor this was an offshoot of the limitations on player numbers you could have in a Starcraft or Warcraft 3 Battle.net game will probably be a subject of interest for many years to come, but regardless of how it came about, the current standard for a MOBA is two teams of five. Many MOBAS all the way back to Aeon of Strife include a traditional base destruction design – the goal is to get your team's heroes past the other team's defense and destroy their unit generating structures and finally their “castle” or game-winning structure.

In a standard MOBA you are going to have both “waves” of AI controlled creatures and also AI controlled neutral spawns. The creatures generally give a monetary incentive when killed by a hero, so it becomes important to get the “last hit” on a monster to help build your funds up quickly to purchase better equipment. These AI elements are directly related to the PvP aspects – attack an enemy hero when his “creep wave” is around and they will turn on you in an instant and start laying into your hero."

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Amprimoz, J. F., Orfano, Finn. Multiplayer Online Battle Arenas Explained. 

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​     The most typical layout of MOBA is a square map, with two almost identical bases on the top right and bottom left of the field. Each base has three paths out of it, or "lanes", in which the "creep waves" walk through. Each lane has three turrets defending the entrance of the base. Once inside the base, there are another two turrets defending the main nexus of each base. This makes a total of 11 turrets per base defending it from intruders.

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     This image shows the map of League of Legends, the most popular MOBA with well over 33 million registered accounts. The blue posts indicate turrets for the blue team, while the purple posts represent purple team's turrets. It is not required to destroy every turret to defeat your opponent. A team must only destroy turrets in order within each lane, but the turrets in each lane have no correlation to each other. For example, a team could destroy all of the three middle turrets, then have access to the base and kill the final two turrets and nexus, totally 5 turrets killed. Or a team could render their victim useless as they destroy each and every turret until the base is destroyed. It various from game to game and from team to team depending on strategy and the players.  ​

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Additional reading on the game can be found through some of these links.

-MOBA-​

​http://www.gamesradar.com/ask-gr-anything-whats-moba/

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-League of Legends-

​http://leagueoflegends.wikia.com/wiki/League_of_Legends_Wiki

​http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Legends

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-DotA 2-

​http://www.dota2wiki.com/wiki/Dota_2_Wiki

​http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dota_2

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-HoN-

​http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroes_of_Newerth

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