Alright, let’s talk about these Dota Facets everyone’s been buzzing about. When I first heard about them, I kinda shrugged. You know, Dota changes all the time, another system, another thing to learn. But then my buddies started mentioning them in games, “Oh, this Facet is busted,” or “Did you try the X Facet on Y hero?” Curiosity got the better of me, as it usually does.
Giving it a Go
So, the next time I had a bit of free time, I fired up Dota. First thing was the usual update, took its sweet time. Once that was done, I jumped into the heroes tab. It took me a minute clicking around, trying to figure out where this new Facet stuff actually lived. Found it eventually, right there on the hero pages. Okay, interface looks clean enough.
I decided to check out one of my go-to heroes, let’s say, Crystal Maiden. Used to just picking her and going, right? Now there were these… options. Different ways her abilities could work, apparently.
My first look thoughts were kinda like:
- Okay, so it changes one specific ability? Or passive?
- Which one is actually good?
- Do I pick based on my lane? The enemy team? My mood?
- This feels like another pre-game thing to mess up.
It felt a bit overwhelming, honestly. Like choosing a talent, but before the match even starts. I read through the descriptions for CM. One seemed to make her mana aura better for herself, another tweaked Frostbite or something. Didn’t seem game-breakingly different at first glance for her, but definitely noticeable.
First Game Impression
Decided to just dive in. Queued up for an unranked game, picked my hero, and then came the Facet selection. I just picked one that sounded kinda useful, didn’t overthink it too much for the first try. The game started, and for the first few minutes, I honestly forgot I even had a different Facet active. I was just playing Dota, last hitting (or trying to), warding, the usual stuff.
Then I used the ability the Facet affected. And it was different. Not massively, but enough that I noticed. It changed the timing slightly, or the effect felt a bit chunkier, or maybe it was the cooldown. It made me pause for a second. “Ah, right, the Facet thing.” It didn’t magically make me play better, I still made dumb mistakes, died when I shouldn’t have. We lost that game, actually.
But it was interesting. It wasn’t just a passive stat boost. It actively changed how a part of my hero worked. I started thinking about other heroes. What does the Anti-Mage Facet do? Does the Pudge one make Hook weirder? It definitely added a layer.
Played a few more games since then, trying different Facets on different heroes. Sometimes it feels impactful, sometimes I barely notice it. Sometimes I pick the “wrong” one for the match and feel a bit silly. It’s still early days, still figuring out what works best when. It hasn’t fundamentally changed how I play Dota overall, but it’s definitely tweaked the small moments, the ability uses. It’s another thing to experiment with, which keeps things fresh, I guess. Still feels like more homework before the game starts, though!
