First, full disclosure; part of the reason I'm posting this is because the game's community is just plain too damn small. They recently removed group queuing, both because they needed to make improvements to the back end of matchmaking and because there simply aren't enough people on at various skill levels to make it reasonably fair. This leaves solo queuing (playing with random folk) or hoping that unranked lobby games are active (which they often aren't). I hope to gather the game at least a few more players by making it known.
That said, I do fully believe Smashmuck is a game worthy of notice, so I'm not just schilling so I might have some more newbies to beat into a pulp. (I had enough of that inadvertently through the queue system
)
So what exactly is this game? The game refers to itself as a MoBA, but it really doesn't play like League of Legends or DotA. It is, however, an online battle arena in which there are multiple players. I myself never could get into 'proper' MoBAs and most of my friends who play it couldn't either, so if you ever liked the basic premise of those games but didn't like the implementation, well, here you are! The basic idea is that two teams of 3 or 5 players pick from a large roster of champions (26 at the moment). They then fight to achieve an objective (there are four player-vs-player game modes and a player-versus-environment one as well). There is
no in-match leveling, nor item buying - what you start with is what you've got. Characters have three active skills and two passive skills that define how they play, and have several customizable elements (weapons, which boost stats, improve skills, and/or swap out skills, badges, which are passive bonuses, and workouts, which are basically Rune Pages). Aiming, positioning, and timing are all extremely important, and battles are typically very fast-paced. Teamwork is absolutely critical.
To give a few bullet points that I'm told are pertinent from my more MoBA-experienced buddy;
- Matches are quick. Most will take
no more than 5 to 10 minutes, with a couple of game modes taking perhaps 20 on the outsides if the match is very close.
- To re-iterate, there are no RPG elements within a match; the game depends heavily on teamwork over farming XP.
- Champions can level their weapons and you do have Coach (Summoner) levels that give some benefits, and there are other equipment types. XP for these is granted along with in-game cash at the end of the match, win or lose, with bonuses for feats like 'most kills', 'most healing', etc. Weapons are all supposed to be (and largely are) sidegrades, and the benefits of Coach levels are significant without being overpowering.
-
Movement is bound to the WASD keys. This was a big selling point for me, as I've always hated RTS-style controls. Your mileage may vary.
- The game is Free to Play with a cash shop, but the only items not attainable by play are Emotes. Outfits (which are purely cosmetic) require some luck with crafting. Everything else, from champ equipment to champions themselves, have a fairly reasonable unlock rate (either from in-game clobber coins or from crafting them, which gives you random results of course).
- The current rotation size is 8, and the rotations are usually robust in their selection of playstyles.
- Speaking of,
there are four game modes; Plunderball, which is Capture the Flag, and Conquest which is Capture Points. Plunderball 3v3 has two maps; the other modes each have one.
- The Siege gamemode is more like the typical MoBA; you have minions that rush turrets, there are two lanes, and you smack each other and push and etc. There is a little shake-up in that a bomb spawns in the middle of the arena roughly every 50 seconds; the bomb can be carried to a turret to do massive damage, usually doing significant collateral damage to enemies as well.
- The Destroyer gamemode gives each team a Destroyer, which approach the center of the map to do battle. Destroyers become stronger by being given Crystals, which spawn on the map. Typically victory is decided based on who can gather enough crystals to make their Destroyer stronger and who helps their Destroyer destroy the other one. (Each destroyer has 3 lives as well, meaning the battle zone will typically move around the map a bit).
That's a lot of words, and bold text scares me. Can I get a shorter version of all that?It's an all-action League of Legends with 5 minute matches and more gametypes.
Videos?The Developer's Twitch channel with various stuff.Videos from the recently-started tournaments. (Commentators are a bit annoying, but the gameplay demonstration is good)I'm only down here for the links.http://smashmuck.com/ - The main website.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/218330/ - Also it's on Steam for your convenience.
If you're interested, I'd be obliged if you gave the game a shot. You should do the tutorial because you get 500 of the game's premium currency for completing it, enough to buy the most expensive Crafting Booster which usually has enough stuff in it to unlock a couple of (random) champs, but the tutorial isn't particularly representative of the game itself. Other than that, I'm happy to field any questions, general or specific, that might come up.
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Topic: Smashmuck Champions - a fast-paced action-ie not-exactly-MoBA (Read 882 times)