Tencent's Arena of Valor [Free] has been "soft launched" in North America for a couple weeks now, and while I gave it in our in our launch day review, I'd score it even higher than that if I could today. It effectively is League of Legends, which is one of my favorite games of all time... So, of course, I've fallen madly in love with Arena of Valor, as it's LoL, but I don't need my PC to play it. The problem with these games, and Arena of Valor is no different, is that doing well in them involves less of a learning curve and more ... smashing your head against a learning wall. MOBAs are incredibly skill intensive games, which is why people get so unbelievably sucked into them, but getting to that point can involve a lot of frustration as you die over and over and over. So, we'll be publishing a series of Arena of Valor guides starting at the absolute basics and (hopefully) culminating in total MOBA newbies seeing some level of success climbing the ranked ladder.
What is a MOBA"
Hero Types
Typical Team Composition
Last Hitting and Gold Generation
Typical Team Positioning
MOBAs Have Guidelines, Not Rules

What is a MOBA"

Starting at the absolute beginning, a MOBA is a multiplayer online battle arena. The genre kicked off with a custom StarCraft Map called "Aeon of Strife" which was pretty innovative at the time as instead of commanding an army of units, players competed with a single hero unit. MOBAs surged in popularity when the Warcraft III m...