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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Roman3 (talk | contribs) at 15:42, 22 October 2010 (→Merger proposal). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

This article will be improved upon. :) --Dotaveteran (talk) 23:17, 19 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Merger proposal

To Rezecib (the one who submitted the suggestion): A good day to you. I have viewed the Wikipedia article you suggested entitled "Multiplayer Online Battle Arena" and judging from the article history, you seem to be a young man with great dedication.

Double checking the references however, it seems majority of them are from either user-submitted community sites with notability problems or Riot Games endorsed content. And here at Wikipedia, promoting unbiased information sharing and integrity is our topmost priority.

My professional advice would be to have the "Multiplayer Online Battle Arena" article deleted.

Unless you are an employee of Riot Games (League of Legends) doing marketing for them, I personally invite you to become a regular contributor here. In the next few years, the DotA genre will be bigger compared to it's current state as it becomes more mainstream and by that time, this article will have to grow with the community. And along with such popularity, we expect vandals and spammers to flood in. A dedicated Wikipedia user such as yourself would be a great asset to both the Wikipedia and the DotA community.

Have a nice day! --Dotaveteran (talk) 02:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

First I should clarify that Multiplayer online battle arena is not the first thing I've done on here. I've been an active member of the Wikipedia for about 5 years. I think that any genre named specifically after DotA (which you have incorrectly capitalized there) should be in the DotA article, which to a degree it already is. However, there are multiple other names being used to describe the genre, MOBA being one, and Action-RTS being another. I want to do more research on it (can't really at the moment, too much work), but it may be best to shift the content of both this article and Multiplayer online battle arena into a combined article, e.g. Action real-time strategy. As it stands, Multiplayer online battle arena has content that could be moved here.
Basically, the main points I stand by are:
  1. This genre needs an article
  2. This genre should not be named after its seminal title. Sure, when a genre first becomes established it gets called by its seminal title; but like RTS and Sandbox games, they move on when other major games (i.e. ones that are not purely imitation or clones) begin to pop up.
  3. MOBA cannot be discredited on the basis of being coined for marketing; so were Real-time strategy and Massively multiplayer online role-playing game.
  4. What should ultimately decide the name for this genre's article is the most prevalent term
~rezecib (talk) 14:44, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In response to Rezecib 14:44, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

  1. Yes, there is no dispute regarding the importance of a Wikipedia article on the Dota genre. We definitely need one due to the emergence of these DotA-based games.
  2. There is no hard-rule in the naming of a particular video game genre. If there was, Rougelike would not exist.
  3. MOBA isn't being discredited solely because it was coined for marketing purposes. The difference between MOBA and Real-time strategy is the level of acceptance in the industry. The term MOBA may be used often among members of the League of Legends community but this genre is not only made up of LoL players. We have the DotA, Heroes of Newerth and DotA 2 communities to cater to.
  4. Agreed. Basing on the MOBA article's history and discussions, the MOBA term has had problems with it's acceptance. And as of the moment, the DotA genre is the more prevalent term being used to classify these type of games.

Final Recommendations: Merger Proposal Removed. Let both articles co-exist for the meantime until the time an overwhelming majority acknowledges the term, MOBA. In the meantime, let the prevailing term be used.

Additional notes: Shifting the content of both this article and Multiplayer online battle arena into a combined article, e.g. Action real-time strategy seems like a pretty good idea. This can also avoid any impending edit wars between LoL fanboys using MOBA and HoN/DotA 2 fanboys using DBG. Waiting for additional recommendations from other editors before proceeding.

Dotaveteran (talk) 16:32, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You are not in any position of authority to call this debate over and remove the tag, simply because you say so. I'm reverting your edit, due to the fact that this discussion needs to continue before any rash decisions are made.DarthBotto talk•cont 20:43, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In response to DarthBotto 20:43, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Yes, duly noted. Let the discussion continue. Please refer to Additional notes as the suggested course of action. --Dotaveteran (talk) 21:47, 20 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, so it looks like merging both into a third article is the way to go. Are there any ideas for names other than Action-RTS? Also, is that even a valid term? RPG elements also figure strongly, probably more so, but Action-RPG-RTS is kind of long-winded, and therefore unlikely that it's in use. Here are some basic results from Google on the mentioned terms (I tried to include variants):

  1. Multiplayer online battle arena - 509,000 hits [1]
  2. DotA based game - 32,100 hits [2]
  3. Aeon of Strife game - 32,100 hits [3]
  4. Action real time strategy - 18,000 hits [4]
  5. Action-RTS - 16,900 hits [5]
  6. DotA genre - 2,070 hits [6]

Looking at the hits for ARTS, it doesn't look like that's an appropriate term; it seems to have been used to describe very different games. From those statistics, it looks like MOBA comes out on top. I would like to note that I am not a League of Legends player; I tried it for a day or two and didn't like it much, and haven't played since. However, I would welcome statistics or support for other terms, as that would make the merging process politically easier. ~rezecib (talk) 17:15, 21 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Regardless of what happens, the name of the genre should make no mention to DotA. The only reason that "DotA based game" is garnering so many hits is due to the fact that HoN, LoL, and DotA 2 are in works, which many game journalists are going to refer to as a "dota based game". It is in my opinion that a 4 separate titles do not justify the creation of a completely separate genre, and should be more generic. I'm for Action-RTS or MOBA. I do support Action-RTS over MOBA, due to the nature of the game accurately reflecting the title. MOBA is a bit more of a generalized term. Finally, I wouldn't consider ANY of the DotA-based games to be an RPG: the short-lived nature of a HoN game do not allow the game to develop a story or in-game economy to allow you 'role play'. Just my $0.02 MAGZine (talk) 04:08, 22 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

  1. I'd propose MOBA over Actio-RTS. For the sole reason that it got considerably more hits on google, and that the function of WP should be to explain existing term, and not to establish new terms that describe something best in the opinion of a few users.
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