How to Play Deadlock: Pro Tips and Tricks for Dominating New MOBA Shooter

Showcasing elements of tactical third-person shooting and a Moba lifestyle Deadlock, I've come to understand, is gaining considerable traction among the gaming community, and Valve just keeps integrating different ideas from great games like Dota 2 and Team Fortress 2. The game features both the complexity of Dota's and the fast-paced shooting combat. If you find yourself lost at the beginning of the game, this guide aims to assist you in mechanics and understanding better tips while playing.

What is Deadlock?

Deadlock is a cooperative 6v6 shooter in which players pick heroes and take turns defending and attacking the enemy’s base, which has the Patron as their primary structure. There are 4 lanes on the map, which contain guardians in the center of the arch and walkers and elder guardians around it. These all add to the strategy as MOBA and shooting hybrid game style mode requires strategy planning along with FPS requirments.

Credit: Valve Corporation

The matches are mostly decided in 20 to 30 minutes, though longer, more competitive ones can easily stretch to 45 to 50 minutes. The strategical laid back focus of the world and objectives within it added a level of depth to the game progression and speed of the matches.

Key Objectives in Deadlock

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In Deadlock, any player is out to destroy the Patron base of the enemy that is more or less a structure that is strong enough to be classified as the strongest base. Players must start off by pushing through the lanes in which they complete objectives and slay enemy players. Here's a more detailed breakdown of the lane objectives:

• Guardians: They protect the lanes using laser and some close combat.

• Walkers: They are big robots that have AOE attacks and capabilities of stunning the players by lifting them.

• Elder Guardians: Stronger variants of Guardians who guard the stronghold.

• Shrines: Two structures that are found on the opposing stronghold which surrounds the Patron.

With the removal of these objectives, the Patron then becomes open to an attack. It is then required that both the Shrines in the opposing stronghold are taken out first which also overtime weakens the Patron. Once the Patron has weakened it would no longer be able to move and this is the best time to destroy it which would lead to victory.

Choosing Your Hero

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At round one for every match, players select a hero from a list of 21 heroes with four abilities with one of them being an ultimate one. Different from most MOBAS, deadlock does not have ability usage restrictions to certain levels. In Deadlock, players earn souls that they can spend to level different abilities of their playing character. Depending on your style, you can choose to upgrade your ultimate more and leave other upgrades at lower levels, or vice versa, for your playstyle.

Credit: Valve Corporation

Laning and Farming in Deadlock

The map in Deadlock consists of 4 lanes which include Yellow lane, Orange lane, Blue lane, and Purple lane. Each lane has a zip line that is usable to fast travel but the control of that lane must belong to your team, otherwise you cannot use it. the game is split into 2 duo lanes and 2 solo lanes with respect to two pair of players and in the first 10 mins if a player is close to his teammate one of the players full value soul bonus is awarded for minion kills.

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Farming minions is critical to earn souls, the game's currency utilized for item purchases and ability enhancement. Soules can be gained from last hitting the minions or shooting the soul orbs that drop off their bodies. After the 10 minute time frame, only the orbs give souls, and therefore it is much more important for players to get those.

A rigorously planned strategy is also maximizing the deployment of orange orbs by your minions, which in turn blocks enemy players from getting souls. This takes away elements from your enemies thereby in turn favoring your side.

Souls and the Economy

Souls are useful in upgrading one’s hero and getting items. Gaining souls from either last hits, lane minions or jungle creeps is a major aspect of Deadlock. Five are secure souls and unsecured souls. An unsecured soul is obtained from neutral camps and map chests. The secured soul is directly earned through the gameplay.

Credit: Valve Corporation

Unsecured souls on the other hand will with the passing of period become secured souls. However, it is best to spend unsecured souls early in order to avoid losing progress.

Key Game Mechanics

Deadlock features a set of movement mechanics that are purposeful. For instance, players can quickly navigate themselves across the map while using dashes, double jumps and rail rides. However, in order to become a pro player, it is very crucial to learn how to move around effortlessly during fights, snipe minion’s last hits and avoid attacks from your enemies.

Dashes can be followed up with jumps in order to close any remaining distance. Sometimes, you find yourself wanting to land a barrage of bullets while escaping through the rails which you can do. To increase your chances of surviving when I recommend peeking out through walls but disabling your weapon.

Jungle Objectives and Boss Fights

The selection of souless neutral creeps from the jungle enables not only additional lives but permanent advantages too. Interestingly, the time of farming jungle camps does vary making it essential for players to know the times when those camps provide various resources to them and get an advantage over their enemies. These are some of the timings: The time for small creeps is every after two minutes where after every four minutes the game respawns them. Every 3 minutes after the 3rd minute, the game respawns gold urns which grant one's team some resources. Then at the death timers of the mid boss, which is after every 10 minutes, it gives buff that boosts the lane creeps while allowing lower cooldown timers.

Defeating the mid boss is a strategic goal but watch out if the enemy team has respawned, they can help contest the kill and secure the buff for themselves.

Tips and Tricks

1. Do Not Waste Your Speed Boost Early: You may be tempted to use the zipline speed boost when the match begins but instead save it for times you really need to zip out of a fight or are looking to rejoin a fight to make a significant impact. It is on long cooldown (340 seconds) so do not waste it unnecessarily.

2. Make Sure You Focus on Denying Souls: Denying the opponent’s souls is much better than just focusing on the kills. Use minions to shoot the orbs and deny resources to the enemy players.

3. Melee Last Hitting Minions Is The Way Forward: This is a very good strategy as it does not only help in safely getting the required resource, but it also requires quick melee range attacks which are hard to do without being effected from enemies' crowd control over your character.

4. Advance The Urn Goal: The Soul Urn is a very resourceful item that gets unlocked around the 10 minute mark. Always protect your teammates with the soul urn as it will always make your team stronger. If you do not have the urn, make sure to stop the other team from reaching their goal.

5. Efficient Mobility: Learn dash jumps, slide-hops, and wall bounces to outrun the foes. Throwing in these actions together with proper pacing of your stamina will make your motion more elusive and likely give you the upper hand in mobility.

6. Avoid Fighting the Mid-boss Too Early: Only try to fight the mid boss when the enemy team has been wiped out or is otherwise engaged. Overly aggressive fighters will lose the mid-fire to the enemy’s place in the team.

7. Don’t Farm Carelessly Past 10 Minutes: Post laning phase, use those neutral camps spaced out from each other to try and further expand onto jungles. Don’t farm with teammates, solo farm to maximize soul gain.

Conclusion

So imagine a game that combines heavy strategy and MOBA elements with pulsating fast action hurtling through worlds in a third person perspective. That is the essence of Deadlock, as it requires not only mechanically skilled players, but also strong team work in order to secure shrines and farm enemies in order to win. Seeing how Deadlock is a continually developing game, it is best to try and learn every new strategy in the game, so that you will never fall out of the meta.