[croon]

As I mentioned I have played it, but not by any stretch as long as other games, so it might have been unfair in that regard. You are probably right.

However, would it be unfair to suggest that designing a game with unlocks that way takes you down one of two routes below?

* That unlocks (whether it be items or heroes) give you unfair advantage by being fundamentally different in balance and design, and having those available only to some skews the advantage towards the one with a bigger pool.

OR

* That to avoid being unfair to newer players with less unlocks, you end up balancing everything towards a lowest common denominator, that variations in function/mechanics can not exist because it would skew the advantage to only the few who has unlocked it.

In dota you can have really hard hero counters, because everyone has the entire hero pool. If you could only expect players to have 20 out of 100+ heroes, you would have to design them in such a way that at least a 1/5 heroes could play in either the exact same way, or a sufficiently equivalent way.

And at that point, what's the case for making a lot of heroes?