Finally: Deadlock Lets You Dodge Your Least Favorite Hero

Valve’s Deadlock has finally introduced a hero avoidance system, a pragmatic move that, while not a true MOBA ban phase, offers a vital quality-of-life improvement for its pre-alpha state. We at In Game News have long stressed the importance of player agency in managing frustrating metas, and this "prefer to avoid" toggle is a critical first step. It allows players to dodge specific power picks or notorious hard counters, creating a more enjoyable grind on the ladder, even if it falls short of a collaborative draft experience.

A Calculated Compromise: Deadlock's "Prefer to Avoid" System

The perennial pain point in any MOBA is encountering that one hero who utterly ruins a match, often due to an overtuned kit or a particularly grating flavor-of-the-month build. Traditional ranked play often mitigates this with a robust hero ban system, allowing teams to strategically remove threats before picks even begin. Valve, in its typically iterative fashion, has taken a different approach with Deadlock, labeling its new feature a "hero banning system" in the patch notes, though our analysis reveals it's distinctly different.

Instead of a team-based ban phase, Deadlock now offers a simple "prefer to avoid" toggle. When queuing for either standard ranked play or the more casual Street Brawl, players can designate a single hero from the game’s roster they wish to avoid. This individual preference is then factored into the matchmaking process. For veterans who remember the sheer frustration of early MOBA metas without proper ban systems, this is a welcome, if limited, addition. It’s a direct response to player feedback on balancing the meta without overhauling the core matchmaking logic.

Key Details of Deadlock's New System:

• Mechanism: Individual "prefer to avoid" toggle.
• Scope: One hero per player per queue.
• Availability: Standard Play (Ranked) and Street Brawl (Casual).
• Exclusion: New heroes from the "Old Gods, New Blood" patch (and future new releases) cannot be avoided.
• Effect: Influences matchmaking to reduce encounters with the avoided hero.

Not a True Draft: Why Deadlock's Approach Makes Sense (For Now)

We understand why Valve has opted for this lighter touch rather than a full, traditional MOBA draft phase. Most competitive MOBAs feature a pre-game lobby where teams collaborate, taking turns to select heroes and collectively ban others. Think of the intense pre-game strategy in League of Legends, where each player locks in a ban before hero picks, leading to up to ten unique hero removals from a single match.

Deadlock's current system bypasses this strategic, collaborative element entirely. Players make their individual choices, and the matchmaker does the rest. While this might seem less sophisticated, we believe it's a necessary compromise for a game currently in pre-alpha with a relatively smaller hero pool. At just 34 playable heroes for a 6v6 game, a traditional system where each player gets a ban would easily remove over a third of the roster every single match. This would severely impact roster diversity and potentially lead to incredibly stale metas, forcing players to adapt to an even smaller pool of viable characters.

Deadlock's Avoidance vs. Traditional MOBA Bans

The Elephant in the Room: Cannot Avoid New Heroes

However, our editorial stance demands we address a significant caveat: the inability to avoid new heroes. Currently, this applies to the six characters introduced in "Old Gods, New Blood." This decision is, frankly, perplexing and potentially detrimental to the early meta. New hero releases in live service games are notoriously prone to being overtuned to encourage play and purchases. Preventing players from avoiding these potentially imbalanced characters means, for a critical period, the meta could be dictated by these fresh additions, forcing players to either play them, counter them directly, or simply endure the power disparity. It feels like a missed opportunity for true player agency, and we hope Valve reconsiders this restriction as the game evolves. We've seen this play out poorly in other titles, and Deadlock should strive to avoid similar pitfalls.

Despite this concern, the core utility of dodging a universally reviled hero like Bebop (a personal bane for many of us on the team) is a massive quality-of-life win. It demonstrates Valve is listening to player pain points and iteratively improving the experience, much like how they've spent the past year refining Deadlock's core mechanics.

Looking Ahead: A Foundation for Future Evolution

While this isn't the full-fledged, tactical ban phase veteran MOBA players might crave, it's an intelligent and necessary step for Deadlock in its current developmental stage. It provides immediate relief from irritating matchups and allows players to experiment with new picks without immediately running into hard counters, fostering a more forgiving learning environment. As the hero roster inevitably expands, we fully expect Valve to iterate further on this system, perhaps introducing team captain bans or a limited draft phase. For now, this "prefer to avoid" system is a sensible and welcome addition that significantly improves the overall player experience, albeit with a crucial restriction that bears watching. We'll be keeping a close eye on how this impacts the meta and player satisfaction moving forward.