It's widely expected DOTA2 is going to be free to play, anyway. I think this will boil down to "people like having you in their team, here's a free hat".

Confirmed by Gabe ;)

Anything that can make MOBA community be less goddamn terrible for new players is a good thing. This is just Valve trying to maximize possible market penetration on this, by trying to make accessible something that is very, very unaccessible (mainly because of the community itself being very, very elitist and unfriendly for new members).

That is a good thing. So far I've had only good experiences in DOTA2 (then again I've only played two matches with people.), which is very unlike EVERYTHING that I've read about the communities in that kind of game.

What do you mean by 'characters'? I see this not as discrimination against people, but against behavior, and discrimination against certain behaviors has a long precedent.

Ok let me put it this way... everybody have rage moments...so some "guy" will decide if I am a good or bad person? How can you decide that on a fricking game....

I'm thinking that it'll be using a community vote system. Sure, if you have a bad day and take it out on some players you'll get downvoted that day, but if it's not your normal behavior then the amount of upvotes you get on every other day will far outweigh that day's downvotes, and your average will look good.

Granted, I'm not saying this will be a great system, I'm skeptical since I think it'll be abused, but I was just countering the argument that it's flat out discrimination.

It is a sort of discrimination,that they can use only on their f2p titles... I don't believe it is doable for 3rd party titles

No, it wouldn't be. I'm still not even sure what they're charging more/less for. Gabe mentioned as an example that mic access could be more for downvoted players, but if I had to guess I would say that's just an example since charging for mic access seems a bit odd. I guess you can sell hats on DOTA. Not sure what else.

Heroes, I should think. The mic thing was most likely a joke.

Urrrgh, competitively played multiplayer gaming is the absolute pits. You can tell this by the sorts of people who do it.

I'd rather play against an AI thanks.

"Steam, now with 50% more bullshit"

"…the games industry has this broken model, which is one price for everyone. That’s actually a bug, and it’s something that we want to solve through our philosophy of how we create entertainment products" - Gabe Newell

Did Gabe Newell just call us Aussies a bunch of arseholes?

Steam through an AU IP:
CODMW2:$90
CODMW3:$100 (not even brick and mortar stores sell PC games at this price anymore)
Skyrim:$90

Steam through a US IP:
CODMW2:$20 (Yes, that's a $70 difference)
CODMW3:$60
Skyrim $60.

EDIT: Just to add, The Au and US dollars are pretty much at parity and have been for quite a while now.

OH shit, I got a warning on their forums once.

I will never buy anything from them again? :P

Btw. they just thought: "Well, if we are already banning and warning everybody, maybe we should make some money from it!" :P

From my experience with Dota 2 this would mean 80-90% of the people playing are going to be paying an extra hundred dollars for the game if this actually happens.

Internet anonymity will always lead to trolls and immature individuals messing with others online. If this model goes through the amount of trolling and downrating for no reason would be unprecedented.