Turning a Warcraft 3 mod into a fully-fledged product be probably a tricky process, especially when that mod has a feverishly devoted fan base. Valve senior project manager Erik Johnson recently spoke t' IGN about how the Dota 2 dev team be tiptoeing through this potential minefield, explaining that the core gameplay a the mod will remain unchanged. "We'd be pretty hard-pressed t' improve on that," Johnson explained.

Valve's additions t' the DotA formula will be largely cosmetic, focusing on "infrastructure, art, 'n providing helpful tools t' newcomers so they can figure out what's going on." That seems like a good compromise -- keep the things that hardcore DotA fans already know 'n love, while giving a leg-up t' people like us, who manage t' lose DotA matches within mere milliseconds.