Dawngate is a Free-to-Play MOBA game developed by Waystone Games and published by Electronic Arts for Windows. Both the gameplay and the interface are similar to the ones seen in League of Legends, the developers advertising it as “a game which learns from its predecessors and which respects them through the players’ experience”.
You control one up to five players on a team with the goal to defeat the other team and destroy their guardian.
Shapers (Heroes)
You take control of a hero (Shaper), which you select at the beginning of each map. Every hero has a set of unique abilities, level up as they gather experience and improve their offensive and defensive by leveling up and purchasing items. Additionally, each Shaper has control of a set Vitality.
Leveling Up
Heroes gain experience and increase their level by killing enemy units (enemy Shapers, minions, workers, jungle creatures). The same units award Vim, the in-game currency.
Roles and Loadouts
Before the match, when entering the Shaper Selection Window, you must indicate your preferred role or roles to help your team-mates plan strategy. There are 4 roles:
- Gladiator: Focus on killing Lane Minions
- Tactician: Focus on harassing and territory control;
- Hunter: Focus on killing Jungle creatures;
- Predator: Focus on ambushing and killing enemy Shapers.
In addition to selecting Roles, each Shaper has a list of loadouts to choose from. Loadouts are sets of Perks that come in the form of stats, passive effects or a mixture of both. Though not yet available, developers say players will be able to customize their own loadouts.
Controls
Here are some basic controls that will prove useful in-game:
- To move your character, right click on the ground;
- To attack an enemy, right click on it and your hero will attack automatically;
- To move your camera, move your mouse cursor to the edge of the screen;
- To center your camera, press the Space Bar.
Abilities
In addition to the basic attacks, each Shaper has a set of 4 unique abilities. By default, you can activate these special forces using the following keys: Q, W, E, R.
At the beginning of each match, Shapers start with level 1 and one point to attribute to an ability. You can unlock new abilities or improve the effectiveness of an existing one using these skill points. Each time your Shaper levels up you will gain a new skill point.
To activate an ability, press the corresponding key, and after the target/area reticule appears, left click to launch the attack.
Spells
Similar to abilities, every Shaper also has a common set of Spells, available for everyone to use. They are unlocked on levels 1, 10 and 20 and bound by default on the 1, 2 and 3 keys on your keyboard. Spells work in a similar way to abilities do: press the corresponding button, position your cursor according to the target / area reticule and left-click to activate.
Because they are more powerful, spells have a higher cooldown than normal abilities but their effects are special.
To select a spell not hotkeyed to the keys above, click the Spellbook button in the bottom panel of the screen. There, you can pick a spell, use it, or change it. Changing a spell will cost you Vim, the in-game currency used in Dawngate.
Wards
Every Shaper has a Ward spell which can be activated using the F key every 3 minutes. Wards can be placed anywhere (best in bushes) to grant vision of the surrounding area.
Items
To increase your power, you can purchase items from your base's vendor with Vim. Items have upgrade branches, which can be reached by using Vim.
All items award certain attributes or beneficial effects. Active Effects will stack (+40 Power from an item and +20 Power from another item means +60 Power) but Passive Effects (effects that are always on while you carry the item) with the same name (e.g. Tenacity II from an item and Tenacity II from another item) do not stack and their effect counts as only one.
Consumables are single use items that last for a limited time.
Returning to Base
Pressing the B key will teleport your character back to the base where you can purchase items and get your hero healed. This ability is very useful to quickly travel to your base and save yourself from critical situations.
Map and AI
On the current beta map, there are 2 paths (North and South) that lead to the enemy Guardian, each defending the enemy tower. These towers will take down their enemy Heroes and Minions on sight. The minions are automatically spawned units which support the Heroes into battle. Between these 2 paths there are several jungles filled with neutral units which drop items and award experience.
Bindings
On the two paths between the Guardians are Bindings, powerful defense towers which must be destroyed before you can proceed to the enemy base.
Detroying a Binding grants your team a bonus, with a maximum of three available. These bonuses help your Striders, larger summoned minions, become more powerful and help defeat the enemy hoards.
However, the Bindings will respawn after a period of time, with the ones closer to your base respawning faster and the ones further away, slower. The lane lines on the ground are used to track when a Binding will respawn.
Minions
In a match, you are assisted by AI-controlled units called Minions. Waves of Minions spawn regularly and distribute between the 2 lines / paths.
In addition to Minions, far more powerful units called Striders will occasionally spawn and assist in combat. Their power and abilities increase and they spawn more often based on the enemy Bindings destroyed. Destroying every Binding on a lane will make Striders spawn with every wave of minions.
Near your base, the 3 glyph slots will fill in as you destroy enemy Bindings. This allows you to see the state of your enemy more easily.
Jungle
Surrounding the lanes are the neutral areas known as Jungles. Within these jungles, besides neutral creatures which attack anybody, you can find 4 Spirit Wells, which passively gather Vim for your team. Each team begins the match in control of 2 Wells.
They have 2 states: locked and captured. You can capture a spirit well by staying inside the well without taking damage until the capture meter fills up (going from red to blue). Capture the Wells to gain an advantage over the enemy team.
Located in the center of the map is a powerful jungle creature known as "The Parasite". The Parasite will spawn at the beginning of the match in a weakened form and evolves twice through the course of the match. Killing The Parasite will grant global income for your team and with the 2nd and 3rd evolution of the creature, it will also grant a buff that grants large amounts of power and health regeneration.
Guardians
The final goal of the game is killing the enemy's Guardian. The Guardian is a powerful creature able to attack and use abilities like Crowd Control and Area of Effect damage. They have 3 health bars which if only partially drained, will regenerate over time. Draining a health bar will pass on to the next and will not regenerate anymore.
