- DotA 2 metagame undergoes major changes every patch, whereas League metagame is mostly guided by Riot towards a certain playstyle. E.g. in DotA 2 lane assignments are extremely flexible, under certain conditions you can see any hero in any lane, whereas in League champions are mostly only viable in certain lanes.
- Mechanics wise, DotA 2 is more punishing. If you die, you are dead for much longer, you lose a significant portion of aquired gold. Laning wise, you can deny your own creeps in order to prevent the enemy from gaining gold and experience, and you can modify where the opposing creep waves meet in lane via pulling from the jungle camps. You cannot do that in League. Teamfights in DotA 2 are usually very fast and deadly, due to the presence of strong disables/burst (which is something League shies away from), strong initiators, and the fact that heroes are very asymmetrically balanced.
- The map in DotA 2 is bigger which puts a great emphasis on mobility and positioning on the strategic level - The International 3's Grand finals were a great example of that.
- DotA 2 comes with a lot of complexity. There are a huge amount of synergies, item/spell interactions, and generally mechanical knowledge that a player needs to absorb before they can play semi-efficiently (not that the process is not fun; it just takes a considerable amount of time in comparison).
- On the technical side, DotA 2 has a better client by an order of magnitude. Also, it has a Linux-native version which runs perfectly.
Major differences:
-No denying in LoL
-The lanes are much more rigid, with 1 top, 1 mid, 2 bottom, and 1 jungle being the standard meta, although in competitive you will sometimes see lane swaps. I can't say I've ever seen anything like an aggressive tri-lane in LoL.
-There's a lot more out of game but game impacting customization of your hero/champ in LoL that is tied into their micro transactions (runes) and account leveling (masteries). In Dota all of these small differences are absent, and the items are generally more impactful and more frequently have actives. The biggest out of game impacts are from your choice of heroes.
-On that same note, in LoL, you only have a small roster of free champions each week, plus a couple of starter champions, to play from initially. You can buy more as you earn more in game currency or pay money to unlock them directly. This is contrasted with DOTA giving you all of the heroes up front as soon as you make your account, with only cosmetics being for sold for real money.
-Spells are generally more costly and less spammable in Dota versus LoL. Champions in LoL are usually centered on one controllable unit, with some having a second unit that's controllable through an alt-click. This contrasts Dota's more RTS controls where heroes are capable of amassing armies of units.
-I'm sure I'm forgetting some things, but overall a lot comes down to the different design philosophies of either game. Valve strives with DOTA 2 for "perfect imbalance", with everything having some "overpowered" aspects. I can't really speak to what Riot's current design philosophy with LoL, as I haven't followed it a lot recently, but a lot of the decisions are built around their specific take on the f2p model.
1) eSports. I have to many kids and a wife who agros at anything Video Game related so I play like 2 or 3 games a week on a good week. I really enjoy watching lol eSports. Go TSM
2) League is easier - I have such limited playing time that League is much more approachable. Having played LOL for almsot 5 years now I don't have to learn anything to have a good time in Normals or Ranked.
3) DOTA seems very dark and just rubs me the wrong way. I prefer the League over the top cartoon world.
Interesting to see if someone plays both and has any comment on how they differ.