What is Deadlock? - Valve's Newest Game Explained

Deadlock is a MOBA/hero shooter hybrid game by Valve - it's currently in a private alpha test but does not have a release date.

It's rumored to be the next title by Icefrog, the creator of DOTA. Regardless of whether that’s true, the game borrows many DOTA elements like laning, denying, neutral creeps, and allowing massive snowballs to happen. There is even a massive end game objective, like Roshan.

These MOBA-like elements are combined with gunplay, abilities, and verticality similar to a hero shooter like Overwatch. This is especially felt during late game team fights. Overall, it feels like an 80% MOBA and 20% hero shooter ratio.

Flavor and aesthetic wise, it takes an interesting approach with a mixture of humans, robots, and demons fighting in a version of New York, called the Cursed Apple.

In this guide, we'll cover the broad strokes of how a game of Deadlock works - including descriptions of its core early, mid, and late phases of a standard match. We won't be covering the nitty details of mechanics and strategy, so head to our Guides section instead if you're looking for that.

How A Game Works (TLDR)

• A Deadlock match includes two teams of six players (twelve total)

• The team that destroys their enemy’s base is the winner

• There are 4 lanes with 3 layers of turrets before two Shrines (Inhibitors) are exposed (defended by a base boss, called the Patron)

• After both Shrines are destroyed, the Attacking team can hit the final objective to go for a win

• Most games are around 20-30 minutes long but can definitely stretch to 45-60 minutes if it’s a close game that goes back and forth

Pre Game

The players select multiple champions, you currently have to pick three choices.

Just like other MOBAs and hero shooters, there are a wide range of hero archetypes and playstyles.

You're able to set priority order for the characters you want to play most.

After selecting, you join a lobby as one of the champions you selected at random.

There are no mirror matchups in Deadlock, and each character can only appear in a game a maximum of one time.

To explore all the characters and their abilities, head to our dedicated Heroes page.

Early Game (0-10 minutes~)

The game begins with players immediately being on ziplines going directly to the four lanes at random with equal numbers (meaning lanes of either 1v1 or 2v2).

A Trooper wave comes with the players and will continue to spawn throughout the match. Killing these Troopers will grant Souls which the players can use to purchase items to create Builds to get stronger. If a player does not kill a Trooper, they do not spawn a soul.

If minions are killed by their weapon or abilities, the Soul comes out like a little balloon and must be claimed or denied by their enemy if they shoot it first. Minions killed by the Melee attack will be immediately claimed.

During this phase, the players choose between farming the minions, denying minions, poking the enemy, going for kill, when to buy, when to push wave, and how to kill the 1st tower, called a Guardian.

Ganking other lanes or collecting neutral monster camps is possible at this time but is contextual.

Mid Game (10-20 minutes~)

Similar to other MOBAs, the Mid Game begins around when the first layer of towers begin to fall. The winners of these lanes will begin to roam and gank other lanes to snowball their lead to other parts of the map.

In the image below, you can see that the purple lane on the most has successfully destroyed their opposing tower, giving Lady Geist the option of continuing to push or roaming the map.

Skirmishes over jungle creeps happen often and mobile heroes become more dangerous. Depending on which characters are in the game, some will look to start grouping or look to split-push a lane.

At 10 minutes, the Mid Boss spawns but is likely too strong to slay until closer to the Mid-Late game transition. During this time, the Spirit Urn objective also spawns.

This is a side objective that involves the players having to carry an Urn all the way across the map to deposit it. If they succeed, they are granted Souls across the entire team.

Carrying the Urn poses some risk as the enemy team is alerted when the Urn is captured and the holder cannot fire their gun or use their abilities unless they drop it.

Mid Game phase continues until the players start to destroy the 2nd and 3rd layers of turrets.

Late Game (20-30+ minutes)

Finally, we have the late game, which will begin when one team has gotten strong enough to start breaching the final defenses of their enemy’s base.

Although isolated fights and skirmishes can still occur, large-scale 5v5 and 6v6 are likely to happen. If the game is close, a team may look to claim the Mid Boss to help secure momentum. 

Doing so grants a Rejuvenator buff that grants additional firepower, shorter spawn timers, and more. The team that gets the Rejuvenator definitely has a good chance to win but can still blunder, especially in a close game.

Eventually, due to long death timers, there will be a window where an attacking team can either push for lethal or the defenders get a big win and are able to push the tides in their favor. Sometimes the defenders can win off of a revenge push, or they can stabilize the game.

These large scale fights continue until a team eventually makes a strong enough push to destroy the base's Shrines and Patron.

That's all for now! Explore the rest of our Deadlock site to keep learning more about the game. We are absolutely hooked!