While these two mega-popular games may very well be based on the same classic game, the directions they've taken couldn't be any more different

One of the biggest differences laid at the feet of both League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth is based on their respective communities. Fony even noted that, when he played Heroes of Newerth, his team was quick to brand him as a newbie (You realize it was because you bought boots as your first item on Maliken!), while in League of Legends, the community seems a little bit nicer and more accommodating. In reality, both of these communities can be downright harsh - one just disguises it better. League of Legends employs a "newbie island," where new players can play with other new players, and that heavily contributes to a more accommodating community. Heroes of Newerth, on the other hand, has no such learning stage for matchmaking games, and most players don't even queue up for the matchmaking - they instead opt to play in the thousands of public games that are player managed like DotA. In these public games, the players can control who plays by checking on the stats of the players joining, and if they feel that someone is too low or too high, they can just kick them.

Unfortunately, while League of Legends is, technically speaking, more "fair" in its matchmaking process, it's really just a dice roll when it comes to the quality and "niceness" of your players; the only difference is that LoL automates this dice roll while HoN players just kick whoever they don't like. I would like to say, however, that in Heroes of Newerth, if you leave a game before it ends too many times, you'll get a "leaver" status, which can make you ineligible to play in "no leaver" games. For many players, this punishment acts as a great deterrent for potential leavers - in League of Legends, there doesn't appear to be any punishment (aside from the fact that the game records how many games you leave), and so, in most of my games, someone always leaves after their first few deaths. As well, if someone picks the hero you want in League of Legends, you can simply leave, thereby forcing the game to disband and placing the players back into the matchmaking queue. This can get incredibly annoying and games are constantly being disbanded before they start because of this)

Finally, when it comes to the actual game play aspects of League of Legends in comparison to Heroes of Newerth, this is where we get to the whole entire "apples and oranges" part of our comparison. One of the cool things about DotA was that it could be played in a number of different ways; depending on the heroes chosen, some teams prefer to split up to get quick kills, while others like to stick together while looking for the opposing team. In this regard, DotA and Heroes of Newerth both favor a very fast style of combat and many fights can be over within the first five seconds of when they begin. Considering most abilities in DotA and HoN have anywhere from a 15 second to a two minute cooldown, this means that whoever can get their abilities off first can often win the battle. In this way, many strategies revolve around small-scale skirmishes rather than large team fights, and this tends to favor individual skill over team coherency.

In League of Legends, Guinsoo has noted that they wanted to focus more on team fights and team coordination. In this way, LoL rewards players for pushing lanes and traveling together much more than DotA or HoN. Of course, in response to this, players have adjusted accordingly and, in conjunction with the smaller map of LoL, most mid to late game fights end up being large, pitched battles between both teams, with much of the focus being placed upon pushing lanes to destroy the enemy base. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you see it), this places much more emphasis on team coordination over individual skill, and for many DotA players who don't play with premade teams, this can be quite frustrating, as they now have to heavily rely on their teammates in order to win the game. In DotA or HoN, while your team is important, strong individual play can often times compensate for a weaker team. This is, obviously, not the case in LoL.

In the end, League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth are both fantastic evolutions of the DotA / genre and, having played with and against both development teams, I can honestly say that the MOBA industry is certainly in some very passionate and capable hands. With regard to players wondering which game is "better" than the other, it really does come down to individual preference. Do you like to rely on your team to win the game? Are you looking for something like DotA, but with a different direction (and a lot of potential)? Then maybe League of Legends is the game for you. When you play DotA, do you think to yourself "I just want more of this, but prettier?" Do you want to see the full potential of DotA explored as a standalone, fully developed game? Then maybe you should check out Heroes of Newerth. Or maybe you should just check out both of these great games and see for yourself what you liked best of DotA.