Why Players use Pings and Annotations in Dota 2

Groupware research has long focused on representing gestures as a means to facilitate collaboration. However, this work has not led to wide support of gesturing in commercial groupware systems. In contrast, Dota 2, a popular MOBA game, provides two frequently-used gesturing tools: annotations - freely drawn lines on top of the gamespace - and pings - a combination of animation and sound indicating a point of interest. While gesturing tools are important for quickly coordinating with teammates in Dota 2, there is little information about how and why people use them. To gather this information, we performed two complementary studies: an interaction analysis of eight game replays, and a survey of 167 experienced players. Our findings include: six distinct motivations for the use of gesturing tools; when and how frequently gesture motivations occur during games; and, that players find pings an essential tool for winning, but not annotations. Our findings provide new directions for the design of gesturing tools in groupware and online games.