I am back to having 4v5 games 50% of the time in League of Legends, so I am giving it up for at least a few months. It is a roaring mix of people who never connect to the game, miss the first 5-10 minutes, AFK after one tower goes town, intentionally feed, wait at base for 200 gold, or (to take my last example) have their mothers tell them to come eat dinner 20 minutes into a game.
Whatever system discourages leaving games has no visible impact. It is tolerant, because technical problems happen. You need to accumulate some number of offenses before action will be considered, and then punishment is possible, and then it may rise as high as a temporary ban. I presume some number of time bans will eventually lead to a permaban, but my short Tribunal history shows no permabans for that, as opposed to cursing at people. In a F2P game, you can have as many accounts as you like, so the main penalty is that you need to log back on and have less IP. Basically, you can do whatever you want, and you have no skin in the game; the sort of person who might get permabanned on a level 30 account would love the chance to start a new account and smurf/troll the newer players.
I have mainly been playing ARAM because the average toxicity seems lower. The attendant lack of concern for playing the game (“eh, it’s just ARAM”) is rather upsetting. I presume I could have fewer of these people if I played high ELO ranked games on Summoner’s Rift, but I don’t feel willing to wade up the stream of toxin to get there. Also, I am far from a platinum player, so I am worried the game would suggest that I park for a few months midstream.
: Zubon
I’ve always wondered why people play toxic games like LoL. I tried it for a week at a friends insistence and I could not find one redeeming feature in either the game or the community. My friend spent 90% of the time raging at opposing team members. At face value it is game for masochists. I certainly would not spend money on it.
Distinguish between the game and the community (or a subset of the community). The game is rather good. Even with F2P, you do not become one of the most popular games in the world without actually being a good game.
I might enjoy the game a lot more if the community were gated. For example, give me a checkbox for “only play with other players who have spent money.” That plus the prospect of banning could radically improve things, although queuing times would likely be longer. Also, I cannot see running ranked that way without undermining the game’s image.
Also also, some people enjoy that kind of community and thrive on trolling trolls. They want rage. People want different things.
I have written posts showing that in my experience (and play level) only 1 in 5 is a “close” game. The element that you want to avoid shows up in around 30% of your games. Once you play enough you learn to accept that.
And then you wonder, should I even accept that?
It’s a great game. Zubon is right – I always thought about ways to improve matchmaking such as “who has spent money” or even more effectively – don’t match up people with zero tribunal visits with those who have them – force the trash into a little area where they only impact each other.
For some Reason Riot believes they can rehabilitate their players (they have a team of PHD’s in Behaviour, Psycology, and Neuroscience) instead of focusing on the good they have.