Crit, Drake Changes, And Esports
Riot, players, it's a simple issue. Esports is still new, and still not really recognized AS a sport, by a large number of people. Right now, League of Legends is leading that charge, to get esports recognized and supported more. LoL is bigger and easier to get into and watch than DotA. Hearthstone is trying, but the large RNG in that game prevents people from really calling it a sport. Even gamers struggle to call it truly competitive with how much RNG is there...Bringing me to my point.
Crit in games is a staple. I am NOT saying crit is a bad thing, it doesn't need a nerf, it doesn't need a buff....It needs rethinking. Crit in games can be done TWO ways, in the coding of the game. One, the way League uses it now. Each attack has a chance, to crit. As Crit Chance, the stat, would imply. This fucntions, and it's often used. This is, however, entirely random until your reach 100%, and therefore unreliable. I cannot and will not attempt to count the number of times I have heard the following phrases from LCS casters: "Oh that Crit!" "He got critted out." "A lucky crit". In some games, the casters have actively SAID that they prefer when ADCs reach high crit numbers, so that there's less luck involved, and the game gets decided based on skill. No luck exists in an ACTUAL sport, so why would luck come into an esport? Should it? I don't think so, which is why I point out the SECOND, rarely used way to code crit into a game.
The second way to code crit, is as a flat bonus to your attack. If you have, say 25% crit chance, then every fourth attack since gaining that stat would be a crit. Period. No guessing. No RNG. No surprise. Every four IS a crit, said and done. This removes the luck from your crits, removes the luck from LCS, and helps give League a chance at really being seen as a sport. As it stands, when someone tells me "Oh, esports aren't real sports"....I can fight back with every argument you want, and almost win...Until they say, "Well, there's still luck involved, right?" Well, there IS still luck involved, and why should it be?
As for the new drakes..I like em. I think it's pretty cool, and it looks like fun to see. With that said...RNG RNG RNG. RNG is bad for us, as a game, as a community, and as an esport. I realize you can't make the drakes simply rotate, because that removes the point of the stacking mechanics and things you've added. What I am asking you to realize is that the addition of these to the LCS will completely devalue any integrity we had as a sport.
ESPN has only just barely started to host LCS games. We can't really afford to have them hosting games where luck will suddenly be a massive factor. Crits alone, maybe we could play off, and get away with. With these too? No. We'd not be as bad as Hearthstone's RNG, but we'd not be taken seriously. LoL is THE Esport right now. If we devalue ourselves as a sport, we devalue esports period, and it could be years before any game is in a postion to try to get esports recognized. We need LESS RNG, not more.
Again, I'm not saying remove crit, or nerf it, or buff it. Not saying the new drakes are bad, unusable, need a buff, need a nerf. ALL I am trying to make clear here is, as a community and a game, League of Legends benefits from being the foremost Esport around, and the entire gaming community is benefiting from this as well. If LoL adds more RNG, and continues to heavily feature RNG, in the competitive level, then LoL will cease to be seen as a sport, even by those that play it, and both LoL and the video game community would suffer from this.
TLDR RNG bad. Please don't add more to the LCS, and remove what we have.
PS: I'm not intending to get the casters in trouble, I'm simply using them as a reference to prove that I am not the only one seeing the issue with crits, and as they do see a LOT of high level matches, they have a large sample size to base their opinions on. Please don't yell at the casters for being honest.
