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@Riot, LCS viewers should NOT be the primary goal in mind

Best Fiddle·7/19/2018, 11:22:15 AM·132 votes·20,283 views

After having read GhostCrawler's most recent post on making sure to attend towards the LCS viewers, it begs the question. Exactly how much do those viewers really know about the game? Do they even care about the state of the game?

Why do so many viewers seem to be having fun watching a game, in which we, the actual players, CLEARLY see it shooting itself in the foot? Everyday we see posts about the same exact bullshit, regarding balance issues, yet we go unheard. So, why are thousands of LCS viewers the primary goal to attract the game to, when your majority (the fan base that actually plays the game and is the very backbone of the game) gets the boot?

Have we become so irrelevant, that even if we speak on these boards, (which are the actual game boards and not a third party source) get no replies at all by ANY other Riot staff? Not even just one?

LCS viewers did NOT build this game, we the actual game-goers did. We helped you build the game's very foundations, not LCS viewers. The people "crying and complaining" all these years, are ACTUALLY the people who carry a lot more value, than the masses of anonymous viewers, who probably only view the game, after getting bored with overwatch or fortcrap.

Also, we should not have to open Reddit, just to see game changing news. Im pretty sure, that we deserve to be informed of changes before any third party audience.

Riot will end up looking like the following if they don't give this crap up:

http://i67.tinypic.com/6i9t6p.jpg

125 Comments

BeatzBoyFTW7/19/2018, 11:37:17 AM47 votes

I bet $1000 that 80% of the viewers there probably played League only twice per week & doesn't give a shit about balance and climbing.

Keevalroy7/19/2018, 1:38:40 PM41 votes

Maybe they'll stop with this delusion of grandeur that League is somehow going to be a global sport that lats generations...

You know why basketball, baseball, and soccer are as long-lasting as they are Riot? You didn't get it then, you didn't get it as your views and population started to tank, so maybe you'll get it through your thick heads now. They're long-lasting because the rules didn't radically shift and change on the whims of the creators every fucking year, with obscure rule changes being thrown in and out at random in order to make it more exciting to watch.

You're killing your game with this crap you started at the end of season 5 and need to either revert virtually everything you've done since then, or at the very LEAST, just stop with the asinine changes for the sake of change in a sad attempt to make pro play more watchable. If people were interested in watching, they'll watch. If they aren't, don't try to incentivize them - they aren't interested for a reason, a reason that shouldn't be "solved" by trying to turn the game into a fucking Michael Bay movie. He's recognized as a shit director for a reason.

Naon7/19/2018, 1:06:47 PM36 votes

Even LCS viewship is taking a dive over the years. People are getting tired of seeing the same champs picked to 100-0 someone and it's just gotten even faster each season that it happens.

There is no real "surprise" or outplaying anyone. "Everyone" has a dash or blink to forgive them misplaying something awful so they can get out unpunished.

If there is an offshot meta pick you can almost be certain that once LCS ends, that champ will go up on the chopping block for nerfs.

Arcane Blue Boi7/19/2018, 11:41:31 AM22 votes

Even if LCS is ''fun to watch'', i feel like the game is too complicated at that level for you to really undesrtand whats happening with your knowledge alone, unless you are high diamond (even then...)/masters/challengers. So it leads me to the conclusion that people watch it just for the entertainment, not for educational purposes, which if they do they need to stop because most things pros do is because they are pros and should not be immitated.

So, riot insists to make every champion flashy so it can entertain, and feel good to watch or play, but be annoying to play against (the epidemy of this is he who will not be named whose dash is 0.1 cd, result people love to play him, hate to play against him or with him).

I dont think they have the notion lcs viewers are only 70 000~ average (totally guessing), while there are many more millions that only play the game and dont care about watching a game, as its not informative to do so without a breakdown of what the fuck is actually happening (which atleast western casters dont give a fuck about, they just relate about stuff like CS or some team being more ahead, who actually cares about jungle routes and why that will impact the game the way it will LUL)

I kind of lost myself in my train of thought but yeah, if riot keeps balancing the game to LCS viewers, do they want their playerbase to be ONLY LCS viewers? Because LCS in its current state is not even worth viewing without a vod review

Raiyza7/19/2018, 5:53:16 PM19 votes

And this right here, ladies and gents, is why companies encounter a huge drop in customers.

By failing to listen to them.

Smithy2Q7/19/2018, 3:07:55 PM18 votes

It's funny, because since they've started balancing to appeal to LCS viewers, those very viewers have stopped watching. GJ Rito.

Zed Boss7/19/2018, 11:26:25 AM12 votes

I hate opening reddit just to see some changes happen on this game.....[zombie-brand-facepalm]

I am Lomar7/19/2018, 3:36:37 PM10 votes

Implying LCS viewers don't actually play the game.

ChargeItDownMid7/19/2018, 2:07:50 PM8 votes

The thing you have to realize is that lcs viewers want the same thing as players the vast majority of the time. The problems in the game stems from poor execution from the balance team. They aren't making the viewing experience better at the expense of the playerbase, they are making both worse and scapegoating the LCS and its viewers.

Suspirian7/20/2018, 2:03:04 PM8 votes

Riot needs to understand that people don't watch LCS for entertainment value alone. Yes, it's entertaining but it's not like Football, Hockey, Soccer or Basketball where you can watch the sport and mostly understand it without ever having played it. I'm pretty sure most viewers watch LCS to watch a game they love playing being played at the highest level -- NOT for pure entertainment alone like the other sports. So by this, I would wager that number of LCS viewers is a direct function of number of active SR players.

But it seems like Riot is under the impression that if they balance the game to make pro games more like an exciting clown fiesta, they can attract more players and more casuals and new players into playing the game. They are reversing cause and effect. People watch LCS because they love playing league.

So if they balance towards 25 minute LCS games and forcing pro players to take risks and fight eachother, this is just going to make the game unfun and snowbally in solo queue and cause people to stop playing which will backfire and reduce LCS views.

I am not saying they should balance for bronze or silver, but they should really stop balancing the game around LCS with organized teams instead of balancing around something like challenger/master solo queue.

Wyrmblade7/19/2018, 5:44:01 PM8 votes

It doesn't even make sense to ruin the game for LCS because who's going to keep watching it after they quit? I haven't payed attention to it for one second in the six months since I quit.

ModAcademy Kayn7/19/2018, 3:10:40 PM7 votes

LCS viewers did NOT build this game, we the actual game-goers did.

Because watching LCS definitely means that you don't play League. I love the elitism in this post, as if you're somehow better than someone else just because "You don't watch LCS" or "We were here before they were", and you deserve something because of it.

japhib7/19/2018, 2:48:54 PM7 votes

The only reason Riot brings up LCS viewers as someone to consider in making the game interesting is to make the argument that changes specific to LCS impact more than just than just the players themselves.

Im pretty sure, that we deserve to be informed of changes before any third party audience.

Hence surrenderat20.net and Meddler's several-times-per-week "Quick Gameplay Thoughts" giving context on most changes and answering a bunch of questions.

Have we become so irrelevant, that even if we speak on these boards, (which are the actual game boards and not a third party source) get no replies at all by ANY other Riot staff? Not even just one?

The reason why Rioters don't post on the boards more often has far more to do with these boards' general tendency towards toxicity, hyperbole, and circlejerk than with our "relevancy." This post isn't toxic but literally like 80% of the other gameplay posts are.

GripaAviara7/19/2018, 8:14:06 PM5 votes

I don't know what to say, it's total bullshit from riot's part. Majority of LCS viewers clearly play the game. I, for example, don't like seeing fights end in 2 sec since basically, it's the most exciting thing to watch in a game (i mean who loves watching them farming?). Longer fights are great to watch, yet now a TF is done in 3 seconds so I don't know where the hell they get their focus group but something is not right

Somber Rites7/20/2018, 1:32:39 AM5 votes

Nice post but that "Fortcrap" was a stretch. I'd go with something like "Fortshite", because at least then it kind of rhymes.

(It's a shame Fortnite got so popular too, BR has given the entire game a stigma with people between the ages of 17 and 25, so now I can't find anyone in my age group to play Save the World with me. ;v;)

Last Gunfighter7/19/2018, 9:25:18 PM4 votes

I've spent tons of money on esports merch and in-game icons. I watched more pro play than I actually played. I stopped watching the second marksmen were killed. [zombie-brand-clap]

Riot acts like the core audience wants to see crazy fiestas, but I know I'm not the only one who appreciates the steady strategic side. The game is too volatile to be enjoyable, and Riot completely missed the point of what makes the LCS different from other esports.

AmazoX7/19/2018, 9:08:50 PM4 votes

I think Doublelift's recent video about the game perfectly summed up how League of Legends should be, fewer changes every week and only bigger changes every 2-3 month.

It would actually make the game more enjoyable and add more capacity to learning new curves and mastering instead of learning every single change every 2-3 weeks.

Dota 2 did this and the game was completely fine with great playerbase, audience & happiness with of course a bit of Russian cyka blyat thrown in the Solo Q.

Tobykachu7/20/2018, 2:35:25 PM4 votes

I feel like if this is their aim, they still failed to actually achieve this. I used to watch competitive League of Legends every day. Even when people spammed ResidentSleeper in the chat, due to supposedly boring and repetitive games, I still enjoyed watching out for the smaller things. The things that makes the pros pro. How they'd position in lane, when they'd go to wards, the kinds of items they'd build into specific match-ups. But now in League of damage it just feels like the smaller nuances are borderline non existent. Just pick a champion and wait for the enemy to position poorly or make a poor engage, and just 100 - 0 them before they get a chance to react. I haven't watched a single pro game in months as a result of this and I'm sure I'm not the only one who felt like this.

geeklove7/20/2018, 2:42:02 PM4 votes

I wouldn't watch a sport unless I was a fan. Sports fans tend to be knowledgeable about the sports they watch. All the people who claim veiwers don't actually know what's going on in the game, are plain wrong. Obviously you're a bunch of nerds who don't watch sports.

If someone is watching pros play, maybe they're watching just for fun. But if they have half a brain, they're also watching to learn. Watching pros play League is edutainment.

League of Legends is based on an even more successful game, DotA. DotA has gone through so many iterations and so many patches. So many new heros over the years, so many new items. DotA was so successful there's an entire genre of copy cats, MOBA games. League is still missing a lot of what made DotA great, like creep pulling and denying.

Shablagoo7/20/2018, 5:12:02 PM3 votes

I think people who watch the game would play it, or else how would they know whats going on. I think a lot of them play in fact, they may even play more than normals, just because you dont watch the LCS and play doesnt mean that this demograph is bigger, proof of that is reddit, a lot of it is actually LCS related news. So I think a lot of LCS viewers play and care about the game.

I Want Vacation7/20/2018, 11:31:31 PM3 votes

I never watch lcs if I’m taking a break from this game. Not playing=no viewing They ruining the game for competitive play. 15 min of stompping or getting stomped with very minimal chance to comeback every game in solo q. Yay super fun XD

Furious Delisha7/19/2018, 10:49:35 PM3 votes

This is a classic cart before the horse situation. E-sports happens because a group of competitive fans in a popular game want to organize a stage to see who is the best in their favorite game.

Esports is NOT a platform to create a game around. The game must be fun first, then people seek the competitive scene. People don't seek esports of games they don't care about, much like how people who don't play rugby will also not watch professional rugby.

Examples of good E-sports scenes: Starcraft Broodwar Super Smash Brothers Melee Dota 2

Examples of bad E-sports scenes: Overwatch League of Legends Overwatch Overwatch

rtbf2256182417/19/2018, 8:04:55 PM3 votes

Because it's kind of like fireworks. Many viewers that don't play the game just want to see cool explosions, healthbars getting bursted cuz "LCS BIG PLAYYYYSSSS" when it's just busted bullshit without them knowing better and Riot cashes in on that stupid "Oohhh cool shiny lights!"