Encourage Better Gameplay with Objective Focused Psychological Rewards

I think people will agree League is toxic. Unless you are hardcore 311t, you'll prob be told to "git gud". But looking at the game, I feel there are elements in the game that mislead players to do the wrong thing, which in turn frustrated the higher skilled players, which creates abuse, etc... It's a vicious cycle.

So had some thoughts that could improve the game. Figured I'd share em, simply for the sake that I do like the "intellectual core" of what League is, but struggle to enjoy it from the anonymous human element that feels free to abuse strangers for the freedom of no repercussions.

1. Have the Announcer Praise Objectives Over/ As Much As Kills As it stands, the Announcer makes reports when players are killed/ when you kill them. This is one of the few times you hear a voice praising you. And because we are hardwired to that, we are encouraged to get kills.

But remember - kills don't win games. They help a LOT to win games, but they are like cash - a means to an end, but not a result in and of themselves (e.g.: if you were given a briefcase of a billion dollars, but are on a desert island, at most you have some good kindling to stay warm).

So instead of the Announcer Praising ONLY Kills, why not have that voice give equal emphasis to Towers and Dragon Slaying? These progress the game towards an end, and if players are told "you did a good thing" they will likely do it more.

I suspect this is one of the reasons many LoL players are KDA obsessed. They get the voice praising them (there is also the gold and mechanical benefits too). I get it, but again - Kills won't win you the game. They just increase the chances you will win (but its not an assured thing).

2. Give Announcements for Tower Progress Continuing the above point, why not promote when a Tower drops below 50% HP? It will let players know which lanes are making progress with a verbal announcement, which can encourage a push in that lane for the payout it gives.

3. Give Minor Reward for Tower Damage Progress Continuing point 2, why not give a gold bonus if you are present when a Tower drops below 50% Health? Again, have the announcer praise the progress ("Bottom Tower nearly Toppled") and offer a small 50 gold bonus for contributing to the damage of it in the last 5-10 seconds or so.

In exchange you can reduce the final gold payout of a Tower Down by -50, but it would again encourage Objective Focus over Kill Focus.

4. Change Earth Dragon Given the KDA mentality of players, it makes sense that people prioritize the Infernal Drake over most others. Equally I find many players are underwhelmed by the Earth Drake, despite its buff being the most objective focused in game.

Why not simply make ALL Dragon's offer a lesser "Objective Damage" bonus (aka the Earth Dragon's current bonus - reduced slightly since its possible to get up to 5+ dragons in one match if REALLY focused on it!) and make the Earth Dragon buff something like a Tenacity bonus? Nothing major, but equally something useful to deal with the annoyance of Crowd Control in Teamfights.

5. REALLY praise Inhibitor Destruction The Announcer makes it sound like "Penta Kill" is the best thing in the game. Sure it takes skill to do, but in reality its a selfish reward which encourages selfish (read toxic) behaviour. Why not give the same degree of voice acting to Inhibitor destruction? This wins the game after-all so, again, make the players feel psychologically rewarded for the achievement!

6. Verbal Praise Survival over Kills People won't want me suggesting I reduce the praise of the announcer for kills, but there may be merit in letting the tanks feel good for not dying. Afterall if there is anything players hate its feeders, and people who die when it was avoidable.

If a champion managed to return to base, when they were reduced below 20% Hp from an enemy hitting them in the last minute, have the Announcer praise it. You HELPED your team by not dying afterall (note I'm not saying you are praised for not dying at full health - that would be ridiculous - I'm saying you were attacked, survived, and lived - making the enemy's effort on you wasted).

It could also encourage Junglers to gank those lanes a bit more as it will be promoted "I am struggling in this lane - pls help me. I'm not dying, but I'm risking it a lot, and I don't want to help feed the enemy in the process).

7. Give Kills to the Player who did the Most Damage This will appeal to the KDA junkies, and would shut off a lot of the "Kill Steal" outcry that is heard a lot. If a 2v1 resulted in one player doing 99% damage, and the other player doing the 1% killing blow, the player who did the effort should get rewarded for the work. This MAY encourage more assassin/ DPS/ burst mages to appear in the rift, but it would reduce the toxicity. In fact it may ENCOURAGE praise a bit more (thankyou for finishing the target off so I could get the kill) thought I also recognize it could create a different version of toxicity ("Why didn't you tower dive them for me!? You could have killed them and I'd have gotten rewarded for your sacrifice!?")

Not saying this idea is a great one, but there is merit to consider it in some way I feel.

8. Less gold for the Killer; more Gold for Farm Kills give gold, and that's great. But again - Kills don't win games, they help at most. Kill Gold SHOULD be given, but I feel it shouldn't be a LOT of gold. Killing a Champion should simply mean you can get free gold from your immediate farm with little to no risk. THAT should be where the Gold comes from.

Basically I'm sayin Farm Gold should be increased, and Kill Gold decreased. They have done this a bit already, but it's not enough to the point players are noticing it. I say push it some more so it becomes more notable. It won't remove the benefit of killing a champion outright, but it will encourage players to focus more on farming than ganking.

9. More Gold from Team Kills This is meant to be a teamgame, so players should get rewarded for team-plays. When you kill an enemy champ 1v1, you should get 100% gold. However, if you Kill a target with a 2v1, what if you got 105% gold? Its a minor increase but it would add up overtime. It would also encourage Ganks to happen more often (more Gold all round) from the Jungler, and would make bot's "Duo-Lane" more profitable as well.

This would make teamplays a lot more appealing, which would really push the element that this is a "teamgame". As it stands, Kills feel very selfish focused - helping the individual a lot more than the team - and thats a bit disapointing.

NOTE: this would be a decreasing cash bonus for extra champs (e.g.: 108% from a 3v1, and capped at 110% at a 4v1 or 5v1).

10. Give more Gold to Assists Support is one of the least appealing roles in game cause many players want the KDA, which you don't get as a Support. So maybe that needs to change.

Why not add a feature into the support items that gives you an extra +20gold (or something) whenever you assist in a kill - but don't MAKE the killing blow? This would encourage supports to play their role (help get kills and get rewarded for it).

Alternatively, if you DO get a kill with the item, the nearest allied champ within X distance of you gains +15 gold (so even if your Kill Steal, your partner gets rewarded for it).

This may become an abused item build (everyone buying support items), but a fix could be "the benefit of only one support item can only occur once every minute per team - when this ability activates, all support items on that team go on Cooldown for this effect". This would encourage a "one-per-team" pick like the jungle items, and promote again more teamplays.

11. Show Gold Gain INSTEAD of KDA This is something Smite has done right. Kills are great, but the goal is gold for builds to take objectives. As it stands we can only see "CS" and "KDA" and it doesn't show the overall effectiveness of the champ. Its a VERY minor tweak, it could be implemented easy, MAYBE as a HUD variation choice in the settings, but it would give a more accurate idea of who is going what.

Afterall when the game ends, you can see how much gold each player earned for that match. Is it that hard to show it off in game?

Anyway its some ideas. I hope some people like them, but having seen what the majority of response are to ideas on this forum (the "TLDR dismissive attiudes and troll culture), I may only check in on here once and respond to people who offer actual feedback, then leave it be.

I do like League of Legends at its core mechanics. I just wish I could find players who weren't so selfish in exploiting the game for their own individual needs. Maybe these ideas could encourage some more empathy and sympathy and encouragement in people who are more interested in playing the game, over punishing players with kills and feeds.