Why aren't invulnerabilities frustrating?
League has conditioned us to expect rewards if we do something. It's a simple way to reward players for doing the right thing and keep them engaged. The most notable rewards are gold and damage.
Every time we kill or destroy something we gain gold. Even zombie wards or the Nexus give gold to feed that action->reward principle. Similarly, if we hit an ability, we expect to deal damage.
When something violates that principle we can feel cheated or frustrated. Best example being
's blind and
's wind wall.
If we compare those abilities to similar abilities, we can see that the less-frustrating alternatives stay true to the principle.
Near-sight, while most of the time being even stronger than a blind, doesn't feel as bad. None of your attacks get negated, it's just a lot more difficult to get them out in the first place.
Braum's Unbreakable, while effectively being a moving wind wall, just intercepts projectiles but causes Braum to get hit instead. Only the damage of the first hit get's negated, which is barely noticeable in most fights.
Even if we hit shields we get the satisfaction of seeing the damage to the shield. This is part of the reason why damage reductions are popular defensive tools to give champions, instead of negating damage.
And yet, we don't see a lot of complaints about invulnerabilities, even though they clearly violate the
action->reward principle.
are all able to completely negate damage, while
can do something similar.
And frankly, I don't know why.
I have three theories, but feel free to add your own.
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They are almost exclusively ultimate abilities. Ultimate abilities are expected to do something impactful, hence the "ultimate". Maybe this expectation negates allows those abilities to break the principle without causing frustration.
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The concept of invulnerability is common knowledge. A lot of games have some sort invulnerability status or power-up in them. The expectation what invulnerability does has been established in our brains long before League started using it. Maybe that expectation weighs more heavily than the action->reward expectation.
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I'm simply unaware of how players react to invulnerabilities. Not really an interesting theory, but it's possible that most players find those abilities frustrating and I just don't know it.
Please let me know. Do you think invulnerabilities are frustrating? Why or why not? Do you think Teemo's Q and Yasuo's W would be less frustrating if they were converted to invulnerabilities? (Just the abilities in isolation, outside of the context of their respective kits) Do you think abilities like Teemo's Q and Yasuo's W would less frustrating if they were ultimate abilities? (Again, just the abilities in isolation)