Boards›Gameplay

So I think I've identified the looming problem in league of legends for many players

deadlychuck··6 votes·873 views

To preface this, i'm not going to be necessarily offering solutions in this thread just explaining how i constructed the hypothesis. Sry for the wall.

Hypothesis: The complexity of the game has gotten too low.

#What do you mean? So to be clear, i'm not talking about depth. The game still has a significant amount of depth in it, and that should be maintained, if not expanded further. This video probably does a better job of explaining the difference, as far as game design is concerned. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVL4st0blGU

  • However, the TL;DW version would be (thx GaleGrim in the comments of that video)
  • "depth is how much the player CAN think, what variables they can use. Ware Where as complexity is how much they HAVE to think and on what caliber."

So using these definitions

  • Depth: Potential understanding of the game
  • Complexity: Required understanding of the game

#How do you figure?

Not all players like a game just because it's deep. Removing the complexity from the game takes away the exploration of the unknown for many players and the potential for discovery, making it unenjoyable.

There are a few things which point me towards this hypothesis.

  1. The identifiable difference between bronze to mid-plat players has become more blurred.
  2. Niche builds have become less viable and/or cookie cutter builds have become more viable.
  3. The lack of champion diversity.

##1) Ranked obscurity The hypothesis would predict, low-complexity + large-depth = very large pool of roughly equally skilled players (those who don't put much thought into the game), then a rapid increase in player skill (those who choose to put significant thought into the game).

So i personally don't play ranked, never really cared how good i was if i was having fun so why play "tryhard mode". However, I've seen, and had, much discussion here and there with higher level players, that see the skill between the lower ranks to feel very similar. In that the difference between the skill distribution across the ranks seems to be exponential. Starting out slow, then rapidly picks up.

##2) Niche Viability / Cookies! The hypothesis would predict, that as complexity lowered, the reliability of cookie cutter builds would increase. The reasoning behind this is along the lines of "you don't need to think as much to pick good items", remember this is using the above definition of complexity. Niche builds would be affected by complexity, because their viability is dependent on the reliability of the meta builds as far as items are concerned.

Besides the obvious lethality builds. Checking website traffic for the 5 of the more popular league of legend websites that either provide build data or builds. (mobafire, probuilds, champion.gg, op.gg, lolking) All have been increasing in traffic, the only exception being lolking. Mind this traffic increase needs to be compared to the change in active players, as an increase in active players could result in a relative growth for these other websites.

##3) Champion diversity They hypothesis would predict that as complexity lowered, champion diversity would go down. This is because each champion has their own levels of complexity and depth. Assuming equal power/reliability, low-complexity/high-depth champions will be very popular at low levels, where as high-depth champions regardless of complexity will be popular at high levels. Mind you, the extra factor of power and reliability, which i cannot take into account but has no effect on complexity or depth does play a significant role in this. E.g. Increasing the damage of a champions' Q makes them stronger without a change in depth or complexity.

Riot themselves will admit to this one, if your own experience isn't enough.

This is a working hypothesis and might not accurately predict all factors of the game, both listed and not listed in this post. If you can think of something which doesn't fit the hypothetical model feel free to leave feed back (The more rage the better).

6 Comments

Chaos Milk Tea2 votes

Oh hey, Extra Credits. Love that show. Watched every episode. Let's talk game design.

The importance of low complexity high/depth systems is that they are accessible to less skilled players, but people who take the time to BECOME skilled will get more out of them since they have "accessed the depth." This is an important ideal for many games, as it puts less pressure on new players to "learn everything" and lets them focus on playing the game. Based on this, I believe that a low complexity system makes it MORE apparent which players are skilled as it is very clear on what basis to judge them on. For example, if two chess players are competing, you may not know who is winning based on the number of capture pieces, where as an experienced chess player could tell based on the board state. The true state of the game is masked slightly by the complexity of the game.

As it stands, League of legends is not an accessible game. You essentially have to be babysat for a month to start making your own decisions due to the obscurity of how objectives affect the game, the importance of csing, how items change your champion, the importance of the jungle, how to fight, when to fight, and of course the list of 100+ champions each with unique abilities that will all impact your games at some point.

Now I do agree on your hypothesis that low complexity makes item builds into a solvable or at least non dynamic activity. As it stands, building is all ready hard. You mentioned that the most trafficked league of legends sites have item builds, and that is because items are all ready complicated. A new player doesn't know if Darius is a fighter or a tank, and even if they do may likely end up building critical strike chance on him instead of health and cool down reduction. There COULD be more items, letting players who already did the research quickly browse the store and pick their niche counter build items each game. This can be a very interesting and rewarding puzzle, as many tanks already function this way when building against AD champions. The choice between Randuin's Omen, Thornmail, Frozen Heart, and Sunfire Cape among many other items can be crucial to your success against the enemy champions. On the other hand, a new player basically has to do "homework" before they can actually play anything. If you don't know what your champion scales with before hand, and which items provide those stats, you can spend a good 20 minutes of the game reading and still buy the wrong items.

I think Riot is VERY aware of complexity both within and without champions. They are perfectly happy to let some champions be complicated or difficult to play. It's rewarding to some players, and lets them express themselves the way they want. If someone chooses to play that champion, they have also agreed to partaking in that complexity themselves. On the other hand, complexity can "bleed" out of a champion and burden other players with extra knowledge and necessary actions. In lower level play, a thresh Lantern can be a very confusing conundrum. "Another player has thrown out an object. Must be an attack?" It's not Thresh's burden of information to support you at that point, it's YOUR burden of information to support YOURSELF. I'm not saying Thresh's lantern is a bad mechanic. Rather, it's a really cool one that gives him a ton of interesting gameplay. It's just an example of how champion complexity can mystify every champion you haven't learned about in depth. I mean, how is anyone supposed to know what Ryze is doing to you by looking at him? He's a bunch of nonsense, lol.

Right now, League's complexity rest primarily in 3 areas: Champions: We have a lot of them. They are all different. If you don't know what one does, you will likely be taken advantage of by them. If you don't know what they are supposed to do, you likely won't know what to do with them. Items: Their interaction with champions is obscure to new players and players who don't look up builds are punished in game by those who do Gameplay: There is an agreed method of "how to play league". Lanes, roles, jungle, objectives, etc. If you don't know these basics ideas and why they matter, you will perform very badly.

I DO enjoy complexity in games, but as it stands you basically have to go to school to play league of legends or hire a personal tutor. Once you get passed the complexity THEN you get the experience some depth. Ideally, a well designed game shows you the depth first, and then lets you experience complexity at your own pace. This would be fine if you didn't play this game with and against other people.

Rito You need some real damn tutorials Good ones where you learn to build items Get on that Damn

Paroe1 votes

{quoted}

snip

So what youre saying... is that riot needs to make a simple ARPG using league of legends as a base, and sell it for 9.99 USD? :P

deadlychuck1 votes

I don't think tutorials are particularly a solution to the problem, they'd help new players, but the problem has extended beyond new players. The older players are currently looking at a game, which has become so standardized and optimized, that there is basically no room to explore or try different thing. Rather than having a gradient of complexity for many different levels of play, there is a wall of complexity between a gold player and a diamond player. Yet the gold and lower players are given access to the particular aspects of the depth of the game, generally by pro players or websites, without really needing to understand for effective use.

I've used malzahar's rework as an example in the past, of riot basically pigeonholing players, and a kind of fake complexity. Where there is really only a single way which the champion is functional. You can play him with a different play pattern, or build, but he's been so carefully tailored, to such a precise degree, that deviation from the pre-defined (riot approved) pattern quickly results in sever damage loss, and virtually no circumstances exist in the game which will change that. There is a decent amount of depth in the champion, but understanding it is secondary to mimicking the pre-defined play pattern and building the optimized items, because exploring that depth so blatantly offers no benefits.

If riot really wants to help new players approach the game, and keep players interested, they need to stop making the "wrong" decisions so much worse than the "right" decisions. Understanding has become secondary to playing "correctly" which hurts the game by making all of it's depth meaningless to the average player. If you put a massive punishment on deviation, then it discourages and even prevents players from exploring different aspects of the game's mechanics and how they can be used. That kind of curiosity is what hooks many new players and keeps old players.

Chaos Milk Tea1 votes

This is a problem that plagues any competitive game, especially the ones with customization like card games or anything with RPG elements.

For example, I've put in the time with compeitive Pokemon and Magic the Gathering. (mostly Pokemon) Smogon.com, the competitive pokemon bible, is a community where the top pokemon, movesets, and teams are discussed. A new player will likely look up tier lists and guides to get them started building teams. Pokemon plays like chess though, where you make predictions and feint plays in order to take pieces meaning ultimately no matter how many guides you read the better play has the advantage. Secondarily though, just because you read the guide on the top movesets, doesn't mean you are a good team builder or even a good moveset builder. A proper understanding of WHY you choose certain moves to eliminate certain threats and counter certain strategies is needed as well. League of legends is similar, where mechanical skill must be backed up with proper game knowledge and tactical skill. You can know that Rabadon's deathcap is strong on mages, but if you don't know when to build a Rylai's, Void Staff, or Zhonays instead you will be at a disadvantage.

Unfortunately, ANY game will end up solved at some point. Pokemon has tier lists and top movesets. Every single card game has top decks of the season, many of which are variations of each other. Fighting games have tiers and matchups. Even chess is considered largely a solved game. That is what a Meta is. There is breathing room within a meta, but it is usually not seen as starting players will look to the meta to help them get a grasp of how the game is played, and therefore enforce the meta through all of their play. It is not until you have a strong grasp of why the meta is what it is that you can even begin considering when it is appropriate to break it in places. Riot uses the meta to their advantage though, designing champions for the existing roles in order for new players to easily understand what they mean for the game.

No matter how complex your game is though, it will end up solved at some point. That is one of people's favorite aspects of complex games. It's a big community effort to get together and discuss a game. "Who is strong?" "What items do you use on so and so?" "Which team compositions have good win conditions?" Yes, some games take much longer than others, but it happens eventually. What competitive games usually do in response is release new content which changes the meta and forces everyone to "resolve" the game, even if only a little bit.

Umbral Regent1 votes

Something I'd also like to contribute is a shining example of Statement #2 - Niche Viability vs. Cookie-Cutter: I've also watched a fair bit of Extra Credits, and one thing that I think reinforces your second point is the First-Order Optimal Strategy, or "FOO Strategy" as Dan likes to call it - strategies involving low skill input with high power output.

And as the shining example, let's take a Champion Riot will have nerfed noticeably by tomorrow - Varus. Short version: Varus had too high a damage output from buying Lethality and just firing max-range Piercing Arrows without having to bother getting in Blighted Quiver stacks to up the damage - he could just as easily take out 75% of a squishy-champion's health out with one shot in the mid-game while standing happily out of range.

Long version: Changes to Lethality have made the stat and its items overpowered - both for the raw Lethality stat they had and the powerful utility the items (Edge of Night in particular) brought. I don't know the math behind Lethality, but one important thing I've been told is that despite being technically armor penetration, it's better used against squishy targets than tanky ones.

This put Champions who could easily use Lethality (Jhin and Varus, as notable examples) in the top pick priority in Bottom Lane, and Varus was a terrifying thing to begin with. A high-damage Artillery Marksman who could potentially hold you back from healing if he wanted to, and with his own personal root to hold you down. And that's if you got into range - he could just as easily poke you from beyond your range with max-range Q shots until you either recalled or died.

This was so much the case that Riot lowered the maximum AD ratio on his Q and gave it a longer cooldown, partially refunded if the shot detonated Blighted Quiver stacks - trying to reinforce that Varus shouldn't always stay so safe with such an easy time doling out damage.

And what does this all say about Lethality Varus? It's a First-Order Optimal Strategy - Low skill input (buy an item, fire max-range Q's), high power output (%75 of a squishy's health bar gone in one shot).

And this is only the easiest and simplest example for me to write up, there are doubtless more examples of FOO Strategies in League right now. But, that's as much as I can think to contribute to the discussion - I hope this helps in some way.

deadlychuck2 votes

The reworked malzahar is another good example of this kind of FOO strategy being standardized by riot. Where input is very low skill, but the output is very high power. Most of his power comes from interactions in his kit, which the player really doesn't even need to consider.

The result is a unsatisfying experience, and a champion who has depth without much complexity. The champion leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth no matter how you do. If you win, you feel like the game did all the work, if you lose, you feel like there wasn't much you could actually do to change the outcome because the champion failed to function even if you hit all the right keys.

More from Gameplay

3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay764 comments
7,167
votes
3 Refunds per season, upvote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay156 comments
3,510
votes
UPVOTE FOR URF
Gameplay606 comments
2,440
votes
Yes plz.
Gameplay456 comments
1,721
votes
3 Refunds per season, up vote if you want 3 refunds per season.
Gameplay114 comments
1,716
votes
When is ANYONE at riot going to address the awful new player experience?
Gameplay634 comments
1,383
votes

More by deadlychuck

Really hate how riot's design has actively discriminated against passive methodical play styles
Gameplay122 comments
116
votes
I don't even know why i play this game anymore
Gameplay112 comments
106
votes
@riot, if you're not gonna buff AP
Gameplay83 comments
86
votes
I'm very confused by the new mastery Battle Trance
Gameplay49 comments
63
votes
PSA: If an ally is behind
Gameplay21 comments
45
votes
People acting like they're just now noticing that Zoe Q is pre-rework nid spear...
Gameplay34 comments
34
votes