Why I feel like forced autofill shouldn't exist and why it would be better to be optional.
It's something of importance to really understand why Autofill exists in the first place.
https://nexus.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/2017/06/ask-riot-autofilled/
To sum everything up, "Autofill was introduced as a last resort way of ensuring people didn’t sit in queues for ridiculously long stretches."
Now I get it, autofill was made so that you don't have to sit in a million years in your queue to start playing your game and to start getting into the rift. But here's the thing. Most of the players who had to wait about 10 - 30 minutes for a queue time, were the ones who were all in super high elo. Like, the highest of the high. That's where you'd see streamers waiting for ridiculously long queues in order to get a game started. Everyone else, may had to have waited 2 - 5 minutes to get their role. But here's the thing. They got their role. Even if they waited 10 minutes to get a game started, they got to play their role. Be it top, mid, jungle, support, or ADC.
But there are already tons of flaws with this, considering that as they said, "We agree it can feel bad when getting autofilled; you could just become a support Brand one-trick like me, but I realize he’s not for everyone. There are a couple of ways to cheat the system on a per-queue basis, though – here’s a few things you might not know" Why on earth would you integrate a system that you already know is going to be hated. Then immediately create ways in order to 'cheat' it? Why bring something so negative into your game if you know that players are going to 100% hate it's existence?
Players did not want autofill to be a thing. Players did not want to be forced to have to play a game of support or fill (if they're a main for one role) just to have a higher chance of getting that role that they main.
Autofill should be a choice. You shouldn't have to lock in a role and go, "Man I hope I get ADC today and not get stuck as jungle...I'm a terrible, terrible jungler and I know 100% that there's not gonna be a jungle main who I can swap with."
If a player is trying to climb the ladder and reach the glorious Diamond tier, they don't care how long they have to wait to get their role. If they're a Mid OTP, then they'll wait as long as they have to in order to insure that they continue getting that role.
Forced autofill means that more than not, you're going to get at least one or more OTP laners in roles that they don't main. And the worst part about it, is that dodging if you get autofilled into a role you don't play, doesn't really 100% guarantee that you'll get it again. There were loads of situations when I queued as support/mid and ended up as jungler. (I'm a terrible jungler) And no one would want to swap with me, because the people in their roles were actually people who queued for those roles and none of them were jungle mains.
So the question is this, if players are queuing up less and less for a particular role, instead of going, "Wow, no one is playing this role, we need to bring in a system that will force players into this role!" Wouldn't it make more sense to go, "Wow, no one really likes playing this role! Maybe we should find out why no one is playing this role and make some valuable changes in order to make the role more desirable for players to select."
If autofill needs to stay in existence, it needs to be an option. Something for players to decide to turn on or off. Reward players for choosing autofill. Give them an incentive to select it. +5 LP for every win where autofill is turned on, shorter queue times and... I don't know, some other third thing.
However players that turn it off, can flat out know that even if they have to wait a bit longer, they will be able to get the role they want. And when you're making a hard grind to diamond, you are willing to wait as long as needed if it means every player is in the role they want allowing for more quality games, instead of the Mid Yasuo main being forced to support or the support main being forced to jungle.
