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There are two MASSIVE issues with voicechat.

Joxcab··105 votes·4,367 views

#1. Voice chat is far harder to moderate and detect toxicity in than plain text chat. This should be fairly obvious. The only possible ways to moderate voice chat are either human labor (would be literally impossible to do in any sort of timely fashion which was also one of the biggest reasons the Tribunal was a horrible failure) or voice-to-text and then recognizing from there, except that has huge problems with recognition currently.

#2. This creates a huge gap between players who cannot/do not want to/will not use voice chat and those who do. This should also be fairly obvious. Communication is incredibly important and voice is far more useful than text chat for multiple reasons, speed of communication being one of the biggest and the other being not needing to stop to type. Players who use it will have a huge advantage over those who do not. There will be many players who will not use voice chat either because A, they cannot (no mic/etc) for one reason, B, cannot for another reason (sick or people over or whatever), or C, (has some sort of problem regarding talking such as shyness or a complex or whatever) another reason, among other reasons. This creates an unreasonable gap. At least with people using stuff like Discord, it meant it was up to the players to decide.

#TL;DR: Too hard to punish people with what they deserve for voice-chat toxicity and creates a gap between those who use and those who don't in performance.

101 Comments

HeadyWizard33 votes

IDEA : LET PLAYERS TAG VOICE CHAT TOXICITY

[slayer-pantheon-popcorn]

  1. Each Summoner gets a New Button in [TAB] Menu (like the mute button)
  2. Push to send the last minute of voice chat from voice chat offender to Riot.
  3. Text to Speech creates a Report for Riot.

item 3060 Too much to handle Riot? Crowd source the Voice chat Moderation, offer IP(Rewards) for the work?

Erockandroll8 votes

{quoted}

IDEA : LET PLAYERS TAG VOICE CHAT TOXICITY

[slayer-pantheon-popcorn]

  1. Each Summoner gets a New Button in [TAB] Menu (like the mute button)
  2. Push to send the last minute of voice chat from voice chat offender to Riot.
  3. Text to Speech creates a Report for Riot.

item 3060 Too much to handle Riot? Crowd source the Voice chat Moderation, offer IP(Rewards) for the work?

Despite OP's claim, I think Voice to Text is advanced enough to do the job 99% of the time. I think the bigger issue is going to be Multiple voices on the same line. And it's not just Toxic behavior, people can just be plain obnoxious. (Especially that guy blasting Linkin park like he thinks he's a DJ)

However, If Riot does move forward with a VoIP, I hope the consider extending the so called "Chat Restrict" to such a system.

Theorchero3 votes

{quoted}

Despite OP's claim, I think Voice to Text is advanced enough to do the job 99% of the time. I think the bigger issue is going to be Multiple voices on the same line. And it's not just Toxic behavior, people can just be plain obnoxious. (Especially that guy blasting Linkin park like he thinks he's a DJ)

However, If Riot does move forward with a VoIP, I hope the consider extending the so called "Chat Restrict" to such a system.

Are you judging my Linkin park playlist?

Aeszarck1 votes

{quoted}

Are you judging my Linkin park playlist?

Do you actually have a Linkin Park playlist? They're my favorite band.

Lord Desert1 votes

You should check out Skillet and Nine Lashes if you like Linkin Park ;D

3TWarrior1 votes

it "can" be advanced but usually only after training by the user. Voice to text programs also make "assumptions" based upon how likely a word is to come after what it has determined a spoken word to be.

This creates many problems with words such as Asset going to asked or cassette, etc

Hela15 votes

If you played overwatch then im sure they will do something similar as to where u wont be in voice chat unless you join in on it yourself. That way people who want to communicate can and those who arent comfortable or just dont want to dont have to worry about muting people right off.

Hela2 votes

P.S. if you record the conversation (or the game might automatically do it for devs.) then it will actually be easier to report people.

I Might Lose8 votes

I think the point is it's a lot easier to read through 40 minutes of text than to listen to 40 minutes of text

ActivatingEMP5 votes

You know what else happens in overwatch? Anyone who doesnt use voice chat is gold or below (our silver)

Hela20 votes

{quoted}

You know what else happens in overwatch? Anyone who doesnt use voice chat is gold or below (our silver)

you do realize that is already the case in league of legends right?

Hyrum Graff2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Son of Durin,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=Eb2MQsmg,comment-id=000200010000,timestamp=2017-05-31T04:58:13.532+0000)

you do realize that is already the case in league of legends right?

I play both solo and flex, queuing solo in both queues most of the time. I don't use voice unless I'm with a premade. I'm gold 3 and 1 respectively. What was that about everyone who doesn't use voice is silver?

Theorchero1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Hyrum Graff,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=Eb2MQsmg,comment-id=0002000100000000,timestamp=2017-05-31T13:00:26.236+0000)

I play both solo and flex, queuing solo in both queues most of the time. I don't use voice unless I'm with a premade. I'm gold 3 and 1 respectively. What was that about everyone who doesn't use voice is silver?

Still gold, lol.

Leetri3 votes

Gold is still better than the vast amount of players. If you're in Gold 5 you're in the top 30% of all players, Bronze makes up 32% of all players and Silver 38%.

Theorchero1 votes

{quoted}

Gold is still better than the vast amount of players. If you're in Gold 5 you're in the top 30% of all players, Bronze makes up 32% of all players and Silver 38%.

And he still uses voice chat, just with premades. People who willingly put themselves at a disadvantage are generally bad at the game. Just like how using locked camera is stupid, some people can reach diamond with it, the vast majority of people who try cannot.

Leetri3 votes

Some people simply don't want to talk to strangers in-game, doesn't mean they're bad players. Women or people with accents especially, since voice chat makes them easy targets by trolls or toxic people. I've seen it multiple times where the team is acting all normally until a girl makes a call-out or something like that in the voice chat and then they go ape-shit wild with tirades of sexist comments and unfunny pickup lines.

Theorchero1 votes

{quoted}

Some people simply don't want to talk to strangers in-game, doesn't mean they're bad players.

Willingly not communicating. No one said that they have to be on mic, just be able to hear others.

Women or people with accents especially, since voice chat makes them easy targets by trolls or toxic people. I've seen it multiple times where the team is acting all normally until a girl makes a call-out or something like that in the voice chat and then they go ape-shit wild with tirades of sexist comments and unfunny pickup lines.

Ehh not really. I've played csgo, dota, league, and a lot of other games which have had voice chat. Most people don't really harass girls online, they may try to clumsily flirt but that's because most of the people who play these games are younger single guys who don't really have experience talking to women.

That being said I've told more than one woman to shut the fuck up because they were doing an exaggerated high pitched anime-esque voice and was being super annoying with that fake bullshit, and when I do men sounding like banshees harp in white knighting all over the place.

Don't buy in to this gamergate feminist propaganda bullshit. Women aren't really persecuted on the internet, they're just treated as if they were men because their tits don't give them privilege in the virtual world in most cases.

Atanchan1 votes

{quoted}

Don't buy in to this gamergate feminist propaganda bullshit. Women aren't really persecuted on the internet, they're just treated as if they were men because their tits don't give them privilege in the virtual world in most cases.

{quoted}

That being said I've told more than one woman to shut the fuck up because they were doing an exaggerated high pitched anime-esque voice and was being super annoying with that fake bullshit, and when I do men sounding like banshees harp in white knighting all over the place.

🤔

DrCyanide4 votes

Overwatch is a very different game, in terms of strategy, time commitment, communication, etc. It's far easier to play a game of Overwatch completely ignoring what your teammates are doing than it is to play a game of League ignoring what your teammates are doing. Because you can ignore them more easily, not joining the voice chat doesn't hurt you as bad.

Conversely, we've seen premades on voice chat have a tendency to ping less, and that does effect people who aren't on voice chat.

ChaoticPinecone2 votes

...What?

Overwatch is MORE staining to play without voice. In League, if youre playing ADC and the enemy Lee Sin is ganking top, you see it on your minimap. There is no minimap in Overwatch - you need the callouts to tell your team where the enemy team is. Also, since Overwatch is more fast paced and you can literally die in 2 bullets, getting those callouts as fast as possible is huge.

Thats not to mention that in a game of League, youre going to have about 5 or 6 attempts to ult at the very least. In Overwatch (unless you severely outclass your enemy), youll only be able to ult 2-4 times per round, sometimes down to once per round. Also, staggering ults is important so coordination is important - blowing all your ults in one fight is generally a bad idea in Overwatch for most maps, so you need to communicate what ults you want to use. In League, you generally want to use your ult every fight since it will be back up for the next fight.

Unless youre Shadder2k or Seagull on Genji and you can 1v6 solo carry, youre going to need voice in a shooter. The past 7 years show that you dont really need voice in League. Helpful, sure, but not as necessary.

Arakadia15 votes

I'm pretty sure people will, in general, be less toxic in voice chat.

Anidan5 votes

I don't think I've ever heard anyone use voice chat to be toxic in OW or DotA2--I'm sure it happens, it's just never been in my games that I can remember, and I've put in a lot of hours on DotA2 especially. It's usually text if they're going to be toxic. If you have to actually say it out loud to someone who will immediately verbally respond it tends to curb the desire to continue since you immediately remember they're human on the other end.

I'm completely okay with voice chat in League. It allows you to communicate more effectively because you don't have to try to type out your plan or hope they understand what you're after with pings. People in League try to comment about the potential toxicity of voice chat, as if that's going to be worse than text chat, and people are already fine with muting that and reporting them afterward so voice chat should literally be no different at all in that regard.

Nobody11113 votes

I played dota 2 on eu servers and thats how I learned the vast majority of russian insults I know via voice chat

Atanchan2 votes

I play DOTA 2 pretty often. A solid chunk of people on voice chat I encounter are definitely asshats.

korg0231 votes

This too.

Sukishoo11 votes

#2 Already happens. Nothing new.

RainbowIcee9 votes

League has been fine without voice chat keep it that way. There's programs that use voice chat already for games like discord that don't flag league at all. The idea of people just whining and complaining or having lack of communication for not participating in the voice chat is far too annoying.

LichKing2343 votes

while i agree with you some peoples comp cant handle outside programs like i had to use my phone for discord as my old comp anytime i did use aan outside voice communations it lagged me to hell but for some reason never got lag when using voice chat and aram that was always a mystery

Armored Yokai6 votes

I think voice chat will be very beneficial, because sometimes people can't read chat in team-fights and they will need to hear something because they will be too focused and not pay attention to chat. My only worry is toxic and annoying voice chat like (In a 12 year old lisp and loud voice)"OMG YOU STUPID IDIOT YOU ARE MAKING US LOSE!" "YOU ARE SO BAD JUNGLER YOU LET YASUO KILL ME!! GO JUMP OFF A BUILDING!" this alone would cause me to not focus and tilt me

zeskgames6 votes

I don't think they would recruit human workers to listen to toxic chat all day, that sound like one of those loose-faith-in-humanity type jobs to me.

the weeaboo6 votes

what if I don't want to use text chat right now? oh yeah, that's right, I mute everyone and am at a disadvantage because of it

Pandemic Punch1 votes

I do that too but that is significantly less detrimental compared to one team using voice chat and the other team having people who are not using it.

It may also create some division. If 4 people are using it and one person is not, the 4 people are wayyyyyy more likely to just shift all of the blame onto the person not in voice chat. They may even just ignore or troll the one person in-game and cause losses that shouldn't have otherwise happened >(

I just say that to say, muting voice chat is much different than muting text chat. That said, I will still be leaving chat and voice chat muted :D

Doozku5 votes

In mobas, voice chat is less important than in other genres. In DOTA 2, for example, there's voice chat but many members of the community simply prefer to use text. It's not like an FPS where there's very little downtime, and you always need to be moving.

KoKoboto5 votes

I play Overwatch and they have voice chat. I haven't found any problems with it, game is usually more enjoyable when I use voice chat.

Winters Dawn4 votes

I didnt think aboht that. I dont have a pc mic right now and even if I get one I dont always want to chat with team but then I have to worry about the the other team all chatting and having much smoother cooridination. This actually worries me a little

Hong Kong Revolt6 votes

You don't need a Mic to listen to calls.

Kudrov4 votes

another problem peoples don't talk about and its a serious one ... welcome to the new wave of false voice chat report which a player will falsely claim that someone is toxic on voice chat or that someone is refusing to communicate because he don't use voice chat so yeah welcome to more shit on league of noobs.

Guy Fox Teemo1 votes

Very much doubt that reporting for voice chat is even going to be an option because it's not physically possible to actually monitor. See overwatch for how voice chat works perfectly

Lirik1 votes

i don't doubt it at all.

Jorencice3 votes

Is.number 2 a reasonable complaint though?

It would be like an Olympic runner refusing to wear shoes. So they start bitching that everyone else has shoes.

The runner can still use shoes. Nothings STOPPING her. She just doesn't want to. Why is that the fault of everyone who's okay with shoes?

She should simply lose the advantage of shoes and get over it.

option paralysis9 votes

{quoted}

Is.number 2 a reasonable complaint though?

It would be like an Olympic runner refusing to wear shoes. So they start bitching that everyone else has shoes.

The runner can still use shoes. Nothings STOPPING her. She just doesn't want to. Why is that the fault of everyone who's okay with shoes?

She should simply lose the advantage of shoes and get over it.

because that analogy isn't good. olypmpic runner doesn't have to talk with 4 other people while running and trying to win. also, you NA guys are not taking into consideration that there are other languages other than english out there. EUNE and EUW have so many different lang, all playing on the same server. Imagine a french duo going bot lane and talking in french over other 3 ppl that can talk english. Or people talking shit in polish ja pierdole kurwa etc. Everybody knows english by now, but maybe not everyone is comfortable using it in voice chat and not everybody is so quick to talk and understand it, like you'd need it in a teamfight that last like 5 seconds.

Silverjust4 votes

I dont want the toxicity that comes with "shoes", but forced to "wear" them, if I dont want a disantvantage

BarbaJhini2 votes

what's the difference if someone write you suck or someone screams the same thing the solution is the same = mute+report. (if you do not want to hear/read that, you can always ignore and let him write/talk).

The Vilemaw Icon1 votes

Are you actually asking why having somebody scream at you is more aversive than typing it? Because that's silly

Frightning3 votes

As long as voice is opt-in, opt-out for each player the problem of voice toxicity should be easy to manage: If a player is mic spamming etc. You can just each voice mute that player, and then still be able to talk to each other. I tend to prefer using smart pings to being in voice because I actually tend to be distracted by voice and don't play as well when I am in a call with people, especially if they aren't talking about important in-game stuff. I think smart pings would be enough for players that don't have a mic and/or don't want to be in the call for whatever reason.

Kreaaateev2 votes

Voice chat sounds so exciting. I'm definitely looking to find the right man for me through it. Kind of like online dating, except with the benefit of a guaranteed shared interest. xx

Pierce The Veal2 votes

The simplest way is to separate queues, with a checkbox for voice chat. People who want voice chat will be with and against people who want it, and vice versa. For higher elo, where queue times are longer, we can simply set up an opt in system instead.

The Vilemaw Icon3 votes

But that would literally double everyone's queue time, which Riot will not do.

Pierce The Veal1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Vilemaw Icon,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=Eb2MQsmg,comment-id=000e0000,timestamp=2017-05-31T21:32:52.404+0000)

But that would literally double everyone's queue time, which Riot will not do.

Would it really? I don't think so.

o Eon O2 votes

Yet people get punished in OW when they flame using voice.

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