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Leveling: A Disaster

Poke Bot·11/28/2014, 5:27:36 AM·8 votes·2,946 views

As I'm writing this topic, I've been waiting 20 minutes for a game already. This is on a level 24 account, but the queues are insane and I could play double the amount of games on a full level account.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v154/Moonblaze/lowlevelqueue_zps2e023014.jpg

Every game needs fresh blood to live on, and League is no exception. Leveling in League is currently the worst experience the game has to offer, and I wouldn't wish it upon any player. The games are majorly imbalanced, take forever to find and the experience reward is so small it's painfully long even if you purchase a big experience boost.

Many of the friends I've tried getting League has been turned off by the low level experience. There's more toxicity, more leavers and longer queues than normal games. It requires a lot of dedication and sitting through awful games to actually hit level 30, where you then can begin to find your proper ELO.

Should Leveling stay in the game? Or get replaced by another system?

My idea would be a simple achievement system. For example, instead of gaining your Mastery points by leveling, you would have to complete a number of insightful objectives, such as "Spot an enemy player passing through a brush with a ward." Objectives that could teach players invaluable mechanics such as last hitting, freezing waves and warding against the enemy jungler.

This is just one idea - feel free to voice your own below.

25 Comments

I Summons I11/28/2014, 10:13:42 AM7 votes

The reason you have long queue times is because the system recognizes you are a smurf and therefore places you in smurf mmr. Not too many smurfs --> long queue times.

Fed by Snu Snu11/28/2014, 6:52:39 AM5 votes

Just start everyone with full masteries, this system is stupid because it teaches nothing about the actual game's parameters.

Runes should also be free, but Riot won't give up on their mandatory IP use that forces people to buy champs with RP.

Yandere Carry11/28/2014, 10:17:29 AM4 votes

it's good for actual new players.

Fury and Emperor11/28/2014, 5:41:11 AM3 votes

The only reason it is in the game is because Riot wanted to make money in 2009.

It needs to be removed, and runes should also be removed and each champion should get the stats corresponding to their best rune page for free.

Xonra11/28/2014, 8:54:27 AM3 votes

The leveling in general is just awkward.

You get to level 5 in a matter of maybe 5 games, then you will get to level 6 in maybe another 3...getting to 10 might take you two days, and so on, to make it drag out for no good reason.

Then you have the rune system put into this awkward tiered system that is nothing more than an IP sink with multi-tiered runes, not to mention masteries, which is okay mostly.

Then there is the unlocking of the summoner spells

Theeen as you pointed out above once you get to around 20-26 finding a match starts getting awkward because you start waiting in queue about the same time most people in challenger do half the time when there are few people on.

TheKingDodo11/28/2014, 5:02:46 PM3 votes

Leveling is totally needed. True newbies have absolutely no idea how to play and requires more than 100 matches before they learn. Riot's doing us a favor by helping us have less bronze level players and thus improving competitiveness in ranked games. Leveling's just a issue for smurfs that makes up 90% of the pre-30 accounts. Crappy runes and masteries aren't really a problem, since your opponents have the exact same disadvantage.

CaRTeLKiLLa11/28/2014, 11:29:02 AM2 votes

Low level games are atrocious, Im constantly matched against people who are obviously smurfing from Plat or Diamond while my team consists of actual new players. The best moment I can remember was trying to shut down a Yasuo who had just gotten a Double Killl tower diving our mid and jungler only to find that he still had flash, ignite and his ult... WTF?

Artist Bogrim1/19/2015, 12:34:19 AM2 votes

I'm bumping this thread as I still have +15 minute queues at level 28 and games are completely imbalanced with a mix of new players and plat/diamond smurfs. It makes winning consistently impossible and being on a loss streak barely gives you any experience, when you need to hit level 30 to even begin determining your elo.

This is addressed directly to Riot: Your leveling system is broken and it's only getting worse every day. You need to start thinking about leveling to keep a healthy flow of new players. This experience is plain awful.

097Aceofspades11/28/2014, 8:25:26 AM2 votes

The reason you don't get all masteries at level 1 is because Riot doesn't want to push too much on a new player. The whole getting 1 point a level system was to let new players not feel over whelmed by it.

Starrow11/28/2014, 6:49:11 AM1 votes

please, on my smurf when i was pre 30 i was getting 40 minute queue timers...

but its cause you're a smurf. also the people i was getting matched with were master and diamond

Thudloderp11/28/2014, 5:45:21 AM1 votes

I haven't had to level up a damn thing since like Season 2, and I still remember going through that procedure like a hazing ritual.

I don't think the 'achievements for masteries' is the best idea though. I think just starting with all your mastery points, and a decent (if generic) starting rune page would be a better solution. All level would really do at this point is gate off Ranked play, which would be better accomplished with, say, a requirement of 50 normal games? It'd certainly prepare you better for high level serious play better than the current alternative of like 300 bot games.

Useless Ali gg11/28/2014, 8:32:44 AM1 votes

simple play bots to lvl n stack xp boost up

OJ19111/28/2014, 2:02:21 PM1 votes

All new players should start with generic AP and generic AD FILLED rune pages; generic offensive AP, Offensive AD, defensive AP, Defensive AD, tank, and support mastery pages with all mastery points filled out.

it's hard enough learning this game without having to learn the meta-systems as well.

Oh and all summoner spells should be available with flash and heal being the default, if you try to change away from flash before like level 15 or something it gives a warning of some kind though does allow you to do it if you attempt to change it again.

idl111/28/2014, 7:27:33 PM1 votes

I think the levels are fine, but maybe they should be lowered to around 20 max. I also agree with people that Rune pages are an irritant, I would be happy with them making Runes a lot cheaper if they wouldn't just get rid of them. I like Masteries but it would be cool to start off with all the points. My reason for this is that I'm level 24 right now, with 113 wins, but I get matched with lvl 30 players every day.

Also I don't agree with the achievement progress system, but if you just like achievements use Elophant :)

Quepha11/28/2014, 7:00:28 AM1 votes

level system is better than the system you proposed, although there is a tutorial section in co-op v ai that gives you those objectives to help you learn the game. riot probably won't ever implement in game achievements like you said because of how they can create toxic games where people are just trying to farm achievements by setting up whatever weird situation they need for it.

also, what are you queuing for that has such a long queue? i know there aren't as many low level players but unless you're trying to do teambuilder as a non-support you shouldn't have to wait that long.

Watch911/28/2014, 1:57:10 PM1 votes

Riot can't control the actions of toxic players, but they can prevent them. Although, most people refer to toxic players as people who criticize people in a small manner. Like a regular criticizing comment like this,"pls dont miss that smite again", but people will read that as a,"if you miss that smite one more time i'm reporting you"

JevelFaithful11/28/2014, 7:30:28 PM1 votes

I'm curious, did you leave a few games by any chance? I'm thinking you might be in low-priority queue right now.

Xonra11/28/2014, 9:04:02 AM1 votes

As I'm writing this topic, I've been waiting 20 minutes for a game already. This is on a level 24 account, but the queues are insane and I could play double the amount of games on a full level account.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v154/Moonblaze/lowlevelqueue_zps2e023014.jpg

Every game needs fresh blood to live on, and League is no exception. Leveling in League is currently the worst experience the game has to offer, and I wouldn't wish it upon any player. The games are majorly imbalanced, take forever to find and the experience reward is so small it's painfully long even if you purchase a big experience boost.

Many of the friends I've tried getting League has been turned off by the low level experience. There's more toxicity, more leavers and longer queues than normal games. It requires a lot of dedication and sitting through awful games to actually hit level 30, where you then can begin to find your proper ELO.

Should Leveling stay in the game? Or get replaced by another system?

My idea would be a simple achievement system. For example, instead of gaining your Mastery points by leveling, you would have to complete a number of insightful objectives, such as "Spot an enemy player passing through a brush with a ward." Objectives that could teach players invaluable mechanics such as last hitting, freezing waves and warding against the enemy jungler.

This is just one idea - feel free to voice your own below.

I would personally prefer to see a system that teaches you the game, like a proper tutorial, then a system that prepares you for what the game is really about, like having you play placement match equivalents in normals instead of grinding levels. It could even be a similar process where you "Earn" summoner spells and mastery points, just make it less grindy and more about rewarding the player.

There needs to be proper IN-GAME tutorials on important things you rarely learn anymore outside of watching the LCS or getting yelled at by someone on a smurf...like warding (not even exact placement but why it is important), jungle concepts and the use of smite and the objects, the towers now that they are all different, things like that.

The new player experience could be awesome, instead of a grind as it is now which makes most new players (I know this because none of my friends have made it to 30 and have since quit) not want to bother grinding.