This snowballing problem. Any Theories?

Erockandroll·11/17/2015, 2:59:31 PM·5 votes·967 views

I have been taking note of the increased number of threads complaining about the increased snowballing in recent games. And games lasting less than 30 minutes.

Instead of Lashing out at riot because of the symptoms of the problem. I thought we should try and find the root of the problem. What exactly is the cause of the increased snowballing.

I don't think it's the new shut down mechanics. though I would guess that the root problem lies in a combination of the reduced vision, and the reduced turret health. Those combined seem to make everything harder to defend. particularly in the early game. And the reduction in wards also makes it harder to defend your Jungle.

Any thoughts or theories?

11 Comments

Kitten of Evil11/17/2015, 7:13:49 PM3 votes

Turrets and vision.

Trebbi11/17/2015, 3:19:32 PM3 votes

The Turrets and general amount of dmg present early->midgame.

Sire Hippington11/17/2015, 11:06:18 PM3 votes

In short: paper turrets + absence of vision.

The icredible weak towers mean that 1 solo kill in lane can already give a tower, and a won teamfight at minut 20 often enough means an inhibitor.

The lack of vision due to nerfed sightstone+nerfed trinkets+no stealthwards means mapcontroll gets huge. If you losse your towers, you have little places to go without randomly bumping into an enemmie that probably kills you due beeing ahead.

it also seems like the more expensive full-upgradet items make items powerspikes and thus goldleads a bit more relevant. It also appears that towers now give global xp, snowballing a level lead. also, given the item and masterie changes and also the most common teamcopositions, there is more damage compared to tankiness arnound, which also leads to harder snowballing, as towers provde littel shelter if you die 100-0 in ~2sec

also, the nerfs to positions/flask made it harder to survive in lane vs bad matchuos or a snowballing opponent

Bladerunner777711/17/2015, 3:03:48 PM2 votes

the turrets

Restless Slumber11/18/2015, 4:01:01 AM1 votes

I think that a lot of people are finding it more valuable to take ignite top lane (myself included) and just solo carry with fiora or jax by pushing down their lane super quickly by killing the enemy enough.

Budlightboi11/18/2015, 3:58:40 AM1 votes

mastry's and vision after you get 1-2 kills you can just rome and gank and be fine

Renascent11/17/2015, 5:04:02 PM1 votes

I've been thinking about this, and I believe it has to do with the difference between old masteries and the new. Most squishies tend to invest 21/9/0 because they usually had no use for Utility masteries. With 9 invested into Defense, commonly +36 health and 3% max health, they had the extra amount of tankiness needed to prevent getting 1-shot even after feeding a couple of kills.

Now, people go 18/12/0. The first tree hasn't changed much in its functionality; It's the SECOND tree that's the culprit here. What does it offer now as your secondary point-investment? A bit of old Utility tree as well as some extra offense, and NOTHING for Defense.

The way people allocate their masteries in the preseason ENCOURAGES snowballing by making themselves EVEN squishier, meaning it takes less kills for people to get 1-shot. So, in a way, one could say that the fault of snowballing rests on the majority of the playerbase for continuing to believe that the performance of the old 21/9/0 automatically translates to 18/12/0 in the new masteries.