Promo games are archaic and should have been removed a long time ago
It's possible I'm just completely out of the loop on this, but I think its interesting that this issue isn't a super commonly discussed point of contention about matchmaking. Promo games make no sense and I haven't come across a single defense of the promo game system in my 6 season span of playing this game. This has been on my mind for multiple seasons now and while it isn't the biggest issue with this game, it's still something that I think needs to be addressed for a few reasons.
**1.) It minimizes LP gains ** This is a pretty straightforward and disheartening point. If you're at 75 LP and gain 24 lp per win, you won't get to your promos. You'll get to 99 LP and require another win. That next win essentially saps away 23 LP from you. In a system that relies purely on LP and not by arbitrary "tests of skill", not only would you retain all your gained LP and move up a rank, you could most likely still lose a game afterwards and remain in that new rank. Instead, you are forced into a game with way less of a reward, and you still have to win 2 or 3 games after that as well. Frustrating and disheartening
(For anyone who wants to bring up how you could possibly message Riot support for that extra LP gain, you're proving my point. If support is willing to do that, then why should this issue even exist? It's indefensible.
2.) It's pointless and arbitrary Probably my biggest point of contention. It legitimately doesn't make sense why three games are arbitrarily put on a pedestal and have so much more importance put on them compared to all of the games you played up to that point. First of all, aside from Diamond (which even then is a bit of a stretch) the differences between individual tiers is extremely minimal. If you have won all of your games up to that point, you've already proven yourself. You probably belong there, so why on earth are you arbitrarily being gate-kept from moving forward? Why are those three games so much more important? Again, it's disheartening. There is no reason why it should be like this other than "it's always been like that". In a flat LP system, not only are you not arbitrarily gate-kept by three games for no reason, but there are absolutely no downsides to it being implemented either. If you truly aren't a bronze I player, then you'll fall back to bronze II, though I seriously doubt the difference of skill between those two tiers is gonna be determined by that.
**3.) Pure Unadulterated Aggravation ** Gonna be honest, this is a personal point but I can pretty much guarantee 99% of the player-base would agree with me. In a game where 40% of ranked games are determined by if the three players on your team with undiagnosed personality disorders can keep there composure in a 30~ minute video game through even the mildest of turbulence and not spend the rest of the game flaming you or someone else under fountain, it makes it all the more frustrating when a majority of your promos are over before they begin because your teammate doesn't want to win. It's not fair, and the fact that it happens so often just adds unneeded stress on the player for al the wrong reasons. Are we noticing a theme here with the whole pointless and frustrating thing?
Possible counterpoints (if they exist???)
1.) They're fun and rewarding! No.
Okay, that's not fair of me. For one, it's completely subjective, but considering I added some subjectivity to my reasoning as well, I should address it a little more. Again, this is another shot in the dark, but every single person that I know personally takes no enjoyment in them. In addition, every time I've seen it brought up by people I don't know, they're generally grieving having to be in them, and I haven't seen a single person ever say they were excited to be in them. If the reaction to your system is "Ugh, promo time. God I hope I don't get 2 AFK's like last time" and not "Oh boy, promos! I cannot wait to get 2 AFK's and have to start all over again!", then your system isn't fun, its faulty. It also doesn't matter your or my opinion on the system if the system doesn't work and goes against the flow of play as I've already expressed.
2.) It's a bad system, but it's also the best! I actually haven't seen this defense before, or any defense, so this might not be the best point of contention to bring up, but it's one of the few things I could think of. This is not the best system and plenty of other games have better systems. When I first played Overwatch, my mind was blown by the fact that they just had a flat LP system. How good I was was just determined by how hard I won or lost my games, and all games were totally equal to each other: no worries about promos or anything. It was so refreshing, and It was one of the things that first got me thinking about the system in this game. I'm not sure if the ranked system in OW has changed since then though, so If any of the 3 people who still play it could verify if they're reading this, that would be cool. CS:GO also lacks a promo system, and although the inner machinations of that system still aren't entirely known, I would still rather have that system in place and have the general notion of "win good, lose bad" than "only these three games matter". So no, it's not the only option we have.
3.) It's always been that way Just because it's always been this way doesn't mean its healthy for the game, doesn't mean people are content with it, and doesn't mean that it can't be replaced with something even better. Simple as that.
Alright hopefully someone can take some solace in my rambling, I realize I'm pretty much preaching to a choir or a brick wall with this but season 10 has really showed me the worst of the ranked playerbase and it's been wearing on me and I needed to get this off my chest. I really hope that this system gets revamped at some point, I think it would improve matchmaking substantially if it was dropped.
