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What aggravates me the most about Riot, and the boards

Arch Mage Magnus··51 votes·2,368 views

We have a bunch of great posts talking about people not wanting to play the PBE because Riot doesn't listen to their ideas, or concerns over Veiger and new patch ideas. Sure some of these posts don't go into a ton of detail but they more or less speak for themselves. Does Riot every comment on them? No. Instead someone makes a post about "Good work with the new champ" and Riot jumps right in thanking them for praise.

Honestly Riot, stop the cherry picking the posts. If you goofed up, come into the post and explain your decision process. These posts are at the top of the page for a reason and you just ignore them. The last discussion we had on why Lee hasn't been balanced was over a year ago, and the reason was "Community backlash". The community has complained about a number of changes you have made, ranging from a number of champs (Kass, Veig, Nid, J4, Azir) to the entire new jungle concept and weaponry. THESE are topics I look at everyday, hoping to see a red response going into detail on your decision making.

It feels like you are afraid to go head to head with your own player base with your decisions. You are hiding behind your veil and making changes based on what individuals in the office feel, NOT based on the players who encounter the match up issues everyday. I would like to see a forum rule, where if a topic reaches 200 upvotes, it warrants a red response. If it's a troll post, even a "Oh you guys" would suffice. It tells us that you at least looked at it, and the forums are being constantly supervised. At this point I can create a 10 page response to how things should be handled, and who needs to be nerfed / buffed, but it's never going to be commented on by Riot. However, if I make a post about how artistically beautiful Bard looks like, and how his game mechanics should bring interesting ideas to League match ups (cause the above is all true) I will get a red response where it's not even needed.

TL:DR - Explain your decision processes Riot. If posts are around the 150 - 200 mark, comment within it and give reasoning / insight to answer what the post is questioning. If it's received that many upvotes, chances are it's important to the player base.

26 Comments

Ariaflux10 votes

Stop cherry picking the threads that don't have replies. Here are some threads with Riot's replies over the past few days:

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/tudnEmGv-there-was-a-red-post-a-while-back http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/YAYUikEO-strategic-diversity-items-like-ohmwrecker-are-just-as-useless-as-expected http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/uRv66Z91-i-love-immobile-champs-the-last-years-have-been-the-worst http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/2TavB1Ax-dear-riot-can-we-get-a-straight-no-nonsense-description-of-what-your-vision-for-this-game-is

Their main job is not to discuss game balance with amateurs, Riot is miles ahead of any other large gaming company already by talking to the community so often.

Riot either already explained their reasoning or their actions on those champions, what more do you want?

http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/4oIbX9EL-morello-why-are-you-trying-to-hide-people-who-disagree?comment=0004 http://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/gameplay-balance/eZvxEKrF-make-azirs-soldiers-smaller-so-they-dont-visually-reach-farther-than-they-can-attack?comment=0003

Byrnes9 votes

Not to take sides here, because I have no investment in these rounds of changes and have even barely played League for the past month, but I do take issue with these "responses".

First and foremost, they cherry pick which of the threads they are going to respond to. They really do. Whether it be because some threads are more thought out than others or whatever, but they do.

Secondly, "...Riot either already explained their reasoning or their actions on those champions, what more do you want?..." is kind of the problem. They come into threads (or make their own), explain what they are thinking and why they've made the decisions they have, then bolt on out of there. They don't answer questions, they raise more! Sometimes they'll stick around to clarify, but the moment people start asking real and hard questions, the Rioter has either moved on or ran as fast as they could (or the "well, I tried to give context, this isn't my specialty").

Third, it's a bit condescending to, well, the entire community when you say "...not to discuss game balance with amateurs..." I'm sorry to very blatantly pop your bubble here, but a good portion of the players have been around playing this game longer than the majority of the Rioters that they interact with on the boards. If anything, the Rioters are the amateurs. Unless, of course, you are speaking to the fact that community members don't get paid to do it. Then yes, you are 100% right, but I don't think getting paid necessarily dictates your ability to do something better or worse than anyone else. And, that aside, something seems a bit off about ignoring the player base who know more, play more, and have access to many of the similar stats that Riot does. Likewise, this doesn't mean the community can't be wrong because, oh boy, they can and have been.

Now to answer the question you posed. I cannot speak for the community, like I said I've barely even been around until recently again, but from reading post after post I can make a few guesses.

  1. We need organization for the boards, much like how highly-spoke-about reddit threads are handled. Someone needs to take a topic, organize the damn thing, and then list out points. Then people need to contribute. The one thing the community is terrible at, as a whole, is beating horses with dead sticks. And not only a stick, no no, 1000000 sticks in the form of posts. This should give clarity to the Rioters.

  2. Forum going Rioters need to stop commenting on serious topics when their response is either: A. a joke or B. to say it isn't their area of specialty. I'll never understand why A. happens at all, I get Rioters are humans but damn what a way to communicate you don't think the topic, or the OP, is important in anyway. B., I get, but what I don't get is why apparently no Rioter from the correct department will show up and engage with people. Is it because they don't want to deal with the mess? Of being called out? Rioters should be thrilled when community members make good points or challenge your ideas in ways they hadn't been in your office setting, that's like the grounds for ingenuity and brilliance!

  3. Balance aside, what's up with all of these "we will fix it later" responses? Yo, if the community just handed you literally hundreds of thousands of bucks (I don't want to actually calculate this number, I feel I'd be depressed) to buy a single skin, and the particles that made the skin worth the extra $5 bucks are randomly disabled, fix that shit. Asap. And I don't mean "asap" as in once you are done with whatever secret projects youre working on, I mean now! Oh no, we have to patch and that's inconvenient! Shush, we paid for the product, give us the damn product in full. And I guess it wouldnt be bad if these things were routinely fixed, but that Cass visual glitch...aren't we at like three months into waiting for that to be fixed? And how many other things like it exist that just aren't "important".

Anyway. that's my very large two cents. I don't think Riot is inherently evil or anything, they just need to pick a company direction, convey that to the users, and make it work.

Ariaflux2 votes

First and foremost, they cherry pick which of the threads they are going to respond to. They really do. Whether it be because some threads are more thought out than others or whatever, but they do.

If you mean that there are certain kinds of threads that they choose to not reply to, then yes. However, I fully support their decision to ignore any "RIOT BALANCE TEAM SHOULD BE FIRED" threads. Believe me, I had the same mentality as you before, but after being seriously invested in Gameplay Balance recently, I started to tire of the same people that I allied with.

Secondly, "...Riot either already explained their reasoning or their actions on those champions, what more do you want?..." is kind of the problem. They come into threads (or make their own), explain what they are thinking and why they've made the decisions they have, then bolt on out of there. They don't answer questions, they raise more! Sometimes they'll stick around to clarify, but the moment people start asking real and hard questions, the Rioter has either moved on or ran as fast as they could (or the "well, I tried to give context, this isn't my specialty").

It is the case sometimes, but not always. Even if they do explain their reasons, the community will riot because they do not agree with the reasoning. Basically for some things, the community will not accept Riot's decision no matter how much they try to convince the players. In these cases, I can understand why Riot will just try to go away quietly.

Third, it's a bit condescending to, well, the entire community when you say "...not to discuss game balance with amateurs..." I'm sorry to very blatantly pop your bubble here, but a good portion of the players have been around playing this game longer than the majority of the Rioters that they interact with on the boards. If anything, the Rioters are the amateurs. Unless, of course, you are speaking to the fact that community members don't get paid to do it. Then yes, you are 100% right, but I don't think getting paid necessarily dictates your ability to do something better or worse than anyone else. And, that aside, something seems a bit off about ignoring the player base who know more, play more, and have access to many of the similar stats that Riot does. Likewise, this doesn't mean the community can't be wrong because, oh boy, they can and have been.

I don't mean amateurs as in "inexperienced in gameplay", I mean amateurs as in "inexperienced in game balance", and I hope you can agree that it requires a different skill set. I do not agree with your statement that the players "know more" and "have access to many of the similar stats that Riot does". Furthermore, Riot balance team is aware that their personal playing skills are not top-notch and do get help from experienced players to help them playtest. Here's another thread that proves that Riot takes feedback. Now what they don't do is to follow every single command that forum posters give, just because they have a lot of upvotes.

Let's talk about Veigar. According to Riot's game philosophy, his E has to go. There is no arguing about it, it's a game model that Riot has decided on, players have absolutely no say in this. It'll be like trying to convince Riot to switch to a P2P model, or change LoL to become a RTS instead of MOBA. Meanwhile, Riot tried to make some changes to balance it out. They have already said that if the changes turned out to be insufficient to compensate, they will do more. How in the world is this unreasonable? They need time and research to know what's the best way to buff Veigar up if he proves to be underpowered. There are tons of suggestions from the community, but no one has no idea what their suggestions would do gameplay wise without actually playtesting them, why should Riot implement any of them? Yet the community makes it sound like it's the most reasonable thing in the world to just take the community's idea and put it in game without any concern or research for overall effect on game health etc.

Byrnes2 votes

I was trying to figure out how to respond to this, but I have nothing to add besides this was really well layout so thank you! Lots to think about, and I understand your position!

Ariaflux1 votes

Thank you for such a positive comment :D

Kuroi861 votes

I don't mean amateurs as in "inexperienced in gameplay", I mean amateurs as in "inexperienced in game balance", and I hope you can agree that it requires a different skill set. I do not agree with your statement that the players "know more" and "have access to many of the similar stats that Riot does". Furthermore, Riot balance team is aware that their personal playing skills are not top-notch and do get help from experienced players to help them playtest. Here's another thread that proves that Riot takes feedback. Now what they don't do is to follow every single command that forum posters give, just because they have a lot of upvotes.

SO. MUCH. THIS!

Circuit Bear2 votes

[deleted]

Ariaflux1 votes

Kudos on this detailed reply. I can't give a detailed reply matching yours, but I appreciate your effort. In any case, I must say I am actually on board with you for most points. I pretty much agree with you on the points for Cass and Sona. My disappointment with Riot on their treatment of Sona is what made me vocal in the first place (she's one of my favorite characters). I actually made the same argument on her inflated win rate, along with the comparisons with Blitz and Leona.

When I wrote my response, people like you are not what I had in mind. I'm not against well-formulated arguments and I really enjoyed the Cassiopeia feedback (at first, I hated the attacks on Stashu later on). My problem is with how every time I come to the forums, the main page is filled with threads from Gameplay & Balance, and I find that I feel like downvoting more than half of them, some of them twice. It converted me from someone arguing against Riot to someone defending Riot. Maybe it's because in my line of my work I also have to handle clients are fucking ridiculous and hard to please, who never seem to understand that we have difficulties too.

I guess I am generally sympathetic towards Riot and still believe that they, like the old Google, are not evil. They might make decisions I dislike, but in the end, I think they are genuinely trying to do what they can (and sometimes fail) to make the game better, and I despise people who try to pile on them with undeserved accusations. I have not seen a gaming company of this size, that treats their players this well. Also, I would really love to actually have gameplay discussions flourish instead of one insipid complaint thread after another.

Lastly, after the whole #betternerfsona fiasco, I see now that even after her nerfs, she still maintains a pretty decent support, so right now I am really skeptical of the way arguments are made on the forums. Ever since reading Urgot's entry for guess-the-champ forum game, my new favorite link is this, which I use to try to show that it's pointless to list the factors that make a champion OP or UP. They can be so skewed that the conclusion drawn is completely ridiculous.

P.S. I am aware that I didn't address your Veigar / Zed comparison, but I feel that their cases are different even though I can't really point out exactly how, so I will concede.

Circuit Bear1 votes

Well, I actually disliked my post a fair bit. I double checked Sona's win rate to see if there were grounds for my dislike and after realizing she barely dropped a percent and a half I can't really complain I guess. I decided to reevaluate my arguments and had hoped to delete it before anyone saw it but it seems I failed in that regard.

I also recognize I am heavily biased due to the fact most of my characters have been on the short end for years now. So often I write really long posts and then delete them or never post them because I never can decide if it is worth posting or not.

Either way, thank you for the mature conversation and now to regret writing a post that tapped the character limit and not studying for my exam in 30 minutes.

Ariaflux1 votes

Either way, thank you for the mature conversation and now to regret writing a post that tapped the character limit and not studying for my exam in 30 minutes.

D:

Good luck

Circuit Bear1 votes

I'll need it. I'm a system admin specialist working on a Comp Sci degree. Aka, all we teach is programming.

If you wanna play sometime feel free to add me ingame. I don't mind. You seem chill enough.

Ariaflux1 votes

Nice, I love programming, at least the little bit we did in university.

Thanks but Plat is way way above my level, don't wanna break your back @.@

Linthe1 votes

{quoted}

First and foremost, they cherry pick which of the threads they are going to respond to. They really do. Whether it be because some threads are more thought out than others or whatever, but they do.

But they have to right? I mean you don't really expect a Rioter to respond to each and every Veigar is hosed and RIP Kassadin thread right?

Personally, in a case like this where the "visible" community seems nearly universally in agreement is for Riot to start a sticky thread (temporary if need be) and monitor it periodically.

Jamaree4 votes

To be fair, if they did this for every post, champions like Irelia, Jarvan and Renekton would be even stronger. You got to realize that there is a circle jerk mindset of these forums. "Yeah, they are talking about something I hate, and want it to get nerf, I should upvote this." It is never "Hmmmm, perhaps they are right, but what about this angle of thinking or maybe this is why this gets to be so strong?" If you don't blindly follow said circle jerk, you then get downvoted. While they do need more clarity with some of their issues, you can't say that there isn't circle jerk bias mindset with buffs and nerfs here.

Narog1 votes

the difference is that riot actually did talk about the irelia nerfs and they have a point not like now

Jamaree1 votes

But the community backlashed, insulted them, said Morello was bias and wrong, fast forward to now.

Narog1 votes

morello at least make some points and not everyone was against it like now , now is just this is like this and we dont care what you think.

Jamaree1 votes

Bullllllshit people agreed with him. No one agreed, there wasn't a SINGLE post agreeing that "Hmmm, maybe Irelia might truly be too strong." Bull fucking shit you saw any either. EVERYTIME she got a nerf it was "Oh, better nerf Irelia for no reason." "Look at Morello using those buzz words but having no idea what they mean." "OMG another nerf for a champion that didn't need it."

And with supports "Morello keeps nerfing them, oh they aren't viable, man supports can't even support."

People said as they played supports, the role with an overall majority of all of them having above average win rates. The amount of communication about nerfs and buffs has changed sure, but PLEASE don't act like people didn't find every way to say that Morello was wrong, even though apparently he was right.

UnknownMartian3 votes

We have a bunch of great posts talking about...

You mean posts that literally only bash Riot and bring nothing to the discussion

Narasimha2 votes

Honestly, the argument here isn't really fair. Most of the RIot members that jump on the forums aren't part of the design or live balance team. Hell, Ghostcrawler is one of the few ones, and you guys WANT to scare him off. The ones that do comment usually do in an area of their expertise, or because they found something humorous/interesting.

Kuroi862 votes

Because somehow Ghostcrawler came to Riot and automatically earned reign over complete balance at Riot games.

Where he got this dirt he's using on Riot to keep them blackmailed into letting him do as he pleases, I have no idea.

Nor do I understand how people can assume he has anywhere near the level of influence they think he does.

Narog1 votes

Riot that i felt in love with has change a ton am disappointed , there is no communication with riot so the only option is stop playing the game at less for me and well my brother that mains veigar too.

Big Nasty Mèat1 votes

I'm sorry, but the main reasons Riot significantly cut down it's balance discussion with the community are:

  1. The game population has boomed over the years to the point that the average community member doesn't know what they're talking about when it comes to balance or about making balance changes in the context of the entire game.

  2. The overwhelming majority of balance feedback from the community is intentionally negative and condescending, as evidenced by the front page of this board on any given day.

You can't constantly go around saying "Riot balancering team sux dix lol....u shud all b fired!!!!!" and then be dumbfounded when they no longer engage in "discussions" with you.

Knight SoIaire 1 votes

its not as much as riot is cherry picking riot does not speak about their ballance almoustat all

click red tracker and look at the amount of posts in ballance vs stuff like gd and miscelaneous

Doctor Dyment1 votes

Great posts? Great... posts? Ha. Haha. Hahahaha. HAHAHAHAHAHAH. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh sweet LORD ALMIGHTY! Great posts? You call any of these fucking posts "good?" You are so fuckin' stupid then. There is the occasional good post that actually gives some ideas, and Riot replies to them. But, oh good Lord. This one? Fucking crimeny Christmas. You are just the WORST! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!! GREAT POSTS? DO YOU HAVE BRAIN DAMAGE? AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA!

Stephenizgod1 votes

Well since 90% of these "great posts" you speak of have "fuck you riot" or "Riot Balance Team should get fired/kill themselves" somewhere in there (sometimes multiple times in all caps and bold) i think it pretty reasonable they do not want to reply. Also when there 100 posts a day about one thing it gets hard to reply or comment without sounding like a broken record.

Also there are different teams at Riot, one team for champion design and another for balance (maybe these two mingle or are the same idk im only using it as an example), so a Rioter posting for champion design and not for balance is pretty reasonable. They probably dont have anything to do with balance.

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