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What do you think about attaching multiple Summoners to a single Account?

John Berserk··23 votes·2,222 views

I think registering/attaching multiple summoners to a single account could hold many benefits for both Riot and for us. It would help with account/summoner organization for one, it would help prove legitimacy in some cases, it would help with smurfing somewhat (which I will explain below), and I think it would be a great opportunity to create certain rewards that could span through all summoners attached (ill go into this below as well).

On Smurfing Im not sure how much better that would make things, but Im sure it would be easier for Riot to keep track of smurfs and adjust their MMR accordingly.

For example: Say account name Yojimbo90 has 3 summoner names attached to it:

-YoBigJim (Diamond II) -JimBoy (Plat IV) -mojibo (Silver IV)

Now JimBoy and mojibo (these are all just names I made up on the spot btw; any connections with actual account or summoner names is purely coincidence) are obviously smurfs for YoBigJim. Because they're attached to an account with a Diamond II summoner, why not increase their MMR to meet somewhere in the middle? So, for Jimboy, it wouldn't be much higher than normal, maybe around Diamond V. No big deal. But for mojibo, it would increase to around, say, Gold II - Plat IV, probably closer to Plat IV because of the presence of an already Plat IV summoner on that same account. Maybe not this exactly, but I think something like this this would make it so they climb faster to get where they belong quickly, and it would alleviate somewhat the rare unfair advantage they give to their team in the lower tiers (having Diamond smurfs in my Silver IV games, while rare, is just not fun), as well as giving Riot a way to officially legitimize smurfs.

On Player Incentives Now what incentive would players have to register/attach their main summoners and smurfs to a single account? Well I think that's up to Riot to provide. Here's one idea I had: Make Champions owned on one summoner available on every summoner attached to that same account. Things such as Runes and Champion/Ward skins would probably be best to keep available only on a single summoner, but I think thats fair. Perhaps some special Summoner Icons could carry over.

This also benefits players who want to introduce friends to the game and play some Normals with them (are these considered smurfs?? idk). I'm sure most of us know how annoying it is to make a new account just to have a low level summoner to play with friends in Normals and be sort of on the same playing field in terms of having little/no runes and masteries. Also, what about possibly being able to create a new summoner at any level from 1-30 if you already have a summoner on that account above level 30? I think being able to have access to all of the Champions you normally would be able to on your main account AND being able to start at any level would just make that whole "introducing friends to League" process go a lot smoother.

For example: Let's say YoBigJim, who happens to have every champ in the game available to him, has a friend interested in playing League. They (the friend) make an account and summoner and level it up some, lets say to level 15 or something. YoBigJim decides then to make a fourth summoner to match them in level so he can teach him in-game by playing through some games together, without them fancy runes and masteries to get in the way of the learning/teaching process.

Biggest Concerns Now with a system like this in place there are obviously going to be some concerns and drawbacks. Some notable ones:

  • How would Ranked/Duoqueue work with these smurf accounts? Would the same duoqueue restrictions apply to them as they normally would on their highest-tiered summoner?
  • Aside from incentives and rewards, how would Riot get people to not just ignore this and continue making new accounts for smurfs as normal, and avoid the MMR-gain increase and various restrictions?

I'm sure there are some drawbacks to this that I can't think of at the moment. I will update this once I can think of more, but if you can think of any, or if you have any other comments, suggestions for other incentives Riot could provide, or anything else, please tell in the comments. I'm open to criticism on this and willing to discuss it. :)

19 Comments

Deep Terror Nami9 votes

I'm sure it certainly would help place Smurfs in an appropriate MMR bracket...but there are many who make smurfs specifically to avoid their real MMR. They'll just not attach their smurf accounts to their main and just not give a rat's ass about the incentives as they continue to ruin the game for lower Elo mains.

Edit: I do like the idea though. +1

John Berserk1 votes

Thats true. I forgot to touch on the situation of "what about players who just dont attach smurfs to the same account and just continue as before?".

That might be where Riot's incentives come into play though. Email confirmations could only go so far, im sure.

ValyrianBlade2 votes

I agree with this.

Whenever you look for a stream to learn a champion, it's often you find a load of smurf streams just stomping lower elo.

Smurfs shouldn't exist really. People who make smurfs do so to stomp lower elos and inflate their ego. They're not going to link accounts because that defeats the purpose of their smurf (Alternatively because they need an account to play on when they get banned - linking would ban all). Those trying to help a friend learn can watch them play and give pointers. If you go in game with them you're just going to get them free wins, inflate their mmr, and cause them to feed/lose badly once you stop playing with them.

John Berserk2 votes

I don't think all smurfs exist for that purpose, thats assuming a bit much. But I see your point.

As for going into ranked games with friends on smurf accounts, there's something to think about. Perhaps there can be restrictions on that, similar to the duoqueue restrictions.

So let's say YoBigJim's smurf and his friend level up to 30 together. His friend does his promos, and lands in, say, Bronze II. Should YoBigJim's smurf (or any of his summoners for that matter) be allowed to duo with his friend at that point? The account has a summoner on record showing he's more than a tier above his friend in ranked, so duoqueueing with him would essentially break the restrictions put in place. So, the free wins and inflated MMR scenario likely wouldnt happen.

This is all, of course, assuming people use summoners tied to a single account, which is the main problem I think we can all agree on: How would Riot get people to actually go through with this and not just ignore it and go on making new accounts like before?

cshakes1 votes

There are some people who have one set of friends on EUNE and another one EUW. I believe there may be a similar thing going on with NA and LAN. Also, some X country only tournaments (X being my country of origin) are held only on EUW, not EUNE.

This is Snake2 votes

My 2c is smurfing should never been a thing for League. Its one thing that is making ranked a miserable place to play. Ive encountered countless smurfs who confess to be smurfing post match. Problem is Riot employees back smurfing 100%

John Berserk1 votes

I understand, I've experienced firsthand Diamond smurfs (two of them in one game as a matter of fact) in my Silver IV games, and it was just not a game we could even really play. There was no contest.

This is why I suggested raising the MMR of the smurf accounts attached to an account with a Summoner that's high tiered. So, a Bronze smurf on an account that has a Diamond summoner will NOT be matched with other Bronze players, but would likely be pushed up to Gold or low Plat.

Mediocre Joe1 votes

This would be a great idea I would Love a feature like this because I would like to switch accounts without fully logging out and it would be nice to give people who already hit lvl 30 some sort of boost if they wanted to lvl a new account. I personally could careless about smurfing I lvl new accounts for a more relaxing game play not because I want to smash lowbies.

Gremlinfeller1 votes

So basically, a prestige mode. LOL

John Berserk1 votes

Essentially, I guess so.

kDrakari1 votes

I don't really understand what legitimate reason there is for "smurfs" anyway. I mean, if your main account is in Diamond, why would you just let them play against lower ranked people anyway? Even if you adjust MMR, you either end up playing against the same people except any LP gains don't go toward your ranking, or it's somewhere in the middle and you're still smurfing for easier opponents just not to the same degree.

The only thing I can see for it is the ability to try out less-than-stellar ideas without affecting your main account, but that's what Normals or custom games are for. Other things you've mentioned don't actually seem like positives to me, or could easily be done anyways (teach somebody how to play without runes, masteries, or high-level summoners by... not using runes, masteries or high-level summoners maybe? It's not like you can't take them off).

If this is combined with some method for preventing separate-account smurfing then at least you could prevent people from just continuously making accounts just for trolling and moving to the next when they get banned, but I would prefer that they just not allow smurfing at all if they can.

Damorion2151 votes

I love this idea. I'll take it a step further: Trolls and pure assholes might be more careful about...well, trolling and being an asshole. Because, if they do such on any one of those accounts, then not only would the main account get punished/banned, but so would the other accounts. That way, instead of banning "accounts" as they are now, Riot would actually be banning people since all the smurfs would be tied to one account. :D

Of course, the trolls and such could technically still create smurfs by making them totally new accounts by not attaching them to their main account, so as to how to counter that, idk. Although, it might be easier for Riot to pinpoint the trolls since everyone else might link their accounts together while the trolls won't. Of course, some new players might get caught in the crossfire of that and as to solve that...I also don't know. :/

Can anyone here think of a solution to this particular situation? :?

John Berserk1 votes

This is the biggest dilemma really when it comes to this idea: getting people to actually do this as opposed to just, well, not, and continuing as they were.

I can't think of many ways right now that don't require installing something mandatory on that person's main computer and making it so that program or whatever is also connected to that account, making it so they cant have multiple accounts, but that seems like a huge hassle and possibly an invasion of privacy, so thats likely not the way to go about this. :S

A Tortoise1 votes

Hell, no. Those shitty games where you can make multiple characters per account are just god awful.

Quepha1 votes

basically means riot would be encouraging smurfing

uses mmr of the main account

in that case no one would use it because that's 90% of smurfs. the only other reason are gimmick accounts that are usually a main of a certain champion with a silly, related name, and then you aren't really saving much trouble.

Adrian Umbra1 votes

+1 for the ease in creating new accounts to play with friends. This is a MAJOR problem, just considering that players WANT to be able to play with new friends they just introduced, but have trouble considering that they need to create smurfs to do so. I would like to note that making the MMR too high would be troublesome for this because you'd still be dragging your friends outside where they should be, though.

We'd probably see more smurfs stomping lower level games, but honestly if the players of those smurfs really want to go stomp lower level games, there's nothing Riot can do to stop them as is. Might as well "legalize" the process, recognize that this is a thing, and make moves to try to keep these things under control.

John Berserk1 votes

I dont think embracing the "stomping of lower level games" is the way to go really.

Also, making the MMR higher would also affect their ability to queue up in games with their lower MMR friends, because it would essentially be high enough to consider them more than a tier above them, and so the duoqueue restrictions would come into play.

Reminder that this only applies to ranked, not normals or other game modes.

Jakethenight1 votes

RP purchases should be carried over from summoner to summoner, IP purchases shouldn't.

Loki Viserion1 votes

I was just thinking about this because I have an old account I don't play anymore but I would like all my champs I spent on and to be able to use the runes. I like that the runes are separated tho!!!! that way the new account couldn't be overpowered!

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