It would be nice if this game had more bans, it would make the game 10x better.
It would be nice if this game had more bans, it would make the game 10x better.
87 Comments
Slamurai Jack14 votesI honestly wish there were less bans so people would learn to play against annoying or strong champions instead of just banning them every game. I feel like 1 ban per team would be enough to take care of outliers like Ryze and 4.20 WW. Bans are supposed to be so you can ban out certain players or ban champs that would counter your team composition, but all people in Solo Q ever use them for is to ban the 6 perceived most OP champs at that moment.
BluePolarizer3 voteslol have fun playing against 
every game where the enemy team literally cannot die without making multiple huge mistakes but you are forced to ban Ryze.
Slamurai Jack4 votesDo you actually ban Ahri and Nidalee? I hope and pray they enemy team picks them so I can just pick Yasuo and acquire my freelo. The only champion on that list that is worth banning is Kalista because your stupid team always feeds her.
BluePolarizer3 votesIf I'm first pick I ban Ahri first.
Yasuo is a 45% win rate champ. Ahri is the best mid in the game. If you first pick Ahri there is zero risk. If you first pick Yasuo the enemy is free to counterpick any one of his counters ranging from cheese counterpicks like Jax, Pantheon or Riven to solid low risk counterpicks like Annie. You don't always get to counterpick.
Orbv1 votesI have to agree with Slamurai Jack. Ahri doesn't seem worth the ban.
Yes she's safe, but she's not a burst mage, she's a sustained assassin, so I also don't fear facing her unless I'm feeling particularly lazy and don't sidestep constantly.
I get paranoid when I see 
. Annie can guarantee a kill, always. All that matters is her execution, and with her active resisances, she's a bit tankish as well and tibbers can tank turrets. Great utility. Her mana sustain keeps her in lane forever and her AA range with the nerf still gives her poke early game.
Orianna has perpetually been one of the best mid laners. She's almost as safe in lane as Ahri, but not quite...it depends. She gets the shield and speed buff and innate resistances, but Ahri post-6 has dashes which in the long run are better. Ori can initiate a team fight harder, although not as readily. And every skill she has contains AoE dmg and has utility. Q-Site, W-speed, E-Shield, R-vacuum. Ahri has less AoE and two of her abilities only target the unit closest to her. She can't assassinate someone with a front line.
But Ahri is very good. She has poke, she has safety, she has sustain, she has CC. But her poke is not the best, her safety is not the best, her sustain is not the best and her CC is also not the best. She's a Jack of all Trades
BluePolarizer1 votesBest mid in the game is not my judgment. It is the statistical average in terms of KDA, farm, win rate, etc.
http://champion.gg/champion/Ahri/Middle
Ahri is better than average in all categories (especially win rate) with the exception of 1: games played by Ahri players. Most Ahri players aren't mains, yet they're still wrecking, simply because they're using the best mid in the game.
Orbv1 votesThat all proves that she's a safe pick with the amount of damage she provides.
She still averages more deaths than the majority of mids. She then has average damage compared to the majority. And her gold earned is average.
Her wave clear and # of kills almost place her at the 40% mark. That doesn't scream best mid.
BluePolarizer1 votesbeing extremely safe with high damage is the definition of "good". She has no counters while she hard counters several other mids. Also note her games played is very low, meaning ppl might just make mistakes. And are we looking at the same chart? Her deaths is 13/48, lower than average.
maybe in low elo, Ahri is played suboptimally and makes mistakes, dies and then has zero impact, but in higher elo, giving her even a single kill or picking suboptimally may mean losing the game.
Ventira1 votesCho'Gath mid can ruin Ahri's day quite spectacularly. Just yell at her after she uses her ult, knock her up with your 1.0 ap ratio q, than eat her.
BluePolarizer1 votesThat's the theory. The reality is that Cho falls off a cliff post 25 minutes and can't follow Ahri's roams. All Ahri has to do is never engage you, gank other lanes, and have the other lanes get so far ahead that it doesn't matter how ahead you are.
Ahri actually counters Cho strategically, even though Cho is a tactical counter. That's why Cho has a negative win rate vs. her.
Ventira1 votesTrue, but if Cho'Gath is left alone and reaches full build, he can get up to 1190 true damage on his ult which is TERRIFYING to get hit by (and an 1000+ Damage Q). I wouldn't quite say he falls off like a cliff, there is a period where he is a bit weak if he doesn't get kills though. His Q and ult scalings are too high.
Occams Raiser1 votesThis is why everyone should get a ban. Ekko walking around and you Ahri. Somewhere there is a place where they build Magic Resist, gank less mobile lanes, and dodge skill shots..... and Ahri is less of a threat.
BigPooStorm7 votes1 ban per team? That's a horrible idea. Bans aren't just to take away champions that are strong, they're also meant to take away champions you really dislike playing against because they aren't fun to play against. Imagine if there were only 2 bans, have fun playing against some of the most obnoxious champions in the game, every single game, Imagine every game you play with Ryze, Ekko, LeBlanc, Katarina, Gragas, Sejuani, or Hecarim in it. Does that sound like fun to you? Doesn't sound like fun at all to me either.
Some champions just aren't fun to play against in certain metas, and bans facilitate that process. As more champs get added to the game, it makes sense there should be more bans.
Slamurai Jack1 votesIf I could get away with not banning champs, I would. But people rage whenever I don't, so I ban the same 3 champs every game; Fiddlesticks, Swain, and Riven. Fiddles because people even in plat can't tell where he's ulting from, Swain because no one knows how to deal with him, and Riven because they're always huge ragers on my team and get super fed on the enemy team.
Llanite2 votes5 bans then you will just figure out something else to fill your silly 'mandatory ban' list.
Sammystorm4 votesBans are not supposed to take away annoying champions. The whole reasons bans are there is so that you can ban out specific counters to team comps. People just don't do it that way in solo queue.
grLKQ9ma0o2 votesBans are supposed to take out annoying champions. Bans are for whatever you want them to be. Bans are supposed to get rid of counters, too. They're also for getting rid of champions you wish your team wouldn't play. There's no specific purpose for bans, so you can ban how you will.
Personally, I like banning champions that I know I don't want on the other team because I don't trust my team to shut them down properly, like Ryze, or even Nasus, Riven, Leblanc, etc.
Sammystorm1 votesJust because you use bans a certain way does not mean that the way you use them is their intended function or an optimal way of doing things.
grLKQ9ma0o1 votesTheir intended function is to get a champion out of the game. That's the only function. The reasoning is completely fluid. It has nothing to do with WHY you want them out of the game. Riot honestly doesn't give a flying fuck about why you ban them.
Sammystorm1 votesThat is just not true. The reason is all that matters for bans. Riot added bans to specifically give team strategies and/or champions outs to champs that beat them in champ select. So basically the only reason bans exist is to make it so the game can't be won in champ select by picking the most dominant strategy (the game currently can be won in champ select but only by error of a team). The end result is getting the champion out of the game but the reason behind getting rid of the champion is the only reason bans even exist.
grLKQ9ma0o1 votesYes, but why would you imply that only one strategy is ok?
Say I was playing a game and my adc sucked on the champion. I get them in my next lobby, and so they don't pick it again and throw my game, I might ban it so they can't play it. That's a strategy.
Maybe I play Zed mid and want to not play against a hard counter, like Lissandra. I'll ban Lissandra, not because she's OP or part of the most dominant strategy, but because it's not something I want to play against. That's a strategy.
Maybe I just really don't like playing against Teemo because the players who play him always spam his laugh and it infuriates me. I don't want to get pissed off and go on tilt, so I might ban him. That's a strategy.
Maybe someone in my lobby just dodged, but not before several picks went through. I get to the next lobby and have all the same team members. I'll ban some of the picks from the enemy team because I can play a bit of battleship strategy trying to ban out the players from champions I saw they were comfortable on. I have no guarantee it's the same people, but I could hit one on the head. That's a strategy.
Riot doesn't care what strategy you use to ban. They just give you the tools to get rid of a few champions that you don't want to deal with. Again, they don't give a flying fuck why you want them out, they just recognize that you don't want to play against them, and so they give you a limited tool with which to decide what not to play against.
Sammystorm1 votesYou are exactly right in the sense that it is intended to be a limited tool. However adding more and more bans makes the tool more and more general. The more freedom you as a player have to ban away champions that you find annoying the more lop sided games become in champion select and the more general or despite strategy tool becomes. However the fewer bans you have the more strategic the bans become and they then have to be incorporated into some larger strategy. In a certain sense they don't care why you are banning something but at the same time they care a lot. They don't care in the sense that you can have many different strategies. They do care because of power level, lop sided games, dominant strategies, and probably others. The end of the day the best strategy to set up a good victory is to ban out specific things that counter your team comp. However due to the nature of the pick and ban phase it isn't possible to out right win with bans. Your opponent always gets a chance to respond. Hence why banning out specific counters is the intention and best use of bans to form the best possible team.
grLKQ9ma0o1 votesThere have been 3 bans per team ever since ranked came out in Season 1. Since Season 1, almost 60 champions have been added to the ranks, basically doubling the number that were there to start. Seeing as 6 total bans out of 60 champions is 1/10th of the total, with over 120 champions now, we would proportionally get 12 total bans. The community is only asking for 10 total bans, 5 on each side.
In 75% of games, team comps are not really relevant (see: bronze and silver). That's not a judgement on the players as much as it is a point that in a majority of ranked games, people just probably ban champions they don't like. Hell, even in Challenger streams, the streamers often just say "I don't like ____, I'm gonna ban him/her."
Riot doesn't care if you ban because of team comp counters or if you ban because you wish someone would shove a rusty fork into Teemo's shitty little body.
Having more bans doesn't mean it's less strategic. In fact, I'd argue it might be the opposite. If you see someone banning certain champions, you might be able to ban what their bans counter (like ban Zed if they ban Lissandra, etc).
There's a reason that you ban champions BEFORE you pick your team. You are not guaranteed a specific team comp, and you have to have a variety of different ways to play. Bans at that point become more about what team comps you would rather not play against than team comps you want to play, which is just as strategic.
That brings me to the main reason why I don't believe Riot is going to introduce 5 bans per team.
When you first are able to start ranked, you only need to be level 30 and have 16 champions available. As it is, you can have 6 of those banned, and be left with 10. If for some reason, 10 of your 16 champions are banned, you are probably up a shit creek without a paddle. They aren't going to change how many champions you need because 16 is already ridiculous to obtain with just IP, especially some of the more fun ones that people want to play (see: not 450 IP).
Sammystorm1 votesI do agree with your last point. However on the topic of adding 60 champions that is true. However it is not fair to just take the general sum of all the champions available because some are purely just not good and others for reasons won't be picked. If all champions were created equal it would make sense to have 12 bans but that is not the case. So priority picks or dominant picks are easier to pick up with the more flexibility you have with banning. You are also correct in stating that banning opens up strategic options. I wouldn't however attribute that to any strategy of having more bans but rather strategy of the pick and ban phase.
Leon Etoile1 votesOut of your list, Ryze is the only one who legitimately deserves a ban every game. I still ban a few from that list but it is out of fear of my team's lack of map awareness.
Fidgit92 votesThere were only two bans for quite a while. With reaching well over 100 champions to chose from there are counters to every pick. Riot is continuously working to make characters more readable to allow players to learn and understand their tells. If there were no bans? Everyone would be forced to play the flavor of the month or be ready to counter it. If there were 10? The counters or "OP" champions would be banned (A skin made Ezreal viable and a single tournament showed how split pushing could break the aoe team comp). The champions you just "dislike playing against" are the ones you should be practicing against most of all, understanding them so they are no more difficult then any other. As a mid from 2 years ago I am horrified to step back into lane to find assassin ads on the other side of the field but I better get used to it and learn the new strategies or indefinitely hide in ARAM from change.
If you don't like the meta or flavor of the month try something new. The concept of jungling didn't happen over night, a lot of people trying new things until something stuck. A niche only WW could fill (and sometimes Fiddles) is now a staple. If assassins are wining try building tanky, send a Naut mid and lockdown Ekko when he gets close by.
Bans offer us a way to limit the opponents options, to possibly prevent one team composition or ban a champion who may need to be adjusted (Xin on his opening week), they should not hinder us from learning how to combat characters or strategies.
Dengeden1 votes2 bans per team was what I was thinking (or 1-2 bans blue side, 2-3 bans red side), bans shouldn't be Riot's Get out of Jail Free Card when they screw up a champion.
Otherwise, I completely agree, heck even LCS teams usually ban 2 or more fotm champs and only target ban after that.
Petiovski2 votesI agree with BigPooStorm, if we had less bans we'd also have an even less diverse pool of champs we currently see because you'll have them crowded out by the more obnoxious and fun saping champs.
Sammystorm1 votes"more obnoxious and fun sapping champs."
That phrase is entirely subjective and as such should not be used in this discussion as any thing other then just opinion. What makes you think we will have a less diverse pool of champs with less bans? On the flip side do you think more bans will lead to better champion diversity?
Petiovski1 votesYou see a good amount of players tend to play champions that are strong in any given meta, sometimes even if they have little experience playing the champ, images if you were to have 4-5 bans per team, you may just see a spark of diversity since all of the meta dominant champs are out and people might play champs they like that weren't viable due to X reason.
But the problem with increased bans is that in higher level play people will ban out a persons whole champ pool
Sammystorm1 votesYou will not see more diversity. That just won't happen. What would happen is you would see different champions in the top spot. Their will always be a best champion in any given meta. Adding more bans just changes it to someone else and adds specific problems to champion select.
Occams Raiser1 votesThey can play then in normals
Mew Goes AD3 votesThe main issue is that champ select chat and post-game chat aren't looked at for bans. If they would just start taking those into account and allow people to report for chat posted there, it would help significantly.
Hobbsgoblin7 votes[{quoted}](name=Mew Goes AD,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=MgHVPngq,comment-id=0000,timestamp=2015-06-11T03:39:44.634+0000)
The main issue is that champ select chat and post-game chat aren't looked at for bans. If they would just start taking those into account and allow people to report for chat posted there, it would help significantly.
Errr i think he meant at champion select.....
Akesgeroth3 votesWe do need more bans in Draft Mode. I'd go so far as to say 10 bans would be reasonable.
Rismonaught3 votesOne ban per player could be new and fun
WeFlyNoLie3 votesWe do not need more bans.
It only reinforces your inability to play against specific champions.
If you increase that pool, you'll only get worse at the game.
Sammystorm2 votesI disagree. Having more bans just makes the game more decided in champ select then it already is. it also makes it possible for fringe picks to become overpowered because you will have the ability to ban out all their counters.
BluePolarizer2 votesWhat fringe cases are you thinking of? The only ones I can think of are Ahri and Kalista, but you can just ban them.
Occams Raiser1 votesThat sounds more interesting actually.
Sammystorm1 votesIt doesn't sound fun to know you have lost from champ select.
Occams Raiser1 votesRandomization helps break down this phenomena.
Yxgl222HaX2 votesbans are more for team 5s than solo que anyway. Solo que yea its nice to get rid of a few monsters like kat, seju sometimes chogath ect but you never really know who/what your playing with anyway. in ranked 5s you have more time to plan your team comp ahead of time and what you want to go for- a 1-3-1 a wombo comp ect- and can just focus your bans around what would be detrimental to that instead. Which is what they do in lcs. (and they have the privilege of knowing who they will be playing against before hand which helps alot im sure) but for everyone else if you don't like the bans accept it and move on there are literally over a hundred champs banning even half of them would still leave alot of strong picks available.
Lugg2 votesI completely agree. With the absurd amount of OP and broken champions currently in the game, more bans are a must. The only people who would downvote this are the ones who don't have enough skill to win on balanced champions.
Snakezzy1 votesNo, it wouldn't at all. The point of this game is to play champions you like and have fun with. You are probably one of those kids who complains about OP champs then cry on the boards that there are OP champs. Bans don't even need to be in the game, sure it would make things worse, but awful? Not at all.
Raptamei1 votesThe HotS community is opposed to bans because preventing an enemy from bringing their A game is a scrub thing to do.
Remove bans, fix balance.
KazaLyn Shao1 votesPicks and bans are a part of the strategy, and if your A-game is restricted to one champion, then your A-game is most people's C-game.
Raptamei1 votes[{quoted}](name=KazaLyn Shao,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=MgHVPngq,comment-id=00120000,timestamp=2015-06-12T17:20:18.543+0000)
Picks and bans are a part of the strategy, and if your A-game is restricted to one champion, then your A-game is most people's C-game.
DotA bans are part of the strategy because you can ban heroes after the enemy has started picking, so if you see a deathball forming, you can boot out Magnus and Warlock and force them to come up with an alternative. (It's still lame. You don't "beat" them, you just say "no, you can't do that strategy" with one click like a scrub.)
But LoL bans have no strategic value because you have to ban before you even know what the other team is going to try. The only purpose of bans in LoL is to get rid of OP champions.
What does that say about game design?
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