Are games more than coin flips?

So recently me and a buddy have been wanting to start doing duos together but we want a game plan before we start so we actually get somewhere. However no matter what we try doing it always seems to come down to which team has all 5 players on it, however the more I think about it the more I feel like there could be a way to win. For example if SKT1 Faker was on your team in a bronze to platinum game I feel like it would be pretty hard to stop him from winning, but at the same time how does that prove that one person can make or break a game because I sure have tried a lot of crap and nothing ever seems to work. How well you farm, your map awareness, teamwork, abusing leads, focusing objectives, building correctly, getting the right runes, counter picking and banning, executing engagements correctly, playing aggressive or being safe, staying up to date with all the latest strategies-the list goes on of things you can do to better in a game, but does it really all matter? I have a hard time blaming the matchmaking system for lack of teammates simply because I'm sure Riot is aware of all the problems with their game and wouldn't just let matchmaking screw someone over out of purely bad luck (though at times it certainly feels that way).

I don't mean to pose that I personally have the power to win every game, i mean... I'm not even that great, but sometimes i feel like I'm not even in the game because some other player lost lane and the other team ends up ahead off someone else and even after a lot of salt and frustration the teams randomly make it back neck and neck again and once the games over it feels like that winner was random and that winning or losing during laning phase didn't matter at all (and yet everyone gets tilted anyways). Even with objectives I still feel like one team could randomly get a lead out of nowhere, there has been a few games where some random top laner was ignoring their team 0/9 or something trash and they push in get inhibitor then rally at baron and out of nowhere they make a winning push (yeah I know there's a billion way to stop that but do you have 5 players on your team smart enough to pay attention?). Here I ask myself again if one or two players could pull off something to win, and honestly I don't know.

You also have to keep in mind that your not alone in a game, those other players are actually people trying to win (as hard as that is to imagine) and not just your teammates but your opponents as well and I'm sure they are trying to figure out how to win as well.

So really is it possible to turn every game into a victory? Realistically no, but is it even theoretically?

I feel like league is missing some of the hardcore correct choices that makes or breaks a game, because it feels awfully random who wins regardless of lots of available choices. For example rift herald, baron, dragon (and elder), first blood, first tower and inhibitors, they all have strong influences but they don't seem to make or break anything in the long run (even thought they are influential).

I'm not a game developer so I really don't know a perfect solution (come to think of it they obviously don't either) but I would suggest a few things to give players the power to win or lose a game:

1.) Increase the skill gap

I understand why Riot would want to close the gap between hardcore league players and those who just wanna have fun, they would lose players. However as of late they seem to be losing players a lot anyways so really they should stop hurting themselves. I don't wanna start complaining about all the broken champions out there so ill just pick on one for an example, Master Yi (master q). There have been a lot of Master Yi players I have seen that are just simply bad but they do really well anyways, I've seen them build at least a hundred different ways but it never makes to big of a dent on what they do best, press q. Of course there's more to it than that but when your playing say a skill shot based champion and its late game and Yi q's you your most likely toast, I'm not saying that there's no way to deal with it but clearly his one button is easier to press than the 5 it might take to outplay him. now lets say there was a way for you to press 8 buttons (bare with me its easy to explain like this) as the skill shot champion and outplay them or if Yi had to instead press 3 buttons to gain that advantage then we might see some players that are better rise above the others (and some epic replays would be generated). Personally I think item actives and additional consumables might help with this or add keystone actives to runes or something (that might get to complicated). One item I used to love building back in the day was Death fire grasp which had an epic active that did a percent of the targets health in damage, unfortunately this item was removed after a statistic showed that nearly 1% of players that built the item actually used its active, however if you ask me a rework of the item would have been better than removing it because it was really powerful if it was utilized like intended (increasing the skill gap).

2.) Increase object influence

I think having a list of objects gives the game a good path to follow and something for players to fight over, however I think these objectives should be a high priority to get, buffing some objectives might be healthy such as dragon buffs, also adding maybe anther objective. This way plays can map a way to get and fight over objectives giving the more informed and dedicated player the edge. This would also encourage more engagements (something riot seems to wanna push towards).

3.) Widen build diversity

This is something riot is already trying (with all the freaking zeal items) but I think they can step it up a little. More items to counter play would be nice like 2 addition items built off of quicksilver so more people can deal with cc (from what I've seen only good players build ever quicksilver anyways). More items that pose risks like the dark seal would also be great, something where you can put your skill on the line would really make or break a player. Support items that do more than increase healing............ or make a second item like ardent censor. Two variations of Rageblade or maybe 3 AP/AD, AP, AD, Tank. Honestly my ideas for Items probably are not the best but really though, having only 1 or 2 counter build items feels almost like a bad option at points and the options should be widened.

4.) Create/post none ranked (normal pick) MMR or KDA sorting

I know that normal games are not intended to be taken as seriously as ranked games but I don't feel like ruining peoples ranked games to use it as learning (therefore I take my normal's seriously and I'm sure plenty of people are in my boat). there should be some kind of rating that places you with even teams like each teams KDA average the same (or heck even average their ping) or invent some complicated algorithm for making like teams based off wins, mastery with the lanes selected (draft pick) or create a rating system based off their played champion difficulty. Really there are players that are not in it for the wins (I know crazy right) but are playing for anything from social status to boredom and these players are probably gonna be less useful to their teams than people who are actually trying to win, sorting these player into like boxes may have an impact on the coin flip feel we get from a lot of games, and at the same time would cater to the interests of both types of players.

5.) Promote team play

A big part of winning or losing that I feel is overlooked is how teammates treat each other. Honestly whenever a lane fails for example and I'm jungler and they blame me for not ganking the last thing I want to do is gank for them now, I'd rather just let them keep failing because ya know... Salt. Or even the other way, your jungler takes a perfect opportunity to gank and you back off without paying much attention and so you get flamed and now you want nothing to do with your jungler. Now I don't mean to start an anti-bullying campaign or anything, what should be done is increased rewards for moving places with other team mates, for example if keystones gave near alley buffs like +hp regeneration per ally within 600 meters or bonus magic damage on hit per ally hurt within 600 meters, something that would encourage taking objectives as a group and also demote split pushing (sorry every top laner that ignores their team, I mean full offence). Now I personally don't think you can take the salt out of league but look at aram for example, its generally less heated as summoners rift, and you dont lose as many players behind as you can in normal because they can get assists from anyone,s good work, a lot of this is because of its constant team fight scenario, moving this over I think would be very influential on how games end up late game

Players should have power to move games, skill and dedication should be rewarded with more victory's. Games are not completely a coin flip but they sure are close this season and someting should be done about it, my ideas are just examples of the large abundance of things Riot can do to fix things a little bit.

On a side note I'm not an English major and this is my first post, I know someones crying/cringing looking at this.

GLHF summoners [poppy-wink]