4v5's are not just "some disadvantage"

Bârd·Feb 22, 2016·197 votes·7,854 views

They ruin the game outright.

One side is nearly guarunteed to win, where the other has to slog through at least 20 minutes of pointless fights, which is elongated if anyone on your team is the "never surrender" type of person.

With the new client, there are a few things I want in this regard.

A ping display in client.

To reduce the frequency of lag induced afk's. If a player KNOWS that their connection is beyond shit at the moment, they will be less likely to go into game.

Safe to leave games

If a player disconnects for at least 3 minutes, other people can leave the game without penalty.

No LP reduction

If a player disconnects for long enough to trigger the "safe to leave" condition, no other player will be penalized for the loss.

At first glance, that last one seems like something that can be abused by premades. "Oh, every lane lost. Eric, your turn to take the burden." So that the LP lost is minimized.

The thing is, if they just took turns afking to not lose LP, their accounts would quickly get banned, negating their efforts. Even if they had one person play the scapegoat and take every loss, they would need an inexhaustible supply of level 30 smurfs to keep their scapegoat in the game, which would just not be worth the time or effort.

97 Comments

MaeFireFeb 22, 201646 votes

I will say that the one thing I like about Dota2 is that if someone leaves, another person can LITERALLY take control of the afk person's character to keep them leveled, and to avoid them being a handicap if they return.

In HotS? They become an advanced bot. One that can flash when needed. A bot that can actually win you fights.

crippler38Feb 22, 20163 votes

malfurion bot man

Ulquiorra995Feb 22, 201650 votes

DotA is miles ahead of this game when it comes to handling AFK's. Game never starts if someone doesn't connect, if someone leaves other players gain gold/XP advantage to make it more of a fair fight, can control the leaver's hero or sell all his items and distribute the gold among themselves. And if all that fails, they can still leave without taking a leaver penalty (but MMR changes if ranked still apply - thus eliminating the "abuse case" Riot clings to as one of the reasons it shouldn't be implemented).

Seriously, what the fuck? Riot's only game is a MOBA -and the most successful one at that and after 6 years it lacks even the most basic 4v5 prevention methods. Hell, even Smite has the decency to allow you the early surrender so you don't waste your time at least. But Riot? Nooooo. Muh abuse cases.

Festive BearFeb 23, 20163 votes

I hate riot. Like, really badly. They might have the biggest and most played game, but they don't take suggestions from the community when making the game. My first bad experience was a while back, on my now banned account, end of s4, lvl 13. I was playing a bot game, bots, intro bots, 2 smurfs on my team getting super fed it was going to be an 18 minute game. I play the game just to pass the time because i had to go soon anyways. I leave 11 minutes in. 11 minutes, intro bot game, 2 super fed smurfs already ending the game. I come back, "Due to recent AFK behaviors on this account, you have been placed in a lower priority waiting queue"... I email riot... What i get... Is this "We are unable to modify your lower priority queue, being AFK makes gameplay very unenjoyable and leaving your teammates alone on the battlefield is very unsportsmanlike." Some bullsh*t like that. I got so pissed, so mad, and all they said was the same thing. Same thing happens with DotA, i went AFK and got a penalty, I email support, they say "Alright, yes we see here, our system is automatic so it catches any AFK's. We'll fix this and you should be able to get back playing quite soon!"

Riot fails at even helping their players out

PsyrionFeb 22, 201630 votes

What about a system allowing players to join the existing game as that champ, same role, with their own masteries and runes? Possibly even with items refunded so they can rebuild quickly to adapt to their playstyle? Kind of like a rescue queue, where games with a player out for a specific period of time (or with a definitive player-induced disconnection) are able to continue with a 5th man. Even allow for a team to vote to request a rescue, the same way surrenders are voted for. Maybe not a great system for team queues, but in normals, solo ranked, and ARAM, it would help significantly.

NilokFeb 22, 20167 votes

I swear this was talked about in season 3 but it never come about.

Pars FortunaFeb 22, 20162 votes

I have to admit, this sounds a lot more practical and actually possible than easily abusable "safe to leave" systems. Great idea, good to know that this was talked about in season 3... there is hope then, right?

yoniameFeb 22, 20163 votes

there is, but it would take away too much from the budget

CIit YeastwoodFeb 22, 20163 votes

You're right... I mean they ONLY get a billion dollars a year these days. There is NO WAY they could afford to implement something that will actually improve the player experience, thus retaining and attracting new and old players, thus making those happy customers more likely to spend money.

As someone that has taken multiple business and object-oriented analysis courses.... can we stop making this fucking excuse? Truth is: They have the funds to do whatever the fuck they want. They just choose to dump most of it into LCS and take a major loss because "screw the people that got us this far."

I mean shit, if you are going to make excuses for Riot at least take the maymay route: the technology just isn't there yet. Because frankly, with Riot, it isn't. Once the new client hits they literally have no excuses for not having these basic things anymore.

Winston WolfFeb 23, 20163 votes

Tencent took over, they don't care about the people who got them this far.

Riot cared about the game originally, because it was a game to them. Tencent bought it as a company, and now run the game as a company. Money is priority.

blueberrypancakeFeb 23, 20161 votes

Actually Tencent don't force Riot to do much, they just reap the profits

DevlinCrowFeb 22, 20163 votes

This is a great idea!

iainB85Feb 22, 20161 votes

Who would want to do this though? You'd be joining a game where your team is most likely behind from being down a man for 'x' amount of time, but still risking your LP as if it were a normal game?

EvilRabbittFeb 22, 20164 votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro0yZyVR0Qk

WOMB RAlDERFeb 23, 20163 votes

I would do it. Probably the least toxic games you'll ever join. You're only trying to help the situation, and anything you do is better than the 4v5

WOMB RAlDERFeb 23, 20163 votes

I wasn't sure how I felt about it at first, but can you imagine? You're in a 4v5 situation, and someone out of nowhere comes in ready to play for the AFK guy (because you chose that queue). A lot of toxicity would be gone right off the bat just because of the favor you did for them.

However. Let's look at another situation. Some one rage quit. Fed beyond belief. AFK'd. Now you're playing for a feeder in a game which is going to be really tough, maybe impossible to win. No one is going to have fun with that.

Also, looking at the programming architecture that Riot has set up this would be absolutely impossible to implement without reworking the networking system. When 'spectator mode' first came out, it was literally just a 6th player who stayed at base. It took them forever to get a real spectator mode working, and when you think about it that's just a 6th player with no champion. Something like removing control of a champion and giving it to anther player is probably not possible at the moment. I know it seems like a simple unplug plug, but I doubt they have their code setup that way. It's probably locked in once you see that loading screen and has no functionality for change.

TL;DR The idea is decent, but not possible for Riot

A5W9VPIhgQFeb 23, 20161 votes

that exist in csgo for esea, they are called .ringer's

Malicious MetalFeb 22, 201614 votes

Yeah, this completely ruins the ranked experience. Especially promos. I lost two of my promos to plat due to afk's and my next game deciding wheter I advance makes this even more bitter, knowing that I might have progressed if it weren't for afk's.

Mecha MaIphiteFeb 22, 201612 votes

[{quoted}](name=The True Bard,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=O0vpMnFo,comment-id=,timestamp=2016-02-22T03:52:44.223+0000)

If a player disconnects for long enough to trigger the "safe to leave" condition, no other player will be penalized for the loss.

And none of the winners awarded any LP. The game should not affect LP or ranked MMR if someone afks for a prolonged time.

Firstly because the team of 5 had too easy of a win to be counted, and secondly, it would actually be skewed for the team of 4 as well, as they would either lose no LP or gain a bit of LP, even if that only happens around 20% of the time.

NahuiFeb 22, 201618 votes

I disagree. It's unfair that a winning side doesn't get LP because the opposite side fucked up. I agree not taking LP away, but the winner still won and deserves the win. That's why loss prevented exists but not win prevented.

NikoyopuFeb 22, 20165 votes

That would create inflation in LP which is why Riot doesn't do that.

CIit YeastwoodFeb 22, 20161 votes

No, it really wouldn't.

Maximum MordeFeb 22, 20163 votes

Yes it mathematically would. If every match that would have lost lp no longer does so, there are now more LP total in the system unless we counterbalance that by not giving it out for the wins either. It is the definition of inflation.

Combine that with promo helper and you increase a little bit the number of people going on lucky streaks and getting promoted. I wouldn't say they don't belong there, because if that is how the system works then that is the new skill level for that rank, but it does mean the average skill level at a given rank/lp is a touch lower.

Whether any of that is a problem is an entirely different discussion. I personally don't see it as a problem because it is unlikely to make more than a division or two difference within a rank, but some people might. But, I also really don't care one way or the other.

4ManVotedAgainstFeb 23, 20162 votes

They obviously want DEFLATION of LP/MMR in order to force a higher percentage of the player-base to get demoted into Bronze/Silver & make them waste more time being required to win through at LEAST THREE FUCKING MATCHES IN A ROW JUST to make up the points necessary to break-even from ONE loss... because... something about money & being greedy & over-pricing RP whilst simultaneously giving DISMAL IP-rewards. Riot seems to LOVE their MONEY even MORE than Nexon does...

{quoted}

That would create inflation in LP which is why Riot doesn't do that.

NikoyopuFeb 23, 20161 votes

…That makes no sense with the current system.

ahferroin7Feb 23, 20161 votes

Except there is already inflation in LP, you don't lose as much as the enemy team got, because the system is designed to allow people with a theoretical 50% win rate to still trend upwards overall. Add to that that you lose even less if you surrender, but the enemy team gets the same amount they would for a regular win.

CansemaFeb 24, 20161 votes

{quoted}

That would create inflation in LP which is why Riot doesn't do that.

people down vote me for trying to explain what people would do.. you explain how it would effect the game.. in the end i get down voted.. you get up voted.. ehh.

Touch My BoxFeb 23, 20161 votes

{quoted}

And none of the winners awarded any LP. The game should not affect LP or ranked MMR if someone afks for a prolonged time.

Firstly because the team of 5 had too easy of a win to be counted, and secondly, it would actually be skewed for the team of 4 as well, as they would either lose no LP or gain a bit of LP, even if that only happens around 20% of the time.

Your MMR changes less if you win quickly, just a heads up.

20 minute games will move you less than 40 minute games, regardless of outcome.

VengefulMarvFeb 22, 201610 votes

This needed to happen years ago.

Frankly, there's no excuse for Riot to be this far behind on this big of an issue. They've spent way too much time focusing on esports and not enough on having a playable game for the other 99.9%.

I've been here since Beta. At one point it was all about making positive changes. Now I just feel like we don't matter anymore. Tribunal is gone. Putting Lyte in charge of creating an automated system hasn't even remotely done as much to help this game.

TLDR: afk's and leaves are a big problem. Half my placement games had them and I still see them VERY regularly. The system needs to change.

CIit YeastwoodFeb 22, 20168 votes

^ This so much.

Beta was so amazing, right? Xin release OP as fuck? It's okay, only lasted two weeks before he got nerfed.

LB fucking retarded? It's cool, within 48 hours there was a hotfix nuking her into the ground.

These days we have to wait 10 months just for them to publicly acknowledge that something is a problem, then another 12 for them to say that they are actively working on a fix.

PhantomGGFeb 22, 20168 votes

i have been saying this for the longest time, It is legit bs to lose a entire game because of a afk, happened to me the other day in a ranked game, went in with a positive attitude told myself "im going to play diana jg and im going to fucking carry even if it kills me" went in like a boss, all my ganks were successful, I had great invades, I was hyper fed and I got my lanes fed. We were ready to win. One problem.

kassadin warns us "my internet is bad" ten minutes later this is proven to be true as he afks and never comes back as our team eventually gets out scaled for five damage dealers vs four damage dealers, hey, you do the math.

ahferroin7Feb 23, 20161 votes

You do know that technically it qualifies as unsportsmanlike conduct to knowingly put your team at risk of such a severe disadvantage.

MnR9IRojHwFeb 22, 20168 votes

funny how this gets upvoted. ive had 1 intent feeder and 7 afks/rage quitters in the past 25-30 games. ive tilted to different dimensions because i had 3 rage quits in a goddamn row. the enemy team has yet to get someone that dcs ONCE. i dont blame it on riot, but i blame it on the system they created were everyone gets sucked down the free loss regardless if they are good or not. games were i go 5-0 but my mid is afk and regardless of me winning my lane we lose the game and get demoted and such.

RavenMagusFeb 22, 20164 votes

The thing is, if they just took turns afking to not lose LP, their accounts would quickly get banned, negating their efforts. Even if they had one person play the scapegoat and take every loss, they would need an inexhaustible supply of level 30 smurfs to keep their scapegoat in the game, which would just not be worth the time or effort.

Or just make the LP loss stay on the disconnectee and the people they were queued with. It's mainly a soloqueue problem anyways.

John ViandeFeb 22, 20163 votes

It could work only for the first 3 minutes of the game. Otherwise there would be abuse cases where a person could leave near the end of the game to allow the others to not have LP losses.

There would even be a new type of toxicity: "it is your fault that we are losing, take your responsibility and leave that game"

CIit YeastwoodFeb 22, 20162 votes

I found Lyte's secondary account guys.

You know how other games handle that issue? Low priority queue's. Or bans. Either works. Not rocket science.

9kPluzZFeb 22, 20163 votes

No one would do that just to help a bunch of random people they don't know, on the internet. People aren't that selfless. If anything it would just piss them off.

Robbit MangFeb 22, 20163 votes

[{quoted}](name=The True Bard,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=O0vpMnFo,comment-id=,timestamp=2016-02-22T03:52:44.223+0000)

They ruin the game outright.

One side is nearly guarunteed to win, where the other has to slog through at least 20 minutes of pointless fights, which is elongated if anyone on your team is the "never surrender" type of person.

With the new client, there are a few things I want in this regard.

A ping display in client.

To reduce the frequency of lag induced afk's. If a player KNOWS that their connection is beyond shit at the moment, they will be less likely to go into game.

Safe to leave games

If a player disconnects for at least 3 minutes, other people can leave the game without penalty.

No LP reduction

If a player disconnects for long enough to trigger the "safe to leave" condition, no other player will be penalized for the loss.

At first glance, that last one seems like something that can be abused by premades. "Oh, every lane lost. Eric, your turn to take the burden." So that the LP lost is minimized.

The thing is, if they just took turns afking to not lose LP, their accounts would quickly get banned, negating their efforts. Even if they had one person play the scapegoat and take every loss, they would need an inexhaustible supply of level 30 smurfs to keep their scapegoat in the game, which would just not be worth the time or effort.

okay on the whole safe to leave thing

this is a system from dota 2 that applies to normals.

In ranked its treated slightly differently.

If a player disconnects for a certain amount of time, but they disconnected -->BEFORE FIRST BLOOD<-- the whole game becomes S2L and nobody gets a loss except the person who left. HOWEVER, if someone leaves the game -->AFTER FIRST BLOOD<-- the game is safe to leave, but leaving the game counts as a LOSS (for the team with the dc). so in a way its like being able to immediately FF after someone disconnects.

BUT in dota 4v5's are still winnable! how you may ask? it has nothing to do with game balance, its just that the person who DCs gives their bonus gold to their allies. Doesnt sound like much, but those 4 players actually become rich af and get a gold lead, meaning by midgame the 4 man is always at a gold lead unless they fucked up and can possibly win the 4v5 unless its taken to lategame where the 5 man would outscale by pure numbers. Pretty great system imo.

JayrettFeb 22, 20162 votes

[{quoted}](name=The True Bard,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=O0vpMnFo,comment-id=,timestamp=2016-02-22T03:52:44.223+0000) 2) Safe to leave games

If a player disconnects for at least 3 minutes, other people can leave the game without penalty.

I agree with everything you've said, but I feel like this should be upped to 5-10~ minutes. great post otherwise.

Hot DeliFeb 22, 20162 votes

I don't understand the problem with not dropping the LP of players who have lost during a match when a teammate had disconnected. I see NO problem. NONE.

TheSlogsFeb 22, 20162 votes

I have to slog through every game no matter what :/

GreekscopeFeb 23, 20162 votes

Notice how no one from Riot will ever respond to this type of thread, but they'll jump all over some irrelevant post about skin ideas or something else completely unconstructive

PeachsPropertyFeb 23, 20162 votes

I myself am still trying to figure out how 3 votes to surrender is a failure to surrender..

If RIOT remembers kindergarten 3 is greater than 2 and majority vote is how voting ** should ** go..

Mini WeenyFeb 23, 20162 votes

Told myself I was going to win some games and climb tonight. Champ selection went alright, solid team. Gets into game and mid laner reconnected. Happens, right? They get into lane and BAM enemy first blood, summoner disconnected. And this kept happening every few minutes, reconnects, immediately disconnects. Lost 18 LP and wasted 20 min. Too bad they didn't just DC out of champ select. Hate this game.

I do like the idea of a ping display in the client. I check my ping before I get into a game by running a ping checker on my computer so I know I don't make games 4v5.

IqqiFeb 23, 20161 votes

The idea of a "balanced and fair" ranked system in League has been an illusion since its inception. Since the beginning the system has been against the solo individual player.

The key rule that it seems a lot of people do not realize on the forums is that Riot is a for profit company. Which means it makes terrible business sense to ever make a game change that would reduce player count and or reduce potential revenue.

With that said Riot over the last 6 years could of made changes to ranked to provide a more enjoyable, "balance, and fair" ranked system. The issue is every change that Riot can make would ultimately exclude players. Could they exclude players who are currently experiencing high ping from ranked? yes. Could they exclude players who have a history of DCing from ranked? yes. The list goes on.

In the end Riot has made a choice. They have decided since the beginning that they would rather have the environment they have today which at least in my experience is terrible and completely unfair. If Riot decided to lock your ranked queue if you ping is over 800(random number) or if you DC in more than 10% of your last 5 games things would be very different and teams would be more evenly matched because it would actually be a 5v5. See MMR doesn't care if you DCed or if you have insane ping, or any of these obviously very important factors that weigh into your winning chances and suchness. MMR also doesn't care if you had someone like this on your team. Basically if Riot locked ranked from these people it would create a much better experience for those playing ranked, but ultimately Riot could and likely would lose some money. So it is a terrible business idea to do so.

So since Riot is not going to exclude any of these "victory inhibitors" from ranked your train of thought should lead you to identifying these unbalanced environments and reducing punishment. Could Riot IP address ban? yes. Could Riot MAC address ban? yes. Could Riot create a system to secretly create an MMR rating for you based on normal mode so people who are really terrible are not playing as what silver 3 out the gate? yes. However like everything in this game, it can be exploited. By enabling banning it excludes people. You can easily find an internet cafe or really any public internet connection blocked by Riot. Including schools, LAN parties.... etc. etc. Then all the people that Riot actually would want these features to catch would likely be the people willing to take the time to google/YouTube how to get around the system. So by trying to restrict and exclude people (again against business model) they would end up causing way more hard than good and the financial commitment to fund oversight of such a system would not be something Riot is comfortable with.

In the end it all comes down to Riot's MMR system. They have decided to create a system that is extremely basic ( I still dont even believe MMR exists. I think it is completely based on your current rank and you play against people -+2-3 ranks from your own and that is it.) If Riot really wanted to do anything the best way they could fight it and still fit their business model would be to actually create a MMR system in the first place, and then expand on that system to also look at additional factors such as DCs.

I have no doubt that anyone working at Riot or on the leadership team does not care. I am sure they care a lot and are extremely dedicated (except Ghostcrawler way to hire WoW's worst game designer ever). At this point one of two scenarios has to be true. Most likely is Riot is ok with the system they have today because it maximizes their business model. Or, less likely Riots designers are not smart enough to come up with a solution that provides a more fair and balanced system for a majority of their player base.

ArtMurderFeb 23, 20161 votes

I would also like to see something like "Depending on how many players have left the game you can surrender 5 or so minutes sooner. So if it's a 4v5 from the get go you can surrender at 15 minutes."

DazarukFeb 23, 20161 votes

I'm honestly confused as to why Riot hasn't designed a system that detects if a player hasn't been in the game for 10 minutes. This meta is already snowball-y as all hell and I have not only been on the receiving end of someone not connecting to the game, but I've also not connected for 10-15 minutes. When this happens to the enemy team I feel like the win was so cheap it wasn't worth playing.

It's common sense to add something to alleviate this sort of thing.

UmmTastedPurpleFeb 23, 20161 votes

Or to be that guy, you could always.. git gud :D

http://postimg.org/image/8ap0nnd4f/

Though honestly, that 4v5 was intensely stressful and we won both through being much more skilled and them making map movement decision mistakes.

The points made remain true that's it's really tough to have a 4v5.

NøbleFeb 25, 20161 votes

I think the leave game idea is not good, because for example, lets say your internet goes out, its gonna take more than three minutes to get back to the game, but when you do get back 2 other members have already left and now you need to 3v5, i think that the in client ping indicator would be awesome, and i agree that in a game where someone is dc'ed, afk, trolling, intentionally feeding etc, that not only should that be identifiable by the game client, but it should reduce your lp loss if not remove is completely. However this is asking a lot.