Ghostcrawler balances the game around pro-play, and does a horrendous job at it.

KING XXXI·Jul 17, 2018·44 votes·9,947 views

What everyone seems to be complaining about right now is the fact that solo queue is a gigantic mess, and that Riot's intentions are solely to balance pro-play.

But Ghostcrawler's incompetence doesn't stop there, no. The thing that everyone seems to be ignoring right now is that, at the expense of the entire rest of the player base, he's completely and absolutely garbaging pro-play.

All Ghostcrawler ever cares about is flashy plays. Gotta get that solo kill every game! Am I right fellas?! And everyone cheers at Riot for how much of a creative genius he is.

Oh? The more flashy solo kills the better! Let's make it so that flashy plays are so easy to get so that we can have flashy plays every game! More flashy plays means our viewers will be excited and our viewership will skyrocket! Flashy plays flashy plays flashy plays every game!!

But look at the health of the pro-play scene. Viewership is plummeting, people are not caring about the game.

The reason solo kills back then were so exciting is because they were so rare, there were times when players would go hundreds of games without getting solo killed, so when it actually happened it blew you away.

Now Riot crams it in our faces every game because they want exciting flashy games every game. The problem with making solo kills so easy to obtain is that people start to not care.

It's sort of like inflation, the more kills that are in the game, the less value they have on the viewer.

They've made damage so high that the only thing that matters right now is flashy plays for the first 15 minutes, and when everyone's had their fun, just quickly end the game so that they can move onto the next. This is clearly evident by the fact that turrets get weaker and weaker the closer they are to the nexus.

Ghostcrawler, I watch pro-play for the strategic and teamwork value of the game. You suck at balance and need to be fired ASAP before you put yet another game on the list of games that you Armageddoned.

51 Comments

ModWulf HelhammerJul 17, 201818 votes

Ghostcrawler doesn’t balance the game.
They primarily focus on higher elo (not pros). They do however pay attention to both pro play and low elo to address things there if needed.

KnifeCatJul 17, 201826 votes

[{quoted}](name= Król Wilk Sam,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-07-17T16:54:30.347+0000)

Ghostcrawler doesn’t balance the game.

They primarily focus on higher elo (not pros). They do however pay attention to both pro play and low elo to address things there if needed.

While Ghostcrawler doesn’t balance the game directly, he’s said on mutiple ocasions that he’s responsible for deciding the direction in which the balance of the game goes in.

Basically he tells the balance team what to aim for.

Ghostcrawler: we want faster games, make it happen

Balance team: Buffs baron minions, nerfs Nexus towers, etc

AnateraJul 17, 20185 votes

[{quoted}](name= Król Wilk Sam,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-07-17T16:54:30.347+0000)

Ghostcrawler doesn’t balance the game.

They primarily focus on higher elo (not pros). They do however pay attention to both pro play and low elo to address things there if needed.

YEEEEAAHHH, BECAUSE MAKING CHANGES TO HIGH LEVEL PLAY HAS NO IMPACT ON LOW ELO RIGHT?

AirKingNeoJul 17, 20184 votes

now why in the world would any competitive game balance around low ladder?

Pokemon doesn't do it. (Really fucking glad Ubers is finally calling itself a tier and starting to ban things. Fucking 80% pickrate P-Don in high elo.) Yugioh doesn't do it. Why should League?

AnateraJul 17, 20183 votes

{quoted}

now why in the world would any competitive game balance around low ladder?

Pokemon doesn't do it. (Really fucking glad Ubers is finally calling itself a tier and starting to ban things. Fucking 80% pickrate P-Don in high elo.) Yugioh doesn't do it. Why should League?

Probably because League is neither Pokemon or Yugioh.

AirKingNeoJul 17, 20184 votes

Ok, but we're talking about the concept of balancing around high elo.

You didn't prove they're unrelated. You didn't disprove my point either.

AnateraJul 17, 20183 votes

{quoted}

Ok, but we're talking about the concept of balancing around high elo.

You didn't prove they're unrelated. You didn't disprove my point either.

Probably because it's not possible to definitively do so. And your anecdotal "evidence" is hardly convincing. You should really be speaking for yourself, since I never said we should only balance around low elo, but apparently that's a conclusion you leaped to all on your own.

Btw, your attitude of treating every conversation you have like it's a competition to win an argument is quite obnoxious. Might I suggest you, I dunno, cut that shit out? Some of us are actually concerned about the game itself and aren't interested in fulfilling your desire to win arguments on the internet.

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

My evidence isn't anecdotal. There are multiple competitive games (almost all of them), who balance around high elo. Your complaint is against balancing around high elo, and I am countering that by giving examples of why balancing around high elo is good.

I'm concerned about the game too, but this forum should have no room for those who spout things that are completely unreasonable and make no sense in a world that attempts to actually help the game. If you say something that makes no sense, I will point it out and make you defend that illogical ideal. A smart person will grow and realize their ideal needs to be adjusted or changed completely. An idiot will get frustrated and choose not to learn.

You've realized that you've become vindicated for something you said. I thought what you said was unreasonable, so I put my reasoning against it. There's nothing wrong with that. You aren't putting reasoning against me or to back yourself up. There is something wrong with that, especially if you were to continue to claim you were correct (despite not being able to prove it, nor refute counter-evidence).

InTheoryJul 18, 20181 votes

AnateraJul 18, 20182 votes

{quoted}

My evidence isn't anecdotal. There are multiple competitive games (almost all of them), who balance around high elo. Your complaint is against balancing around high elo, and I am countering that by giving examples of why balancing around high elo is good.

I'm concerned about the game too, but this forum should have no room for those who spout things that are completely unreasonable and make no sense in a world that attempts to actually help the game. If you say something that makes no sense, I will point it out and make you defend that illogical ideal. A smart person will grow and realize their ideal needs to be adjusted or changed completely. An idiot will get frustrated and choose not to learn.

You've realized that you've become vindicated for something you said. I thought what you said was unreasonable, so I put my reasoning against it. There's nothing wrong with that. You aren't putting reasoning against me or to back yourself up. There is something wrong with that, especially if you were to continue to claim you were correct (despite not being able to prove it, nor refute counter-evidence).

TLDR: Someone has found me out and I'm going to write an essay in a vain attempt to pretend that's not what I am.

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

You said something I found stupid. I pointed it out. Now you're blaming me because you won't defend yourself.

Aren't you just making excuses?

AnateraJul 18, 20181 votes

{quoted}

You said something I found stupid. I pointed it out. Now you're blaming me because you won't defend yourself.

Aren't you just making excuses?

Oh it's ok, I totally believe you. Don't worry about it.

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

You refuse to think, but you'll still make your initial claim despite having no way to prove it.

AnateraJul 18, 20181 votes

{quoted}

You refuse to think, but you'll still make your initial claim despite having no way to prove it.

Oh don't worry buddy, I totally believe everything you're saying. You're right and everyone else is wrong.

AirKingNeoJul 19, 20181 votes

I use evidence. They don't.

AnateraJul 19, 20181 votes

{quoted}

I use evidence. They don't.

Yeah, exactly! You're not arrogant or stuck up the ass at all. You're always right no matter what.

RyzeTheSmurfMageJul 18, 20182 votes

{quoted}

now why in the world would any competitive game balance around low ladder?

Pokemon doesn't do it. (Really fucking glad Ubers is finally calling itself a tier and starting to ban things. Fucking 80% pickrate P-Don in high elo.) Yugioh doesn't do it. Why should League?

Because the games you listed are for weebs. League isn't an anime

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

What? I could see Yugioh being arguably, BUT ONLY ARGUABLY, but Pokemon is not a "weeb game".

Also, how does being a "weeb game" have anything to do with balance?

RyzeTheSmurfMageJul 18, 20182 votes

{quoted}

What? I could see Yugioh being arguably, BUT ONLY ARGUABLY, but Pokemon is not a "weeb game".

Also, how does being a "weeb game" have anything to do with balance?

Usually games that have something to do with anime have hiper mobility and broken abilities because they are flashy. This isn't good for balancing a game where most people don't want that

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

What does that have to do with those games are balanced around high elo?

ModWulf HelhammerJul 17, 20188 votes

Correct.

In the majority of cases, most things don’t really effect low elo anywhere close to the degree they do in higher tier play.

You know the phrase “champion picks don’t matter in bronze”? That’s mostly true. Any champion can get you out of low tiers, because at that level basic gameplay is stronger than champion mechanics

AnateraJul 17, 20185 votes

[{quoted}](name= Król Wilk Sam,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=000200010001,timestamp=2018-07-17T21:41:15.054+0000)

Correct.

In the majority of cases, most things don’t really effect low elo anywhere close to the degree they do in higher tier play.

You know the phrase “champion picks don’t matter in bronze”? That’s mostly true. Any champion can get you out of low tiers, because at that level basic gameplay is stronger than champion mechanics

Sorry? So you're saying it's OK to change the meta every other week because bronze players don't know what they're doing anyway? How defeatist do you have to be to think that up? Have you thought about a career in politics?

AirKingNeoJul 17, 20184 votes

So you're saying it's OK to change the meta every other week because bronze players don't know what they're doing anyway?

Yes, it is. As you just said, "they don't know what they're doing". Their lack of knowledge isn't an excuse to not change the game at all.

TheSingularityJul 18, 20186 votes

Imagine if I changed the laws every 12 hours. And every 12 hours you committed a crime without knowing. How could you possibly improve in not committing crimes if the rules governing those crimes changes so often?

Same with bronze players. How the hell will they learn when they have to start playing a different game every 2 weeks?

AirKingNeoJul 18, 20182 votes

Sorry, but what? That doesn't even make sense.

Patches are every 2 weeks, not 12 hours. You couldn't expect people to adaptive in less than a day. 2 weeks is a decent amount of time.

Patches preview themselves on the PBE and are posted every 2 weeks, so your point about "without knowing" is irrelevant.

The game doesn't drastically change every 2 weeks, so that's irrelevant. Also, they won't learn if they don't know how to adaptive to basic balance changes.

Teriyaki BukkakeJul 19, 20181 votes

Boy you are a little daft aren't you hey?

Vlada CutJul 17, 20183 votes

[{quoted}](name= Król Wilk Sam,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=0002,timestamp=2018-07-17T16:54:30.347+0000)

Ghostcrawler doesn’t balance the game.

They primarily focus on higher elo (not pros). They do however pay attention to both pro play and low elo to address things there if needed.

Yeah. They sure are doing a greaaaaaaat job at it! Oh how I pity CG's white knights. [sg-miss-fortune]

ModWulf HelhammerJul 17, 20186 votes

That is literally the facts.

Doctor FillgoodJul 18, 20181 votes

I'm curious when anyone pays attention to low elo? I know I'm not great, but I'm stuck here no matter if I'm good or not just because I don't main a carry champ anymore. It feels like there are only two options, either hard carry or feel like you contribute nothing.

I'm very interested to know who pays attention to low elo and why they leave it the way they are? And why the majority of my games are just trolls and/or (more rarely now) smurfs?

Since I've stopped playing Riven virtually altogether because the circlejerk got to be too unfun to me, the game just gets more frustrating as each season goes on, I've lost my will to want to climb, and end up quitting for months on end. I stupidly come back, in hopes that maybe it feels like horrible, and then I find more true damage, less tower....everything, tanks have been completely dumpstered in favor of hyper mobile, hyper burst everychamp. Even on full tank built tanks, its rare to last longer then 2 seconds in a fight.

Who pays attention to low elo? Because whoever it is really needs to do a very careful review and actually communicate with someone.

Thank you for your time.

rayzoJul 18, 20182 votes

lol these mods...

ModWulf HelhammerJul 18, 20181 votes

Again, those are literally the facts.

KairoptraJul 17, 201812 votes

{quoted}

I don't balance the game. You wouldn't want me to. I do help set the direction and philosophy for how we balance.

LankPantsJul 18, 20187 votes

The problem is the philosophy and direction.

D357R0Y3RJul 17, 20187 votes

He said Riot targets balance around high plat/Low diamond where changes have the highest amount of impact across the game

Please stop creating bandwagons

SugeMinPikkJul 17, 20186 votes

While I agree that the game is in a hilariously bad state, I'm a bit tired of the whole "ghostcrawler single-handedly does everything involving balance" meme..

HalcyonDwellerJul 17, 20186 votes

You had me going there with the discussion of inflation and such. But then you ruined it by calling for CT's head on a pike instead of suggesting ways to fix the problems you identified.

Something something near miss, something something Carlin.

inboardshooterJul 18, 20186 votes

Sorry if I come off as an ass, but my frustration is not with you, it’s with the devs.

Why bother listing ways to fix the game at this point? Everyone knows what needs to be fixed: reduce damage, reduce mobility creep, fix the cancer champs, stronger turrets, stronger baron (not the buff) and a whole lot more. But Riot does the literal opposite of what the community wants. At some point you move beyond being mad at the organization and need to hold the people running the organization accountable.

Slightly off-topic: Im just a nobody, but I really hate how Riot is conducting their business and the state and direction of their game and am on the verge of finding something else. Maybe their overlords at Tencent are forcing them to make the game like this, it’s the only explanation I can come up with. And if that’s the case, it’s to cater to the markets in Asia, and therefore they no longer are the Riot we used to know and love and respect.

HalcyonDwellerJul 18, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Sorry if I come off as an ass, but my frustration is not with you, it’s with the devs.

Why bother listing ways to fix the game at this point? Everyone knows what needs to be fixed: reduce damage, reduce mobility creep, fix the cancer champs, stronger turrets, stronger baron (not the buff) and a whole lot more. But Riot does the literal opposite of what the community wants. At some point you move beyond being mad at the organization and need to hold the people running the organization accountable.

This didn't come off as being an ass, it's actually probably the most eloquent expression of your point of view that I've seen from anybody so far. I completely get where you're coming from, and it sucks to feel like they don't listen to us. I just don't think that trying to hold them accountable is going to help with getting the things we care about looked into.

Slightly off-topic: Im just a nobody, but I really hate how Riot is conducting their business and the state and direction of their game and am on the verge of finding something else. Maybe their overlords at Tencent are forcing them to make the game like this, it’s the only explanation I can come up with. And if that’s the case, it’s to cater to the markets in Asia, and therefore they no longer are the Riot we used to know and love and respect.

I think that games have been made shorter to accommodate players at internet cafes who want more bang for their buck. If games end in under 30 minutes then the cafe patrons can get 2 games in. I think Riot made this change to get a better hold of the customers that play exclusively through cafes. I might be wrong, but that's how I believe things have shifted. For people in areas where there are a lot of gaming cafes like in parts of Asia this is great. For people like me who care more about quality of the matches than quantity, it absolutely sucks if this is the case.

I dunno if Tencent has anything to do with it, I still believe that Riot is fairly independent in their choices, and I haven't seen a reason as to why Tencent would want something that Riot didn't want too. On top of that, owning shares doesn't give control of how the company operates, it grants influence, sure, but not control. If Tencent tried to make Riot do something that the game developers disliked badly enough, they would quit and start a new company that didn't have to listen to Tencent. That's how the free market works.

Whisper87Jul 17, 20184 votes

I'm on board with you buddy. I don't know if it necessarily is all because of balancing around pro play. I also think the following elements are in place.

-Casual Players: they like to give classes/items there moment in the spotlight to draw fair weather fans back in. Ardent Censor meta is here! Come all you kog maw and janna mains! Alright that had it's time to shine, now we nerf that into the ground and it's going to be the year of the fighter and tanks are out! YUCK

-Gaming climate: this is related to the casual players thing. But I feel like Riot is trying to jump on board with the battle royale game hype by making shorter action packed games that folks can spam and not really care about winning or losing. Horrible idea to try and move that ideology into a game like LOL which, in it's best iterations, is primarily a cerebral game. LOL is a thinking man's game, not a fighting game. It is already more dynamic and exciting than any of the other games of the same genre like HOTS, Smite, Dota 2. You don't need to try to pull it even farther out.

Here's a really big travesty. Riot made all these changes so now we get to play fighter mid and mages or fighters bot and we have funneling, which are all really cool and I'm glad that they are here BUUUUUUUT....we have had to sacrifice too much to get that level of variety across roles. Sure the meta is play whatever you want. But the game has become so homogenized in terms of win conditions and over all strat.

Every game in ranked and pro play is 1. win lane 2. snowball through mid game 3. take baron 4. win

That's it, every game so similar. Every single role is trying to fight and skirmish in the early and mid games to get a snowball going, everyone is trying to hit the earliest item timings possible. it's always about up front damage and aggression and engage. The champion variety has gone way up sure, that's cool, but our macro variety is in the freaking dirt. Let game knowledge and game sense and patience win the day again. Let decision making and macro play be on equal value levels with mechanics again. With up front burst damage so high right now, the matchup knowledge doesn't even matter too much any more. It's seriously just whoever get's the jump on the other person has the advantage hand's down. Forget about windows and openings. It's so freaking boring when all that matters is mechanics on your select 2-3 champs you main and snowball through and/or out of lane phase.

P.S. the map play is also so dumb in solo . Everyone plays around bot side, the attempted 4 man gank into drake and bot tower first blood is virtually guaranteed. I would like more options for a big play to get the early game going. Let's see something on the top half that is as desirable and easy to play around as drake. Let's find reasons for mid and jungle to show up top instead of always coming bot. I'll admit this is a little better in pro play, but not much. And herald takes so GD long to take and is not consistently good enough for teams to build a play around it, it's 99% of the time an icing on the cake take after you already made a big play. There has got to be something put somewhere else on the map that has just as much of a chance of drawing the first group play of the game as much as the bot tower into drake play does.

saltranJul 17, 20184 votes

CGrawler = bad

Upvotes to the left, thank you.

execratoryJul 18, 20183 votes

wth, riot hired ghostcrawler from blizzard? are they nuts? GC is a horrible dev, was riot not aware of the damage he has done to WoW?

ShobekJul 18, 20183 votes

Dude. What do you expect? Ghostcrawler ruined wow pvp. He was a dev for a PVE game. When I found out Riot hired him I was super upset.

He straight up gave up on 2v2 in World of Warcraft. It was the games largest PVP draw and the most active bracket.

https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/655393-Upcoming-Arena-2v2-Bracket-Changes/page6

Just go back and look at the transformation of wow pvp from one of the biggest e sports opportunities of the decade to a shadow of its former glory. Seasons 2-5 were MEGA hyped.

And all of the esports hype was created by the playerbase and external companies! Blizzard didnt fund it.

Riot also needs to stop deleting champions.

Re works are garbage; and riot is alienating their player base.

STOP IT!

Just make more new champs!

NaonJul 18, 20183 votes

I think it's a bit obvious how messed up the pro scene is just by watching Faker playing. He used to be top of the top with his skill cap champs like Zed. Yes Zed, because to master him on the level Faker played him took a ton of skill. He predicted outcomes on the spot and reacted as necessary.

Now if you look at LCS it doesn't require nearly as much skill. If you go back through the years and watch older videos you will find that the games required more skill to play and itemization was more diverse then what there is now. More champs required Skill Shots and didn't have access to blinks / dashes. They were forced to commit instead of being able to escape easily. There was punishment for mistakes and rewards for playing well.

There was a bigger diversity in champion roster being used then the same mainstream 10 champs now. There was joy in the surprise pick of seeing a champion such as Gragas joining the fray instead of seeing a Lee Sin picked.

What has made this game stale is how much Riot pushes certain champs out of the game. Kayle was seeing competitive play for a little bit and they nerfed her and removed her steroid on her Q. Meanwhile you see certain champs getting a lot of favored love for the LCS because they are "flashy" like Lee Sin or Thresh. Riot allows these champs to continue for years at a time in the cycle and even buffs some of them once they fall out of favor.

This is stagnating the pool and pro scene. It's not rewarding actual players for being skill based. Now it feels like those who can be pro are the ones who join a game house or spend endless hours just grinding away LP. Don't get me wrong, there are good players who deserve challenger for sure. However I feel like the quality needed to get to challenger has dropped. This is just because I see a lot more mistakes being made now days with players in challenger then I did see before. But ofc now that everything has a blink it feels like, the player is easily forgiven by pressing their "get out of jail free" card.

WingklipDec 11, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Can NOT Support,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=000c,timestamp=2018-07-18T12:40:47.049+0000)

akali, irelia, yi, yasuo, pyke, neeko

ChaddyFantomeJul 17, 20182 votes

League should not be balanced around pro play to begin with. Instead, proplay should be restricted based in its own problems. A huge amount of Lols fundamental game design rules do not even function when you balance around proplay.

The biggest example imo are high skill cap champions. How do you implement High skill cap champions into the game without them inherently being overgeneralizing in pro play? You can't. Meanwhile, in of itself, high skill cap champions aren't a problem because they take more skill to pull of successfully, and measurement of skill is the whole point of ranked.

These champions however area problem because they become overgeneralizing in pro play, and as a result they become gutted to the point where they are trash unless played to the utmost perfect level, at which point, why even go through the headache of playing them when you can play something easier for the same or better results more consistently?.

I could go on, but this is kinda the catalyst of my opinion when it comes to Riots insistence on balancing the game for pro play AND casual play. it just isn't gonna work.

Daddy AntsJul 18, 20182 votes

Meddler and the joke that is called the Live Gameplay Team are in charge of balance.

Linna ExcelDec 11, 20182 votes

Ghostcrawler isn't working on league anymore. We've been in the meddler balance era for awhile now.

WingklipDec 11, 20181 votes

[{quoted}](name=Linna Excel,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=V5vs39gi,comment-id=000d,timestamp=2018-12-11T01:11:39.381+0000)

Ghostcrawler isn't working on league anymore. We've been in the meddler balance era for awhile now.

It seems just as bad - "lets nerf irelia, then buff irelia's core item" -> deaths dance now heals for all damage

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

WingklipDec 11, 20181 votes

Is anyone at riot competent enough to nerf the core problem of all these gamebreaking issues, conqueror? Almost all the cancer champs take it, and they are nearly able to 1v5 every single game they take it if they aren't a boosted bronzie and know what to build