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Shouldn't people in their promos/provisionals be paired with others in them too?

Knalxz··58 votes·4,652 views

So we've all had that game where someone trolls or throws hard and don't really care because its just another game of ranked to them, but then there's you. Yes you! The person in high point of their League hoping to move forward and just had your hopes dashed because of something you had (the majority of the time) no control over. There are a large variety of things that can negatively affect your promos and since we ALL know them there is no reason for me to go through the trouble of listing them besides the one major problem that plagues promos the most.

Being paired with a player who doesn't care.

They could not care for 100 reasons but the fact of the matter is that they could lose or win with and they won't be affected by the outcome all to much. So what appears to be a well oiled machine at minion spawn turns into a turkey dinner at five minutes. You being the one in your promos just lost because another person was in their 15th game of the day.

It would make everything much easier to pair people up with players who's goal is complete 100% troll free victory. It would cut down on toxicity and make for an even more competitive game. I know riot really wants those games to start and end as fast as possible but what about those people who don't want to get paired with non-promotional players?

It would be nice to have a separate queue dedicated to players in their promos who only want to get paired with others like them. Its not like it would be a game breaking experience to do this, if anything there should be nothing but a positive feedback. I can't imagine someone say they hate having the choice to play with other players in their promos or just going into normal ranked games.

Giving a little more power to the players isn't a bad thing especially when it comes to a situation that only profits the player and not the company. It shows you care.

35 Comments

CoolKnightST23 votes

I think the real question here is why riot still keeps promo's between devisions. Tiers should be enouge.

NoFunWithNunu4 votes

its the way to "test" a player going up and down between divisions, let alone is a trash method IMO i liked the old season 2 ranked system, just straight elo, you go up or go down, not try per league, placements, lp at 0 because system said you lucky to be there

Grand Eleven3 votes

[{quoted}](name=Troll Berserker,realm=NA,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=WdAGXneA,comment-id=00020000,timestamp=2015-01-23T20:09:39.834+0000)

its the way to "test" a player going up and down between divisions, let alone is a trash method IMO i liked the old season 2 ranked system, just straight elo, you go up or go down, not try per league, placements, lp at 0 because system said you lucky to be there

You mean as opposed to now where it still uses straight elo for all match-making and just gates the "feel good reward" with an arbitrary RNG known as Promos?

Knalxz2 votes

I think everyone game should look at Halo 3's ranking system for guidance. Probably the most perfect one I've ever come across.

There were two ways to rank up skill and socail. Skill ranking paired you against players who were all to your level. Depending on how you won the game you'd rank up or come close to ranking up.

I.E. If you blew the enemy out of the water, it was an instant tank up but if you barley got off the win you'd have to do that 3 more times to prove you've got the skill. Vise Versa if you lost and were going to lose your rank. IF you barley lost you were given a few more chances but if you were blown out then you'd hear most sad thing ever. THe Promotion sound in reverse as your rank gets sucked away.

Then there were social ranks. This was the game monitors your skill over hundreds t the thousands of games you played in non ranked games. In Social ranks you were promoted if you've actually seen an increase of your skill judging apon fighting more and more skilled opponents.

another example, imagine playing LoL and when you're playing draft pick your MMR starts putting you against higher ranked opponents. Back in Halo 3 that was your social rank and when you would see those higher ranked players in your game you'd get a social level up. Social games typically took hundreds of games to level up in if you were lucky others needed thousands. Normally ranked only took a few if you were skilled and a dozen for those unable to climb.

Social ranks and had skill ranks had noticeably different icons. If two players skill was around 35 they'd both be majors but the Social player would have a title and gold bars while a skill ranked would have a grade and silver bars.

Staff Major Knalxz would be my social rank while Major Grade 3 Knalxz would be my skill ranked.

Sneak Dog1 votes

LoL has many different strategies. You can't make a system that accounts for all of the known and unknown strategies and rates teams based on this performance (if you can, do so!), let alone rate players' individual skills. The only goal in the game is destroying the enemy nexus and there's many sometimes counterintuitive things that can help achieve this goal (making the entire enemy team hunt you down all over the map and kill you repeatedly would win you the game, but your score would be terrible. Giving up a lot of gold/lives to get 5 dragons would win you the game, even with a gold deficit).

Perhaps I misunderstood you and you just wanted everyone to have two ranks: A highly variable one and an almost static one, both based only on wins and losses. I'd just wonder in that case which one you would use for matchmaking.

Knalxz1 votes

Basically you have several ways to rank up. If you rank up thought a different way I.E. from your MMR just being so good from not playing ranked, you'll get promoted. If you're playing ranked you'd just level up normally.

That's how it was done in Halo 3. Alot of people judged the samething in Halo when Bungie first made the system in Halo 2 and said they were going to improve upon it in Halo 3.

People said The Golden Triangle would be too much for game to calculated a players skill and yet it was done and Bungie has received infinite praise for the system.

Multiple ways to rank up, each taking a look at your overall skill improvement and sending you up or down the ladder. Both and ladder on all three 3 ranks because they added an another ranking system within the first two so players could have other ways to determine their skill. When all three of the skills were added up you were put at the associated skill level.

Example- My Social rank would be High, my Skill rank would be at its peak but my Paring Acceptance rank would be at the middle. With Bungie's system, they'd calculate how much of the Golden Triangle i was aware of, use KDA ratios, accuracy and a whole bunch of other nonsense and rate me for the players who would at my level which at the time was the lowest of the high ranked players or in League terms being Diamond 4 or 5 to platinum 1 or 2.

If I got my PA ranking up then i'd get paired with my skilled players.

This system was so great at determining skill that when it was removed for a more casual friendly form of ranking. ugh, A ranking system that made it so you leveled up just from playing games. Winning or losing didn't matter it lead to what is called the Dark Ages of Halo. With the new Halo game coming out that seeks to master that system yet again, people have been given hope.

Sneak Dog1 votes

So for LoL, you're just suggesting to use the normal mmr as well as the ranked mmr to calculate your rank? But then people would be confused that their normal games where they play casually affect their rank?

It sounds like it doesn't translate to LoL because you can't use KDA/skillshot accuracy and a whole bunch of other nonsense to calculate someones skill. Skillshots don't have to hit to kill an enemy if they lure that enemy into certain death if they dodge it anyway. KDA doesn't matter much for winning, proxy singed can tell you why from when he used to work. The only stat that is relevant is whether you won or lost that game.

Knalxz1 votes

I'm not suggesting anything, i'm just saying that it was a perfect system in Halo and other games should try to implement it in.

To sum up what the whole deal about the system is.

Every game shows your skill. From when you're playing with your friends casually to going ham on ranked. The system Bungie designed made it so if someone had played Draft pick for 4 thousand games and was in Silver, after awhile their skills would of naturally improved from playing the champions they had for such a long time. If they did actually start becoming more skillful they would rank up without having to play a single ranked game but to get into Silver. The Rank wouldn't be significant it would move them up the bar slightly, turning a Silver 3 to a 2.

Normal ranked was how it is in LoL just without the promo series and LP.

PA would be sort of your promos. If you were actually good enough to hang with the people that your social rank has set you up with.

The three together allowed for skillful display, casual enjoyment and making sure no one got lucky in getting carried.

No Crumbs2 votes

It's not straight Elo, pretty much everyone in Gold, Silver, and Bronze are in roughly the same elo now. I'm a silver doing my promo's against golds, and diamonds with bronzies on my team. So if I win all ten games I'll go from s3 to s5....But it's impossible for a silver to win ten games against gold players, so I'm bronze 5 when I finish these last two games.

Taarki1 votes

I had a person on my team who went 9-1 in their placement matches and last year they were silver two. They got placed in bronze 4. How the hell does that happen riot?

NoFunWithNunu1 votes

{quoted}

It's not straight Elo, pretty much everyone in Gold, Silver, and Bronze are in roughly the same elo now. I'm a silver doing my promo's against golds, and diamonds with bronzies on my team. So if I win all ten games I'll go from s3 to s5....But it's impossible for a silver to win ten games against gold players, so I'm bronze 5 when I finish these last two games.

first the so called system "tests" you again gold players because you know, the higher you get in silver, the less bronze you have to see and more gold, or do you think you are going to face bronze right in plat? nope you have to keep fighting higher targets

2nd, you cant duo ranked with a bronze if you are diamond, the ony way to do that is something so nearby impossible, that seems a fairy tale, it should be like you, diamond one, with the lowest mmr possible for a diamond (a match or 2 to be demoted) duoing with a platinum in the same situation than you and so on its likely impossble you gonna face a bronze unless you play at 3 am and the system gets tired of searching a proper team for you

Cornerstone13 votes

A dedicated troll would stay at the top of their division/tier, maintaining 80+ LP for "normal-non-troll" playing, making sure they hit their promotions often, then troll. Not all trolls are unskilled at LOL.

Knalxz1 votes

Yeah but if they are losing because they are trolling then that shouldn't be rising up. Not to mention if they go ham to get into promos they've helped more then they've damned so...there's that.

Grouchy Poro1 votes

True but the initial issue brought up is still there. I think this idea could be expanded on and maybe only queue people with mostly promo players plus some people close to their promos.

Knalxz1 votes

Eh, I still feel like that's getting to close to unleashing the Floodgates.

The way you phrased that reminded me of Halo 3's ranked system. (dear lord was it perfect) but one thing that always put a bit of fear into my eyes was when I got to a high enough level that I needed to play with people who were far skilled then me or lessers in order to get into a game of Lone Wolves.

The way you described what you said just reminded me of that nothing really else.

Cornerstone12 votes

Nice concept, but It wouldn't stop the trolls. It might make them worse because they KNOW their trolling would have MORE impact. These "evil" people thrive on making other people miserable, and need a more generic solution.

The queue time for matchmaking would be way too long.

Knalxz4 votes

Well maybe but if you put what you and MadManApocalypse said about trolls not getting into the promos then this is the best way to ensure your promos are troll free.

aka this is the way for this to be done.

Sightless662 votes

The thing is, trolls do get into promo games. Most trolls aren't trolls 100% of the time, and they aren't just terrible players (I'd put money on Platinum having a higher percentage of trolls than any other league, Bronze included). They're going to get into promo games, and they can still get pissed off and troll there too.

You also have to consider that if you create a queue just for people in their promos, there will be people who just play to get into a promo game, then get into that queue and throw. If you gather up everyone who really doesn't want to be trolled in one area, it just makes them easier to target.

The question is, is this actually worth creating a separate queue and increasing queue times for something that may not produce any benefit? I don't think so.

Also, for promo games, you aren't fixing anything. If you match promo players up with other promo players, then they just get matched up with any random guy who decided to play ranked for the first time that season. They might get matched with me, and I don't play seriously in ranked at all because they're so much easier than normals. If the goal is to keep players from being matched with players who don't care, promo matching won't accomplish it, and it will have major queue time problems later on. The current system of matching a player in ranked promo game based on their MMR or their normal MMR is probably a better option.

Hyrum Graff2 votes

Relevant.

tl;dr, I play each ranked game individually. For me, my promos are just another ranked game. It really helps me reduce ranked stress.

Grand Eleven2 votes

I wonder how large the promo pool is. If it adds too much queue time it may not be worth it ... but then again in a game this size ...

Knalxz1 votes

The one fear of this is the pool not being large enough.

NomAdrianna2 votes

I totally agree. I have had countless times where I could have been promoted but then this one guy decides "nah, this isn't my game." and will either dc or just not try all together. It's frustrating. I feel like they should implement something that will pair us up with people who have the same goal as us :)

Knalxz1 votes

Exactly, good to see you support this.

Nausicäa 2 votes

Honestly i dont understand why people get so upset about their placement matchs and their rank following them.

  1. If you deserve to be higher elo than you're placed (ie you're good enough) you will eventually get there anyway. Hell you can even skip divisions if you're doing really well

  2. This ranked season is gonna last another 6+ months. Whats your rush? You have plenty of time to get there eventually.

  3. Having a goal is great, it increases your motivation to play and gives you something to do/care about. The journery towards your goal is fun and fulfilling. Reaching that goal is often less fun then the journey.

  4. You might think the next rank silver, gold ect is some magical fairy tale land where theres no bad players, trolls or toxic players but you're wrong. These types of players inhabit all levels of play. So really you're just getting more of the same with slightly better players.

In short, relax enjoy the game and dont get too upset over placements.

Knalxz1 votes

The point of this thread isn't go on about raising throughout the ranks but just asking a question on why something that can easily be implemented isn't in the game.

Skill can't stop someone from going afk or a teammate taking advantage of another saying they will throw the game if the person in their promos doesn't do what they say. While you can be good enough to recover from these it will take much time and you only have a small chance of victory.

I agree that if you rise up to that point and fall you should be able to rise up there again but its different from when your defeat is real to one where you have a traitor. We can both agree that trolls aren't a good thing within the game society or IRL.

Cutting down on their activity is only positive. Atleast I see it that way, others for some reason disagree. They themselves might just be the very trolls that we want gone.

MadManApocalypse1 votes

those trolls would never get to promos, they suck. It should take it in consideration though people 80+ LP for promo ques

God God1 votes

Riot doesn't care about lower ranked people advancing, why they don't have the Tribunal anymore and why they did a soft reset instead of wiping MMRs. Anyone under gold pretty much gets shit on and no one under gold cares about improving.

ComeOnAndSlamJam1 votes

I like throwing in asshole's promo matches. If you didn't want me to stay silent when Fizz goes missing and get dumb people on my team to make bad initiations, and go to Baron at bad times, you shouldn't have been an ass to me in chat. Enjoy repeating your promos dickfish ¯_(ツ)_/¯

O o b l e c k1 votes

Kinda annoying when I'm doing my placements and we get a Teemo being paid to feed :/

Sneak Dog1 votes

Needlessly increases queue times. Probably doesn't reduce the amount of trolls as there would probably be people trying their hardest to reach a promo series, preferably into the next tier, and then troll.

My only suggestion would be to change matchmaking in promo series to not use your mmr but the mmr of the division you're trying to get promoted to. You could be against platinum III players right now trying to get promoted into plat V. Of course, luck will give you at some point 4 wins in 4~6 games*, but it'd just speed up the process and make the promo series a bit more fair. It'd make it less about playing enough games to get your lucky win streak as the matchmaking perpetually tries to give you games with a 50% win chance and more about proving that you are indeed a plat V player.

*(1 win to qualify for a series, then 3 wins before 3 losses)

Knalxz1 votes

Can you explain the thinking behind to that first part because what i read was, because queue times are larger, people will try harder to get into promos and troll when they get out of them.

Sometimes I can't understand things if they are worded weird, can you help me out here?

AxlStream1 votes

I guess promos give you that feeling of getting better and more immediate rewards than just going up this freakin huge ladder.

Valhalla Rising1 votes

yes, but only during the first month of the season and only if the player opts in for it, otherwise the que's might slow way down after the majority of active players complete their placement.

Knalxz1 votes

Its promos and provisionals related. Promos shouldn't ever have a time of decreasing.

Leti the Yeti1 votes

seems logical thats why riot wont do it

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