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Prisoner's Island already exists.

PsykeMaNewts·1/21/2017, 10:36:58 PM·3 votes·1,763 views
Ask Riot: Banished to Prisoner's Island - Nexus - League of Legends

So I just read the Riot point of view about Prisoner's Island and I have to say it is pretty interesting to see their point of view on this. I had not considered the idea of reforming people to be MY responsibility until I read this article. I disagree with it completely. Unfortunately, Prisoner's Island already exists. It's called Bronze. Read my story and I will almost guarantee anyone in Bronze can say the same...

I started playing League of Legends in Season 5. I was ranked and placed in Silver that season. I'd just learned the game, and I had the foolish and naive notion that the player base in Ranked would be more focused, friendly and supportive than those in Normal games, so I was eager to played Ranked and see how I did. I ended up getting grouped with trolls and griefers and sadly, as an adult, I couldn't handle people being brats. I didn't get how horrible some people could be, intentionally throwing games cause they didn't get their role or champion. It didn't make sense to me. I tried grouping with someone I thought was nice, but turned out to be a troll throwing games. Before I knew it, I fell to Bronze and then I started succumbing to bad behavior as well. I was surrounded by toxic players acting horrible to each other and soon I found myself acting just as horrible.

At the start of Season Six, I thought I had a new chance. I had gotten better at playing the game, and I won 8 out of my 10 promos, but I was STILL placed into Bronze. The previous season I'd been silver with 6 out of 10 games won. This was incredible to me! How could I get so much better, to the point where half the time I'm carrying a team and I win 80% of my placement games, and I start off the season in a worse position? It didn't make sense. I quit for awhile, came back, tried a few things different, and I got to Bronze 2 at one point. Season ends, I keep practicing, but I never climb out of Bronze.

With Season Seven, I've already played over 370 games, and I'm still Bronze. I fluctuate between B5 and B4, but that's pretty much it. I have a 50% win rate, not because I suck half the time, but because half the time at least half of my team sucks and I can't carry them all. I'm positive, I'm supportive, I try to give good advice and I share what I know with people, but it just isn't good enough. I go on streaks. I win 5 games, I lose 5 games, but that's not the worst part... Recently I won 20 games in a row (with maybe a loss or two mixed in). When I started my streak, I was B5 with 0 LP, coming off a loss streak. I made it almost to B3. I was in my promos for B3, for crying out loud! Then the loss streak came. But... it was only 5 losses and I was back to Bronze 5. I lost my series, down to 75 LP in Bronze 4. I lose another game, -26 LP. 2 more losses I'm at 0 LP in B4. One more loss, I'm down to Bronze 5. Again.

When I started playing this game, in Season 5, I DESERVED to be put in Bronze. I was bad. I succumbed to the negative toxic players. I trolled with the worst of them because I was surrounded by them. Season Six I deserved a second chance, but I didn't get one. I was stuck right back in with the bad. But I'd learned my lesson. I pushed through and became a better player because of it. Now, in Season Seven, I could roll with Gold players and they'd never know I was in Bronze just by playing with me. My skills are sharp, I know my stuff, and I'm a team player. But because of the system, I'm stuck in Bronze for life.

370 RANKED GAMES IN SEASON SEVEN. Three Hundred and Seventy. I'm surrounded by toxic players every game. I'm on Prisoner's Island already and I DON'T deserve to be here. Half the games I lose are to trolls, AFKs, or people who are just so bad and oblivious, I can't carry them. It shouldn't be my job to teach and reform every team I get on, but apparently it is. And that's not fair. When I play 25 games and win 20 of them, I shouldn't go right back to where I started. But I do. And I'm not alone.

If RIOT doesn't want a Prisoner's Island, they shouldn't have started everyone as Bronze this season. There should be a place for people to FALL TO, not just a place for people to CRAWL OUT OF. There needs to be a place where bad players can go to get reformed, but they shouldn't be stuck there forever. One win in B4 I get maybe 12-16 Lp, and one loss I lose 26? It should be the other way around, frankly. If someone is really bad, they'll be harder to carry, and they'll win less and lose more and they'll be where they belong. But if someone is good, and they just can't always carry, they'll win more and lose less and they'll be able to climb, eventually facing players with equal or greater skill, and if they can't get past that, they'll stop climbing. But right now, the way it is, Prisoner's Island exists and its called Bronze because more than half the people there don't care anymore because they have no where left to fall.

5 Comments

The Magyk1/21/2017, 10:48:13 PM1 votes

advice from someone that hard to crawl out of bronze last season:

pick a handful of OP champions to climb with, 1 or 2 for each role. master them, perfect them, abuse their power. in bronze you HAVE to solo carry your team most of the time. you have to be good enough to 1v5 and at the very least kill a couple and get out alive. it gets easier once you get to low to mid silver but its never great.

you seem to do well on katarina, spam her more, if shes banned play champions with a similar play style (high burst, in and out assassin) example; akali

PsykeMaNewts1/22/2017, 12:46:00 AM1 votes

ADDENDUM:

There's a lot more proof that Bronze is Prisoner's Island. Consider these two points:

  1. Autofill You take a bunch of kids and people who aren't very good at the game and let them play Ranked. Every kid deserves a chance to play any sport, right? Even eSports. But, since there is basically nowhere to go below Bronze, and Riot is making everyone start in Bronze this season, all of the worst of the worst players are in Bronze (aka Prisoner's Island). Bronze, being the worst of the worst, HAS THE BIGGEST PLAYER BASE, yet Riot insisted on making Autofill a universal thing across all the League tiers. So, while it might be needed for Gold and above, all it does for Bronze players is force them to play roles they're not good at.

Take a look at this perfect storm example: Player A mains Mid. They're autofilled into Support and they aren't the best support. Player B is assigned Mid, but they're horrible and they don't really know how to play League. Player B has 12 games, 11 losses, and a KDA in the negatives. So while Player C, the person assigned Bot, rage quits because Player A is being forced to learn how to work with Player C, everyone else on the team is flaming Player A and Player B. A bad game is had by all.

The ultimate result? Another day on Prisoner Island for all involved.

  1. Leaver Penalties and Dodging How do you combat Autofill? You can't when you're in Bronze. Even if YOU can play EVERY ROLE well, chances are the other players can't. Once again, RIOT posted they don't feel a Prisoner Island where players have to reform each other works, but even when you offer to take roles people don't want and try to stay positive, you still have people on Bronze playing Akali support or Jinx top or Soraka jungle because they're tilted and griefing. You get trolls rolling into games and banning your picks or playing the champion you selected and threatening to feed ALL THE TIME. So what choice do you have but to say you don't want to play with those people and dodge?

I'm currently, as I'm writing this, waiting out a 30 minute dodge penalty because last night I dodged a Yasuo Support, Ziggs Bot, Lux Jungle and some guy who banned Katarina because I didn't want to trade mid to him, and then just now I was autofilled into Support and everyone on the team was being negative right in the lobby. I didn't feel like losing, again, from a role I can't carry from. So 30 minute penalty because I'm on Prisoner Island. If I was in Silver or anywhere else I knew the people I'm playing with could be trusted, I wouldn't need to dodge. If the people I was playing with had anywhere else to fall to, I'd know they'd always try their best. But... I'm on Prisoner Island and in Bronze, there's no where to fall to so people don't care. But still, I am penalized. My losses hurt more than my wins heal. So sometimes we have no choice but to take a penalty, which are ridiculously long.

370 games. After today, it'll be 380-390 games played. Even with a 50% win rate, statistically with the amount of games I've played, I should have lucked into Silver by now. One of my streaks should have carried me out of Bronze by now. But... since Riot doesn't want to make a low priority queue for bad players, everyone in Bronze is stuck in Prisoner Island. They just think the flowery curtains of their denial hides the bars everyone else is banging their head against.