Why do 4v5 games punish so hard for losing?

TopGarenteed·11/30/2014, 1:54:50 PM·4 votes·2,289 views

I have had multiple games now where a player fails to connect or leaves in the middle of the game. In the current season it is almost impossible to win these games with the amount of importance placed on dragons and other jungle Objectives. How does it make sense to lose 22-25 LP in these games and then carry games and only gain 12? Even in games where the 4v5 is won still only 12 LP is earned so it this metric seems broke as some very derogative swear words. It is far more common for me to get imbalanced games (for either team) than it is to get straight up 5v5 games. Do other people experience this same swing or is it just me?

15 Comments

Drogmyre11/30/2014, 3:18:00 PM3 votes

I still don't understand why Riot doesn't implement an Abandon system similar to Dota 2.

You leave the game or DC/AFK, you're penalized for it, and IIRC so is your duo partner if you have one. The rest of your team does not suffer penalties, and is even permitted to leave the game themselves, basically getting a 'loss forgiven'.

In addition, players who abandon have their items sold and current gold and any gold they'll passively earn distributed to their remaining teammates equally: If the carry with 10k gold abandons (power outage or whatever) his 4 teammates get 2.5k each, plus they split his gp/10 as well: Giving an item advantage to mitigate the loss of a player.

I've literally seen people 2v5 (i've done it myself) because of this system: Games with DCs/AFKs/Abandons are irritating but absolutely winnable. And even better, if you REALLY don't want to stay in a 4v5, you can leave without being punished.

Obviously if this system was implemented in League a few things would have to happen:

Any party members of an Abandoning player are also given an LP/MMR penalty. They aren't marked as leavers/afks, but still lose LP/MMR in order to prevent abuse in Solo/Duo queue and Ranked Teams.
Abandons would need more than the 5 minutes alloted in Dota, as League does not have a pause system in place.
Ranked Games where the enemy team chooses to continue playing and/or an ally player(s) chooses to continue playing does not invalidate either team's LP/MMR gain (however it would be reduced significantly, depending on the time a player abandons.) if they finish the game.
Games where a player chooses to abandon (after the game is 'safe to leave') does not prevent them from joining another game while the game they left is still ongoing.

#s 2 and 4 will be the hardest to implement, IMO. #2 because the 'safe to leave' mechanic will be difficult to implement in and of itself, and #4 because I'm about 90% sure the 'you can't join a game while assigned to a game' thing is basically hardwired into the game's matchmaking.

ƒæµ11/30/2014, 2:06:25 PM1 votes

I had a similar situation on one of my smurfs due to decay. Regardless of the 4v5 or afk situation because it's random and nothing u can do about it no reason to even make a thread. The reason you are gaining 12-15 then losing 22-25 is because your current league (ex. gold 3) is not currently accurate to the MMR of your account. So whatever league you are currently in.. the system considers too high based on your MMR stats. This is a huge pain and takes quite a while to fix. You will need to win a lot A LOT more games than you lose in order to fix it and keep your league.. or else the system works it's toll and will eventually lose you so much LP you will fall to the league that your MMR is at. You should check in your games at lolnexus to see the average league of players you are matched with. On my plat smurf I hadn't played for over 6 months and decayed to plat 5. Even after the league decay I was losing 22+ LP each loss and only earning a max of 14 on win, and being qued with people in mid gold. Even with a positive win rate I eventually fell to gold on that account. What will happen to you is that when the season starts and you need to play your 10 placement games you will get placed in a lower elo. Even if you do well it is a soft reset which means it will be based of MMR not the league you are currently in. On the bad side you will pretty much be in a lower league at the start of the season even will a good showing in your placements, on the bright side, your LP scores will be accurate again and it will be easier to climb. Sorry my friend. :(

ƒæµ11/30/2014, 2:17:04 PM1 votes

I feel you. My dou partner had PC issues for over 3 months and couldn't play ranked. Now his MMR is fucked doing the same this we talked about. He is really unmotivated and hardly wants to play now seeing as even with a 65%+ win rate together he is consistently dropping LP :/

Sirsir11/30/2014, 2:02:09 PM1 votes

Something something, systems like that could be abused, blah blah.

Although that falls short from the 'failed to connect' games...

AetherKingdom11/30/2014, 5:02:34 PM1 votes

That's your mmr. ~~LP gained/lost is completely decided by your current rank and mmr~~ Actually no, I was on a roll to diamond, got from gold 1 to plat 3 in 4 days, then riot said haha fuck you and made me gain 13 for a win and lose 22 for a loss. WHILE I was on a massive win streak, and my overall win rate hasn't been negative since the first week of season four. fuck you riot.

BlackRaven12/1/2014, 12:43:28 AM1 votes

because its our complete fault that we lost when we had a disadvantage. riot promotes you losing when u have a disadvantage. another example would be how they treat west coast and east coast players. just plain disgusting and nasty on their end.

LongFur Fox11/30/2014, 2:33:14 PM1 votes

This is just your hidden mmr. You lose the same amount of lp for a loss independent of the number of people in it. If you really are losing 25 lp every loss and only gain 12 lp every win then your hidden mmr is much lower than your current ranking. If you can keep winning more than you lose eventually you will only lose 12 lp for loses and gain 25+ lp for wins (I personally experienced a 49 lp gain once if i remember correctly so it is possible).