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Let's balance the influence of AFKers!

DeReiniger·10/6/2015, 12:56:25 PM·5 votes·881 views

Hello everyone!

Here is a quick message from a very frustrated LoL player. After being demoted several times, I couldn't help but thinking that it's not just my lack of skills that turned my games frequently into losses. It has occurred to me that there is an increasing amount of players that leave the game, and I want to suggest a solution.

I understand that "automatically preventing a loss" when someone is AFK at the end of the game is something that can be exploited. But what if: your loss CAN be prevented, but only if the player who went AFK must have been disconnected at least 5-10 minutes before the end of the game? This solves several issues:

Firstly, assuming the player who went AFK is innocent (connectivity problems):

Neither he or his teammates gets the blame for a loss: it not possible anymore to be punished for playing as good as you can, because if you didn't play as good as you can, the enemy team surely could have ended the game in 5-10 minutes after someone has disconnected and you would have rightfully lost LP anyway.
Players won't be frustrated with eachother nor with the game as much as they are now, as there isn't a feeling of injustice anymore.

Secondly, assuming the player went AFK on purpose (to either troll his team or to try taking advantage of the loss prevention)

The teammates who suffer from a player who disconnected still has a chance to redeem themselves: if they can last 5-10 minutes with one champion missing, they rightfully deserved not to lose (as much) LP.
The enemy team also will have a better game, as they'll have to fight stronger resistance in order to finish the game, which takes away the boredom.

I'm not saying that this is a flawless plan, but I would really like to make Riot aware of the fact that there might be a solution to make the game more enjoyable, especially for us fighters in Bronze and Silver. The game should rate you based on how well you played, not based on how (un)lucky you are.

Thank you for your attention.

14 Comments

PiVoRx10/6/2015, 5:24:39 PM3 votes

Riot is too busy banning for "gg easy" to do anything.

Meeks01110/6/2015, 10:15:54 PM2 votes

In DotA AFK players get their gold split among teammates. Do something like that.

PorkNasty10/6/2015, 4:18:50 PM2 votes

It does seem like league has become something to do in the background while people watch a movie or are in the middle of something else. I just wish people who took the game that way didn't play ranked. In a game yesterday my top laner was on the phone for the first 10 mins and my mid yasuo went afk at level 3 for about 5 mins. Neither one gave a crap that we got behind just typed "my bad, on the phone" or "had to take care of something" and played on to the inevitable loss. Both ended up raging at me, the jg, cause it was somehow my fault that I couldn't snowball bot lane or get them caught up. Would be nice to be able to do something about games like this but what can realistically be done? There's nothing you could put in place that people won't find a way to exploit.

RisenDarkKnight10/6/2015, 4:14:07 PM1 votes

There are unfortunately a few problems with this.

Firstly riot cant' really tell if you dc by accident or intentionally (unless you do something stupid like say you're gonna ragequit in chat or make a habit of leaving losing games).

Also, as other have mentioned would you still give the 5 man team full lp if they win? Because if not you are basically wasting their time, especially if the enemy went afk because of how well they were doing. Other people have suggested making the afk player lose all the lp for the other 4 players on his/her team. That might be a good idea, but it does seem a bit rough that you can demoted more than a whole division because of having your internet service provider made a mistake. And again riot can't tell the difference between intentional afkers who don't broadcast it and people who experience bad connection sometimes.

Another option would be halve the lp for games with an afk (so the "winners" don't move up too much for a 5 v 4 and the one player isn't punished as hard for something that coudl have been an accident/not his/her fault), but this is lame if you are playing a 50 min game but someone on the enemy team afks but you don't realize at first so you dont' end the game until 60 mins but the lp gain is halved because a player was afk for 10 mins. That would be really frustrating.

I think the only solution is to more aggresively ban/remove habitual afkers from ranked and improve detection of intentional afkers.

ZenGotto10/6/2015, 1:06:10 PM1 votes

I have had the same idea kinda. I was also thinking they could do something along the lines of "fillers" so to speak. If you had a someone afk for more than 5 minutes then a new player would be dropped in using the same champion (it would say in the queue if you would be dropped in a game). It would then pause the game for 1 minute for that person to choose the abilities the way they want them, and also give the average amount of gold (your teams gold) to that person to buy whatever they wanted. Then the game would continue. But I am sure there is a flaw in this as well.

windwolf77710/6/2015, 10:23:25 PM1 votes

Do it like in dota. Split the gp5 they have with the rest of the team and make the team gain 25% more exp (or 20% I'm not exactly sure)

Syronosin10/6/2015, 2:25:24 PM1 votes

The main flaw is if you have someone on your team dodge a losing game so you receive a "Loss Prevented."

The teammates who suffer from a player who disconnected still has a chance to redeem themselves: if they can last 5-10 minutes with one champion missing, they rightfully deserved not to lose (as much) LP.

5-10 minutes is nothing to "deserve not to lose (as much) LP." I have won and lost games in which we've had a 4v5 disadvantage and a 5v4 advantage. Early enough in the game you can still have a 45 minute game. If it is already at 40 minutes then yes 5-10 minuets I suppose would be a long amount, but it really isn't at all.

The enemy team also will have a better game, as they'll have to fight stronger resistance in order to finish the game, which takes away the boredom.

Most people don't care about this and they aren't bored when they have an advantage. If anything most people want to quit games when it turns into a 4v5 when they are on the side of the 4 remaining.

Leeerzeichen10/6/2015, 3:11:25 PM1 votes

You have 4 randoms in your team, the enemy has 5 randoms in his team. If you are never go afk, the enemy team has always a higher chance to get a afk. So in fact afks will already help you climbing if you are never afk. And not loosing no lp for an game with a afk isn't really a good idea, because the enemy team could get no lp to prevent an lp inflation (everyone would have more lp => lp is less worth => you will stay in you elo). I think it's more frustrating if you get no lp for a good game because the enemy team went afk, than loosing lp for a bad game.