Is it just me or are normals no longer... fun?

Varalessia·8/30/2015, 4:57:18 PM·119 votes·10,016 views

It seems like gone are the days where you'd queue into a normal game and consistently see funny or out of the box strats, now it feels like every game theres the same twenty or so champions doing the same one or two things. And not only does it take away from the diverse champion pool that this game has, but a lot of those champions feel completely awful to play against. ( , , , every sated jungler etc.) This isn't a "THESE CHAMPS ARE OP NERF EM RITO" more of a... "When did normals, the supposedly casual chill game mode get so irritating and awful?" I honestly dread seeing a Yasuo or Fizz and I'm so sick of seeing the same two adcs with the same support.

That's not even brushing on the community deterioration that seems to have occurred. I can barely queue into 3 games without one having some guy going "GG" every three seconds. It even seems to show in the little things. like how people don't say glhf at the beginning of a game anymore.

104 Comments

Crowe Stalker8/30/2015, 4:59:31 PM45 votes

This video is good for the soul: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxAabW7JfTQ

Nameless Voice8/30/2015, 9:08:43 PM19 votes

The game itself used to be a lot more fun before it was filled with overloaded champions who feel terrible to play against. Riot talks a lot about design and valuing counterplay, and do make some token efforts in that direction, but the biggest offenders are never fixed, and still continue to ruin the game in almost every game.

These days, I consider a game to be good when there's none of these champions in the game - but sadly they are incredibly popular because ... well, of course a champion with no counterplay is going to be popular. You win a lot.

Deep Terror Nami8/30/2015, 5:06:35 PM13 votes

Some people don't do Ranked (bless their hearts) and take Normals as seriously as you would a Ranked match. I think you might find a lot more variety in Team Builder.

LICENSED HOOKER8/30/2015, 8:30:58 PM9 votes

its like ranked has become normals when i first started if you wanted to play AP jax or singed mid you played normals now if you play anything out of meta you either

Will take 60 bajillion hours to get that spot in team builder
Get flamed by your teammates if your not massively snowballing and carrying them -_-

Sassmast3r8/30/2015, 10:41:01 PM7 votes

This I actually agree with. Three normals I played last night, one with Leona, one with Zyra, one with Miss Fortune. Let's talk about the Leona one first.

My Team: Leona (Support, ME :D), Vayne (ADC), Fiora (Top lane), Zed (Mid lane), MasterYi (Jungle).

Enemy Team: XinZhao (Jungle), Azir (Support), Lucian (ADC), Chogath (Mid lane), Gangplank (Top lane).

You know what? Even though we were the team with broken-ass sated devourer Yi, all in all that game was honestly fun. I loved going against the Azir botlane support, congratulated him for it afterwards if I recall correctly. And damn, Lucian ADC? You know that guy no one ever uses? He whooped me early game! But I still had fun, because it wasn't the norm! But the actual game as a whole? I felt so bad for their team! Literally, all of them were building non-OP items (Xin went warrior!!!). They used balanced, fair champions to fight against and I actually wish that I could have convinced my entire team to surrender and honor them just for actually having the confidence to do that and not just dishing out the BS that is the group of popular champions as of late. Bot lane was fun, but the fact that we had meta champions on our team was quite disappointing if you ask me, but whatever, I'll deal with it.

Second game I played as Miss Fortune:

My Team: MissFortune (Me, ADC), LeeSin (Jungle), Heimerdinger (Mid lane), Diana (Top lane), Thresh (Support)

Enemy Team: Draven (ADC), Thresh (Support), Udyr (Jungle), Zed (Mid lane), Yasuo (Top lane).

Damn, this is one of those games that I'm hoping Riot would finally say "Miss Fortune really needs a legitimate rework." Being immobile as I am (That is, no dashes or flashes), I got DESTROYED!!!!!!!!!! Not only bot lane against the automatic Thresh enemy support (I wish I honestly didn't have Thresh supporting me) literally being able to stand IN FRONT of my minion wave and FORCING me to stand back and hide because there's nothing I can do in fear of being grabbed and automatically killed by his BS of CC. And the best part is? My Thresh sat under turret the entire game, and waited for them to engage! Did we win lane? Actually, yeah, he got one really sick grab and gave me a double kill, and then I just snowballed. But late game... may I just say how unfun that was? I guess it was a taste of my own medicine for using someone close to meta last game (Leona), but seriously, I wish we had just surrendered the second it hit twenty regardless of the possibility of winning, because I legitimately wasn't having fun anymore. It's not enjoyable to get elated by Zed, and Yasuo at the same time. It's not enjoyable to know that you are one of few ADC's that cannot make it out of those sort of... hard engages to say the least. It wasn't enjoyable. Damnit I want to use Miss Fortune and prove to the world her strength, but the problem is that, what she has in actual damage is lost in her ability to escape ANYTHING. It's so frustrating I could scream! And don't even get me started on how broken Udyr and every other sated devourer jungler is. Look, I get it; in LCS, it isn't broken! You know why? Because in the LCS, they are all five, on a call, with their coach right? They communicate verbally! They can convince each other "Hey, Udyr is going to BS late game, so what we need to do is choose one lane and push hard before he can get his sated!" "Wow smart idea guys, let's do it!" Things like that. But the issue is that the best counter to this sort of BS (if you ask me) is good communication, and typing in chat isn't even close to what can be accomplished through skyping. Damn I wish they had a voice application in this game... would use it to speak to everyone regardless of how much of a nervous wreck I am tbh. We need this sort of communication to deal with these champs, otherwise we simply don't stand a chance. Do I think Sated Devourer is OP? No, honestly I don't, because it has counterplea. But it's best counterplay is legitimately IMPOSSIBLE to pull off without being in a high enough rank that you actually all know each other, are on a team, and Skype each other whilst playing to strategize. You can't do that in game. Too many stubborn people want to do what THEY want. Too many people don't even use chat, and just mute everyone prior to the beginning of the game (And to those that do it, kudos to you! You're choosing not to deal with absolute bullcrap from your team members, nice job!). Too many people sometimes don't even speak english (no joke, I legitimately have matched up with people who speak very little English and I find it astonishing). Sorry everyone who chooses to read this; that was quite a rant. Anyways, what I was trying to basically say was that, with the most recent inventions enabling so many champions to outperform the others, I can't use my queen Miss Fortune anymore and expect a victory. I simply cannot. She does not stack up against the others. I honestly am totally fine with nothing being done to her ultimate; it's really good, it's just people don't like to actually strategize and think about when best to use it, so when people get interrupted with it, or when people get killed during its usage, they instantly complain about it on the boards instead of thinking "Wow, where could I better place my ultimate so as to inflict the most damage without being killed? Oh, maybe when the enemies abilities are on CD? Yeah, I'll try that next time!" "Wow, I just killed three people with my ultimate! It actually works!" ANYWAYS, I forgot to mention something. This was the same game where my poor Heimerdinger gets flamed by my Diana and Thresh for "feeding Zed". Are you fucking kidding me? They literally told him to uninstall and quit forever, and reported him post game, for feeding Zed. He was trying to explain himself and nobody would listen to him. In all seriousness, I EXPECTED him to lose. How do you even win against such BS? But they still chose to flame. I was honestly half tempted to 1v1 both of them as Zed and force them to use Heimer just to make my point, but I decided against it. I decided to friend this Heimerdinger and apologize profusely for my teammates ignorance, and we played the next game together. But honestly, so help me if I have to see this sort of atrocious behavior towards people who use non meta champions and lose against meta ones...

Third game I played as Zyra:

My team: Zyra (Me, Support), Draven (ADC, was actually the ADC from last game that I chose to be friends with because he was the only balanced, fair, fun champion on that team to go against and to use, I thanked him post game and offered to support him next game), Syndra (Mid lane), Vayne (Top lane), Shen (Jungle, this was the Heimerdinger that got flamed the previous game for losing to Zed, I apologized profusely for my own teammates poor behavior towards him when he could literally do nothing considering how immobile he was).

Enemy team: Diana (Top lane, same Diana I was with before that flamed the poor Heimerdinger), Vayne (ADC, who else but her? :P), Blitzcrank (Support, because "Synergy"), Azir (Mid lane), Udyr (Jungle, also went sated ;)))))))).

Honestly, this was my favorite game of the night. It was so enjoyable, and no, I'm not talking about laning phase. I'm talking about the fact that none of my teammates gave up, when we gave Vayne two kills bottom lane. How, we continued to fight for victory even with what we were up against. And you know what? We won! We contested Baron and we ended up demolishing them near Baron pit with my Vayne and I being the only sacrifices! I was even using an off meta support omg I was so cheery. We were even dealing with Meta buillshit!!!! But then unfortunately post game chat the enemy Vayne has the audacity to say "GG easy" because who else but Vayne? But regardless, what made this game fun was that all of my teammates continued to fight for victory, and we actually made it through all the way to victory, regardless of how frustrating beginning game was.

All in all, those three games were mostly satisfying, aside from the Miss Fortune game. However, they would have been EXCEEDINGLY more fun if meta champions were not used. It's just.. they aren't fun to play against. At all? Was the game all-in-all fun? Yes, all three were for the most part. But they weren't "Wow, I had so much fun that I'm going to go use another off meta champion!", but rather "Wow, I had lots of fun, but you know what seems more fun? Using bullshit! Time to try it out!" I don't like leaving games contemplating if I should start using meta champions because they seem so much more fun. I like leaving games still being able to use off meta champions. I'm genuinely concerned however, that eventually I literally won't be able to use ANY off meta champions and expect a victory, and instead it will turn into a game of "Which team has insert BS champion here?" Oh how I miss the game back in December/January, back when I first started playing and these champions weren't used all that often...

Silents4298/30/2015, 7:33:27 PM5 votes

It's just you.

EkkoFroffles8/30/2015, 7:20:00 PM5 votes

I've been playing normals exclusively for months, and I'd honestly say I see just as much outside-the-box stuff as I do people spamming Vayne and all the other FOTM champions. It seems like every other match there's something that's either completely random, like Riven support, or something that you don't see too often, like Teemo support. Would you believe, in the 15 matches I've played with Janna, I've seen a total of 3 Vaynes, two on the enemy team, and one on my team? Maybe it's just low ELO teambuilder, but I don't know that I've ever seen more overall diversity than I've seen now.

That being said, I play nothing but support and tend to dodge groups with Riven, Vayne, and other champs that tend to suck on your team, but dominate on the enemy team.

KarKzz8/30/2015, 8:23:24 PM4 votes

Why do we get flamed went we want to have fun ? I got heavily flamed for played a warwick + malzahar bot lane !

T RexHasTinyArms8/30/2015, 8:38:15 PM3 votes

That's sort of the biggest issue with current reform systems. Normals were traditionally the escape from ranked stress and raging, but with rank restricted players needing to clear x number of normal games normals have more people playing serious bc they want to be playing ranked instead, and they are the ones most prone to get upset when people don't play serious. The combo takes a lot of the chill out of normals and can make the things people used to look for in them impossible to find.

P0IS0N IVY8/30/2015, 7:01:49 PM3 votes

Normal is sometimes fun. Ranked isn't fun at all.

Jarrito2328/31/2015, 2:25:40 AM3 votes

People play this game to have fun?

Madara8968/30/2015, 7:59:27 PM2 votes

It seems they forgot about the good ol' champions. Why I never see an Irelia? I just discovered her 2 weeks ago and I can't stop playing her. I can almost never see a nasus, sion, poppy (that's good, I hate her), Aatrox, Renekton, Olaf where are those champions? all I can see these days is garen, fiora and darius bullshit. Yasuo has a ridiculously high pick rate in normals I can't remember the last time I saw A lissandra, Ziggs, Heimer, Akali, karthus, anivia, twisted fate(ok, I saw some tfs but rarely), Xerath, Malzahar, Brand. Why no one plays them? Always yasuo, kata, zed, ahri, fizz, ekko.

Divewing8/31/2015, 12:49:06 PM2 votes

I feel it's the attitude, not the picks. I pick Yasuo when i feel like i want to "let loose", since he has low cooldowns, high mobility, and a sick theme, so it really is nice to just jump in a game and somewhat mindlessly spam QE all day. Especially after playing Azir, whos so mentally taxing it gets tiring really quick.

For me, I really don't want to have to watch my minimap, as lazy and foolish as that sounds. But I just want to play a simple game, If I have to worry about the jungler and support double-flank it means buying/placing more wards than I would like, I'm doing this in ranked, do i have to do it here too :( I can't really describe it, but you can always tell when someone is tryharding.

UncIe Zed8/31/2015, 10:37:30 AM2 votes

the problem is that why would you play twitch when u can play vayne ? why would you play karthus when u can play azir/viktor/tf ? so much champions are overnerfed and some others are overpowered .

   To be honest, I feel like I see the exact same compostion in LCS, and that's very sad,because I would like to see Febiven play zed mid or even talon, wich are playmakers champions and beautiful to watch . Nah we get full farm azir/viktor/tf, 0 lane kill pressure wich was the enitre think of the season 4 world ( pawn triple solo kill faker, it was the good days ) .

I hope we can see more champion diversity in next worlds, but that's Riot's job :D

D4N13L8/30/2015, 6:31:15 PM2 votes

I totally agree. I used to go into normals and see those off meta picks and everything and have a fun environment and a lot of banter over all chat... now it's all meta picks and toxicity if you do something wrong. C'mon people, don't take normals so seriously.

PL558/30/2015, 6:53:07 PM2 votes

I think I've muted more people in normal games than in ranked.

Ztoka8/31/2015, 3:36:23 PM1 votes

I have also noticed normals are way more serious than they used to be. Not as bad as ranked but close. Ranked gives a more even playing field though. So many try hards lately in normals. Tons of Diamonds and Plats trying to flex their e peens and show how "good" they are through normals..

ahferroin78/31/2015, 4:30:16 PM1 votes

I wholeheartedly agree. I never played a lot of normals, now I only do it in groups of three or more when I know everyone in the group IRL.

chide da jungler8/31/2015, 10:50:36 PM1 votes

You don't like having your win depend on rock-paper-scissors matchmaking in the lane?

TNHA Baritone8/31/2015, 11:04:07 PM1 votes

Jinx can be annoying but she isn't THAT bad. I wholeheartedly agree on the Yasuo Fizz Thresh and every other sated jungler. Lmfao Idk when the last time I saw a Runeglaive was.

Streeton9/1/2015, 12:04:18 AM1 votes

Im sorry that the community wants to play champions that are good :(((

DIRU9/1/2015, 10:24:54 AM1 votes

pray normans is no fun because you cant even pray mechonically intensivify chempinos such as catlin and pray normans always have troll permades which ruin game all time such as faker per say, i deserve challenjoir, gg

p6TXQXYfJB8/31/2015, 6:18:21 AM1 votes

Well first of all it is quite very much based on what you've said, which is that normals are just a place to play OP CHAMPS NOT BANNABLE because its not ranked or draft. So you see op champs being played. Secondly I see people playing "out of the meta" or non-normal picks just to troll not actually trying new things. There are always new things to try but those people get flamed whereas when people autolock same lanes, they dont quit, they just think "well its only normals, gg" when its not even gg...

Ralanr8/31/2015, 6:27:04 AM1 votes

I don't see why we can't try and be civil to our teammates in game. I'm still new to pvp in normals. When I mess up I apologize. When I know my opponent I ask for advice.

I guess there are moments where we start hating the people we team up with. I've had a few myself. But everyone makes mistakes.

CoffeeDave8/31/2015, 6:34:58 AM1 votes

I'm having a blast with Dominion. I should play that more often.

TheSingularity8/31/2015, 6:35:14 AM1 votes

I used to love holding on to a hairs breadth trying to make epic comebacks with my friend like 2 years ago. Now.... that happens like once a month at best. With the current meta it's just a painful, boring drag with a very small champ pool and a low chance of enjoyable comebacks.

Yes, people got really sick of the assassin meta, really quickly but I liked the fact that even though assassins reigned supreme, EVERY FREAKING CHAMP WAS VIABLE. I could play naut, zyra jungle, ad TF mid, the list goes on and even with 2 assassins on the enemy team(mby kha and zed), someone could usually peel for you.

Now, we have people as tanky as pre-nerf mundo with the damage of pre-nerf ekko. Like darius, garen, gnar, gragas, irelia, skarner, diana, cho, renekton and j4 just to name a few offenders, all of these champs need merely one core dmg/tank item, whether it be hydra, tri force, cleaver, or HP item. Upon full build with their single core item+the rest, makes them into apparent 4K hp hyper dmg AD/AP carriers. These hyper carry damage tanks are killing the game. A tank should be a freaking tank, and a carry should be a bloody carry. Not both. EG: diana shouldn't be able to build a rylais or abyssal and somehow be tanky enough to survive any burst most mid laners could dish out. Or gragas being able to build zero dmg items and somehow burst a carry seemingly as effectively as a full ad zed.

Yordle Xayah8/31/2015, 6:55:35 AM1 votes

{quoted}

how people don't say glhf at the beginning of a game anymore.

Oh they do, then proceed to tell you go die in a fire in All Chat if you kill them.

Mazohist8/31/2015, 7:01:21 AM1 votes

cause vayne thresh and yasuo require constant practice for a person to be good with, i will go with yas to normals every now and then to brush up

hgjkdlsaf jeldvb8/31/2015, 7:07:14 AM1 votes

It's been meta long as I remember. Team builder is just assassins mid tho.

FlashnFuse8/31/2015, 7:25:11 AM1 votes

This is why I like to play champions nobody else plays. Like Quinn. Nobody plays Quinn. Nobody expects a Quinn to do well and yet suddenly everyone and their mother is an expert at balance and say "Quinn needs to be nerfed" because they tried to fight me through a blind or tried to jump on me when i had vault. It's the same reason I've loved playing Diana through seasons 3 and 4. I would get reported and flamed in ranked games for picking Diana, but people would shut up if I won their games for them. Same thing with AP eve with DFG, fairly powerful but people flamed me for doing anything other than AD or Tank eve.

Yes there are champions that are stronger than others but if you really want to solve the champion diversity problem, you'll have to reach outside of your comfort zone and play champions that reddit tells you are bad. Have fun playing champions you love and suddenly the game becomes much more enjoyable.

Be the change you want to see.

Fiveofswords8/31/2015, 7:29:19 AM1 votes

i think some people consider those champs op and i think they are just wrong. I have fun proving them wrong.

Knalxz8/31/2015, 7:48:57 AM1 votes

Well OP I'm unranked and what you've said you don't see is what I see all the time. I actually can't remember the last game I had where some one didn't say GL HF. I also continually change it up with the champions i play and I see a wide variety of different ones being played. Not to long ago I saw a melee bot and before that an AP bot.

If you're looking for a more chilled environment, just don't get a rank. That alone says you're wanting to compete with the elites or you're in it for the competition. My first year of league was spent in ranked and I saw alot of the shit this community has. This year i've spent all of it unranked and I'd think it was playing a different game.

Also you'll find alot less tryhards on 3v3, Dominion, ARAM, Customs and the PBE (depends on what's been updated).

I can have fun with league but the one thing that drawing me from the game is how Riot is just makes a random change to force in the meta. I haven't been around in league for a long time but what's wrong with the idea of everyone being a viable pick? Really, does it take over a year to rework Poppy or is riot just trying to spread around their content so they don't have any droughts? It's a good business tactic and I understand it but that doesn't mean it's fun because we still have to deal with the broken messes they haven't changed.

Hell it's pretty much confirmed that Riot won't nerf Fiora until Riot release the new Project Skins. Could be a reason we haven't seen a nerf to devour either considering Yi is getting a Legendary skin.

Mute8/31/2015, 9:38:02 AM1 votes

I just wish people didn't take normals so seriously. Back when I started at the beginning of S2, I remember how I used to see a wide variety of champions and it was almost rare to see the same champion three times in a row. People tried wacky builds, /allchat seemed to have more friendly banter instead of actual insults or plain silence. I do acknowledge there was a fair amount toxicity back then too, though. I'm one of the people who don't bother with ranked- I got Silver in S3 when I did my placements just to see where I'd end up. I have too many awful memories from Halo 3 and how my experience was ruined when I felt a massive need to always win. And even if I got to rank 50 in Lone Wolves playlist, no fun was had, every death was stressful and every loss hit my mood harder than I'd like to admit. I've decided to strictly stay out of ranked gametypes in every game because of it. But when normals start feeling like ranked matches... what's the point? Why would I want to play? :l

vivjan308/31/2015, 10:36:34 AM1 votes

Ok, i'm a just a lvl 16 and the environment your talking about does not fit mine. In my environment for normals, you see wacky builds, wacky supports (Tryndamere bot, yorick mid, etc.). It is very relaxed and I rarely get flamed. If I feed, I just joke about it and nobody flames me.

Lady Hammerlock8/31/2015, 10:43:36 AM1 votes

before reading this i wanted to play a champ in the meta and buy 1 but i guess playing champs less picked like kassadin and leblanc OR Karma would seem a lot more fun especially since the chance of a mirror match up is reduced it made me think maybe i should get sender maybe maokai maybe that gay ass crystal guy maybe poppy maybe bard maybe break the meta maybe yorick maybe urgot

this inspired me a bit so thanks

Yùsùkè8/31/2015, 10:45:03 AM1 votes

Normals can't be fun once you hit level 30, they are braindead and a waste of time. You can't have fun playing literally nothing.

ExcitableOyster8/31/2015, 12:56:29 PM1 votes

I started playing ranked, not because I wanted to rank up, but because I got tired of getting in queue with 3/4 man groups who would troll. 3 man is bad, but 4 man is worse and there's nothing you can do. You can't surrender. You can't report them (because they'll all report you)...

Like, to be honest, my friends all quit playing League and play Smite. I hate Smite. But one thing it has going for it is its main 5v5 mode doesn't allow 4 man groups. It only allows those in arams or that big arena thing. Stops a lot of trolling.

Edit: This is of course, for blind pick that I'm talking about