Who is your customer?

Plasma Servant·May 24, 2016·1 votes·453 views

Dear Riot:

Who is your customer? Your engineers and designers? Or is it us ... the players?

If it is your engineers and designers, you are doing great by them. If it is us, the players, then you need to satisfy all of us. More modes, more ways to play them. Is there any reason you can't do blind pick on H.A.? Noooo ... there isn't. So why don't you? Why not have all random in TT and Rift?

It isn't about you Riot ... or even about any segment of your players. It is about all of your players (i.e., customers).

What is really wild is that even if a large group of customers might not like a particular mode, that doesn't mean that another large group wouldn't like it. if 70% of the customer base wouldn't like it, but 30% would, do you really want to make them less likely to care about league or would you want them to love you forever for making their pet mode?

8 Comments

PheonixwishMay 24, 20162 votes

It is very, very difficult to please everyone considering LoL has a finite amount of players and not a lot of room for new maps. If we had a selection of modes that appealed to everyone perfectly, queue times would be off the charts, champion balance would be near impossible with their limited resources, and all this would lead to a very frustrating experience for everyone.

So, do I want a 1v1 map that I can play easily with a small community of players? Yes. Would this mode ever be balanced, free of tryhards using duelists or tanks, and economically sustainable to Riot? That is simply too much to ask.

Plasma ServantJun 4, 20161 votes

What I'd want is not new maps ... there are plenty of them. But it seems like (as now) when snowdown in running a lot of people play that mode. Why not make blind pick H.A. a regular event (minus the snow king). The champion selection would be the only thing that would change (and I'd be willing to bet they could use the same code they do for nearly every other blind pick).

what is done can be done ... permanently.

PheonixwishJun 5, 20161 votes

My post still holds for maps and modes alike. With the removal of a few key queues after the introduction of Dynamic Queue/draft as well as the removal of Dominion, there may be some possibility space for Riot to handle. But the way they handled Dominion in particular is what makes new permanent modes a fantasy.

You see, it's not the actual map that drains resources-it's already built-but the unique game mechanics and balancing behind it. With a balance team distracted by yet another mode that will be understandably unbalanced and completely unique experience, confusion and miscommunication about balance for our current modes will only go up. Riot is a company full of humans, not multi-tasking legends, and sustaining a mode like ABAM (there is a whole custom game community that you would love if you haven't been part of it already) to a point where it does not die off, is not robbing other queues of too many players, and balanced around all champs would drain time and groups of various teams around Riot, making it virtually impossible at the moment.

Not to seem pessimistic, but I'd rather not ask too much of a company that is seemingly up to their shoulders in work and under constant community pressure.

Plasma ServantJun 7, 20161 votes

I want the balance team distracted as much as possible. They get it wrong all the time. Every time they change something, they make it worse, not better. Sure, an initial champion (oh, did I say they need to STOP introducing new champions?) adjustment, but beyond that they just screw up the game. Season 3 was about the best ... it has been going downhill ever since. I'd rather they NOT balance past what season 3 did.

ModWulf HelhammerMay 24, 20161 votes

What in the world are you even talking about?

The reason why maps don't have queues for different pick modes is because they aren't balance around it. All random on SR or TT would suck, and being able to pick what you wanted for HA completely defeats the purpose of what the map is supposed to be (and no, alternate game mode types don't excuse that).

Plasma ServantJun 7, 20161 votes

balance champions, not maps. nerf the living daylights out of those that in any map can take out other champs quickly. If they were all balanced without thought of the map/mode it would make it easy.

ModWulf HelhammerJun 7, 20161 votes

Except champions play differently on different maps because of different items and different layouts.

For instance, Kindred doesn't get any passive marks in ARAM because there aren't any jungle camps, making them a bit weaker where they otherwise wouldn't be (but not much, as they don't have to balance them separately there's). Another stronger example is healers, who have a specific debuf on HA to reduce their healing, as in a game where you can't back and heal up, the healing those champions can put out is immense and makes the game completely one sided.

Plasma ServantJun 8, 20161 votes

ARAM didn't start on H.A. it started on the rift as a gentlemen's agreement. I know, I played it before H.A. was around. Riot brought H.A. in, and changed it (WRONG MOVE!). Having the "rules" of ARAM enforced was fine, but no champions are balanced WRT H.A. and ARAM.