Boards›Gameplay

ELO difference in ranked games.

Something Mousey·9/27/2019, 8:59:54 AM·67 votes·17,539 views

Just played a game where I had a pretty decent lane with another random person, who was support. Despite losing, we decided to queue up together after the game to try again, since our lane went really well.

We couldn't queue together because the 'ELO difference was too high'.

Riot, what the actual shit. If you're allowing players multiple ranks and tier levels apart to be queued in solo/duo randomly, yet not allowing the SAME people to queue up as a duo, then that is a major mistake that needs to be remedied. It's hard evidence that players much lower in ELO are being put in games far above their range. It's unfair on both sides. The high ELO players who now have to carry a much lower rank that may not be used to the pace of the current game will have a harder time. It's just as unfair to the lower ELO player who might stand no chance in the game they've been shoved into.

This isn't always the case, of course. The lower ranked person might be capable of playing well in the higher ELO game, like the experience I had, but it was still not supposed to happen in the first place. All the same, ranked queues are supposed to be balanced, and have specific guidelines to matches, to balance things out and keep it competitive.

There's tons to discuss in between my points, so let me just get it out of the way: Yes, it's normal to have a game where one player (or more) isn't up to par, and yes, it's normal to be that person who's overwhelmed sometimes. I'm not saying that shouldn't ever happen. All I'm confused by is why Riot would put someone in your ranked game that you're LITERALLY not allowed to duo with due to a vast difference of ELO. It makes no sense, and it should be corrected, on one side or the other. Tidy up the solo queue to match the requirements of duo, or vice versa.

I doubt this will be explained, or even given any attention, but I thought the other players should know what a joke ranked is becoming. Convert some peoplepower from improving the visual aspect of the game, (which seems to be your ONLY focus, as of late) and divert it to improving gameplay, please. After playing this game for many years, seeing it decline to the point where it's getting apple-fied is truly disappointing. :C

27 Comments

ExcaliburX9/27/2019, 9:48:29 AM20 votes

I submitted a ticket where a silver flex player was in my plat game. He didnt que up with anyone, he was a loner. To make it worst he was a bronze rank in solo, fed top laner which lost us the game. The response i got to justifying such matchup was that the high ranking within the team is suspose to carry and balance out the lowest elo player.....smh

Saezio9/27/2019, 3:49:32 PM5 votes

If you can't duo with someone you shouldn't be able to meet them ever in games.

PERIOD. What the fuck are riot thinking? Might as well remove all ranks and mmr then and match people randomly. Ranked queue is supposed to be the competitive queue.

General Esdeath 9/27/2019, 9:34:22 PM3 votes

"it's MMR based, not rank!"

The Riot Knights cry out, unaware of how worse it makes their overlords at Riot Games look

5050BS9/27/2019, 9:14:29 AM3 votes

Thats not the issue. The issue was that Riots system put you together in the first place.

Iv seem B4 and Gold 4 in the same game. That is TOTAL shit (and yes the B4 was B4 not anything good)

Raiyza9/27/2019, 5:13:23 PM2 votes

Riot won't do anything. This is one of the reasons I quit the game. The skill discrepancies are just unreal.

Kai Guy9/28/2019, 6:13:03 AM1 votes

Have they placed yet? What's the Rank gap between you guys?

Sciplex9/28/2019, 9:22:00 AM1 votes

It's because of MMR that causes this situation. It fair and unfair at the same time. One is that it allows for the low-rank player to rank up faster in higher elo game than his current rank. That means that if some high elo player, "Challenger" wanted to make a new account then he doesn't have to deal with so much grind from each division/tiers just to get back to Master-Challenger (Don't ask me why they make smurf accounts, I don't know either). Second, Riot decides to make it that way..so you might want to wait for the person to get to your rank soon. As for unfairness that just go for low elo player to deal with smurfs and lose games automatically and that you can't duo because he's just not in your elo yet...just be patient honestly...that's why MMR exist to help that player get to its elo by skipping division/tiers from doing good at the game.

Uraraka9/28/2019, 4:53:36 PM1 votes

It is because how bad matchmaking is and in that game, your mid and jg were pre-made, so to make it fair your support was chosen from below the average tier level-because for duo they add some mmr. Imo I would've just dodged that game, because it was a sure loss(imho): top was unranked player who isn't good with vlad and supp was like 2W-9L so far. If there were no duo, you would've never got a Bronze 1 support and even if the bad matchmaking is aiming at lower queue times, it won't go 1 full division(gold 4 to Bronze 1) and there is usually 3-4 ranks difference at max.

I think MMR should be visible, so that players who come and write "MMR is same" kind of jokes see these differences and matchmaking should be made better. Don't get frustrated with such games and gl hf [slayer-pantheon-thumbs]

Skýcrow9/28/2019, 6:04:21 PM1 votes

Same mmr different visual rank. System doesn't allow you to queue up with a plat1 and a decayed plat 1 player who has now Gold rank with plat mmr.

thats just how it normally goes

YouGetsNada9/28/2019, 11:03:54 PM1 votes

i strongly agree with this, multiple times iv been shoved into a game where the elos didnt match, times where iv gone against almost full gold teams as a silver 4, with bronze players on my side. i belive i had 4 times the kills my own team did, while the opposite team ran through mine easily.

Not complaining about my team, but maybe the elos being somewhat equal would help players advance if they have the skill to.

Mihalikb9/27/2019, 11:43:47 PM1 votes

I've been having rows and rows of 4/32 KDA ratios lately where one side or the other is completely stomping the game, completely hopeless and pointless. One recent game I've won like that where it was like that, I check the enemy team, my lane is 3 ranks lower, the enemy adc is B1 and our adc is Plat2. This is a low gold/silver game.

I'm like WTF?

Other game our jungle is clearly someone ELo boosting. The guy has like 75 to 30 loss to win ratio, mostly plays Jarvan bronze player. Suddenly he won his like 8 of 10 of his games, every game jungling on Olaf with 15/2 or 19/1 KDA ratios.

It's like he suddenly became a pro Olaf one trick Challenger.

At this point Normal Draft pick random matchmaking feels fairer and more balanced than SoloQ.

Kendren19/28/2019, 1:18:28 AM1 votes

One of my accounts got a silver duo bot lane in a plat game. Low winrates as well, not smurfs, their accounts were peak gold, but they were silvers vsing a plat duo bot on enemy team. Needless to say we lost. Our silv vayne put out about 5k damage to enemy adcs 36k. Rly felt like we got a quality game of league out of it XD

Aazzlano9/28/2019, 2:01:51 AM1 votes

One time when I was in D4, I got randomly put in a Master tier game. Oh and I was not only in a Master tier game, but I was AUTOFILLED into it.

????????????????????????????????

What kind of coding does it have that it thought that was reasonable? Like oh we need one more to fill this team, let's autofill a damn D4 into it.

I've also had multiple ranked games with Bronze players in them in Diamond elo as well. Not like smurfs or anything, legit Bronze players who then go like 0/17 because they are way out of their depth. It's actually amazing. Had tons of silvers as well, and a lot of golds. It's amazing what matchmaking finds acceptable tbh

JRobin319/28/2019, 3:00:04 AM1 votes

You've raised an excellent point that I hope RIOT will examine, but I'm also skeptical that RIOT will come up with any solution to the dilemma you've posed as long as RIOT insists on super secrecy of their hidden matchmaking system while enforcing an inaccurate Superficial Ranking system as the reference by which players understand where they stand in relation to other players.