Boards›Gameplay

There's a difference between Bad and Clueless

RookPusher·Jan 22, 2018·4 votes·333 views

And the boards never talk about it because we're all so quick to tell other people they're bad. "I climbed out of Bronze - and if you can't, you're bad." Agreed. Now that we've established you're a better human being than me, lets have a real discussion about players who show up in Ranked without any idea whats going on.

First of all, before we get into what to do about it, I'd like to think we can all agree that it's on par with trolling, even if that isn't your intent. As short as these games are getting, there are times when some of us have 1/2 games per night because of work, class, and whatever else. Showing up in your 6th game of the night on a new champ with no concept of the matchups you're involved with is asinine.

I'm all for carrying bad players. But bad players aren't the problem. For me, I can't stand the people who show up in ranked with no knowledge of champions, match-ups, items, or what to do after an ace (In bronze, the answer is always recall - which kills me). To this end I really feel like MMR alone shouldn't determine the match-up, I'd really love to see total games played in there as well. There needs to be something, because none of these people take feedback, they always think they're the best player, and for the love of christ they can never say "I'm not doing well, but that Mid is destroying his laner...I think I'll just NOT feed as my contribution." Every meet up is a Leroy Jenkin's attempt at heroism.

This was just a rant. i've given up on Riot doing anything about the legions of assholes that operate at the bottom levels.

10 Comments

redniwediSJan 22, 20181 votes

I'd like to think we can all agree that it's on par with trolling, even if that isn't your intent.

I don't think it's on par, but I still think something should be done about it. Bronze is too wide of a rank right now, to the point where there is a massive skill difference between people just within Bronze 5. Silver and Gold don't even have massive skill differences between ranks 4-1, yet Bronze 5 is allowed to be this awful amalgamation of the lowest skilled players.

RookPusherJan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

I don't think it's on par, but I still think something should be done about it. Bronze is too wide of a rank right now, to the point where there is a massive skill difference between people just within Bronze 5. Silver and Gold don't even have massive skill differences between ranks 4-1, yet Bronze 5 is allowed to be this awful amalgamation of the lowest skilled players.

So what's the difference then? If 4 people are relying on you, and you come ill prepared, and conduct yourself in a capacity that benefits the enemy, to me, that's all but trolling.

redniwediSJan 22, 20181 votes

Intent is the only real difference, and I do think intent means something. Even our legal system makes allowances for intent, albeit by reducing the severity of a punishment rather than removing the punishment entirely.

That's why I did say something needs to be done. I think there should be a drop off below Bronze 5, where people can actually drop out of ranked eligibility for a specified time period before they rejoin with new placements. It won't solve your problem with people first timing champions in ranked, which isn't a knowledge problem and is just a straight troll, but it would help keep Bronze from just being this black hole of despair.

RookPusherJan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Intent is the only real difference, and I do think intent means something. Even our legal system makes allowances for intent, albeit by reducing the severity of a punishment rather than removing the punishment entirely.

That's why I did say something needs to be done. I think there should be a drop off below Bronze 5, where people can actually drop out of ranked eligibility for a specified time period before they rejoin with new placements. It won't solve your problem with people first timing champions in ranked, which isn't a knowledge problem and is just a straight troll, but it would help keep Bronze from just being this black hole of despair.

I've been arguing for that for awhlie and Riot, at one point, seemed to back it but it seems to have gone the way of in-game Skin ID: There, but vanished overnight and was never explained.

There needs to be some hard notice - like a Ranked Ban - to tell people "You're not doing this the right way" because they just cannot get it through their heads that the MOBAFire guide they read that told them they were exactly right might actually be true.

Unker139Jan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Intent is the only real difference, and I do think intent means something. Even our legal system makes allowances for intent, albeit by reducing the severity of a punishment rather than removing the punishment entirely.

That's why I did say something needs to be done. I think there should be a drop off below Bronze 5, where people can actually drop out of ranked eligibility for a specified time period before they rejoin with new placements. It won't solve your problem with people first timing champions in ranked, which isn't a knowledge problem and is just a straight troll, but it would help keep Bronze from just being this black hole of despair.

How will this help? Someone with a 700 MMR in bronze 5 (1000 average MMR) gets dropped from ranked and has to do new placements. Matchmaking uses MMR so he will be placed in the same matches for placement as if he were bronze 5 and after 10 battles he will most likely be placed exactly where he was.

redniwediSJan 22, 20181 votes

It's more the time out period where they can't play ranked than simply having to redo placements. Having something that physically keeps you from just grinding out games that says "hey, you're not improving and are already playing at the bottom of the barrel, take some time to practice before rejoining ranked" could be helpful.

Unker139Jan 22, 20181 votes

Its still relative. Removing the lower bronze 5 players from the ranked pool means the remaining bronze 4-5 become the new lowest players and wont be able to win. ELO will always push to the average.

A battle of diamonds has 5 winners and 5 losers. The losers drop in MMR until they are playing at their level. Remove the lower levels and they will continue to drop.

You need to be better than the people you are playing with and against to move up and if you are truly better, you will move up.

RookPusherJan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

Its still relative. Removing the lower bronze 5 players from the ranked pool means the remaining bronze 4-5 become the new lowest players and wont be able to win. ELO will always push to the average.

A battle of diamonds has 5 winners and 5 losers. The losers drop in MMR until they are playing at their level. Remove the lower levels and they will continue to drop.

You need to be better than the people you are playing with and against to move up and if you are truly better, you will move up.

We addressed this in the original post. So long as you permit these people in the game, you're making Bronze about who has the most clueless players. The ones not looking to improve. And since you can play up a few ranks, that makes it almost impossible to escape the tumult.

Unker139Jan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

We addressed this in the original post. So long as you permit these people in the game, you're making Bronze about who has the most clueless players. The ones not looking to improve. And since you can play up a few ranks, that makes it almost impossible to escape the tumult.

It is still relative. Remove the most clueless people and you have a new set of most clueless that will be the new bronze 5. Remove bronze and ailver and gold 5 becomes the most clueless and will eventually drop to bronze. The bottom rank will always have all the players that are not strong enough to move up. Removing the bottom just gives you a new bottom and fixes nothing.

RookPusherJan 22, 20181 votes

{quoted}

It is still relative. Remove the most clueless people and you have a new set of most clueless that will be the new bronze 5. Remove bronze and ailver and gold 5 becomes the most clueless and will eventually drop to bronze. The bottom rank will always have all the players that are not strong enough to move up. Removing the bottom just gives you a new bottom and fixes nothing.

You're confusing talent with preparation. And you can measure prep based on games played. If a player put in their time with Champs X, Y, and Z and they have a bad game - then they had a bad game. If you're rolling into a ranked match with a champ you don't have Mastery 2 on, and you're dying 11 times in a 29 minute match, then whether it was intentional or not is irrelevant to my LP.

Removing players who callously operate, indifferent to their team, is not a skill thing. And it doesn't mean a new crop will arrive after having removed the previous. Either you come prepared or you don't. And while we can't measure your intent, we have auxiliary metrics that give us a good indication.

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