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Pro's only reinforce the meta they do not create its change

DropKick Slang··18 votes·4,197 views

If you take a look at traditional NA sports, there is a stagnation in the development of changing strategies. Consider the length of time the NFL only had a run first oriented offense. For decades the risk of moving the ball forward due to pass seemed a poor choice. In addition, on the defensive side of the ball the 4-3 (4 down linemen 3 linebackers) was dominant for years until the 3-4 (3 down linemen 4 linebackers) came into favor and receded again. In the NBA the low post presence has dominated the game since its inception.

In these examples the drive to change comes at extreme economic cost. The value of consistently winning games is the highest priority for professional teams. The best strategy is to rely on consistent winning strategies with thousands of iterations of field testing. As a result the value of winning professional games comes at a secondary cost --- innovation.

The innovation in these sports or changes in the meta come from the amateur ranks, namely the college and high school ranks. In the college football scene there are a tremendous and wide variety of strategies and formations being used. From spread offenses, triple options, and ball control there is a wide variety of metas in play. In the college hoops scene there is a tremendous variety of zone defense, teams that emphasize motion offense, or guard dominated play. The variety of offensive and defensive present in the college game is too long to accurately list. In essence the innovation in strategy comes from the lower tiers of play, the upper tiers only sharpen the execution to a razor point.

So if you want to change the meta it’s up to the community to develop strategies to combat it. If the general player base knew the strengths of the current meta (i.e ability based champions going mid to take advantage of power spike) and why it is employed so exclusively it could help innovation.

30 Comments

RiotPWYFF19 votes

Succinct and to the point. I've long held the personal opinion that the weekly cadence of the LCS comes at the cost of consistent innovation (except between splits, etc) as teams don't have the time refine and sharpen strategies in between. It's often when we see brand new teams to the LCS that we see new champion picks (remember when ROCCAT first picked Pantheon jungle? Or when Link first started on CLG and picked Syndra?).

We talk about the pro scene as reinforcing optimal play, I'm unsure if it's optimal so much as safe. We can offer tools for players to experiment with but, like I spoke about before (re: perception shaping the game equal to objective balance), it's tough to get them to try it in the first place.

DropKick Slang4 votes

As far as tools offered for players to experiment with, I think team builder is a great one. However even for me it has a feast or famine mentality when it comes to trying unique team compositions. If I am playing by myself I am far more likely to only go with teams with a more traditional composition. If I am playing with friends who I know have a certain skill set its easy to go with unusual team compositions(I hate the term troll pick it just stifles innovation).

Dragon Fang Shot1 votes

Not to mention how Darien started drawing bans on his Top Warwick in the Spring Split. That didn't live as long as the other off-meta pick though.

Hellioning2 votes

Which trickles down into the primary community. League players are obsessed with what the pros are doing and if they can win more by doing what the pros are doing; I know that many other games are doing the same thing, but League seems to be even worse about it than usual. So many Lee and LB players that don't know how to play their champs and end up feeding terribly, taking the word of whatever pro players say as gospel, etc.

It's kinda annoying.

Privet1 votes

Forgive me if this is pointless discussion as or if I should have opened another discussion as I'm just replying to a comment so you at least have a chance of seeing it but I'd like to ask what Riot's ideas and design choices behind getting the rest of the champion pool up to an acceptable strength or with a unique playstyle and role that enables them not only to be a viable and competitive option in all levels of play but to also change the stale 1-1-2 with a jungler as a side effect. Currently the game is heavily favouring and is being shoe horned into the current team setups with the only variance, between now and what it was a few months ago, being the popular picks.

Currently, and this is even reinforced in public games, pro teams are using the same laning strategy that was pretty much developed way back when I first started playing back in late S1/S2. From what I have seen, Riot seem to have enjoyed this style of play and have made a lot of effort to set this into stone. This isn't so much as a bad thing provided that there is diversity with the champions being selected. However, this hasn't been the case much at all and I can see that you guys at Riot are well aware of this and are wanting to fix it, at least I hope.

You guys have this impressive Champion roster a lot of which has some really cool champions and ideas that could really make for some exciting games both as a spectacle for an eSports environment and for public games in both normal and ranked options but it isn't used. Every LCS, every split, every official competition is always the same 30 or so champions that is deemed to be the strongest at the time with little to no variation at all. So much so that casters can almost always guestimate the 6 bans and 10 picks with almost complete accuracy. I want to see more champions being a viable option. I want to see more champions being picked, more ideas being tested, more strategies coming out. What is Riot doing to bring options like these to light?

MaknBacnPancakes2 votes

It's a tough balance issue man... With such a robust roster, you are bound to have multiple champions bump heads for a specific role (support, CC, damage) and one is always going to lead the pack.. Therefore become the "pro choice" in which the non-pro community latch onto to emulate the pro play, and the pebble size issue snowballs into the debacle that we currently face. If Riot is to neuter the 30 or so "viable" options of champions in favor of decking out some of the bottom guard (Sion, Urgot, etc..) then you eventually run into the same "stale issue" with the new batch of "now strong" bunch.

I applaud Riot for not taking the knee jerk stance and just nerfing/buffing across the board, and I hope what I see is tactful patching in hopes of a delicate balance, and not a company overwhelmed and buried in a hole of their own making (an overly large roster). Admittedly I am new to the game, however I am unfortunately a veteran to video games and the practice. So far I like what I see and am interested in seeing what the future holds.

Privet2 votes

No it isn't a tough balance issue at all. There is a problem with Riots current balance ideals that's leaving a lot of strategies that could be employed unusable. Riot doesn't have to neuter the top 30 champions at all. There isn't a problem with these champions being viable. The problem is that the rest of the 80 or so champions being either so situational that the situation to pick them only comes up once every never or so bad in the current meta that they are the feast or famine champions without the feast. Look at Dota for example. Icefrog recently went through and systematically buffed, changed and added/reworked abilities to make as many heroes as viable as possible for the up coming TI4. It worked and it worked amazingly. There has never been a time where so many heroes in that game have been so viable and there is a myriad of strategies available for use. It's some of the most exciting MOBA/ARTS competitive games I have seen since I first started watching league sports in S2. Why is it that in just the qualifiers alone, nearly EVERY hero was seeing at least a pick or ban with only a few weeks here and there where only between 1-5 would see neither. Compare that to Leagues current. The only access to this information I have been able to see is the LCS at the start of the year where 50 champions were picked and banned across both LCS and OGN. Not quite sure how accurate that information is but that's still really not acceptable.

Given that the game boasts this impressive roster and claims to want innovative, unique and interesting strategies, why does it try so hard to shoehorn the game into the same laning strategies, the same small handful of champions picked and the same game plans every game. Early aggression, early dominance and early control is king right now and with the way that a lot of champions now scale better than they should given their early game strengths, there is no draw back to this. There is no reason to take someone who needs to hit 3 or 4 items before they can finally fight with impact when you can pick someone that could walk into a fight with brown boots and a sunfire cape or a BT or a half finished deathcap and still crush up. When another similar, but different, game can boast a large champion/hero pool and have those champions/heroes being viable in the highest of competitive play why is it that League cannot? Is there something wrong with their design and balance philosophies? Or is it that they've listened to the lowest common denominator for too long that they can't back out now and suddenly change up their game for the better.

Earl Eulrich1 votes

I personally think the main problem is the relatively stellar pick&ban-phase. Teams just don´t have to prepare oddball-tactics...as with 6bans they will almost always get a "standard-comp" together. I really think that´s one of the few things LoL really can learn from Dota, a more restrikting ban-phas leads to more variety in the actual gameplay. Though I also think the LCS format is not really ideal currently...while i like the weakly action, I think it would be far better to have 2 best of 3s per day instead of all the best of 1s - it prepares teams better for worlds, and you can´t come to a best of 3 as a 1-trick-pony and expect to come out ahead, you have to prepare and show different things.

2000boxes3 votes

I read this and started thinking let's bring back mid assassins! mid lane assassins keep the game exciting it makes team fighting about who engages first with mage mids its all about who will be the one to get stunned first which kind of makes games get boring after 30 minutes

The Scyphozoa1 votes

English-speaking pro's only reinforce the meta they do not create its change

ftfy

JohnnyNoxid1 votes

I don't mind "off-meta" picks, I hate pick that either don't fit the composition or are terrible vs the enemy team comp.

Matthias91191 votes

The innovation in these sports or changes in the meta come from the amateur ranks, namely the college and high school ranks. In the college football scene there are a tremendous and wide variety of strategies and formations being used. From spread offenses, triple options, and ball control there is a wide variety of metas in play.

I just want to point out that a fair amount of this is due to either:

  1. Huge disparities in skill between college teams (and individual players on college teams)
  2. The general inability of almost every college football team to play defense

While there's a big gap in quality between the best and worst NFL teams, there's a far bigger gap between Auburn/Alabama (or any team that's a powerhouse right now, like Miami in the late 90s) and <insert any unranked school here>. A lot of college teams can get away with plays that only work when your QB and/or RB are massively more athletic than the opposing defenders.

It's true that risk-taking is discouraged in the professional sports for a variety of reasons. But I also think that eSports teams are less constrained by this -- you can try a wildly different teamcomp/strategy without having to draft a whole new set of players.

DropKick Slang1 votes

Football off topic! ;^)

  1. I dont think this is true in conference games (also App st v michigan)
  2. This is directly related to the rise of the spread and read/option offense which negates the numbers advantage that defenses have in a pass dependent offense

You can see how long it took for the read option to make its appearance in the NFL, Urban Meyer had it in Bowling Green in the early 2000's and it took 10 years for it to sporadically appear in the NFL. Now every team uses it to some degree.

The argument specifically is that the incentive to experiment in matches that have direct economic impact on the team does not allow for risk taking in strategy. If you are winning with a consistent methodology what would be the incentive to change?

MaknBacnPancakes1 votes

Someone has to be the one that goes out on a limb and tried something different. Unfortunately, unless it has been tested and battle proven, a pro pulling out new meta on the big stage (often) is not going to occur due to the chance of potential failure. The risk to reward for changing it up does not favor shaking up the safety of the pre-established meta at the time of given tournament.

Privet1 votes

One of the bigger problems is that there isn't much room for innovation at all. Most of the champions are either outclassed by the popular 30 or so or don't have the items to fill the gaps so that they're effective. It's not that pro's won't, pros can't really do so.

DropKick Slang3 votes

I completely disagree with this sentiment. There are many instances of champions being viewed as underpowered until they show up in professional games. But these innovations did not develop on a whim, they emerged from lower tiers of practice.

Privet1 votes

Can you explain why, even if innovations are made, only a small handful of champions ever see play or are ever perceived as strong/important enough to warrant a pick or a ban.

MaknBacnPancakes1 votes

IMO, that stable of 30 or so characters are deemed "safe" either as a natural pick or ban.

We can battle back and forth about the relevance of fighting games to MOBA's.. However I see a very similar feel, especially up on the professional stage. And that similarity is.. Play what is strong, play what is safe, it simply up's your percentage of likely victory, or gives one the best chance to be successful. As opposed to playing the wild card with potential that I have to not only out play, but out think AND work harder to boot.. A majority of the time.. WHY BOTHER?!

Privet1 votes

The fact that we have to play the top 30 or so champions in the first place to maximise our chances of victory is mundane. It's not an indicator of good game health or balance in the slightest. The fact that nearly half of the champion pool sees play between 5-10 games and more again see play less than 0-5 games per 100. They see no play, they see no bans and they see no love from Riot to get them game to be a more diverse and exciting game. How are you not sick of seeing the same champions or a rotation of "acceptable" champions to play. Would you rather having 60 or 90 champions being viable instead of 30? Would you rather watching the other team draft and wondering what they are going to do instead of seeing another Renekton or another Lee-Sin or another Lucian and knowing exactly what they are doing, what they're going to build and where they are going to lane.

MaknBacnPancakes1 votes

Again, and maybe it is just me.. It is the pro world doing what the pro world does..And 99.9% of the time that is play what is safe and strong. I don't particularly like and/or agree with it..

Privet3 votes

But it's not the pro world doing what the pro world does. The game IS restricted. The game IS stale and it's not because of the pros at all. They can't pick "outside of the meta" or "change the meta" as far as changing how they lane or picking a different sort of carry because the option isn't there to do so. They can't forego a jungler in favour of a duo top lane with a roaming support. They can't put much else midlane except for an assassin or a mage. They can't support any other champion bar ADCs because if they do anything other than that, they will lose because it's not optimal. There are further restrictions as other champions /are/ severely outclassed and outmatched against the current top tier. They aren't perceived to be. They are. The mobility creep has been such a defining role in further etching the meta into stone that champions are being released with gap closers built in, both offensive and defensive in the case of Braum. Older champions or champions that don't have the luxury of built in mobility get left behind because they can't compete with them.

ADCs, or Marksmen in case any rioter is reading this (I don't wanna be murdered), suffer greatly here. Immobile carries like Ashe, Kog'maw and Varus get bogged on because they can't survive in the high mobile, high burst, high CC environment that League is right now. Having those sorts of champions isn't bad, by all means that's not what I'm saying but there has to be something that counters that. Something like an ability like Puck, from Dota. Her ultimate tethers all affected to the cast point. The hero is free to move but only within the range that is dictated by the ultimate. If they break the tether by moving too far away, they take damage and are stunned. Why not introduce something like that to bring an equilibrium to the mobile vs immobile champions?

Fighters and tanks are being left behind because they either don't have mobility or they don't do damage whilst being difficult to kill. They either can't stick to a target or they can't kill their target once they are there. Fighters like Renekton had started to see play because they can do both. Same deal with Shyvanna and Vi with Lee Sin and Jax (Jax is more like a carry, though). Even champions post nerf like Kha Zix were still strong as hell purely because of how their kit worked.

Supports are just as bad. The current top tier for supports are Thresh, Annie and Leona. Very rarely do you ever see any of these seeing a pick or a ban in any level of play both professional and casual, low elo or high elo. The other supports either don't have the stats, the items or the CC and mobility in comparison to the top tier. It's not because they are terrible, it's because they are being compared to the titans of their class. They can't compete. They need help. The titans can still be titans, by all means. Bring the others up to the level of top tier or just under it.

Then you have the case where an old Champion is picked up and tried elsewhere and does very well. Instead of balancing them around this aspect, as well as their intended role, Riot nukes them from orbit because that's not how the champion was designed to play. The Champion finally got dusted off but was immediately taken away because people were whinging and instead of shaving off the barbs that made the champion "unfun and toxic" to play against, they go straight for their balls and render them useless in the new role and never to be seen again for their intended roles.

NB: I realise my response seems to be going all over the place. I have just finished work and I'm just putting my thoughts down on the page.

Sunfield1 votes

I think you havent watched lcs in a long time. Kog is a pretty dominant pick right now. For suppprts, I havent seen Annie or Leona for a long time. But I see alot of morganas, Braums, Namis...

Goes to show how many champions are viable despite not being picked in pro play. What if I told you, pros can be FOTM sheep too

DropKick Slang2 votes

Its the perception of weak champions that create the choosing, Its not iterations of practice that have determined this. Players develop preconceived ideas about relative strength and weaknesses via anectdotal data as well cursory examination of winning percentage and conclude this champion is OP or UP.

Orinne1 votes

While I can agree that innovation in the pro scene will always be difficult due to the need to win, I feel that champion design is something that can't be overlooked and plays a large part in why innovation is either stifled or what I feel is an even bigger problem, that innovation is controlled completely by the balance and champion design teams, not the players themselves. When looking at recent champion releases and some older ones that remain relevant, this only becomes more clear.

Look at supports for example, specifically Lulu, Thresh, Braum, and Nami. Thresh and Braum dominated the lineups almost immediately on release, largely because they've got great kits that do a lot, offer unique mechanics, and don't sacrifice anything. Lulu's been a relevant force that comes and goes, but has always had success in other lanes, and is currently tied for 2nd most picked in the NA LCS alongside Elise and Lee Sin. Her kit offers arguably more relevant utility than any other ranged supports. Nami's only started to become picked up after being left behind for so long, but she's still far behind Morgana who flew into popularity the minute the Spellthief's Edge line became a reliable source of early game gold, and stayed in popularity as a decent check to Thresh and later Braum.

Reworks such as Sona's, while they will make her a more relevant pick, only continue to build on the problem that a champion can't be relevant unless their kit does everything and then some. In the proposed rework, Sona will have her auras replaced for an AoE on-next-hit buff, AoE shield, and AoE haste with extra effect for Sona. She'll pretty much become a more consistent Karma who doesn't have to sacrifice an ultimate to boost only one of her abilities. Yes, Karma wasn't picked much anyways and she offers some bigger numbers, but just the idea that Sona will just beat her out on arrival and probably appear as at least a 2nd tier support in the pro scene, after having always been 1st or 2nd in the past before her current decline highlights the issues of balance for me. Is it something that will take time to fix? Sure. It just baffles me that this problem seems to have persisted long enough to reach a point where the pool of champions actually feels stagnant, when it's never done that before the end of Season 2, and wasn't as big of an issue in Season 3.

I've only detailed how the support line-up currently runs, but this problem exists in other roles as well.

KSHarrison1 votes

Mm the "passing meta" of football was opened up by Hank Stram from the Kansas City Chiefs. He invented all kinds of things including the moving pocket. The West Coast Offense began with Don Coryell who was a coach for the St. Louis Cardinals. Pro beginnings either way.

At the same time pros reinforce the meta, they also create the meta itself. For example, when a pro player picks jungle Wukong or support Annie, they make that champion viable in the eyes of the public. It's a cycle of Pros create meta -> introduce new champions -> Meta evolves slowly -> prevents new changes -> patch changes / experimenting -> pros create meta ->....

It depends on where your analysis begins on the cycle for how much pros create or hinder diversity in a meta. Without a pro scene, there is no meta and the top solo queue stomper becomes the favorite picks. I'm not convinced it would be much different.

In the end, I would say champion imbalances hurt diversity more than anything else. There's only 5 different roles in the game and 6 bans available. If even 3 champions are too strong in each role, that's a total of 15 champions which means players will be cycling in between them. Champion balance is very unforgiving in how slight an advantage can tip the scales.

The best Riot can do is try to give each champion defined strengths and weaknesses to open up more ways of expression than just "good at everything they do." This is what they are exploring now but it will take time. I feel there is some incoherency between different designers at Riot for why this has been such a difficult area to make strides in. I suspect community expectations take their toll and complicate the process. But that's all pure conjecture from me.

DropKick Slang1 votes

Football off topic!

Coryell spent 12 years at San Diego St working on optimizing the I formation and developing the genesis of Air Coryell. Immediately following his tenure at San Diego St (he was wildly successful) he went to the cardinals where he implemented his new offense. I will agree that Hank Stram is a great example of innovation at the pro level.

But i'm not indicating that innovation never occurs in the pro ranks, I'm just pointing out the economic incentive to try unproven strategies limits creativity.

Just think about what happens in champ select if players try "off-meta" picks players respond with "troll pick". But at these levels of play, player skill is the primary determinant of the outcome not champion design. I like the pro scene and the LCS and the innovations it brings, but I think the community at large is responsible for the diversity of the game.

KSHarrison1 votes

hahaha never expected to get educated on football on LoL forums ;)

Thanks for the lesson!

I agree with you wholeheartedly. My only qualm is that, assuming we hypothetically abolished competitive league entirely, would solo queue be better off? I think people would still realize that Kassadin is OP etc. There would be a different meta that revolves around solo-queue pub stomping champs, but I don't think that a champ like Sejuani necessarily becomes desirable.

DropKick Slang1 votes

I think the pro scene offers insight to solid counter picks and gives players a chance to watch highly skilled players execute.

Lets assume 500,000 games are played a day. We could focus on the top 10% of the player base(skill wise) and have 50,000 games a day to examine. Within that set of data, I'm sure a majority of the players are making safe "on meta" picks. But within that set there have to be alternatives to the safe pics that have emerged that the general population is unaware. There is little to no exposure in these unconventional picks and they fly under the radar until they gain traction within that player base.

Gorbache1 votes

You have a good point there regarding the meta. And as Riot Pwyff said during the season it's rare that you will see new strategies emerge since the players are busy learning their opponent and perfecting the game play.

This is why you have a lot more "meta" changes in Korea since most of the team have a large staff behind them that basically their job is to innovate (you will see a lot of one-off or two times wonky comps during the season when teams try new strategy during "easier games").

The fact that Riot will potentially add new teams to the LCS will contribute largely to that. More teams will more more strategy and since there should be a greater disparity between the first place and last place, that will leave more room for teams to try new strategies.

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