If you solo/duo queue, you really should take a look at this.

Robert Hoxworth·Oct 1, 2013·46 votes·3,813 views

(I know its TL/DR but please give it a read)

I'm not anyone special so I don't expect much feedback, but I really would appreciate some. I've played now a 150 or so ranked games, and something very simple that also seems to be very easily implemented has peaked my interest. How many times have you played a solo queue and this happens: Immediately upon joining the lobby someone in a lower pick position decides they'd like a roll, and of course doesn't get it. As soon as this happens their reaction is "idc, I'm still going ------" (You get the point). Then, as you'd expect, when its their turn to pick a champion they pick a champ for that position and say something along the lines of "F you, I'm going wherever I want, F pick order" (Whats ironic about this is that these people would be the first to call out pick order if the circumstances were different) And at this point you've lost before the game is started. The rest of the team decides that it would be a good idea to dodge, and ALL agree that they'd rather not play this game. What sucks about this is that the person who decided that pick order doesn't matter has no intentions of dodging, and is usually the fourth or 5th position in the lineup. I usually find myself being the person to either not pick a champ or dodge, because i do honestly and truly follow most guidelines of TEAMWORK OP, and I'm well aware that our chances of losing just went from about 50% to somewhere close to 75%.

My problem is that people who make the sacrifice of dodging/not picking a champ are punished, and rather heavily. You lose 3-5 LP every time, and your time waiting varies from 6-30 minutes. I think this is absolutely ridiculous, as it follows no logic whatsoever. Why punish the person who truly has the team in his mind? I feel that I'm saving a bunch of people their time and frustration (Even the guy who didn't get the position he wanted) and I'm punished in a blatantly cruel and unfair way for doing so? In what way is that acceptable? Anyways, my very simple solution to this problem is this: Why not implement some sort of poll system similar to the forfeit system that can be done in the lobby before a match starts. 3/5 people must vote in a positive manner to dodge the lobby, and then given an option to explain why they decided to do so (Sort of a hybrid between the forfeit system and report system). This would save alot of people alot of time, and generally increase the moral of players when they start a game. There is nothing worse that losing a game like the one described earlier, then having to muster up the urge to play another. Not only that, but I see it as a more full-proof way of weeding out badly behaving players, because from my personal experience, I'm usually so drained and disappointed by the end of these types of games, that i neglect to even report the character or explain to the enemy team what happened. This is usually followed by logging off for a few hours/days just because of how frustrating these sorts of people can make the community.

Anyone who has connections with anyone of power in RIOT or even someone who can have a direct impact on this, I implore you to seriously think about creating this sort of interface, I truly believe that it would improve the quality of gameplay and function of the LoL community tremendously.

Humbly-

A concerned LoL player.

P.S. Sorry for making it an essay.

(I've decided to add something else to this, as people in the comments continue to bring it up without reading the comments first.)

As for those of you who have found what I believe to be the most detrimental of abuses for this method, I spit-balled an in-depth explanation of exactly how to thwart it. Here it is:

This is the response to PimpoftheJungle which you can find down below. He was the first to bring up this point and I'm very glad he did, because its a massive loophole in my idea.

"True, I haven't thought of that yet, its a very good point. At the same time however, you'd think that if people were that concerned with the enemy team's composition, people would dodge if they'd truly thought that based on champions alone would cause the loss. Still however, your point stands and makes quite a bit of sense. I guess some sort of limitations could be added to this method, although I'd like to refrain from that. There could also be some sort of sub-category of the tribunal, where the lobby chat in games that are dodged become the cases being looked at, and those who do look at them can decide whether or not the reason for dodging was legitimate. I guess the "punishment" for dodging illegitimately would be say.... after 4 or 5 times of consecutively being considered an "illegitimate dodger"(creative name, right?), the next 5 times you dodge, or for the next week, you have to wait 15-20 mins each time you dodge, regardless of being a legitimate one or not. I think that's a rather fair punishment for the crime, of course these numbers could be switched around to what RIOT personally sees fit, but if I do say so myself I've done quite a good job at patching that hole up. What do you think?"

86 Comments

Brokeback CowboyOct 1, 20139 votes

Why not, before you even enter the que, have a role preference you could select from. Granted certain positions would have a longer wait time than say support, but people would get the role they wanted. If your a player who just wants to get into a game have a fill selection that would speed your que up and give you a random roll to fill (not always support).

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20132 votes

I did think about this actually, but contrary to what "The Onix Mage" said, I think this would really REALLY heavily increase the wait times for ranked matches, specifically because of what you said in your second sentence. Not to mention, people could just troll anyways, choosing supp as their preferred roll, and then joining a game and saying they're going to top lane. Like I said, I thought of this sort of solution as well, but its not fool-proof, whereas (sorry for sounding arrogant) I believe mine does. Thanks for your input though.

Brokeback CowboyOct 3, 20131 votes

I agree with you that people will just choose support then get in game and take another role but if we combine your idea with what I said then it works out. As for wait times I think that people will just start taking support role more often because they dont want to wait as long. This will shorten que times for every one.

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

The solution to the wait time issue is to make this role queue type optional and continue to have the current queue type for those too impatient to wait. Some summoners are OK with waiting longer for a guaranteed role while others would rather risk somebody bullying them into an undesired role for faster queue times.

The Onix MageOct 2, 20132 votes

They did that same idea for World of Warcraft. Wait time wasn't an issue, but I do have concerns about this being used here in LoL...XD

Muffin PufferOct 2, 20133 votes

This is still the most needed feature in LOL. This will almost always get more people to play along with the meta if they know going forward that they will get the lane that they want. Why this hasn't been implemanted is almost as mind blowing as why if I take the time and effort to be in one league in ranked why I am constantly matched with players of a lower league. But that is a gripe for another thread.

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

My solution is akin to what you are describing: http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=3915896&highlight=desired+role

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

My solution is akin to what you are describing: http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=3915896&highlight=desired+role

CozarkianOct 17, 20131 votes

Being a versatile player gives me an advantage in games because I can fill what is needed while allowing my teams to have their preferred roles. Your idea removes this advantage by forcing me to specialize into a single role. (Yes, even with a "fill" option it takes away this advantage because the enemy team is all specialized whereas under the current system they might have players in uncomfortable roles).

Also, it eliminates certain juking strategies. For example, I used to like to first or second pick Fiora and tell my team "top, unless they pick Jax, then I'll need to jungle or mid." It's much more difficult to do this when you have an assigned role, forcing you to play a selection of safe champions that are hard to counterpick, which reduces the viable champion pool.

IBleedWhenIPOct 1, 20135 votes

this is a genius idea it should happen

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20134 votes

THANKS! TELL YA FRENDZ

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

If you like this idea, bump my thread on this to gain visibility: http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?t=3915896&highlight=desired+role

PimpoftheJungleOct 2, 20135 votes

I actually approve of this, I would also like to add my idea that there should be a 10 second "mercy" time to dodge without losing LP or time. I have gotten the chat-log bug a couple of times where i was unable to type or read the chat, thus not being able to communicate with my team about roles/trades/etc. Sometimes also I have played a game where a person would either intentionally feed or be very extremely toxic, and I would get paired up with them the next game. I highly feel that this 10 second grace period should be implemented, that or the vote.

However there is ONE problem with the voting system you described, what if first pick picks mid, and second picks top, and they get countered? What if by 5th pick you realize that the enemy teamcomp is a lot stronger than yours, or what if you wanted certain champs and the enemy picked it... It seems really abusable.

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20133 votes

True, I haven't thought of that yet, its a very good point. At the same time however, you'd think that if people were that concerned with the enemy team's composition, people would dodge if they'd truly thought that based on champions alone would cause the loss. Still however, your point stands and makes quite a bit of sense. I guess some sort of limitations could be added to this method, although I'd like to refrain from that. There could also be some sort of sub-category of the tribunal, where the lobby chat in games that are dodged become the cases being looked at, and those who do look at them can decide whether or not the reason for dodging was legitimate. I guess the "punishment" for dodging illegitimately would be say.... after 4 or 5 times of consecutively being considered an "illegitimate dodger"(creative name, right?), the next 5 times you dodge, or for the next week, you have to wait 15-20 mins each time you dodge, regardless of being a legitimate one or not. I think that's a rather fair punishment for the crime, of course these numbers could be switched around to what RIOT personally sees fit, but if I do say so myself I've done quite a good job at patching that hole up. What do you think?

CozarkianOct 17, 20131 votes

Also, free dodges encourage the toxic behavior that this idea seeks to avoid. Right now a player that says "mid or feed" has to worry the team might call his bluff, but if he knows his team will just dodge, then there is no risk to being a jerk in team select. To combat this you'd need a dodge tribunal to both pardon the dodging player and punish the troll and Riot has already stated they won't add pre and post game chat to the tribunal.

Another problem is the ability to dodge your own team even when someone isn't trolling. Several months ago, I think it would have been pretty easy to get a team to agree to dodge if someone wanted to play support Annie and now that's a popular choice. Many teams might also dodge if you want to play a rare champ like Fiora, Karma, Sej, or an extremely unpopular one like Teemo (heck, I might dodge teemos if it was free).

ZektovOct 1, 20134 votes

This is actually a really good idea, and it seems like a lot of thought has went in, however I would upgrade it to four people, and maybe anonomous, so that they don't just do it randomly, that if all 4 agree without seeing who else did, then maybe it could work

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20134 votes

I had thought about this as well but here is the problem. As many other people have said in multiple forum posts, "RIOT!!! duos r 2 stronk!!!". If two people think they're going to come in and ruin a lobby, they very well can if the vote requires 4 "for" and 1 "against". That would be a flaw in the system as far as I'm concerned, and here's what I'd also thought of to back that point up. If 3 people are voting yes in solo/duo ranked, that means there is no feasible way for them to be pre-made, meaning that at the very least there is one outside opinion as to whether or not to dodge the match. I'm not sure I follow the anonymity thing, but with a chat bar that's constantly there, I don't see how it you could make a voting process like that anonymous.

Rival CharlieOct 2, 20133 votes

I just hate that you have to dodge a game because of a bad teammate that won't fill his role, and then get PUNISHED for it. If you don't dodge, there's a high chance you will lose, and the game will probably not be fun anyway.

Come on riot, do something like this. It's no fair that if you want any chance of winning you have to dodge a game with an autolock/troll etc.

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

Here's the problem with LoL currently: NOBODY SHOULD HAVE TO FILL in a team. Everybody should play the role in which they can contribute the most effectively. This is a major flaw of this game, that summoners are forced into roles for which they are not specialized. This makes their solo queue ranking nowhere near as accurate as it could be.

The SoulforgedOct 2, 20132 votes

only prob is 4 man premades but in most cases YES!

Solan StonewhipOct 2, 20132 votes

There are a few posts like this one. It's a concern of mine as well. I think that this is a good addition. i'd also like it if Riot would call down some kind of ruling eliminating 'calling it' from the game and sticking with pick order. a simple tick box system that announces what your preferred roles at the start as you enter the lobby would solve THAT argument. then it would come down purely to pick order.

couple that with the voting system suggested would solve all issues. but you'd have to make it either 4/5ths majority to dodge safely.

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20132 votes

People keep bringing up the 4/5ths rather than the 3/5. Forgive me for my ignorance but is there some way to have two groups of duos join the same solo/duo queue match? If not then I can't imagine why people would want 4/5 rather than 3v5. Of course, this would be one of the intricate details to this solution that would be hashed out over the development time required to implement it, but in my personal opinion I would prefer to have a 3/5 vote rather than a 4/5 vote.

Solan StonewhipOct 2, 20131 votes

i thought about that and it's a good point. but i don't think it should be too easy to dodge either. or you'll end up with everyone dodging. if you make it 3/5 then we'll end up with people dodging for smaller and smaller reasons. if we're really going to end up with two people being dicks. well that's something you'll have to live with. but i haven't encountered that very often.

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20131 votes

Sure, I guess all I can say here is we have differing opinions. I strictly follow an ideology of "majority rules", so It irks me to see a small pre-made group have full control over the outcome of a decision. I guess it comes from being a political science and philosophy major. :S

Like I said this is in no way a "final draft" of this idea, so to speak. Its merely a brainstorm concocted over the course of about the time it took for my temporary queue ban to run out. :P

This exact thing happened to me just before I posted about it , I actually think we ended up winning, but its not winning that matters, its the principle of being considerate to your fellow players, as well as having fun while wasting your time on the internet.

Solan StonewhipOct 3, 20131 votes

hmmm, well i can see how it would be annoying. but how would you suggest dealing with the increased dodging? if it's 3 people needed. all it will take is someone not liking what other people are picking. or 3 people who wanted to play some other position wanting to dodge. it would circumvent a good portion of the efforts that riot has put into solving the queue dodge problem. it was rampant at one time. how would we deal with that?

perhaps we could earn dodge points?

Robert HoxworthOct 3, 20131 votes

Yeah read my post again people keep asking about this so I finally copy pasted my response to the original person who brought it up.

Solan StonewhipOct 3, 20131 votes

it does happen. you do get two duo's. not all the time. but it's happened several times for me.

MatthevvOct 3, 20131 votes

False. Riot changed this a long long time ago. It used to be possible to get 2 duo's however not anymore. Now it is limited to only 1 duo queue per team.

Solan StonewhipOct 3, 20131 votes

if you say so.... i don't think it was that long ago. definitely has happened to me in the last year. but i guess everything's relative....

lRelapseOct 3, 20132 votes

I completely agree with you.

oChaseOct 3, 20132 votes

Thank goodness you came up with such a smart way to deal with this, because i have been in that frustrating situation where you just want to play, but that one troll or toxic player is sitting there cussing the team out because he is stuck in support or didn't get his "main" role. I completely agree with this and would definitely want riot to look into it.

Robert HoxworthOct 3, 20132 votes

Thank you! Tell everyone that you know who plays and see how big we can make this. Hopefully someone from RIOT will come along and be interested in it too.

i am the hamhamOct 5, 20131 votes

Robert, tweet to to @RiotLyte. He is great about responding to tweets. He is the VP of Player Behavior at Riot. Awesome guy.

cinoOct 3, 20132 votes

yes. just yes.

TheNewDarkOct 3, 20132 votes

"Anyways, my very simple solution to this problem is this: Why not implement some sort of poll system similar to the forfeit system that can be done in the lobby before a match starts. 3/5 people must vote in a positive manner to dodge the lobby, and then given an option to explain why they decided to do so (Sort of a hybrid between the forfeit system and report system)."

^^^ Mind=blown The best idea ever that I never imagined.

Robert HoxworthOct 3, 20132 votes

Thanks! Tell all your fellow league players, make this huge!

J0HN C3N4Oct 3, 20132 votes

Why in the hells does this not have a red post yet?? I agree w/ OP.

djumpOct 3, 20132 votes

Hi Robert and all,

I just wanted to stop by and point out that this issue(improving champ select lobby, and dealing with toxicity there) is one that has been discussed a lot in the past and in fact has had(and still has) a lot of attention from RIOT. I'll point you to the mega-thread from early this year where essentially your idea, as well as a lot of other ideas were discussed in detail by players and reds:

http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=35559365#

more specifically, a topic in that thread that is conceptually identical to your idea is the vote-kick idea. In that case you would vote as a team to kick someone from the queue, as opposed to dodging the queue, but that's just semantics. The end result is the same that you vote to end the current queue and get a new one. Lyte (from RIOT) talks a bit about it in these two posts in that thread:

http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=35559872#35559872
http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=36589459#36589459

This thread also discusses the idea of specifying a role you want before joining a queue some how quite extensively (which is not in the OP here, but I saw discussed in comments)

RIOT has been working hard on this issue for a while. I've seen several comments from RIOT from time to time about how champion select is one of the big issues in the game right now, and they're working on it. In fact, they've hired Ph.D.'s in psychology to consult on a lot of the underlying issues with champ select in detail (don't remember exactly where I read that or I'd reference it here). So I'm really expecting them to come out with some well informed changes to champ select in the near(ish) future after all the research they're doing in it. I look forward to seeing what they come up with.

With all that said, I'll throw in my 2 cents on your idea:

I agree with what others have mentioned here, and what Lyte says about vote-kick, that overall i think this would introduce a much more combative and uncooperative dynamic to champ select. You are essentially giving people an action choice when they disagree with another player that will emphasize disagreements by making them more worth pursing. Because now when you disagree, you have to live with it or dodge with consequences. If there is an option to leave without consequences, if anyone is not happy with the situation, they will waste time and intorduce negativity arguing for their perspective. Note that I've kept my statements general here in that I think this is true if someone has a legitimate or illegitimate complaint against another player in champ select.

I think your ideal case of a normal champ select with 1 troll, and the other players quickly and quietly agree to dodge and move on would be a minority case. Instead, you will open the door for a lot of arguing about more minor issues and trying to convince others to vote dodge.

You propose a solution of somehow limiting ability to vote dodge (which lyte mentions and argues against briefly in the thread i referenced) but in my mind, this would only restrict extreme cases of constant dodges. As Lyte mentions, even if you allow each player one vote dodge per day, they will probably use it. and if you have 10 players per game, queue times on a whole would at least double or triple.

This longer queue time as well as the overall more uncooperative dynamic (when what we want is a more cooperative dynamic) makes this solution undesirable to me.

In conclusion though, despite me disagreeing with your idea, thanks so much for making this thread. I love thinking through how to improve the game and talking through thoughtful suggestions with other positive and reasonable players. I wish there were more threads like this!

djumpOct 3, 20131 votes

bonus link:

if you've never seen the thread where riot officially endorses pick order over call order (if you can't come to an agreement otherwise), here it is:

http://forums.na.leagueoflegends.com/board/showthread.php?p=37793023#37793023

TeeDeeKOct 2, 20131 votes

Learn every role. That way you can fill in where ever u need too.

Robert HoxworthOct 2, 20131 votes

Absolutely, that should go without saying. If you're a level 30 you should know all roles at a moderate level at the very least. If not, stick to norms and customs until you do. There is a reason "unskilled player" is an option for reporting someone. As for your second sentence, I myself am, but I understand that not EVERYONE is a "fill". Its quite rare to come across anyone that is, which is why I sort of pride myself on it. And of course, think of this as a sport, why put someone who is really good in one position somewhere else. Now I understand that most insta-lockers are those sorts of people (at least they'd like to think that), but RIOT themselves has made it very clear that Pick Order>Call in ranked. So basically what that means is, even if you're just that tad bit better at top than the first pick is, if he wants it, you gotta suck it up and go somewhere else, and I'm fine with that rule thus far. -Luck of the Draw

LargerJackolopeOct 16, 20131 votes

I know this thread hasn't been posted in for a long time, but just an update in case any of you are unaware.

[http://www.newsoflegends.com/index.php/introducing-team-builder-queue-up-for-a-specific-role-small-pbe-balance-splash-update-the-current-state-of-fighters-and-ecommerce-ama-13260/]

Hyper-linked above is to a League of Legends announcement about a new concept call "team builder". Where before you queue, you pick champion, role, and lane, and it matches you up with other people who have chosen other roles. Then seems to be the solution to the problem many of you having been looking for.

Solan StonewhipOct 2, 20132 votes

it's more about people who won't play by that philosophy. if it all comes down to pick order. then it's a little more random and less childish

xNappaOct 3, 20131 votes

Pick order isn't random. its highest ranked. or am i wrong? (not that i disagree with the post. )

Robert HoxworthOct 3, 20131 votes

Something like that yeah. I'm not sure if it goes by leagues or divisions, but usually the order is highest to lowest. Check out the league wiki.

FawltyOct 20, 20131 votes

The new matchmaking system they're implementing on the PBE and such will hopefully change all this. It will take a bit before this replaces the ranked draft mode and such though =/

SmokingPuffinOct 21, 20131 votes

"Why not implement some sort of poll system similar to the forfeit system that can be done in the lobby before a match starts. 3/5 people must vote in a positive manner to dodge the lobby, and then given an option to explain why they decided to do so (Sort of a hybrid between the forfeit system and report system). This would save alot of people alot of time"

High elo games would simply stop happening. It's a very rare game where one team or the other does not feel like they've been outpicked in champion select. If you gave a majority vote to not have a game take place, the vast majority of high elo games would not be played out.

Back when we had only a half hour time penalty, which to me feels like a pretty large amount of time, I remember it being typical to pick champions in 4 lobbies before playing one game, because of this strategic match dodging problem.

The problem with addressing troll picks in champion select is a hard one because of abuse cases like this one.