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The Carrot or the Stick? (@AllPeople)

Swuft··16 votes·6,571 views

The age old debate: does rewarding or punishing players have a greater effect in changing their behavior? In this Wall O' Text I will attempt to convince you, the reader, and more importantly Riot, the Sole-Arbitrators-of-All-Things-Rule-Related, that in this greed filled world we inhabit today the carrot is oftentimes more effective. Let's take this step by step.

1. Defining the Carrot The carrot is a reward/incentive, given to players based on their dedication to upholding the rules that are intended to make LoL a fun experience. In other words, players who follow the rules are rewarded for their behavior. The purpose of this reward is to positively encourage players to behave well within the confines of LoL.

2. Defining the Stick The stick is a punishment, given to players when they prove they are* incapable of upholding the rules that are intended to make LoL a fun experience.* The purpose of the stick is to use fear as a tool to keep players in line. Basically, if you don't want to get punished, follow the rules.

Current System Currently, Riot heavily favors the stick over the carrot. Unfortunately, it is nigh impossible to own enough sticks to keep LoL players in line. Yes, bans and restrictions are nice, but their effects are highly individual. I.E, each ban only removes one tiny part of the larger problem (and often only for a little while).

So how, if there are not enough sticks, can we make LoL less toxic and more fun? What this beleaguered community desperately needs is a change in the outlook. Bans and chat restrictions will NEVER, and I repeat, **NEVER **make a noticeable difference in making the LoL community less toxic. Instead of trying to remove small bits of the problem, we need to focus on improving what we have already.

PROPOSED CHANGE Break out the carrots!!!!(while keeping some of the sticks within close reach). If players behave well, reward them! It doesn't have to be big; maybe even just an IP-Boost every 3 months or something.

Conclusion The point is, it is clear the stick alone isn't working. They say don't fix it if it isn't broken, but goodness gracious, it is definitely broken. Adding carrots to the equation might not be the cure-all, but I firmly believe they can make a big difference when combined with sticks. Believe it or not, there is a small, less vocal minority of players out there who honestly want to see the LoL community improved. Please. Consider this.

~A Concerned Citizen (P.A.F., People Against Flamers, Certified)

P.S. If that argument is not enough, consider this: Gangplank has oranges to remove his scurvy; where are the oranges(carrots) to remove the scurvy people experience in LoL everyday?

32 Comments

RiotRiot Baconhawk11 votes

Interesting! Would love to hear your guys' thoughts on this!

Ralantha3 votes

Interesting! Would love to hear your guys' thoughts on this!

I would like the thumbs up button in the stat screen to mean something again. I think if we garner enough points in a section we can convert them to IP :)

VengefulWight3 votes

The first thing I would do would be to remove (or revamp to accomodate) the honor system, and implement a point based reward system which can be redeemed for exclusive (or not depending) items.

Valkyrie Witch suggested some things elsewhere in the thread which could be used as rewards for this type of system, and i've gone ahead and added a couple ideas of my own to it as well.

  • Borders (Or possibly something similar to the existing Crests in lieu of it)
  • Summoner Icons (Maybe re-releasing some unavailable ones in a limited fashion through points?)
  • Ward Skins (Riot Fist Bump pls)
  • A Skin Shop (Maybe one skin from each champion?)
  • A Champion Shop with tiers for point costs similar to the regular IP/RP shop (So 10 points for Garen for example and then maybe 75 points for Gnar) I understand this might not be possible, but it would certainly be one hell of a carrot
  • IP Boosts. A set of IP boosts available for different amounts of 'points'
  • RP Bonus upon purchase (Similar to whats going on with sugar rush perhaps. Redeem X points for Y bonus RP on next purchase)
  • Account Name Changes
  • Rune Pages

As for earning points, I feel the best way to do it would be to incorporate the pre-existing system which looks at the games in your matchistory and evaluates if you were positive, negative, or neutral in a game. So, perhaps every 20 games it would check to see if you had a certain percentage of positive or neutral games in your history, and then assign points based on that.

Something like this

  • If I was positive or neutral 100% of the time, i would receive 10 'points'
  • If I was positive or neutral only 95% of the time, perhaps 8
  • 90% might be worth 3 points (If any)
  • Anything below that should not be worth any points at all
  • Chat restrictions and bans would also create a 'point restriction' which would disable your ability to earn points for a certain number of games. After that point restriction, chat restricted and formerly banned players would be able to earn points as normal, provided, of course, they meet the requirements.

A point system similar to this should be a good carrot for players, as it provides a clear, tangible reward for being a consistent pleasure to play with, as well as limiting the potential for abuse.

Anyone got any thoughts suggestions or ideas on this?

Lilinae1 votes

Yeah. Rather than making a whole new system, working it into what already exists and expanding on it would be simpler and more effective overall. If Riot were to incorporate a special shop area for redeeming good behavior points, It should probably be something where (assuming you play maybe one game a day) you should be expected to be able to redeem something nifty maybe once every 3-4 months (for some of the bigger prizes if you save up that is). Rather than checking every 20 games, checking every week or month and rewarding a certain amount of points base on how positive/neutral you were in all the games during that time frame would likely be best. Chat Restrictions and bans preventing you from gaining points until you have upped your positivity some would also help the stick aspect of the carrot and stick analogy.

Champions/champion skins might be too much to ask for, but IP boosts, special borders, icons, ward skins, and that RP bonus on one point purchase thing you mentioned could all be nifty things to have in such a shop if it were to exist. While I would love to be able to redeem a champion or skin from it, I think keeping this special honor points system as separate as possible from what can be purchased with IP/RP is for the best.

But, that does also bring up the possibility for some kind of 'Honorable' (Champion) Skin that comes out once a year (Like Victorius/Championship skins) and is exclusively offered as a reward in the carrot shop. Too much to hope for probably, but that would be a cool thing.

Flemman1 votes

For me, the better thing will be a new refund token every year (with max 4 to avoid stock them too much) for the player with good behaviour

mi ramfan2 votes

The Report system has grown fangs while the Honor system remains entirely symbolic.

If you want to enhance the experience for Honorable players, they need to get something real that they can show off. Nobody cares about banners on the select screen or loading screen. The summoner icons are cool, but they're only visible to your friends, who probably friended you in the first place because you were a good guy/gal.

Here's my suggestion: Periodically (once a season or so), give a free skin to all players who you consider to be "honorable". Make it a big deal, like the yearly Victorious skin. This will not only reinforce good behavior that already exists in honorable players (making them feel that being honorable in the face of trolls and AFKs is worth the trouble), it will also pound home the message that in League of Legends, unlike other gaming communities, being an enjoyable player to play with and against is just as valued as being skilled at the game. You could also implement a special Normal queue for honorable players which would allow them to relax, unwind, and play League without fear of getting trolled. This wouldn't create a Prisoner's Island effect, since the vast majority of players would still not have access to the queue.

TL;DR currently your negative reinforcement system has physical consequences (account bans, chat bans, etc) while your positive system doesn't really do anything. If you want to encourage players to be more positive, then hand out physical, noticeable rewards for being positive.

HunterOrion1 votes

^^ This. Just yes. I think that the punishment system is very real. So the reward system should have real rewards. Not just a pretty banner at the loading screen.

Dom1nati0n1 votes

I don't think we can afford right now to support anything but positive reinforcement. The community is toxic. And I don't think tossing people out like bad acorns is the right thing to do. I surely agree with this Summoner, and I hope that positive reinforcement is the only way that we need to deal with people in the future. A man can dream can't he? :)

Deep Terror Nami6 votes

Only a very small percentage of people ever receive the stick, and most of those never see the stick again. The stick works.

As for having carrots, they would need something that everyone from vs. AI casuals, normals, bronze to challenger, all these people can benefit from the carrot. e.g. giving IP boosts is nice for newer players, but veterans have exactly zero use for. A good carrot might be;

  • Fancy borders
  • Summoner Icons
  • Ward skins
  • Custom colors for Active items (Zhonya's, Sweeper/Scrying Orb) or Summoner spells

Basically, time and effort must be used on Riot's end to create incentives. What we need to do is convince them that it is worth their time. How? Hell if I know, but I'd even pay for palette swap actives.

  • Edit: Playing off Omnipherious's idea, each day you got a +1 honor you receive Good Behavior Points that can be redeemed in the store for the specific Goody-two-shoes carrot incentives listed above!
Omnipherious4 votes

How about a part of the store that has Borders/Icons/Ward Skins/Skins that can be bought only with with Good Behaviour Tokens?

Deep Terror Nami2 votes

I like that. I'll take it.

Sluiceway2 votes

What, if I may ask, would earn a player such tokens? Is it merely not getting reported (then how does Riot weed out false reports)? It is something that is tied to the honor system (because my experience of giving and getting honor leads me to the conclusion that honor is a spotty system: i.e. I get honor the majority of my honor when I play support and only infrequently when I am playing another role, even though I try at all times to play with the team in mind. Those times I give honor, it is usually to whole teams, unless it is for something like friendly or teaching, which are more individual in nature, though I don't have a firm system for honoring, so honors mostly depend on my mood at the time, and there are the games I mean to honor but click the home or play again button too quick.)? Or should there be a third criteria, either new or currently underused, to define who receives tokens?

Something I think could be improved in the carrot department, in any case, is defining the honor crests. As a random sample, let me ask here how many people know what the green honor crest I have stands for (no peeking please, I want to make this as fair as possible)? Because I find that the players I meet in a lobby, if they say anything about my crest at all do so only to ask what the green ribbon is. With Riot's interest in readability governing many of their recent and future updates, I think these crests should be looked at as well.

Rew7112 votes

I like the token idea. It brings with it rewards that do fit a standard but seem a little out of reach...

Someone, jerk or not, will report the good person doing the right thing. Good Behavior Points/Tokens, should be instead given to those with like 10/15/20 people saying he showed good behavior. Can be more but the thing is, it will come from players saying if you are friendly, team player, or such. To allow a token. I've only gotten a little over a hundred in a years worth so the token thing doesn't seem in good reach.

But I do like how these points are good ways to help the community.

Omnipherious1 votes

I think improving / expanding on the Honor system would probably help this type of token system.

It's extremely tricky, especially if anyone else is able to influence whether or not you get a token; the key thing is we don't want people going around asking for honor or something in order to get tokens in the first place. These tokens should be a product of continued good behaviour. How such behaviour is measured proves difficult given the current context of League since there are more measurements for negativity in place compared to the opposite.

This sort of system would need to be accompanied by a revamped Honor and Tribunal system IMO.

Let's say we got a Mentoring system at some point, positive feedback for mentors could be a criteria that increases progress towards a token. Like if you spectated a random game below your MMR and left 1-2 lines of feedback, the person then reviews the feedback and decides whether or not it was helpful (netting you a +1) or not (no change). This particular example shouldn't be abuse-able via the friend list.

Another measurement might be like, not accruing reports every 200 games or not being reported for 50 games in a row. Those take a crapton of time and aren't necessarily easy feats. I'm sure there are other ways but these are the best I can think off at the moment.

Omnipherious4 votes

I agree, carrots pls.

item 3166 ? Close enough.

Carrots Reward people for maintaining positive behaviour e.g. "Congratulations Summoner, you have not been reported for any negativity in the past 100 games. Here's a Skin Discount Token for your continued good sportsmanship!"

Encourage helping other players and distribution of honor e.g. "You have recently been recognized as a positive force in the League of Legends community. Have a 10-win IP boost and stay positive!"

Encourage curbing toxicity i.e. Reward players with +200 IP for contributing to the reformation of players with negative behaviour.

Introduce LP bonuses/penalties, Ranked is about Teamwork not Ego e.g. Maintaining positive behaviour gives you +10% LP per win and reduces LP loss by 10%; Consistently poor behaviour nets you 25% reduced LP per win and increased LP loss.

Grimztaa1 votes

I don't think getting reported should be a criteria for getting rewards in any kind... there are trolls out there who just simply report for no reason. their having a bad day, they report everyone they play with, winning or not.

Omnipherious1 votes

People who report spam are easy to pinpoint. Besides, report spamming can be criteria to count against reward progress.

PurpleKingCrazy3 votes

This system definitely needs a better rewarding systen.

So, more yays than nays!

(And when I mean by that, I do approve of more carrots in league.)

However, It is concerning trhat Riot should not "give cookies" to everyone. Yet, some rewards from doing your better in ranked, especially if you are unskilled, provides a better chance of learning better and getting stronger every time. But then you gotta "secrete" those pesky trolls that make the team worse than they are in ranked.

Mattarias2 votes

I dunno, I think maybe a lot of people, in their mad dash to the "carrot" might leave a decidedly unpretty wake. Or simply return to their bad habits. Like, a lot of people either didn't care about ribbons, or lost them and went "meh", never trying for them again.

I think the carrot and the stick both need to be used in equal measure.

AvariceSyn2 votes

The problem is that everyone is different. While people generally fall into broad categories, treatment or prevention of bad behavior, and rewards for good behavior, are based on the individual as far as effectiveness goes. Generally, I believe it's a good idea to contain both when the group of subjects is so grand that handling people on an individual level is nigh impossible.

Riot has already dabbled in granting the carrot in the form of the Santa Baron icon handed out to players who displayed good behavior during winter holiday. As far as its effectiveness, I'm not sure how it worked out. But it would certainly be nice to see more carrots than sticks.

ps. Had an all night Battlestar Galactica season 3 marathon last night with the life-duo, this thread is totally relevant!

JacobusSimon2 votes

This goes into the psychology field of operant conditioning, the modification of behaviour by the manipulation of surrounding events. The distinction drawn from there is between

  1. "positive reinforcement": providing something a person likes (perhaps IP, in this case) when that person does something you want, encouraging that behaviour
    versus
  2. "negative punishment": removing something a person likes (chat ability) when that person does something you don't want, discouraging that behaviour Studies generally show the former to be more effective in modifying behaviour in a lasting manner. This is not to say that negative punishment is useless, rather that positive reinforcement shows results faster and for a longer time.

For that reason I would be in favour of rewarding desirable behaviour in the community.

GhastlyGhoulMan2 votes

I think that should definitely be part of the honor system. Use rewards in a Pavlovian-like way to encourage good sportsmanship from people. :)

Orisi2 votes

I have to agree with this. I am open about the fact that while I do try to be a nice and positive player, and try to contribute to good atmospheres when they arrive, I can often be negative and get frustrated at the game, and we all do from time to time.

But the fact is, if the system's entire method of trying to prevent me from doing that, or persuade me not to do that, is stick based, it will fail. As Lyte has said repeatedly, very few of the community are actively consistently toxic, but the fact is much of the negativity and toxicity does come from those who are NOT consistently toxic, and will likely never receive a punishment for a behaviour they rarely exhibit. However, this fact does not make the experience any less negative.

Now, if I was sat in a game feeling stressed, but also felt like if I remained positive as I do in other games, I would actively be rewarded for it, perhaps through bonus IP, I might make more effort to repress the negativity, as opposed to having the ability to think "I haven't lashed out in awhile so it won't matter if I do". Maybe something as simple as putting a slightly stronger curve on the amount of teamwork/helpful/friendly rewards, but having those actively feed back into your IP, so that when they pop up, you know not only have the other players recognised having a good game with you, but you've gained maybe 20-30IP thanks to them recognising it, can make it feel more worthwhile. Having more consistent or attainable rewards long-term, like the skin discount tokens or even, maybe, the integration of these skin recolours as a non-cash redeemable reward for positive play, would be a great step forward, not only in the reformation of toxic players, but in the lowering of general negativity among the non-toxic.

Wullf2 votes

I beleive that Carrot was once tried. I am talking about Honor Ribbons.

But it failed. Not many people is using this system.

Thing is that when you end the game you automaticly press "home" button, or you go looking at damage statistics or you report someone for being such a prick. Not many people take time to think about their teammates to give them honor not mentioning the enemy. Neither do I. (well sometime I do u´but mostly not)

But.

Is not the solution close at hand. Is not the time to revive it?

GundayMonday2 votes

I like the idea, but seems like a waste of time since RiotLyte has recently revealed that ~99% of players are positive. That's a lot of good behavior points to give out (wouldn't feel special since everyone would have the rewards). Feel like this isn't as big of an issue anymore since the player behavior team is kicking ass and taking names.

MrBuffington2 votes

https://i.imgur.com/kCMhErX.png

Ironclad Dragon1 votes

I'm on-board for this.

Cuix1 votes

They already know. They've already talked about it... many, many, MANY times.

Furyful Fawful1 votes

Whatever way is decided to add the "carrot" I don't think it should be entirely clear how it's gotten. It should be more like "You were generally positive, so here's a reward/points towards the reward" to give players an incentive to be good players instead of players that farm for these points even when they don't deserve them.

Also, I thing I saw during my stint with DOTA 2 is a pop-up after some games asking me how I would rate some specific member of my team. I think that might go along well with the honor system to gauge how positive a summoner acts in-game.

Might.

Elphrihaim1 votes

Upvoted because closing comment.

ShadowKnight12241 votes

It always makes me extremely suspicious when people complain about the sticks/bans/etc. Lyte has stated over and over that the truly toxic part of the community is merely a minority when compared to the rest of the playerbase.

You shouldn't be afraid of the stick. There IS enough sticks for the toxic part of the community and it won't touch you unless you really deserve it.

Now the reward idea in and of itself isn't bad. It would be nice to have an incentive to be nice and positive in game (particularly in the face of toxicity).

TenSlashTen1 votes

Something that's actually intelligent. b

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