Demoting
(not exactly sure which board this would best belong in) Dear Riot,
As I'm sure you know most of us who play League just play for fun. I like to think of it as a pick-up basketball game. We get competitive, we try our best, we work really hard, but we're not expecting to join the big leagues. We just want to have some competitive fun, and thus also play the ranking system in a casual manner.
"If you're just playing casually, why bother playing ranked then?" you ask. Because I like the competitive feel, I've been playing for two years and am familiar with the champions and game play, and I like having a long term goal like the season rewards and ward skins and such, which are excellent incentives for people to attempt the ranked circuit. I understand the grind up to Challenger, Diamond, or Platinum needs to be challenging, but for most of us who are just trying to work our way through Silver I believe the demoting system is FAR too harsh. It's hard enough getting enough LP and working through a promotion series, especially when you can only play a few games a week. It takes me a long time to get up there in the ranks due to time constraints, so when I get demoted from Silver 1 back down to Silver 2 after few months of doing a couple games every day it really dissuades me from playing the game ENTIRELY.
Demoting of course only happens when you lose a few games in a row, but there are many times you can't do anything about the circumstances. There are issues with team mates of course, such as someone having internet trouble, or rage quitting, or trolling, but there are also plenty of people who come in on "smurf" accounts and play against us in the Silver leagues who are much less skilled and experienced. This is also ultimately a team game, so I find it rather backwards that most people feel they need to master a champion that can, "Carry you to Gold/Platinum." When it comes to team mate issues I try to foster good team relations in every game I play to get everyone in a cooperative mood. I try to find out what people prefer to play lane wise and to choose a champion that I'm confident with that combines well with the team, but when things turn south it rarely ever matters. The toxicity of a team can be rough enough to deal with, especially if you're already frustrated 'cause you made a lot of mistakes, now add on top of that a demotion at the end of a horrible game. All it does for me is make me want to turn it off for good, and I think many in the League of Legends community would agree with me. I feel a lot of this negativity, and perhaps even some of the player toxicity, can be deterred by removing demotion from the Silver and Bronze leagues, thus making the penalty for losing in the early stages of ranked play not quite so harsh.
Sincerely, A slightly salted Silver Leaguer
