Thoughts on Chat Restriction - Why It's Useless

TL;DR - Skip to the end.

So, needless to say I have been placed under chat restriction for around 70 games (in many ways this is fortunate, since it's happened before but I've never been straight-up banned by Riot or the Tribunal), and needless to say I'm not particularly pleased. Now, there's really no way for me to debate the reasoning behind it, since I think by-and-large my own toxicity is what I choose to type in chat, and not how I play, and I'm glad the Tribunal/Riot has correctly identified that this is what needs to be improved in order for me to consciously decide to think carefully about what I say to other Summoners.

Let me make a disclaimer before I explain why I despise this "chat restriction" concept, not just personally but as a behavior correction tool in general. It's not that I cannot see past the error of my own ways to recognize this as an effective opportunity for me to improve my behavior, it's that I simply will not. Look at it from my perspective first: I use the chat primarily as a way to communicate with my fellow summoners useful information such as flash timers, suggested gank paths, warnings about missing lane opponents, suggesting build paths when my teammates aren't sure what's best, and advising for or against specific strategic play either before or after they are made, all while using the **ping system ** in conjunction (which by the way I think is the greatest thing to happen to League in terms of communication).

The rub I have with the chat restriction is this: in most of my games, at least 9/10, dialogue in chat will occur that either bothers, insults, or otherwise frustrates another summoner or myself, and I will make use of the Mute feature, as I have determined that further communication with this individual is either futile (in terms of cooperating with them) or would be counter-intuitive to my own ability to play the game without going on tilt. Usually my reasons for muting someone can come down to a simple exchange of words that came across as either sour or (in my case) an attempt to dissuade me from taking a specific situation too seriously (phrases like "calm down" and "it's just a game" are particularly annoying for me personally to have to deal with, since they have completely the opposite effect on me).

If I use the mute feature, I no longer have an obligation to converse with the people that are irritating me, and I make sure right before I hit the button, I say in chat "muted" to let them know that I am indeed no longer paying any attention to what they are saying, at least in chat (since Riot has decided that muting someone doesn't mean that they still can't randomly ping whenever they feel like it, which is a huge mistake considering how toxic this community can be). So the question becomes: what's the point of the chat restriction if the mute feature exists?

A chat restriction limits YOUR ability to communicate at all in chat, instead causing you to favor pings, which is generally what I do anyway because everyone ends up muted because talking to them more often than not just causes myself and others unnecessary frustration. More than this, let's say I've already used my 3 messages per 5 minutes or whatever the timer is for it, and I am madly pinging "Be Careful" and "Enemies Missing" (as I have no other communicative options) after my lane opponent leaves lane, and then after their lane gets successfully ganked by the enemy team, they complain in chat "where was the mia?". I fail to see how I can take responsibility whatsoever for this, as I cannot physically reply nor warn them, and before you say "well, you brought your punishment upon yourself, and this is the type of thing you have to deal with before it's lifted", might I retort by saying: these people (like I said) would more than likely be permanently muted anyway the moment I pinged in a normal game and they didn't listen (as if they can't pay attention to a bunch of loud noises all occurring next to and around them, how do I expect them to read chat right before they overextend and are killed in the same way?).

Now obviously, as with all forms of conflict, there are always at least two parties involved, and I'm not suggesting that I have no responsibility whatsoever for my toxic behavior towards others in this game (except that you'll find it's always mutual and never only one side to blame once conflict does arise). But what I'm getting at here is that a chat restriction explicitly will have zero effect (at least on me) in terms of a way to correct whatever behavior I was exhibiting in chat to earn it. I am still free to spew at least 6 - 7 toxic messages per game, I can still mute everyone and never speak a word (not uncommon pre-chat restriction), and I can still block and report everyone who made the game a miserable experience after it's ended, just like normal.

As an alternative, I think first I might recommend that Riot stop taking half-measures as far as toxicity is concerned. Don't RESTRICT the chat of someone who is specifically showing bad sportsmanship in chat, take it away COMPLETELY and make sure other summoners know it (a HUD indicator on the TAB bar next to the mute button displaying the Summoner as being under a full chat restriction, nothing too fancy or overt). The Ping System is more than enough for people to recognize attempts at communication, and only in higher elo (Platinum or above) will communicating more strategically prove more of an advantage. By this time though, people should be used to the new ping system and accept that if that's the only way players choose to communicate in a game, that's just the way it is. That's a much better alternative I think than having to read a bunch of people arguing in chat, since it means that the Summoner has to use their MOUSE and not their KEYBOARD to both communicate and play the game. People who type in chat during the game are often just standing there doing absolutely nothing, when they could be focusing on playing the game rather than acting as a negative and disruptive force in a game where teamwork is essential for success. If Summoners are either chat restricted themselves for bad behavior or know others are, they'll wise up and use pings instead of words to tell their fellow players what they need to know, and if that doesn't work, then post-game that "Refusing to Communicate with Team" report option becomes a much more viable way to punish people.

I couldn't possibly fathom what the people at the Tribunal are thinking sometimes, as what works in practice and what works on paper are obviously not mutually exclusive, and the fact that I feel as though they read more chat logs than they actually WATCH the games in which the chat occurred is absurd. The events of the game tie into the usage of language much more than the interaction itself, and if those who are responsible for punishing toxic players can't realize this, then this game's community will literally NEVER improve in the slightest. In-game decision-making should be much higher on the priority list for being toxic behavior than whatever the hell they decide to type in chat from one game to the next. You can MUTE other players, but you cannot VOTE-KICK them in League of Legends, and this is why a Riot needs to start thinking much more carefully about HOW they punish and not just WHOM, just like I need to think more carefully about my own behavior.