Edit: This was mostly a rant from someone that was frustrated, and I think a lot of my point was lost in translation (partially my fault) and started a bit of arguing, which wasn't my intent.
Just removing this so it won't further any arguments or negative comments. Thanks for the positive or helpful comments that were left regardless, guys.
RiotLyte62 votesI'm actually curious if your memory is impacting your experiences and perception. When I review accounts and players that say they constantly see toxicity, usually it's in less than 10% of their games and for most players, they've never seen hate speech for 100s of games now.
If we just do simple things like measure the number of times n*gger is used in games globally, the rate per game has gone down dramatically in the past 3 years. Leavers/AFKs are down dramatically, and in Ranked is in less than 5% of games. However, we could always do better, and these negative behaviors still do happen sometimes. Are you perhaps remembering the negative events too strongly?
Von Thuggin6 votesI'm actually curious if your memory is impacting your experiences and perception. When I review accounts and players that say they constantly see toxicity, usually it's in less than 10% of their games and for most players, they've never seen hate speech for 100s of games now.
If we just do simple things like measure the number of times n*gger is used in games globally, the rate per game has gone down dramatically in the past 3 years. Leavers/AFKs are down dramatically, and in Ranked is in less than 5% of games. However, we could always do better, and these negative behaviors still do happen sometimes. Are you perhaps remembering the negative events too strongly?
Statistics without numbers aren't very meaningful. Some people's experience is bad, which is why they remember it so vividly. Also I don't know how you see some of these peoples chats if there's no tribunal. If i'm correct you can only see games that someone is reported in, and i highly doubt you'd spend so much time on a very miniscule dent in a major problem. It might be 10% of their games that you check, but for me i feel like it's about 30% of my games have someone who complain or cuss someone out in chat. Not to me persay, but to someone. And i do really understand this summoners pain. I may write another post about the problems in Rioters perceptive on the game and how they think it is versus reality. Who knows. i'm surprised a rioter actually read and replied to this. Either way, i hope you don't get many more toxic people and that the tribunal comes back, and to you Lyte, we should talk about these statistics that you manage to come up with, and the actual numbers that you get.
RiotLyte59 votesStatistics without numbers aren't very meaningful. Some people's experience is bad, which is why they remember it so vividly. Also I don't know how you see some of these peoples chats if there's no tribunal. If i'm correct you can only see games that someone is reported in, and i highly doubt you'd spend so much time on a very miniscule dent in a major problem. It might be 10% of their games that you check, but for me i feel like it's about 30% of my games have someone who complain or cuss someone out in chat. Not to me persay, but to someone.
Well, there's also research suggesting that humans will remember negative events and not positive ones, and that they may remember negative events 400% as vividly or intensely as positive ones. So if you have 99 neutral games and 1 negative game, you'll most likely only remember the negative one. It's known as negativity bias in Psychology.
Von Thuggin8 votesWell, there's also research suggesting that humans will remember negative events and not positive ones, and that they may remember negative events 400% as vividly or intensely as positive ones. So if you have 99 neutral games and 1 negative game, you'll most likely only remember the negative one. It's known as negativity bias in Psychology.
Please show me some of these research reports that you're finding or making, because I don't believe anything you're saying until i get some of your proof.
Von Thuggin3 votes[{quoted}](name=Girls Love,realm=NA,application-id=cIfEodbz,discussion-id=xcn4iUfy,comment-id=00020000000000000001,timestamp=2015-10-16T05:27:23.487+0000)
Thank you, but i did ask this from Lyte. Wikipedia, if you did not know, is a great source, but can be editted by anyone with an account on it. I'm talking about the physical website or published straight from the source, not from Wikipedia.
Jeddy01715 votesDo you not have the ability to google this info on your own?
RiotLyte61 votesPlease show me some of these research reports that you're finding or making, because I don't believe anything you're saying until i get some of your proof.
Just search negativity bias. It's common literature in psych.
Ito, Tiffany A.; Larsen, Jeff T.; Smith, N. Kyle; Cacioppo, John T. (1998). "Negative information weighs more heavily on the brain: The negativity bias in evaluative categorizations". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 75 (4): 887–900
Rozin, Paul; Royzman, Edward B. (2001). "Negativity bias, negativity dominance, and contagion" . Personality and Social Psychology Review.
Skadeglädje7 votesSince most Leaguers probably don't have access to PsycInfo, Wikipedia has a pretty good article on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negativity_bias#Learning_and_memory
T RexHasTinyArms2 votesPsycharticles > psychinfo everything is available in pdf and you don't have to worry about getting a physical copy from the uni if you find something useful to your lit review.
Skadeglädje1 votesWe're getting waaaaay OT here but technically PsycInfo (4 000 000 items) > PsycArticles (200 000 items).
T RexHasTinyArms1 votes:P yeah sry for the OT. PsycInfo definitely is more inclusive and for like dissertation or something is the way to go, but if it's just like a final paper for a class or mini lit review for a project I like PsycArticles bc it lets you be lazy and just pull everything up and read it without having to go get hard copies or worry about coordinating with the uni to get the articles you want. That way, if you just need support and research regarding a topic, rather than the perfect/absolute best fit research you can get regarding the topic, you aren't disappointed by bringing up something cool and not being able to access it.
Shyvana Bot1 votes(http://www.wisebrain.org/media/Papers/NegativeBiasInEaluativeCategories.pdf)
and
(https://sites.sas.upenn.edu/rozin/files/negbias198pspr2001pap.pdf)
were pretty easy to find on google. Although i work mostly with pubmed, the only google never fails.
WizxKalif2 votesIt so hard to get Rioters' attention when we need you to hear us as a community. You can't tell me none of the Reds see the threads with 500+ upvotes, especially when they're on threads that you guys specifically made. Can you at least tell us if you heard our concerns on the Ranked Season rewards thread about the loading screen boarders showing our end-of-season divisions? We were told that this would be brought specifically to your attention, Lyte. Tell me, are you hearing us? Better yet, are you listening to our concerns? Because Rioters' tendency to look the other way when it comes to things like this are what makes me embarrassed to say that I play League.
When you realize the ones who made and develop the damned game don't give a damn about the community, then maybe it's time to look for another game to play.
Von Thuggin1 votesIt so hard to get Rioters' attention when we need you to hear us as a community. You can't tell me none of the Reds see the threads with 500+ upvotes, especially when they're on threads that you guys specifically made. Can you at least tell us if you heard our concerns on the Ranked Season rewards thread about the loading screen boarders showing our end-of-season divisions? We were told that this would be brought specifically to your attention, Lyte. Tell me, are you hearing us? Better yet, are you listening to our concerns? Because Rioters' tendency to look the other way when it comes to things like this are what makes me embarrassed to say that I play League.
When you realize the ones who made and develop the damned game don't give a damn about the community, then maybe it's time to look for another game to play.
Amen sir, amen.
BastionKross18 votesLyte, you are one of my favorite Rioters for this reason alone.
Well this type of stuff, and all the public smitings that you gave out back on the old forums. Even though I perceive that League has been more or less constant in it's toxicity since I joined in season 3, every time I saw you post someone's logs and then hand out harsher punishments really made me feel like toxicity in League was being fixed. At least, temporarily.
Are there any plans for volunteer public trials like this? I believe that would be a morale boost for the community seeing toxic players get punished firsthand instead of just being told that "the system is working".
xFrostKnightx2 votesPublic shaming isn't encouraged. (You can get into serious trouble and problems unless they gave you permission to do it to them)
Lyte only came to publicly smite if the user begged for it claiming innocent.
The Yetii Rider3 votesJust search negativity bias. It's common literature in psych.
Ito, Tiffany A.; Larsen, Jeff T.; Smith, N. Kyle; Cacioppo, John T. (1998). "Negative information weighs more heavily on the brain: The negativity bias in evaluative categorizations". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 75 (4): 887–900
Rozin, Paul; Royzman, Edward B. (2001). "Negativity bias, negativity dominance, and contagion" . Personality and Social Psychology Review.
I'm just here for the Lyte 
findog1 votesGood man.
Final Boss Naut3 votesup voted, because i feel like this is a logical explanation of why people feel league is as negative as people feel in normals. lyte can i ask you a question, idk who's really in charge of it, but i was wondering if a rework can be considered to have successfully kept the identity of a champion if they have to change the title. idk if ranked has the same stats, because ranked stresses a lot of people more in different ways than normal games. my thing i find a problem in ranked is the in-tier promo's because i tilt often, i'll beat a promo and be back in the tier lower after a few games, which happens, but then i have to re-play the promo i beat the day before, which i feel extremely frustrated with.
Son Olivia Hye1 votesWell, there's also research suggesting that humans will remember negative events and not positive ones, and that they may remember negative events 400% as vividly or intensely as positive ones. So if you have 99 neutral games and 1 negative game, you'll most likely only remember the negative one. It's known as negativity bias in Psychology.
Psychology major confirmed
Trylobyte3 votes[{quoted}](name=Sneaky Kaiser,realm=NA,application-id=cIfEodbz,discussion-id=xcn4iUfy,comment-id=0002000000000004,timestamp=2015-10-16T16:12:14.059+0000)
Psychology major confirmed
You mean his job title, Lead Social Systems Designer, didn't give it away?
Hellpyre2 votesAlso I don't know how you see some of these peoples chats if there's no tribunal. If i'm correct you can only see games that someone is reported in
As far as it goes, Lyte (and the other Riot members dealing with Player Behavior) has access to all of a player's chat logs. Lyte in particular has occasionally (and at the request of a complaining party) gone through a player's reported and unreported logs and described trends in both.
SonicÐeHedgedawg3 votesI can honestly say that, as of late, I've had more ragers, trolls, afkers, griefers and feeders in ranked games than I have had in a long time (oddly enough, it's generally been precipitated by an adc mad that someone took a couple of their cs). But I'm perfectly aware that I could just be a statistical anomaly
BottleCapster4 votesIts kind of funny just how stark the difference between two people's sessions can be. I've always heard a lot about these Crazy ADs who just bitch and whine all day long, but after 3 years heading on 4 of being a support main, I've maybe been harassed about taking a few minions...... a handful of times. I'm kind of curious what factors go into people having so many negative experiences with their ADs, because from my own anecdotal experience, most of my carries are pretty nice, sure some of them are sour, some of them aren't that good, but overall, I've not been harassed by my carries save a few rainy day scenarios, and i LIVE in bot lane.
Jack º1 votesI wanna hug you right now, League is going nowhere, its still the best <3
Von Thuggin2 votes[{quoted}](name=Entropy Aether,realm=NA,application-id=cIfEodbz,discussion-id=xcn4iUfy,comment-id=00020002,timestamp=2015-10-16T05:08:49.387+0000)
I wanna hug you right now, League is going nowhere, its still the best <3
It is one of the best games out there, that's why i still play it. It's just how Riot treats the players and how they "try to become the best company in communicating with their community". I just wished that Riot took some consideration into Anything. it seems they don't even really think about game impacts anymore. Want some examples? Darius, Garen, Mordekaiser. Their reworks have shifted the entire meta of the game within a day of their reworks. Other examples, the tribunal. it's been "upgrading" for over a year now.
Entiwin2 votesSo, if I start recording my ranked games will that help you see something other than digits? Because I did notice, you did talk about psychology, "negativity bias". How about you address the fact that you have different ages, practically children playing League of legends. How about you guys make some simple changes to make it more professional for playing a "ranked" game. Because clearly in my game, I have "trolls" or "kids" that don't seem to understand the difference between a serious game, and a casual game. My memory isn't the best, so maybe you guys do need some physical/digital evidence of the community in silver games. Like, I think I would rather play in bronze more now, because people in that division actually want to improve. While I play games in silver, and it's like if I am on a treadmill and not going anywhere in that division.
I know LoL isn't perfect and you guys are working very hard, but there wouldn't really be this much "negativity" if there wasn't something wrong with people's games. I would like to suggest to you guys to really be strict on Ranked. More rules to keep a bit of order in there. Number of champions required, mastering champions ( since you did add that, might as well use it)
Because Ranked=/=casual games. Regardless of division/sub division
buffetfood1 votes[deleted]
PDE5 Inhibitors6 votesI'm going to be honest, this doesn't make sense. The % being lower still means that you should see it less, regardless of there being more players.
In your example, 200/10,000 is 2%. 100/1000 is 10%. If 10% of the community is toxic, there is an average of 1 toxic person per game. If 2% of the community is toxic, there is an average of 1 toxic person per 5 games. While 200>100, the % of the time you get a toxic player would still be lower.
DocShephard4 votesLyte, thank you for taking the time to engage this thread. I think your point is valid and well-thought out.
At the same time, I'd like to pose a rebuttal:
Does it truly matter whether toxicity is **actually ** constant or toxicity simply **feels ** constant when the result remains a jaded and angry playerbase? Sometimes it only takes that 10% to set someone off and create a ripple of negativity, like in a single promo game at the end of a hard fought streak.
It would be nice to see a proactive approach to toxic gameplay (feeding, trolling, baiting teammates - things certainly harder to monitor than chat logs) in the way that you've taken a stance against toxic language.
Jesus is Savior3 votesLeavers/AFKs are down dramatically, and in Ranked is in less than 5% of games.
I guess this confirms your detection system sucks, and it doesn't detect people who run around in circles in the base.
Because when I was active (over 2 months ago), leavers were WAY more frequent than this. I would say it was more like 1/5 games. But they wouldn't "leave," they would sit in the base and talk shit for the rest of the game.
slippykitten2 votesI'm actually curious if your memory is impacting your experiences and perception. When I review accounts and players that say they constantly see toxicity, usually it's in less than 10% of their games and for most players, they've never seen hate speech for 100s of games now.
If we just do simple things like measure the number of times n*gger is used in games globally, the rate per game has gone down dramatically in the past 3 years. Leavers/AFKs are down dramatically, and in Ranked is in less than 5% of games. However, we could always do better, and these negative behaviors still do happen sometimes. Are you perhaps remembering the negative events too strongly?
Could it possibly be that your data isn't actually encompassing the entirety of toxicity? If many people that have played for a long time say that toxicity is worse (me being one of them) then maybe there's something to it?
Or you could just simply passive aggressively insult their intelligence and tell them that they can't remember correctly and move on like everything is fine, which is what I expect you to do.
lolptwo2 votesHey Lyte,
As someone who's been extremely toxic before, reformed, and like the original OP agree wholeheartedly 100%, would you allow me to take screenshots of every game in a 100 games or so that people are toxic. I promise promise promise you, you will see roughly 40-50 games of extreme toxic, purposeful afk's and hate speeches. We aren't saying this just to f with you, it's true. I also understand negativity bias, I took psych in university, albeit i'm not a Psych major. So I try to be a little bit more understanding when I get 1 bad game of flamers. However when it's 2-3-4-5 games in a row with constant flamers, and sometimes it's the same person 2 games in a row. This is where it's not negativity bias, but it really only does(like the OP mentioned) take a couple games like this in a row to push someone to the point of quitting.
I am also someone who does not like to admit i'm part of this community to my friends. This game turns people into monsters, trust me, i've been there, and I'm known by my peers as a very understanding friendly person in real life.
Really though, it's the consistent negativity, consistent trash talk, game after game, day after day that did that to me.
RamboDash151 votesI often have games where no one is toxic, or no one even types in chat outside of "gg"
My theory is that because toxic behaviour and people leave more of an impact in people's minds, and as such creates a misconstrued image of the community in general. I've seen less toxicity in my games as of late with no change in either the time I play or the modes I play.
Not to say OP is wrong, toxicity is still in the game, but it's an interesting aspect of the memory and what is classified as important.
Only Play Darius8 votesI'm sorry the community ruined league for your friend.
It seems like it changed so suddenly too. I started mid S4 and still have fond memories of my climb to level 30. We were all new and all bad so no one flamed for feeding, no one called you an idiot if you were building hurricaine on Tristana, and smurfs were only encountered once in a while.
For the hell of it I made a new account recently and it's unbelievable how bad it is now. You have silver smurfs with suspended accounts calling a lvl6 a retard because they took Udyr mid, I kid you not every other game there is a lvl 12 Yasuo with 300 CS at 25 minutes, and matchmaking itself often decides to put a lvl17 against a legitimate gold 3 account in draft pick.
The new player experience used to be boot camp, now it's a gauntlet.
Kaitri5 votesits funny how in eu boards ppl will kill you if you say anything against eh community and here you get upvotes.
Inphernal5 votes"It's not our game it's your confirmation bias." fucking riot.
Remlap12232 votesDon't question Lyte guys, he's studied psychology.
Yeah, so have I, and I can still tell you the community has gotten worse. I've found a significant amount more of people saying "ggez" after games. More flaming their teammates, and AFKs, while haven't gone up, they still are a thing.
They need to stop making excuses and bring the Tribunal back and completely reform the ranked system from the ground up.
Scrimshäw4 votesthe reason for toxicity is honestly incredibly simple;
if you don't like someone, you're fucking stuck with them for like 30 minutes or more.
call of duty, halo, whatever the crap console game you want to play; you can literally just leave with hardly any repercussion, as a result, there is literally 0% shit talking and raging in my games when i play simple stuff like FPSs (my experience, but totally honest)
Remlap12232 votesTo further add to this, if someone is pissing you off in COD, you can mute them. If someone sucks, you can actually carry yourself and your team if you're good enough. If your team is pissing you off, even after you mute them, you can leave with only a defeat.
In LOL, you can't carry unless you're a carry, you need your team to work with each other or you're fucked, and if you leave, you get punished, ranging from a timed penalty before you get into queues, to suspension, to account removal. It's basically a troll's paradise.
Auroramancer4 votesAs someone who also has been playing for 5 years (Mordekaiser was the new champion release when I started), the fun of the game for me was because nobody knew what they were doing and the game lacked structure.
**There was immense reward for those who picked up the game well and knew how to play it right, and there was very low penalty for those who struggled to play the game right. **
Now look at League's culture. People are paying actual money to take classes from pro players. Playing the game has become a job for the average player, even if they aren't being paid for it. Everybody knows what they are doing now, even if they may not have the mechanics to perform those actions correctly. Now that there is a set meta-game, a structured way to play, there is more room for frustration for this team game because of team-based issues.
For example, post-beta League was a lot like basketball; everybody playing can be involved and doing something, but there is a lot of room for one player to carry really hard, and it's not that big of a deal to the newbies because that player is just really good at the game. The experienced player can do the same actions that every one of his teammates can, at any time of the game.
Current League is a lot like baseball; everybody has their own role and are limited to that one role, they cannot fill in for others at any point in the game, so any deficiency in the team's play can be pinpointed on a particular player not doing their job, and it is so obvious who is holding a team down given the structure of the game. Your first base man cannot also be fielding. Your batter pitcher cannot also be catcher. You can have great players guarding the bases, but if your fielders are shit, your whole team is going to be shit at defending.
And this is why current League is more prone to toxicity and negativity. It's easier to flame or get angry about players for not doing what they need to do, because the structure of the game defines that player's job, and everyone in the game knows it. All team's have a similar structure, so it's easier to compare/contrast players of the same role on the opposing teams. It's easy to rage over the fact that your left fielder can't catch/throw a ball to stop the other team from running the bases, while the other team's left fielder catches every ball and your team can't score at all because of it.
I'll even admit that my frustrations with the game come from this dynamic. It's when my teammates are completely outclassed by their counterparts or refuse to cooperate with the rest of the team. That one player who never follows their roaming lane opponent. That one player that calls Missing after their laner has already killed you. That one tank/support who is split pushing instead of team fighting. That one jungler who is always second to show up for ganks, only responding to the enemy jungler's movements. That one Marksman who refuses to auto attack in a team fight when only threatened by a zero-damage, cooldown-blown tank, and says "I NEED PEEL FROM LEONA". The structure of the game labels those who are weak and those who are strong, because of the criteria it provides to measure players by.
Now I'm not saying game structure is bad, but it certainly contributes to toxicity and negativity when the masses play the game by a certain structure, and it re-defines the conditions by which you have fun. You can have fun in basketball regardless of how everyone else is doing. You can't have fun in baseball when no one is working together. Current League is baseball, and ARAM is basketball.
MadClown3 votestl;dr Bit of a rant from someone who has been playing for 5 years and wondering what happened to this community. Gonna be a long one.
While the bans have gone up (supposedly) as of late, the toxic behaviour has gone up with it (not saying it is because of it, just an observation). It has gotten to the point I don't even want to admit to my friends I play this game because they know just as well as I do how terrible the community has gotten, and sadly it is the unvocal majority that is this way, unlike the vocal minority that tend to show up here. It is the ones that go into fun game modes and start calling people the N word, threatening people with cancer, saying all kinds of ridiculous stuff, intentionally feeding, all because they don't get a champion in All For One they want. It is the ones who can't handle dying 1-2 times in a game and start flaming everyone and everything for their own mistakes till it just takes the fun out of a game. It is the ones who will flame and talk down to actual new players for not knowing the "meta" or how to play a champ properly at level 10 (saw a ridiculous amount of this last night trying to teach a new friend how to play. He has already quit after 3 days of constant trash talk and berating from smurfs and I don't blame him). I remember when this game was about having fun, but now it is about nothing more than winning at all costs, and acting like a child if you don't (I've seen 30 year old men acting like 12 year olds in this game, so it isn't just teenagers). When did the fun leave? When did it start becoming the nor m to flame and dodge ARAM because you didn't get what you wanted and someone wouldn't trade with you? The worse part is, there are less people like me it seems that remember when the game wasn't like this, as you even have people thinking this is normal, and defending the trash talkers and feeders because they have the same terrible mentality. I give Riot credit for trying to fix it now, but I think it is a bit out of control overall, and now the punishments are just making some act out even worse, and overall it is about a year too late. I love this game and have since 2010, but I loved Eve Online at one point too, and sadly just like that game, it is the players ruining the fun experience, not the game.I hate to quit, but everytime I log in, I stay logged out that much longer.
I have a question not just for you but most of this community.Why does it bother you when someone insults you or anybody else?Why is it important to you what a random probably a teenage moron says to you in a online game???Why do you all care??Why are you so sensitive? I presonally dont care if someone flames at me or my teammate i instanlty mute them and you know what i dont even report them because i simply do not care and its stupid to report someone for raging i simply do not care i enjoy the game because its a fun game regardless of what sam random person in it says.Altought the reworks latley havr been annoying
Dedraak2 votesCompletely agree, it's not worth the time or effort to care about what other people think. Especially when it's over a computer and riot gives you the option to mute them.
jade harley BARK3 votesI mean, not every single person is like you. Mentally, some are much more unstable and cannot handle being flamed for no reason (and as someone who was once depressed, things like that can really affect you). It's cool that you don't take personal offense to someone being a jerk, but that doesn't mean toxicity isn't an issue and shouldn't be resolved. New players shouldn't have to be verbally abused because they make a mistake. Many want to be kind to their teammates and it's a large turn off to be playing a TEAM GAME full of people who tell you to kill yourself. Players who are toxic should not be a part of this community, period. It's unrealistic to believe all will be punished, but being indifferent towards it won't help.
MadClown1 votesI am not saying that toxicty isnt an issue.i do agree sincw most of this community is well like him emotionaly dependant lets put it that way.But to they way riot punishes people for being toxic or the way riot tries to change basicly human nature in some way.In my opinion that chat isnt even need the only time i use it is when i am playing premade but even that is rare since we are on team speak.Communication with pings is enough and all that writing in chat good or bad is simply distracting so i remove my chat i am suprised that i havent been reported or punished yet for refusing to communicate with the team.Also bear in mind that my attitude removeing chat might be this way because i just got out of bronze and i never so anything useful in that chat so i just remove it or mute everyone when i play ranked.
