@Riot Trolls and Reporting - A Suggestion for Improving Player Experience
So today I was playing League and I got a troll support (I main ADC). I had had a pretty good game myself, and played well, so I was obviously a bit upset. I reported him after the game ended, and as did my other team mates. He said he was happy he had "taught me a lesson for being a bad ADC who relies on items". Okay, oh well, right? It happens. I waited a few minutes before re-queuing, and lo and behold in my next lobby he was there again. I'd already lost LP due to him trolling, so I asked if anyone else would be willing to skip queue. Everyone refused (I didn't really expect anyone too, people never do) even though he stated in lobby "oh good, I get to teach this ADC a lesson again". He proceeded to do the exact same thing as in the previous game, and in the end commented how glad he was to have been able to ruin another of my games. However, the fact that I was trolled is honestly largely irrelevant to the purpose of this post. Rather, I'd like to give an easily implemented suggestion that might help improve player experience and reduce overall toxicity.
My issue here isn't that players like him exist (I understand that it happens, especially at lower Elo's like where I am) and that it is difficult for Riot to really prevent these kinds of players from ruining the game experience for others. However, the real problem is that after reporting a player for intentional feeding I was matched with them in queue immediately again. Doesn't it strike others as an issue that someone who you reported for toxicity / griefing can be matched with you in the very next game? I understand that preventing that would have potential for abuse, you could simply report unskilled players and gradually only be matched with more skilled players as you had more "non matchable due to report" players. However, I think it would greatly improve the user experience if we had the ability (maybe even just once a day) to skip queue without a penalty if we are matched with someone we have reported within the last 3 games. Even if the report is not valid / deserved, if someone got reported then that team was obviously having some conflict and toxicity, regardless of the source, and forcing you to play again with someone that you are going to have a hard time working with is an unfair game state. The whole point of the new dynamic queue system was to make both teams feel more unified and prepared for a game. No more arguments over who gets what position, and the pick intent feature is a great way to coordinate strategy!
I feel that adding a system whereby you can skip queue without a penalty if you are matched with someone that you reported within the last 3 games would be a very feasible, fair, and difficult to exploit mechanism that would greatly improve user experience as well as be totally in line with recent game design choices by Riot. I understand that at higher elo's this might cause problems, as at the Diamon + level there are less and less total players you will get matched with, thus allowing a free skip to be quite problematic. However, the vast majority of the League community is in Bronze - Gold (I believe what I've heard is upwards of 90% but I might be wrong). As such, I think that implementing this system in the bottom three tiers of play (Bronze - Gold) would be a reasonable accommodation. It makes sense that as you get a higher ranking you lose certain "crutches" (for instance once you reach a high enough tier your LP starts to decay) and this would be just another such "crutch" that you would lose once you progressed into higher levels of play. This would be especially helpful for the retention of newer players, as it would to some extent allow them to reduce the amount of toxicity that they face (the experience of someone who has just reached ranked play is often incredibly negative).
I'd like to be clear that this thread is not simply me wanting an outlet to complain, but moreover a venue for me to try and improve a game that I enjoy playing very much! I know that adding @Riot won't necessarily help this thread get any official response, but I really do hope that someone at Riot will take a look at this thread, and at least give me their thoughts on the matter! My hope is for the League community to be the best it can be, and I think this would go a long way towards achieving that. After all, League is a game, and we should be having fun, not worrying about whether we will match with toxic players repeatedly.
TLDR: In order to improve player experience and reduce toxicity, a system should be implemented in Ranked for Tiers Bronze - Gold wherein if you have reported a player within the last three games, and then match with them again, you are able to skip queue without penalty. This would be in line with the current direction of Riot's game design (as shown by their announcements and dialogue around the dynamic queue system) as it would allow teams to focus on the game, and not worry about being rematched with toxic players