So, it has come to this: someone displayed misbehavior in a LoL match in flagrant disregard for the game's rules, ToS, EULA, and Summoner's Code. That's unfortunate, and I'm sorry you had to deal with it. If this misbehavior happened in chat (including emotes or ping) and they don't respond positively to a single, courteous, constructive request to focus on the game, your best option is to mute that player. Submit a report after the match. This is equivalent to dealing with a noisy person in a library by asking them to keep it down and then notifying library staff and moving to another area.
Do not respond with misbehavior of your own! If you do that, your teammates may mute and report you, and those reports would be valid. This is equivalent to dealing with a noisy person in a library by getting into a shouting match with them. Just because someone else started it doesn't justify you in continuing it. I'm sure you're familiar with the "s/he started it" trope, where two children get into an argument or fight and then try to claim innocence of any wrongdoing by claiming that they didn't instigate it. As any parent, teacher, or other supervisor of children will tell you, that excuse doesn't fly. When Dad is trying to drive you to Disneyland and your annoying brother starts making faces at you as he's previously been told not to, you should calmly ask him to stop, and then, if that doesn't work, calmly notify your parents of the problem. Making faces at him or shouting at him has never been a good way to get him to stop, and it makes you just as guilty of that as he.
Riot doesn't care who started it. Someone else's misbehavior does not justify your own.
From Riot's support knowledgebase:
- Simply speaking, retaliation is not an acceptable or justifiable behavior. An argument between two players can easily create a negative experience for the rest of the players in the game with you. Regardless of the other player’s actions, this does not justify your own behavior. You alone are responsible for your actions within the game.If you encounter a toxic player like this, the best option is to simply report their behavior and move on.
- Reports are a vital piece to the puzzle. If you are not sure of what sort of behavior is reportable take a look at the Reporting a Player FAQ
Your opinion of the rules is of zero relevance. When a cop stops you for going 40 in a 25 zone, you can claim "I think the limit should be 45 here" all you want. You're still getting a ticket. If a librarian asks you to keep your voice down while you use the facilities, shouting that libraries should be loud will simply get you escorted out. If you go to a friend's house who insists that you remove your shoes while you're in their home, "that's a stupid rule and I do what I want" will lose you a friend. If you are using someone else's services, facilities, equipment, etc., you abide by their rules or you deal with the consequences. If you think the rules should change, that is a completely different conversation (and I wouldn't give a plugged nickel for your chances at convincing Riot to change their rules to allow behavior like yours).
From Riot's support knowledgebase:
We work with the overall community and within our own company guidelines to identify what disruptive behavior is and what the consequences for those behaviors should be. We understand that it can be difficult to know where the line is, which is why we provide chat logs and we have a few tiers in the ban process in order to allow for you to learn and grow.
Riot's punishment system used to hand out stacking chat restrictions, such that consistently toxic players basically had a permanent chat restriction. Unfortunately, it turns out that such players used their few chat opportunities to be toxic, and, when they couldn't be as toxic as they wanted to, they resorted to committing non-chat offenses such as griefing (following someone around and taking their farm, using wall abilities to interfere with their play, etc.) or inting. The purpose of the punishment system is to eliminate rule-breaking, not make it worse. Thus, if a couple chat restrictions don't make any difference in a player's misbehavior, the system ramps up the punishments until the player is permabanned and thus unable to use that account to break any more rules ever again.
Riot used to give toxic players a long series of gradually-increasing suspensions. However, they found that players who got more than a few punishments would never stop misbehaving and receiving punishments. As the goal of the punishment system is to eliminate rule-breaking and Riot has absolutely no interest in coddling toxic players, the system was changed to eliminate this long tail of irredeemable players. Compared to the hundreds or even thousands of typical players who are bothered over dozens or hundreds of matches ruined by a toxic player, that one player's ability to annoy people merits no sympathy or concern. The preferred outcome of punishing a misbehaving player is reform: according to Riot's figures, most players who get one punishment never get another. However, when a player refuses to stop breaking the rules after a few warnings (punishments), they are removed from the game with a permaban because Riot no longer believes them capable of reform.
Did you find something in Riot's store allowing you to break the ToS? No, because such a service is not offered. Regardless of how much money you spend, you are required to follow the same rules as everyone else. If the IFS determines that you've been validly reported in violation of those rules, you'll be punished according to those rules. If you wanted to avoid a punishment, you should've followed the rules.
The ability to play on a new account doesn't negate the benefits of permabanning toxic players. If every single one of them did that, then it would at least be a minor punishment, taking away their unlocked skins, icons, champs, and so on. Any who don't do that are removed from the game and the problem is solved in at least those instances. Quite frankly, Riot and 99.994% of the playerbase (people without permabans, according to Riot's figures on this, which I see no reason to doubt) don't give one whit for how permabanned players feel about being ejected from the game for consistently appalling behavior. Most permabanned players stop playing the game. It's extremely rare for a permabanned player to be so oblivious and/or unbalanced that they accumulate multiple permabans on a series of accounts. Riot does not have the wherewithal to prevent that except when a highly-visible player (such as a popular streamer) engages in this behavior, in which case they may issue an ID ban (Riot employees manually ban any account that such a player is seen to use).
The money Riot gains from duplicate purchases on serial permabanned players' accounts pales in comparison to the many typical players driven away by toxic customers. It is not a conspiracy. Riot just doesn't want those toxic players to play the game anymore.
You are certainly allowed to defend yourself from toxic chat, which is accomplished by muting. This is a 100% effective method. Flaming back is a 0% effective method that also constitutes unacceptable behavior and thus opens you up to reports and punishments. Read about this in more detail here.
