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Discussion on Inebriation & Similar Disadvantages

Umbral Regent·8/22/2018, 1:33:44 PM·1 votes·3,074 views

EDIT: So, I'm seeing something of a larger portion of the discussion at present being geared a little more towards the solitary case of being inebriated, and I feel that my post's title may be doing a lot of the miscommunication.

To clarify, I'm not talking about being inebriated in and of itself, but rather the general claim/mention of being inebriated or otherwise similarly disadvantaged. I'm focusing more on the potential morale impact of the claim/mention than the actual inebriation itself.

The discussion is still appreciated, but I felt as though I may have messed up in terms of clarity.

So, I'm sure we've all had that match at least once, where you're getting into a game of League, and out of the blue in Champion Select, or early into the match, someone chimes in saying "i'm drunk lol" or "i'm high".

And I could imagine that one wouldn't have to drink or get high themselves to know that that's generally a bad thing to hear in a game that demands focus and attention.

The match goes on; the lane with the inebriated player starts going sour...Unfortunately, as expected. Inevitably, the team at large starts doing worse - the enemy outroams, has their objective game on point, and your team loses.

And I'd reckon at least a few people in that situation would think to themselves "why did this guy have to go and get drunk before playing League?" or "why couldn't they just play a single player game if they're gonna be high?"

Now, that scenario throws up a lot of questions. Did the team actually lose because of the drunk player? Did the drunk player effectively harm team morale with their pointless quip at the beginning? Did the "drunk" player actually go and get inebriated before booting up League? Or, did the enemy team just trash you?

It's virtually impossible to rightly answer them all, but, for the largest part, I want to zero in on that second question. "Did the drunk player effectively harm team morale", since that's the only thing that can effectively be spoken for (due to it being impossible to verify whether or not a player is actually drunk/high/whatever).

I will speak for myself first; My expectations for a given match drop dramatically when someone says "I'm high" or "I'm drunk". I don't know where their thought process goes sideways, but I cannot fathom anyone in their right mind deciding "let's play League while drunk". Getting drunk or high puts someone at a serious disadvantage for something that requires focus and attention from all players, and the mere mention of it from someone makes me feel like they don't want to win.

Part of me has been mulling this over in my head for a while. I know for a fact that simply getting drunk can't be punishable, because there's no way for Riot to verify whether or not someone did drink before playing. But, there's still one constant in those scenarios that I'm curious about applying punishments for; the mention of being drunk or high.

So, before I get my rough idea out there, I'm going to reference Kei143's simplification of the IFS for it, so I may as well give a brief rundown on that just in case;

Kei143 explains the IFS as follows; valid reports result in a penalty score being applied to the account, with the score varying depending on the misbehavior it is applied for. Minor negativity (defeatism, arguing) is something like a 5-10, flaming and excessive complaining can go from 15-25, harsh insults or excessive flame can go to 50-70, etc.

Once a penalty score reaches 100, the next tier of punishment is applied, so if someone starts fresh and has one game of excessive flame and attacking their team, and three or four games of general defeatism, that would add up to the 100 score and result in a chat restriction.

Some offenses (hate speech, encouragements of self-harm, & gameplay offenses) have a penalty score of 300, so they skip the first two chat restrictions and land straight on a 14-day ban.

With that explanation out of the way, here's what I'm thinking.

I feel as though talk about being inebriated, high, or under any similar disadvantageous influence should merit a light penalty score, somewhere (give or take) between 10-15~. I feel that it's bad enough to have a player at such a disadvantage, but tossing out something that could potentially harm team morale from the gate (or anywhere in the match, for that matter) is needless and potentially disruptive.

So, with that, I ask for everyone else's thoughts on the matter. Does the mention of being inebriated drop your expectations or morale? Do you feel that nonchalantly claiming to be drunk is behavior that could merit a punishment? If yes, would you consider my suggestion fair - and if no, what are your thoughts?

I'm hopeful to see discussion from either side, but I also write this all with the knowledge that my idea may not be considered, let alone approved by Riot, so take this as both a suggestion to be criticized and an opening for discussion on the topic. And if nothing else, I hope at the very least that this thread gives people something to think about.

22 Comments

ModThe Djinn8/22/2018, 2:07:41 PM4 votes

Does the mention of being inebriated drop your expectations or morale?

Maybe a bit, but the goal is still to win with the team I've got. 99% of the time I don't really care.

Do you feel that nonchalantly claiming to be drunk is behavior that could merit a punishment?

Not at all. Drinking it totally legal (for players over the allowed age in their country), and it's not okay to enforce the mental state a player is allowed to be in. Playing while frustrated, angry, sad, depressed, distracted, or anxious also influences your gameplay, after all, and in some cases moreso than inebriation.

Kei1438/22/2018, 2:55:15 PM2 votes

I'm going to preface my point with a video between high MMR ARAM player on alcohol and a sports psycologist:

https://youtu.be/CNrS579GS0s?t=5m

tldr: LoL is not a reaction based game, but a decision making based game. Alcohol can help remove the distractions and help people focus more on the decision making.

People at my ELO (low silver) don't look at the minimap often, they suck at CSing, they like to run in straight lines and don't make the decision to think about side stepping skill shots often, they don't take in account people's cooldowns, they suck at wave management and don't make very sound macro decisions.

The expectations range of people within that ELO is so huge that even if someone is drunk, it hardly influences how I expect them to perform.

So here is main question: Depending on the amount of alcohol intake and how inebriated a person is. Are they still capable of making sound decisions? If not, at what level can they perform (aka, what is their ceiling)? If they already don't CS well, don't look at the minimap, don't side step, don't take in account for CDs, don't have good wave and macro decisions, how much worse can they perform?

Granted, they can be so plastered to the point that they can't even click correctly. Yea, they shouldn't be playing. But if it's a bottle or a glass here and there so they can get buzzed and help them remove distractions around them, I'm OK with that.

I had a Nasus once say he's drunk. He got 179 stacks at 20 mins. Did he just get outplayed there? Or did his inebriation cause him to last hit even worse? I won't be able to tell in just 1 game, but his history should be able to say something.

Professor Ward8/22/2018, 1:47:12 PM1 votes

I dont drink, but man do i get tired of these being posted weekly, i get it though so ill be as un-biased as possible.

Basically this is what it comes down to, as in life:

If hes being an ass, or being a fool, its punishable, if not, hes just drunk.

Mental health and causes of current mental capability should not be limited to alcohol. As there are thousands of drugs you could be on currently. And way more in-life problems that could change your current mental state.

Is it also bannable that my jungler is on prescribed xanax because it makes him too passive? Or are we just witch hunting alcohol and its confessors? ** Is it bannable that dude just got a divorce? And will for certain be performing worse mentally?** Because i could argue that being a bigger factor than drugs in every case.

There are literally millions of combinations of mental health and drugs that you will encounter in game, even in sober people. Thinking alcohol has any more of a mental effect than a kid who was abused his whole life is cherrypicking.

I can say from experience that my worst league experiences dont come from drunks, but from people with other issues.

Phoenixdust8/22/2018, 1:51:09 PM1 votes

i could not care less if anybody says anything in a match. Until he does not influence my game then i'm cool with it. If he says he is drunk and plays like a drunk, thats another thing, but then he should be punished for his plays and not for chat. So i think punishing ppl writing this in chat is a VERY bad idea.

Or on the other case, i've seen Gragas players joking how drunk they are etc.. Knowing that Rito's chat detection system simply just looks for words, a joking Grag player would get banned (just like we see it with the "kys" baits), so that is another NO on this.

disregardable8/22/2018, 3:28:47 PM1 votes

I've seen people carry when being drunk, so it makes no difference to me. I don't care at all. getting a guy that loses because he's drunk is no different than getting a guy that loses because he sucks.

mlm olo mlm8/22/2018, 5:51:11 PM1 votes

If you get tilted by other peoples words, your will power is not strong enough.