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Share your solutions to reduce toxicity and griefing!

Corey Grim··1 votes·2,250 views

EDIT: The fact that this thread gets down voted should tell Riot that the current atmosphere is real problem that need to be solved. If player is trying to do something to help the company to make the game more enjoyable for players and gets downvoted -> That is real toxicity.

Hi!

I have been thinking lately how the community and riot could reduce the toxicity and griefing in this great game.I want to hear the players thoughts and other suggestions to do this. I strongly believe and hope the will is there to finally tackle the issue head on and start healing the playerbase. League is awesome game but it would be so much more awesome if we players together would really push for the change for better.

So I want to collect a list of suggestions, bad and good, so we maybe would get Riots attention and help them to help us. If you suggest a solution (seriously) I will edit it into end of this post.


My own suggestions (some may not be good, some have issues, but they are ideas nonetheless):

  • Give players only 2 (or so) reports per week, this way the amount of reports riot gets will decrease drastically and possibly enable them to dig deeper why the report was made and act accordingly.

  • If player gets banned, he will get "toxic" logo in front of his username. Any player who finds himself in the same team with toxic player is free to dodge without dodge penalty. Toxic logo reset after 6 months if no further bans were applied.- Tie accounts to phone number (no prepaids). This way you only have one main account and if you get ban you get all accounts banned.

  • Getting banned will reduce your LP gain and increase LP loss.

  • Make it possible to votekick a player from game. resulting 4v5 game, the amount of money the kicked player had is divided for remaining players.

  • Tie accounts to phone number (no prepaids). This way you only have one main account and if you get ban you get all accounts banned.

  • Getting banned will reduce your LP gain and increase LP loss.


Thank you for caring, lets do this people!


Suggestions from players:

  • Instead of banning people for typing you should ban people who run it down mid, int, and actually ruin the game in a way that can't be solved by the click of a button.

  • Use the account share ai to understand trolling and inting

  • Educate people on what is actually griefing and when is it not.

  • Add a friendly alert when recent behavior has been problematic but insufficient to trigger a punishment. With luck this makes people take a second look at how they're behaving before they get punished.

  • Add the same friendly reminders when a player has been recently punished, decreasing in frequency over time. With luck this helps people remember to watch their behavior post-punishment as well.

  • Remove the punishment confirmation pop-up, but add a place on your private profile where you can see the number of punishments your reports added to. Update it weekly so you can't tell when a particular player was punished. This should help people remember that the system is working. Consider adding a seasonal reward for accuracy in reporting toxic behavior, so that players aren't encouraged to simply spam reports to see the number rise.

  • Equalize win/loss XP a bit more, and either let First Win of the Day stack up to 2-3, or change it to a mission to Win 1 game or Play 2 games where you place at least 3 wards. This takes some of the feeling of loss out of only having time for 1-2 games and being on a loss streak, which should reduce frustration.

  • Should adjust QOS for queues so toxic players play less because they just aren't getting in as many games. should actually encourage team players rather than punish them.

31 Comments

im still toxic3 votes
  • Don't be a giant pussy and realize it's an online videogame and people are going to talk shit, and instead of banning people for typing you should ban people who run it down mid, int, and actually ruin the game in a way that can't be solved by the click of a button.
KVbqbFsC8e3 votes

Accept the reality that solving the issue of "toxicity" in a free to play online game was an unrealistic delusion of Lyte.

Corey Grim2 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Big Piece,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2018-07-31T10:25:43.307+0000)

Accept the reality that solving the issue of "toxicity" in a free to play online game was an unrealistic delusion of Lyte.

It is hardly unrealistic as other games can do it.

KVbqbFsC8e2 votes

No free to play competitive game will ever do that. Especially never in a moba, where you are punished for other peoples mistakes.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Big Piece,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=000100000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T10:41:17.124+0000)

No free to play competitive game will ever do that. Especially never in a moba, where you are punished for other peoples mistakes.

Because? I have couple friends who refuse to play League because ingame toxic behaviour (not chat thing). More happy players means more revenue.

KVbqbFsC8e2 votes

Because it's not realistic. Anyone is free to make multiple accounts and keep on playing if they are banned.

And in a large game such as League, where Riot uses an automated system, any kind of "toxicity" that isn't chat related is rarely detected.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Big Piece,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=00010000000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T10:52:19.463+0000)

Anyone is free to make multiple accounts and keep on playing if they are banned.

And changing this would not be a start to solution? Unrealistic is to believe it can be fully removed. Realistic is to figure out ways to reduce it.

KVbqbFsC8e1 votes

And how do you think Riot would be able to do that?

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Big Piece,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=0001000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T11:03:02.807+0000)

And how do you think Riot would be able to do that?

Phone number tied into account. It wont solve everything as there are ways around it, but it would be a step into right direction.

Also m8, feel free to suggest something that you think would work! This is why I started this thread, to find solutions, not to argue.

KVbqbFsC8e1 votes

Riot wants to keep League free to play. Not everyone owns a phone. I don't think there is anything that would work, but I do agree with I'm Still Toxic's response that Riot should put a much bigger focus on gameplay toxicity.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Big Piece,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=000100000000000000000000000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T11:18:28.418+0000)

Riot wants to keep League free to play. Not everyone owns a phone. I don't think there is anything that would work, but I do agree with I'm Still Toxic's response that Riot should put a much bigger focus on gameplay toxicity.

Are you really telling me that there are many people who dont have a phone but do have computer that can play LoL?

Also: I agree with you that there should be bigger focus on gameplay toxicity.

im still toxic2 votes

Sounds to me like your friends could use some thicker skin, if they stopped playing a game they liked cuz their feelings got hurt.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=im still toxic,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=00010000000000000001,timestamp=2018-07-31T11:02:12.990+0000)

Sounds to me like your friends could use some thicker skin, if they stopped playing a game they liked cuz their feelings got hurt.

It wasnt about feelings hurt, it was about other people trolling. As said not a chat thing but more like this: friend goes jungle, after 3 minutes adc twitch goes to mid and leaves tank support alone in hard pushing lane, jungler is forced to go help bot, adc starts jungling (without smite), jungler stuck in adc position with non adc champ adc keeps roaming the map and taking farm from every lane and taking own teams buffs without helping anyone. Shows up after teamfight to get himself kills, not helping to win teamfights.

That is just one example, but that is not about "grow thicker skin", its about ruining othervise good game.

Shukr4n2 votes

We have an ai that can understand if u are playing another account by mouse pattern and button pressed and stuff.

But

It cannot understand if u suicide diving or just afk die or troll

Amazing ai is amazing.

Tl;dr: use the account share ai to understand trolling and inting

Kei1432 votes

Educate people on what is actually griefing and when is it not.

ModThe Djinn2 votes

I'm going to talk about a few of these, and then share some thoughts.

#Addressing Current Suggestions

  • Give players only 2 (or so) reports per week, this way the amount of reports riot gets will decrease drastically and possibly enable them to dig deeper why the report was made and act accordingly.

Not a fan of this. It will greatly frustrate players who run into situations that require reports, will mean that a lot of toxicity goes unreported if people run out of reports, and the system already digs pretty deep into the behavior in question, so a deeper dive isn't really useful. Improper bans are pretty rare, and significantly reducing throughput (and adding feelings of player powerlessness when out of reports) to try to get one or two percentage points more accurate isn't worth it.

  • If player gets banned, he will get "toxic" logo in front of his username. Any player who finds himself in the same team with toxic player is free to dodge without dodge penalty. Toxic logo reset after 6 months if no further bans were applied.

This is largely the same as booting them from the game entirely, and also makes queue times longer for unpunished players who don't want toxic teammates. Further, it's a very obvious brand of "you are poorly behaved," and Riot tries to avoid those because it makes people a target for blame and toxicity.

  • Tie accounts to phone number (no prepaids). This way you only have one main account and if you get ban you get all accounts banned.

There are large portions of the playerbase who may not have a phone, or may only have a prepaid phone. While this may be uncommon to your friends, bear in mind that League's playerbase is 13+ in a wide range of countries, and these things are not as common everywhere as we might like to think. In short, the answer to your question "Are you really telling me that there are many people who dont have a phone but do have computer that can play LoL?" is yes. Shared computers, college campuses, cyber cafes, and the like are all common in the League playerbase.

  • Getting banned will reduce your LP gain and increase LP loss.

This simply makes the MMR system less accurate, and leads to unbalanced games for those player forced to play with a toxic player with an artificiality lower ranking.

  • Make it possible to votekick a player from game. resulting 4v5 game, the amount of money the kicked player had is divided for remaining players.

This punishes players who have bad games, and throws off the balance for any game it occurs in if it gets a team of assassins and mid-game-brawlers fed early.

  • Instead of banning people for typing you should ban people who run it down mid, int, and actually ruin the game in a way that can't be solved by the click of a button.

Riot tries to do both, and "don't ban toxic chat" is something of a non-starter, as Riot has taken a strong policy against that behavior and seems to have no interest in changing that. This isn't an "either/or" situation.

  • Use the account share ai to understand trolling and inting

Riot is working on this, to the best of my knowledge. It's a more complicated puzzle than people think, as while individual play patterns can indicate whether or not one individual is playing on an account or not, finding sufficient commonality between all intentional feeding behaviors to be able to systemically identify when a specific individual is intentionally feeding is a bit trickier.

  • Educate people on what is actually griefing and when is it not.

Agreed. A lot of players seem to consider "doing poorly" or "making bad decisions" or "not listening to our calls" to be the same as "griefing" or "intentionally feeding," which isn't true.


#Personal Suggestions

  • Add a friendly alert when recent behavior has been problematic but insufficient to trigger a punishment. With luck this makes people take a second look at how they're behaving before they get punished.
  • Add the same friendly reminders when a player has been recently punished, decreasing in frequency over time. With luck this helps people remember to watch their behavior post-punishment as well.
  • Remove the punishment confirmation pop-up, but add a place on your private profile where you can see the number of punishments your reports added to. Update it weekly so you can't tell when a particular player was punished. This should help people remember that the system is working. Consider adding a seasonal reward for accuracy in reporting toxic behavior, so that players aren't encouraged to simply spam reports to see the number rise.
  • Equalize win/loss XP a bit more, and either let First Win of the Day stack up to 2-3, or change it to a mission to Win 1 game or Play 2 games where you place at least 3 wards. This takes some of the feeling of loss out of only having time for 1-2 games and being on a loss streak, which should reduce frustration.
Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Djinn,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=0004,timestamp=2018-07-31T13:36:51.724+0000)

I'm going to talk about a few of these, and then share some thoughts.


There are large portions of the playerbase who may not have a phone, or may only have a prepaid phone. While this may be uncommon to your friends, bear in mind that League's playerbase is 13+ in a wide range of countries, and these things are not as common everywhere as we might like to think.

For younger folks and people without phone you always have your parents/guardians etc. phone number. I think 14 year old dude would behave himself when his accounts are tied to his dad's phone number. If you get banned, I do not believe many parents would be smiling when receiving text message that you have been banned for toxic behaviour. That said, I do understand your point, I am by no means trying to be elitist prick with this, just trying to figure out a better way. BTW as far as I understand Korean server accounts are tied to phone number already. It does not mean it is ultimate solution, but it somewhat would reduce bad behaviour that if you want to open up a new account you need to get non prepaid sim and pay for it.

In other words, I believe it is step 1 to the right direction but it won't solve anything without proper follow up and figuring out other strategies to reduce griefing.

ModThe Djinn2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Corey Grim,realm=EUW,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=00040000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:05:02.322+0000)For younger folks and people without phone you always have your parents/guardians etc. phone number.

An individual might not have a parent. The parent might not have a phone, or not want his/her phone being used. There might be multiple siblings. The family may only use pre-paid phones.

In other words, I believe it is step 1 to the right direction but it won't solve anything without proper follow up and figuring out other strategies to reduce griefing.

I think the phone system is frankly not the ideal place to being, as it may make getting a new account harder, but it doesn't directly do anything to help address toxicity. Hence why I offered a few suggestions aimed at helping with in-game behavior and reminders.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Djinn,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=000400000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:15:16.038+0000)

An individual might not have a parent. The parent might not have a phone, or not want his/her phone being used. There might be multiple siblings. The family may only use pre-paid phones.

I think the phone system is frankly not the ideal place to being, as it may make getting a new account harder, but it doesn't directly do anything to help address toxicity. Hence why I offered a few suggestions aimed at helping with in-game behavior and reminders.

One of the main problems is that RIOT does not identify you, just your email. Emails are plentiful, if you want to have 1000 accounts for trolling, you can, You will never be banned from the game permanently, there is no cost to your "main account" if you play nice there, but you can just burn trough 999 accounts without a worry of concequenses.

This in my opinion, is the root problem to even start to solve other issues, if ban does not affect anything, it has no consequense, then why try to improve banning at all?

ModThe Djinn1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Corey Grim,realm=EUW,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=0004000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:22:41.440+0000)This in my opinion, is the root problem to even start to solve other issues, if ban does not affect anything, it has no consequense, then why try to improve banning at all?

You'll notice that none of my suggestions actually aimed at improving banning, but rather at reducing toxicity. This is because bans are fairly easy to circumvent (even throwaway phone numbers), and also because, as Riot has said, a large number of banned players do stop playing or return better behaved. I really don't think the issue is that bans don't work, but rather that there things we could be doing to prevent bans from being needed as often because there are more ways for players to be reminded and encouraged to behave.

There will always be assholes, and those assholes who are dedicated to finding ways around the system will always do so.

Corey Grim1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Djinn,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=00040000000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:31:58.305+0000)

You'll notice that none of my suggestions actually aimed at improving banning, but rather at reducing toxicity. This is because bans are fairly easy to circumvent (even throwaway phone numbers), and also because, as Riot has said, a large number of banned players do stop playing or return better behaved. I really don't think the issue is that bans don't work, but rather that there things we could be doing to prevent bans from being needed as often because there are more ways for players to be reminded and encouraged to behave.

There will always be assholes, and those assholes who are dedicated to finding ways around the system will always do so.

I understand your point and agree that there will always be assholes, and it is unrealistic to try to have all removed from the game as they will figure out workarounds. However, if your account is identifiable to you and reminding/banning you from the game is much more devastating (as it should be) than banning your throwaway email account. Sim cards cost money and getting new requires atleast some effort.

The important thing is that players would not want to get banned (phone number) vs it does not matter if you get banned (email).

EDIT: Other idea that just came into my mind is single 5-10€ fee to get a "key" of sorts, under that key are all your accounts, no monthly fees, just "entry" to start playing. If you get banned all the accounts under that key will get banned also. Ofc, rich toxic trolls don't care, but I personally would not like to pay 10 € just because one game I ran around stealing all my junglers camps.

ModThe Djinn2 votes

[{quoted}](name=Corey Grim,realm=EUW,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=000400000000000000000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:38:11.265+0000)Sim cards cost money and getting new requires at least some effort.

I get that, but even Sim Cards are pretty cheap, and I'm not sure the added security is worth the potential problems. If League thought that mandatory phone numbers was a good solution, I suspect we'd have it by now, as that's a fairly obvious solution -- unless, of course, data shows that it wouldn't be a good idea, which I suspect is the case currently.

The important thing is that players would not want to get banned (phone number) vs it does not matter if you get banned (email).

I don't believe this will be as big a discouragement as you suspect. It's not a bad solution, necessarily, but it seems like a potentially problematic one and, without access to data neither of us has regarding League's playerbase and the average access to phones for this purpose, I can't do more than say "it COULD work, but would need to be seriously investigated as a solution first."

Bijeesny2 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Djinn,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=000400000000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:15:16.038+0000)

An individual might not have a parent. The parent might not have a phone, or not want his/her phone being used. There might be multiple siblings. The family may only use pre-paid phones.

Now you're just making the most stupidest excuses xd 99% of kids who are young af (and im talking about 8-10 yrs old) in my country (which isn't in the best financial state) have brand new Samsung/iPhone phones. My country is a fucking shitstain compared to America, so pls don't make such excuses buddy. If kids in my country can get their hands on brand new phones, kids in your country can DEFINITELY get one, or at least some shitty Nokia 3310 in the worst case scenario.

I think the phone system is frankly not the ideal place to being, as it may make getting a new account harder, but it doesn't directly do anything to help address toxicity. Hence why I offered a few suggestions aimed at helping with in-game behavior and reminders.

But you only offered suggestions about chat toxicity...what about trolls?

ModThe Djinn2 votes

{quoted}Now you're just making the most stupidest excuses xd

About 95% of families in the US have a mobile phone, with smartphones up at 77%. There is no recent study that I have found of how many parents will let their children use their phones for this sort of purpose, but I'm not convinced the number is at 100%, so this could actually result in a significant (not enormous, but significant) drop of a few percentage points of possible players.

Now, without looking at the data myself I can't say for sure, but it is something that would need to be considered.

99% of kids who are young af (and im talking about 8-10 yrs old) in my country (which isn't in the best financial state) have brand new Samsung/iPhone phones.

Can i ask what country? Because that statistic seems implausibly high, and I'd love to check the actual data.

But you only offered suggestions about chat toxicity...what about trolls?

The topic asked for some suggestions to reduce toxicity and griefing, and I provided some. I did not provide suggestions intended to solve every issue -- simple to alleviate some forms of toxicity.

Bijeesny1 votes

[{quoted}](name=The Djinn,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=TqgA6HxP,comment-id=00040000000000010000,timestamp=2018-07-31T14:52:53.803+0000)

Can i ask what country? Because that statistic seems implausibly high, and I'd love to check the actual data.

Croatia.

ModThe Djinn1 votes

{quoted}

Croatia.

So the best scholarly sources I can find are a little outdated at the moment (looks like 2015 data, so we can assume a rise from this), but it looks like Croatia's 2015 smartphone usage was at about 60% of the population, and was estimated to reach about 65% by 2021 based on the rate of change.

Given that the US rate was 75% at this time period, and rose to about 77% now, that seems reasonable, and also means that the cellphone rate in general is likely slightly lower, so about 85-90% seems like a reasonable guess (I can't find the statistics for all cellphones).

This does make me highly suspicious of the "99% of teenagers have brand new Samsung phones" though, because statistically that seems impossible given this data.

afmghost2 votes

Instead of typing your messages, yell them at your computer screen. Your neighbors will call you nuts, but at least you won't piss other players off.

I Yuke I1 votes

Should adjust QOS for queues so toxic players play less because they just aren't getting in as many games.

should actually encourage team players rather than punish them.

SugeMinPikk1 votes

Mute button

Nothing is going to stop someone who wants to ruin the game by gameplay. Especially on a free game.

candiggler1 votes

Make league 16+ game to play, the toxicity will vanish over night.

Voldymort2 votes

phisical age =/= mental age

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