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Does Riot care about the toxicity in League of Legends?

NappyXIII·6/21/2017, 8:58:11 PM·8 votes·2,078 views

I'm a long time player for many years, and despite all the changes to items, the meta, queues, and roles, one thing has obviously remained consistent. The toxicity of the community and the game.

Now this obviously doesn't stem originally from the game itself, a lot of it has to do with the "black mirror" and the anonymity of the Internet, sure. But despite this, there are many ways to combat and otherwise mitigate this kind of behavior in online communities. In fact, according to Riot, they have a team with multiple PhDs working on this problem with the community as part of their game. I said, according to Riot, because I have seen very little to no information from the company regarding these issues in the last couple years.

I think it's great that narrative has been revamped, and there is more careful attention to things like "transparency" with updates to abilities and VFX in the last couple years, not to mention the reworks. But why is there almost no information or update released regarding the toxicity in the game.

Forget queue health, I want an update on community health. Not only has the Tribunal system never come back, the automated report system is obviously very flawed, and there is little to no feedback regarding the actions of toxic/troll players. I honestly question if this board is even that effective at working on questions and enabling any sort of change... and if so the point of it.

I've seen multiple posts here over the years about "report calling", the act of calling for other players to report a particular toxic/troll player. People have pointed out how this is sometimes a form of harassment, and also how the system does not take into account multiple reports to flag games.

But that's not the real problem. The reason that people report call is because they want some form of immediate feedback and reprimance for the actions of the player around them. They have to sit in a game for another 20-30 mins, send off their often-meaningless report, and then have no feedback or satisfaction to speak of.

I think that League of Legends is one of the best designed games out on the market right now (I'm a game designer), but at the same time I can never say that it is even close to the best game out there. Why? Because it is not only responsible for some of the best game experiences, but some of the absolute worst. There are many games of league of legends that any one of us can attest to being absolutely the worst gaming experiences.

And yet, what I want, or rather the community should demand, is at least some dialogue about this. Riot almost never talks about this subject, has not given any sort of update on the Tribunal (which has been offline for how many years now?), and there seems to be no indicator of any sort of change in the future. It's entirely disheartening.

Some people have said to me that Riot doesn't want to implement a better system because that would affect their revenue. I don't know if this is true, and honestly, knowing some Riot people personally, I doubt it. But if this were the case, it would be absolutely disgusting.

And that's part of my beef. I like Riot. I know many people that work at Riot. And yet, I find myself unable to respect a company that refuses to address these kinds of issues. I love the game, don't get me wrong, and I will probably continue to play for many years. I just wish and expect more.

And some people will say that toxicity will always exist because of the internet. But that's not an excuse, that's an allowance. There are actions and tools you can do and provide that mitigate that. The goal of addressing player behavior shouldn't be to remove toxicity, it should be to enable ways to mitigate it. Not completely ignore it.

Maybe I'm mistaken and someone here can elucidate me on this subject. But I do feel strongly enough to list my grievances as this is a long-standing and disappointing problem of the game.

13 Comments

Liquid CtrlWard6/22/2017, 4:15:24 AM4 votes

Someone posting common sense? This post will fade into oblivion fast. It really is a shame because the concept of this game is fun but this is a SERIOUS issue and its become quite obvious they don't care. In fact the two issues mentioned go hand in hand. Is it always the case? No, there are just plain toxic players here, However, if someone gets intentionally sabotaged/trolled/however you want to word it, multiple games in a row... Do you think they are having a good experience? Anyone think it might anger them? okay add to the fact they report and literally get matched with the same person a week later because absolutely nothing was done about it. They get more angry, they continue to get sabotaged every second or third game (THINK I'M EXAGGERATING? Watch a low elo stream.) So now they start thinking "Why should i try? Nobody else cares." or "**** this game" and begin to do the very same thing that initially evoked their anger in the first place. I have no doubt that players are already leaving this game daily. Soon, there won't be a player-base to compete against or to buy the newest champs and their cool skins and icons. The last to be affected will be the top of the ladder who have the most public voice and by that point, it will be far too late and this game will be beyond saving.

Soul Dealer9/25/2017, 7:39:42 PM2 votes

So I am necroing this thread because I think this guy said exactly what we wanted to here but of course because the OP has commen sense the post faded into oblivion. I want anyone who reads this post or comment to upvote this post so we can get riots attention and maybe get them to change the way they deal with toxic players, trolls, and afks. Also the should add some sort of safety is champ select so I can dodge when I have a garen bot lane and a kat top lane without being punished for it but I maybe be alone on that one.

KVbqbFsC8e6/22/2017, 3:45:36 AM2 votes

I wouldn't say that they "don't care", its just that they vastly overestimate how effective their automated system is.

83142275DEL16/23/2017, 12:36:32 PM1 votes

i completely agree with u. yesterday i was flamed for eating chips too loudly on discord, to the point where i didn't want to play. I was spoken about, not spoken to, because i had low elo - in a group discord chat. it is sick. it is disgusting nd its why i will never say LoL is the best game I played. i'd rather play PSOnline with friends. At lest my friends list on here isn't toxic.

feedback is one thing, abuse nd lack of effective reports is another. People having respect isn't going to lose riot money. People don't work together because too much importance is put on title instead of on how to get the damn title.

Tyrantx11/1/2017, 11:13:35 PM1 votes

Bump

Cocfight11/12/2017, 3:44:33 PM1 votes

I agree this this post. I have noticed a recent trend of letting people know they are breaking rules in game and being met with multiple people telling me "LAWL Reporting does nothing! Riot doesn't ban anyone!" If this is the general belief of the community then it would seem the current system of dealing with toxic behavior is not working.

XxXJoshXxX4/14/2018, 6:46:20 AM1 votes

Give this man a medal, hot damn, right on the money. I'm gonna necro this until it's adressed sheesh

hi ìm groot4/14/2018, 6:58:36 AM1 votes

Can we just stop with this shit? League is literally the first game I've ever played where people cried so much for big brother to protect them from mean people. I've never played a game where outside of terroristic threats or extreme racism that anything would ever happen to you besides this one. But people are still making these posts bitching that its not enough? Deal with it in your own way, its healthy, its how REAL people do shit in the REAL world, not expecting everything around them to change.

undercover90007/4/2018, 5:52:45 AM1 votes

for riot less toxicity is less player and less player is less money as simple as that the game is dying and actually they had it coming

khorney6/21/2017, 9:05:02 PM1 votes

Heroes of the storm is better in a sense. But I don't report people because 99% of the community is toxic or afkd or something similar . But they do but don't I was permabamned and what I said wasn't even toxic lol but some of the serious things people have said they do nothing about but God forbid you tell someone stop running down lane

Support Position6/22/2017, 3:35:48 AM1 votes

Simple answer. No they don't.

HarambeMeme6/22/2017, 6:04:33 AM1 votes

no riot doesnt care thats why league of legends is the most toxic game ever thus far

ModPrandine7/4/2018, 6:01:03 AM

While Necromancy may be handy (and sometimes needed) in video games, it's not the case for old forum threads. Please avoid using such magic and be mindful of how old threads are before posting.

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