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Off meta picks: How more choices stop meta enforcement

TeCoolMage·11/16/2016, 11:30:41 AM·3 votes·611 views

So, as we all know, a singed support main playing as a double jungle while queueing as a support was banned recently. Riot's justification is that singed was refusing to communicate and got frequent reports for not explaining his pick and leaving the ADC at 2v1, unsure of what's going on.

The question isn't whether the justification works or not, but why riot can even justify it that way in the first place. First, a bit of background on why the meta is enforced should be given:

  1. Riot's pro play encourages the meta. Remember the last professional double jungle? Neither do I. This is, however, out of Riots control other than things like scouting grounds NA and labeling roles on screens.

  2. Media surrounding lanes like tutorials and things like league educational videos. Riot silently says on FAQ pages and certain responses that off meta is allowed, but they don't actively encourage it or even say anything about it on the panels for the client, not even in very basic things like loading screen tips

  3. A culture is built around the meta. This one isn't simply all the other points together, it's simply a separate point that arose later than all the others. Simply speaking about mid lane matchups is made with the assumption you have a jungler in summonerschool Reddit. This one can only be solved by fixing the other problems and giving it time, or by actively discouraging meta. Or by making a PC correction and say "DID YOU JUST ASSUME MY COMP" every time someone brings up a role other than the one you brought up: aka join or create a counterculture.

  4. Fear of rejection. Okay this one is practically the same as the last, but in a negative view: people usually want to go against a culture, but fear rejection or fear being viewed as someone with the negative traits of a stereotypical member of a counterculture (don't want to go off meta because people may see the player as a troll). People also report frequently for these sorts of things which adds to the problem

  5. The most important and recent point: the system only conforms to the meta. Queuing requires you to pick one of the 5 roles. People use the system expecting others to follow it, aka people playing as support always go traditional support, rather than back then when it was pick order where it was only a limit from the subjective looking culture, not the objective system.

For these reasons, the meta is enforced and singed support is considered trolling. Singed was playing and expecting his pick to be like picking a traditional support: thinking he would require no explanation and for all they cared he could be a non English speaker as long as he used pings and listened to them effectively.

In short term, it was his fault, but it's Riot's fault for forming league around the meta in the first place.

So how does Riot undo the damage caused by years of copying professional play mindlessly?

By giving more choices, and adding incentive to try them by showing the inherent advantages that are hidden (not by artificially adding advantages)

  1. Add a tick box for whether you are playing meta or not

  2. 'role' should be changed to 'role you are queuing as', (to help give better understanding)

  3. Add a list saying "roles that must be meta" so if you're an ADC player who can't play without a support (there are plenty of crazy bot lane players who can 2v1 given a safe enough champion), you can tick it. Mid laners who love ganks but don't care if top is Soraka can tick jungler and leave top unticked. Calculate the queue time reduction for leaving things unticked. If you play non meta you'll inherently be more restricted in the amount of players that accept you so you get non meta accepting players more often than others.

OR just outright stop the meta from being enforced: Add two selections: role queuing as, actual role. So if you want a double jungle with singed support, pick support, then pick jungle. Then: Add a little text box that must be filled in regardless of whether you're going meta or not describing your General playstyle and strategy (I usually play as a proxy farmer and counter jungler, and will drop by bot to gank so the other jungler can gank mid, or I am a passive adc who occasionally ganks mid or something like that) and in champ select you can view everyone's text on your team and report inappropriate spam or filler text.

What do you guys think? (Don't mindlessly downvote because you like burying ideas you don't agree with, please)

EDIT: THIS IS NOT ABOUT SINGED DESERVING OR NOT DESERVING A BAN OR REPORT, THIS IS ABOUT THE FACT NON META PICKS NEED TO BE ACCEPTED IN THE CURRENT SYSTEM

DOUBLE EDIT: Nice all the feedback I get is "trolling is bad therefore I don't have to actually read this" and a bunch of downvotes. Thanks community. This time I'll try to cater to your expected comprehension and highlight the important stuff so you don't spam downvotes for seeing a trigger word in the corner of your eye

10 Comments

it be lìke that11/16/2016, 9:00:12 PM2 votes

fuck that guy, id report him too.

it wasnt for being off meta, play singed support if you want, the issue is he was trying to double jungle, he was hurting his own junglers clear as well.

it isnt riot forcing a meta, its riot telling you not to be a shitbag.

you are abandoning the person who is 10000% more important than you, you chose to be a martyr by queuing support, deal with it.

Kaioko11/16/2016, 9:16:29 PM2 votes

As the person above me pointed out; the singed player deserved the report. It's one thing to play an off meta champion and build; it's another to just flat out refuse to play your position especially when you queue up to a mode where you know you're going to be assigned a specific role.

As far as your suggestion goes; multiplying the effective amount of choices players have is something that is good in theory but bad in practice. The general match making algorithm already has enough issues with 2 role selection and effective MMR without adding in a third layer of playstyle preference.

Ravenhale11/16/2016, 11:00:13 PM2 votes

Actually, Riot should just change the fifth role from Support to Fill.

I know this brings uncertainty to the game, but the fifth player is the extra champion on the field. How that player is used should be discussed in team select. META encourages the fifth champion to be Support, but that has inherently becomes a problem with queue times. A lot of players don't want to support.

This change would have zero impact upon Support mains like myself. We would pick Fill and people will be thrilled/relieved to get a game with a support.

It might be a disaster to everyone else... but a majority of players don't want to support anyways and we wouldn't have issues like this if they did. Riot is spending way too much time and effort on trying to glorify the Support role when the issue is with the players, not the role. If players don't want to play the role, stop forcing it in champion select. That's the easiest solution.

ReadyxPlayerxOne11/17/2016, 2:40:36 AM1 votes

This isn't the exact problem and definitely not the correct solution.

RIOT approaches the game as a puzzle to be figured out by players. The best teams in the world have figured out that puzzle by examining xp and gold per second, statistically calculating matchups and encounters (team fights, when to gank, when to take objectives) in the rift and maximizing their effectiveness.

Anyone attempting to find other methods of play aren't discouraged because it's a puzzle to be figured out. The general rule for player behavior is "don't be a jerk" - RIOT Tantrum. It's my thinking that stating you're supporting when in fact you're double jungling and ruining the effectiveness of the xp, gold and encounters is being a pretty big jerk especially if your team isn't cool with it and doubly so if you can't pull it off well.

If you and the other jungler end up clearing the entire jungle the whole game and completely counter jungle the other team then that's one thing. It's a pretty powerful strategy if the other team doesn't have a mobile support and laners who can help counter. However, if you're there to soak xp and generally be a nuisance... that's being a jerk and should be penalized.