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Toxicity and How I Think It Can Be Helped

LucianBloodmane··1 votes·1,741 views
These Games Can't Escape Their Own Aggressively Toxic Communities

Many websites list League of Legends as the most toxic online game to date. See above for those links. Toxicity and Verbal Abuse have been a major issue since the beginning, and Riot's current solutions are only a band-aid. On the other hand, in recent years the developers have been working hard on making changes for the better.

To begin I would like to apologize for the long post, but it is important for a game I feel passionate about. I will preface a few things before I get into the proposed solutions.

Preface I understand this is an online multiplayer game. There will never be a perfect solution to get rid of toxicity completely. I also understand there is a mute button, but I have a few issues with that as well. I have been playing since Vel'Koz came out, so roughly 4 years. However, I am only an average player who usually plays norms, with about 1100 games under my belt. My win rate is maybe 50%, I am ranked Bronze II, and I am a college student that doesn't have much time to play unless it's during the summer.

Proposed Solutions There are numerous solutions to this issue. I will only talk about two. Please feel free to comment if you feel something else can be done. The more we come together as a community to get this out there, maybe something will be changed. It really begins with the player.

I really like what Blizzard did with their chat system. They found typical sayings (gg ez, you are bad, etc.) and re-routed them to something else less toxic and possibly humorous. I believe if something like this was implement into League of Legends, then the community would be better as a whole. Most players aren't afraid of being reported/banned. For example whenever someone says "I am going to report you" the typical response is "do it bronzie." However, if players knew their "you are bad" was going to be changed to "It's past my bedtime. Please don't tell my mommy" then they may not say anything at all. Also, players may get a laugh out of it.

For the "Why don't you play Overwatch, then?" response... I didn't enjoy the game. I like League's dynamic leveling system, runes/play styles, and item builds. It's fun, strategic, and engaging. That's just my opinion.

As for the in game mute button. I think League should implement a way for the mute to carry over into the end game screen. That way players can look at their stats in peace. There could possibly be a setting in the options menu to turn off end game chat all together. Like the current turn on/off all chat toggle along with the /muteall command.

I appreciate those of you who took the time to read this long post. I would like to see the community come together in a way to make this game much better. I also hope Riot sees these solutions and thinks of more possibilities in the future.

Edit Changed link below to link above.

11 Comments

CharDeeMcDenniz2 votes

i really dont think a chat filter would change much

if someone is tilted and trolling they will do it no matter what, it's the same thing as the mute button IMO. If a troll is muted by his whole team, he will just feed or afk or wall off his teamates, whatever trolls do. I think the same would happen with a filter. If a troll knows his flaming will be "censored" he simply won't use chat for his trolling

NA NOEL1 votes

I disagree. I believe many players will play to win, its just in their blood... but its also in their blood to flame poorly performing teammates. If chat were disabled.. they would just skip to the play to win part.

CharDeeMcDenniz2 votes

[{quoted}](name=NA NOEL,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=bL0IO8hu,comment-id=00010000,timestamp=2018-06-26T15:39:32.558+0000)

I disagree. I believe many players will play to win, its just in their blood... but its also in their blood to flame poorly performing teammates. If chat were disabled.. they would just skip to the play to win part.

or they would skip right to the in-game trolling part

i see it happen all the time, it's standard temper-tantrum behavior

-game starts going wrong for the troll in whatever way -troll starts to flame team in an attempt to shift the blame to anyone but him -the team (hopefully) mutes him -after a few min when he realizes no one is responding to his flame, starts to feed/troll/afk bc if you're going to ignore him in chat it's the best way to get a reaction from you. Which is all he's looking for anyway

NA NOEL1 votes

I'm not saying that doesn't happen. I'm just saying there is a percentage that would jus tplay to win. Wouldn't you like it if lets say 40% of the games where people rage in chat.. were suddenly silent.. with people just playing the game? Sure the other percentage people would int/afk whatever.. but the others we can actually play.

CharDeeMcDenniz2 votes

[{quoted}](name=NA NOEL,realm=NA,application-id=ZGEFLEUQ,discussion-id=bL0IO8hu,comment-id=0001000000000000,timestamp=2018-06-26T15:48:41.022+0000)

I'm not saying that doesn't happen. I'm just saying there is a percentage that would jus tplay to win. Wouldn't you like it if lets say 40% of the games where people rage in chat.. were suddenly silent.. with people just playing the game? Sure the other percentage people would int/afk whatever.. but the others we can actually play.

40% is VERY generous number IMO

and like someone said before, chat filters are one of the easiest countermeasures to circumvent, alternate spellings, 1337 5p34k, self-censoring (F###### noob!)

seems like an effort in futility

NA Omega1 votes

I'm suggesting removing chat all together.. Doesn't matter if its 20%.. thats significant improvement ..

LucianBloodmane1 votes

{quoted}

i really dont think a chat filter would change much

if someone is tilted and trolling they will do it no matter what, it's the same thing as the mute button IMO. If a troll is muted by his whole team, he will just feed or afk or wall off his teamates, whatever trolls do. I think the same would happen with a filter. If a troll knows his flaming will be "censored" he simply won't use chat for his trolling

Its not necessarily the fact of trolls using chat to troll. Its the toxic players who use chat to abuse teammates by telling them how bad they are playing etc. Trolling has absolutely nothing to do with the levels of toxicity when a teammate isn't doing well in this specific game.

I understand what you mean when a game isn't going the way the troll thinks it should. Then the troll goes afk, feeds, or flames. I am talking about the majority of instances when someone isn't doing that well in a game. That player is flamed so hard their performance is affected.

Shukr4n1 votes

The chat filters,are good. But after that u need someone that tell u to stop playong with filter and behave like a civilized person.

Said that, punishment system is fine...for chat

Inadequate shamefull and bad for griefing

LucianBloodmane1 votes

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean exactly. To clarify you think the chat filters are fine, players should stop "playing" with the filter and behave like civilized people, and the punishment system is fine for Verbal Abuse?

Kei1433 votes

He means that people learn the filter words and start gaming they system by using different spellings.

Essentially saying that there is a limit to what chat filters can do.

LucianBloodmane1 votes

Just had another example today of how people don't care about getting reported at all. I pinged a Fiora to be careful. She ping spammed me and told me to "shut the fuck up." After I told them they were going to be reported, they said: do it, I don't care if I get banned, I will just make a new account. If I get permanently banned I will just go play a different game.

The League community is so toxic because players know they can get away with it.

Riot really needs to do something about this issue. As a multi-million/billion dollar company they have the resources and time.

As far as "getting around the filters..." Then continue updating the filters? This really isn't that hard to implement.

At least give an option in the settings to turn off all forms of chat, etc.

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