Boards›Player Behavior

Trolling vs off-meta

SnakDatSmilesBak··3 votes·1,652 views

Riot, long story short, I think you need to update your stance on this. https://boards.na.leagueoflegends.com/en/c/player-behavior-moderation/EtXQhs5J-weore-updating-our-policy-so-unusual-play-styles-dont-get-14-day-bans

How do we know if someone is going off-meta for the sake of going off-meta or if that player actually has a plan in mind? How can teammates tell if a player is using these new policies as a way to sabotage the game while remaining untouchable?

For example, one of my games had an ap lucian. Now I'm not against off-meta picks. I love winning with them (just look at my match history FFS). But when I make an off-meta pick, I have a goal in mind and multiple reasons that the pick works. Ap Lucian offers absolutely nothing that a different pick can't provide better. I think that's what makes an off-meta pick a troll pick or not.

Isn't this ap Lucian sabotaging my chances of winning by swallowing resources while providing almost nothing useful, except mediocre magic damage poke? It's like going top as garen and building straight magic penetration. Sure it's "good" when you use it, but how often are you gonna use it?

If the player is given gold and experience by being given the mid lane, does he not have a responsibility to try to be as useful as possible? That goes for any role. Purposely gimping damage for no apparent benefit constitutes trolling by griefing because that player is making it harder for me to win than it should be on purpose. (Yes I know this is inductive reasoning but that doesn't make it wrong.)

  1. If somebody's entire playstyle is demonstrably weak for no reason then it is griefing.

  2. All picks need to bring something useful to a team, any kind of utility as long as it's useful and realized to its best potential is ok (meaning the player tries their best to make the pick as useful as possible).

If you have an argument about why I'm wrong, take a look at those guidelines. Take a moment to read what you are arguing against and to understand what that means for ranked.

I think those two guidelines will help differentiate between troll picks and off-meta picks. Real off-meta picks have a method to their madness. There's a Korean challenger player who plays yi in mid lane. Think about the popular champs people take mid. Now consider yi's quick damage potential and his alpha strike. Like I said, there is a reason for real off-meta picks and it's not to be a special snowflake.

59 Comments

Chønklord4 votes

The problem with your line of argument is that not everyone who plays league knows all the ins and outs of a champion, their build variances, etc.

Maybe they wanted to try AP Lucian because they saw some youtuber do it;

Maybe they weren't aware that AP isn't strong on an AD scaling marksman (other than some small Ap ratios on one or two abilities);

Maybe they genuinely had the notion that playing AP Lucian might somehow be OK in terms of damage;

You can't fault every player that tries something differently on their champ pick in-game, simply because you believe it to be sub-par at best, or complete garbage at worst.

I mean, I still get people throwing their shit over picking Udyr top, Darius supp or Tank teemo. All of which work for me and have been helping me climb out of Silver. (Literally have had players say they are flat out going to int feed, or report me because they didn't like my choices).

The community is overloaded with young, immature, emotionally volatile tweenagers who have Trump-sized Ego's and very little social maturity or mental fortitude when it comes to facing the unknown, and/or assume they know the only and best way to play X champ. By catering to their selfish, self-absorbed entitled spoiled mentality, you stifle creativity within the community and progress for meta changes and cripple any chance of off-meta playstyles or player decision over his/her gameplay.

As long as they're trying to win, are not intentionally feeding, actively participating in the game and doing their best without exhibiting toxic, griefing behavior in chat, there's nothing wrong with any pick in any position with any build.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

You see, I've thought about this. I fully understand trying to make something work. I fell like 3 tiers this season because I tried gp support and was trying to find a viable ashe support method. Ashe worked out, gp didn't.

The difference between me and that lucian player is that I had a reason for my picks. Gp's early lane poke is nuts with the blue support item and grasp. As for Ashe, well you probably know why I'd pick Ashe. You have reasons for udyr top, darius supp, tankmo. You don't even have to explain them; I can see them working.

All I'm asking is that a pick bring some utility to a team, whether it be damage, heals, slows, safety, threat or whatever. Basically that the player have a good reason for picking that champ in that position with their build. If the pick actually offers anything useful I'm willing to work with it.

Edit: and if the player doesn't know the ap scalings on lucian and yet strays from the recommended build path, why is this happening in ranked? That's a whole different problem.

Second edit: During that time that I was trying gp, I'm sure people reported me. Do I mind? No, I ruined their games with my experiment when I probably could've had a much better chance of winning with something else. I stopped as soon as I realized gp wasn't working so those reports didn't hurt me. But I deserved the reports I got, those adc's lost lane because of me. My team lost the game because of me. All because I knowingly gambled with our chances of winning when I could've picked something reliable and trusty. Personally I wouldn't report someone trying something out if there's a reason to it, but other people would and from them I'd accept reports since I did ruin their games.

Silly Neeko1 votes

Lucian actually has 90% AP ratio on his W, which is higher than most...... But otherwise yeah you pretty much said it.

As DSN said however, there could have grounds for punishment if you consistantly do something like building AP on a champion with no ap scalings..... (riven comes to mind).

I do agree with pretty much all the rest though lol.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

The thing is, I don't fault every player who tries weird shit. I apologize for not making it clear enough in the op but I will let anyone try anything if they give me a good reason for why their pick works or even why they think it will work.

The problem is the players who do not have a reason. Those are the people just going off-meta for the sake of going off-meta and griefing. And I'm not even the type of person to call them out, I'd see if it works bc I'm a curious SOB.

Funkin Dunkin1 votes

I went AP Urgot once and went 8/3/11. Was the funniest thing I've ever done. So damn tanky.

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Project Xayah1 votes

From where I stand, an important distinction between "trolling" and "off-meta" is communication. When I say communication, though, I don't just mean "post your intentions in the lobby chat and ignore your team". I mean actual discussion and explanation as to why you're making those choices and how you plan to make them work. If your team still isn't convinced about it, then just do something else (try something a bit more "meta" for that match if you have to).

When push comes to shove, it's the community (not Riot) who decides what falls into the category of "trolling" by what they report. A good example of this would be the "Support Singed" player from several months ago, who received hundreds of reports over the span of a month, if I remember correctly. If they had communicated better with their teams, made different choices when they were met with resounding "No!"s, they likely wouldn't have been considered a troll.

That said, there is still a distinct difference between ranked and unranked matches. People will always be less inclined to try something different in ranked, so it's always best to try new things in unranked to show it can work. Then, and only then, should you take it into ranked.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

{quoted}

From where I stand, an important distinction between "trolling" and "off-meta" is communication. When I say communication, though, I don't just mean "post your intentions in the lobby chat and ignore your team". I mean actual discussion and explanation as to why you're making those choices and how you plan to make them work. If your team still isn't convinced about it, then just do something else (try something a bit more "meta" for that match if you have to).

EXACTLY! For you to have that kind of communication, there needs to be a reason that pick is useful. I mean, you said it yourself.

I've done all this stuff. 300 games of explaining my pick and discussing with my team and I realized what makes it work is the reason you give your team.

Chønklord2 votes

The problem is, even if you explain your pick, and it is reasonable and actually works, there are still going to be others who completely disagree with you, or worse, throw a hissy fit and start griefing over your pick/build/playstyle.

For example, I had one game earlier today where I picked teemo supp (I got mastery 7 just from teemo supp), and the marksman freaked out the moment he saw my hover and threatened to start troll int feeding.

People are crazy; and if you start saying that players have to do this because someone else said so, or else, you're opening the floodgates to a shitstorm.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

But riot already said players have to do this... "We want players who enjoy playing off-meta picks but massively disrupt their team to learn and adjust their communication on their own"

Riot already wants disruptive off-meta players to communicate. That thead has 200+ upvotes and believe me I thought it was bs that riot is forcing communication like this but what can ya do? I made a thead about how people should do this because it helps them win and not because riot told them to.

I get what you're saying, I run into the same things. All I'm saying is that a player have a reason for picking a champ who can provide something. That's enough to show they're not trolling. Is it too much to ask that players in ranked have a reason for picking something over something else?

Chønklord3 votes

That's the thing; once you start setting limits and boundaries as to what is "disrupt-able" -- you begin a downward spiral where players will start being ostracized for anything deemed "too different" by any group that is loud enough to stifle that player.

Riot cannot both say "off-meta is fine", but also say "you have to get the 'OK' from your teammates first in solo queue to play off-meta".

That logic simply doesn't work, because someone is always going to bitch and grief about your pick, even if you win and do well.

I have literally had players tell me while in-game already, that they were going to report me "whether we win or lose". So you want to force other players to abide by your definition of "acceptable champ picks and playstyles for a role" only; but they can't have freedom over their own selection? How fucked up is that mentality?

##Humans by and large, are averse to change, and a majority of us tend to "fear" the unknown/different. This is exacerbated by playing a competitive video game where the majority of the community are in their early adolescent years (even when you're in your early 20s, as a male, your brain is still developing).

Because of these factors, you cannot insert an element of "mob mentality" when it comes to individual player choice. There cannot be a balance, because realistically in the "real world" of ranked solo queue, there will always be that type of person that freaks out over anything that isn't exactly as they imagine it should be according to their understanding of the "meta".

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

I need to start splitting up my responses to you since they're getting quiet complex, but I don't mind that. And I really love that you've played devil's advocate so long. It's made me question my idea a lot but imo it's still sound.

You're starting to argue against progress to avoid angering a minority who will freak out over anything that isn't exactly as they imagine it should be according to their interpretation of the meta. How did I reach this conclusion? Follow my logic closely please. I will start at the beginning.

Support nunu and support singed were a problem. Both were public cases. One, the nunu and correct me if I'm wrong, was trolling. Singed wasn't trolling but was struggling with communication.

Riot's next step was to encourage players to learn to use communication to help their team endorse off-meta picks.

Here I come in. I'm angry that I have to communicate with my teammates but eventually I understand that it's a good idea to do this because it helps me win, not because riot "said so."

Fast forward a hundred or two games and I'm improving at convincing my team I'm not a troll. I'm getting a lot better at showing my team I'm not a troll. I realize the key is that giving them a reason to trust me, a chance to show them I've done this before so they can trust me.

Fast forward some more games and I'm seeing trolls who claim to be off meta halfway through the game to hide the fact that they're trolling. Now how do I know they're trolling?

Because they don't have a reason for their "off meta" pick. They won't know how to use it to win or how things synergize with it.

This is the point at which I decided to make this post. To highlight this difference between people who know what they're doing with off-meta picks and people who don't and are arbitrarily lowering their team's chances and morale.

Now I've given people a surefire way to determine whether or not someone knows what they're doing with an off-meta pick or if they're doing it to troll or grief.

Simply judge them on the guidelines I provided and if they pass they're not trolling, if they can't explain their pick then they are. Or if they can't explain their pick they are at least lowering your chances of winning by being clueless which is unsportsmanlike in ranked in my eyes.

Now you come along and say that I shouldn't be doing this because assholes will still be assholes. Notice I didn't say anywhere that off-meta players should ask for permission. Off-meta players should already be explaining their picks to their team because it makes it easier for them to win. I never ask permission for my picks, it's an ego thing but my teammates almost always don't mind my pick.

My suggestion is progress because it clearly gives people a way to spot a troll as opposed to an off-meta player. Now you are saying that a certain portion of the population will believe you're a troll no matter what. Those people can not be helped, but the rest can.

Judging on these guidelines will make champ select go more smoothly for off-meta players and their teammates most of the time.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

you are wrong about the nunu. the nunu wasnt trolling and riot lifted his punishment and said what he is doing (picking support but actually playing as a roamer/counter jg) was ok.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Do you have proof for that? I'd believe you if you could show me.

However, if you read the post, you'll see that whether or not nunu was trolling is irrelevant.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

well you did say to correct you if you were wrong :)

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

Yeah but how do i know if you're right? I don't usually believe stuff without proof. Like i appreciate it but idk if you're right or wrong

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

this guy gets it

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

Read the guidelines carefully and try to understand what that means for ranked of you disagree with them.

Chønklord3 votes

No. You're conflating "communication" with "compliance".

This was a key issue in the nunu/singed smite support cases.

You simply cannot tell people that if someone disagrees with their champion pick, that they must then comply to another's demands.

The problem with these arguments including the OP's, is that you are now imposing restrictions and defining what is and is not acceptable in terms of off-builds, off-meta playstyles and champ roles. Once you follow that path, you open a gateway toward an extremely biased and narrow perception of what is "the right way to play" or the "right champion to pick" or the "right items to build".

There is a meta, yes, and there are champions who fit within a class and sub-class for the different roles in the meta, yes; but there are also a wide variety of items and scalings for champions and the original developers of League specifically wanted to get away from traditional MMOs. That is why they made the game with the ability to express creative freedom in builds and playstyles, and not force any individual player to adhere to a strict "metagame".

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

He is suggesting that you pick something more meta if your team disagrees with you. Like you and me, he understands that the team will flame and bitch and groan sometimes no matter what and in those cases it's best for morale to go with something meta.

I understand that players need not adhere to a meta. All I am saying is that players must have a utility-minded (as in it'll help you win the game) reason for choosing to use a certain playstyle in ranked or it is a troll pick. Are you disagreeing with that?

My thread wasn't made to limit options, rather to better distinguish between trolling and off-meta.

Chønklord2 votes

You simply cannot give "power" over an individual's ability to choose what they want to play and how they want to play it in League; there will almost always be dissenting opinions and those players who either, egotistically assume they know it all; or those that freak out at the mere sight of anything that isn't "meta", spoonfed to them by their favorite youtuber or streamer.

There cannot be a middle ground in solo queue if off-meta players want to do their own thing with picks or playstyles, simply because they will hardly get to try anything new or creative. Even things that once were normal to see -- i.e. udyr top lane -- is liable to fall prey to the "group consensus" mentality.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Like I said, he is "suggesting." You're starting to ignore many of my points to put words in my mouth. I don't think you're doing it on purpose so I'll direct your attention once more. Here it is copied from the comment you just replied to.

I understand that players need not adhere to a meta. All I am saying is that players must have a utility-minded (as in it'll help you win the game) reason for choosing to use a certain playstyle in ranked or it is a troll pick. Are you disagreeing with that?

My thread wasn't made to limit options, rather to better distinguish between trolling and off-meta.

Chønklord1 votes

I'm not disagreeing with the fact that there are surely players out there who maybe subtly "troll pick" under the guise of playing "off-meta"; that's not in question.

The issue at hand is, you are saying that you have a "surefire way" to detect these trolls -- and I'm counter-arguing saying there is no such thing as "surefire" for it, because first you have to set strict guidelines and rules that define what is off-meta trolling and what is simply just off-meta playing.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

All I am saying is that players must have a utility-minded (as in it'll help you win the game) reason for choosing to use a certain playstyle in ranked or it is a troll pick.

Chønklord3 votes

Except, that decision isn't up to you, or anyone else. It's called player agency;

Meaning every individual like you and me have control over our game in terms of champion choice and item builds etc.

You can no more decide what is or is not "troll"; because for the most part, that is a subjective, personal bias on behalf of anyone making that judgment on another player.

That's why I said there is always going to be someone out there that disagrees with an off-meta player's pick or build... and even those that disagree with something completely within the "meta", but from a past season. Someone will always disagree.

If Riot says "Off-meta is allowed; players have agency over their champion choice, item builds and playstyle/role so long as that player for all accounts is fulfilling their role and trying to win", then that's it. End of story. Anything more than that, is just community speculation and personal bias on what may or may not be considered "trolling" as defined by the dictionary, and Riot games.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Thanks for the reply, I'm just saying that as long as a player has a reason for the pick that will help the team win. It's not trolling. The lucian was just an example, I didn't mean for that to be what people focused on :(

And riot's report system works on a basis of community judgement. If enough people report it as trolling then it would be considered trolling. Reporting and deciding what is or isnt troll is a personal choice, you are correct. I'm just offering a way to determine whether someone is trolling or not.

Breaku1 votes

I won't stop playing ADC Soraka.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Whatever man as long as you bring something actally useful to your team and do it as best you can it's not really trolling, that's the point of the post.

But how's adc raka better than adc lb who has multiple self peels and multiple repositioning tools?

Breaku1 votes

Actually, ADC Raka wins 1v1 vrs any adc other than maybe MF.

Gunblade first item into standard adc build, her Q works so well for trading and farming early, and the silence hurts a lot of ADCs.

And her passive is amazing for positioning during teamfights, getting to fights, or escaping

Friendly Ram1 votes

support j4 brings two forms of bonus damage, 2.5 forms of cc, and free wards to bot lane.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

no he doesnt have any responsibility to you. a player can play whatever character and build he decides to. its up to him.

if he is not trolling and is trying an offmeta build then thats his choice he should be able to play it however he wants. and if he is actually trolling then he is still going to be able to troll just as easily if you had forced him to build AD lucian.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

You're telling me a player does not have to try to be as useful as possible to his team. Isn't that against the summoner's code?

I'm saying there is a way to spot a troll who is claiming to be off-meta. The troll will not know the reasoning behind the build. Someone who's played off-meta will know how to use the pick to its fullest potential and why it works.

The post isn't to force anyone to play anything. It's to differentiate between trolls and off-meta players.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

no. you dont have to try your very hardest every single game.

did you watch dyrus's series where he plays every single champion top lane? every single one. AD janna top, bard, soraka, etc. he did this in ranked. obviously those picks are not going to be 'as useful as possible' to his team. but they asked riot about it and they said as long as he is trying to win then he can play whoever he wants.

teemo is not my best champ. not even close. but i love him so i play him quite a lot. i take him top, mid, sometimes support. if i wanted to be as useful as possible to my team, i would never use him. in fact i would probably play nothing but amumu jg which is my best winrate. but should i be forced to play something just because i am better with it over something i have more fun with?

the right answer is no. its a video game and people can play however they want.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

He made those picks to prove the same point I am asserting.

"2) All picks need to bring something useful to a team, any kind of utility as long as it's useful and realized to its best potential is ok (meaning the player tries their best to make the pick as useful as possible)."

Yes people can play however they want as long as it's demonstrably intended to help the team. If a player cannot show that they want to help the team, then and only then it is griefing by troll picking.

Note the italicized words here. All I'm saying is that players must have a useful reason to play the way they do. If they lack that reason, then it is trolling.

  1. If somebody's entire playstyle is demonstrably weak for no reason then it is griefing."

When dyrus made that series, he tried his best to make every champion work within top lane by playing to their strengths. He did not put them in a weak lane and build them in a weak way for no reason.

When trolls do something like that, they do not try their best to make a pick work by playing to its strengths.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

you are in luck! i think i can put your mind at ease.

i looked up the game you were talking about (the AP lucian went 5/7 pretty respectable) and i can see good reasoning behind lucians decision to go ap.

your team was very AD heavy. ad top, support, and adc with only elise as ap. lucian could very well have been worried the team would stack armor and went AP to make sure he could give the team some extra magic dmg.

this is not trolling. this is calculated to help the team. and you would want him punished. i would say that lucian is not part of the problem, but you are.

edit: he also led the team in dmg done to enemy champs and cs and bought a ward.

the fact that you called him a troll is both sad and proof that off-meta should not be punishable. just because you dont understand something doesnt make it trolling.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

"some extra magic damage"

I did the numbers, his build did a total of 800 magic damage in the best case scenario. That's pathetic best case damage for building a champ full ap.

But ok, that's about 580 magic damage that we didnt have that we now have.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

lol i cant believe you are still even arguing this. HE DID TOP DMG ON THE TEAM. if ap lucian is so bad and he was trolling, how did he outdmg your darius and tristana? he also outdmg the other teams midlane. and its not because you werent fighting bot lane. their jinx did most dmg in the game by far.

you are exactly the player that boosted bonobo was describing. you saw he was going ap and you freaked out because you dont understand it. but when you look at the numbers its obvious he wasnt the reason you lost. its because the blue team's jinx went on a rampage.

but no you are one of those people who think it has to be the off-meta's fault somehow.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

I didn't say anywhere that it was his fault....

Yeah he did the most damage? Because we lost in bot and top...which you could obviously see lmfao

Look at my match history. I understand off-meta picks when there's a good reason for them. And frankly 580 more magic damage while sacrificing thousands of physical damage is not worth it.

Look at how much gold that lucian got. Put that into ad items and you have a much more useful champion. It's not the pick, its that he didn't know how to maximize it's potential that makes him lower our chances of winning by a lot.

Leave the lucian out of this debate and look at this. Lucian was just an example and there is no clear way ANYMORE to prove whether he was trolling or not but, I'd be very surprised if you argue against this.

  1. If somebody's entire playstyle is demonstrably weak for no reason then it is griefing.

  2. All picks need to bring something useful to a team, any kind of utility as long as it's useful and realized to its best potential is ok (meaning the player tries their best to make the pick as useful as possible).

If you have an argument about why I'm wrong, take a look at those guidelines. Take a moment to read what you are arguing against and to understand what that means for ranked. if you believe those guidelines to be misguided.

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

well its all subjective. one man will say an off-meta is trolling and another will say its fine. how can we judge?

any character in the game can be useful. to say some pick or build cannot be useful is ridiculous. it all depends on the skill of the player. ive seen an adc soraka who far outplays the other teams adc and carries the game. ive seen an AP mid lucian who does top dmg on his team. how can you say any build is useless?

when i pick teemo support a lot of times someone on my team will whine about it and say teemo does nothing as support and that im trolling. but i have played a lot of teemo and i honestly do much better with him than as braum or leona or many other supports.

ive gone 0-6 with it and ive gone 12-2 with it. someone on my team when i go 0-6 as support teemo will say my entire playstyle is demonstrably weak. but they just dont understand it. any support can go 0-6. and they dont see the games where i bully the enemy adc out of lane and finish with top kills top dmg.

if someone builds ap lucian someone might do the math and say it only does this much dmg it cant be worth it. but how can you tell how much it is worth to him? he could have mastered lucians abilities so can always land them. maybe he also gets mana and cdr on his build so he can spam his abilities. maybe 4 players on the enemy team are building armor.

short of someone building 3 boots or 6 tears how can you say any playstyle is weak? its opinion. there is just no way to judge. you dont know them or their strategy.

SnakDatSmilesBak2 votes

Assuming equal amounts of skill some builds do not work. But that's not even the point I'm making. You and bb dragged the point through the mud so much that you two aren't even able to see it clearly anymore.

All I am saying is that players must have a utility-minded (as in it'll help you win the game) reason for choosing to use a certain playstyle in ranked or it is a troll pick.

This already implies the player has a strategy. All I'm saying is it's trolling if the player goes off-meta with no strategy. Read those guidelines again very carefully. You'll realize I'm not overstepping boundaries by asking people to have a reason for their picks and builds beyond "oh it's off-meta."

I'm not saying I report people for going off meta. I'm not encouraging that. I'm providing a way to discern off-meta players from trolls. I'm done with this argument. I'm just repeating myself and people aren't actually reading carefully.

Funkin Dunkin1 votes

Well in my case you would see a long history of Skarner top with the last 3 years having a 50% or better win rate with him in lane. I don't use him jungle. That's how you determine if it's off meta.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

You're not trolling because you bring something to the team in the form of meaningful damage and cc by building the way you are. However if you built full mana regen, that would be a troll pick because you do not try your best to make the pick useful.

All I am saying is that players must have a utility-minded (as in it'll help you win the game) reason for choosing to use a certain playstyle in ranked or it is a troll pick.

SecondAirbane1 votes

an off meta pick would be like a teemo pick or any weaker champion in the list

AP lucian is INDEED trolling he doesnt scale at all with AP

MUSHROOM MIDGET1 votes

lucian definitely wasnt trolling. he did top dmg on his team and won midlane.

he didnt stack ap he build stuff for cdr and on hit dmg like lich bane, gunblade, and he was building nashor's tooth next. he finished 5-7 only because the enemy adc was a beast and wrecked everyone in the endgame.

Dolyna1 votes

{quoted}

AP lucian is INDEED trolling he doesnt scale at all with AP

He gets 90% AP for his W. It's only one ability, but it's significant.

NickMP1 votes

To me, making the right pick, whether it be Champion Pick or Items, Summoner Spells, Masteries or Runes, is a form of skill, not intent, mostly because if you really want to just boil it down, sometimes going for a specific build/pick is a bad idea, if you're bad at dodging Blitzcrank hooks on say, Ashe, picking Ashe into Blitzcrank can be a stupid idea.

But at the same time if you're support is bad at dodging hooks and you're good at it, in this case picking Ashe to encourage the Blitzcrank to try and pull you and focus less on your Janna or whatever could be a great decision as you'll be free to punish him while it's on cooldown and can also in a way protect your own support who may have otherwise fed.

League of legends is a complex game where even the tiniest situational difference can feel like an earthquake.

Likewise, if you understand how to play with an off-meta build(which is usually as simple as just playing the Champion normally with situational differences based on items, such as baiting stuff because you have Zhonya's on literally anybody so your CC-weak Yi can clean house etc.), you may still not understand which situations are best or downright suicidal to pick it in, sometimes people don't perfectly understand why meta builds are strong.

This lack of understanding can also make it hard to decide which items to build, regardless of whether your pick is meta or not.

I'm fairly standard AD Zed, I want a defensive item, I've got my eyes on Guardian Angel or Edge of Night, while the enemy has some hard CC for EoN, they also have some filler abilities like Ezreal Q and Ahri W to get rid of the shield, and also have some decent auto attack threat that EoN may not save me from, additionally they're support's been warding flanks quite well so I need to be careful of getting too close while dewarding with Duskblade or I may get jumped before I can get EoN's channel complete anyways.

I don't play Zed, but this is a good example of questions I often ask myself, and knowing the answer to questions like this is a form of skill.

Likewise with off-meta builds, just like the previous example, you need to understand what items you want in what situations, as well as what situations your pick is weak in, but if you currently don't know the answer to those questions and you still make your pick, you aren't trolling, you're simply inexperienced or lacking skill, which isn't an offense.

If you can't put why you like your pick into words, that also doesn't mean you're trolling, it just means you may not understand the build well enough to put it into words yet, or you may just have trouble explaining your thought process to people.

So what means somebody's trolling? Personally I just ask myself if they made their pick in sincere "Good Faith", if they made a bad decision on their pick in Good Faith, it was still in good faith, just a bad decision, which is simply a lack of skill. Though I also like Riot's wording, "did they exhibit "Intent to Win"?" I don't think it's much different to how I see it, so I still use my term.

To me a good way to show Good Faith is to have made your pick before in normals with some practice, at least a little, to me this basically confirms Good Faith, though the lack of it doesn't disprove it. (People first time !@#$ all the time in ranked, this isn't trolling, but it is the majority of the time a mistake or unskilled decision.)

I looked through this Lucian's past games and he does have 1 AP Lucian game in a normals a month ago, it's literally the only Normals game I can find on his op.gg, and he gave a solid 9/5/10 performance with lots of damage done to enemies(second highest on his team only losing to his allied Jax by 500) he does have 58 Lucian Ranked games, as well as 84 Ahri games, Ahri was available so I'm kind of surprised he didn't pick Ahri, he did have an Ahri loss recently though so he may have wanted to play something else, so it looks like he just wanted to try out something he did in a normals game in ranked.

Combined with the fact that he once again gave a pretty solid performance with plenty of damage done, I'd have to say he made his pick in good faith, would he have been better off going AD? Maybe, but even if so he wasn't trolling, he would be making a mistake, which Riot doesn't punish.

[EDIT - made a minor correction to the Zed story]

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Thanks for the reply, I'm just saying that as long as a player has a reason for the pick that will help the team win. It's not trolling. The lucian was just an example, I didn't mean for that to be what people focused on :(

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

I'm really glad that you understood the point!

Ah O Yeah Harder1 votes

We just had our jungler go Ahri Jungle because she was autofilled and because she wanted to Fizz jungle but it got banned.

Long story short, Ahri jungle had 37 cs at the 12 minute mark (enemy jungler had 87), Ahri was 0/3/0 (enemy jungler was 3/0/2), Ahri wasnt getting any dragons either.

I somehow managed to carry that game with our swain mid. The rest were just feeding the whole game.

SnakDatSmilesBak1 votes

Yet most of the people who commented here would say that she wasn't trolling if she tried to win...

Seems like people can do whatever they want if they say "i'm trying to win"

Ah O Yeah Harder1 votes

Guess that means I can go play some Janna top and not get banned.

/s

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