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Final ideas for a healthier system around chat

Machiavellist·7/18/2018, 11:40:42 AM·3 votes·2,753 views

Hello everyone, this thread is an attempt of me to find a solution about the toxicity problem in league by creating an environment where flamers and non-flamers co-exist, without the one harassing the other in any way. First things first, in this case the word “flamers” doesn’t include people who wish death or diseases upon other players nor people who call others names. I can’t seem to find the proper word to distinct them from one another, but for the sake of communication let’s call the more healthy kind of toxic people “pushy”.

Firstly, because in threads like this the “you’re flamer so you just want to flame freely” argument is always present I want to inform you that I received a permanent ban in my main account one year ago. Back then I wasn’t pushy, I was purely toxic. Today I’m completely reformed, I’m honor 3 and I haven’t got a single penalty ever since. It’s not that I don’t lose my temper but I’m always trying hard to focus on the objective.

So I know that the solution should be something that doesn’t put any form of responsibility on non-flamers (like mute does). So I thought of a couple positive or neutral for the non-flaming players suggestions:

• Non-flamers should get some benefits out of the system. I believe that already happens with the Honor system which is exactly this- honorable players have access to features like border marks, key fragments and loot crafting while dishonored players are excluded from the crafting feature alongside with all the other penalties. • Distinction of “strong critique” 1 from “flaming” 2. 1)pointing out a mistake you believe a teammate did without cursing or repeating it 2)cursing, slurs and strongly aggressive language towards another player. For the first one, I know every player has his own playstyle that’s why I emphasize the word “believe”. He can then state his own opinion that I’m wrong or that he indeed made a mistake and we keep playing the game focusing more on that or any other mistake. So players like that shouldn’t get banned at all. As for the second one, the system stays the same or even stricter towards players who wish diseases or death upon others etc. • Taking into consideration retaliation/counterblasts. That’s something that in the current system is absent. I know that two wrongs don’t make a right but without the first wrong, the second in most cases wouldn’t occur as well. Think about it, I’ve seen so many games that we manage to keep balance into the team cooperation. Then one person goes “retarded jungle again”, the jungle responds, mid comes into the conversation and it’s over. So I believe that if the strictness towards the first burst doubled by Riot, then the first person who wanted to blame someone would think twice before doing it.The current state is “everyone gets judged by his own behaviour” which is fair, don’t get me wrong. But that has more of a “judicial” nature while what we need here is something more “political”. that’s not a justification for the second person to go flaming and cursing the first, I remind you that this kind of behavior is in all cases bannable • New chat mechanics is my final suggestion. I saw that part on “Smite” and I think it’s a really good idea to be applied in League as well. There would be some hotkeys that you press in a row and would activate automated messages frequently used and needed for team cooperation (example: VVK-Ok VVHF-Have fun VVNH-I need help etc.) Additional point, if that idea was applied, would be to drastically reduce the characters that you can manually type, so players would be more focused in the game.

These are my thoughts and every opinion that respects them will be respected. And like I said:

P.S.(1) This is not an attempt of me to legitimize my flaming nor to recover my account. Even if these or any other changes for the matter are applied, I will keep behaving well in a possibly more productive environment.

P.S.(2) I don’t have anger management problems so the “if you can’t control you temper you should go see someone” argument isn’t really what we need here. League, especially in ranked, is a very competitive game which leads to a big load of pressure. That pressure pushes me –and similar types of people- to sometimes overreact in the fear of losing our objective. I know that many other players can control this pressure appliance more effectively but I’m not perfect and like every other person I have a flaw. Mine is this and someone else’s is another but we can try to co-operate in a healthy environment.

P.S.(3) I’m aware of the “Start--> /mute all” solution as a counter-move to knee-jerk reactions. However, I really don’t want to miss the chance of interacting not only with my team but with enemies as well. I had so many fun games where we all had a conversation on interesting topics while we were playing the game. This enlightens the mood so much and really reminds us that in the end of the day “it’s just a game”.

Thanks for reading and will appreciate your feedback!

12 Comments

ModThe Djinn7/18/2018, 12:12:06 PM3 votes

{quoted}Hello everyone, this thread is an attempt of me to find a solution about the toxicity problem in league by creating an environment where flamers and non-flamers co-exist, without the one harassing the other in any way.

First off, congratulations -- this is one of the best threads on this topic I've seen in a while, because you take care to remember non-punished players as well, and your ideas don't distill down to "allow toxicity."

Non-flamers should get some benefits out of the system_. I believe that already happens with the Honor system which is exactly this- honorable players have access to features like border marks, key fragments and loot crafting while dishonored players are excluded from the crafting feature alongside with all the other penalties.

Alright. Let's note, however, that this is currently how the system works, so calling it a beneficial part of a new proposal is a little odd to me.

Distinction of “strong critique” 1 from “flaming” 2_. 1)pointing out a mistake you believe a teammate did without cursing or repeating it 2)cursing, slurs and strongly aggressive language towards another player. For the first one, I know every player has his own playstyle that’s why I emphasize the word “believe”. He can then state his own opinion that I’m wrong or that he indeed made a mistake and we keep playing the game focusing more on that or any other mistake. So players like that shouldn’t get banned at all. As for the second one, the system stays the same or even stricter towards players who wish diseases or death upon others etc.

You are currently allowed to do things like point out mistakes. "Hey Jax -- that was a dumb dive. He's a bit too far ahead for you to be able to pull that off" is fine, unless you're calling him dumb all game. "Hey Jax, you noob, stop feeding Darius" isn't fine. So critique -- even strong critique -- is actually currently allowed, provided you aren't being overbearing, insulting, or disrespectful. Bans and punishments usually come from a player being one of those things without realizing it.

Taking into consideration retaliation/counterblasts_. That’s something that in the current system is absent. I know that two wrongs don’t make a right but without the first wrong, the second in most cases wouldn’t occur as well. Think about it, I’ve seen so many games that we manage to keep balance into the team cooperation. Then one person goes “retarded jungle again”, the jungle responds, mid comes into the conversation and it’s over. So I believe that if the strictness towards the first burst doubled by Riot, then the first person who wanted to blame someone would think twice before doing it.

This is interesting -- I haven't see the suggestion to weigh initial aggression move but keep punishments for responding before. The proposal interests me, but I suspect you'd run into issues detecting what qualifies as "initiating toxicity." If I tell a player their play was stupid but it's fine and we'll get them next time (something that should be allowed by your previous point), and they respond by flaming me, is that my fault for calling their play stupid, or theirs? That's an even more clear-cut case than a lot of situations you'll see, and I think a system like this would struggle to identify "initiating" toxicity sufficiently to please the community.

New chat mechanics is my final suggestion. I saw that part on “Smite” and I think it’s a really good idea to be applied in League as well. There would be some hotkeys that you press in a row and would activate automated messages frequently used and needed for team cooperation (example: VVK-Ok VVHF-Have fun VVNH-I need help etc.) Additional point, if that idea was applied, would be to drastically reduce the characters that you can manually type, so players would be more focused in the game.

This is also an interesting one, especially since it could, in theory, be used to allow chat-restricted players to have access to a list of pre-approved commands used sparingly. MM, TM, BM for mias, for example, or DragX for "Dragon in [time until dragon]". I frankly quite like this suggestion, although I'd want to be specific in my choice of available phrases.

Voldymort7/18/2018, 12:14:59 PM1 votes

I know that two wrongs don’t make a right but...

The current state is “everyone gets judged by his own behaviour” which is fair, don’t get me wrong. But...

there are no "but"s in an admission. either the system is right about it or it's not.

Pick ONE! you can't pick both at the same time!

• New chat mechanics is my final suggestion. I saw that part on “Smite” and I think it’s a really good idea to be applied in League as well. There would be some hotkeys that you press in a row and would activate automated messages frequently used and needed for team cooperation (example: VVK-Ok VVHF-Have fun VVNH-I need help etc.) Additional point, if that idea was applied, would be to drastically reduce the characters that you can manually type, so players would be more focused in the game.

that sounds great...on paper

when riot first introduced the "?" pings, it was so that they are used to call for missing players. but what most people currently use them for is to ask "what the duck are you doing?!?!"

it's not an exagerration to believe that what you're suggesting might suffer the same fate

Highwiseene7/18/2018, 1:28:21 PM1 votes

1)pointing out a mistake you believe a teammate did without cursing or repeating it

Unless it's a mistake they continue to make I see no point in pointing them out. Everyone makes mistakes, even dopa for crying out loud. It's just not really your place to point out your teammates mistakes, especially when you're guaranteed to make a bunch yourself.