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Why Reddit Style Boards are BAD for League

the Anarchit3cht·12/5/2014, 10:02:55 PM·28 votes·2,494 views

It's simple, really. There are a few reasons. 1.) Reddit already exists and way more popular. Why come to less popular platform where you will receive less feedback? 2.) Upvote/Downvote is an atrocious system that is VERY toxic. While it is good in theory, it works a lot worse in practice. 3.) It severely stagnates discussion with its poorly made "communities."

The one I'd like to mostly focus on is number 2. On the old forums, new players or players that had concerns actually felt welcome to post them. Even if they got negative feedback, at least they got feedback. With this new system someone reads something they don't agree with(probably without even taking time to actually consider it) and they immediately downvote it and then the topic gets buried while meaningless things such as "BRING BACK URF pl0x" or the tenth thread to say "WW OP GG" spam the top. You could change it to filter by recent, but lets face it, how many people are actually going to do that? It's out of the way, and the average League player just can't be bothered.

It leads to people posing legitimate concerns and then feeling like they did something wrong or bad for posting them because all they got was a bunch of down votes as opposed to actual feedback. Which in turn, limits the chance for other people who might give legitimate feedback to actually notice the topic. Think about it this way. You apply for a job. You'd much rather get a notice of rejection than simply to never hear from them again. And that same feeling of never hearing from them is exactly what an upvote/downvote system encourages.

It would be best, I think, to either remove this feature or create a restriction that allows you to upvote/downvote only if you actually post in the topic. It's great that you have an opinion, but why do you have an opinion? Why do you think what that person said was right or wrong? And furthermore, I think people don't exactly understand when they should and shouldn't up/downvote. Just because you don't agree with a sentiment doesn't mean you should necessarily downvote it(the opposite is also true) because then it, like I illustrated above, destroys the concept of having a discussion.

Anyways, this will probably get downvoted and no one will read it, but oh well.

41 Comments

Silver5aruman12/6/2014, 3:53:21 AM4 votes

But its good because Riot-pun-circlejerk-"hey I'm not in this department but I can answer the convenient parts of your question"-reddit-memes ex dee dee

FaRmErX12/6/2014, 8:04:52 AM3 votes

I used to check the aram specific forums everyday. the change happened and now Im here once every 2 weeks at most

Saixos12/6/2014, 11:02:44 PM3 votes

I have to agree with the second point, but an even bigger concern of mine is that people who don't receive any views/votes at all will simply vanish into nothingness. I posted a rather long analysis that I worked hard on recently and had it die pretty much immediately. I'm somewhat demotivated about writing another thing now because if I put effort into a thread I'd like to get it to get some actual views instead of getting some "Stop flaming me if I miss a hook" to the front which won't have any impact overall anyway.

Hyrum Graff12/6/2014, 10:28:12 PM2 votes

1.) Reddit already exists and way more popular. Why come to less popular platform where you will receive less feedback?

Because eventually (distant future), this site will have a lot more integration with the client. Things like, you can read a build guide on here and click to import it directly into your item sets.

the Anarchit3cht12/6/2014, 9:15:32 PM1 votes

I'd just like to point out another scary thing.... 4 comments to 200 views. 2 of the comments being my own. Okay, maybe it's just not interesting or what people expected. But then 13 upvotes. Upvotes on the comments. No discussion. Just meaningless voting.

Sukishoo12/8/2014, 8:10:29 PM1 votes

-2.) Upvote/Downvote is an atrocious system that is VERY toxic. While it is good in theory, it works a lot worse in practice.

But we had up/downs on the old board and that was just as toxic... so there's really nothing different here.

Bresn12/9/2014, 2:15:21 AM1 votes

The old forum makes finding posts on certain sub-forums impossible too...

ABlueQuaker12/12/2014, 1:31:38 PM1 votes

I agree with your point that the upvote/downvote system is toxic and I was quite vocal about this for a while. It just needs to be Upvote, or leave it alone - if it's genuinely offensive or off-topic it just needs to be reported and subsequently removed. Downvoting is inherently negative and, by extension, breeds toxicity.

BRBGTGBOWFLEX12/13/2014, 2:54:54 AM1 votes

I really hate boards.

I feel like Riot is open to feedback on the game-- i.e. Jinx's skin got redone after we all agreed it was trash. Summoner's Rift has been improved and we've all provided positive comments.

But we all give feedback on the boards, we all say they suck, and we just get this idiotic brick wall. Someone is selling boards as a success to their boss, but really, this is a failure. They probably also get to make the metrics that define success, so when they present boards they can spin this as a success.

It isn't. Whoever you are, you're bad at your job.

ujf2qEqxi912/6/2014, 9:20:46 PM1 votes

Look, Riot doesn't care what you think.

They are a Chinese company, and will cater to the Chinese players. Where do all the bots come from? China, just like in every MMO with gold farmers.

They're running their company into the ground. This game is on it's last leg.

Rhlax12/13/2014, 4:07:33 PM1 votes

While i disagree with your title, i do think there is some good feedbacks here...

2.) Upvote/Downvote is an atrocious system that is VERY toxic. While it is good in theory, it works a lot worse in practice.

it is better than people bumping their own threads, no? there needs a way to sort posts. up/downvote is very democratic

off topic - what we need is player unions(?).. players helping players to articulating their concerns in an effective manner... that means without the use of hyperbole... people may have good ideas but difficult time writing it down...

it is easier to express emotion, but easier to understand logic