[Suggestion] For the scoreboard, shop, ping etc; discount through champion mastery, map theme etc…
Hello, Riot and anyone who’s interested.
I have a list of suggestions; not sure which section to post this, but since it contains some stuff that doesn’t exist in the game, so I’ll post them in this section;
It’s a wall of texts with various topics, but I’ve separated them with titled blockquotes, and each part of the topic with a simple dotted sub-title, so you can just read the ones that caught your interest, or all would be much appreciated.
#SCOREBOARD
- Scoreboard Map An alternative display for the scoreboard that can be optionally enabled in the setting (not the post-game result scoreboard, but the in-game statistic scoreboard), which shows a larger map on one side (maybe on the same side as the mini-map), while showing a vertical, listed scoreboard on the other side, similar to the old ones.
I don't know if this is going to break any tradition of MOBA games or not, but this would be like an alternative way for map awareness, an extra choice for players with different habits and playstyles.
The map would also allow player to click for pings, maybe LEFT CLICK for the location ping like the ALT + LEFT CLICK, and RIGHT CLICK for the alert ping like the CTRL + LEFT CLICK, or the other way around; and also the drag and release pings, except that you don't need to hold the CTRL key or the ALT key.
And maybe instead of enabling / disabling from the setting, a toggle button on the scoreboard for player to click and toggle anytime would be quite convenient, quick and easy; another way is to hold a button while the scoreboard is opened, a button easy to press, like the SPACE key for example, to toggle the scoreboard into map temporarily while holding; but of course, the SPACE key is used, so maybe some other key nearby; either way, it would also be easier to introduce to players than a checkbox hidden in the settings.
I'm not sure where I got this habit, but I'm sure it came from quite a few games, different genres of games; I myself check on the scoreboard quite frequently, so I was kinda hoping that I could also check on the map all together in one quick scan.
- Rearrange In Between When rearranging players on the scoreboard, instead of only be able to drag-and-drop on another player to swap orders, player can also drag-and-drop in between two players to cut in line; but yeah, this is just some minor stuff.
#SHOP
- Direct Search A hotkey that opens the shop and focuses on the search bar upon opening; simply for convenience.
The [L] key seems to be a nice choice for that, since it's CTRL + [L] to focus on the search bar, and it's not used for anything by default.
- Deep Search If the search only matches one result, the drop down list would show the entire tree of prerequisite items, without needing to replace the highlight section on the right; this way the highlight section can also be used as a bookmark section for an item.
https://i.imgur.com/GRojaNY.gif
- Undo Not only in games, but probably in any application that comes with and an undo feature, I'd expect CTRL + [Z] to undo as a matter of course, subconsciously.
- Quick Shopping This one's more of a bold suggestion;
While recalling, player would be allowed to buy and sell in advance, but every change in the shop would of course, be temporary, like a simulation, which would only be executed when the recall is successful; and as soon as the champion reaches the base, k'ching, all done and ready to go, unless if the recall is cancelled in any way, then all the changes in the simulation would be reverted.
As far as I know, there's no way that gold could go down besides buying things anyway, so buying and selling with the possessing gold shouldn't affect any alchemy; player can just do all the shopping in the 8 seconds of recall.
Unless you need to wait a few more coins for an item, or to rest for a while for health & mana to recover, otherwise faster is always better, especially in times when the base is on fire, you'd want everything to be as fast as possible.
#GOLD
- Particular Gold Income This one's not anything important, but I think it would be interesting if we could know how much gold we've earned from each aspect individually.
Like pointing cursor at CS would show how much gold we've earned from CS alone, pointing at KDA would show how much we've earned from all the kills and assists, pointing at destroyed turret would show how much we've earned from destroying structure, and pointing at match time would show how much gold we've earned from the gold generation.
Or a little more detailed, with the CS separated into minion and monster, the KDA separated into kill and assist, the destroyed turret separated into turret and inhibitor, and the match time separated into base gold generation and item gold generation;
I was going to suggest that the CS part should be even more detailed, like melee minion, caster minion, siege minion etc, but then the list would be a little too long with all the neutral monsters, so minion and monster only should be just fine.
#CONTROL
- Lockscreen <> Freescreen The same way how you lock the screen temporarily by holding the SPACE key when using the freescreen, holding the SPACE key when using the lockscreen should also unlock the screen temporarily, which means the screen would reset back to lockscreen upon releasing the SPACE key.
I know that many or most player don't use the lockscreen, I don't use it myself, but some of my friends do, and since it's something in the game, I just figure why not fix the flaw.
#CHAT
- Clickable Summoner’s Name When typing on the chat section or when holding the [Z] key, simply click on a player's name to whisper to that player;
Sometimes when I'm talking to two or more players through whisper, the /r or the /reply only allow me to reply to the last whisper, if the second last whisperer has a complicated name, I'd be like "how am I supposed to type that", I mean I can if there aren't any special characters, but there are names that are just hard to type, it takes time, so if there's any easier way, it's be very helpful.
Or was it intended because of some player behavior related reason?
- Reply Hotkey A hotkey that goes directly into chat and reply to the last whisper (with the /r or the /reply); the first key that pops up in my head is the BACKSPACE key (when not typing), it sounds familiar... probably from some other games again; but whatever key it is, it's useful.
#PING
I don't have any complete suggestion for the pings, but I've heard that there are reworks currently in progress, so I have a few fragments in mind that might be of some use as reference:
- Something that happens a lot, but pinging alone just doesn't always seems to be enough, and you might still need to type in the chat sometimes, for the team to understand; besides the enemy warded ping, a request ward ping and a request sweep ping might also be useful.
- For the target ping, sometimes I can't tell whether if it means that they're going for it, they want me to go for it, or they're just waiting for the right opportunity; or it could just be me for not being experienced enough.
- We have the alert ping that could mean retreat, and the target ping that could mean pursue, so how about a wait ping? It could mean you're going or leaving, but you have something in hand that you need to finish first.
- If the drag and release ping is too crowded for any extra ping in one pie, then maybe separate it into two pies, with the CTRL key for louder pings, and the ALT key for softer pings; but everyone is probably so used to the current pie already, so one point deducted.
- Some extra, non-tactical pings, expression pings? Like gratitude (thanks), refusal (no thanks), apologies (sorry, my bad), comprehend (okay, understand), permission (can I, may I), agreement (yeah, sure), disagreement (nope), excuse (brb), praise (nice, good job, well done), pardon (it's okay, never mind, don't mind!), care (take care, be careful, play safe), impressed (wow), funny (haha); a few seconds of cooldown between each use should be necessary, about 3~5 seconds, shared by all these pings.
All these supposed to mean nice, but yes... most of these have potential for sarcasm and other meanings, like gratitude, praise, impressed, funny; could be poisonous, could be flammable, or just plain saltiness, but it didn't change the fact that it could still be nice, moreover, the chat is like a gigantic opened gate anyway, these pings would be like a tiny door beside it; and sometimes, a human's tongue can be more harmful than many things in the world, so replacing them with pings might even be less hurtful in some point of view; and from the same perspective, expression like angry and sad could also be like fighting fire with fire.
#CHAMPION MASTERY
TL;DR, playing a champion that you do not own allows you to earn IP discount for the champion through the mastery system, specifically through the mastery level of the champion.
It's mainly to feel more rewarding when playing champions that you do not own, since you can't get chest and some other things from them; and also to provide a shorter route for newer players or less frequent players to reach more champions; it could also lower the stress of “there are nearly / more than a hundred of champions left to unlock".
And if someone plays a champion a lot or very well without even owning the champion, I'd say some discount is probably deserved; it could be like an encouragement to buy the champion, to clear up some hesitation especially when it comes to pricey champions; or it could just encourage player to try out or play more unfamiliar champions; if you're getting better at using them, you're already a few steps closer to owning them; although it sounds a bit immoral.
It doesn't have to be a complicated system; every mastery level from level 2 onward earns a percentage of discount as soon as it's achieved; for example: level 2 earns 5%, level 3 earns 10%, level 4 earns 15%, and level 5 earns 20%, up to 50% at mastery level 5, or lower if it's too high, here's an example of how the price would be after discount:
Mastery Level 1 > Level 2 > Level 3 > Level 4 > Level 5
- 6300 IP > 5985 IP > 5355 IP > 4410 IP > 3150 IP
- 4800 IP > 4560 IP > 4080 IP > 3360 IP > 2400 IP
- 3150 IP > 2993 IP > 2678 IP > 2205 IP > 1575 IP
- 1350 IP > 1283 IP > 1148 IP > 945 IP > 675 IP
- 450 IP > 428 IP > 383 IP > 315 IP > 225 IP
Of course, champions not owned needs to be able to reach level 5 in order for this to work; Besides the last one or two being a little insignificant, the rest should feel rewarding enough, It doesn't affect the RP price, but if it's the RP market that's in the way, then I have nothing to say.
If not, the biggest obstacle in the way would probably be that, the current mastery system is... safe to say, not hard, or dare to say, easy, as long as you have the time, at least up to mastery level 5.
Currently, as a random player once said, having a high mastery level on a champion doesn't actually mean that you're "good at the champion", but usually means that you've "played a lot of that champion", or to put it in other words, it's like earning a cool crest that anyone who plays a lot can get; it doesn't have the "value".
But it can be something that's more worthy of pride, and it can even make the discount more reasonable as well; here's the idea:
- Hextech Crafting Hextech crafting would be available from mastery level 1, except that you don't need blue essence, champion shard or champion permanent up to mastery level 5.
- Champion Points Mastery level would each have their equivalent grade: mastery level 1/2/3/4/5/6/7 : D/C/B/A/S-/S/S+ grade; to gain champion points, you must earn the equivalent grade or higher; of course, higher grades would give you more champion points, but higher level would require more champion points to max.
- Level Up To level up, you must first max out the champion points of the current mastery level, similar to the current level 5; and then similar to the current level 6 and 7, you'll need a mastery token to level up.
- Mastery Token Once the champion point has been maxed out, you'll need to earn one grade higher than the equivalent grade to get a mastery token;
So let's say if you're level 3, you'll be able to earn CP from the equivalent grade - which is B grade or higher, but once you've max out the CP, you'll need to get one grade higher than the equivalent grade - which is an A grade or higher in order to earn the mastery 4 token, which is needed to proceed to the next level; once you have the token, you'll be able to proceed to the next level through the hextech crafting.
- Difficulty To increase the difficulty, each level higher would require one more token to level up; so for mastery level 1/2/3/4/5/6, you'll need 1/2/3/4/5/6 pieces of mastery 2/3/4/5/6/7 token to level up to mastery level 2/3/4/5/6/7; and more difficulty can be added on the champion points through some mathematics; well... for a 6300 IP champion, 50% would be 3150 IP, so it needs to have some difficulty.
It's actually pretty straightforward; higher mastery level requires higher grade to progress, and even higher grade to proceed - to prove that you're qualified for the next level, this way the mastery would mean a lot more than potentially just repetitive plays; when you see someone with mastery level 5 or higher, you'll know that it came from a lot of well played games, instead of expecting their match history to be covered by that champion.
Of course, all these would need to reset the entire champion mastery system in order for it to work, and also for it to be fair; so it's just an idea, for reference, you can see this as a suggestion, or a joke, I can understand that.
- Ranked Mastery Token Some extras; to add a little more challenge: a mastery token that can only be obtained from ranked games, for players to upgrade their mastery level to ranked version, but only for mastery level 5 onwards;
The difference is that you would be earning the mastery token for the current mastery level instead of the next, which means that you would be required to reach a mastery level on normal games first, in order to earn the ranked version of mastery token for the same level from ranked games; which also means that you would need to earn the equivalent grade instead of one grade higher.
Mastery level that has been upgraded to ranked version would have a different appearance for the crest; a crest that proves the S’s you’ve earned from ranked games; more “value” for the crest.
#NORMAL QUEUE
- Choose Position Before Blind Queue To me, the need of calling lanes through the chat every time has always been, or feel... unnecessary? inessential?
I don't know how to say it, but... why not just make something that could skip that step?
You pick a lane, get matched to a game, and then only use the chat to discuss if anyone were to have a second thought; it sounds convenient to me, and it could potentially avoid quite a few conflicts.
Is there a reason why it's only available for draft pick? Sorry if this was mentioned somewhere, I wasn't following up the news and updates up close all the time.
If it's about the queue time, then I think I could understand; but maybe there could be something like an increased IP gain for choosing the fill position, although the difference needs to be a bit significant for players to prefer it over individual lanes.
#MINOR THINGS
- Anonymous Stream An option in the setting or a toggle to hide all summoner names in a quick and easy way, both in the lobby and in the game (such as on the chat, on the scoreboard etc.), for anyone who might want all the names to be hidden while streaming or recording.
- Lore Audiobook Are there audiobook or anything similar for all the stories in the universe?
Because I have a little difficulty in reading, even checking this entire post is harder than it should, it's not that I can't but it's very stressful, and it takes a lot more time than people would normally need, it just ruin the mood; so I was wondering if there are any other ways that I can reach the stories.
#MAP THEME
Lastly, map theme; but before any suggestion, I have two questions:
- I'd like to ask if there are any plans on making theme / skin for maps, or at least just Summoner's Rift? If there aren't any, then this entire suggestion can be skipped.
- How big is a map in terms of hard disk space? If they're too heavy, then it wouldn't be a wise feature to add.
Well assuming that it's planned and not heavy, here are some ideas:
- Seasonal Map Map with seasonal change; since this game can arguably be considered a repetitive game (not in the bad way, of course), some minor change on the visual every once in a while, instead of only on annual events, can actually have a strong refreshing effect; and as strange as it may sound, in a vague way, where it has its effect but it's all very natural (forgive me if no one understands what I'm saying).
Since it's seasonal change, I was going to say little by little every month, like in the autumn, where you could see yellow or yellowish green instead of green in the early autumn, more yellow + orange in the middle autumn, and more orange + red in the late autumn; while there would be more fallen leaves on the ground in each stage; but ahem, that would be a little too much, so about every 3 months for each of the four seasons to fill up the year would be another way, roughly following the seasonal change in the real world.
- Before I Continue... Probably like everything I said in this post, this one especially, would be a perfect example for "easier said than done", and if I am to be honest, I don't have anything convincing or persuasive enough to fight for this idea, only "there will be many people who would love these kind of things", that's why I put this last, as it's basically a bold idea to suggest.
- Regional Map Besides seasonal map, I'd absolutely love to have regional map, one or more for each of the regions / continents on Runeterra: Bandle City, Bilgewater, Demacia, Freljord, Ionia, Mount Targon, Noxus, Piltover, Shadow Isle, Shurima, Void and Zaun; and it doens't have to be outdoor in my opinion, as long as it has the same terrain, it could be indoor or semi-outdoor, but more than anything, it could widen the creativity space by quite a lot.
- Thematic Map Not a location map, but themes that are used on champion skins, bigger theme or theme with stronger concept, such as academy, arcade, blood moon, hextech, omega squad, pool party, project, star guardian etc; they all have very promising potential.
- Festival Map So far, we only have event map for Halloween and Christmas, right? Or Harrowing and Snowdown Showdown.
Maybe there could be a theme for all the annual events, like Valentine, April Fool, Easter, Lunar New Year, and any event themes that are used on the champion skins; and if anyone like those themes, they can buy them within a limited time period around the event.
And many more designs, it's a whole new world for creativity. As for the design as a feature in the game:
- Naming Concept It could be called a Sphere, or an Orb, from the concept of a Snowglobe, like Demacia's Sphere, or Noxus' Orb.
Or it could be called an Atlas, a fancy word for a Map I guess, like Freljord's Atlas; it has a cool image if you think of it as a vintage atlas.
Or Globe, like the... Globe, with a stand that you can spin, is there another name for that? It may have an "inferior" feel if you think of the modern colorful globe, but again, it can be kinda cool if you add a little vintage into it, try googling; but a flaw for this is "a globe for a continent" can be a little unfitting.
- In The Store Personally, I'd hope to see them as an IP/RP thing, but of course, they would be a lot more expensive than champions, easily over 5 digits of IP, and since there are players who have a staggering amount of unspent IP with basically nothing to spend on, this could be a solution for that as well.
For the sake of the RP market, each map can be separated into 3 tiers: I'll call them common, noble and royal for now; the common one is the one that can be unlocked through IP/RP, but it can only be used for yourself; the noble one can only be unlocked through RP, but it can be shared to friends when queued together; the royal one can also only be unlocked through RP, but it would be more expensive than the noble one, as it can be shared to anyone in the team; if a lower tier(s) is unlocked through RP, the spent amount would be deducted from the price of the higher tier(s).
- How To Use Of course, it must be optional, as it could potentially affect the gameplay of some players, so it could be made into something like the ward skin, which you can choose between the classic theme, or any other theme that you or your team mate may have during the champion selection; but different from the ward skin, player only sees the theme they have chosen, which means every player in the same match can see the map with different themes.
- Willing Weight I have absolutely no idea how it would be like for the development team to make a map, so don’t take offense if this sounds stupid, but if themes for maps are going to be heavy, can it be made into something like a DLC? So that players would only need to download the theme they are ever going to use.
- Music As I was thinking about themes for the eyes, how about themes for the ears? Like those login screen music; if you have the talent, all you need is time, there could be a theme BGM for each champions, similar to DJ Sona, except that the BGM is bought separately.
A nice name I have in mind is an orchestrion, "a large mechanical musical instrument designed to imitate the sound of an orchestra.", said google dictionary.
It could be for individual champions like Ahri's Orchestrion, for a region like Ionia's Orchestrion, or for a theme like Arcade's Orchestrion; and maybe, each individual champion's orchestrion can only be used by their respective champion, and regional orchestrion can only be used by champions that are living in that region, and themed orchestrion can only be used when using a skin with the same theme.
Music is more on the preference side though, in many games to many players, the range is quite big; music can be an influencing, or an important part of a game to some players, while it can also be something that's usually muted as soon as possible for some players.
But from all the login screen music, it's clear that this game attach importance to music, especially music that introduces a champion, like Kindred's, Jhin's, Camille's, Taliyah's, some of my favourites; music like these gives a strong feel to the characters, and makes me very much into the design and the style.
But~ back to the suggestion, a big leak to this idea is that it's just audio, player can just mute the game music and listen to it somewhere, or any music; yeah, it's like digging a hole to bury the idea... so if this orchestrion is a thing, it should be really cheap I guess;
Or hey, a crazy idea but: every champion that reaches mastery level 7 gets their classic orchestrion unlocked for free, and all the noble or royal map theme would also have their respective orchestrion unlocked in a package; sounds interesting to me, but crazy, for the development team.
- HUD Royal map theme would each have their respective HUD change... at least that's what I really want to suggest, because the original HUD has this "exquisite" kind of feeling that makes any HUD change feels a bit inferior, or non-original; but a part of this impression probably came from some fan-made custom HUD, well-made but a little too fancy to feel original, plus they’re overlaid instead of replacing the original HUD, so it makes them even more unfitting.
But for original customizations, it’s the same for any game I guess, if any of them were to look bad, that would only mean that they have only put so much into it; no problem at all on that part for Riot I believe, any alternative HUD would be a delicate piece of art anyway, but that’s either an investment if it has its worth, or just another scrapped idea otherwise.
And~ that'll be everything I have in mind for now.
Flooded by the amount of texts, it's obvious that I suck at writing, so again, sorry about that; I'm not a native English speaker, hence all the uncommon words I might have used, and all the grammar mistakes I may have made.
But anyway, a big thanks to anyone who has read all up until this point; if you have anything you'd like to say something about, the discussion section is right below.
Have a nice day.