Regarding these account farmers in Dominion

Drunk Old Man·8/12/2014, 5:09:50 PM·19 votes·1,721 views

I'm assuming any of you who've been on Reddit or other communities have seen all the links to sites selling LoL accounts, and they claim that they can have an account level 30 in 3 days. Is it true? Absolutely. If you play a Co-Op vs AI Intermediate Dominion game, chances are you're going to get at least 1 person on your team who is a bot. More commonly, you're going to get a full team of them. I've seen 3 queues of bots that pick the same champ every game, and go in the same path every game. It's pretty damn sad, but it also seems to be pretty damn easy for them, since not a lot of people play Dominion compared to the other modes. It's short games, where even losing gives them the XP they want, so they just bot the accounts for 72 hours straight and get them to level 30, then sell them for at least $10 each.

Now, while this may not exactly seem like a problem that's plaguing the community or ruining the game, it really is. The majority of streamers who don't level their accounts by hand or get them from subs, buy them from sites that create them in this fashion. Some of these sites even let you pick a name for the account (from what I've heard). It not only makes smurfing easier for people, but it encourages it.

So, aside from the fact that this utterly ruins the fun of playing Dominion (because, yes, they're in PVP too, and boy do they feed.) it just seems sloppy that it's kinda just.. being ignored. In the nearly 3 years since Dominion has been out, literally 2 of those years it's been filled with bots. This is pretty darn depressing, since the only way I can play a legit Dominion game (without playing so many games I up my MMR for it or something) is to create a custom with 9 other people, which is a hassle to do.

So, tl;dr; what I'm asking is: why not just disable Dominion for a while, until a solution is found? I know some people like the game mode, and I personally like the idea of it as well. But I feel like both the game mode and this issue could use some work, and to even begin stopping smurfing we need to make it as hard as possible from the get-go. If not disable it, disable Co-Op vs AI for the map and add a level cap of at least 15 to the PVP queue for it. This is of course temporary, but it should have a massive effect on these botters. An alternative third option is to take away the XP rewards for the queue temporarily. Either way, it will hinder their market.

Also, regarding what I saw on GD a while back about people not botting customs, it's not true. You can simply fill the entire game with bots, and have them play it out in a macro fashion. While it does infact work, it requires the botters to be pretty damn organized, which is why they prefer Dominion.

Anyway, thoughts/opinions? I'd personally both love to play this game mode legit for once, and like to see this community stop suffering from being botted as much.

25 Comments

FDru8/12/2014, 11:56:19 PM6 votes

Disable the mode? That's your answer? LOL! You're insane. Yes, some people like the mode... a lot of people do. Disabling it doesn't help anybody, the bots will just go to another mode (btw, ARAM is infested with them as well).

If Riot disabled IP name changes, that would be a much better way to hurt their business. Since players would be forced to pay for a name that isn't stupid as hell, accounts would need to be sold for more.

If Riot made the level 30 grind less painful, less players would feel the need to pay for a pre-leveled account.

If Riot made the IP grind in general to be less horrible, it would be better for everybody.

What if Riot made level 30 the default? It's kind of ridiculous that players need to farm up an account just to be on a level playing field (the IP grind for runes plays into this as well).

There are a lot of things Riot could do to discourage players from buying accounts. You take the absolute worst idea that hurts nobody but Dominion players and that's the one you decide to pitch? What's worse is you do this because you want to play Dominion matches? Please slap yourself since I can't do it.

Exvoto8/16/2014, 5:23:56 PM2 votes

The bots are not just in "vs AI" mode. They are in pvp mode as well. It has gotten much worse this week. Dominion is my most favourite mode and I play it almost exclusively. This issue is going to force me to play other modes or quit. It is distracting from the game to be trying to figure out who is a bot and not communicating so that I am not reporting actual summoners. My game play has definitely been negatively impacted. My enjoyment in playing the game is severely affected. Divinity Arcane had some suggestions that I hope are considered. A response from Riot about this situation would be appreciated. Delaying queueing for Dominion, temporarily, until level 30 may be an option. Thank-you for considering this unfortunate situation.

Sluiceway8/12/2014, 10:41:31 PM2 votes

Since we can't use summoner names on the forums, I have to ask my question in an unfortunately roundabout way (if this is still against the rules, let me know and I will take it down). Has anyone encountered, either solo or as a duo queue, an Akali or a Yasuo who use Cleanse and Clairvoyance as their summoner spells in intermediate AI dominion? Ones that spam pings constantly throughout the match, and who have seemingly decent item builds (Hydra, Sanguine Blade, and GA on Yasuo, and Gunblade, Triforce, Witchcap on Akali)? I thought they may have been trolls, but I wonder now if these were bots farming XP.

Micavity Cat8/12/2014, 9:06:26 PM1 votes

i have never encountered a bot in my 3 years of playing. mainly because i stay away from bot games. bot games are nothing but trouble. they only make you play worse against real people =/

get rid of all the bots rito plox

Hoi Im Temmo8/12/2014, 5:31:56 PM1 votes

While I don't play much dominion, I actually haven't encountered many bots O.o

CharQueen8/17/2014, 12:13:34 AM1 votes

I've encountered plenty of those bots. In both Bot Dom and PvP Dom. Fortunately, they were the enemy team. While they did provide easy feeding, I am sure to report them all. You would think that Riot would notice what is going on and therefore punish those players.

I have a great idea that allows Riot to profit from this mess of account bots...

  • Remove EXP bonuses from the shop.
  • $15 - %50 Lv.30 account upgrade packs. Packs come with various champions / runes. Least expensive pack only upgrades your account.

...and bingo was his name-o.

Pallin Majere8/12/2014, 5:52:00 PM1 votes

Even if true, no reason to disable Dominion for this, especially if its only in Co-op intermediate games. People rarely play that at all... They'd just flood SR instead anyways so it wouldn't solve anything.

Wasabo8/12/2014, 8:52:55 PM1 votes

I encountered 2 bots in one game once. It was on beginner mode and we lost ._. Reported them both