Why is team builder so slow?

CherryOakSmoke·Sep 8, 2014·6 votes·9,899 views

I remember when team builder was first released and it was great. You could pick your champ and lane and not have to worry about the blind pick trolls. ( i.e ADC or feed) And it only took like 2 mins at max to find a group of people to create a team and play. BUT NOW it will literally take you 20 - 30 mins to just find one freaking support or even a jungle. WTF happened to team builder. This is insane having to wait so long just to play one game. I'm seriously about to quit using team builder and risk the troll waters of Blind pick, but I really don't wont too. Is Riot even aware of this issue and are they gonna do anything about it. I hate to see something that was great in the beginning fall apart because of neglect. I know i can't be the only person frustrated about this. Please raise your voice let it be heard so that Riot can do something about this before it becomes a black mark in an otherwise perfect game.

20 Comments

MandaariSep 8, 20143 votes

Relevant

It's also not about Riot needing to do something. More people just need to play the less popular roles. Queue as a support or jungle and you'll get into a game instantly.

RiotcautomatonSep 8, 20148 votes

This is why I play Support on Team Builder mostly. Instant games. Now if only I was actually better with Thresh or Braum.

MandaariSep 8, 20143 votes

As an ADC/support main I get games instantly, granted sometimes as ADC I need to wait for a jungler or support. As mid and top it's pretty awful though, especially pre 30. Trying to get mid or top on a smurf just isn't worth trying. Hence the link.

NazzadanSep 8, 20143 votes

Sooo instead of commenting on the issue in a helpful way you confirm the issue exists by saying "just queue as support, even if you suck at it xDDDDDD" quality redpost, glad it took a slot in the redtracker 10/10 would be baited into thinking its an actual post again

RiotcautomatonSep 8, 20149 votes

Didn't mean to come off as flippant. I've shared in the long wait pain, though as Mandaari points out, some of it is just about which roles are popular and one action we as players can make is to jump into other roles. And while I'm not on the Team Builder team, here are some recent-ish forum posts by those Rioters addressing some of these questions.

RebelMeThisSep 9, 20141 votes

Well, isn't what was said true? I mean, here's a TEAM game yet I want to stick my fingers in my ears and shut my eyes and get my way every time, aka the champion of my preference. Nevermind what the team needs. Nevermind what it is that I should probably learn to do in an effort to round out my skills. If you just want to play your champion, end of story, then wait. Wait until we have need of that champion, because it's a team game. If you're willing to be flexible, to fill what is needed, then great! You skip ahead of the line.

Not sure what you would expect Riot to do to fix the issue that is inherently based around the USERS of the system, not the system itself.

Short of perhaps offering a reward/incentive of some sort (extra IP?) for the least popular roles...

I mean, Riot could change the system to disable sign-ups for overly popular roles at a certain ratio, but how does that help YOU get to play the one role/champion you want?

So while you're getting mad at the Red post, which indicates this topic was actually noticed/read, you don't actually offer any solution yourself...

Linna ExcelSep 8, 20141 votes

Whenever I play support we can't get an ADC or jungle. Whenever I play jungle we can't get an ADC or support. Teambuilder sucks because too many players are expecting the meta and not enough players want to play those 3 positions.

MrBuffingtonSep 8, 20141 votes

The support icon is the only one I have for this same reason, lol

KeysheSep 11, 20141 votes

You can say you are other roles to get the icons, cheating but it works. I've got fighter as Nami support XD

MrBuffingtonSep 11, 20142 votes

haha true. I have a new Shurima icon for now though, so I'm not too bent on collecting all the teambuilder icons XD

FattyDrakeSep 8, 20142 votes

I've played a few Team Builder games last week, and honestly, the wait wasn't more than 5 to 10 minutes for any of the games, which I think is fine if I get to play the role I want. I queued for a bunch of ADC games, a couple jungles (with a premade, save one spot), etc.

If you ask me, after Riot is happy with Team Builder, they should get entirely rid of Normal Blind Pick games. That would certainly help wait times instead of having 3 normal queues.

MandaariSep 8, 20141 votes

I'm pretty 50/50 about ditching blind pick, at least until Riot addresses a few concerns about TB:

You can't see what side you're going to be put on. The side influences who I want to play.
You can't change you champion/lane once you've joined a game, making it nearly impossible to adapt to your team.
You can only queue as/look for one role at a time.

KillrazorSep 8, 20143 votes

You can only queue as/look for one role at a time.

If you could queue/look for like 2 roles, it would help a lot I think. Hopefully that is something they add at some point.

cshakesSep 8, 20142 votes

Or just queue as one role for multiple lanes (eg. Ryze Top or Mid) or as multiple champions (eg. Janna & Zyra as Botlane Support).

INTER5TELLARSep 10, 20141 votes

I've played a few Team Builder games last week, and honestly, the wait wasn't more than 5 to 10 minutes for any of the games, which I think is fine if I get to play the role I want. I queued for a bunch of ADC games, a couple jungles (with a premade, save one spot), etc.

If you ask me, after Riot is happy with Team Builder, they should get entirely rid of Normal Blind Pick games. That would certainly help wait times instead of having 3 normal queues.

The usual wait for me is around 10 minutes (if I want to top, mid or even sometimes ADC/jg). It wouldn't be bad if the games didn't commonly run 45+ minutes...that's essentially an hour a match. If I get up a little early in the morning and have a spare 50-60 minutes before work, I want to get in, play, and get out. I have mained supp since I started a few months back, but I DO enjoy the other roles...sometimes it feels like punishment sitting in queue juggling 10-15 players while waiting for a supp :( IMHO, offer a little incentive if a role in queue is a severe minority - maybe a 10-20% IP bonus for queuing for that role for that match? Also, get rid of blind pick...

GG BeersSep 8, 20142 votes

I'm with you. I was sooo excited about Team builder, I refuse to argue with people in champ select and I was so tired of seeing all the fighting in blind pick. Now as you said the queues are becoming worse and worse, I think people are shifting back to blind picks with the queue times getting longer in TB.

I refuse to go back to blind pick so when I really want to play a specific champ that isn't support or jungle I just play dominion.

I really like the idea of being allowed to select multiple champs and roles, though I don't think that will fix much time wise.

PsychoSimSep 8, 20141 votes

My wait as a Support is less than a minute. Usually only a few seconds... just say'n.

INTER5TELLARSep 10, 20142 votes

My wait as a Support is less than a minute. Usually only a few seconds... just say'n.

But what if you main support and actually want to play a different lane?

That's my situation - I play support probably 80% of the time. If I want to play Viktor (my mid main), then I shouldn't be punished for NOT picking support.

conzyplaysJan 18, 20151 votes

{quoted}

My wait as a Support is less than a minute. Usually only a few seconds... just say'n.

Whether support is important enough, for many it's the most "boring" role. I think the key issue is people who want to support / jg go blind queue cause it's not desired and they will likely be against a troll support.

KeysheSep 11, 20141 votes

Not as many people play support or jungle, which is why I main those by the way lol. I try to pay attention what in demand and pick from those, as well. The only thing I can think Riot can do to help, is if a game is taking a long time to setup ect, have a option to switch roles/champs with the captain permission or something. I've gone for other roles (support or other) and found out should have gone jungle ect.