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Plat+ LP gains and losses are still an issue

XinZhao2WinNhao·8/28/2019, 5:07:28 PM·2 votes·1,129 views

It makes you feel like you're in a casino since if you play many casino games, the house will always win, while most video games design their systems so that if a player plays a lot of games, the player will slowly win over a long period of time. In fact, I think LP gains and losses are even worse than the odds of most casino games (Roulette, for example, gives you a 95% return on your bet, blackjack gives 98%). In plat right now, I gain 40 per 1st and lose 60 per 8th, and that factor is the same for other placements (aka I lose 1.5x more for a loss of 5,6,7,8th place than I gain for 4,3,2,1st). I typically gain +28 for 2nd, +18 3rd, +6 4th, -9 5th, -25 6th, -40 7th. Assuming that I have a 12.5% chance of placing in each of the ranks (aka supposedly breaking even if LP gains were fair), that means that I can expect to lose about 5 LP per game. This may be mitigated by things like an 8th place only demoting you to 75 LP instead of losing the full 60, but as someone who wishes to actually climb to diamond rather than just drop slower, it's not much of a consolation.

These LP gains are the LP gains that a plat player should get for playing with silvers, not other plat.

I don't think my MMR has an issue. I play mostly with plats of my own rank, and many other plat+ players, including top streamers, have the same issue so I doubt that it's all of us having bad MMRs.

I have to say that LP gains have gotten better since 9.15 (back then it was +37 for 1st, -80 for last), but better still isn't equal.

TLDR video games aren't casinos. Video game progression should either be net-zero or even slightly benefit the player, not the house.

8 Comments

1wolfpack8/28/2019, 5:08:56 PM1 votes

"LP gains and losses are still an issue" - fixed the tittle

yw.

hypnoso8/28/2019, 6:51:00 PM1 votes

I think Riot said this is on purpose, so people would not climb by default.

Rentless8/28/2019, 7:27:13 PM1 votes

{quoted}

Assuming that I have a 12.5% chance of placing in each of the ranks (aka supposedly breaking even if LP gains were fair), that means that I can expect to lose about 5 LP per game. This may be mitigated by things like an 8th place only demoting you to 75 LP instead of losing the full 60, but as someone who wishes to actually climb to diamond rather than just drop slower, it's not much of a consolation.

I don't think your viewing it the proper way though. It is not a split on 12.5% at all. It still is relating to skill, and interpretation of the in-game meta (how well can you shift). No matter how high you rank up, you will eventually; 1) Run out of skill and stay stagnant, 2) Run out of time to rank up because your aren't winning enough games, 3) get demoted because you have run out of skill and out ranked your skill, or 4) Rank up.

I think in the end, you'll end up where you should be. I don't think the design is so that all players make it to platinum or beyond.

Aaaandy8/28/2019, 9:25:59 PM1 votes

Couldn't agree more. I also want to point out that although TFT is skill-based, the RNG part is still a key factor. That's why you see even top players playing their smurf accounts get 8th sometimes. This makes climbing even more frustrated because sometimes it has nothing to do with your skills, you just get bad luck, and this one bad game can ruin hours of work.

Worst JG Wins8/30/2019, 2:37:45 PM1 votes

It's because your MMR is below your rank. My smurf gets about 86 LP for a win in plat 1, but that's cause i get put in D2-challenger games.

Don't get me wrong it's 100% a problem at the very top of the ladder, but i'm talking top 2000 or so. It's only because almost everyone above that has MMR much lower then they should be. This has also been slowly correcting itself the longer the ladder has been out.