a challenger's perspecitve on league in general, as well as adressing people's common concerns with the game

*these are my opinions, they aren’t absolute and should encourage discussion, but it is the equivalent of an NBA player discussing basketball with a high school athlete*

1. The game is not bad.

If you feel like playing is a chore, genuinely ask yourself why you continue to play the game. If your answer is: “because I just always have,” then I think you know what to do. Take a break, come back, and you’ll probably love it more than ever. It will always be here.

It was released in 2009 and has only gained in popularity, maintaining its yearly status as one of the most popular games on the planet. Statistics speak for themselves. If you thought a food was bad you wouldn’t eat it, but you choose to eat League, which is also why you’re morbidly obese.

To some people it may not appeal, it’s a competitive multiplayer game, of course! But, if you have 5,000 hours in it don’t even start on how it’s a bad game…

(TL;DR if playing feels like a chore, ask yourself why you play. The game’s popularity and consistency speaks for itself in terms of effectivness as a medium of entertainment)

2. The game is pretty balanced, stop harassing its developers.

(I’ll be honest, I fell into this bad habit of permanently complaining about the game’s balance as well as criticizing the people in charge of its decisions. But I came to this realization the better I got at the game, and every time I see people complaining a champion is broken on this subreddit, I will proceed to watch the clip or read their rant, and recognize, wow, you have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Here’s what I realized:)

I’ve said some pretty questionable things in my life, and acted extremely immaturely, but the amount of harassment I’ve seen toward Phreak and league developers in general is ridiculous. First of all, if you’re in a lower rank, most changes don’t even matter with the sheer amount of mistakes being made that just go completely unpunished. For higher-elo players, this frustration makes sense, but never should we ever be legitimately harassing nor insulting them to this degree. It is childish and embarassing to our community. In addition, what makes you think a developer, because they’re a, key word, PERSON, will be incentivized to pour their heart into improving the game when its players are constantly harassing them? Particularly when most of you, have no idea what the hell you’re talking about!! Yeah, they’re being paid to work on it, but they’re f***ing people just like you and me.

Firstly, there are 165 champions as of this post’s creation. Each champion has 5 abilities (including passive), and there are over 200 items in the game. That means there are 1025 “things” in the game, excluding champion interactions which become more complex, that need to be in near perfect balance at all times. League is not a gun game, it’s not that simple.

Assuming it is played perfectly, there are champions that are designed to beat you, particularly early game. It’s like saying pantheon is overpowered; I check your match history and you were playing kayle and died 5 times before minute 8, and your team surrendered before he reached his weakest point, midgame. He’s overpowered because you didn’t realize after the first 4 deaths that you can’t walk up to farm against a champion that’s particularly strong early game. It’s the reaction of a toddler doing the same thing over and over again with tears in his eyes, because that’s probably exactly what you did: you tried to play League like it was a first person shooter, and it’s not.

But foj, there’s some champions I can’t EVER fight in lane no matter what point in the game I’m in! This took me a while to understand and feel, but lane isn’t everything. And, welcome to the importance of understanding the game. Will a Riven ever be able to 1 v 1 a Renekton? No. I could lose to an Emerald Renekton in a 1 v 1 at 20 minutes if he has the mental capacity to press QWER. What separates a good and an average player is understanding its design. Hey, I have 4 f**king dashes and build hydra first, meaning I have good wave clear and solid roaming potential; I just need to minimize my losses in lane and gap him in teamfights with my AOE. Because, that is what I am designed to do!! I am designed to be able to roam!! When you say a champion is overpowered, chances are its not. Champions like Garen and Illaoi are overpowered in lane relative to other meta toplaners, but are they overpowered in general? No. These two champions rely directly on their ability to splitpush and bait enemies into falling for it. If you clear the wave and proxy, they become USELESS. They are designed to be strong in lane as there are serious counterplay measures. Lane isn’t everything. In addition, perspectives of one tricks on other champions are often heavily biased. Imagine trying to play Illaoi into a syndra, it is unplayable.

But I’m low elo!! [insert champion name] is so broken down here! Oh, look. The developers you so hate are the ones that are even catering to your lack of understanding and providing elo-specific nerfs to things that seem to be strong to you, when in reality, you have no idea what you are doing, and could fix the misconception with a clear mind and an outside perspective. It is the equivalent of complaining about a shotgun in an FPS when you’re so close to the enemy you can smell they haven’t showered in a few months.

(TL;DR This continual harassment of developers will only further destroy the community’s relations with developers, developers’ intrinsic motivation to improve the game, and our community’s reputation to newer players. There is an unfamothable amount of factors that interact in ways that can’t be expected whether it be bugs or overtuned items; league is exponentially harder to balance than an FPS. Understand the roles of champions and that being a better player includes acceptance of certain matchups as unwinnable.)

2. Elo hell and loser’s queue do not exist.

I have played in every elo and felt stuck at every elo at one point. There is not a single rank in which the term elo hell applies. These two concepts are attempts to rationalize one’s emotional response, often of their own inadequacy. What seems like loser’s Q is the work of a team game at play. Due to the nature of a 5 v 5 match, it is a complex system with the goal being to maximize the probability of success; there have been games I have lost in Silver due to severe unluckiness and champion specific interactions. If you hate it, realize that a Radiant in Valorant with 10,000 hours could get run and gunned by a drunk Iron player out of sheer luck.

(TL;DR elo hell and loser’s q are rationalizations of emotional responses to inadequacy. League is a complex system as a team game, you being better than the other players should only increase probability of winning, not guarantee it. Radiant’s in Valorant can get rng-ed by a 7-year old by pure luck; if a challenger gets solo-killed by an iron it’s time to reconsider the ranking system.)

3. In any competitive setting, there will be unavoidable negative emotion and toxicity.

In any professional sport, and look at any, there will be always be controversy and minor feuds between players in the heat of the moment. This is also worsened by the isolated nature of gaming as well as League being a multiplayer and quite competitive game. Toxicity in League is appears to be more severe than other games because simply put, there are more players and just more of everything.

However, there are issues that specifically come with the nature of gaming. In League, as lots of focused is required, we will generally be playing by ourselves, and as humans are social creatures, this can often have negative side-effects when playing for extended periods of time. It’s very easy to project one’s issues onto others through the form of toxicity, especially when we forget there are humans just like us on the other end. It is so easy to dissociate consequences from our actions particularly online. I have issues with this myself, I will not pretend I don’t, but it’s something I work on.
How could we fix EXTREME toxicity? I’m not really sure, nor am I really qualified to speak on this, but I may consider attaching some form of real identity with one’s account similar to Korea or China. That way, there is some form of true accountability and real consequences to players actions. Some may say it removes the appeal of playing in the first place (anonymity), but I think that’s also the issue.

(TL;DR if toxicity scares you, a competitive game to this degree is not for you. Reactions ike toxicity occur in response to being invested in something you care about; it’s seen in professional sports since their invention. League’s toxicity seems exacerbated due to the isolated nature of gaming and its anonymous feature.)

4. Anyone can hit challenger, but you must be playing to win rather than simply playing for enjoyment.

But, it takes people years to hit challenger! Yeah, but this is the difference between playing with intent and playing for fun. You will never hit it as a casual unless you’re able to play 10 games a day for an eternity. People play for 7 years and remain gold, and others can hit challenger in 2. Time does not necessarily equate to skill, but over time, intentional playing will directly correlate to skill. In addition, in physical sports, coaching is extremely normalized if not just flat-out necessary, in esports it is not as common for individual players or looked down upon (in my opinion).
Simply put, there is no way a casual player will ever outclass a player who is obsessed with the game no matter what rank they may be. A more talented player may beat a less talented player initially, but if the other player has an obsession for perfection, he will eventually become inferior. Obsession can become talent itself. A player who thinks about the game more will not only have more repititions in matches, but will also create a habit of processing situations in the game, and that means more thoughtful repititions. Enough thoughtful repetition will lead to near perfection.

(TL;DR if you want to hit challenger, stop playing as a casual and play a lot of games with a lot of intent. Even if you have barely any talent, obsession can amount for a lack of initial skill.)