Forums → Games → League of Legends and Professional Aspects

Hello, as you may know I'm not a very openly grateful folk around here and my cynical standards may appear awkward or unreasonable at times.

I have a vast love for a great many things -- people, the sky, silence, even more so for the luxuries that most of us enjoy on a daily basis. The ability to communicate with you instantaneously throughout these relatively massive distances is a fortune that many of us seem to take for granted.
The extent to my negative self is the exploitation of others, or the luxuries we have for one's own gain. Perhaps not for ones own gain, but perhaps for not giving sufficient respect that these feats of humanity deserve. This is what I base my argument on, primarily.

League of Legends is a great game -- it's free to play and of utterly intense fantastic gameplay / style, free or not. Its variety and its touch, its innovations and its community have been a massive boast to its success. Alas, I've a few problems.

First off, a genuine gaming error that I perceive throughout most professional games, including Starcraft II if only to a minimal extent:
Chance.

Chance is an element of games to make things unpredictable and to make the moments "more special" by having the VERY idea of "WHAT ARE THE ODDS?!" streaming into your mind. It has exceptional uses and whilst I tend not to lean towards these kinds of games, its capabilities are both exilerating and heart breaking, depending on the situation.
It is here my perception of professional gaming and this element of gaming clash. Professionalism relies on skill, cunning and of course the business side of "entertainment" and &quotrofit". It is here that critical strike chance (what is pretty much the only factor of randomness in League of Legends as of now) I believe harms the most. Skill, is a massive thing to consider when watching gamers. It is too easy to watch friends and family, or even gameplay of a previously unknown game -- when it comes to a professional level, however, I feel that chance is something too unfair for the game.

Consider the profit at hand. There are many situations where critical strike chance in League of Legends can determine a kill, a death or a decisive winning engagement. More so when the odds stack against you, making the enemy believe there is more than reasonable chance in eliminating you... but your "Luck" as it may be called allows you to pull a success, with no requirement of adhering to skill whatsoever. You won through chance, and especially awfully so if you had a very low chance at that.

Factors to be considered should be those that are definitive in terms of professional play -- an aspect of gaming that Riot Games has continually mentioned they intend to go for and thus should follow this up with.
I am not a professional player -- it is in a sense a point that I've no say in the matter. Here I must disagree, as not only do I believe that this is more or less common sense / logic / pure mathematics but balance or matters of discussing in games are usually only discussed by the betters because of THEIR SKILL. As I have reasonably mentioned previously, there is no skill in chance, and thus that SCV building the Barracks at the vulnerable end too long or the critical strike that took 30% of your HP at the start could be too fatal to come back from.

These aren't always minor differences either. I work with Jarvan IV on League of Legends, and my first item is a Regrowth Pendant. Being as a fair few of you here may not have played League of Legends, I'll simply say that it provides me with longevity in the game.

When I enter confrontation with someone in the early game, I do not expect in the slightest a flat out win -- I tend to fall back and "regrow" from my wounds. From this you can see me wearing down the enemy or effectively giving me free reign on creep farm. However, if they have a summoner ability that damages me over time (Ignite), and they critical strike me from 50% HP to 20% HP and are able to get one more strike in, their Ignite can finish me off!

It has happened. It has also happened in more extreme circumstances of course but this is one that could turn the tide of an entire game, when a 4% chance became a 100% victory. This is a significant flaw of professional gaming that Riot Games so happily strives for and being a player of League of Legends for quite the while now, whilst delving into the ideas surrounding professional play, I believe it's a fair gesture to say that critical strike chance is an element that ought to be revamped into actually reliable aspects of the game or removed entirely, given the reasons provided.

This seems to be the only "random" thing in League of Legends, given that Dodge chance is removed, thankfully. This is not an act of ungratefulness, I feel truly that this is a missed aspect of the game that... whilst providing good entertainment and depth, does not constitute a healthy style towards professionalism. However, I wouldn't be very responsible to ask the beloved Riot Games (I do love you <3) if there were not suggestions. Every X hit items provide sufficient reliability and consistency but not a "Well this is generic". I wouldn't recommend it be on too many charges, such as needing to hit 125 times before it activates, of course -- that would be an equal, or bigger gamble at best. It should be a constant, where attack speed could gain more benefit than just letting you hit and run more quickly, perhaps. It would require a large amount of balance, yet, that is one of my next "complaints".

The additions and changes in patches, every 2-4 weeks.
I appreciate your continuous stream of new content but that in itself is a continual harm for the metagame, being constantly changed and inhibited makes it so that only the recently buffed characters are viable and etc. It would be good if you could settle down and find a way to make, at least the majority of champions, viable, because currently only a select few are seen as accessible in the highest levels of play. Whilst some clans like SoloMid have consistently shown to be innovating their strategies or constructing completely dominating and unique ones, there is little leeway for experimentation beyond this kind of surprise, even gimmicky tactic. It is also as a result unpredictable to know just how powerful these are, as being as it changes so often it's difficult to gauge whether it's too strong for other strategies, or merely due to the lack of evolution of the metagame.

With this I ask -- have any of these traits in a game bothered you? I recognise I'm far from a professional player, however I think mathematically on reliability. If I cannot determine whether I will die or survive, completely knowing the situation I should not be a professional player (unless there are gameplay choices that the enemies make that you do not anticipate -- in which case, they should be inefficient for them), but critical strike chance makes that uncertainty.

- H