Yut Put wrote:

Here's the thing, though, as a designer. In my opinion, if people play your game a way that you did not intend, you have failed.

That's not meta though. That's just bad design.

If your game is rock, paper, scissors, and you remove rock, people will naturally pick scissors because it cannot lose anymore. As a consequence of how you've designed the game, people alter how they play it.

If you're actively trying to control and alter the meta as a designer, I feel this is the sign of a bad designer. If people are exploiting bugs and you fix them, that is one thing, but if you go around removing or changing things just because you do not like how people play, that is something else entirely.

Best example would be LoL vs DotA 2.
LoL has an incredibly forced meta that has not changed in a long time due to the developer interfering constantly. It's games tend to be long, boring and very little happens. It's esports scene is a joke that is entirely run and funded by Riot (it's basically like wrestling, it's not a real sport and everyone knows it's fake, but they watch it anyway).
DotA 2 however, is balanced around hard data. If a hero wins 55% of games, it gets nerfed. If another loses 55% of games, it gets buffed. As a result it's meta is constantly changing, and it's esports scene is not only fun to watch (usually, except those boring metas), but has some of the biggest prizes in video gaming events anywhere because the players love this stuff.

Balance the game, don't dictate how people should play it.

The Magic Man wrote:

LoL has an incredibly forced meta that has not changed in a long time due to the developer interfering constantly.

This is not true. The meta isn't really "forced" in any way, it's just the best way to play. If you choose to not follow the meta you won't take any penalties, and perhaps you'll find a few strategies that actually work. Worlds is a good example of this, some crazy things have happened and been successful.

It's games tend to be long, boring and very little happens.

Uhhh, maybe you should watch more. The games are quick, or slow, or in the middle, just like dota 2 depending on how it's going. The Taiwan scene for example are renown for having nearly constant fights, 40+ kills at 30 minutes is routine over there.

It's esports scene is a joke that is entirely run and funded by Riot (it's basically like wrestling, it's not a real sport and everyone knows it's fake, but they watch it anyway).

Well you're half-half right. The LCS and Worlds are run and funded by Riot, but IEM and OGN and other tournies aren't. Neither are the teams, and calling it a joke is just downright ignorant. I can't remember the team (I THINK it's Team Coast?) that got bought recently, by the richest man in Russia. There's also another team owned by the richest man in Japan.

DotA 2 however, is balanced around hard data. If a hero wins 55% of games, it gets nerfed. If another loses 55% of games, it gets buffed.

This is exactly the same as League.

FTFY.

EmpirezTeam wrote:

The only time where meta comes into play ( in term so of game length ) is actually deciding whether or not to go for an early game or late game team comp

Uhhh, or a poke comp, or a seige comp, or a brawl comp, or a hard engage comp, or a kite comp, or a tank comp... All of these are effected by the meta.

Except that's still not right. I'm not going to sit and go into the nuances of each of the types of comp I listed, but each one has a very large impact on how long a game goes on for.

A small example, a lategame scaling comp can still easily be beaten by a good poke comp if they lack engage, or even a kite comp if it's built properly. This is important, because whilst they both have mid-game powerspikes it's going to be harder to capitalize on them whilst the lategame comp gets stronger and stronger, it's going to stall the game out for a very long time if the meta is in the poke or kite comp's favor.

The game isn't "boring" because of people not making mistakes, heck I'd argue it's not more or less boring than Dota 2 fullstop, but more because the pick-ban phase is SO important. It's like, 80% of games at worlds thus far have just been won at Pickban, because of different types of comps and playing to their strengths. All of which is effected by the current meta.

The Magic Man wrote:

People get banned in LoL for not playing the meta. Riot even added meta to the matchmaking, so now you can queue as one of the 5 roles in the game. Riot designs champions based on a specific role that fits within the meta. They nerf anything that breaks the meta.

This is a very common misconception, people THINK you can be banned for going out of the meta but you literally can't. It's not in the rules, it never has been, and it never will be. I have friends who play really off meta picks all the time like Support Shaco or ADC Rengar, and that's all they play. I have friends who take duo top and leave an ADC bot by themselves. They don't get banned because it's flat out not against the rules to do these things. So long as you're playing the game to the best of your abilities you will not be banned unless you're an asshat.

Except it's not. Riot have admitted several times to nerfing champions for dumb reasons. They butchered Eve and Twitch for years because new players would get dominated by them and quit. They butchered Shaco continually because people didn't find him enjoyable to play against. They butchered Singed because he could break the meta.

I wouldn't consider it a dumb reason at all. If a champion is overperforming in a certain area of skill, it's above that 55% winrate. It's in the margin (For that skill region) of being nerfed. Shaco is a prime example of this (Sorry to use him again but he's really the best example). He has been nerfed, tweaked, changed, nerfed and batted again and again because he is SO damn strong in the low Elo regions that he just can't be stopped if you're half competent (Past tense, this is no longer the case since those nerfs etc). However despite being a average pick in low Elo, he's still a very powerful pick in high Elo, and the main of many players. Riot don't nerf "Because hue hue ghostcrawler hue" they do it for legitimate reasons, not to enforce the meta or push some agenda, but soley because they are too powerful in certain areas.

None of these were OP, and none of them needed nerfing so hard, they did it because they didn't fit Riots ideal game design.

Put what I just wrote on the back burner for a second, and I'm still right. Yes, they change it to fit Riot's ideal game design, which is a balanced environment that is influenced 70% by strategy and 30% by skill. League has always been like this, from season 1 to now. They don't push the meta, infact if Mordekaiser is anything to look at they're actively trying to add variety to it.

You're right. Half of it is to do with game design. Almost every champion has a method of escaping, and flash. But very few champions have any way of forcing anything to happen. Due to this the meta has evolved into 40-50 minutes of passive safe farming which results in a single fight that the game is essentially decided upon.

I'm sorry but I can't take this bit seriously. Yes nearly every champ has an escape and flash, but "Very few champions have any way of forcing anything to happen", an escape is a gapcloser, friend. You can use it to engage, if every champ has a gapcloser, every champ has an engage. Obviously that's a bit of a hyperbole, but even then a LOT of champions have great engage, and A LOT of them are viable, even top tier picks at the moment, with the likes of Zac, Malphite and Hecarim being strongly contested picks.

I'm not sure if you actually watch worlds, but the fact that SKT's average game length is 34 minutes, and the fact that the average first blood happens within 6 minutes, and the fact that MOST games at worlds have been <40 minutes with >27 kills, just completely demolishes that argument. And that's at worlds, where honestly (some) teams are very passive. Like I mentioned earlier, watch the Taiwanese games. They're crazy aggressive and constantly skirmish having games with 50+ kills is almost standard (Ok that's a bit high but still).


Say what you want about the game, personally I've given up on it recently after reaching Diamond, but you cannot make baseless statements like that which are just flat out wrong, lol.

Kats wrote:

LoL is one of my favorite games, but even the most die hard fan shouldn't be so blind as to see that Riot does a very hard job of enforcing the meta as it stands. Team positions are one thing, but they really do try to keep the solo top/mid/jg and duo bot pretty strict.

Again, using worlds as an example, nearly every game has had laneswaps out the wazoo, duo mid with midlaner bot, duo jungle, triple bot. Also there has been a fair few off-meta picks too, such as the legendary Kennen adc. And I'm just going to point Morde out again, he's a bot lane "adc" who is melee, lol.

I don't think what Riot does is enforce the Meta and try to push for it, but rather have accepted that it's the way people enjoy playing the most and have just catered to that. When the game first came out there was no such thing as an "adc" or lanes, really. Champs didn't stick to certain places and do things, the community built that, and Riot sees this. They know that's how people want to play so they release things that stick within those boundries, but I wouldn't consider that enforcing. Once again, Mordekaiser, a brilliant example of Riot actively trying to give players more options on how to play.

Team builder I have little to comment on, I think it's more an anti-toxicity method of preventing people from going craycray in champ select because "BUT MUH DUO BOT" and "NO Y U BAN MUH MUNDER?". EVEN THEN Team builder doesn't enforce the meta. Go into it right now, you can literally select Duo mid and no jungler and other things. It's not stricly 1/1/2

While it's not optimal design, it kind of is what it is and most players just accept it. The challenges comes from the skill of the players more since laning and jungling are more often than not even matches.

Again I believe you have this completely backwards. It's not players accepting it, it's Riot accepting that's how players are playing it.

I do think the meta could be changed up a bit to allow for alternate strategies

I definitely agree, but that's still not quite how it works. Players are always going to optimize the best possible situation for themselves, all Riot can do is basically throw shit at the wall and see what sticks. And from a business standpoint, it's far safer to throw what you know people already are enjoying, then trying out wacky things.

But don't hate on muh Morde tho, das shit cray.

EmpirezTeam wrote:

They're really not enforcing the meta. I don't see how anyone can say that when they're releasing champions like Kindred who are essentially ADCs who can jungle. That's not enforcing the meta, that's a step in the direction of opening the game up to be played in as many ways as possible. ADC and jungle are my two most played roles, so I came in my underwear when I heard I was going to be able to do both at the same time.

Exception that proves the rule.

There are multiple champs that can go multiple lanes, with Kayle being the only champ that can go in all 5 roles. Lulu works mid and bot, as does Annie. Shyvana can jungle and top lane. Quinn can ADC and top lane. Jayce can go mid or top. Yasuo can go mid or top. This list can continue all night, the point is all they have to do is change like, one part of these champions kit and they wouldn't be able to fulfill multiple roles, and they would have if they wanted to enforce a meta, but it seems to me they like the idea of allowing players to have a variety of options.

Morde is another example. I'm sure there were people who wanted to play a melee ADC bot lane, and now they can. Forcing meta would've looked something like never adding a melee champion ( that wasn't a support ) who thrived in the bottom lane.

Rushnut wrote:

EmpirezTeam wrote:

Kayle being the only champ that can go in all 5 roles.

Son you ain't seen shit till you've seen my Kennen jungle.

I've seen a pretty good Teemo jungle too, and he's decently good in all four other roles too.

Whenever I lock in ADC and see my support picks Teemo I just alt-tab and watch Crunchyroll until the game is over.

But no, Riot gets a lot of flak for its meta when in reality the meta is actually at the bottom of the list when it comes to League's shortcomings. The true issues with League are:

- Riot's definition of anti-fun is usually BS ( for example, they think Bloodseeker's ultimate has no place in a MOBA game )

- Riot wants the game to be as dumbed down as possible ( that's why we can't have creep denying as mechanic and why no gold is lost on death and why the game is designed in such a way that makes comebacks very easy )

- Supports are far less impactful in League. I actually enjoy the support role in Dota 2. I happen to play and watch Dota 2 and League equally so I can say I've seen far more instances of supports carrying the game in Dota 2 than I've seen in League. I've seen a couple carry Threshes and Tahm Kenches and even some Lulus but Rubick has carried more competitive games of Dota 2 than all three of those combined. Hell, the biggest play of the grand final of TI5 were the combined ultimates of Earthshaker and Ancient Apparition - those are supports for those who don't play Dota 2.



What support in League could've done the equivalent of this? Besides a Flash Tibbers, and even then in order to have gotten the kills, the Annie would've had to have been building damage items instead of support items to kill them as quickly as Earthshaker did. However, I will say that they are moving in the right direction with supports. Tahm Kench and Bard are both supports that emphasize making plays on other parts of the map and not just bottom lane. The idea of a roaming support is exactly where we need to be taking the role.

- The active items are a joke in this game except for Zhonyas and maybe Righteous Glory ( RG + Sejuani buff back during Cinderhulk introduction made initiating a brainless task. just ping the enemies so your team knows you're going in, press Righteous Glory, press R, win team fight, rinse and repeat until enemy realizes if they wanted to win they should've just banned Sejuani ).

- Their balance changes sometimes contradict each other. Sometimes they'll say "We nerfed x because it's a y who can do a, b, and c" then someone in the community makes a post pointing out how another champ similar to x who is a y can do a, b, and c as well but never gets touched. I remember when they were nerfing Kha'zix, they were like "Yeah, we're toning him down because it's just not cool for an assassin to pounce on one target, tank damage and be able to continue fighting. assassins should have to kill one target and then back out of the fight, not keep attacking and soaking up damage."

And then I'd make mention of Jax on the forums and how he's an assassin who, just like Kha'zix, has the potential to pounce on the ADC, 3 shot them, soak damage, kill the support that was standing next to the ADC, leap to the tank and kill them in like 7 hits, and have like 30% HP left over when he's backing to the fountain. He's one of those sleeper OPs that no one knows about, similar to Swain and Quinn, because everyone's too busy locking in whatever they see Faker play.

Anyway, I said all this to say the meta is the least of the problems. Riot needs to make the game harder instead of wipe your ass for you after you screw up, we need better supports and meaningful active items, and Riot needs to quit contradicting themselves because quite frankly Bloodseeker's ult is almost the same as Kindred. If you didn't read the thread, the reason why Bloodseeker's ult is considered bad is because the player doesn't know when it's cast on them and doesn't immediately recognize that it's killing them as they move. How is Kindred's ult any different? The first time I went against Kindred and she ulted, I actually moved out of it because I thought that invulnerable buff only applied to her. This is the exact same situation I ran into when I first got ulted by Bloodhunter in Heroes of Newerth ( he's basically the same as Bloodseeker in Dota 2 ): I just kept moving because I had never encountered the ability before. The point is, you experience something, learn from the mistake, and don't make it the next time you're up against that enemy. If they can add a Kindred ult that exploits a player's ignorance to the way her ability works, why can't we have a Bloodseeker ultimate equivalent? WHY RITO?