Nick Smith · @inero
11th Jun 2016 from TwitLonger
I love League of Legends
Gonna do this in two parts since they both pertain to different things:
Part 1: Boosting
So I guess I should start with the situation that prompted all of this. Yesterday with the QQ booster ban wave, anyone associated with the skype group, QQ names, etc was banned for obvious reasons. These bans are deserved and everyone got what was coming to them. One of those banned was our current support player. This whole process happened immediately after the roster lock for NACS this week, so next week we'll be subbing in Bee Sin again. I'm not really salty about having to use him as a sub over an actual support main, since we could've taken the C9 approach and signed 20,000 subs and we opted not to.
Now, despite the arguably justifiable reasons for our support having boosted 2-3 months ago, he knew what he was doing, and opted into doing it anyways. If I was in his position, I would have done the exact same, but that doesn't really change the punishment for anything. My only issue with this whole situation is that he was cleared by Riot at the start of our season, despite Riot knowing that he had boosted then. If a player is cleared by Riot to play in challenger series, despite knowing that he's done this and been punished for it already, how can you punish him 1 week later with a competitive ruling? The company basically lied to the organization about the player being eligible to play, and they lied to the player about his situation. They basically dangled this fantasy in front of the kid's face and pretended like he had a chance of playing despite knowing full well they were going to kick him out anyways. I don't know if this company has some insane communication issues going on behind the scenes that caused them to change their stance on former elo-boosters playing professionally that caused them to overrule their ruling on the eligibility of him playing, but it's really sad. He basically wasted time he could've spent at another job or opportunity with us because he was told he was okay to play.
To be honest, I'm all for condemning people who are elo-boosting and trying to play professionally. I don't blame people for boosting when you can make enough money to pay for school, but it shouldn't be something that's allowed by pro players. Unfortunately, almost everyone does it or has done it, so if Riot is going to start banning former elo-boosters despite clearing them to play, we might as well expect the entire LCS and CS playerbase to disappear. I think it might be a good idea to start with the players that are currently boosting in LCS and CS, rather than those that have already quit it, especially since they're still actively doing it.
Part 2: Organizations
Alright, so everyone's basically heard at this point that Riot will give a nice tug-job to any team with big financial backing. If you're famous, rich, etc, Riot wants you badly and will do what they can to get you and keep you in. The whole promotion system from CS to LCS, while completely 100% better than the last, was definitely intended to help move towards a franchise system and help make investors feel more secure about getting involved with LCS teams. I don't blame them for wanting to make money by creating a cleaner system, but if you're not apart of the "big boy's club", you're basically treated as an outcast.
So there's pretty much 3 tiers of teams:
1) LCS teams with big names or big sponsors, i.e. Fnatic/TSM/Cloud 9/NRG/etc:
These guys will get really good treatment from Riot. They're likely friends with them, etc and have a lot of pull in the community because of who they know. This is 100% normal and something that will always happen. Nothing negative about this.
2) Average LCS teams: Giants/UOL/Old TiP/etc
They still probably get good treatment from Riot, the on-site people that do player support in the studios are all great so nothing much really changes on this front. They won't have much pull with Riot though, and no one's going to be too upset or try to save them if they drop out unfortunately. This group has been slowly slimming down with recent investors coming in, and will likely be replaced if they don't get good backing, which is good for the sport imo. All LCS teams should have similar treatment.
3) Challenger Series teams: Literally everyone not in LCS that isn't a B team for an LCS org
So here is what Liquid Matt described as the ghetto. Whether you think that's offensive or not, it's 100% true. Unfortunate LCS players will drop down here waiting on their career to die, and young 16 year old kids will sign shady contracts hoping they do well enough to make it out. You're also the guinea pigs for anything that Riot wants to test for LCS. Have fun
Riot doesn't care about the orgs that make up the third tier. They don't care if you get paid unless it's the mandated minimum amount they give out for each season, and even then they may just not do anything. If your org decides to give you a scam contract and fuck you up at the end of the season and not pay you, Riot won't do anything to stop that org or help you. You're told to handle the legal matters yourself, and that org is allowed to keep going. Challenger Series orgs have even tried to keep Riot money meant for players to themselves, and STILL been allowed to stay in competition for CS.
Huma got called out for this by their staff, Riot deemed everything as fine since the players at least got their minimum Riot salary. CW as an LCS and CS team got multiple complaints from ex-players about not getting paid on time, but they left on their own accord, without getting any punishment from Riot. Imagine and Ex Nihilo, the teams Martin Shkreli had a huge involvement in, didn't pay their players. No one heard about that until the random scandal with Shkreli's drug prices came out though. Alicus, probably one of the last people you'd hear me praise, is the one who had to pay the players on Ex Nihilo, but Riot just didn't seem to care I guess. There's teams in LCS now too that have just decided not to pay players, but most players just avoid talking about it because it's a big struggle to handle a lawsuit like that if you don't have a good backing. Imagine being a 16 year old kid in Challenger Series trying to bring a lawsuit to an organization that fucked you over if Riot doesn't even seem to care?
-------------------------------
I don't know, I could probably write a novel on the rest of the shit that just upsets me with Riot and League, but I don't think it's really necessary right now. The only good experiences I've had with Riot have come from people like @vigsworld in player management. I really can't say I've had nice run-ins with the rest of Riot. Most of it has always been unorganized and sloppy, and it really makes me feel demoralized knowing that a lot of the people in charge are usually clueless about how things actually work. I've said in the past multiple times that I think anyone can be apart of esports, but I've never actually meant that in a good way. I just think that the majority of people involved are either extremely incompetent or greedy. I've stayed around in CS to try and help new players handle the shit storm that is professional league, but it's really getting tiring.