Hey, like the title says the only ban you can get from trolling/telling positions/attacking your teammates and all griefing etc is chat ban. I haven't seen a single cooldown/ranked ban on anyone or ever even heard of one, except for cheating. So Riot doesn't punish anyone with anything else than a chat ban. When is this going to change?
External link →Hey friend! If you check out the EOY article we wrote, we talk about addressing these things in the coming year. https://playvalorant.com/en-us/news/dev/end-of-year-competitive-play-area/
Being honest here, we're already working on this. It just takes a lot of time to design something that is fair, reasonable, and has a good chance of being effective; and even more time to coordinate across teams for how this actually gets implemented in game.
We don't want to do the thing where we roll something out and discover that we were too strict and banned half our players. We also don't want to roll something out, only to tighten or change up the rules a week later. There are a lot of risks here, so we're being diligent with the process.
Hope this clears things up a bit :)
Why not start with a ultra ultra conservative rule? There is really no excuse to have zero bans. It's just such an issue when there is ZERO fear of being banned. It leads to players ruining games/boosting/smurfing/etc because they have ZERO reason not to. Even if you said you implemented banning and didn't actually implement anything, it would probably go a long way wink wink.
Lol. Funny story, I'm one of the folks at Riot who trains other people how to moderate our player labs. We talk about how to promote good conversation, how to manage the room effectively, etc. And I have ONE rule I always enforce to my trainees:
"The only thing that will lose you respect faster than not creating rules...is creating rules that you don't enforce."
So I'll have to hard pass on the "tell them they'll get banned but don't implement it" lol. But I like your initiative ;).
And seriously, I get you. Something is for sure better than nothing. We're already breaking up the penalty stuff into a few different phases so we can roll things out sooner rather than later. (But every time we break it down into a little deliverable, that means it delays getting the whole system out to players...and we genuinely believe the whole system is the best thing. So we don't want to delay it too much).
Hope that makes sense :)
Looking forward to it. The purposeful throwers and trolls that ruin everyone else's game and cause teams to derank and waste 30 minutes of our lives every few matches in mid to low elo is disheartening and drives people away from the game... Who really like the game.
I couldn't agree more, and thanks for being patient <3 I think I'm gonna buy the team champagne when we finally get to hit the big red button lol.
Ha, I know that feeling. It's tough now and everyone is under a lot of pressure. I really respect you and the entire riot team's community engagement and follow through. This game and the teams working on it are something special. Happy holidays!
Thanks friend :) Happy Holidays to you too!
I would say to get a time ban on any mode you're playing and "above":
You keep being toxic (or other stuff) on unrated, then you're banned from unrated and competitive.
In spike rush? Enjoy being able to play only DM.
Even in DM? Keep playing it, alone and muted for everyone.
Depending on infractions make it so you have to "unlock" playing other modes again by not being an a*hole following this.
This is consistent with the idea we have around "minimizing the impact of disruptive players." Like, we don't want you playing if you're gonna be like that...but we ESPECIALLY don't want you playing compet. I can't speak to exactly how we'll be implementing this "minimizing impact" idea, but you're in the right line of thinking :)
Being honest here, we're already working on this. It just takes a lot of time to design something that is fair, reasonable, and has a good chance of being effective; and even more time to coordinate across teams for how this actually gets implemented in game.
One thing that doesn’t take as much time is banning those who are chat banned from the ranked queue. They should not be able to play competitive. You’re inadvertently punishing their teammates.
This is something we've talked about, so I'm actually super curious for your thoughts on this: What about folks who choose not to use mics? Or don't have one? Does it feel equally penalizing to play with them, or does that feel different?
Coming year is a pretty big time window, hopefully it's sooner rather than later. I really want to like Valorant, but so many games just feel awful. I was excited to finally get a melee skin because pepermint is awesome and I'm a recovering candy cane addict, but after playing a normal game first I remembered, oh yea, I don't want to play Valorant until matchmaking is better.
I saw the headline about Valorant taking action against smurfing earlier and was eager to see what it was going to be and so disappointed to see that it was only requiring 10 wins instead of 20 games. So count me as someone fully in favor of stricter.
I'm curious, which part about the smurfing is most painful for you? Getting into games with people who are higher skilled? People tanking their games intentionally so they can get those favorable matchups? Anything else?
Im glad your taking slow so that people don't get falsely banned, nearly every other game just has a lazy blanket system that bans innocents
Thanks fam :) We appreciate you appreciating that lol.
Just make sure not to add any perma bans, if anyone would even still remember to try the game after a few months they deserve a second chance
Oh for sure! There's also a LOT of legal stuff around permabans. It's like a last, last, last, LAST resort situation for us. And we for sure want to give people a chance to grow and get better.
hey man just wanted to say thanks for replying to all the folks here , u guys doing great job with game and its enjoyable :) take ur time and fix stuff :) thanks for great support and always being interactive.
Thanks fam :) As weird as it is to dance around NDA stuff, I really enjoy chatting with you all and giving you whatever answers I can. And all the questions just means you care, right? Take care, and happy holidays!
I think there's a difference between someone who is toxic versus someone who isn't but has mic/muted and disabled. The toxic person is less likely to play with the team especially if they get frustrated and their only way to take it out is to grief the game.
Gotcha. So the idea is that "When people get chat banned, they're more likely to be salty/upset/disruptive, and they've already demonstrated they're willing to act like a jerk...so I don't want that in my game." Did I get that right?
Yeah that's my take on it. As an EU player is common to get people who don't speak but it'd much rather have someone who can't speak over someone who is banned from speaking.
The lock from competitive also gives them an incentive to not be toxic and improve
Got it. Thanks for clarifying on everything! It definitely helps us think things through.
how can i get that fist symbol next to my name? thanks
You've gotta be a Rioter for that :)
I would also note that people who don’t have/use mics for whatever reason are more inclined to learn the ping system, use chat, and utilize the other non-verbal tools at their disposal. Someone who has a 1 week chat ban isn’t incentivized to learn these other tool, as in a week they won’t need to use them.
This is a really great point! Thank you!
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Thanks so much friend :) Happy holidays to you too!
I notice you reply a lot, so chances are you’ll see this. I’ve tried a couple times making a post about Contract weapon skins possibly getting VFX and stuff we could unlock with Radianite, like the blue cracks on Omen’s ghost lighting up like the glowing energy in the Oni set, Viper’s shorty spewing a little chemicals when it shoots, etc. Is there a way you could bring that up to the rest of the Valorant team? Lots of players would love it and it would make a bit more money! Thanks :)
Hey there friend! I support several teams, and the Progression Team (who handles contracts) and the Premium Content team (who handles making our cosmetic content) are both on my list :). I'll be sure to mention it to them!
I'll give my 2 cents on this as well! Before I start I just wanna say as someone who's played LOL for 6 years, I super respect Riot teams/employees especially for all the communication directly with the player base on forums just like this, so special thanks to you /u/aeneia !
Now in regards to the mics subject. I am just a lowly silver player but even for me it can oftentimes feel like being teamed up with people that just dont use their mic at all and don't even attempt to communicate via pings/text chat can be SUPER frustrating.
As someone who is super active on comms (and not toxic haha), I feel that a cohesive team voice chat actually increases your chances of winning by a great margin. I would be curious to see if Riot had any sort of stats regarding teams who had 3-5 players that even activated their mic once in chat vs teams that didnt (If those stats even exist)
TL;DR
Having a team that refuses to communicate in any way can feel super super frustrating and it feels like you start the game from a deficit in a sense.
Hey fam! I don't know of any research that's been done on the team to identify if having mics is predictive of higher win rates (and I've been on the team since before launch, so chances are we haven't done it!) As someone who plays the game a lot, I can tell you anecdotally that I much prefer having other teammates who use mics, so long as those other teammates aren't abusive. (Even if it's not for the sake of winning, the cooperative strategy and communication is one of my favorite parts of the game. It's a real bummer when other players refuse to talk.) So I don't have an answer for you, but I can tell you -- I feel you.
To add another similar opinion: Someone who chooses to not use a mic likely has good use of pings / comm menu, and presumably has gotten to that rank without needing a mic (possibly making up for it in other ways.)
I see someone who is chat banned effectively at a competitive disadvantage, and am generally not too happy to have them in my comp games.
Someone else made this similar point, and I think it's a great callout! Thanks for bringing it up :)
Yeah, I 100% agree! As someone who is a very extroverted person but doesn't have many friends that play Valorant I will usually end up Solo-Queuing. Just having people to talk to (as long as they're not toxic) can be a big part of enjoying the comp experience. It can also help drive some of the loneliness of Solo-Queue away haha.
Anyways, thanks for your reply and its nice to hear that people working ON Valorant are considering things like this.
That being said, is this something you guys are looking at making any changes regarding or is it something you can't really do anything about?
Unfortunately that's not something I can speak to ><. I can tell you that we recognize it's a pain, and we've put a few different ideas out on the table. We haven't committed to anything, though, and we've got lots of things to deliver before we start hammering out those ideas! Sorry it's a bit of a non-answer, but I hope it helps <3
Hopefully I’m not late to the party but this is what I tend to see happening. I’ll join a ranked game unaware that someone is chat banned until I get spammed with party requests. It then becomes a “should I join this possibly toxic player” and/or “is everyone going to join it because if it’s just me I’m also losing coms”. So I decide to join. We lose the first 2 rounds and the person ends up being.. well toxic. So then I decide to leave his party and he ends up throwing the game.
So I’d agree and say yes. The chat ban should remove you from ranked. You’re bringing your punishment and “handicap” into 4 other players who have done nothing wrong. A chat ban in unranked is fine but imagine this scenario:
Chat banned guy is at CAT. Gets killed from behind. His team is all mid and are unaware that he was flanked. His option now is to ping a ton but that distracts the other players and they al die to a flank. This puts the remaining players at a severe handicap if that player was able to communicate “flank flank”
Not too late to the party! Thanks so much for the input. This is a behavior some players have told us about, and it's definitely a problem. We don't to put y'all in that position :(
Could you consider adding a pick up spike from teammates option?
Because people who intentionally throw in attackers' side just take the spike and camp in no man's land.
In defender's side they just buy an odin and press W ;P
Coming from a guy who played with 'i will throw'
Hmmm, I see your point here, but wouldn't it be equally abusable from the other side?
Much worse to have someone who’s mad or toxic in my opinion because it will bring down the whole team. Someone with no mic might cost a round every so often but it’s okay
Thanks for sharing :)
Super cool to actually be talking to someone on reddit who has the capability to change it rather than just echo chamber our frustrations with other redditors! Also, thanks for making such an awesome game. I seriously love it.
Thanks so much friend! And yeah, that's why so many of us lurk on here :P. If this is where the conversation is happening, we should be here to listen.
I don't mean to sound cheesy here, but your feedback genuinely makes a difference in how we do things. We really appreciate it :)
-fistbump-
Imagine having a job like that. Please tell me you only get payed $6 dollars an hour for that shit and have to work a real job on the side.
My "real job" is strategic advisory for VALORANT. Training the moderators is something I have volunteered to do because it helps level up how we all work at Riot. (FWIW, I hope you didn't mean to be quite as rude as that comment came across.)
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