Please, if you decide to read this, do so with an open mind.



The subject of the tribunal is about as sensitive as politics. There is a passionate rivalry between those who think that the tribunal is just and good, and those who think that the tribunal is harsh and bad.The truth is, and I think everyone can agree, the tribunals intent is a very good one. It really would be great if nobody raged and if nobody fed or disconnected or if nobody threatened to ban you for whiffing an easy skill shot on a guy standing still. But that is not the case. I personally side with the latter, that the tribunal is harsh, bad, unnecessary and harmful to the community (KEEP IN MIND "the tribunals intent is a very good one"). My opinion may be biased and I will get into that later on, but please continue reading. The overwhelming reasons that I feel this way is because I have been banned for 1, yet never banned from any other game except for botting in WoW which I understood completely and for 2, I am an empathetic, sympathetic, courteous and considerate person. I am not trying to say that you are not if you are for the tribunal so don't get offended. I just can understand JUST A LITTLE how someone MIGHT get mad playing this game.

The tribunal for me has done more harm than good. It has trained me to threaten to report and many times do so at the slightest most petty things that really hold no merit for a ban or suspension, mostly because I know that if I am getting reported for petty things, the only thing I could possibly do to get even with someone is to report them just the same.

This is the only game (that I have played in 12+ years) that bans for verbal abuse, or defines verbal abuse in such a strict way. It is admirable of riot to attempt to maybe revolutionize esports or online video games, but there are reasons why it is not working.

The problem is that league of legends is a pug game where you are HIGHLY reliant on your team. It is also a competitive game, and some people care more or are naturally more competitive than others.

All professional sports hold strict behavioral guidelines for obvious reasons.. The best example I can think of is to compare league of legends to golf. League of legends is the golf of internet video games because of the tribunal and summoners code. Strict behavioral guidelines are expected of the players (most of which are probably 12-26 year old males). Golf does this for many reasons, but it is a completely different game than league. You are not reliant on others, other people do not provoke you, other people do not coach you, other people do not disconnect, etc. etc.

In every game I have played, I choose my team, I play and don't rage, and I ignore anyone that annoys me or go to a different server etc. Examples:
1. Basketball (churchball/gym class/pug)- I play with who I want to play with and don't play if I don't want to
2. CS & CS:S (cal-i/cevo-p exp) - play with a team that I joined (in leagues), settle things like men among the team on ventrilo or find a new team.. there was no im going to try to get you banned from the game situations unless you were a hacker
3. WoW (5x gladiator exp) - choose my arena partners, find new 1s if things don't work out.

( the point of the exp references is just to show that I am competitive and to show the degree of competition in those games, NOT to brag or anything to that extent )

In all of these examples, I decide who I am playing with, and move on if I don't want to play with someone. When this is not the case, such as in league.. or in those games someone would harass me, the obvious decision at that point was to respond or ignore the person and continue playing.

So why is it such a crime in this community to get upset? ESPECIALLY WHEN PROVOKED.

Many of you are familiar that the opposite side of negative repercussions are positive ones. There are so many alternatives to mass banning people that are in a million different situations. I have suggested previously that there is a chat filter and a mute function. I'm sure that point has been brought up a thousand times on this forum. If you take the time to report someone for harassment, why would you not take the time to simply mute that person and never give it another moment of your time? Somehow in previous posts I always lose the reader and they just start yelling at me at how I'm a terrible person and deserved my ban, so let me remind you, I am not encouraging or justifying AT ALL "toxic" behavior or blatant harassment. I am saying this game is competitive and it is inevitable if you haven't noticed that by now. I know I have in thousands of games.

Let me tell you a little bit about myself. I'm 22, deliver Chinese food while going to college, am in a VERY healthy 1+ year relationship, have played LoL for probably 2 years now as my first moba style game, have vast gaming experience, have never gotten into trouble with the police, have made 2 enemies in my lifetime, which were a set of best friends and the 1 guy didn't like me because his sister was crushing on me (so it is understandable in my personal opinion), and consider myself a very easy going, mellow, soft-spoken individual. People have told me on multiple occasions that I have a very peaceful and easy going demeanor. I have also been permanently banned from league of legends on 3 accounts and am well on my way to 2 more.

The community however, has labelled me as toxic.. Can anyone conjure up anything more hideous?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am5Pq1SuddQ

I personally prefer passionate or competitive for reasons like most of the reports and bans that I have received are a result of provocation which I respond to VERY passionately. People don't do this in real life, and if they did I would respond the EXACT same way. I am not upset or dissatisfied with the nature of who I am as a person. My passion has helped me achieve many things and it constantly reminds me that I am alive. Some of you may not be passionate. Some of you may work 9-5 jobs and have a monotonous and boring life and not care at all the outcome of a game you invest a large portion of your free time to, but not me.. I care, and I am not ashamed.

Basically my goal in this post is to just make people understand that not everyone is the same, that there are alternatives such as positive repercussions or muting, and that there are unquantifiable variables and circumstances that each of us face each time we play this game like our personality, our mood, our team mates, etc. that make it difficult to say whether someone REALLY deserved a ban. I look at posts of people who get unjustly banned, and I see peoples responses of superiority and utter satisfaction from seeing others being punished, and I am eager for change.

I also want to mention that many people that I play with, who are less passionate or "toxic" than I (really "good" people) play this game in constant fear of being banned. Every game I play (I only play ranked) someone threatens to report or tries to get another player banned, if not multiple occasions per game.

Let's look at some specifics of how the tribunal might be "flawed".

I personally play shaco as my main champion. I have gotten 4 accounts platinum as shaco with 70-80% win. I would say in 80+% of my games as shaco my team will constantly complain, coach, or threaten me. These things are literally said to me almost every shaco game.

"NO NOT SHACO PLZ"
"i hate having shaco on my team they all feed"
"wow lvl 2 gank, who starts blue on shaco noob"
"shaco build tanky"
etc.

These things get really annoying to me when I get 3+ uncontested dragons (a 3000 gold advantage) gank multiple times, have low death scores, split push, ward, etc.

Generally I will respond with, "please stop". "please stop doing what you are doing, I am not coaching you, or telling you your picks suck please stop" then if they keep saying things to me, or get an attitude, I get really upset. it's like someone making noise when Tiger Woods is trying to make a put to win a lot of money. It's just not courteous or polite, and I get really offended when people that I am higher rated than (on other accounts) are down my throat or belittling me and overall just being disrespectful and rude for NO REASON AT ALL.

Obviously I do overreact (according to most of you), but there are grounds for my reactions at all. The point here is that I'm not you, I respond differently. If someone disrespects me on a game or is condescending to me, or puts my back against a wall, I respond differently.

Other things that I am sure you have experienced are a jungler that refuses to gank, a player that refuses to group, a tank that refuses to innitiate, an adc that refuses to auto attack (or so it seems - graves only buck-shotting and running), a support that doesn't ward or buy oracles, a feeder solo lane last pick who demanded top, and many other things that can be extremely frustrating to have on your team.
I will remind you a third time, I am not encouraging harassing such players; simply explaining why people get mad in league, so that maybe some of the tribunal judges that only play normal games and have an inflated sense of self entitlement and self worth can maybe look at cases with an understanding attitude rather than an offended, spiteful victim of "trolling" who is disgustingly eager for the opportunity to JUDGE another human.

I have a universal mindset towards humanity and this community. Although I DO NOT like but maybe a small percentage of you, I under no circumstance aside from afking/hacking/glitching would want any of you to have your accounts banned. THERE IS NO REASON TO WANT THAT FOR YOU. No matter what you say to me, I would never want your account banned EVER. I may not want to be your friend, or treat you as such, and I may disgust you, we may be complete opposites, but in my mind, that does not give me rights over your property. If someone cuts me off and gives me the finger when I'm delivering Chinese food, I might think that person is a complete moron, but I do not feel as if he should lose his car. Maybe he got dumped, or is borderline suicidal. Maybe I perceived the situation wrong AS A HUMAN BEING. Whatever the case, that scenario is over and done with within a short period of time, and has no significant impact on my life. In all of the games I have played, I have heard, seen, experienced vulgar, profane, harsh words, harassment to the highest degree and not once have I felt like disciplinary action needs to be taken on that person because I am in complete control of whether I want to continue interaction with that person or not.

Sorry that this is mostly a not very structured rant, I don't exactly have a way with words, but hopefully someone can understand what I'm saying and this won't be a flame fest for 10 pages.

I would also like to say that I know I "rage" I know I get mad, and I know I say things that most of you snuff your noses at, but that is not the point at all. The point is that the tribunal is not working as intended and is tremendously flawed as thousands of people have blatantly pointed out.

I'll respond to your post before looking at your reform card, because if you have been banned 3-going-on-5 times now and you're unapologetic about it, I'm sure I won't like what I see there. So let's make this about your ideas in general rather than the specifics of your recent ban.

I want to call your attention to one particular paragraph from your post.

You pointed out a major difference between League and the other games you play. When playing Basketball, CS, or WoW, you get to pick and choose who you play with. Even more relevantly, you get to interact with them in a way that lasts. I'm sure you don't instantly bail on a clan or guild based on one incident that bothered you. People feel each other out gradually. Over time, you either say "I didn't like this guy at first, but I got used to him" or "There's something about this guy that I'll never like, but I'll live" or "I'm just never going to get along with this guy and I should stop playing with him."

You have the option of doing that in League too. You can play just premade 5-man games and you will never encounter the problems you've been talking about here. Play League exactly as you would play a WoW battleground with your guild. Join a group of people who play together and play with just them, and if the relationship becomes strained due to irreconcilable differences, leave and find another group.

Solo queue operates under different social rules because it is fundamentally different than the other kinds of games you're talking about, and by choosing to play in solo queue, you are choosing to be bound by these rules. These are people you've never seen before and will never see again, so there's no option to feel them out gradually and get to know them. Solo queue specifically tests your ability to cooperate with people you don't know. This includes not being on the same page strategically, a problem demonstrated by your Shaco quotes. If you played with the same people all the time, you would have time to demonstrate to them that you know what you're doing with Shaco. For strangers, that amount of trust isn't always there.

The reason that it's hard to agree with most of your post is that you believe that you are justified in responding abusively when someone "puts [your] back against a wall." Having been in that situation, we can all sympathize, but we choose not to retaliate because that would mean becoming part of the problem. It's the equivalent of responding to people talking during a movie by shouting at them to shut up. Everyone else in the theater is now pissed off at both of you.

I should also point out that you claim "this is the only game ... that defines verbal abuse in such a strict way." But it's not Riot making that definition. When you get reported for verbal abuse, it's because many, many people that played with you thought you deserved to be punished for what you said. When you get punished by the Tribunal, it's because a majority of the community thinks you deserved to be punished for what you said. Riot hasn't established a standard for verbal abuse beyond "Don't be a jerk." This Tribunal experiment is showing that, overall, online gamers actually prefer a community free of trash talk and abuse. We've just never been given the power to make it happen before.

Edit: Somehow I glanced at the link so quickly that I thought it was to a reform card and not a youtube video.

Reform card pls.

I looked for a reform card first... Didn't find it. Didn't read the wall of text.

g-- d--- f--- trolls ...

*shrugs* Reform cards don't lie.

he's talking about the sensitivity about the tribunal, and a game "that bans for verbal abuse, or defines verbal abuse in such a strict way" and asking "So why is it such a crime in this community to get upset? ESPECIALLY WHEN PROVOKED"

why do you need a reform card to talk about that?

I don't. However "ESPECIALLY WHEN PROVOKED" is not a valid reason for anything. So I would address the only thing that means anything. And that is wither or not I agree with him that he is a toxic player or not.

I don't have a reform card, I'm not currently banned. I'm not asking you to review anything. I also do not think I am justified in saying things that you and riot consider ban worthy; it isn't about justification, it's about the inevitability of trash talk, whether you disguise it in a playful way, yet your goal is to provoke and make another players experience less enjoyable, or a flurry of cuss words, it will happen in this game, it will never end. And I am not encouraging that behavior. I am simply telling you that the tribunal doesn't work. It weeds out a certain personality type like mine that really isn't toxic AT ALL which is why I included personal information about myself in "reality" and suggested to you the idea that some people are overly competitive, I have literally tried to adjust my behavior. I read pages of threads on tribunal and think maybe I'll just not say anything. Works for a few games.. few days.. then you play a few hours and get trolled beyond belief and stop caring. It wears on me. I even muted every1 for several games but then you can't see mias and things it's just not the same.

In my VAST personal experience, the tribunal encourages more fighting in the form of reports. It's the quick fix for all of your problems. I think there would be a lot more "encouragement" if there was no report option. It would force the community to either solve our problems amongst ourselves or mute one another.

I also attempted to convey to you that no one really gets on this game to intentionally feed, with the intent of harassing anyone, or afking. We all play the game for entertainment purposes. And I personally do not play with the expectation that every1 is going to be nice to me, in fact, I expect the opposite. So if some people get upset, do they really deserve a ban? You don't get your car taken for giving someone the finger on the road, that's not how things work.