Riot Games wants to reward all the players that don't act like pricks in League of Legends. Today they announced a special reward for the folks with clean records this year.
"As a first step, players who haven’t been chat restricted or had their account suspended in the 2014 season will receive a 4-win IP boost," said lead social designer Jeffrey Lin on the Riot forums. "Due to the number of players receiving this reward, we’ll be granting the bonuses over the next week. Keep an eye out for a shiny new boost icon next to your IP balance."
Naturally, some players' response to the reward was to complain about it. After all, a lot of veterans already have more IP than they know what to do with... some also have more rage than they know what to do with [NSFW video below].
Lin responded by saying well-behaved players could get other incentives in the future, saying "Not every reward has to be SUPER EPIC VALUABLE to every player to mean something. Every player responds differently to different rewards, and different things matter to different people. We'll explore a wide range of stuff over time."
On that same thread, he asked players to volunteer to share their most recent chat logs. The players who do so will receive an unspecified extra reward.
While looking over one of the volunteer's chat logs, Lin pointed out that the development team isn't trying to remove profanity altogether from the game. They're more focused on getting rid of antisocial behavior.
"What's neat here is that you do use profanities in some of your games like 'fuck' and "holy shit' but they aren't targeted at others," he said. "We've always said that we--as a community--aren't out to get rid of offensive language, and the key is that you aren't directing these phrases at others. You also thanked your team members for doing well when you weren't doing so great in your lane--that's cool."
He added that players breaking the rules are only a small minority. About 95% of active players in 2014 were never banned, restricted in chat or otherwise punished by the developers.
While toxic chat is the current focus for Riot, they plan to roll out new systems targeting other problems as well. Lin mentioned leavers, AFKs and intentional feeders as some of the upcoming targets.
Riot Games has taken a number of approaches over the years to fix player behavior. They instituted a Tribunal to allow players to review misconduct by fellow community members and determine punishments. They also gave players the ability to recognize each other's good behavior through the Honor system.
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