LoL and the surrender button.

[Lye Sean Yang]

I'm not sure if this topic have already been discussed to oblivion (I did not search all the topic).
I played a lot of online games, FPS, RTS etc.. The one thing I learnt from those no matter how bad it is even you are going to lose make the living hell out of the enemy before dying (at least that's what I did). Learn from the mistakes examine the style of play and adapt new strategy to win next round. Then I started playing LoL with my friends.
At first the enemy surrendering seems fine at least I won. Then when the tables turn towards us I felt that surrendering seems a good choice and we surrender most of the time if the first few rumbles between heroes goes bad. One of my friends when commented things like "This is a stupid match lets just surrender", "There is not hope" etc etc. Sometimes my teammates even feed the enemy just to keep them from surrendering.
Then one day after a few match where even low level players surrender and one particular where my friend went on a pissing contest with me and then surrendered. I felt something wrong. Whats the point of playing if you can't handle the humiliation of getting your arse kicked, you are not suppose give up just because of that. Get pissed, find ways to attack back the enemy not coward away to the surrender button just because its bad. The button is like Cartman's way of saying "Screw you guys I'm going home."
The concept of the surrender button now feels wrong to me, its giving players an easy way out while not learning anything when a match goes bad.
Thats my though of the surrender button in LoL. What you guys think? Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong (will be, I played a lot of games but not all).

 

[Maximum Bert]

I never surrender unless for some reason the game is unplayable (atrocious lag say) or someone is deliberately griefing me (then I just turn the game off for a bit).

I remember in a Magic the Gathering Tournament some guy gave me shit for not surrendering even though it was impossible for me to win because he used a lockdown stasis deck which would mean that you were stuck doing nothing but he couldnt hurt you either so he beat you by making you run out of cards which took ages. I didnt surrender because I wanted to see the deck play out and he complained because he had to concentrate then so he didnt mess up the lock and he didnt like long games apparently. My reasoning was if you dont like concentrating or playing long games why the hell play that deck? sure its powerful but you will never win quickly with that deck its just not designed that way and I am just not going to surrender and hand you the win.

 

[Master Kuja]

I hit the surrender button if the game is legitimately hopeless, that is, if all our lanes are lost, no one's doing any damage to the enemy, every team fight is uncoordinated and messy and we're just getting absolutely dominated.
If I see a possibility for a win, like, sure, we might be getting outplayed in some respect, or individuals are getting caught out in the jungle but one good team fight could seal the deal, then yeah, I don't agree with surrendering just because we've had our asses kicked through the rest of the game.

But when it reaches the point of getting utterly stomped and no one's having fun anymore, then there's no point in continuing. Not being able to take getting humiliated is one thing, but when you're so frustrated with a match that it's failed to be in any way enjoyable, then you're just wasting the time of both you and your team.

 

[Weaver]

One of the greatest skills you can learn in life is when to give up.

Surrender in LoL makes sense, and I have played hundreds or maybe even over a thousand games. If you're 25 minutes in and it's 2 - 20 kills you're pretty much legitimately fucked. As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen. LoL, while skill is required, is also very much a stat based game. When the enemy is buff beyond your abilities, you're simply hosed.

 

[DazZ.]

As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen.

But that 1/100 game is the one you'll remember most fondly forever.

Worth 99 defeats for the joy of a glorious comeback.

 

[Weaver]

As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen.

But that 1/100 game is the one you'll remember most fondly forever.

Worth 99 defeats for the joy of a glorious comeback.

That IS true, and I've had a few myself that I still do remember.
Including one crushing defeat where we were the ones doing the stomping.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well I understand you need the ultimate hard on when winning, but a lost match is a lost match and a waste of everyones time to go on, in MOBA games that last stretch can mean a good half hour extra of waiting... when you could be playing half of another match in that time.

Worse yet is that most team mates do want to waste your time and wont surrender just to spite everyone, because it's just that kind of community.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Well, a certain someone in my LoL team would promote a surrender @ 10 patch...

*anything negative ever happens*

"Right, we're done! Done!"

It's progressed past surrenders in ranked games now though. For some reason, the moment Season 3 started nobody even surrenders anymore.

You can almost always win though. When I won one of my series matches out of Bronze was a pre-rework Karma jungle who was actively trolling who bought 6 Doran's Blades then sold 3 for 3 Wriggles Lanterns because "he needs to see more." Our Jarvan top was 0/9/0, they had a legendary Shaco and Lee Sin within 15 minutes and the only one not feeding was me playing support Nami.

We fucking WON that game. Don't you DARE tell me games are unwinnable when I won that travesty of a game.

Right now, I'm coaching a friend through his pre 30 levels and it's HILARIOUS what people surrender over. Enemy team steals one baron *random guy starts surrender vote*

I've told myself not to play Twisted Fate in those games because christ the pubstomp is of legendary proportions.

 

[hazabaza1]

It's dumb.
I've had many a DOTA game where people would've surrendered but we stuck on and won. If you want to surrender then bite the bullet and leave.

Maybe DOTA is just better balanced against snowballing. I dunno, I don't think it's easy to get out of the snowball, but surrendering is just a dumb thing to do.

 

[Glongpre]

One of the greatest skills you can learn in life is when to give up.

Surrender in LoL makes sense, and I have played hundreds or maybe even over a thousand games. If you're 25 minutes in and it's 2 - 20 kills you're pretty much legitimately fucked. As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen. LoL, while skill is required, is also very much a stat based game. When the enemy is buff beyond your abilities, you're simply hosed.

That is awful advice. Hey just let that guy kill you.

If you play a sport you can't just quit, you have to stick it till the end. The bottom line is you can't learn anything if you just surrender when it seems the worst. This defeatist attitude really grinds my gears.

 

[Weaver]

One of the greatest skills you can learn in life is when to give up.

Surrender in LoL makes sense, and I have played hundreds or maybe even over a thousand games. If you're 25 minutes in and it's 2 - 20 kills you're pretty much legitimately fucked. As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen. LoL, while skill is required, is also very much a stat based game. When the enemy is buff beyond your abilities, you're simply hosed.

That is awful advice. Hey just let that guy kill you.

If you play a sport you can't just quit, you have to stick it till the end. The bottom line is you can't learn anything if you just surrender when it seems the worst. This defeatist attitude really grinds my gears.

I didn't say just "let them kill you" I said to press the surrender button, which casts a team vote and ends the game if the vote is successful.

You're right, you don't just quit a sport because sports generally have audiences with expectations. Additionally, sports were not made with the notion of "surrender" in them. LoL, mechanically, has put an alternet win condition in their game. It's there and it's part of the ruleset.

Additionally, sports are purely performance based, LoL is not, there is a statistical element to it. If the other teams damage output is just too high, there is really nothing you can do to stop it. Your whole team getting melted in 2 seconds for the 7th fight in a row basically means the game is over. And it's over, because they have better gear and/or are higher level. If you can't farm without getting ganked, and can't teamfight without losing, the game IS over. Whether you wait another 15 minutes is up to you.

I've done my LoL dues and I can more or less detect the point of no return in a game, and there's no reason to waste everyone's time in dragging it out. When the vote is put up and everyone votes to surrender, they've earned their win all the same.

All that said, knowing when to quit IS a good life skill. I'm currently going through entrepreneurial mentoring and failing early and knowing when you're hosed is one of the skills they drill into you. Though, in the real world you have the option of pivoting.

 

[Padwolf]

The reason I like the surrender button is because if you are legitimately fucked with no chance of a comeback, the surrender button prevents you wasting another 20 minutes of your life while you hopelessly defend your base only to lose the final fight because the enemy team has access to dragon and baron as much as they want. Knowing when to quit is a good skill in it's own right.

 

[ItsNotRudy]

As much as we'd all love to go super saiyan and spirit bomb the enemy, 99/100 that just doesn't happen.

But that 1/100 game is the one you'll remember most fondly forever.

Worth 99 defeats for the joy of a glorious comeback.

After a little while hours/days you'll forget that game too. I know I've had them, just don't remember what I was playing as or with who to be honest. Because it doesn't matter. And tbh if I could get the 10mins wasted per pointless game that surrender was denied in trade for that one good win, I'd do it. Could've probably played dozens more games in the saved time and not be annoyed at those two 0/8 premade bot lane bastards who think they still have a shot with their proudly saved up Phantom Dancer/Pickaxe combo and Philostone/Mana Manip Sona 35mins into the game.

 

[Gnmish]

If you play a sport you can't just quit, you have to stick it till the end. The bottom line is you can't learn anything if you just surrender when it seems the worst. This defeatist attitude really grinds my gears.

Of course you can concede a game if you face someone who will win, they do it all the time in Chess.

The only reason surrender/concede is normally not a valid option in most sports is because they are timed, and you have to play out the time limit.

As to LoL specifically, sometimes when a team is absolutely dominating, they will purposely stretch the game out in order to mess with the losers, get a few more kills and generally try to humiliate them. That this point surrendering is the only power the team has to end the game.

Edit: apologies AC10

 

[Weaver]

If you play a sport you can't just quit, you have to stick it till the end. The bottom line is you can't learn anything if you just surrender when it seems the worst. This defeatist attitude really grinds my gears.

Of course you can concede a game if you face someone who will win, they do it all the time in Chess.

The only reason surrender/concede is normally not a valid option in most sports is because they are timed, and you have to play out the time limit.

As to LoL specifically, sometimes when a team is absolutely dominating, they will purposely stretch the game out in order to mess with the losers, get a few more kills and generally try to humiliate them. That this point surrendering is the only power the team has to end the game.

I think you might have messed up the quotes

 

[Zhukov]

If it's unwinnable, surrender.

Do not fucking waste twenty minutes of my time for no good reason.

I'm thinking of Smite here, not LoL or DOTA, but the basic idea is the same.

 

[Lyri]

DotA 2 player here.


Let me tell you I am glad that the surrender button has not shown up in DotA 2, if you want to leave then you can take the abandonment punishment of low priority queues.
I've had those games where you just want it to end so you can get to the next game, if there was a button you would definitely press it because it is 20 minutes in and they have 2 sets of mega creeps, it happens and I get it.

However people just do not give up like they used to do all the time in League of Legends when I played, every little thing that happens (support giving a kill to a carry) usually results in someone shouting that they're done and just going to wait for the surrender.
It was infuriating because not only would they stop playing with any kind of passion to win but if they did decide to come back from being AFK then they were at a detriment and when they inevitably fed from the set back they would never be inspired enough to continue.
The surrender button is a focus of negativity.

Edit: As a side note, people who say "I do not surrender because I have honour." Fuck off, you're on a video game.
Really annoying when the team wants to surrender but you will not.

 

[Nowhere Man]

I loathe the way the surrender button gets abused. I understand you can get in a situation where you waste another 20 minutes but lately Its almost like no one has the commitment to press on and rally from even the smallest of set backs, or at least take the opportunity to learn from everything even if a win looks impossible. Whenever that prompt comes up I just hit no and type in the chat "I aint going down like no punk ass."

Funny thing is there was this one match I played where 2 team mates were begging to surrender. We pulled through and won. They expressed how grateful they were in the after game lobby that they didn't.

 

[Ratties]

I never surrender unless for some reason the game is unplayable (atrocious lag say) or someone is deliberately griefing me (then I just turn the game off for a bit).

I remember in a Magic the Gathering Tournament some guy gave me shit for not surrendering even though it was impossible for me to win because he used a lockdown stasis deck which would mean that you were stuck doing nothing but he couldnt hurt you either so he beat you by making you run out of cards which took ages. I didnt surrender because I wanted to see the deck play out and he complained because he had to concentrate then so he didnt mess up the lock and he didnt like long games apparently. My reasoning was if you dont like concentrating or playing long games why the hell play that deck? sure its powerful but you will never win quickly with that deck its just not designed that way and I am just not going to surrender and hand you the win.

[http://photobucket.com/images/door%20to%20nothingness]


I beat my friend with this card once. He damn near flipped the table. The card isn't that great. Its the ultimate "fuck you, you lose."