Open Letter to Parents of League of Legends' Players

[COMaestro]

I see both sides of the situation, as it can be frustrating to lose a player in a multiplayer game which you then go on to lose, while at the same time, I think the letter comes off sounding very entitled and obviously written by someone who is not a parent. However, isn't the point of playing a game to have fun? Sure, I know this is ranked, and that the very highest ranked players can actually make money from their abilities at the game, but how many of those highly ranked players actually get effected by this due to a child's poor time management?

An average player, sure, I see them being affected quite a bit, but I really doubt it happens to the really highly ranked players because my understanding is matches are set by the player ranking. A child who is actually good enough at the game to have such a high ranking and a shot at winning money from the game is most likely going to have parents who know this and will be supporting them, thus less likely to yank them out of the game at an inopportune moment. At the same time, they will probably also have more strongly established rules about when the child can or cannot play the game than the average family.

So, as an average player, does it suck if some parent pulls their child out of the game? Sure. It makes your odds of winning much lower, and in a ranked game, that can affect your rating. But again, I come back to isn't the point of playing games to have fun? Can you only have fun when you win? Sure, you may lose the game and lose some ranking, but can't you just make it up in the next game when no one drops out? Can't it be fun to hang on as long as you can in a losing battle? I know it can be, because I have had fun doing so before. That feeling is what Horde modes are based on!

As a gamer myself, I would be willing to cut my child a little slack for something like taking out the garbage or doing their homework, as long as they promise to do it as soon as the current game is finished. For things like bedtime or dinner, however, they should know better, and in those cases I would consider them to be previous commitments. You don't make a commitment to do something when you already have a commitment for that same time already. Again, a few minutes of slack for bedtime I might allow if the match was running longer than usual, as a gamer I know that can happen, but only a few minutes.

Dinner, though, I just couldn't do. After my wife and/or myself have been working in the kitchen to make dinner for the past 30-60 minutes, I think it's a great show of disrespect to not come to the dinner table when called. I know my wife gets pissed at me if she's called for dinner and I'm not there within a couple of minutes, at least without a good explanation, and I don't blame her. She worked hard to make the meal and it is really inconsiderate and unappreciative towards her to not sit and eat it. So in that case, my kid would be told to log out and get to the table.

A parent cannot watch their child constantly every second of the day, and can often only vaguely be aware of what the child is doing. Knowing your child is playing a game is one thing. Knowing exactly what game they are playing is another. If I'm busy making dinner, I can't know for a fact that my child isn't starting up a game with a long time commitment. They should know better than to do so, but kids aren't always the best at time management, no matter what their parents may have taught them. It's this knowledge that makes the letter so ridiculous. The letter should not be to the parents, who frankly don't need to give a damn about some random people on the internet losing a game, but to the children whose poor time management caused them to be forced to log out.

 

[Erttheking]

This is why I stay the fuck away from ranked in League.

Too much "srs business"

 

[mike1921]

I did not ever fucking say that it was more important, at most I would say it is worth consideration. Don't put words in my mouth. My comment about following the meta was in response to you calling it disrespectful to call someone out for not following it.

OK, well then I can tell you it has been considered and most parents will consider it less important and the answer is still "No". Let me give you something to consider, 16 year old Timmy has been told 3 times now to take out the trash. First time, was in a match and he said "OK", and the parent waited having other stuff to worry about. Well, Timmy forgot to do it as kids with video games tend to do and started another match. The parent tells him again, where he apologizes and says he will after the new match. "No, do it now" and suddenly the parent is a dick and the new match is more important than Timmy's chores. I am not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out because he keeps forgetting. I am also not going to punish him for abandoning the game when I told him to do it. If his forgetting to do it at a convenient time results in backlash within the game, I trust him to handle that himself. I am not going to intervene and play mediator between him and a bunch of people playing video games. I am gonna let you all work it out. More than likely though the kid isn't as patient, mature, or articulate as he needs to be in that scenario and will get pissed and either quit playing or just ignore anytime someone gives him backlash. I may give him guidance but to be honest, I will tell him how I see it.

You're not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out? Seriously? Is your trash nuclear waste? Is it some herculean task to take out the trash where if he starts now he'll be done in 6 hours? Pretty much any house chore is something that can wait hours.

no, nothing is more important than chores, but everything is more time sensitive than chores. My house would have bankrupt in months if I don't do my "chores" (my chores being doing invoices for my father's business) yet somehow when I was asked at 5 and said "hey could we do it at 9" the answer was "ok" 99 times out of 100, because: shocker, we get the money at exactly the same time pretty much regardless when I make the invoice.

Let's be real here 99% of LoL players are not professionals or "varsity", they are bitchy gamers. And if you ARE a professional/"varsity" surely you'll do OK without the 10 year old on your team, and if you can't - as a professional your win rate must be so high you can afford a loss. Plus, I am all for people getting kicked off the varsity team - even mid game if they don't do the schoolwork involved. Same type of thing.

Consideration. I am not saying that if Jimmy is flunking algebra that you should still let him play, I am saying that pulling him out of a game to go wash the car is a bit irritating. And since when is varsity pro? High schoolers are far from professionals, and people may not be talking about 10 year olds. Teens still have parents sometimes, or so I am told. Maybe that changed in the past few years, and now suddenly all teens never have to listen to their parents at any time.

Pro level players would be playing against and alongside pro level players, so no, they cannot handle losing a player. In fact, they are punished even worse for having one less player, as their opponents are probably going to know how to exploit that better. Your total ignorance of this game and its community continues to undermine your arguments.

Oh, and thanks for calling me bitchy. You must be so proud of yourself for being the first to stoop to insults in an argument with somebody from as toxic of a community as mine. I'll go make you a trophy if you want. You can put it on your shelf, so everybody can know how great a person you are, for insulting people you are totally unfamiliar with.

First, age is irrelevant. Wash the car = flunking algebra in this scenario. The scenario paints priorities. Anything I make him quit the game for is something that he knew he had to do long before logging in. It is a prior obligation. Taking out the trash he has known is his 'job' all year. Completely the match is an obligation he has for 10 minutes.

For one, a lot of kids do not have that sort of structure where they do know about these prior obligations. Second, unless the trash has been piling up all year it's pretty easy to not notice if its time for the trash to be taken out. Third: Priorities should take time sensitivity into account, filing my taxes is a much higher priority than today's dinner in the sense that if I needed to ignore one or the other I'd skip dinner, but one is due in months and one is due in hours: by your logic I should skip dinner and file my taxes even though I can get both done with no ill effect because priorities.

Do you find it irritating when he disregards you and instead does what I want?

In a vacuum? Sure. In the context of "he started doing something time sensitive, what I told you to do is significantly less time sensitive"? No.

 

[FC Groningen]

Mike, you can keep strawmanning your way through the topic, but as said, parents have nothing to do with people playing games. You're not entitled to control any other player in any other way, or tell them what to do. If you don't want to deal with others, don't play multiplayer. No matter how you put it, your gaming time still rates lowest on the scale of priorities.

 

[Lightspeaker]

You know...I think this thread is a great example of why gaming communities, on the whole, suck and are full of assholes who care about nothing but themselves.

This "its just a game, nobody else in the game matters because they're just randoms online so screw them and you people playing have no right to be upset about that because screw you this is my decision" thing. This attitude that is coming from people is a truly horrible thing to teach children. Its teaching them to only give a damn about themselves and people that are within 'punching distance' of them (so to speak) and show zero empathy for anyone else online. And its an attitude that has been permeating the internet for years now. Self-centred assholes who literally care about nothing but themselves because "lol its just online, right? Who cares about anyone else?"

It is pretty much the root cause of the stereotypical potty-mouthed child yelling over the microphone because the parent doesn't give enough of a damn about what their child is doing online to care about them being horrible to strangers you don't know. Because its just a random online, right? Why should they care? And why should the parents care? You see this kind of attitude in public as well, but its less common because in public people can and will complain to the parent in question.

 

[mike1921]

Mike, you can keep strawmanning your way through the topic, but as said, parents have nothing to do with people playing games. You're not entitled to control any other player in any other way, or tell them what to do. If you don't want to deal with others, don't play multiplayer. No matter how you put it, your gaming time still rates lowest on the scale of priorities.

Strawman going nameless, so I'll surely take that accusation seriously.

Of course parents have something to do with it, if parents saying "get off the game" and that significantly alters the impact of a 30-45 minute chunk of time. How the hell is the parent not involved in that?

This is about the parents of players, not players, so me being unable to control "players" is irrelevant, this is about parents. How the hell you can have the nerve to call anything I say a straw man when you apparently lack such basic knowledge of the subject matter is beyond me.

Although the use of the word control in this context is a straw man. An appeal is not an attempt to control, the open letter would be towards the government, not parents, if this were an attempt to control them. I'm not controlling JJ Abrams when I say he should probably lay off the lens flare. And yes I am entitled to tell people what to do, it's called free speech and feedback, they're entitled to not listen but it's just moronic to say I can't tell them what to do. If parents all of the sudden started forbidding their children from wearing green shirts I'd tell them to stop it because it's pointless and overcontrolling, but as I am not trying to FORCE THEM to, I'm not controlling them. The only one CONTROLLING anyone here is the parents though.

You seem to be under the impression that my problem is with the people I'm playing with, which in many other contexts is true, but in this one it just makes no sense. Could you quote me in any point blaming people actually playing games?

The fact that 9 other people each decided they're willing to devote 30 minutes makes it a priority.Also, MY gaming time is irrelevant, I'm plat it's a pretty rare day I run into a kid being pulled away because their mom is overcontrolling and when it happens statistically the odds are 5/9 it'll be on the enemy team and I don't care that much about a free win once every thousand games. I for all intents and purposes have no horse in this race. platinum is top 10% roughly speaking, I'm pretty certain this is a problem that mostly effects the bottom 60% very disproportionately.

 

[Savagezion]

I did not ever fucking say that it was more important, at most I would say it is worth consideration. Don't put words in my mouth. My comment about following the meta was in response to you calling it disrespectful to call someone out for not following it.

OK, well then I can tell you it has been considered and most parents will consider it less important and the answer is still "No". Let me give you something to consider, 16 year old Timmy has been told 3 times now to take out the trash. First time, was in a match and he said "OK", and the parent waited having other stuff to worry about. Well, Timmy forgot to do it as kids with video games tend to do and started another match. The parent tells him again, where he apologizes and says he will after the new match. "No, do it now" and suddenly the parent is a dick and the new match is more important than Timmy's chores. I am not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out because he keeps forgetting. I am also not going to punish him for abandoning the game when I told him to do it. If his forgetting to do it at a convenient time results in backlash within the game, I trust him to handle that himself. I am not going to intervene and play mediator between him and a bunch of people playing video games. I am gonna let you all work it out. More than likely though the kid isn't as patient, mature, or articulate as he needs to be in that scenario and will get pissed and either quit playing or just ignore anytime someone gives him backlash. I may give him guidance but to be honest, I will tell him how I see it.

You're not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out? Seriously? Is your trash nuclear waste? Is it some herculean task to take out the trash where if he starts now he'll be done in 6 hours? Pretty much any house chore is something that can wait hours.

no, nothing is more important than chores, but everything is more time sensitive than chores. My house would have bankrupt in months if I don't do my "chores" (my chores being doing invoices for my father's business) yet somehow when I was asked at 5 and said "hey could we do it at 9" the answer was "ok" 99 times out of 100, because: shocker, we get the money at exactly the same time pretty much regardless when I make the invoice.

There is a couple things wrong with this comparison. First:

To you taking out the trash is about taking out the trash. To me it can spawn into helping the kid form structure in his daily life. (Which is clearly absent if he is ignoring doing it to play games.) You focus on what they are doing and not why it is being pressed. It is more about helping the kid form habitual routines than taking out the trash. Hell, I could take out the trash. But that isn't the point.

No, the trash isn't nuclear waste. However, the kid procrastinates things and has a habit of forgetting responsibility as most kids do. Especially, when video games are involved. You may be the type of kid who is so responsible your parents trust you with the the financial responsibility of their of their income, and no doubt use those invoices to prepare you to be able to take the business down the line but I assure you that isn't standard fare in the teenage world. I bet if you forgot to do invoices a couple of times asking to do it at 9 would flip to the answer being "OK" 1 out of 100 times. Because the logic would be make sure you don't forget again and then you can play your game.

You are using the logic that what is true at your house must be true at everyone's house. My whole point is that what is true at any house is NOT true at every house. Which means while it may seem perfectly logical from your perspective to never make a kid get off the computer I assure you there are many times where it is more important. We have only covered taking out the trash. There is a long list of things that could be interrupting. Not all houses and kids are the same as yours.

First, age is irrelevant. Wash the car = flunking algebra in this scenario. The scenario paints priorities. Anything I make him quit the game for is something that he knew he had to do long before logging in. It is a prior obligation. Taking out the trash he has known is his 'job' all year. Completely the match is an obligation he has for 10 minutes.

For one, a lot of kids do not have that sort of structure where they do know about these prior obligations. Second, unless the trash has been piling up all year it's pretty easy to not notice if its time for the trash to be taken out. Third: Priorities should take time sensitivity into account, filing my taxes is a much higher priority than today's dinner in the sense that if I needed to ignore one or the other I'd skip dinner, but one is due in months and one is due in hours: by your logic I should skip dinner and file my taxes even though I can get both done with no ill effect because priorities.

1. In an environment where they don't have such structure what makes you think that the letter will apply to that environment? (Considering that the letter's suggestion needs structure to be applied.)
2. It's also easy for the kid to get home and not even bother to look because he can't wait to hop online because he is a kid and is excited. That is easily dismissed. It is easy for him to dismiss and forget even after you tell him.
3. You are comparing eating and financial concerns. Both are actual priorities. Not starving to death and not losing everything you own. NEITHER of these are parallel to losing a GAME. Teaching responsibility and structure is not parallel to a game. No matter how you argue your argument the problem is you are saying that a leisure activity should be given precedent over responsibilities. I will never agree with that. That is actually a symptom of an unhealthy "addiction" to video games. Unless there is a direct correlation between finances and gaming such as making money playing, is it even worth a direct comparison. You are actually ranking LoL with eating and bankruptcy which I think is a tad off.

Do you find it irritating when he disregards you and instead does what I want?

In a vacuum? Sure. In the context of "he started doing something time sensitive, what I told you to do is significantly less time sensitive"? No.

Well, we are in a vacuum here. If I choose to make the kid drop the game for something I see as more important, regardless of time sensitivity, he will either do as I want or do as you want. And I have seen no valid reason to prioritize gaming over real life. Just because it is time sensitive doesn't make it more important. It sucks that other people have to suffer for his irresponsibility but that is real life. Being irresponsible usually tends to hurt those around you more noticeably than yourself.

 

[mike1921]

I did not ever fucking say that it was more important, at most I would say it is worth consideration. Don't put words in my mouth. My comment about following the meta was in response to you calling it disrespectful to call someone out for not following it.

OK, well then I can tell you it has been considered and most parents will consider it less important and the answer is still "No". Let me give you something to consider, 16 year old Timmy has been told 3 times now to take out the trash. First time, was in a match and he said "OK", and the parent waited having other stuff to worry about. Well, Timmy forgot to do it as kids with video games tend to do and started another match. The parent tells him again, where he apologizes and says he will after the new match. "No, do it now" and suddenly the parent is a dick and the new match is more important than Timmy's chores. I am not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out because he keeps forgetting. I am also not going to punish him for abandoning the game when I told him to do it. If his forgetting to do it at a convenient time results in backlash within the game, I trust him to handle that himself. I am not going to intervene and play mediator between him and a bunch of people playing video games. I am gonna let you all work it out. More than likely though the kid isn't as patient, mature, or articulate as he needs to be in that scenario and will get pissed and either quit playing or just ignore anytime someone gives him backlash. I may give him guidance but to be honest, I will tell him how I see it.

You're not going to wait 3 hours for the trash to be taken out? Seriously? Is your trash nuclear waste? Is it some herculean task to take out the trash where if he starts now he'll be done in 6 hours? Pretty much any house chore is something that can wait hours.

no, nothing is more important than chores, but everything is more time sensitive than chores. My house would have bankrupt in months if I don't do my "chores" (my chores being doing invoices for my father's business) yet somehow when I was asked at 5 and said "hey could we do it at 9" the answer was "ok" 99 times out of 100, because: shocker, we get the money at exactly the same time pretty much regardless when I make the invoice.

There is a couple things wrong with this comparison. First:

To you taking out the trash is about taking out the trash. To me it can spawn into helping the kid form structure in his daily life. (Which is clearly absent if he is ignoring doing it to play games.) You focus on what they are doing and not why it is being pressed. It is more about helping the kid form habitual routines than taking out the trash. Hell, I could take out the trash. But that isn't the point.

No, the trash isn't nuclear waste. However, the kid procrastinates things and has a habit of forgetting responsibility as most kids do. Especially, when video games are involved. You may be the type of kid who is so responsible your parents trust you with the the financial responsibility of their of their income, and no doubt use those invoices to prepare you to be able to take the business down the line but I assure you that isn't standard fare in the teenage world. I bet if you forgot to do invoices a couple of times asking to do it at 9 would flip to the answer being "OK" 1 out of 100 times. Because the logic would be make sure you don't forget again and then you can play your game.

You are using the logic that what is true at your house must be true at everyone's house. My whole point is that what is true at any house is NOT true at every house. Which means while it may seem perfectly logical from your perspective to never make a kid get off the computer I assure you there are many times where it is more important. We have only covered taking out the trash. There is a long list of things that could be interrupting. Not all houses and kids are the same as yours.

Sure, kids fuck up. but the fact of the matter is, regardless of how you think it ranks in terms of degree, he also accepted the responsibility of completing the game he started and I don't see a solid reason to make him abandon it, and I do think with the current status of many online communities you should be a little careful about actions that make people behind a screen seem like less than people. There's enough psychology promoting that already.

I'm aware taking out the trash is not solely about taking out the trash, however the message you are trying to teach is not necessarily the only one conveyed. Yes, you will convey that adult tasks are important and at some point need to take priority, but at the same time you're conveying a sense that timing and people online don't matter in your priorities ever. If you're going at this from a symbolic perspective than I see where you're coming from but at the same time, an online game can be more about responsibilities to a group and in context it could be about timing.

Anecdote incoming: I know two people with mothers who feel there is no problem taking their kid out of whatever they're doing no matter what to do something that can wait for hours if not days. They're both always off with their timing and are rude online relative to other people in the same circles (one is much worse with timing and rudeness than the other) and yes, they're both constantly afking in games. Of course two isn't the sample size to prove anything and of course confirmation bias exists but when I see a kid tell me he'll be at my house in 5 minutes but takes 35 because he decided that it's time to take out the trash, and he lives about 10 minutes away from my house, and then when he's with me he informs me he's late to be at the gym with someone else, I sort of get the feeling that he wasn't taught how to be punctual and when everytime he mentions his mother it's about her pulling him away from something for a chore he didn't know he had to do I don't think my hypothesis is too far off..

I'm not perfect, I did forget bills a few times, it was just a case of getting a text asking if I did it and then getting it done, and then we got on a system where I just don't miss them (he emails me now, I check my email very often and don't set it to read until it's done).

It wasn't by choice that my father trusted me with the house's income, my mother left us and my dad is computer illiterate.

I don't have a problem with taking your kids out for unique circumstances, what I care about is there being a good enough reason to ruin my game.

First, age is irrelevant. Wash the car = flunking algebra in this scenario. The scenario paints priorities. Anything I make him quit the game for is something that he knew he had to do long before logging in. It is a prior obligation. Taking out the trash he has known is his 'job' all year. Completely the match is an obligation he has for 10 minutes.

For one, a lot of kids do not have that sort of structure where they do know about these prior obligations. Second, unless the trash has been piling up all year it's pretty easy to not notice if its time for the trash to be taken out. Third: Priorities should take time sensitivity into account, filing my taxes is a much higher priority than today's dinner in the sense that if I needed to ignore one or the other I'd skip dinner, but one is due in months and one is due in hours: by your logic I should skip dinner and file my taxes even though I can get both done with no ill effect because priorities.

1. In an environment where they don't have such structure what makes you think that the letter will apply to that environment? (Considering that the letter's suggestion needs structure to be applied.)
2. It's also easy for the kid to get home and not even bother to look because he can't wait to hop online because he is a kid and is excited. That is easily dismissed. It is easy for him to dismiss and forget even after you tell him.
3. You are comparing eating and financial concerns. Both are actual priorities. Not starving to death and not losing everything you own. NEITHER of these are parallel to losing a GAME. Teaching responsibility and structure is not parallel to a game. No matter how you argue your argument the problem is you are saying that a leisure activity should be given precedent over responsibilities. I will never agree with that. That is actually a symptom of an unhealthy "addiction" to video games. Unless there is a direct correlation between finances and gaming such as making money playing, is it even worth a direct comparison. You are actually ranking LoL with eating and bankruptcy which I think is a tad off.

1: I don't know if I'm just tired but I don't know what that contradicts and I don't think it's core to either of our points
2: Sure, but just remind him, I know plenty of adults who do the same things and are doing fine because forgetting things is just something that humans do.
3: No, I'm not comparing not starving to death to anything. You're looking at this too black and white. If I stopped eating dinner now, forever, just no meals after 4pm I would never starve to death , still have lunch. That's why i specifically said dinner TONIGHT compared to filing my taxes, whether I eat dinner one day out of the year ranks about up there with whether I stub my toe this year in terms of importance.

By your logic no one who has any financial difficulties or possibility of any financial difficulties in the future should ever buy an entertainment product regardless of cost because they're ranking gaming over their financial well being. Do you see what's wrong with seeing "dinner tonight" as at all even related to "STARVING TO DEATH" in a first world country? "dinner tonight" is about as petty a consequence as I can give you unless you're having trouble with anorexia, you'll have an irritating feeling in your stomach and may have trouble going to sleep tonight. But: taxes due in months, if they were due in hours dinner wouldn't even weigh in.

When you mess around with degrees enough I believe you can compare anything with anything. Is money more important than your children? What, no? I'll give you a billion dollars to erase one of the answers on a graded piece of homework and replace it with a false one. Of course you'll do it.

Whenever you say you can't compare two things you get ludicrous results. I've heard people say that honesty is something that can never be compromised and then they say they wouldn't lie nazis looking for jews if they could get away with it and other similarly repugnant things. I say if it is something that exists and has an impact on anyone's life, degree irrelevant, you can not deny it's spot as something you can compare with anything else.

I say the game is on the same scale as food and finance because I say everything is on that scale. Otherwise most people should just never buy an entertainment product, ever. At the base level I say they lack the same degree of importance but "dinner tonight" and "taxes are due in 3 months" are such non-pressing matters that I can't falter anyone for prioritizing pretty much anything they feel like over either of them for the time being.

Do you find it irritating when he disregards you and instead does what I want?

In a vacuum? Sure. In the context of "he started doing something time sensitive, what I told you to do is significantly less time sensitive"? No.

Well, we are in a vacuum here. If I choose to make the kid drop the game for something I see as more important, regardless of time sensitivity, he will either do as I want or do as you want. And I have seen no valid reason to prioritize gaming over real life. Just because it is time sensitive doesn't make it more important. It sucks that other people have to suffer for his irresponsibility but that is real life. Being irresponsible usually tends to hurt those around you more noticeably than yourself.

Yes, it being time sensitive does make it more important because both can be done if he does the game first but not if he does the trash first. You're not comparing taking out the trash to anything, you are only comparing which minute within the hour the trash gets taken out to the game. I don't get how you perceive this as being "taking out the trash versus completing the game" because that is a vast exaggeration, you are comparing the game to what position the minute hand on the clock is on when the trash is taken out.

Here's the way I see it. He has a responsibility to me, a small one, to stay in this game, and he has a responsibility to you, a small-medium responsibility (I'm sure if something genuinely important came up and the situtation was right you'd do it and not care). If he leaves the game right now he nets an abandoned small responsibility, if he plays the game but then doesn't take out the trash anyway than he nets a bigger abandoned responsibility, worst. But if he just finishes the game and takes out the trash: he didn't abandon his responsibility to anyone: seems to me like it's obviously the best outcome. Also it's what an adult would reasonably do in that situation and I do think a major point of parenting is to teach your child what they should be doing as an adult.

I don't even see your concern of whether the trash is out this hour or the next as in the category of "real life", any sense of importance you see in that is just as symbolic as the actions of my magical swordsman in league.

 

[Foehunter82]

I'm afraid I'm with Mutant on this completely.

Do any of you LoL players remember actually BEING a kid? Didn't any of you get into that sort of mischief? Kids will stealth join games only to have to quit and eat dinner or go to bed or whatever. It happens. That's what kids do. Understand that some kids actually have such strict parents that if they don't do what they're told, their parents will literally sell their computer or console or whatever.

No, this is massive entitlement, pure and simple. It's brought on by this very attractive, ultra-competitive e-sport BS that leads to an entire segment of the gaming community caring more about stats (that most of the rest of the world doesn't care about) than their fellow human beings.

How many of you are actually making money with these "e-sports"? I imagine that the vast majority of you MOBA gamers aren't making any money off of it, so your livelihood isn't being compromised by the negative (and over-emphasized) stats. So, what are you complaining about?

Personally, I think this letter is going to lead to a Legendgate sort of thing in the near future.

 

[Mutant1988]

Personally, I think this letter is going to lead to a Legendgate sort of thing in the near future.

It won't. It's not offensive in any way. It's just petty, childish and presumptuous.

The game sounds like it has bigger issues in regards to how it handles ranking, team building, play lists and player disconnects. I mean that seriously, it does sound those things need to be fixed.

 

[DocJ]

I have this very same problem but with Dota 2, and usually it's not my fault. My laptop has a massive overheating problem and as such, it might shut off mid game if I haven't adequately cooled it. Now, Dota 2 has a five minute abandon timer. If you don't reconnect to the game within that five minute period, you are assessed with an abandon and are placed in the hellish low priority queue, where you're forced to play with the ragequitters, flamers, trollers, griefers and more. I have spent more than enough time in there because of players too impatient to pause the game to wait for their teammate. After all you're not getting back into the game from an overheat shutdown unless you're using a combination of SSD's and luck.

But this also applies to games when I'm not the one dcing. If I'm playing really well and an opponent gets angry, they'll ragequit, abandon the game and make it safe for everyone to leave, to which the enemy team pisses off to find another game that they can hopefully win. And while it hands me an easy victory, I don't like it. Especially when they're on my team. If the player abandons before the first kill of the game, the whole match is discounted, about 15-20 mins of your time wasted. But usually players abandon after being killed, which means we could be 8 mins into the game and be at a disadvantage. Although this is usually an advantage as we aren't having some flaming, angry idiot yelling at us the whole game.

TLDR: MOBA's will always be fucked up. There's no way to fix the community over the internet.

 

[SweetShark]

This is one of the things I wanted to be told here at some point.
I play a lot of games, like you people. Many games. I wonder sometimes if I die trying to play all these games I want and have in mind. Plus the books/comics I want to read, music to hear, movies/TV Series to watch, etc,etc.
Of course I don't feel sad about that. It is a choice I made and I want to stick with it, because it is something I enjoy.
However, always respect your parents and love them. Even they see you all day long sitting in one place, in one room and playing all the times Videogames, you must remember they care about you and they want the good for you.

So if you are playing a very important game with someone else and you are very near to win and get extra experience, etc., but suddenly your mother calling you to help her with something important, then F*CK the game, F*CK the Book, F*CK the Comic, F*CK the Movie, F*CK everything you do in you little Paradise and go help your Mother!
Be thanful to be borned and be thanful having a family which care about you. A family which feed you, help you with your problems, listening you, everything.

 

[Padwolf]

If I had a child there is no way on earth I'd let them play that game with the chat on. It's like exposing impressionable kids to the XBOX Live community. It's bad, yo. Will change them from sweet, intelligent little things to "OMG DIE CANCER NOOB" or "HAHAHAI BANGD UR MUM LST NITE" and all sorts of awful spelling. Seen it happen so many times Kids need to learn time management it's true. And I agree that they would HAVE to be punished the second they come out of that game. But they also have to learn that life comes before games do.

 

[Aurion]

Disclaimer: I don't have kids.

Yeah I don't know why this even exists.

Why other people's parents should give a fuck about your ~statz~ being possibly impaired compared to, yknow, turning a hedonistic lump of flesh and bone into something at least vaguely resembling a completed person is...um.

Myopic to a ludicrous extreme? I'm struggling to come up with an appropriate turn of phrase to describe how ridiculous this is here.

 

[mike1921]

I'm afraid I'm with Mutant on this completely.

Do any of you LoL players remember actually BEING a kid? Didn't any of you get into that sort of mischief? Kids will stealth join games only to have to quit and eat dinner or go to bed or whatever. It happens. That's what kids do. Understand that some kids actually have such strict parents that if they don't do what they're told, their parents will literally sell their computer or console or whatever.

What is your point? You are literally just describing the way the world is in ways everyone knows. The writer of the letter knows that kids stealth join games right before dinner and bed, that's why he specifically said if he did that punish him after.

No, this is massive entitlement, pure and simple. It's brought on by this very attractive, ultra-competitive e-sport BS that leads to an entire segment of the gaming community caring more about stats (that most of the rest of the world doesn't care about) than their fellow human beings.

How many of you are actually making money with these "e-sports"? I imagine that the vast majority of you MOBA gamers aren't making any money off of it, so your livelihood isn't being compromised by the negative (and over-emphasized) stats. So, what are you complaining about?

Personally, I think this letter is going to lead to a Legendgate sort of thing in the near future.

Did the letter bring up the e-sports scene? This being driven by e-sports is an idea entirely in your head. The e-sports scene exists because it is a competitive skill based team based game and that is why people care about their ranking. Also, you're the one who says it's ok to waste 30 minutes of 9 peoples' time just so your brat gets punished 20 minutes earlier or just so you don't miss your kid at dinner one day when you probably do it every day of the year, how can you possibly say that yours is the position of caring for fellow human beings? This is the equivalent of going on a loud tirade at your kid while you're front of the line in the supermarket, holding up the line and annoying every customer and employee in the process. If what he did really doesn't fucking matter than yell at him in the car or when you get home.

If it doesn't effect my livelihood I can't have a problem with it?

If a parent and child were at taco bell, first in line and there's 9 people there who haven't gotten their drink, and then the parent decided to start yelling at the kid blocking off the soda machine for 30 fucking minutes everyone would agree that's moronic. In any other context people understand that all things equal you parenting your kid should interfere with third parties as minimally as possible.

Like, I don't give a fuck how unimportant you think the game is, I think watching football is boring and unimportant but I acknowledge that if you're going to turn off the game in front of 9 people just as a parenting exercise you better have a better reason for it than "OH MY GOD IT'S JUST A GAME, AND LITTLE TIMMY IS LITERALLY 10.5 MINUTES LATE TO TAKE OUT THE TRASH". The fact that people are willing to watch it for hours at a time is enough reason for me to respect it as a priority that people are allowed to keep watching because that's how a reasonable human being prioritizes things.

 

[sonofliber]

I will just point out that its not " for the elo or what ever other shit you accusers of this are saying", its about the time, a dc mean i just wasted either from 20 to 1 hour of my life on a game that didnt give me the expected return for my enjoyment, all because you coudnt wait for your kid to finish (a game marked teen, excellent parenting there already) a simple match, its not about losing my elo, or ranked (simple because i dont play them anymore thanks to attitudes like this) but time.

Let me ask you this? do you enjoy standing in line for 45 minutes while the cashier does her fingers? do yoy after that say " shees thank good she got her nail worked on, now she looks pretty" or your reaction is "get to work you lazy ****"

If it doesn't effect my livelihood I can't have a problem with it?

If a parent and child were at taco bell, first in line and there's 9 people there who haven't gotten their drink, and then the parent decided to start yelling at the kid blocking off the soda machine for 30 fucking minutes everyone would agree that's moronic. In any other context people understand that all things equal you parenting your kid should interfere with third parties as minimally as possible.

Like, I don't give a fuck how unimportant you think the game is, I think watching football is boring and unimportant but I acknowledge that if you're going to turn off the game in front of 9 people just as a parenting exercise you better have a better reason for it than "OH MY GOD IT'S JUST A GAME, AND LITTLE TIMMY IS LITERALLY 10.5 MINUTES LATE TO TAKE OUT THE TRASH". The fact that people are willing to watch it for hours at a time is enough reason for me to respect it as a priority that people are allowed to keep watching because that's how a reasonable human being prioritizes things.

Shhh dont bring real world examples that happens constantly and everyone agree that fuck those parents, its just a game man, here the other nine people arent near so they dont give a fuck.

Disclaimer: I don't have kids.

Yeah I don't know why this even exists.

Why other people's parents should give a fuck about your ~statz~ being possibly impaired compared to, yknow, turning a hedonistic lump of flesh and bone into something at least vaguely resembling a completed person is...um.

Myopic to a ludicrous extreme? I'm struggling to come up with an appropriate turn of phrase to describe how ridiculous this is here.

see this guy for example, he doest care to wait 45 minutes for the kid to make his pick, or free the machine or just dont be an asshole.

 

[Yuuki]

Do children not have access to clocks nowadays? The child should be smart/mature enough to realize that on their own.

If they aren't, they shouldn't be playing LoL in the first place.

If you have given your child a strict cutoff time for play, do not allow him to begin a game if he has less than an hour left.

Bedtime in 30 minutes? Don't allow him to start a new game.
Dinner in 45 minutes? Don't allow him to start a new game.

My little brother learned this the hard way after a temp ban or two - don't queue for a fucking game unless you're 100% sure you can dedicate the next 30-60 mins to it.

 

[theNater]

Let me ask you this? do you enjoy standing in line for 45 minutes while the cashier does her fingers?

That's pretty terrible. It's right up there with having to wait 30-45 minutes before eating dinner because my brother needed to finish his game. Dinner was a family affair at my house, you see.

The amount of hypocrisy in this thread is staggering. We've got folks pointing out that the other people in the game are real people, deserving of respect, while ignoring that the family is also real people, deserving of respect. Getting mad at those who say "it's just a game" while simultaneously saying "it's just dinner", "it's just bedtime", or "it's just chores".

And putting all the onus on the parents, when it's the kid causing the problems. This isn't a letter to the kids, telling them to check with their parents if there are chores they should do before they start. This isn't a letter to LoL players, suggesting they take a moment at the start of the game to remind their teammates to do that. It's like blaming the cops for issuing your friend a speeding ticket instead of, y'know, blaming your friend for speeding.

 

[sonofliber]

Let me ask you this? do you enjoy standing in line for 45 minutes while the cashier does her fingers?

That's pretty terrible. It's right up there with having to wait 30-45 minutes before eating dinner because my brother needed to finish his game. Dinner was a family affair at my house, you see.

The amount of hypocrisy in this thread is staggering. We've got folks pointing out that the other people in the game are real people, deserving of respect, while ignoring that the family is also real people, deserving of respect. Getting mad at those who say "it's just a game" while simultaneously saying "it's just dinner", "it's just bedtime", or "it's just chores".

And putting all the onus on the parents, when it's the kid causing the problems. This isn't a letter to the kids, telling them to check with their parents if there are chores they should do before they start. This isn't a letter to LoL players, suggesting they take a moment at the start of the game to remind their teammates to do that. It's like blaming the cops for issuing your friend a speeding ticket instead of, y'know, blaming your friend for speeding.

A big difference:

you can do other thing while your brother is playing, people who are playing can not and are stuck there (do you want ot read a book? you can, watch tv? you can. take a shower? you can, can i do anything like that while playing lol? no i fucking cant)

And most importantly you have the ability to kick the living shit out of your brother after it.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

Yep, sounds like the LoL community.

Their ranking is the ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT THING, guys. So you can't screw it up by leaving a game to spend time with your family, or being bad at the game, or playing a character that they don't like, or playing a character in a sub-optimal configuration.

The League community is just gross.

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

It's not about them being people or not, it's about the fact that it's a game.

Just a game. Basically a virtual football match.

It's some kid throwing a tantrum because Timmy's mom interrupted their football game when she had to take him to the dentist.

You're not being "fucked over", you're being put at a disadvantage in a video game multiplayer match. Get some perspective.

It's not just a game. It's half an hour of 9 people. What if someone had a bit free time for one match and you just leave it because you started it knowing you will go in 20 minutes? He can't play a new full match, he wasted his time because you are an asshole who knew he couldn't finish the game but started it.
The letter isn't asking for people to never ever quit the game. It's just asking to be reasonable and realize that on the other end are people as well, with their free time. If your kid must go to bed at 9, don't let him play the game at 8:30. Tell him to play something else.
The letter is actually right. The parents are just teaching their kids that it's okay to fuck over other people. Why would the kid care about anyone else time? Just fuck those stranger who committed their free time to have fun with each other.

There are things outside of peoples control, but parents not teaching their kids about time management and shit is not such a thing.