Check out the LCS schedule and matchups at lolesports.com
With the League of Legends Championship Series looming on the horizon, TeamLiquid scored an opportunity to sit down with Riot's Vice President of eSports to ask him some questions about the intricacies of LCS as well as where Riot stands on the current state of the competitive scene.
No Tie-breaking Surprises
On LoL Championship Series
Dustin sees your League of Warmog's and raises you with Bio-Arcane Barrage
NeoIllusions: Hey Dustin, thanks for taking the time to talk with us. Please introduce yourself and tell us what you do for Riot Games. Dustin Beck: My pleasure - always happy to make time for our friends at TeamLiquid! I'm Dustin Beck, and I am the Vice-President of eSports. I do a lot of things over here, we have our hands full recently! We are building out a team dedicated on creating a healthy ecosystem for our sport, so we have people focused on the LCS (execution, video, rules and guidelines, player management, etc), just released a new website, have people looped in with our design team that have been helping with our new league system, and so forth.
NeoIllusions: With LCS commencing tomorrow, let's go into the details about the league for fans and critics alike. What was the specific motivation in creating regional leagues for the LCS? What do you want to say to fans who want to see even more intra-regional competition in Season 3? Dustin Beck: The regional/global structure already exists in many traditionally popular sports, other eSports and even LoL eSports. For example, soccer has regional leagues which roll up to epic international competitions like UEFA Champions League and the World Cup. In League of Legends eSports, regional leagues already exist – Korea has OGN Champions and Southeast Asia + Taiwan has the Garena Premier League. We like this model of regional league play rolling up into international competitions and decided to continue using it in Season 3.
NeoIllusions: While eSports is a global phenomenon but it seems like with the LCS will divide NA and EU. Korea, China and SEA have leagues previously mentioned. How does Riot plan to advance international competition this season? How will Riot promote the various leagues to foreign audiences? (for example OGN to an NA/EU viewership and vice versa) Dustin Beck: eSports fans interested in international competition can still get that before the World Championship. Our partner events such as IPL, MLG and Dreamhack will have international exhibitions showcasing top-notch competition. Furthermore, the best players in each region – as elected by the fans – will compete in an All Star competition in Shanghai during the break between halves of the LCS. With this structure, fans will get a taste of international competition during the year and storylines between regions will build up, culminating in the World Championship. There is awesome League of Legends eSports competition going on across the globe, and fans in each region deserve to see more of it than they did during Season 2. In most cases, the lack of exposure to foreign competition is due to time zone differences, lack of native language casting or low production quality. Over the course of Season 3, we hope to showcase rebroadcasts of foreign competition in a variety of languages. Furthermore, we’ll be broadcasting LCS matches abroad in foreign languages. The ultimate goal is to help fans to learn about the teams and playstyles they will see at the World Championship.
NeoIllusions: Are they any eSports aspects of other leagues, companies, or games you think are missing from LoL (gameplay features, tournament setups, etc.)? What would you want/hope to add, if anything? Dustin Beck: While I’m pretty happy with the direction we’re heading in now, we constantly look at different leagues and sports for inspiration on how we can do better. One thing I’ve mentioned before is that we need to focus on the entire competitive ecosystem to ensure long-term success. We’ve started that with the launch of the League System, but I think there is still more we can do at the grassroots competitive level.
NeoIllusions: Why did you decide to prevent brother teams from existing in the LCS? Korean organizations have proven it is possible to have this and still retain competitive integrity (Azubu Frost/Flame, KT Rolster A/B, etc.) Dustin Beck: We prevented brother teams from existing in the LCS because we think that in the long run, this is a positive decision for the eSports ecosystem. One positive aspect from the new LCS structure is that we will see these teams grow into franchises – you can already see that with SoloMid or Counter Logic Gaming. With only eight teams in each regional division, it’s better for the long term health of the ecosystem to have more of these franchises around. LCS teams will be able to support challenger teams for the purpose of developing future stars, and you already see that happening, such as Dignitas picking up Pulse.
NeoIllusions: How does the LCS handle tiebreaks? Will it be time based? Will it be penalty point based like StarCraft Proleague? Dustin Beck: I can tell you one thing... we heard the community loud and clear, and it won't be time based. We know fans like ties being resolved, so any ties will be played out until there is a winner. If you want to compare it to baseball, they have a tiebreaker game before the playoffs start.
NeoIllusions: With a number of Asian tournaments (OGN, Stars War League, G-League) as well as Dota2’s The International using Bo2 during group stages, why did Riot decide to use Bo1 format for LCS? Even though all the matchups between teams are four a piece, isn’t it a concern that team A has to play Blue side on one patch and purple side on a different patch? Dustin Beck: We have four games a night, so we wanted to create more diversity over the evening for a better viewing experience. Plus, there will be four of the games over the course of our first split season instead of two, so that's also compelling for the viewers.
NeoIllusions: Riot is pushing LoL to new heights in Season 3, even aiming to mimic mainstream sports in NA like baseball and basketball. However, with such ambition, there are also mainstream risks. In recent news, a corruption scandal was uncovered involving match fixing. Even perennial eSports titles like Brood War have not been immune to match fixing. Is this a concern for Riot going into Season 3 where more and more teams are seeing money involved with pro gaming? Dustin Beck: Obviously there is heightened risk with the amount of money and fame involved, but Riot is laser focused on maintaining the integrity of our sport. We've gone to great lengths to ensure there will be no cheating, or match fixing. To give an example, at the World Championship we tested all of the peripherals brought in by the players on devices used to see if any malware was installed on their devices. We take this very seriously.
Balancing the Artillery
On Game Balance and the Competitive Scene
Nika (RiotNikasaur), Dustin (RiotRedBeard), and Jeffrey (RiotLyte)
NeoIllusions: Moving on to Game Balance: How does Riot view the current overall state of the competitive game? Various designers have commented about specific aspects of the game (jungle design, champ balance, etc.), but how does Riot feel about where the game as a whole stands, at least in relation to competitive play? Dustin Beck: So these answers are coming from our design team, if you want someone to quote it would be Kevin O'Brien (RiotGeeves), better known as the man, the myth and the legend. The game is playing pretty well competitively right now. We are happy to see the return of assassins to the competitive scene and the changes in team compositions to fit with them. Cohesive teams are using lane swaps and other strategies to try to outplay specific enemies with better success than Season 2. There are a few things that we are looking into, such as health stacking and mass consumable starts early with wards, but overall we like the way the competitive game is trending from the preseason changes.
NeoIllusions: Are there any plans to balance first ban/pick with blue purple side? While it was not as drastic at the EU LCS, in both OGN and NA LCS, blue side is victorious over 65% of the time. Dustin Beck: We are still trying to let things settle in with the changes that we made for Season 3. The sample is still pretty small for competitive games in Season 3 and in many instances, a higher seeded team has choice of side, but if we see bad trends we’ll look more into it.
NeoIllusions: We have seen a number of very common bans or picks going into S3. For example, Kha'zix, Olaf, Shen, Eve, Elise, etc) Does Riot think that these heroes are balanced or do they need more tweaking? Zileas was rather against on the LoL forums about adding additional bans. Is Riot still standing on that opinion? Dustin Beck: There are different reasons that these characters are being picked currently. In some cases, combinations of characters are quite powerful, such as Miss Fortune’s ultimate with area damage compositions. For Elise, it’s because she scales so well in the current health stacking meta. For the rest, they are just strong all-around champions that we have been investigating and adjusting. Regarding bans, the approach we take is balancing out the # of bans against the strategic options that we want teams to be able to have as well as having a natural stop if some champions become S tier in power. We want to maximize the amount of in game strategy and not sway too far into the direction of deterministic results based on champ selection. Some number of bans keeps the competitive game fresh, but too many may prevent some players from showcasing their skill on champions they are particularly good at. Watching MadLife play Blitzcrank for example is always a treat to watch. The theory that we run under is that we attempt to stay on top of characters that are trending out of line through direct adjustments to those characters, adjustments to the environments under which they flourish (health stacking), or buffing up other characters to be in line with them. If this becomes too difficult to maintain then we will consider increasing the number of bans.
NeoIllusions: Lastly, Season 3 brought another change to the Jungle, similar to Season 2. Riot has made several statements about their goals with the Jungle as well. Do you feel as if the current Jungle is meeting your goals? What do you consider to be the point of jungling and how well does that mesh with games you're seeing in the current professional setting? Dustin Beck: To rehash the stated goals of the preseason jungle changes, we wanted to increase jungler diversity, reduce very early pressure they were putting on lanes, and give them a bigger presence in team fights. We have seen results thus far that are positive towards this end, as well as a few things that are detrimental to them from other changes. Ward usage seems to be lowering gank potential early, so we have looked into Sightstone as a potential cause and are currently investigating the sharp rise of mass consumable starts with wards.
NeoIllusions: With that, we conclude our interview with Dustin! Thank you for your time. Do you have any last words to your fans? Dustin Beck: Thanks to all of the fans, they are awesome and we can't wait to deliver new and cool eSport content to them every week. Also a big thanks to my team, they work so hard and are the people behind the scenes making all this stuff happen. Legit stuff ahead, stay tuned!
Thank goodness on the stupidity of the time-based tiebreaker. Nice interview. Is there any requirement for casting a vote in an upward direction on a community site on which things may be 'read?'
It's not original, but thanks so much for the coverage. I started playing LoL because of the TL subforum, and now I've totally switched from SC2. It's nice to see that it has become (IMO) the best place for LoL coverage and analysis, even if we aren't "official."
On February 07 2013 04:11 WaveofShadow wrote: Nice interview. Is there any requirement for casting a vote in an upward direction on a community site on which things may be 'read?'
Some points that stuck out for me: -time-based tiebraker: very good decision to not use it
-blue-side advantage: good to see that they don't jump the train with the 65% winrate, I believe he is right about the need to gather more data for a conclusion. I'd like to see them using this mindset for champion balancing too, not just nerf what the current FOTM is
-brother teams: I'd like to know what they think will be better for the ecosystem if they're not allowing brother teams
On February 07 2013 04:19 CatharsisUT wrote: It's not original, but thanks so much for the coverage. I started playing LoL because of the TL subforum, and now I've totally switched from SC2. It's nice to see that it has become (IMO) the best place for LoL coverage and analysis, even if we aren't "official."
Maybe not "official", but certainly professional. Once again, the staff make me proud to be a TLer.
On February 07 2013 04:19 CatharsisUT wrote: It's not original, but thanks so much for the coverage. I started playing LoL because of the TL subforum, and now I've totally switched from SC2. It's nice to see that it has become (IMO) the best place for LoL coverage and analysis, even if we aren't "official."
No worries. Gratitude from readers are always welcome. The fact that you decided to try League because of our subforum is something that all of us are happy with. Our staff is indeed trying to make TL LoL the best place for everything LoL related. :3
Nice read. How did it feel interviewing Dustin; was he outspoken or more like a politician? I get the feeling sometimes he doesn't wanna say what he really thinks.
On February 07 2013 04:49 Delodax wrote: Nice read. How did it feel interviewing Dustin; was he outspoken or more like a politician? I get the feeling sometimes he doesn't wanna say what he really thinks.
I converse with Dustin regularly so we're rather frank with each other. For the sake of this public interview, he still has an image to uphold as one of Riot's top brass. So it's understandable why it may feel like he's holding back. But I did press him not to give too vague of answers since our (TL's) objective was to stand out from his previous interviews with pcgamer and other mainstream magazines. He understood that we are a community of avid LoL gamers and I'm pleased overall with his responses.
disappointed by the evasive answers to good questions.
But nothing the interviewer can do about it, when the interview partner decides to anser like a politician, all you COULD do would be playing inquisitor, but that doesnt work on people who dont actually have to give you an interview.
On February 07 2013 05:00 LaNague wrote: disappointed by the evasive answers to good questions.
But nothing the interviewer can do about it, when the interview partner decides to anser like a politician, all you COULD do would be playing inquisitor, but that doesnt work on people who dont actually have to give you an interview.
On February 07 2013 04:19 CatharsisUT wrote: It's not original, but thanks so much for the coverage. I started playing LoL because of the TL subforum, and now I've totally switched from SC2. It's nice to see that it has become (IMO) the best place for LoL coverage and analysis, even if we aren't "official."
No worries. Gratitude from readers are always welcome. The fact that you decided to try League because of our subforum is something that all of us are happy with. Our staff is indeed trying to make TL LoL the best place for everything LoL related. :3
And so far very successful. great job
It's great hearing that they will be doing another mixed teams play eachother like they did in "world vs riot" and in s2 finals, those were always fun :D
On February 07 2013 05:00 LaNague wrote: disappointed by the evasive answers to good questions.
But nothing the interviewer can do about it, when the interview partner decides to anser like a politician, all you COULD do would be playing inquisitor, but that doesnt work on people who dont actually have to give you an interview.
Which answers were you unhappy with? :O
i was unhappy with him evading the matchfixing problem enirely, but i guess they just cant talk about it too much either way. Then i was unhappy that he didnt talk about how riot is panning to balance now after preseason (heavy nerfbat to beat the top 3 champs back into line every patch vs maybe a more longterm balancing), but when i reread it, i guess that wasnt really in the question. Then he also evaded the north vs south map balance and did not comment on the suggestion to seperate blue and firstpick at all. The game is over 3 years old, there is enough data.
but thats just me, overall i just would have liked some actual thoughts about the two big problems competetive league has, possible map imbalance and lack of balance stability by wild patching.
On February 07 2013 05:00 LaNague wrote: disappointed by the evasive answers to good questions.
But nothing the interviewer can do about it, when the interview partner decides to anser like a politician, all you COULD do would be playing inquisitor, but that doesnt work on people who dont actually have to give you an interview.
Which answers were you unhappy with? :O
i was unhappy with him evading the matchfixing problem enirely, but i guess they just cant talk about it too much either way. Then i was unhappy that he didnt talk about how riot is panning to balance now after preseason (heavy nerfbat to beat the top 3 champs back into line every patch vs maybe a more longterm balancing), but when i reread it, i guess that wasnt really in the question. Then he also evaded the north vs south map balance and did not comment on the suggestion to seperate blue and firstpick at all. The game is over 3 years old, there is enough data.
but thats just me, overall i just would have liked some actual thoughts about the two big problems competetive league has, possible map imbalance and lack of balance stability by wild patching.
The matchfixing question we actually dropped on Dustin ten minutes before the interview, so I'm surprised he actually answered it on the fly instead of vetoing it. I think the main thing to take away from his answer is that they're aware of possible corruption and will be actively looking for it during the season. It's obviously a concern for Riot. There's not much else to answer unless you're looking for possible punishments, etc. Dustin commented that fair play has been on Riot's radar long before LCS.
The Blue/Purple question was something close to our staff (Yango included :3). But it's Riot's stance that more data is needed and I can respect that. Their overall reply is "We don't think the stats warrants action yet but if things become more drastic, we will consider switching FP to Purple side".
Map imbalance is an issue but it isn't a hindrance yet, so requires more data. In regards to (over)active patching, it's not something we asked about but I'm of the idea that patching can slow down drastically. It's already good news that Riot has slowed down Champion releases from two weeks to three.
I don't think the matchfixing answer was a dodge. No one can come up with a 100% fool-proof counter to it. If people want to cheat they will find a way. The key thing is to make it difficult and to have repercussions if the cheaters are caught. I think we all have seen how serious Riot seems to be as far as repercussions go with this new season.
On February 07 2013 05:00 LaNague wrote: disappointed by the evasive answers to good questions.
But nothing the interviewer can do about it, when the interview partner decides to anser like a politician, all you COULD do would be playing inquisitor, but that doesnt work on people who dont actually have to give you an interview.
Which answers were you unhappy with? :O
i was unhappy with him evading the matchfixing problem enirely, but i guess they just cant talk about it too much either way. Then i was unhappy that he didnt talk about how riot is panning to balance now after preseason (heavy nerfbat to beat the top 3 champs back into line every patch vs maybe a more longterm balancing), but when i reread it, i guess that wasnt really in the question. Then he also evaded the north vs south map balance and did not comment on the suggestion to seperate blue and firstpick at all. The game is over 3 years old, there is enough data.
but thats just me, overall i just would have liked some actual thoughts about the two big problems competetive league has, possible map imbalance and lack of balance stability by wild patching.
The matchfixing question we actually dropped on Dustin ten minutes before the interview, so I'm surprised he actually answered it on the fly instead of vetoing it. I think the main thing to take away from his answer is that they're aware of possible corruption and will be actively looking for it during the season. It's obviously a concern for Riot. There's not much else to answer unless you're looking for possible punishments, etc.
The Blue/Purple question was something close to our staff (Yango included :3). But it's Riot's stance that more data is needed and I can respect that. Their overall reply is "We don't think the stats warrants action yet but if things become more drastic, we will consider switching FP to Purple side".
Map imbalance is an issue but it isn't a hindrance yet, so requires more data. In regards to (over)active patching, it's not something we asked about but I'm of the idea that patching can slow down drastically. It's already good news that Riot has slowed down Champion releases from two weeks to three.
yes, sorry. The interview is good, i didnt think my first post in here trough, its too confrontentinal :p Maybe next time you get an interview we will hear more about their balance strategy
also yes, i know they cant prevent matchfixing, the aram showed it. But would be nice to know if they maybe thought about analyzing suspicious games or something (ofc that was not rly neccessary with the aram ). Them controlling players hardware isnt all that interesting.
On February 07 2013 04:19 CatharsisUT wrote: It's not original, but thanks so much for the coverage. I started playing LoL because of the TL subforum, and now I've totally switched from SC2. It's nice to see that it has become (IMO) the best place for LoL coverage and analysis, even if we aren't "official."
Maybe not "official", but certainly professional. Once again, the staff make me proud to be a TLer.
On February 07 2013 05:44 LaNague wrote: also yes, i know they cant prevent matchfixing, the aram showed it. But would be nice to know if they maybe thought about analyzing suspicious games or something (ofc that was not rly neccessary with the aram ). Them controlling players hardware isnt all that interesting.
I see what you mean. I think they will be watching a lot of things like a hawk. I wouldn't even be surprised if right now they have a few private investigators keeping tabs on the teams(very unlikely but not impossible).
On February 07 2013 06:20 SidianTheBard wrote: Well done, great interview. Man, I love TL so much, between sc2 & LoL this site just rocks for the amount of content you guys bring out.
Thank you for all your hard work!
This+1
I also started playing LoL just from reading this sub forum, and even though im in Bronze, it has helped me quite a bit to strengthen my game.
edit: BTW Interview was very appreciated and I love all the content TL puts out for LoL. Its all really high quality stuff!
The only thing I didn't like is his answer to the jungle question. He states Riot wants less early jungle pressure, more variety in jungle picks, and more presence in teamfights. Right now I think these goals have not been met at all.
Firstly, jungle pressure early is basically gone. So this was successful. Though I do have to point out half the reason this is the case is because of early warding. Personally I'm a fan of early warding because I remember terror days where top lane was complete shit because of early jungle pressure.
Secondly, there are no viable junglers that actually build a significant amount of damage. The closest thing to this is the Vi build that XJ9 has started doing. Even then, its 1 damage item and then tanky, which is 100% something we've seen before. Shaco, Lee Sin, Ganplank, and interestingly, Amumu, have all been played as some sort of damagey bruiser/tank. Its funny because they've all been nerfed heavily. So Riot seems to be talking out of both sides of their mouth: They want champion diversity, but the only good DPS champions are either very new (Vi/Hec builds from XJ9) or they are nerfing (Shaco, Lee Sin) or they have nerfed so they are unviable period (Gangplank) or only viable as tanks (Amumu). So any attempt at champion diversity out of the jungle has failed completely because Riot has nerfed Damagey bruisers. The best junglers are tanks and bruisers that build tanky. This isn't because Warmogs is op or something, this is because straight up how the jungle functions, how it has always functioned, and how Riot has decided to balance melee heroes who are actually capable of dealing lots of damage (IE nerf them all).
As to more presence in teamfights I'm not sure I even know what that means. If this means that junglers can get more farm, that's strictly not true. Junglers are getting an okay amount of gold, but honestly, the only way for a jungler to ever get carry levels of gold is to steal lane creeps and to purposely take kills from ganks instead of giving them to his actual carries. Both of these are straight up suboptimal play. Junglers right now function fine in teamfights though, and I'm 100% okay with the concept of the Junglers being a 2nd support slot. I mean, if that's not what Riot actually wants, for jungle to be locked into this 2nd support slot, then, okay, that's cool too. If presence means something else... meh, maybe I'm completely off on this.
Nice interview, though I'm questioning the validity of balance related questions. In the interview Dustin himself says that he is just relaying RiotGeeves's answers to the questions. I appreciate how candid that is from Dustin, but perhaps the next interview should be a double header with the originator of the comments.
This is quite good stuff. There's always a gap between players and game designers that will always exist as you can't please everyone all at the same time. On the other hand, for a game several years old, the fact that Riot are (as a whole) up to date on trends every week is promising. Games have stood out without any changes made to them for a very long time (looking at you BW) from the game developers, yet Riot has stood out as marquee game designer in many ways. They have quite a bit of money from me, and I'm very pleased with how well they treat their game.
Dustin's a nice guy, you don't just need this interview to have gotten a sense for what kind of guy he is. I'm glad you got this interview Neo because shit like this, and getting to know voice actors, all these unexpected peeks into an industry that's very close to its consumers, are exactly what make us TL readers so much more informed than a majority of players. Where else are you gonna have 27 pages of posts about serious trolling?
Really nice interview! For the VP of E-Sports we don't hear from him too too much so it made for a good interview. Can't say I am happy with his response with games not being a BO3 but we will see how it pans out.
EPT
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/NeoIllusions/Dustin_Interview/DustinKogGun.jpg)
We know fans like ties being resolved, so any ties will be played out until there is a winner. If you want to compare it to baseball, they have a tiebreaker game before the playoffs start.![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/NeoIllusions/Dustin_Interview/Dustinesportssgamer2.jpg)
