Does LoL Have 'Losers Queue'? Devs Finally Explain Myth
League of Legends chief gameplay designer Matt Leung-Harrison has clarified that the 'losers queue' does not exist. The game's community was quick to react to the post and doesn't seem to fully believe the assurances.
Some League of Legends players believe in the existence of a "losers queue" in the ranked mode, where Riot intentionally places certain people to cause a series of losses. Screenshots often circulate as evidence, showing player statistics from a match, where the poster has high statistics, and the rest of the team is exceptionally weak. Matt Leung-Harrison, however, denies all allegations.
LoL devs aren't conspiring against players
Matt Leung-Harrison, the main designer of the gameplay in League of Legends, has finally spoken out and clarified that there's no special queue intended to deliberately lower the ranking of specific players. Right from the start, Leung-Harrison explains that in the case of ranking games, there is only one system:
For ranked, we match you on your rating and that's all. If you've won a lot and start losing, it's because you're playing against better players and aren't at that level anymore. It's not because we matched you with all the inters and put all the smurfs on the enemy team.
Later on, the developer clarified that in every game, the player is the only consistent element across all of their matches, while everything else is always subject to change. Apart from that, statistics alone are meaningless, and if a pro or someone from the challenger tier watched the game, they would definitely identify noteworthy issues.
Players still believe in the "losers queue"
On Reddit, the vast majority of the commenters agreed with the developer, suggesting that we need to look long-term and try to play equally well in each consecutive game. More negative comments appeared under the post on X:
I agree with the concept but then why when I op.gg me team it's a bunch of 30% win rate player and the other is 65%?
- Chris Jenis
Not buying this one. It's within your best interest to keep people away from their true rank because it means we will play the game more. There are too many data points alluding to the existence of losers queue that this post means literally nothing until we see the algorithms.
- cahtah
Weird how easy it is to fall into insane losing streaks but rarely find those insane winning streaks. If there wasn't ANY weighting to matchmaking it wouldn't be like this. It's been shown in other games that matchmaking algorithms/whatever are manipulated to increase player time.
- Renbreaker
Furthermore, players are paying attention to the Emerald rank, which is said to be the most toxic place in League of Legends. It's difficult to achieve teamwork with completely new accounts or smurfs ending up there. At this point, Riot should think about changes, and how to make the environment in Emerald much better. Then the opinions about "losers queue" could just fade away.
