League of Legends (again) and "opinion based" questions

Question

Just found this question that I answered earlier was closed because it's opinion based.

It's regarding what Champion is currently strong. The question makes sense because LoL is a game that is updated every two weeks, often changing completly the dynamics of the game. At the End of the Competitive Season a set of changes were put foward which made 3 sets of characters extremely strong, and both in theory and factually they are miles away from other champions (as confirmed by the winrates and change in average score).

The question was put on hold because it's opinion based, yet there are several data sources to be based on a non-opinionated answer. Why are LoL questions constantly being closed for the same reason, yet that reason being completly invalid?

Yes, which is "stronger" is usually a bad question on most games:

• In Tekken is Kazuya stronger than Jin or Heihachi? It depends on the player, because the combos change, but their inherent power doesn't.

• In Crusader Kings is a high martial ruler better than a high intrigue ruler? It depends on whether you want your military to be really strong, or you want the ability to murder people and get away with it.

• In Football Manager is Ronaldo better than Messi? It depends on your tactic and the role you want to put them in.

However in League of Legends, that relativity is really only there if we're not talking about 1v1 laning phase scenarios, like the toplane mentioned in the original question.

Answer 1

The question was basically asking for a recommendation of which champions to play. It's not useful to future visitors of the site, especially because any given answer could very well be invalidated in as little as a month. This is the biggest problem with LoL questions - a lot of them focus on the current meta, which by definition is already open to interpretation.

Additionally, you quote "high Elo" statistics as a reference... the problem with that is "high Elo" (Platinum and above) accounts for approximately 10% of the total solo-queue player base. The other 90% (especially those in Bronze and Silver) shouldn't care as much about the meta, because due to their lack of skill (compared to higher Elo players), almost any champs can feasibly work.

Questions about League that focus on overarching game concepts that are unlikely to change (for example, "What do these abbreviations mean?", "How cost effective is recall?", or "What's the difference between top and bottom lane?") are good questions, in my opinion. Questions that are limited to whatever the "current meta" is at the time are not good questions. There are plenty of other places to go to discuss current power trends - the League of Legends subreddit or even the "summoner school" subreddit work well for this in my experience.

Answer 2

The question shouldn't have been closed as primarily opinion based but I don't think that it should be reopened in it's current state.

The main problem I see with this question is it being basically "Too localized" (Yes I know we don't have this close reason anymore) since it would require too many updates due to the amount of patches and changes done by Riot games.

Here are some question titles that would be perfectly fine for our site without being too broad, primarily opinion based or too localized.

How can I find out whether a champion is viable or not?

Which champions are strong in a Tank meta?

Which champions excel at doing this Job?

All of these are answerable by someone who knows the game well.

Questions about the viability of characters, items and strategies in competitive games are on topic on this site and fall under the category of good subjective question. Obviously these questions do get closed sometimes since it's kinda hard to differentiate between good and bad subjective questions but that's what the reopen button is there for.

Answer 3

I agree, I didn't think it was very opinion-based.

Sure, a lot of it depends on player-skill, but if we factor out player skill and instead focus on the tier list on which is the stronger top laner by considering all the meta pairings, then the answer is pretty clear.

Answer 4

I can't see why this is considered opinion-based.

Ideally this should be split into 2 questions (one for Gnar vs. Jayce and one for Graves vs. Lee Sin) and perhaps scoped to the current season. Regardless, it is answerable by someone with experience in the game.

I can't provide an answer for this question specifically, but if this was in a game I have lost many hours then I could easily provide reasons to help choose between 2 characters.

Asking which is stronger between x or y in any game isn't really a bad question. It is something a real gamer would likely ask. It is the kind of question an expert in the game can answer by providing experiences, statistics etc. The answers will likely help the original asker, and hopefully future visitors. These types of questions seem to fit well within the scope of Gameplay strategies and tactics.

These types of questions are not good for someone who wants to answer but is relying on google alone. The only off-topic reason for any of these questions would probably be the too broad reason. I wouldn't say that was the case for the LoL question linked (other than splitting into 2 questions), but something like the Ronaldo vs. Messi one would need some more context (which team, league, season etc).

Part of the problem here may be that some people just vote to close as opinion-based as soon as they see "best" or "better" in a question.

These types of questions are not being asked to poll for a personal favourite. They are being asked to justify the selection between choices. They will require an explanation for how/why a choice is made.