GG Go Next... Lobby: How Players Use Queue Dodging to Anticipate and Avoid Negative Experiences in League of Legends

Paper Title

GG Go Next... Lobby: How Players Use Queue Dodging to Anticipate and Avoid Negative Experiences in League of Legends

Publication Info

• Topic area: Player behavior and toxicity management in online multiplayer games.
• Keywords: queue dodging, League of Legends, toxicity, matchmaking, agentic play, thematic analysis, player behavior, proactive intervention, online gaming, game design.

Background and Problem

• Problem / challenge: Queue dodging in League of Legends is penalized as disruptive behavior, yet players continue to engage in it, often as a coping mechanism against anticipated negative experiences. Current penalty systems do not distinguish between harmful and self-protective motivations for dodging.
• Significance: Understanding queue dodging motivations is critical for designing systems that balance fair matchmaking with player agency, while mitigating toxicity and improving player retention.
• Motivation and related work: Prior research has focused on reactive interventions for toxicity and the disruptive nature of queue dodging. However, little attention has been paid to the nuanced motivations behind dodging, particularly its potential as a proactive strategy for avoiding toxicity. This paper addresses this gap by analyzing player perspectives.

Solution

• Proposed approach: Thematic analysis of Reddit discussions to identify player motivations for queue dodging in League of Legends.
• Novelty:
  1. Identification of four distinct motivations for queue dodging: avoiding toxic teammates, evading unfavorable matchups, exploiting system mechanics, and reacting to external circumstances.
  2. Reframing intentional queue dodging as a form of agentic play and proactive intervention against anticipated negative experiences.
  3. Design recommendations for game systems to support players in avoiding toxicity while reducing disruptive dodging.
• Procedure and key techniques:
  • Data collection from r/leagueoflegends subreddit using "queue dodge" as a keyword.
  • LLM-assisted filtering of 6,384 Reddit comments to identify 2,932 relevant entries.
  • Hybrid inductive-deductive thematic analysis to categorize motivations into four themes.

Results

• Concrete findings:
  • Four themes of queue dodging motivations:
    1. Avoiding Toxic Teammates: Includes trolling, intentional feeding, griefing bots, hostage lobbies, stream sniping, and avoiding previously toxic players.
    2. Evading Unfavorable Matchups: Includes avoiding poor-performing players, off-role teammates, specific playstyles, champion bans, bad team compositions, perceived auto-lose matches, cherry-picking matchups, and premades.
    3. Exploiting System Mechanics: Primarily involves rank-climbing strategies that exploit the lack of MMR penalties for dodging.
    4. Reacting to External Circumstances: Includes network issues, client bugs, auto-requeue, real-world incidents, and carelessness.
• Advantage over baselines: Provides a nuanced understanding of queue dodging as both a disruptive behavior and a rational coping mechanism, challenging the one-size-fits-all penalty model.
• Experiments / evaluation:
  • Data sourced from Reddit posts (January 2024–June 2025).
  • LLM-assisted content extraction validated with an IoU of 0.92.
  • Thematic analysis conducted collaboratively by researchers with high inter-rater reliability (α = 0.775).
• Limitations and future work:
  • Data limited to English-language Reddit discussions; findings may not generalize to other regions or games.
  • Focused on League of Legends; future research could explore other games with similar matchmaking systems.
  • Suggestions for co-designing systems with players and developers to address intentional dodging motivations.

Summary

This study investigates the motivations behind queue dodging in League of Legends, identifying four major themes: avoiding toxic teammates, evading unfavorable matchups, exploiting system mechanics, and reacting to external circumstances. The findings reframe intentional dodging as a form of agentic play and proactive intervention against anticipated negative experiences, challenging the current penalty system's uniform approach. The paper suggests design implications, such as safe exit mechanisms and improved matchmaking transparency, to balance player agency with fairness. These insights contribute to understanding player behavior and designing systems that reduce toxicity while enhancing player experience.