Home Gaming Riot takes action against illegal account boosting in League of Legends

Riot takes action against illegal account boosting in League of Legends

2 min read
15

shameful

Elo-boosting has become a trend in the League of Legends community world-wide; higher ranking players boosting lower ranked players or selling accounts. In other words: cheating the system. Elo-boosting however is illegal and Riot Games has started taking action against it, starting with the punishment of eight pro players.

An investigation by Riot Games brought to light the fact that that seven League Championship Series North American pro players and a team coach have been engaging in Elo-boosting, which according to the League of Legends terms of use is prohibited.

Definition of Elo-Boosting:

“Elo-boosting” is the repetitive and intentional act of an individual playing on someone else’s account (a “client”) for the purpose of artificially improving the client’s Elo rating. There is no minimum number of games required to be played, nor a minimum amount of Elo gain necessary to qualify as Elo-boosting. An attempt to boost Elo need not be successful in order to qualify as a rule violation. 

The following also constitutes Elo-boosting:

  • Playing on a less-skilled player’s account while the less-skilled player accompanies you in duo-queue games.

The following does not constitute Elo-boosting:

  • Permanently transferring a high-Elo account to a less-skilled player. This is illegal, but it’s in the nature of account-sharing and/or account-selling, not account-boosting.

Riot’s analysis of the effects of Elo-boosting includes that it “damages the interests of players of all skill levels because it cheats the internal matchmaking system of League of Legends”. I cannot agree with them more on this one. This is exactly why we encounter pub games, where you are matched up according to your skill and have an imbalanced game, where you either get completely trashed by players who are way out of your league or play in a team with players who don’t yet have the skill to match the level and cause you to lose anyway.

The following players were punished with 14-day suspensions of their accounts and have had all Season 2 rewards revoked:

  • Brandon “Dontmashme” Phan
  • Zaqueri “Aphromoo” Black
  • Samuel “Chuuper” Chu
  • William “Meteos” Hartman
  • ChengLong “NyJacky” Wang
  • Keith “Phranq” Hunter
  • Kennen “Rhux” Santos
  • Jake “Xmithie” Puchero

The thing that bothers me most is that gamers do this so openly with complete disregard of the developers and the Terms of Use of games. In less than 2 minutes I found numerous sites advertising Elo-boosting, including a South African Facebook group. The most prominent site being lolboost.net (don’t use that service or I will ulti you with Zeus; no jokes!).

If you visit the South African Facebook group, “League of Legends tier and division boosting“ you can clearly make out who the local gamers are providing the service, it makes me truly sad to see some familiar names on there.

Last Updated: March 20, 2013

15 Comments

  1. Sir Rants-a-Lot Llew

    March 20, 2013 at 15:01

    Quick, I need a ban hammer pic!

    Reply

    • That Tall Twit

      March 20, 2013 at 15:10

      BANHAMMER!!!

      Reply

      • Sir Rants-a-Lot Llew

        March 20, 2013 at 15:19

        Hehehe

        Reply

    • Admiral Chief Erwin

      March 20, 2013 at 15:14

      this one?

      Reply

      • Sir Rants-a-Lot Llew

        March 20, 2013 at 15:19

        Lulz!

        Reply

  2. SlagHoender

    March 20, 2013 at 15:44

    Confession Bear: Sometimes I just read the comments to see if Sir Rants-a-Lot Llew and the trolls are commenting.

    Reply

  3. xxLeg1t swagxx

    October 18, 2013 at 10:21

    I have used lolboost. and I must say I’m thankful for the serivce. They got me from Bronze V all the way to Diamond V now I get to play with pros although I feed and lose games I’m still having fun

    Reply

  4. Joseph

    June 27, 2014 at 22:04

    I don’t see a problem… It think it’s amazing that a games virtual accomplishments are worth enough real life money for some people to make a living. Proves how in depth and how much skill our game takes while some people can make money doing what they love (because they are that damn good) If I was a consistent diamond player I would never turn down money to play the game I love to play. 😛

    Reply

  5. Scorfieldes

    July 14, 2014 at 11:54

    There are many sites like that for example http://www.imbaboost.com

    Reply

  6. EloHut

    March 13, 2016 at 22:05

    Yeah ever since tencent bought riot the ban rates went from 0.03% to 0.00% for us this year. #LoL for lyfe~ http://www.elohut.com

    Reply

  7. Ron Germano

    March 2, 2019 at 23:45

    For League of Legends, Overwatch, CSGO, Rocket League, Apex Legends, Destiny, Dota 2 boosting – try boost.gg . They get you a rank boost, elo boost, or mmr boost for cheap!

    Reply

  8. Angelika Lewandowska

    February 5, 2020 at 15:34

    There is no effective way to stop league of legends boosting to be honest, boosters will use vpn anyway + make worse stats on purpose to make it seems more legit.

    Reply

  9. Angelika Lewandowska

    February 5, 2020 at 15:34

    There is no effective way to stop league of legends boosting to be honest, boosters will use vpn anyway + make worse stats on purpose to make it seems more legit.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Check Also

Valorant’s next character is KAY/O, a silencing robot

Usually one suppresses the enemy with a gun rather than a blade but clearly Valorant knows…