Riot Games Plans to Remove Duo Queue in Patch 12.9

Riot has listened to players and hopes to improve ranked matchmaking by removing the option to duo queue.

Players seem unsure about this decision but the developer insists this will improve ranked solo queues, and matchmaking while bringing more players to ranked flex.

Riot Games wants to replace Ranked Solo/Duo with Ranked Solo mode

According to Riot Games, Riot developer Cody ‘Codebear’ and project manager ‘Riru’ has stated in a March blog post that removing duo queue from the ranked solo queue will improve ranked games, matchmaking, and eradicate boosting.

By removing duo queue from ranked solo queue, they hope players will have a lesser time waiting in ranked queue while reassuring matches are competitive and fair. The change is also hoped to further decrease autofill rates in games.

“We’re investigating a Solo Only Mode. In order to match player intent and provide the healthiest competitive individual queue possible, we’re re-evaluating our take on Solo/Duo and exploring a world where solo players play in solo queue and premades play in Ranked Flex or Organised 5s modes.” Riot said in their blog post.

Riot also believes this change will reduce win rate advantages because of team differences in MMR. Also, players would expect their team to be 99% within their own MMR and one division’s rank of one another during prime playtime hours.

The introduction of revival MMR

As players take breaks from League of Legends for some time, unless you are diamond or above you will not decay in rank or MMR. Riot plans to bring a change against this by introducing revival MMR.

“We’ve found that our current systems aren’t as accurate as we’d hoped in maintaining the expected MMR of players that have taken a break from the game, be it a few weeks or a year plus. As such, we’re implementing a more dynamic approach to Revival MMR and MMR decay across all queues that should provide those players with fairer matches in their first 5-10 games back as they rediscover their muscle memory and game knowledge,” Riot said.

League of Legends players on Reddit seem to embrace this change because after a long break from League of Legends they had to compete in smurf queue. This change is a relief for players who reached Diamond III rank and come back to play in Silver II ELO against smurfs. Instead, players who peaked Diamond III would play with and against players with the same MMR.

League of Legends players' concerns for removing duo queue

The League of Legends Reddit community has concerns about removing duo queue from all ranks because they will no longer be able to duo with friends. Another concern in the community is the issue with MMR in Ranked Flex queue.

Smurfs will still exist in Ranked Flex queue which leads to an unbalanced MMR for both teams. For example, Diamond Ranked Solo queue players can still be matched in games with Gold and Silver players in Ranked Flex queue if they have a Gold or Silver rank in Ranked Flex. The community hopes Riot will realize this problem and fix it before they roll out the new changes for Ranked Flex mode.