A comeback mechanic is defined as a particular situation, ability or item which is almost solely beneficial only to the losing person. The dilemma with this type of mechanic is that it makes the winning player feel as though they are not being out-skilled by their opponent, but rather that their enemy is getting a free advantage. Depending on how big of an effect the comeback mechanic has, this can completely ruin competitive integrity.   The problem with which League of Legends faces is that there are some that feel as though LoL has incorporated too many comeback mechanics, and the addition of the bounty system has raised the awareness of such game theory. Doublelift had tweeted: It's clear that Doublelift has a concern over the degree in which comeback mechanics should have a presence within the game. While he didn't say the entire bounty system is faulty, this leads one to believe that he respects the bounty of players that are on a killstreak, although he only stated that it “makes sense”, not that he agrees with it.   Esports historian Thorin entered the debate stating: I disagree with this sentiment, at least in the hyperbolic way in which he states on the basis that some comeback mechanics are necessary to provide an entertaining game for both the winning party and especially the losing party. If defeats were far more guaranteed in LoL early on, surrenders or lack of general enjoyment would be rampant throughout the playerbase. So, in some sense, a comeback mechanic is necessary to keep interest from both parties, and also, as a viewer during pro play matches, it keeps them somewhat entertaining if one team is clearly winning.   There does seem to be some confusion as to the difference of comeback mechanics and snowball mechanics. Comeback mechanics have already been addressed as a situation, ability or item which is almost solely useful to the losing person. A snowball mechanic can therefore be described as an advantage that can compound to a greater advantage through exponential means. Usually this deals in percentages, multiplication or fractions. In both of these instances, some game mechanics are stronger than others.   An example of a comeback mechanic would be catch-up experience, which allows players who are underleveled based upon the team and game average to get greater experience gains from minions, jungle camps and kills. The bounty system is another notorious comeback mechanic which places large amounts of gold on a player that has either killed the enemy a significant number of times, or they have gained leads by accrual of superior creep score.   A soft comeback mechanic would be the item slot limitation and level cap. Both of these prohibit everyone in the game from getting too powerful and scaling infinitely, allowing for the losing team to hopefully stall and regain a footing in the game. The reason why these are soft comeback mechanics is because they are very late in the game and it would be a nightmare to balance infinity. Also, if the item slot limitation didn't exist, it would go against Riot’s philosophy that champions should have clear weaknesses and strengths, and with an infinite amount of acquireable items you would be able to cover champion weaknesses.   Instances of snowballing would be crit items, percentage increase items (Rabbadon’s Deathcap, Void Staff, Thornmail), elemental drakes, two inhibitors down that are next to each other (which spawn double super minions) and many more. Additionally, the bounty system can also work as a snowball mechanic, where the enemy team is generally losing, but one specific player has a bounty, which can easily be gained from the winning team through a coordinated dive. The interesting thing about LoL is that there are several snowball mechanics in place to ensure the team or player ahead has a higher chance to win. LoL did have some rather unfair snowball mechanics in Season 1, such as Phantom Dancer having dodge, and when stacked with a champion like Jax, who also had a dodge passive, Jax could get 50% dodge (or something like that, it has been awhile) against basic attacks.   Games such as Counter-Strike:Global Offensive have less snowballing due to guns and armor being the only changing variables for winning rounds, and very quickly the losing players will accrue money to buy adequate weapons. This game also has less comeback mechanics, those being, money cap, and consecutive round loss bonus, which means that, for up to five rounds, starting at $1400 and every round you get an extra cumulative $500, maxing out at $3400. CS:GO really only has one readily apparent snowball mechanic which is that when you kill someone, you can grab their gun. Not only do you gain money from getting the kill, but now you also have a better gun. This can be confused as a comeback mechanic, but if someone has enough skill to kill you with a pistol, whereas you have an M4A1, then that's simply an outplay and a deserved reward. Along with that, picking up guns and utility (grenades) are beneficial to both teams and can even allow the winning team to snowball even harder.   There is a distinction between these two mechanics of snowball and comeback, and it is vital to be able to differentiate between them when deciding to create game updates. Blaustoise — whose position is gameplay data lead — had said in response to Thorin’s aforementioned tweet:   The problem with this is that he misunderstands the difference between snowball and individual skill. Items inherently by nature are a snowball mechanic, as it changes the game state to where a champion is significantly more powerful. Also, this mode of thought is somewhat lapsed in that the player had to get Infinity Edge by some means, probably by playing the lane phase better. As such, he's rewarded with gold, which translates to items, which then carries over to snowballing.   Both snowball and comeback mechanics are necessary to provide a game which is both fast-paced and lucrative in time investment for all who play it. I agree with Doublelift’s sentiment that the bounty system could be scaled back a bit, and I also have my qualms with snowballing, such as the power of dragons currently in the meta, but overall, the raw mechanics themselves are great applications from game theory. ___ Izento has been a writer for the LoL scene since Season 7, and has been playing the game since Season 1. Follow him on Twitter at @ggIzento for more League content. Image courtesy of LoL Esports Flickr