Is MLBB actually dying?
EDIT: Apparently, Claude got 140+ million, and it was actually QUARTERFINAL, not Semifinal. While yes, each player got 9 votes instead of 3 this year, I think Granger only got, like, 10+ millions in the Quarterfinal, so my point still stands.
I think MLBB is actually dying. Look at the M7 skin polling numbers (by the way, please VOTE CECILION. Don't think of it as "vote for Cecilion", but as "vote against a marksman"), they actually look pretty bad. Last year, in the semifinal polling, I remember Claude getting, like, 125 million votes. Now, Granger only gets 50 million. It also scales similarly for others.
If those numbers are accurate, that means MLBB roughly lost, like, 60% of their players IN ONE YEAR. That's bad. That's really bad. It explains why they implement the lane pre-selection feature in ranked, despite them saying they intended not to do that. I can confirm this anecdotally, because I think 30% of my friend list has completely stopped playing MLBB.
If I may give my opinion on why, I have a few reasons.
One, they allow bad players to rank up. They should've rewarded players who get Gold "medals" in ranked a lot more and punish players who get Bronze a lot more, as well. There are lots of things they can do here: They can introduce "double star loss" feature, where if you play badly enough times, you will lose double stars once (this ignores star protection cards, but does not consume them), they can give Gold players more star points, like 50-100, instead of the current 30-45.
Two, they alienate Tank users. In every MOBA, Tank is the role where there are the least amount of players. Instead of treating them good so they don't leave or switch roles, they treat them badly, like rarely giving them good skins because they won't sell well. This results in Tank users leaving or switching roles, which results in absolute pain for other roles because less and less teams have Tanks in them (I know this first hand. I play as primarily Gold Laner and it's TORTURE not having a Tank in the team, which happens VERY OFTEN in my ranked plays). I know this because I was a Tank user. It's practically impossible to reach Mythical Immortal if you play Tank solo, try it if you don't believe me. That's why I decided to stop and play Gold and Mid Laners. They need to give more Epic+ skins to Tank users, they need to give extra star points (try 50-100) if you play as Tank Roam, and things like this.
If they don't do something, the game might actually be in trouble in as soon as 2 years.