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League of Legends has a toxic community, and this is nothing new. As it is a game that brings out the competitiveness in each player, frustrations often emerge in the form of toxicity and can manifest itself through trash talk, threats or gratuitous insults.
The Origin of Toxicity
For much of a match, each player is facing their lane opponent and competing to gain any advantage for their team, however, even if one of these players manages to “beat” their opponent, this does not imply that they will emerge victorious - Factors such as objectives, team fights, and poor champion picks can drastically change the outcome of the match.
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This situation is quite unpleasant for the player who won their route and, for this reason, they start looking for the reason for their defeat. Faced with this frustration, it is not uncommon for these players to let this feeling out by blaming their team and offending enemy players.
There are also those who take advantage of the anonymity provided by the internet to expose their prejudices and attack other players based on their gender or other personal stuff. It is for these cases that hate speech complaints were introduced.
This conduct is highly repudiated by Riot Games and goes against the precepts of the code of conduct and the terms of use accepted when creating the game account. The following behaviors are repudiated by the community:
Abuse of communication - Offensive language, hate speech and sexual harassment;
Cheating - Third-party programs, hacks, bug abuse, account sharing and manipulation;
Offensive or inappropriate names - Player, account and group names;
Actions intending to lose the match – Game abandonment/AFK - Disconnecting, idle player, intentional abandonment and player refusing to play;
Actions intending to lose the match – Behaviors within the game - Intentional death, harassment within the game and sabotage;
Threats - Physical aggression outside the game, emotional abuse, information leaks and bullying.
The consequences for violating these terms are clear and include:
[link]{https://www.leagueoflegends.com/en-us/event/league-of-legends-code-of-conduct/}
[link]{https://www.riotgames.com/en-us/terms-of-service-BR#id.1yetbuwergid}
Famous players punished for disrespecting the game's code of conduct
Years ago, indefinite suspensions were more common, but most of these bans have now been revoked, and we have excellent examples of players being retired due to suspension.
Dopa
Apdo or Dopa was an extremely skilled player in all routes of the game, considered the best SoloQ player, he was permanently banned in 2013 for doing elo job. In 2015, Dopa publicly recanted his actions.
Tyler1
Tyler1 is one of the most emblematic cases as he was a streamer who was known for his outbursts of rage, for insults given within the game and for losing games on purpose.
He was permanently banned in 2016 and received a pardon from Riot in 2017. Due to his popularity with the community, he even hosted competitive League of Legends events such as LCS 2022.
Jensen
Jensen was banned in 2013 for toxic behavior and cheating. In 2015, he received a pardon from Riot and played competitively for the Cloud9 team and Team Liquid.
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These cases served to reinforce that regardless of the player's actions, the penalty of indefinite suspension is very strict. Every player can have the chance to redeem themselves for their behavior and regain their ability to play.
Considering this situation, it is practically impossible for the League of Legends community to stop being toxic, the competitiveness and frustration resulting from the game simply brings out the worst in people.
Tools for dealing with toxic players
Given this scenario, certain mechanisms were created to deal with toxic players within the game.
Mute
The first of these is the option to mute messages, emotes or pings. Using this option, all chat messages, emotes or pings from that player will be hidden from you.
Muting a player lasts until the end of the match or until you decide to deactivate this option. Therefore, after the match, the player will be able to get in touch through invitations, friend requests or private messages.
To access the muting menu, simply press Tab or “o” during a match, find the player to be muted and choose the mode.
Block
Blocking a player is a more drastic measure that prevents any interaction from that player with you, hiding messages in the lobby, in champion selection and within the game. This person will not be able to send friend requests and will be removed from your friends list if they are there.
Report
When a player behaves contrary to the precepts of Riot's code of conduct or violates the terms of use, they must be reported during champion selection, during the match or at the end.
The moment and method adopted to make the report do not change anything for the system used to measure the infraction, Riot's automated systems check a match in a few minutes and, if appropriate, apply a punishment to the offender, with only one report required for such.
A very common practice when having a player trolling is to ask the enemy team to report the player. This behavior is unnecessary and can be harmful as it constitutes a negative attitude towards Riot's systems.
When a punishment is imposed, the reporting player may receive a feedback notice. Not receiving the warning does not mean that the reported player was not punished.
Practices to avoid frustration
Even though all these devices were created so that the game community behaves with the respect and seriousness recommended by the company, it is impossible to rid the community of its toxicity without removing the possibility of the offender being redeemed. Some players continue their corrupt behavior, and others seek to redeem themselves.
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Therefore, regular players in ranked queues achieve better results in their matches using some tricks:
Command /mute all
When using the /mute all command in a match, messages from all players will be ignored. This command is often used by jungle players as they often receive offenses during their matches.
Wait a while before entering another match
League of Legends matches can often be frustrating and players tend to lose performance after a defeat. Therefore, it is important to wait some time between matches, not only to calm down, but also to avoid falling with the same players as the previous one. Between five and ten minutes is enough to regain focus!
Dodge
Dodge is the strategy applied on the champion selection screen in which the player recognizes that, for some reason, their chance of victory is jeopardized, either because they recognize one of the players or because one of them doesn't want to play on the designated route. The dodge is done by closing the game client to escape the game.
Even though it is a practice punished by Riot through a waiting time penalty to re-enter the queue and a reduction in ranked league points, it is a valid strategy. It prevents you from participating in bad games due to another player's fault, and the penalty applied is smaller than a defeat in the ranked queue.
Conclusion
Even though the LoL community is quite toxic, and this fact will not change anytime soon, many players are passionate about the game and access it daily to have fun.
Using the available methods and making sensible reports, we can have a better experience with the game. This benefits not only the individual player, but for the entire community.
If you know of any other method to avoid frustration in the game or want to know more about another topic, leave a comment. It may be part of one of the next articles!
Thanks for reading!
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