Interesting Random Thoughts: Only played 1 ranked game in 40 days and just some ARAM.

Excluding one day that I played 2 ARAM games with a friend, and another 3-4 games of URF, I only played one ranked game to avoid decay over the past 40 days, closing in to my next decay deadline. Honestly, I don't miss the game at all. I don't miss playing it. Am I burned out? Don't think so, I've only been playing for three years. So, why am I not bothered by not playing?

• Gameplay changes. I feel like I have no impact on the game. It's just coinflip. Matchmaking is the biggest issue. You either get the good players and win (even through bad performance), or you get the bad players and lose (even with good performance). In order to carry a game nowadays (or at least 5 patches ago, when I played more regularly), I feel like I have to:

1. Tryhard extremely hard. Like, not miss any CS and any potential kills so that I can outpace my enemies.
2. Make every little macro move, rotation required so that I can help my little monkeys.
3. Resort to flaming my team, so that they MIGHT LISTEN to the suggestions that THE ONLY WELL PERFORMING PLAYER actually gives them All of these things are extremely taking a toll on me psychologically and mentally. I can't play more than 2 games in a row, because I have to give my all to try and carry games, even as a support. Playing a single game where I only want to win (basically ranked), is such an exhausting task for me, and this not being a fun activity for me anymore.

• Toxic community. This is probably the biggest reason, be that either toxic, or incompetent. I just can't stand getting into a game and getting:

1. Trolls. People who just want to fuck with your fun. They just do random shit that seems fun for them, but ruin the fun for everyone else.
2. Toxic players. Players who will just rage at and flame you, regardless of if it's called for or not. Even more infuriating when they flame you when they are in the wrong.
3. Incompetent players. Mostly a problem of matchmaking. I can't really get my head around how there can be such a huge difference in performance between players of the same division. But even if the matchmaking is kinda unfair, some people need to let their ego go, and let someone else do the carry, especially someone who performs well, and stop feeding their asses off. But hey, why help our X teammate get ahead, when we can feed the enemies so much more to the point that it won't matter, right?

The common denominator to the above is that there is no real punishment, especially the first two cases. Trolls just run rampant and Riot won't find any reliable way to prove their trolling and ban them on the spot, while toxic players just don't get banned quite as often. I had people wish death on me and my family, only for them to get no penalty whatsoever.

This season, I resorted to becoming quite toxic myself, and it's sad to say it, because of all the trolls and AFKers and other toxic players running around. If I can't get any satisfaction from playing and winning the game, I might as well try and get some out of flaming back the troll. Funny how I still haven't been chat restricted yet, goes back to my previous point. Also, this season I just resorted to playing on smurf accounts actively, again, not really proud of it, but it's the only thing that gives me satisfaction in this game. After reaching Plat 3 60 LP on this account, I get the matchmaking disease, where in my next 20 or so games, I lost 19, with most of them being either someone AFKing, or someone hard trolling (things like Teemo jungle with smite / ignite). I dropped to my current division, Plat 5, and with that, I lost ANY WILL I had to climb higher on this account, so I decided to leave it and play on bronze accounts. Surely not a fun experience for the enemy bronze players, but it's the only way I would have fun playing this game. At least, by playing in my smurf account, I'd know that if I do well, I'd win. At least, it was REWARDING to play. Sure, it doesn't reflect much of a challenge, but the feeling of being rewarded for doing well was there, and I at least had fun playing.

Now, some time later, after I essentially stopped playing, I don't feel like I miss the game. I still watch Esports, mainly LCK, and I do some other things in real life, but even when I'm home alone doing nothing, I don't feel the urge to play this game, because I know. I know that if I do, it will all be toxicity, trolling and a negative overall experience in the end. Fuck that.