I'm a smurf. Let me tell you my story.
I had a group of friends in real life who started playing the game. They were having a real bad time. They lost a lot which bothered them a little bit and they were getting flamed and yelled at in their games and this is what really bothered them. I recommended bot games but they were deadset on playing PvP. Now I could have played with them on my main account but that would have adjusted the "competition" to improve when they were struggling already. So I made a smurf account. This would lower the competition to their level (or close to it) and my presence would neutralize the other team having one smurf player in most cases since he could not cheese me and I would be able to inform my friends of his cheese tactics and show them how to turn the tables on them. I was able to teach my friends doing this and they improved at a faster pace while also having a better experience in game because I was one less person to be yelling at them. And to those who play against me, I make it blatantly obvious that I am a smurf with my name. I named myself after a champion in the game. I am now playing that champion. The enemy smurfs are fully aware of this and decide to camp me and not my friends. I want this as I am more adept at handling this than my friends would be. This allows my friends more freedom to learn at their own pace and to give them the opportunity to carry themselves out of the gutter.
Now when I am smurfing I handicap myself excessively. I play Taric exclusively. Taric is a support champion (the hardest role to carry from) and Taric is a tank support (the hardest archetype to carry with). The objective of winning the game is what my friends wanted but not what I set out to do. My presence only stalled the game out which bought my friends time to try to carry themselves out of difficult situations. This gives them more opportunity to carry themselves out of a hole. It didn't happen often but when it did it was probably the best feeling they ever had. There were games where I was not in the support role though. One of my friends did play Sona and since that was her primary role I would forfeit that spot to him so that he would get a feel of that champion in her main position. I would still play as Taric though in either top lane or jungle lane, which he can do but not as good as the support role. Again it was not about winning for me, it was about teaching my friends the game in a less toxic environment.
Fast forward a bit and half of those friends dropped out despite my best efforts and the other half are now 30. I can now play with the friends who still stick around on my main account. I do still play on this account but typically its in bots where I can teach new players the game. I do play PvP sometimes but more out of frustration than anything else. The rise in "bot accounts" has really bothered me to the point that I need to go into PvP because that's where the new players are. I get friend requests from new players and then we go and play some bot games together where I can teach them how to get better in there.
So, am I responsible for ruining your games? Or am I actually being productive and keeping the community from scaring away potentially new players from the game?
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