Reasons why League is detrimental to your health

Have you ever come home from a long day at work or a boring day at school and been itching to try out that new build you've been thinking of? Have you ever had a rough day and thought you would hop on League to pass some time and ease some stress?

I know I have. I know that League has become somewhat of an addiction to me over the years. I started near the end of season 2, having played it for a little bit on its release. I didn't like it so I stopped playing it until season 2 was ending. I quickly leveled my account with friends and began my journey to improve as a player.

Along the way, I had read countless guides, watched numerous videos, and done A TON of research to become the best player I could be. I was constantly analyzing pro players and their builds, why they built that way, and how their decisions affected the outcome of the game. I found myself climbing the ranked ladders. From Bronze to Silver to Gold and into my Platinum promotional series.

I am a player that seems to carry either heavy winning streaks or heavy losing streaks. I guess you could say I go slightly on tilt, but there are games where I will get teams of toxic players that do nothing but trash talk each other, as if we didn't all have the same goal - to win.

From Platinum promos - losing them twice - I dropped down the ranked ladder on a nasty losing streak that would ultimately result in my Gold III rank, from Gold I. From Gold III, I started to lose interest in League and the rankings, as the season had already ended. So before season 5, and after season 4, I dropped my rank from Gold III to Silver II. I just didn't care. I'd get flamed multiple games in a row and it would set me on a stress-filled warpath to losing.

Not only did my play in-game struggle, but I found myself getting aggravated in real life as well as letting frustration and stress get to me. Even in games where I would give it my all and carry my team, regardless of the amount of toxicity, we would lose. As a team game, the phrase, "You just aren't good enough to carry," isn't true. It shouldn't be solely your responsibility to bring a deadweight game back to life. There are 5 players on the team. That means that there is a 20% chance that each player with either to well or do poorly. If you are the only player doing well, you are running on 20% out of 100%. If you are getting dumped on and your team is carrying you, that could be 80% efficiency. If everything is going wrong and no one is willing to work together, you are at 0%.

So not only are the odds not in your favor, but coining the sentence that you aren't good enough to carry is just unbelievably ignorant. In a game where toxicity has become a mainstream and trolling goes unpunished, the whole aspect of it being a "team" game just becomes irrelevant.

When I first started League, the toxicity was bad. As League progressed and more and more players were introduced to LoL, the toxicity became unbearable.

I find more times than not that I leave the game - win or loss - feeling dehumanized and wondering why I even force myself to endure such a torment for such a small and meaningless game. My friends and family don't understand why I still play because I will share stories of what people have said or done to me in the game that make even Call of Duty look friendly.

Physically, sitting for as long as the games can last is bad for your posture as well as your blood flow. Your health can deteriorate without you even realizing it. The games last anywhere from 25-65 minutes, which is a long time to be sitting down focused on a computer screen. Couple that with the anxiety that fucking up will result in a slew of new titles that you never even knew you were - like fuckboy, %%%%%%, dickhead, and things of the like.

Where do all the bad people go? Well, for about two years Riot had disabled the Tribunal. Though they claimed to be dishing out bans and mutes to players, it was very rare that I ever met a player with chat restrictions. Not only that, but there have been times where I have had an intentional AFK on my team and I will see them still playing League a day or two later, because by chance I get the same person in my game again.

Currently, in Season 5, I placed low due to my MMR tank in the off season. I climbed the ladder back with no problem. I have made it to Gold III and failed my Gold II promos 4 times now. And I am talking 0-2 failures. Even if I am on a winning streak, I seem to lose both games every time I make it to those promos. And then I get demoted to Gold IV. Then to Gold V. And I am back to square one.

And by this point, I am wondering why I even waste my time. I know I am a better player than my rank. I have proven it time and time again. But in a game where the slightest mistake can set you under fire, the pressure is always on your shoulders.

The worst part is that when someone flames, the rest of the team often joins in to use the victim as a scapegoat for anything that goes wrong. So not only is the victim being repeatedly bashed by the main aggressor, but also being attack by the bandwagon teammates who can't accept the fact that they might possibly be the problem.

Couple that with lack of coordination, downright refusal to work as a team, and repetitive mistakes and throws, and you've got yourself 8/10 games of solo queue. There is no way that this amount of pressure and stress on the mind, straining your thoughts and eyes to take everything in, for a solid hour, produces anything good.

I find that more often than not, I will leave a game feeling worse off than when I entered the game. No matter if I played extremely well or if I played bad. Instead of promoting positivity and good dynamics for a team to follow, allies tend to focus more on the mistakes you make. I could be 9-0 and the one time I die, I get shit talked so hard I lose all morale and don't even want my team to win anymore.

Though Riot has been saying they are working on perfecting the justice system, when will we see improvements to overall game dynamic? When you play a handful of games extremely well and still lose due to your teammates arguing with each other or someone trolling, is it really fair? I know life isn't fair but I find it completely odd that with a company so dedicated to eSports and developing a proper and positive face for Riot Games would let their game become infamous as the most toxic community to exist.

Stop gimping on the parts that actually matter and effect the people that play the game. Start implementing rules for quicker trials and executions. Implement a system that works. All of this talk and all of these statistics that @RiotLyte likes to throw out are never backed up by experiential data. I think out of the past 5 games, all 5 have had 1-3 teammates either arguing with each other or just being an overall jerk to the entire team because their play was sub-par.

After tonight, losing my ranking (I was in promos for gold III tonight and lost them due to two AFK's) and ending up back in Gold V because of nonstop toxicity, I am considering just removing LoL and discarding it as a sad and pointless portion of my life.

A game I used to enjoy causes nothing but stress and anger anymore. It's sad that I used to be so adamant about becoming the best and ranking up and the only thing stopping me from continuing that attitude is the freedom the community has to get away with murder. _ In conclusion_, I'd just like to say that I have spent a lot of time on League. Sadly, I cannot get that time back. I have worked so hard and repeatedly lost it all only to continue the cycle. It has become a monotonous waste of time where the only thing people seem to be good at in the game is making sure you know they want you to kill yourself IRL.

I used to respect Riot - they used to be about the people and listen to community suggestions. Like all companies that started from nothing, Riot Games rose to stardom and have since forgotten the humble beginnings that brought them thus far in the first place. Monetary value before health of the community is the main concern. New skins, champions, and icon packs are higher priority than promoting healthy gameplay outside of competitive play.

The health of this game and the health of the players will only continue to suffer. This game will age and become irrelevant and all we can do is look back on it and talk about how good it is that this scourge of a community has finally dissipated.