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[SALT] Casual vs. Serious play, where and when?

Sir ArmaMalum·6/19/2014, 2:04:32 PM·8 votes·5,409 views

######Real quick: yes I've been on the CB much less often. I have a summer job finally and it's eating a lot of time, but I'm having fun so that's good. I'm planning to bring my old pace back to my norm soon, as well as bringing in some awesome new projects later as well.

Hello and welcome to the continuation of my series of Sir ArmaMalum's Let's Talk. If this is your first time, welcome! The idea here is for me to present and outline a certain topic, complete with my own bit at the end, for the sole intent of talking about it. Whether it be with me or another replier. I tend to stick to out of game subjects like ethics, behavior and other such things but that doesn't mean I'm avoiding them either!

#####BTW, you can vote on the next post's topic in the poll below.

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http://i.imgur.com/Kg8n6Cd.png Casual Vs. Serious

We've all been there. Someone called someone a try-hard or an elitist, another yelled back something along the lines of "filthy casual". But the real question is, who's right? Or rather, where does the line sit? When does the line move?

Where, along the thousands of games we accumulate, does the appropriate amount of laid back 'for fun' attitude suddenly turn into to un-fun, trollish interactions with everyone else? And on the flip-side, where do we cross the lines of being good at the game to mercilessly destroying someone and being 'all about the win' in every match?

http://i.imgur.com/97tLT4T.png Focus Points

While an easy to describe question, there's going to be quite a diverse opinion on this. Don't be afraid to speak your mind plainly, but I do want to clarify by what I personally mean when asking this:

Casual =/= Trolling

By 'Casual' I mean trying out a champ you haven't played in a while, maybe bring a friend and attempt a weird off-meta duo. At the end of the day my definition of Casual means you aren't playing all your cards available to specifically win, but neither are you trying to lose (intentionally feed, grief, etc.).

Serious =/= Toxic

While sometimes having a paralleled relationships, the people I mean by 'Serious' are the people who will do anything to stomp their lanes and usually try to shot-call their teams or any other advantage they can glean. There are very very well-behaved Serious players out there, but the main common trait I'm going for here are the people who come with the sole mindset to win.

Casual Skill == Serious Skill

Please don't equate this question to 'Worse player vs. Better player' respectively. When considering both sides, please assume they have equivalent skill, it's simply a matter of demeanor and motivation. It would be too easy of a question if you could just answer with "I'll take the Serious player because then I'll win more".

http://i.imgur.com/UoqZNlu.png The Question(s)

Expanding off of the first section, what I want to know is where you, as an individual, draw the lines.

  • What are some red-flags to show you're dealing with an overly Casual player versus an overly Serious player?

  • Who would you rather play with given a choice? Which one would you rather see in a nothing-special normals match?

  • What kinds of players are your current friends / Which of the two do you tend to surround yourself with?

  • Which side would you consider yourself to be in?

http://i.imgur.com/uqGyvft.png My $0.02

I think I'll be in the majority here when I say I'd rather have Casuals instead of Serious players in normal games and Serious instead of casual players in Ranked games. When in ranked I'm coming in with the expectation of focusing on playing well, and by the same regard I hold my teammates to about the same standard. I won't rage at a mistake, but I expect effort to be made.

But with normals I'm much more lenient, I sometimes take them seriously if I'm warming up for a batch of ranked games, but most of the time I play to try out new ideas and just play the game to play the game. I always strive to have cool moments and great plays, and naturally the chance of that happening goes up if you and your team do well, so I always try to help but I may not put as much focus into it comparatively to ranked.

Where do you all stand?

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39 Comments

Lady Luck6/27/2014, 9:24:34 PM5 votes

I am, almost 100%, a casual player. I play champions I want to play and have no issues with others playing whatever random thing they want. I've played Rammus or Anivia support just because I got a new skin and was too slow to call the role I wanted. I'm happy to fill in and play to win once the game begins, but I will play a champion I want to play. I've had people dodge to avoid playing when I was on a spree of enjoying Ashe support. That's fine with me.

However, I almost exclusively play normals. Winning is not the most important factor to me. I do not have a mindset to play ranked games. And it drives me crazy when I'm told to play a certain champion either because they don't like my choice or they want X in the composition. (It drives me crazy when something like a Nocturne jungle auto locks and then demands top or support plays a tank or else we're too squishy and going to lose. If comp is that important to you, then you fill in how you want it.)

I really like this game. I probably know more about it than a traditional casual player, but I enter each game prioritizing fun over winning. So I stay out of the mode that should prioritize winning (ranked). And I prefer to play with other people that prioritize fun.

But I also learned to have fun losing as a child. Playing WC2 at 6 years old against my 14 year old brother... winning was not a likely outcome. But I always had fun. (Now that I think about it... maybe that's why certain people I know have a harder time having fun when losing... They're all older siblings.)

-edit-

For clarity... When I choose to play a non traditional support as support, I do play as an actual support with the goals of vision, zoning and feeding my ADC. I don't act like a dick about my determination to play my desired champion.

RiotRiot Baconhawk6/27/2014, 8:15:54 PM5 votes

It's a little late, but we finally made this Post of the Day (I wanted to earlier!). This is a great discussion and I'm looking forward to the next one, based on the poll you've got here.

Personally I'd rather delineate the kinds of players I am matched with by game mode--if I'm playing SR, I'd rather play serious, and if I play ARAM, I'd rather play casuals. I love the strategy and tryhardness of SR but I love doing those #AFICBIGPLAYS (silly useless plays like jumping forward as Tristana or whomever and flashing backwards while midair, so named on my stream after Riot Afic's antics).

cawws, sizzles, looks up, flies straight up then divebombs....flashes away at the last moment

EMOFRATPARTY6/27/2014, 11:34:06 PM2 votes

I haven't gotten to 30 yet, but I'm generally enjoying Unranked matches.

One thing I've noticed is that some smurf accounts or more experienced players can get pretty toxic if one these two things occur: 1. lesser-skilled players account for accidental feeding, or 2. #BreakingTheMeta. This happens almost entirely in Classic...I don't think I've ever seen negativity in ARAM or Dominion.

I think every player's first goal should be to have fun in a way that is conducive to, and aware of, the experiences of everyone else. This generally means winning and having a good time doing so, but I've had plenty of matches where I've lost and still enjoyed it.

When the environment is positive, I'm open to playing with both casual and serious players. I've learned from those more experienced and helped those less experienced -- neither of which would have been possible without both types of player co-existing in the same space.

Again, this is only speaking from playing Unranked games, but if a game "doesn't count" then I don't see the point in showing hostility or negativity of any kind.

Missus Muffins6/27/2014, 8:59:50 PM2 votes

Overall, I would consider myself a serious player, with casual preferences. Even in ARAMs I try to give the health relic's to the people who need it the most, but as long as people try there best I'm okay with losing. I find myself surrounded by mostly serious players who will be casual (by SALT's definition) at times. I play with friends a lot, and we're a pretty in-between group. We don't do everything we can to win, but we don't usually pick troll comps unless we're need to de-stress (and we usually ARAM for that). I remember a while ago I had a bad day and one member of our group is much more casual than I am while we were playing ARAMs (he was purposely trolling us). I was getting more and more irritated with him and the game cause I just wanted the one win so I could go to sleep and be 'happy'. I was way too serious then, and was starting to show it with my language and what would have been 'playful' banter.

Before I go farther into my post, here are some of the ways that help me to have "fun" (I mention it a couple of times, and I want to make sure you guys understand how I have fun):

  • Making good plays, making smart warding and positioning decisions
  • Playful and respectful chat between allies, and between my team and opposing team
  • Respectful/encouraging intereactions.
  • Having teammates that communicate their decisions
  • Basically it comes down to the type of communication that goes on. Even if it is just with pings, it tells me that my teammates are trying to communicate to make things work. On to the purpose of the post!

I do prefer to see more serious people in ranked, and casuals elsewhere. The types of games I play are ranked, normal SR, and ARAMs. If I'm with friends but we don't have enough to fill a 5s team (and we don't want to deal with rando's) we sometimes go TT. But for me, the most important thing is to have fun and play your best. Sometimes your best is not enough, but we've all had those days. Even in ranked, I prefer having fun to winning,.

As far as my warning signs... I have to agree with what mackledoge said. Casual picks would be super-off meta picks, but like him I do try to give the benefit of the doubt. I personally do enjoy trying to take traditional supports into other lanes (like mid or top), but I'm not brave enough to do it too often. As for the far-too-serious players, I've been trending towards muting them, as they usually come off as ragers or just continue to put people down on my team through blame or verbal abuse. But I don't know if this qualifies them as 'serious' or not. They just get lumped in with them. Since I'm a serious player, I think it is probably harder for me to identify the 'serious' players I encounter, cause I think they are like me.

So.... I'm a tryhard overall, but I go for fun (as defined above) before wins.

MackleDoge6/19/2014, 6:22:36 PM2 votes

Alright, I think this might be the first one of these I've actually commented on, can't remember but here we go. I'm just going to do this paragraph by paragraph based off yoru sections.

Okay, so I guess I should preface by saying I don't play ranked, so my definition of "Casual" and "Serious" are probably a bit different from those that play ranked. I tend to determine casual vs serious by whether or not they more value having fun in the game over winning. Admittedly, I realize that is actually inaccurate in some cases, potentially even all cases, but it's just how I naturally perceive it based off of previous games I've played.

Red Flags

Overly Casual: Super off-meta. Not like Urgot ADC off-meta, but Ahri ADC off-meta. Or something like Vladimir support. Potential to be a troll, but I give people the benefit of the doubt that they want to try it and have fun first. Ridiculous builds. The people that do Tank Teemo in the top lane or AP Trynd. It's fun sometimes and interesting but it immediately tells me they are probably balancing fun over winning (not that that's a bad thing).

Overly Serious: Organizing in Champ Select. The guys that try to dictate what champions you have in your team comp or try to organize an invade at level 1. They've got that "get your head in the game" mentality and they are definitely in it to quinn it (sorry I'll stop). Micromanaging in the game. Not shot-calling, that's just normal and actually really fun to me. I'm talking about constantly telling everyone where to ward or how they should lane or what item to buy. They may be right, it may be good advice, but to me it's a bit over the top unless the person is asking for help or advice.

Preference and Current

I'd rather have casual players. Personally I play for fun and winning comes second. I can have fun in a game I lose. I enjoy the game in general and I like to see people that enjoy the game whether they win or not. On top of that, I'm a better analyst of the game and strategist/coach than I am a player honestly. My mechanics aren't on par with my game knowledge so I still make mistakes when playing, so I don't want to lose a game on accident for someone that really wants to win, that isn't far to them and I wouldn't want to hurt their experience in the game. My current friends are all mainly "Casuals" (filthy casuals lol).

I'm a dirty casual I'm sorry!!! >_<

Captain Colon6/22/2014, 12:00:47 AM2 votes

What a great way to use the new community system! My first time seeing one of these.

I think I'm a serious player. I try to play my best every game. For me it's fun to try hard and do my best and have my team be happy (or at least not buttmad) to be matched with me. It's fun for me to be pitted against superior opponents so I can test my skills. Comebacks are my absolute favorite, because I know I'm getting rewarded for never giving up when maybe others on my team wanted to; I hope getting that hard-earned win encourages them to fight harder in future games.

However, that only goes once I'm actually in the game. As far as champ select, I'm as casual as can be. I'm not going to pick something that has no chance of winning, but I'm not going to take the optimal pick just to maximize my chances of winning either (unless I happen to like playing that champ). If I don't feel like playing whoever happens to be the best choice as far as winning goes, I'm gonna pick something else. Not something bad that's gonna hurt my team, but yeah I can't deny that I'll be making a "suboptimal" choice. That even goes for ranked play...if I'm not having fun then I'm going to be bored and not playing my best anyway, so not taking the "best" champion is actually the better choice when taking psychological factors into account.

I don't play too many normal games (I just like ranked because it lets me track my performance better) but I haven't really run into any issues with people being "overly serious" or anything like that. Maybe I'm just lucky, or maybe I just have magical powers that make everyone in my games have fun...I like to think it's the latter :)

Angry Monster6/27/2014, 11:15:57 PM2 votes

I think the way you label the serious(try hard) and casual is accurate for the community. That said the community does need to get its head examined.

You can be a try hard on a new champ. Actually you better be trying cause you are learning/refreshing on a champ. It drives me nuts when i see people say "sry I am new to the champ" after tower diving 4 times. They use it like an excuse for play bad.

Normals are fine to experiment is with in reason. Building AP Darven is never a legit idea though. Checking builds, refining a champ, working on a lane all good to do in Norm Draft. Hell its fine to even do bruiser bot lane combos as long as your goal is still to win.

The thing that gets me is that when people are not playing to win but see how far they can go before the other team gets them in a mistake and costs then they lose. I can answer that question with even playing the game, the answer to that is the 45 minute mark. one mistake after that point and you just turned the game on its head.

Ranked is for taking your best champs every time, or for taking something that you have worked on and believe is effective. This is the real proving ground people that in theory are your equals.

Everyone should be trying to do there best every game. Also everyone should be trying to win. There are other people on your team that are effected by what you do. Never wanting to group so you can split push to 500 cs is not the point of league. The goal of the game is to take the enemy nexus working with your team.

Achlys Shadow6/28/2014, 8:39:01 AM1 votes

I can see myself as a casual player but I also have a bit of serious skill. I like to play for fun, but when others see me doing really well they ask me why I don't try to expand my skills and knowledge and play Ranked and climb the ladder. I hardly play Ranked and granted I would like to test myself and try to climb and see where my limit is. But I just don't think I'll be able to really get that burning urge to play Ranked unless a friend wants me to play Ranked with them.

I don't really care much about winning, but if my teammates want to focus on winning then I'll join them on that train especially if the opposite team are being toxic towards my team. My friends and other players of a higher ranking have told me I have potential but I'm not seeing how amazing of a player I can become. I have a positive mind and don't immediately admit defeat but instead I just tell myself it's going to be a long game. That's pretty much the basic thoughts I have on myself as a gamer in general not just a League of Legends player.

David Haller6/28/2014, 4:33:22 PM1 votes

I honestly am almost never bothered by what champion any one person plays in whatever role they choose to play it in.

It's never about the fact that they picked what they picked.

I do however, get rather infuriated if by chance I look at their match history once the game is over and see that what they were TRYING to do, they've been trying to do VERY unsuccessfully.

If you wanna' do something like Jungle Soraka in Ranked, by all means play Jungle Soraka in Ranked, I don't mind it, personally. But at least have the common courtesy to practice it beforehand and be remotely competent in your choice.

Just the other day I had a Poppy jungle and I don't know if this is new and popular or not, I've been gone away from League for a few months so I didn't question it. But it was an unorthodox choice to me and I was excited to see it. He ended up crushing everyone in the game. A game or two later we had a Sion locked in for support. I didn't get upset at him either and it turned out to work very well.

So unorthodox picks have never been an issue with me. Any time I get annoyed, it's usually when people laze through their decisions at the expense of everyone else on their team.

Silverthane6/28/2014, 5:53:57 PM1 votes

im a bit of both

Brydaro6/29/2014, 4:16:35 PM1 votes

I play non-meta things very seriously. I'm always trying to think of the next weird strategy or build that will give me an edge and help me win. I don't like set-in-stone ideals and I don't like winning by default. It's frustrating to lose with a new idea and it's even more frustrating when my idea pans out but I lose anyway because my team isn't on point. I don't often rage, I don't play ranked very often either (the greater the investment the stronger the frustration), and I take 10-20 min. breaks between games. I think I'm a casual player by your definition.

the Anarchit3cht6/30/2014, 1:20:37 AM1 votes

I'm fine with both. What I am not fine with is the "casual" player simply choosing the champion they want to play and playing them in a different role/lane because someone else called the role/lane they want. Or somebody calling a role/lane and not really playing that role/lane.

MOST OF ALL, what bothers me is this: Someone will be like, "1st time Vayne." And then they will feed hard and accuse everyone of flaming them, being toxic towards them for asking them to play safer, etc. When really, that person who is playing Vayne is stick around in lane when they can be killed in a few basic attacks, constantly overextending even though the enemy jungler keeps ganking them, ignoring the team when everyone tries to make plays etc. And then they say, "I said it was my first time, gosh! I don't play to win, it's normals. Go play ranked you try-hard."

Spexify6/30/2014, 7:47:22 AM1 votes

Serious players. You can tell if they're casuals usually by the creativeness or depth of their summoner name. Alot of people make all caps generic names for a superficial experience. Most of the time clever names and names without numbers or all caps are people who take pride and passion in their play. I side with serious players because I like to be competitive. Every game(irl or e-sports) is a competition no matter how laid back it is. So the question is do you want to win or not.

Linna Excel6/27/2014, 8:36:05 PM1 votes

My answer - I dunno except that ranked should be serious.

There's times in normal and ARAM games I'm fine with casual and love to try thing out. There are times I'm trying to be serious.

I really wish team builder was a little more casual though.

Every ADC and support in team builder who leaves your team in a minute because the other role isn't filled can go jam something their butts. This is something riot needs to do something about. Plus team builder is for trying new stuff out but it seems like everyone wants to play the meta. You try to pick an ADC who top junglers admit have a jungle potential to jungle? People leave. Try someone different mid? People leave? Support/ADC isn't filled in 10 seconds? People leave.

I love the concept of teambuilder but there are too many meta sheep and jerks ruining it for me.

Siachi6/27/2014, 9:42:20 PM1 votes

I feel like I relate to Baconhawk's description: In ARAMs, you kind of HAVE to play with a casual mindset: the room for strategy is limited on this one lane map, and you don't really have much control over which champions you play (Having an ARAM Smurf IS a thing, but that's a topic for another day). So you sort of just have to role with what you have if you want to win.

However, when I'm in Summoner's Rift, at least in a Normal (Not-Bot) Matchmaking game, I'd like to take it a bit seriously, and I'd like my teammates to take it more seriously and TRY to win. Summoner's Rift is where I want to try to improve with my my favorite champions... or attempt to get better with Jungling, because I have no confidence in my jungling ability, and I don't feel practicing against bots gives me any worthwhile experience in the role, because the bots don't jungle themselves and I can take whichever buff from both sides I want when I want. Anyway, I'm not sure how much I can improve if I feel like someone on the team isn't even trying: If we lose, how do I know if it's simply because this guy was goofing off, or if there was something I could do better.

However, if I'm in a full five man premade with a group of friends I know won't mind losing as long as they had fun, I'll be tempted to do stupid s---, since I don't have to worry about one or more people on my team getting upset with me because we lost.

Nova Wolfe6/28/2014, 12:20:38 AM1 votes

I'd like to give an example of where try harding comes way too much into play, at least in my opinion. When the Nidalee rework hit live, I decided to play her top in norms to try her out. Although I called top first, we had a Gragas that instalocked and wouldn't support, so he got bullheaded and went top with me, even though you know, call order, and it was confirmed by the rest of my team.

The first instance of tryharding is when the Gragas said to let him go top because of his win rate in ranked and that the team should just trust him, he had this. So naturally I looked him up on the nexus and his history wasn't super impressive, hundreds of normal games and mid bronze I think. He ends up using all of his abilities for farming in the game just to deny me, and this comes into play later.

Anyway, it turned out the other team decided to duo top Thresh and Alistar.

I believe I might said something in all chat about not getting to solo because they decided to focus me hardcore, as in burning all of their summoner spells, abilities, including ults, etc on me whenever I came back to lane to try to kill me, including, but not limited too, igniting me whenever either of them had it up, flashing and Thresh hooking and/or Ali headbutting me out from under tower, straight up diving me and going ham with Ali ult while Thresh Auto-Attacked me to death, etc.

They succeeded multiple times...I think I died at least 4 or 5 times before lane phase was over. They came back up every once in awhile as I was trying to catch up in farm and doing any of the above things to kill me.

They also kept saying things in all chat like "get good scrub," etc...I don't remember specifically what was said, but it was that kind of normal stuff players say when they get a lead. I'm not saying I haven't done this before myself in ranked just because it feels awesome to outplay anybody, but in normals, that's kind of ridiculous.

While all of this was happening, all the Gragas did was farm golems and minions. Even when the enemy wasn't in our lane. All he did was use his barrel and body slam to farm minions, didn't matter what was going on. He tried to deny me as much as possible, even with one minion left in the wave and I was going in to last hit it. Even when the two were going all out on me, he just sat there and farmed.

He started hounding me about missing farm all the time, as well as dying so much, and to stop feeding, even though he didn't do anything to help me. I can see why he wouldn't, I didn't heal him at all when he was low, and there was the stuff in champ select, but you don't have to harsh on people when they're trying a new champ, and you're doing everything possible to deny them any opportunity to succeed in the game, while the enemy laners are doing everything they can, literally anything (they dove me under tower with no minions and burned everything still), to kill you.

We won the game, and Gragas carried, and he naturally told me that he was right at the beginning, but I digress...

tl;dr I think it's crossing the line of trolling and being serious when the enemy burns everything to kill you while your lane "partner" sits there burning all their abilities farming, then proceeds to tell you to "stahp dying and farm better," and he goes against the almighty call order in champ select.

I am a mix of casual and serious. I play ranked seriously, and normals semi seriously. I do dislike losing strongly, but I try to have a more casual mindset in normals with friends because I believe that's where you go to have fun, try new champs, etc.

What I'm trying to get at is that it gets to a point in normals when healthy competition turns into the enemy feeding on your corpse after the battle after a healthy teabagging while the guy you were next to in the fight laughs along with them and films the whole thing after pushing you into the enemy and eating your sweet roll before they start beating you...

hartar6/28/2014, 12:37:06 AM1 votes

On a normal match,casual for sure.

JohnnyNoxid6/28/2014, 1:13:54 AM1 votes

I just want casuals out of ranked for the most part. Playing Poppy support because 'i hate support," it's really frustrating. I value winning more than fun. Fun is stupid when it means absolutely nothing and it does all too often. Oh, it's fun to occasionally get a kills. "lulz." How many turrets did you kill/help kill? None? Legit. 50 CS at 20 minutes? True. But "you had fun," so I'm supposed to accept that. No... no. I never will accept that. I want to get to challenger. Yes, I know it'll take a while but that is my goal, one and only. That's not gonna happen with a casual that's ok with dying when it's not "wurf."

Stephenizgod6/28/2014, 1:14:17 AM1 votes

I think Normals should be casual and ranked should be serious. Not an original idea by any means but that doesnt mean its not any less true.

Normals are not only for trying new champions, new lanes, new roles, new builds, etc. Certainly doesnt mean you shouldnt try to win, but winning should not be your ultimate goal, seeing if what you are doing is working for you, if you are having fun is the ultimate goal.

I "troll" all the time according to other people, J4 and Xin Zhao bot, Kayle and Morgana bot, Healz on Wheelz (Raka and Sona) simply to have fun, sure we dont always win but i almost always have fun.

The only times i dont have fun doing these things is because people give us grief when we do and whether we win our lane or not and they lose theirs or not it is still our fault no matter what.

We NEVER go into this thinking "well we wont win anyways so lets not try", we might say "this wont work" or "We are probably goin to lose lane" but we try to win nonetheless, truthfully 9 out of 10 times we do win our lane and if we end up losing its because our team was so busy hating on us in all chat that they forgot to play the game and end up losing their lanes (is that ironic?)

Anyways the point of this long comment is that, if you want to play for the win go to Ranked, if you want to have fun go to Normals, just make sure you go in with a positive attitude and at least give it your all, because regardless of what anyone says Winning is more fun then Losing, but it doesnt necessarily mean you should sacrifice everything for the win even your fun.