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Being "Nice" to your Teammates DOES NOT win you more games.

Best Ekko NA·3/17/2017, 3:23:44 AM·4 votes·6,398 views

There's this huge delusion that Riot has created where "being a good sport to your teammates wins you games".

This is absolutely NOT true.

Being nice to someone on your team doesn't teach them the game, it doesn't make them gain experience. Now I'm not saying that players should just be a dick to every person but there's a line that has to be put down somewhere. When you have a player on your team that keeps charging into the enemy team feeding, teleporting to push into 5 enemies, ruining everyone's games... Someone HAS TO SAY SOMETHING TO THEM. It doesn't matter if you are just tilting them, they're already doing poorly. What good does it do if they can see the gank coming because they aren't distracted when they're going to die to it either way? If you don't say something they're going to keep doing the same thing forever and probably never learn.

There is no nice way to tell someone that they are ruining your game, I'm sorry if you think otherwise.

At high ELO's, you can see clearly that people already understand the game. They are intelligent enough to figure out what they are doing wrong. It makes sense that a player at a very high caliber wouldn't need someone else's input to know that they're messing up and that they need to fix it.

The same is simply not the same lower down the ladder.

These people don't understand what they are doing wrong, they don't even know they're doing something wrong to begin with. They'll keep overextending and dying to the enemy Jungler again and again. They'll have the enemy laner under their wing, but let them roam around killing their entire team without pinging they're missing or following to keep them in check. They'll stand around and farm or watch as their teammates die in a fight when they have the proper tools in their kit to win that fight for their team.

Ignorance is Bliss, you'll always think you're right if you never understand the correct way to build or play in any given situation. Even if you "nicely" point something out, these people will get offended. "I'm not wrong, I could never be wrong... my whole team is just feeders.. you guys are bad".

Not to overlook the fact that all of us make mistakes.

In the meta right now, solo carrying is probably more difficult than it's ever been. Without teammates who do their job at least half-assed, it's extremely hard to win. If you think it's just one single player, get over your brain washed self and gtfo. For years I've seen the whole "hey you're the only thing on your team that doesn't change". You're 100% right, in a scientific world that means any theory for winning would be impossible to figure out because you lack enough constants and have far too many variables. Every game your team changes and so does the enemy team, you have to play a different way every game with different build paths and items based on the situation you are in. If you are losing, it doesn't mean that YOU are always the problem. Whoever came up with that is full of shit. Sure you can always improve yourself to where you will do better but you can't control every factor of a game just because you play slightly better.

If someone on your team is ruining your game, you should never be punished for saying something to them. Granted, I do believe there is a point where maybe you could be going too far (like telling someone to kys, I do believe that's overkill and morally wrong to say to someone), but telling someone that you think what they did was completely stupid and that they should stop doing it should be acceptable (my opinion obviously).

In the real world, people don't hold back to tell you that you fucked up.. sure it probably pisses you off hearing someone tell you that you were wrong but it definitely never killed anyone.

If someone tells you that they think you aren't playing right try to play how they are telling you. Maybe they were wrong, but you'll never learn for sure if you don't try something new right?

Don't get butt-hurt because someone's upset at you, they want to win just as much as you do. Before you cry about how they're "toxic" in chat just calm yourself and think about if there's actually some validity in whatever they said. No one gets pissed off for no reason.

36 Comments

Dynikus3/17/2017, 3:25:29 AM14 votes

team morale is important for playing well. happy teammates are good teammates. Or atleast better than they would be if you were an asshole to them. You can critique someone without being negative, just say it in a somewhat polite manner.

EvilDustMan3/17/2017, 11:03:12 AM5 votes

One, it's a game and that matters before winning. An enjoyable experience.

Two, no, people are not inspired to do better by randos from the internet telling them they suck.

Lapis3/17/2017, 3:29:05 AM5 votes

Maybe it doesn't win you more games, but being an asshole certainly doesn't either.

ModThe Djinn3/17/2017, 3:32:54 AM5 votes

Note that there's a big difference between "Hey top -- He's pretty far ahead of you now. Perhaps just play under tower so he doesn't get even stronger, since you probably can't fight him now" and "Top. Stop being such an idiot. You can't fucking fight him."

In actuality, being nice DOES lead to more victories. While it may not make players more skilled at the game, it may keep a player who is good enough to win but is having a rough start from tilting further, or organize a disorganized team, or make everyone realize that yeah, you DO have a chance to bring the game back around.

It's not that being a good sport creates wins -- it's that creating a supportive, friendly, cooperative environment tends to bring out the teamwork in people, make them more invested in the game, make them more likely to bounce back from a bad few minutes, and encourage those who might be doing poorly and make them more inclined to listen and work together. I've turned around a number of awful games by pointing out that people shouldn't rage at the guys doing poorly on our team, but rather group up, focus the fed enemies, and win as a TEAM rather than as a group of individuals angry at each other.

Gregor Gysi3/20/2017, 9:15:11 AM2 votes

Hey do you remember the last time when a dude told you "what the fck are you doing, that was so stupid!"? I bet that's a fond memory of yours because he taught you how stupid that was and now you learned something new and will never make this mistake again.

420 grams3/17/2017, 3:30:09 AM2 votes

Being nice raises team morale which makes everyone play better. How many times have you made a bad play or get ganked early and gotten frustrated? When you're frustrated, how many times has people telling you to stop feeding and that they're going to report you made you want to try harder to win? 2 games ago I had a toxic team from Champ select. The veigar was raging so hard at teemo for picking teemo top and our adc went Fizz to try to get someone dodge. I was nice to the teemo and bot lane saying they can play whatever they want and convinced them to just mute veigar. Even when things were bad, all 4 of them were negative 4 kills or more, I still remained positive and was able to pull our team together and we came back and won.

Being nice doesn't guarantee a win, but being toxic is pretty much a forfeit.

Spyke19703/17/2017, 6:34:42 AM2 votes

You can give constructive criticism without being a total douche. It's one thing to give someone helpful advice. Calling them names and/or typing in all caps, blaming them for ruining the game, is likely to only make them tilt and play worse. Plus if you're spending too much time typing, you're probably not going to be playing at your best either.

Pie Cubed3/17/2017, 8:41:03 AM2 votes

If everyone in a team hated each other, refused to cooperate, etc. by your logic that means they would do extremely well. People will do better at things when they have a higher morale or encouragement. I'm just saying that if we follow your logic, even after a victory, the team should start attacking each other instead of celebrating.

Packun Flower3/17/2017, 4:03:47 AM1 votes

Im generally nice but thete have been times when i had to tell a teammate or two to "stop playing like idiots and smarten up" and usually it works.

Velociraptured3/17/2017, 5:30:18 AM1 votes

0/2 Lucian 0/2 Thresh, Thresh pinging he has over 500 ping, which is a lie because he's obviously playing normally. "Hey bot please play safe" 'Double kill'. WOW DID A LOT OF GOOD THERE.

Baron Barian3/20/2017, 9:12:24 AM1 votes

Being nice doesn't win you games? Okay, I'll stop saying good job for first bloods, "good luck and have fun" at the start of the games (don't even say it glhf, I go all the way), stop encouraging teammates who admit they aren't good, and just start being an asshole overall.

Whether following the summoner's code or just being nice wins you more games or not, it still helps you enjoy even a losing game, and a positive attitude can leave a window open for turnarounds. I've won a number of games where people were getting mad, I encouraged positive thinking, and win after the enemy gets baron buff. A little positivity can go a long way.

So yeah, seeing a thread called "Being nice to your team does not win more games" pretty much encourage a famously toxic gaming community to do literally the opposite of what gamers in general should do.

Astrovert3/17/2017, 7:38:17 AM1 votes

Being nice to people can be as simple as not commenting at all.

Do you really need to tell them they are ruining your game? Think they don't know that already?