Farewell League of Legends

I know I'm just another individual you probably have never met, but for those of you who've played in Platinum Elo in ranked, you probably know I'm just another hard stuck trash top laner hehe xd. Please bear in mind that I wrote my whole story line here for personal recollection. You don't have to read everything but if you do, ur cool af.

On a serious note, I've been playing League of Legends for about 3-4 years and was introduced to the game by a close friend. In the very beginning, the competitive aspect with trying to learn the game and be better than everyone made the experience very captivating and magnetic to what it had to offer. I leapt around lanes trying to figure out my own identity, but that didn't really come through until I started playing ranked.

My friend and I always had this friendly rivalry on who could be higher on the elo ladder and naturally the higher you climb on the ranked ladder, the more tedious games became to persevere through and ended up being more focused on just objective results. We both stood in bronze/silver elo for the most half in our first year, but gradually as we grinded out more games we learned more about game sense and macro plays. The game still felt very magical and that I had a lot to learn in order for me to become better. 1 year passed, and I learned the hard way that although some people can make OTPs and any champ work, not everyone can heed the same results with time and effort.

2nd-3rd year comes around, and ironically enough I solidified myself as a top lane main because my mentality at the time was, top laners were the hardest feeders and if I can isolate one variable impairing my games, then perhaps I could climb to even higher heights. This was the time before Galio had been reworked, and I enjoyed cheesing enemy top laners with TONS OF DAMAGE from having built Rod of Ages and a fully loaded Q. I spammed Galio all the way up to mid Gold elo, and that's when I had finally managed to save enough IP (Cause I was trying to buy a bunch of random champions at the time) to obtain Darius (This was after Juggernaut Rework). Man oh man did I fall in love with the playstyle of juggernauts. It felt like I had an impact in the game on my own, making advantages for myself in the top lane. With Darius (and a couple of other juggernauts/support champs, yes I enjoyed playing support as well) I had finally reached Platinum elo.

Now this is the point of my League of Legends experience that everything had begun to fall downhill. Being brutally honest here, I saw myself as a very calm, relaxed and chill person to be around and I never really let things linger in my thoughts and get to me. But the level of toxicity and very poor quality of games just made it impossible to cope with all the stress and anger that was building up within me. Some of you may say, League of Legends is just a game (after losing us the game hehe xd) but for those who were really driven to climbing the ranked ladder and one day being able to boast a Diamond border meant the world to someone (Just like that one time I saw a stream highlight of Emiru showing emotion after finally reaching diamond).

In my 2nd year of League of Legends when I first ended in Platinum, the level of toxicity wasn't as prevalent as it is now. You could joke and banter around before, and still have somewhat of a good time with other good Samaritans who were trying to enjoy the game while still climbing. But those good Samaritans are one of a rare breed nowadays. The toxicity has become so concentrated that it's almost suffocating at this point. If you try to be an innovator, you're either perma-banned (Singed Support) or deemed trolling and reported if you don't heed any results. If one bad thing goes wrong in your games, the constant bickering and complaining will never cease for the 40 minute games you're chained in with these tilted players. It honestly seems like everyone I play with in ranked does not enjoy the game anymore. "If you win a game, you feel ok but if you lose it feels bad....I want to be able to play League with people who enjoy the game with me" - Scarra (Taken off from his Q/A video).

Throughout my time of playing League of Legends I can, without hesitation say that the memories here have been some of the best and worst moments of my gaming life. But the positive memorable moments have just been completely marred over with all the negativity that I've encountered in ranked queue. People just want to "go next", "hold you prisoner in games", "make sure you never get out of this elo", because they want you to experience the same suffering that they've undergone. There's no cushion for your MMR when you go on a losing streak. They pair you with other tilted players who are on severe losing streaks as well. It's no wonder people get tilted out of their minds. And magically, when you're on a huge win streak and you go onto your promotions, you start to play with individuals that make very questionable plays, almost with the intent of gate keeping you from getting promoted.

At my peak, I had reached Platinum 1 and hit my Diamond 5 promos 4 times. I was proceeded to be griefed and trolled every single game after that. At some point I had completely snapped and just wanted to win a single game. I went on a 31-losing streak because of services that show match history of wins and losses and MMR. (Ex. na.op.gg). People went onto abuse the fact that I was susceptible to tilt and always camped my lane, and objectively looking at it I couldn't really go against it because I too became so desperate for elo that I would stoop to any lows like BMing for the sake of tilting others so they don't play in their right state of mind.

I had quit 6 months ago and came back to League of Legends 2 days ago to give it another chance because watching NA LCS made the game look very exciting (Especially that one Dhokla Yorick game, as a juggernaut player that was so hype). Needless to say, It only took 2 games to find someone complaining about something about anything they could've nitpicked about (We were winning that game btw). If you look at my match history now, you may say I'm heavily biased because I'm on a 5-6 game losing streak, but it's not just a matter of winning and losing anymore. It's just the quality of the games and people who I'm playing with. Both have not improved whatsoever.

Trying to compress games into a smaller time window (20-30 mins) by adding in a lot of snowball aspects and absurd amounts of damage have given players very little opportunities to comeback from deficits. Once your team sees 0-3, or 0-5, it's an instant /FF20 or "go next'. I would enjoy this concept if I could actually carry on champions in the top lane, but seeing that Riot feels very adamant on the idea of making it a team game, the magic of having power in solo lanes (Mid and Top) will cease to exist and the risk for going for an individual outplay is no longer worth it (because of the constant dog piles and jungle pressure).

You might be thinking, "oh if ranked is tilting you off the face of the planet, why not just go and play normals?" but you see, I've always had the goal of hitting diamond. And the competitive aspect of ranked is what drives me to play the game. Even in normals, you're not free to play whatever you want. People will dictate to you in champ select, whatever you're playing is terrible/un-optimal, why don't you play "a real top laner".

League of Legends has been a huge part of my life and has helped me in developing a thicker skin for dealing with inexcusable, malicious behaviour. But there's only so much as a HUMAN BEING, that a person can absorb the hatred of another.

Thanks for everything, BacklashBlade

TL;DR: Good guy, turned bad from ranked toxicity. Leaving the scenery onto less stressful gaming environments.