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Here's a pro tip for you. Never ever insult your teammates.

Pythagorean Thm·11/28/2014, 1:13:27 AM·114 votes·6,866 views

It never makes them play better. In fact, it does the opposite. It makes them play worse. They lose confidence and moral all in one shot. Once you begin to insult your teammates and start arguments you destroy your chances of coming back. It's like a more painful version of surrendering.

Did your jungler mistime smite allowing the other team to get dragon? Don't say "wtf dude how could you miss that", say "That's alright we'll get the next one."

Did someone push too far without wards and get caught out? Don't say "DUDE YOU MORON WHY DIDN'T YOU WARD?", say "Don't worry about it, just remember to ward next time"

Etc etc.

70 Comments

Cale01711/28/2014, 1:33:19 AM35 votes

Problem with that is that most people I've come across don't know the difference between constructive criticism and insulting. If someone is messing something up, just patting their back and saying it's all okay isn't going to help them learn what they're doing wrong. But the moment you try and guide someone in this game, nine times out of ten they get overly defensive and decide that they no longer have to avoid walking into enemy turrets.

Viro Melchior11/28/2014, 12:25:11 PM11 votes

It boils down to one thing: Are you antagonizing your teammate?

If you are purposefully trying to do any of the following, you're automatically lowering your chances of victory.

  1. Make them feel bad
  2. Irritate/troll them
  3. Get them to go afk, quit the game, uninstall LoL, or "just go die"

If you have noble intentions (helping them improve), but poor wording, you can also be a net negative.

A few key ideas when offering criticism in-game to strangers:

a) Use positive messages, such as "When we respawn, can you keep a ward in the tri-brush?" instead of "No ward in tri-brush makes you a bad support." b) Don't tell them things they already know, such as "You need to stop dying." (if they're 0/6, they already realize that they're feeding). c) Offer to help (in-game). Things like "you're way behind, and not much use right now. do you want to farm top to try to catch up?" works much better than "you might as well afk, you're useless", or saying "its usually better to gank the winning lane, not try to save a losing lane. but if you want, you can farm my jungle camp for a bit extra gold/xp." is much more positive then "no, you suck".

Of course, this all goes out the window when someone ELSE on your team starts provoking whoever is doing poorly. In that case, my only advice is to come to the harassed player's defense ("hey, bad games happen, lets stay positive") and encourage the other player to use Mute. Silence implies consent of the bad behavior, and many times simply knowing that the rest of the team are all "cool guys" is enough to keep a player from raging under the abuse of a single negative teammate.

Sîcarîus11/28/2014, 8:51:58 AM6 votes

I think Caleo17 hit the nail on the coffin. This issue stems deeper than just the league community, though. The issue of not being able to understand the difference between constructive criticism and insulting is a worldwide problem atm, and I can't see us solving it via league of legends if we can't even solve it in real life. It's very sad, but perhaps our brains will function better in the future.

Dr Jarjarbinks11/29/2014, 5:09:41 AM4 votes

Nice post I totally agree. You will NEVER(idc what anyone says) have a more positive result after insulting someone than if you hadn't. You MIGHT have a positive result in spite of the insult but that's not normal. Basically if you flame someone you take credit for all their stupid crap after cus chances are they will play worse.

Cro00311/29/2014, 6:06:01 AM3 votes

**Empathy **

People need to learn to have and live it.

Until the day comes when many more people have it as a skill, we'll have to have a thick skin to play online games.

Konidias11/29/2014, 3:21:01 AM3 votes

When you yell at teammates their usual thought process is:

"Do I try really hard to win this game and show my teammate he is mistaken, or do I take the easy route and stop trying to win... therefore making this rager even more mad, and costing him a game because he doesn't deserve it with his attitude?"

I think the decision is easy for most people. Once you're behind in a game it's hard enough to make a comeback without having some a-hole on your team yelling at everyone. It's much easier to just give up and lose the match. At least that way the a-hole doesn't win.

You create a situation where your teammates would rather take a loss just so you also lose, instead of trying hard to get you a win.

Think about it... I mean really... would you want to win a game for someone who was giving you s*** non-stop?

ModWulf Helhammer11/28/2014, 6:57:33 AM3 votes

sad head shake for all the players who somehow don't realize this fact

Axerum11/28/2014, 1:29:45 AM2 votes

WHAT?! Well that's flash news.

Anyways, I couldn't agree more. Recently in LAS we had this promotional video made by Riot called "Teammates OP" or something like that. The whole idea was flushed down the toilet.

Keeblers Elf11/28/2014, 5:54:08 AM2 votes

Its not even about moral or confidence. Insulting teammates makes a lot of people say fuck it and start hard core trolling you.

LiveYiOrDieHard11/28/2014, 6:24:38 PM2 votes

Everytime I see my teammate pushing so hard without ward and too long, Rarely I say anything. I just ping them to be careful and they dont take that advice so mid, top or jg disappears and gank them hard and even though you warned them and in some cases you couldn't follow your lane, you get blamed because they can't play like idiot freely :) At this point, I make sure I point out what they did wrong withouth raging and put them on mute. About 1/3 or half of my games I either mute one or all of my teammates because I ain't got them for their stupidity. sorry for the harsh words but if I waste my time arguing with them, I would be stuck in "Used Toilet Paper" 5.

Don't spam your caution ping at teammates for no reason. If you think they are in IMMEDIATE danger, sure, but it's a warning ping for a reason. If someone pings me and I back off and then check my map and see everyone on the enemy team visible and nowhere near my lane, I will pointedly ignore any more caution pings for the rest of the game. Especially if it cost me a kill, all because somebody thinks they need to play my lane for me.

The large majority of the time, people are trying to be helpful with a side of ridicule and sarcasm. Also, most people that are pointing out mistakes are also wrong in their advice. Sometimes both sides are wrong and both sides are right. The problem is that this just leads to extended arguments. One person says something, the other person then has to defend themselves by explaining why everything happened the way it did. The accuser usually ignores that and keeps the argument going because they think they know exactly what went wrong even though the defender's story contradicts it.

True. The best lesson I learned from when I used to smurf a lot is to never take advice from solo queue. 99% of the time they're HORRIBLY wrong no matter how much they think they're right.

Ryvaku11/28/2014, 10:11:28 PM2 votes

This is true. I intend not to work well if insulted by the slightest. I would even let that person die in general who insulted.

ArcaneMusic11/29/2014, 5:19:25 PM1 votes

Oh gosh, I've had a game with both of those people in it before. A flaming ADC, and a Touchy Rammus. ADC felt like everyone was shit, and was giving really flaming advice to Rammus. On the other hand, the Rammus was building SUPER inefficiently (First Item being item 3075 , then item 3207. It's really hard to give constructive criticism when one person is telling you to uninstall and the other is AGREEING with the actual advice they're giving, making them report you too. T_T (I recall saying that Thornmail would be more efficient if he built his health up to about 3000 or more, and he responded with a STFU Amumu )

Texicant11/30/2014, 3:18:14 AM1 votes

Caitlyn "Land your bubble Nami!#!" Nami bubble to vayne Vayne rolls out of the way Caitlyn "OMG SCRUB N0oB Nami needs to gtfo" Nami item 3070 item 3070

Just saying about criticism. telling a person to land a skillshot isn't advice, but rather an annoyance. also makes creates a desire to leave lane or just straight out troll the criticizer

Leblancs Boob11/30/2014, 3:49:43 AM1 votes

It doesn't just make the person being insulted play worse.. it makes EVERYONE play worse. Toxicity severely lowers team moral and makes everyone play worse. Not to mention everyone is typing to each other and insulting each other instead of actually playing the game. Don't be that guy that insults your teammates and throws the game because you just have to call everyone out on their mistakes.

Demonsolder2112/28/2014, 5:58:14 PM1 votes

Your mom insults teammates.

TrubbleCleff1/24/2015, 4:22:33 PM1 votes

There is no problem with this. Bottom line, no matter what their response is , it's just a game and that's the right thing to do.

Crett4/7/2015, 8:04:55 PM1 votes

Garen crett is this your first time jungle Trundle no Garen HAHAHAHAHAHA liar Garen rubbish trundle

BroLane4/11/2015, 4:57:36 PM1 votes

I'm still gonna flame.

Talll5/31/2015, 8:04:30 PM1 votes

My teammates play worse when I call them a "Fucking Peice of shitty dicks that even Jesus would take a shit on and laugh at" makes them play worse?!! But no in all seriousness this post couldn't be more right. 90% of the people you play with are so stubborn that ragging at them would make them consider feeding just to make you lose, Don't rage at teammates, help them out.** !!AND DON'T SAY SOMETHING YOU WOULDN'T HAVE THE BALLS TO SAY TO THEIR FACE IN REAL LIFE!!**

OshGoshBoGosh6/21/2015, 12:25:11 AM1 votes

Reading the comments reminds me how many people on this game are spiteful children haha.