Confessions of A Reformed Rager; What's "Pro"

Really well written! This ought to be required reading for anyone who receives a chat restriction.

And like a professional, you have to learn to recognize your priorities. At any given time a jungler needs to be checking for ganks, counterganks, farm, and timers. ADC needs to be counting CS, denying, and watching for zoning / ganks. On and on. Do you really have the time to park by a tower (or ye gods, in lane) and start bickering?

I'm not a very good player, but this is one thing I took to heart after seeing it happen in a game. I was mid Ziggs and had just burned everything to dodge a gank from the enemy mid and jungler, escaping with double-digit HP. I'd suspected earlier in the match from some all chat that these two people didn't get along, and as I was recalling a melee creep gave me vision on the two... standing in lane not doing anything. Yep, they were arguing in text chat. I popped back out and killed both of them with a Q-E-R combo while they were typing insults and blaming each other for the failed gank, which not only cracked up our bot lane but put the whole enemy team on tilt since now everyone else was yelling at them.

I have since vowed to never be That Guy who costs the team the game because I'm more concerned with being right than playing well.

This is actually a great post. I'm glad you improved as a player and person. Respect.

It takes a lot of courage to admit the error in one's way... Sir! You deserve all respect possible, but I can only speak to myself. Wish I could say more, but there's nothing to say...

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lvtjap5yVS1qequ8i.gif

Reading this thread while listening to this.......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MH4uuWITmgY

Well done,my fellow League of Legends player.Very well done.

Great read. As a player going through my own struggles, I commend you.

Wish people who raged would read these kind of posts and actually cared.

Faith in humanity is restored (for now =P). That was a great read and I hope it inspires others as well. +1

I used to be "That Guy". It sucked. I would always try to be right instead of playing well. I've long since learned you don't win games by arguing with your teammates trying to prove your point. Not talking once in a game helps. A lot of the time, teammates will respond thinking you are insulting their gameplay, and then retaliate with trolling or even going AFK. They will get their punishment eventually. Don't think much of it. Even if you have an AFK, you can still win the game. With trolling, it's harder to win than if you have an AFK, but not a problem. As OP said, you can't win every game.

tl;dr: I agree with OP

I've not read a post that long in a while, but it was well worth it! I love seeing that players are willing to reflect and change their behavior after bans/warnings/etc. Please keep up the attitude and good work, and I look forward to seeing you on the Fields of Justice!

Well said sir! Loved reading it :-)

Hey man, that's great to hear.

Now that you truly understand League, you can get a lot more enjoyment out of it. Most people play League to try to win. Sometimes you win, sometimes you don't. But now you play League to get better. As long as you approach each game with your outlined mindset, you will always get better.

The cherry on top is that getting better leads to more wins, so you get the best of both.

It's all about the improving and thinking about what you can improve to do better for your team.

That's one of the most satisfying things I've ever experienced in league, knowing I can improve, and actually getting better at it. Most of the time, I don't even care if my teammates do good or not, unless they start raging and blaming other people, and some really bad players (1 out of 15 to 20 games I guess?). It's all about what you can do for your team, not the other way around.

Know what you did for your team, know what you can do for your team, know what you can do better for your team, and once you know all 3, and constantly do it, you're a master of league already, no matter what rank you are. It gets really enjoyable too, knowing you improve and getting better and better. And eventually, you'll end up carrying and winning :D

I don't even get angry at players anymore. I get angry when my ping is above 70(go figure it always is) when I'm living in the same continent as the server. Absolutely disgusting that theres no USA east server or at the very least permanant free transfers to LAN for the absolute ABOMINATION that is NA.

I had never been a really toxic player, but I was always fairly negative, and I had a similar story across the past two seasons. Almost all of my growth from bronze 4 to gold, then silver to plat, have been because I was willing to be positive, not care about winning, and care about getting better at the game and helping others do the same. The trick I've found is to, while being professional about it, tell people how they were doing something wrong and how they can do it better, not just tell them that they are doing something wrong.

My question to you is, how far have you managed to get in the rankings purely on this philosophy?

Why do people make these threads it's so dumb. .. Bro if u got Perma ban u should have done us a favor, u won't change and just stay out of league, I got 3 accounts to plat and non of them have ever been ban nor chat restricted, maybe when u got Perma ban it was a sign to move forward with your life, this game isnt for everyone.....

Edit: if you thk u won't be Perma ban again just remember bronze and silver ain't stressful and when u are put to the test as u go up, u will be back to your old self so don't spend to much, u will find yourself with another Perma ban ggdhf

Since I started playing LOL I couldn't count how many of these threads I have seen posted, alll misty eyed and gooey over how you used to rage but now your a reformed, you've seen the light and you're now a 'professional'. All because you took your head out of your ass. Good for you.

I'm climbing gold (3 at the mo) trying to hit plat before the season ends. Hit me up sometime if you want a duo

What if I don't care about my rank, and I respond to trolls like this:

"Go ahead and AFK and get banned. I'm already gold in 3v3. I don't care if we lose" -> I'm actually baiting them to stop with idle threats and actually AFK so leaverbuster will auto-detect and ban them.

"Go ahead and feed and get banned. I'm already gold in 3v3. I don't care if we lose" and later: "please feed more. look enemy X is over at top lane. Go feed him please. :D" -> I'm actually baiting him to stop with his idle threats and actually feed, so Riot's feeder detector picks him up and bans him. When I encourage him to feed more, I'm trying to make him easier and faster to detect.

Good stuff, I I'm trying to remember to roam early and ward, because that is scary strong in low elo, just need more practice at giving aid to my team. c:

Destitute, I decided to watch some pro streams (Scarra, shoutout!) and realized a HUGE difference between their play and mine: compared to me, their energy level was almost TRANQUIL. In most competitive sports, intensity is a gigantic part of winning. In the 20th and 30th ruck of a game, you have to find a way to keep reaching down and pulling up more energy. I realized I was bringing that intensity to my games, and more often than not, it would result in me typing something like orders of magnitude more than the average Challenger-level player. And it was not producing good results; some people would AFK or begin to antagonize me in game.

Reading this part made me realize why I was able to get to silver then suddenly stopped my climb to gold. Over time, I have begun doing workouts for highschool sports and I noticed I have become more agressive and energetic since I have begun exercising more often. I reached silver because It was summer and I was doing anything physical so I was able to relax and enjoy the game. Now with daily workouts, I have now realized that I have become more commanding of others and criticized others for their mistakes more often. With this enlightment, I shall now focus on purely my own gameplay and not judge others for hwo they are playing because after all, we are in the same rank.

+100 respect to you sir c": i look up to people like you

"Only when one understands their limitations can they master their capabilities."

-Some guy I don't know

I probably used to be that kind of guy. I used to rage out at people because they would all be stupid or KS me, but a while ago someone told me this when I raged out about getting KS-ed:

"Dude, it doesn't matter who gets the kill. It is a team game a kill is a kill so we need to work together."

Even though that is about KS-ing, I applied that to most other aspects of the game and then I realized that by yelling at people, you will never fix their mistakes. That is why I don't rage out too much when someone dies or something, because then I think about how my lane is doing and then I probably realize that if we lose it is also 1/5th my fault, same with everyone else. If someone isn't doing that well, give them pointers or something and then you should reflect on how you are doing yourself and a lot of the time you are being a hypocrite when you say "y u being a nub bro". I respect you bro, and people like you are what make LoL and the world in general a better place :D

tag

Destitute, I decided to watch some pro streams (Scarra, shoutout!) and realized a HUGE difference between their play and mine: compared to me, their energy level was almost TRANQUIL. In most competitive sports, intensity is a gigantic part of winning. In the 20th and 30th ruck of a game, you have to find a way to keep reaching down and pulling up more energy. I realized I was bringing that intensity to my games, and more often than not, it would result in me typing something like orders of magnitude more than the average Challenger-level player. And it was not producing good results; some people would AFK or begin to antagonize me in game. Why wasn't Riot banning these jerks? [...] What can you do in these situations? Nothing. This is something that a ton of players run into all the time, and have all kinds of things to say about. But the the fact is, you won't win every game. Period. Even if you play perfectly. That's OK. There will be another game. There will be another opportunity. You can hope that your other lanes will benefit from the constant mid pressure, but if they don't...well, that's how games are lost. And that's OK. That's probably one of the most important things William taught me from his streams--even though he doesn't know the difference between "turn radius" and "understeer". :D He taught me that you win, and you lose, and this isn't the LCS. And that helped me climb in the ladder, a lot. Focus on yourself, and learn the metrics for a successful role. Then worry about others--and how you can help them, like a professional.

Nice writing man. That just made me realise a difference between this game and most fighting games (sorry that's the 2 kind of games I follow) : When you see a pro match in a solo game, you can just go, get in the mood and pretend you're MutekiGuile managing to actually win by playing rushdown on a classic zoning character. You can make your match kinda look like some high level matches. In league... it's a team game, so your bubble will quickly be popped by your team not helping, not grouping, not going for the right objective at the right time.

But If I look at pro streams and at premade games in my Bronze 4 team of friends who barely play anymore. My B4 matches look almost more professional, there's more coordination, more chat. More failing as a team too. Anyway, I think what we see as high level play is ultimately more about premade than about skill. soloqueue is soloqueue, no matter what people say about duos. It's still going to be a bit of wild west where you need to play as a team and yet you can't really trust your team. Anyway, I totally went off topic.

Thanks for the read. How's it going since you wrote that?

Who had most wards? Second? Third? When I play, I am invariably first or second most wards bought. Why? Because if I have any change, it goes to wards. Take pride in those wards saving someone, even if it's not you. A pink can last ALL. GAME. if you place it conservatively and provides vision the entire time! That is invaluable, even if nobody notices but you (your ladder rank notices).

OMgosh that is so true. I try to tell my teammates to keep a vision ward up at all times, even if it get takens down. I should always look at my map and see 5 vision wards. I usually just see 2 or 3...and I know ppl can forget. I am almost lv 30 and I want to be a very skilled player and someone to count on as well. forgetting to ward is not an option to me, when I working hard towards my goal. If you have a free stealth totem ward, for goodness sake PLEASE use it. You will benefit if u do, so why not???

I had a kalista once when I was supp, and I kept asking kalista to plz ward bush and I would ping to the push I would like warded. Totally ignored me and didn't type back to me, but when I think about it if you click to see what your teammates are buidling, can you see the cooldown as well?? Regardless she woudn't talk to me ... idk......I was very insulted... Teamwork is important to me. I placed many stealths with sightone later, but really early game you have to make with what you have.

There is a method to not reform though.

Vayne's tumble does NOT allow her to pass over terrain.

{quoted}

I recently read an article by an unnamed reformed player that resonated with me, so I wanted to share my story, too.

Let me start by putting it all out there. This isn't my first account, my first account (genocidealive) was straight up banned. The account I have now is under chat restriction, for the same reasons the first one had problems: allcaps raging. That said, since the chat restrictions first started (however many months ago), I learned a lot about myself and my behavior.

At first, and largely overall, I never really cared about my behavior. I didn't really mean most of it, and my ragefits were generally meant in good humor. I never said anything crazy to teammates (racism, "Kill yourself", "I hope your family dies", "Get cancer", etc.) but I wasn't above letting the profanity-laced insults fly. I often laughed about it, and I had a girlfriend at the time who also thought it was pretty funny. Obviously, I'm not excusing the insults, but rather attempting to give insight to my mindset.

Two things really brought about change for me: the permanent ban of my original account, which I didn't contest in any way, and I suddenly decided that I needed to get out of Bronze. These two things put together did something to me that I hadn't experienced before: a desire to seriously look at myself, my play, and what I was doing wrong. Why does this matter? Because up until this point, I firmly believe I would never have reformed; bans, restrictions, etc. had no effect on me. I felt my chastising other players was "leadership" and having a strong personality and commanding presence was what was required to win games.

But once I did start to do research, I realized I needed to pay more attention to the flow of the game. I did. I stopped worrying about getting the best KDA and started worrying about making good plays. It didn't help much. I was still in B1. I was flabberghasted--literally stuck in "ELO hell". These morons couldn't be taught, pros don't have these problems! They have competent teammates that listen and teamplay. I'd seen plenty of pro games, they were NOTHING like the ones I was playing.

Destitute, I decided to watch some pro streams (Scarra, shoutout!) and realized a HUGE difference between their play and mine: compared to me, their energy level was almost TRANQUIL. In most competitive sports, intensity is a gigantic part of winning. In the 20th and 30th ruck of a game, you have to find a way to keep reaching down and pulling up more energy. I realized I was bringing that intensity to my games, and more often than not, it would result in me typing something like orders of magnitude more than the average Challenger-level player. And it was not producing good results; some people would AFK or begin to antagonize me in game. Why wasn't Riot banning these jerks?

At one point I just realized: I'm simply not being a professional. Cam Newton got in a fair amount of hot water in his first pro game because he was throwing a hissy fit on the sideline while the Panthers were being beaten. There was a ton of media backlash as they remonstrated him for his lack of professionalism, and lack of leadership. When I realized I'm being unprofessional (and I'm older than Cam Newton), I realized I needed to DRASTICALLY alter the way I play in order to achieve. I also realized I wasn't being much of a leader; I was simply spouting the first critical things that came to mind. I was Cam Newton, raging and dissing the people around me because things weren't going my way.

This triggered perhaps the most important changes of my LoL play (in the past 6 mos or so). I stopped caring about early kills, because I realized a very important point: early game mistakes can be painful, but the game flow changes drastically over the course of 30 minutes. Lee Sin might be completely dominating Nasus with ganks and be 3-1-3 early game, but if Nasus keeps his head in the game and farms well while we continually gank down their mid, it is a no-brainer win for us. This helped me realize that kills in general happen when they happen, and you might be able to give someone a pointer, but more than likely they'll just argue and assume you're blaming them. Better to simply focus on your own play, in every single way.

This became my mantra in a lot of ways. So mid is doing poorly, fine. How am I doing? Can I help? So top is doing poorly, fine. How am I doing? Can I help? I attribute a lot of this to playing jungle, because you have to understand the flow of the game in the jungle moreso than anywhere else. You learn to enable your team, instead of trying to be the carry-all badass. Mid Zed? OK, I have to take Fiddle for AP. Mid Yasuo? OK I'll take Sej for AP & Knockup. Someone took jungle, OK I'll take Malp top. Playing one role isn't a crime, but most people in higher ELOs kind of roll their eyes when someone says "ELO hell" discovering you can only play one role. Being adaptable and a team player is the most important contribution you can bring to the team.

"I'm so sick of hearing that, I'm a team player". Lip service to team play is not enough. Look at game summary afterwards. Who had most wards? Second? Third? When I play, I am invariably first or second most wards bought. Why? Because if I have any change, it goes to wards. Take pride in those wards saving someone, even if it's not you. A pink can last ALL. GAME. if you place it conservatively and provides vision the entire time! That is invaluable, even if nobody notices but you (your ladder rank notices). Are you playing a fighter that could be tankier for utility? Are you playing tanky or are you going full DPS? Are you screening for your squishies or are you chasing that support kill for gold/KDR? Chasing is probably one of the easiest low ELO player traits to spot--if they burn their Flash, good job. Now back out and back to work; like a professional.

And like a professional, you have to learn to recognize your priorities. At any given time a jungler needs to be checking for ganks, counterganks, farm, and timers. ADC needs to be counting CS, denying, and watching for zoning / ganks. On and on. Do you really have the time to park by a tower (or ye gods, in lane) and start bickering? If you die, is the first thing you do is to type something like "YOU SHOULD HAVE..." or is it thinking to yourself "What did I screw up there, and how will I catch up / get back in it?" I discovered sometimes the answer is "farm better", "watch ganks", "take advantage"...and sometimes the answer is "buy wards and help someone else that is on the edge of snowballing". And that is the true key between a professional and a Bronze...the ability to recognize that you have fallen short, and your best contribution to the team is to simply enable someone else to the best of your ability.

Lastly, if you're a baseball fan you know what a "heckler" is. Someone who sits in the stands and shouts insults at players as they stand on the field. The entire idea is to get in their head, and get them off their game. This is a decided advantage for the home team, who will sport the most hecklers. They can cause errors, if they are disruptive enough. Make players drop balls, screw up throws or pickups. Don't be the heckler; if you make some pointless diss when someone screws up, all you're doing is creating an opportunity for them to make them preoccupied with their mistake. If you have to type, type what to do to fix it AND DROP IT. A lot of errors in league are the result of a complex series of events, there isn't really time to rehash every little back-and-forth without sacrificing what you should be doing to catch up.

If someone attacks you when you make a mistake, try to put aside your feelings and see if there's a real point there. Apologize if you fucked up and move on. If you're being heckled, MUTE THEM. Do not at any point TRY to defend yourself. More often than not, this person will delight in your response, and it will only get worse. This is so key. Today I had two people take turns harassing me, telling me from 0:00 that they were going to report me, enjoy the reports, etc. After getting ganked mid 3x and asking for a countergank / gank from our Lee Sin, and being told all kinds of excuses, he never came. But then he started telling me to "type" etc. He was intentionally throwing the game and trying to get me to get upset and respond. I muted him and from others' chat I could tell he continued abusing me all game long ("report this guy", "you expect the impossible", etc). It felt awful, but I realized quickly how miserable these players were--they were me 6 months ago. I was in my Gold 4 promos, and I was less obnoxious than they were. And that felt good.

What can you do in these situations? Nothing. This is something that a ton of players run into all the time, and have all kinds of things to say about. But the the fact is, you won't win every game. Period. Even if you play perfectly. That's OK. There will be another game. There will be another opportunity. You can hope that your other lanes will benefit from the constant mid pressure, but if they don't...well, that's how games are lost. And that's OK. That's probably one of the most important things William taught me from his streams--even though he doesn't know the difference between "turn radius" and "understeer". :D He taught me that you win, and you lose, and this isn't the LCS. And that helped me climb in the ladder, a lot. Focus on yourself, and learn the metrics for a successful role. Then worry about others--and how you can help them, like a professional.

no such thing as a reformed rager. I tried. I pretty much gave up ranked. I hate the league community. full of assholes and alot of champs feel unfair for low elo SoloQ. So I just vent in all chat. keeps me from raging and I get to make assholes heated.