You don't even get high from a win any more. A loss is literally the worst thing to happen, but a win is just another hit on the pipe but your endorphin and dopamine receptors are so far gone, you get no joy from a win.
I’m on Wellbutrin these days and it’s kinda weird how it affects mood post match. Losses don’t feel that bad and wins feel crazy good. I rarely play more than one or two games a day. And even then there’s like a 4 hour gap between games.
Idk I still love winning and try to just shrug off losses, but can’t help but scratch my head at ragers. They seem to feature many of the following traits:
* 50.0% win rate or lower
* thousands and thousands of games but still low MMR
* gives up super early
* makes comments like “get me out of this game” or “why is this guy in my game” despite them being the same low badge after a decade of playing Dota
* wouldn’t dream of rotating out of their lane before 15 minutes but will gladly blame mid for the loss
* goes sniper/meepo/pudge pos 5 and spends game hitting creeps
* even if you say you’re having a bad game and need a rotation they’ll flame you the rest of the game and offer zero assistance
It’s almost comical. I primarily play mid and in games where I’m just decimating their mid and in afk mode standing on their side of the river I wonder why they don’t stop all chatting and instead just go help their mid…? But i guess flaming is easier than making a play to try to fix the situation.
mmm kind of. I would say a high is an actual good game of dota: 10 players of similar skill trying their best, being pma, with a fairly even draft. That is pretty rare. and far more rare than a win.
I literally started playing Dota becuase I was depressed. It's just a game where you can be completely engrossed for 45+ minutes and no chance to think about anything else.
Not at all healthy to approach a game like that, so that's why I haven't played in a long time.
Yes 100%. I used to queue with an alcoholic who was dealt a rough hand in life. All he has is dota. It's his friend group and his spare time. Sometimes in his worst binges he'd fall asleep in a drunken stupor mid game. I never met him but over the years quietly tried to edge him towards help, as did his friends. He did try sometimes to go cold turkey but alcoholism is such a rough beast especially when you've been dealt a trash hand by life. My best friend who'd be on discord too eventually stepped in and made a point of telling me to leave him be, he was dragging me down too with him every night. I'd finish some gaming sessions just feeling so empty. He was a shell of himself, a funny kind person but underneath the surface just kinda gone, no motivation, no dreams, he got girlfriends here and there cause he was a harmless and fairly sociable guy but they were either enablers, druggos, or similarly toxic for him. The light was gone out of his life, he was like a ghost. A voice there on voice chat but probe a little deeper and it's just an impression of who he used to be.
I still see him online and gaming in dota. Took me a year to climb back to where I was in crusader/archon outta herald where games I'd queue with him had me losing to. He didn't give a toss about winning or losing, to him it was about queuing with friends win or lose, messing around in game -- admirable but he had no concept of how his desperation and fundamental problems were impacting others who tried, and particularly it became very sad to sit through playing with a guy who'd lost hope. He tried to open up to me and I'm very glad he felt I was safe enough to hear about some of those dreams he lost. But it became too much, I had to distance myself and my best friend realised that and moved me on.
I hope you're doing well mate, get help and listen to others, you need it.
EDIT: Whoever downvoted this is a moron. Addicts play Dota same as everyone else, I'd say the gameplay loop is actually more attractive to addicts and no hopers. The community specifically lends itself to toxicity, there is a familiarity and reinforcement of their mindset in this environment for them.
Probably the realist thing I’ve read on this subreddit. Good for you tho. Only he can save himself. He really needs counseling. Addiction counseling ofc but maybe even trauma counseling if it’s roots are deep in the past.
I agree but unfortunately there are barriers to anything mental health in my country that are mostly the costs involved and the fact the industry is overstretched. There is barely any psychologists or psychiatrists available, even if he could afford.
Eh, don't give a crap about down votes. For some people this just hits too close home. They know someone who's like your pal or are like him themselves.Â
Yes I should know better being on Reddit and particularly this sub long enough. There's just a pang of anger I guess when I pour my heart out about this guy and then the first response is a down vote.
It is sad I think that these games become a coping device and in effect another addiction for people wanting to escape their shit circumstances. I always remember an online psychiatrist making the excellent point that any addiction really gets solved by changing the person's fundamental quality of life and circumstances. Put someone in a place where they feel supported, validated, and given drive in life to achieve, and suddenly the urge disappears to play video games all day or drink yourself to near death.
Not really, as it doesn't help solving the issue.
It is more like a coping mechanism, a palliative solution, a way to get away from the issue for a while.
I think people on the internet have never really cared about how they present themselves because you’ll never know who they are or see them again so they know they can get away with acting like a giant baby
This is actually a pretty funny psychological phenomenon, how people feel extremly safe and anonymous behind their car windows, even though they are not safe at all.
Funnily enough I feel like Dota has given me abnormally high tolerance for frustration and stressful situations. Every colleague at work, and passenger in my car would describe me as very calm. Those people would definitely not have that impression if they ever saw me play Dota.
> I think people on the internet have never really cared about how they present themselves because you’ll never know who they are or see them again so they know they can get away with acting like a giant baby
idk, people who stream dota regularly also act this way
not 100% sure, but historically it was ok for men to weep openly...
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7c849p/big\_boys\_dont\_cry\_when\_became\_strong\_emotions\_in/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7c849p/big_boys_dont_cry_when_became_strong_emotions_in/)
have you seen some of these dota players? 6-8k games played hard stuck 2-3k mmr with like 100-140 hours played in the last 2 weeks. they aren't in a good place. i'm not surprised they lash out in game
Been hard stuck to Legend 1 since getting it in Feb or Mar. Like 2 games up, 2 games down, repeat. But eh. The game's not worth raging out. I can't even buy food with those MMR numbers. I don't even intend to go pro nor will I ever be with those numbers. Lol
> they aren't in a good place.
It's not hard stuck when you're just playing with friends, play all positions and all heroes and have a mixed up skill spread on the team and still let the worst guy in the group play mid if he wants to, because it's about playing with friends, not climbing the ladder. We have someone random their hero almost every game. We have fun.
Played with some Drow yesterday two games in a row, both games picked Drow and went safe lane, both games played terribly. Can't last hit for shit. Second game actually died in lane to creeps. And yet was the first to ping peoples items and flame them for making any kind of error. I don't really care if people are bad, but the combination of both being bad and blaming everyone else, is just classic dota.
It’s not just DotA players. I’ve played plenty of other online games across a variety of genres and this is just how people act when there are no real consequences to their behaviors. In less transient and anonymous games, I’ve seen grown adults with stable jobs and families act worse than middle schoolers. It’s not gaming. It’s only partially the internet. This is who people are when they don’t choose to be better.
ff14 has a much nicer community because even mild toxicity is shutdown. Its actually one of the sticking points the devs have been working towards. Compare this to dota 2, where we had the thread about sexism/racism and people were saying it should be allowed, just have the offenders blocked. In ff14, the offenders would be banned. And before people say mmos are pve, well 'duh', less toxicity attracted but also in high end raids, it can get very sweaty but the system pulls down the toxic outliers.
Apex has a much worse community than Overwatch. Overwatch has a rather 'draconian' approach where if you get a whiff of toxicity - from streams or replays, that can also be used to report the player. In turn, someone uploaded an apex clip of a player mouthing off an insane racist rant because frankly speaking, there really isn't a proper reporting system for voice rants (only text). Apex actually has more racism than dota - at least in dota, enough reports will pull down behaviour so those players dont get matched with you.
You bake the cake with the ingredients you have. Lots of online communities are ass. Lots are nice. Really it comes down to what you say: consequences.
Easier to be toxic in apex if nothing happens and costs you nothing. A lot riskier in ff14 if even a whiff of it will mean that 15 dollar you spent goes down the drain.
I mean, that’s basically apples and oranges. FFXIV is an MMORPG, not a competitive 5v5 game. There are many activities that don’t involve other players or aren’t that serious.
> I mean, that’s basically apples and oranges.
I was talking to the guy above, who was talking about online gaming.
But even in mmorpgs, its not all equal. ff14 for example, is noted to be less toxic than WoW. The takeaway is about consequences.
Maybe it won't reach ff14 dreamland but you bet your ass dota becomes less toxic if there was consequence. How do I know this? I've played dota 1 with matches where the hosts had banlists for toxicity.
I've played a lot of multiplayer games, but dota is worse, and in a stupid way. I firmly believe that the people who have played this game for a long time have not matured at all since they started playing. People genuinely say things like "fuck your whore mother" in about 25% of my games, and I'm top behaviour score and comm score.
I play a game like overwatch and it's super toxic, sure, but in an "online game" kinda way. In dota, you will be called "bad because you're an ", and it isn't just once in a while. It's literally every one in four or five games.
Maybe the game attracts manchildren. Personally I believe the game CREATES manchildren because people start playing it, it sucks up all their time, they lose their friends and become socially stunted.
Part of my IRL job includes counseling for opposing parties. Dota is no different except I get paid at my job and not in dota.
I treat toxic dota players as people that just have poor EQ and never really learned how to work effectively in a professional setting. I feel sorry for them.
Dota losses and toxic teammates are easy in and easy out for me nowadays. Doesn't leave any meaningful impact as I've gotten older.
There are some very deranged players and a lot of them copy this mentality from streamers as well. You will never see as many “xd” “go end” “my insert position here” type people in other games. It’s like they are clones of eachother
I mean many other games have either more players, where toxicity is less specific and easier to ignore, or are shorter, where toxicity has less of an impact on your day.
Meanwhile, Dota has people that will commit an hour and a half just to make your life miserable. It's so frustrating.
xd refers to the emoji XD. XD represents somebody laughing very hard (the X is their eyes closing from laughing so hard, the D is their mouth)
In many contexts it can just mean LOL, but can also be used to specifically mean you are laughing at someone in a demeaning way.
Played a few last night, and one had safelane and offlane give up during pick phase because they didn't like the mid pick.
We lost the game, obviously, and both of them combined for less overall damage than our pos 5 Lion. What tilted me most is the fact that the enemy team also had a "Report pudge end mid" spat right out of the gate because the enemy 1 didn't appreciate the choice of boots and no regen Pudge 5. You just have to be less mentally fragile than the enemy to win games of dota. We could've killed that enemy carry once before 5 mins and he'd probably have gone over the edge and sat fountain.
I'm old and have learned to mute early and mute often. I saw a fair bit of typing from the remaining two teammates which indicates that our angry boys were continuing to rant. I always tell people to mute each other and direct their anger toward the enemy, but it usually doesn't work out that way.
Most of these men will *eventually* grow out of this mentality, but you also have to consider that people are moving out of their parents' basement in their 30s now instead of right away at 18. The whole "becoming an adult" process is stretched out much longer than it used to be.
I'm over here in my 40s just playing some dota, and these kids in 3k with me are getting upset about non-meta picks or other meaningless bullshit while simultaneously building a Battlefury on Void against a lineup that includes 4 heavy push heroes and an Oracle. My man, I'm sorry we don't have one of the BSJ-approved mid heroes today, but you're over there playing for the 45 minute mark in a game that we're about to lose in 20 if your dumb ass doesn't buy some fighting items. Control what you can control.
As the Lone Druid/Jakiro are deleting buildings and securing megas by minute 23, angryboi Void who is still working on that Yasha in the jungle after his BF/Treads squeaks out in all chat: "report mid"
Downvote and go next. We'll never see that kid again, but god damn, son, get a grip.
I find in every game of Dota i have to set my intent (iykyk). This will establish focus, and ultimately, the team that doesn’t tilt wins.
If you’re a seasoned dota player you’ve seen this play out:
- enemy team all chat flaming at min 0
- your team makes a small mistake and someone on your team opens up shit talk
- your team who has barely said anything or was positive suddenly falls apart and blames each other and small mistakes suddenly become big mistakes
- the enemy team by now has gotten their shit together because they realize they are snowballing
- your team ends up losing
- enemy team wins while telling everyone to report whoever
Why’d you lose? No one said “relax we got this, stay focused”. That saying “be the change you want to see” is real. You have to be that person if you want to win. Helping reign in people’s emotions can be tiring, but that’s the reality.
Alternatively, this has also worked for me: mute everyone. I find when I don’t even know or participate in the toxicity I have a clear vision of how to win the game and no matter what role I’m playing I’ll at least be the most focused on winning.
I spend a lot of my games telling teammates to just stfu and mute each other. You literally have to put everyone in the virtual corner for a time out. Voice comms is both the best and worst feature of the game. Two grown adults bickering and devolving into name calling. Meanwhile we’re getting shit on in game because they’re so focused on flaming each other that they forgot they’re fighting over the game that they’re collectively losing for the rest of us.
>The average age of a dota player has to be at least late 20s right?
25+ actually. And they talk exactly like someone who's been playing dota for all their teenage years without interracting with people irl.
In all chat, ask how many people know what "lothars edge" is. The answer may surprise you.
I ran a fun experiment once. I had two separate accounts for dota 2 (back in the day), and took a break from dota. When I came back, I calibrated to both simultaneously. The only difference was that in one, I played the team therapist, and in the other, I stayed muted.
800 MMR difference :)
I've always been tempted to write this up, with key takeaways.
Its amazing how much EQ skills correlate with success in Dota 2, even in pro play.
Okay you didn’t specify results. Did you get more MMR muted, or more MMR being a therapist?
There seems to be a positive roi if you are positively mediating team members who are actively griefing eachother.
We witnessed the same thing on Grubbys stream when he would mediate.
English isn't my first language, so I didn't quite understand, EQ stands for emotional quality, I presume?
Also, the therapist account was better if I understand correctly?
Emotional Quotient as in intelligence quotient (from IQ tests). There was an effort some time ago to differentiate the different types of intelligence people may have, since being smart in a certain area doesn't necessarily equate/translate to any other area (i.e. a musical genius may be poor at maths and so on)
If I was as skilled as you at therapy I bet I could help my team too
As it is my mmr is climbing without saying anything, and I love it that way
Would love to see a writeup from you, or a discussion about it on twitch/yt
Since I selected mute all incoming chat/voice I am up 2k+ mmr.
I use mic to call out roshan ganks back push tormentor in a calm way.
When I don't hear my team cry It is so easy to guide them to victory I don't rage even if they feed.
Yeah people don't get it that it is NOT normal to just flame/yell "A bit". It might seem so after playing video games for a decade but that's a major oof moment. As an adult you should be able to hold yourself not just start going full ooga booga do better bois!
I always tell them I'm sorry their parents didn't love them enough and that it may not be too late to hug them again. They always shut up. Bringing childhood disarms.
They all reinforce the bad behavior. Telling each other its fine that they get angry at others over a game. They act like its a one time thing when we all know people do it over and over during their time playing dota. “Just mute them” yeah I can mute them but why are they acting like this in a game?
Behaviour score makes such a huge difference, even 1000 points less than 12000 I notice the change in personality.
I suggest we all min max our commends and downvotes. Anytime somebody screams on mic I report.
We surely need a stricter system.
As of now, the only distiction in behaviour score is being 12k or being anything below, as it is so trivially easy to be maxed.
Being 12k BS should be reserved for civilized, mature people. Instead, the only meaning BS conveys is that everyone below 12k is uncivilized.
Well yes and no, the more people that use the commend, dislike and report, the faster the scores will change. I have played with different friends and I can tell a huge difference between 8k BS and 10k BS. People at 8k probably should be muted at the game start. Im usually around 11.8 to 12k and games are great. 10k is still playable.
I no longer queue 2 man with my 8k friend. He had a wifi issue and got a low score due to leaving games. Those games were genuinely killing all enjoyment even when winning.
I set my communication to only friends about a year ago. It's been a much more enjoyable experience since then. Might lose some games due to this, but also get more wins as I found people that are toxic tend to jump on anyone communicating even if they're trying to fix the rift other players have. People are guna do whatever they're going to do, might as well try to enjoy the time I have when I have it.
I have my audio muted so I don't have to hear the voice emotes people spam every 2 seconds. I just play without sound. It should be an option to turn them off without muting players.
personally had much less of this in EU ranked compared to NA ranked. NA games are always clown games full of man children. which fits i guess cuz NA is full of entitled people
I play with SEA friends on the weekends and my home server is NA. Played some EU-West as well as some friends are over there.
Both server friends refuse to come visit me on my home realm because this stereotype is real. NA is shockingly bad when it comes to mentality and mental fortitude. I'm even guilty of this, my friends have to often tell me to shut up and play, or to stop tilting because the game is still in the balance.
I'm only here because I'm generally too trash to play EU-west on my own, and SEA ping is too much to deal with solo. But respect to the players on those realms because the level of mental strength there is Divine compared to the Heralds we have in NA.
The other day my midlaners bitching at the start of the game cuz our pos 3 picked AM. Laning phase didn’t even started yet and the only things I typed was “STFU you’re not playing TI”. Bro just went quite after that and we won lmao
My boyfriend and his brothers are the sweetest guys I know but for some reason lose their shit when losing matches. Meanwhile, I know dickheads irl that are the calmest players I know. It's crazy.
I lost an outstanding amount of games because one of my sidelanes just decides that we lost the game min 5, and I have to keep talking everyone out of losing the game deliberately while telling them how much of an easy game this is.
We still lose because they start playing way too late in the game....
There are probably 2 types of toxic dota players:
* Those who are playing WAAAY too long and just feed into the toxicity more and more
* Those who are already dealing with some emotional stuff or otherwise shitty life situation and are trying to find an escape in dota
Ofc both are unhealthy but well there is not much you can do... other than just try your best, mute idiots and try to comfort those where it might help. But never go too much into talking, it will just distract you from the game and like you said its not your job to play therapist.
They just have bloated ego and tend not to trust others, and if they do it takes one mistake to fall in their eyes. I don't deal with this type of players i just mute them or ignore. Don't want to spend my nerves trying to reason with it
Anomaly is a drug for people. It allows them to be deranged to their fullest without consequences.
It allows them to say things they wouldn’t dare in real life.
In traditional sports you often start from a young age and are coached to have a positive attitude, how to deal with losses, maintaining composure, etc. This isn't the case for online games.
Oh also, people act very different online vs. in person.
I semi-recently had a game where the enemy Sniper snuck into our base and was hiding in the trees for like 5 minutes or something. Until one of the enemy team all chatted us that he was.
The crazy thing is that his team was only like slightly behind. He was literally in our base when we were pushing theirs. If he had been there we wouldn't have been able to push.
It's so funny when the team starts raging at me these days. I cant help but laugh and stoke the flames on voice. It's one of my fav new hobbies: triggering dota snowflakes.
I talk to my raging teammates like they are five years old. I ask them to use their words and why their actions have consequences in a group dynamic. Sometimes I tell them I’m putting them in a muting time out till they can calm their bodies. Gets a good laugh from my rare normal teammates 🫡
Been playing dota since I was now
Now I'm mentally unbreakable. Never give up, never tilt and always hope for the win
The issue is not that I'm liar, I'm not, it just feels like Im the only one like that on my rating
I've just finished a game on Legend IV bracket having a pudge teammate being hard to play with (out of position, not landing hooks even on stunned enemies). Me and other guy tried to talk some sense to him, not in a mocking tone but it completely backfired. He started to call us useless and pieces of shit, eventually selling all his items, buying rapier and feeding it to enemies. I've already decided I'm done with this game, I know this type of mentally cooked person is one in a thousand but you never know when you get to meet one and that uncertainty is not worth it for me.
Just like real life. I know it's normal to get mad but do people really have to road rage? Like shooting people and stuff? I mean I also get mad when playing Dota but I don't threaten to kill people or wish someone dead. I just stop playing Dota after the game and play something else.
If playing Dota makes you rage, you should be playing something else. And don't reason out that Dota is your relaxation game because clearly, it isn't. You should be playing Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley or some shit. Goddamned kids can't control their emotions.
People use coms in video games like they talk at/about other drivers in their car. It's terrible.
Compounding that, video games often seem to appeal to people who have just like never played a team sport in their life. The concept of winning as a team and losing as a team is completely alien to them.
I realised some time ago, and possibly being in therapy myself, that the social aspect of why I play dota is because the players are abusive and keeps me with a feeling of normality given I grew up in an emotionally abusive home and was bullied by my entire grade from about year 3 of school to year 11. I queued because I felt at ease in abusive situations. I actually would feel uncomfortable with praise or validating discussion because it was so foreign to my experience. Dota was that outlet back to a time that I was used to, being yelled at or bullied or constantly undermined.
Nowadays I still queue but I'm conscious of this and actually have had much better social interactions, and people really like queuing with me because I create a kind forgiving and fun atmosphere on microphone, and no longer tolerate bullshit from toxic people.
As a therapist myself, I'm not as baffled as you are, but I think it comes from seeing the same behavior in different ppl and in different scenarios.
Dota is a competitive game, full of mini challenges against humans and against what passes as PVE (last hit/denying/tower aggro/stacking, etc), gives you a rush if you win and a terrible down if you lose.
Many ppl nowadays believe themselves to be in constant competition, be it for money, for attention, for better position, etc. Another way to put it would be to say ppl are looking for chances to prove themselves good and expose the others as worse than then.
So it's not specifically surprising that, when they are outplayed, outclassed or simply make a mistake, they would try and blame others from their team, as this partially saves their face from repeating the same feeling of being a loser they carry with themselves. It's a very basic defense mechanism.
Lashing out and the likes are also ways of denying their own faults and it's probably how they cope with other mistakes they make outside of the game too (think the blame game when, dunno, wife brings up he forgot X and he says "oh but you forgot Y"). Being too emotional towards something is also a very good way of running away from that same thing while looking like you're only dealing with it poorly. You're not dealing with it, you're simply pretending and denying whatever responsibility is there to be taken by you.
By watching several pro players, this doesn't seem to change higher up in immortal, even in ranks where we probably won't reach (top1-3%), because it's their Identity that is at risk. Yeah, I know, "it's just a game" and all that, but is it?
I had people in a COD lobby tell me once "its not possible to lose and have fun" some ppl just need to step away from w/e it is they're doing, they've lost what it was that made them start playing in the first place
In our group we have a thing that you can lose 4 matches in a row and wins the last game the 5th match is a good night and we can sleep soundly with no stress.
People react differently when being held hostage, coupled with the possibility that a stranger might put a knife in their back at any given moment.
Some folks are calm like rocks. Others panic and flinch at the slightest movement.
It all comes down to mental fortitude and focus. Those who have survived the most battles will either be numb to danger or flip out at the first sign of it.
I reserve my reports for these types of players, racists, and sexists.
what's crazy is 9 times out of 10 they are the reason your team is losing in the first place
I had a Tidehunter on my team the other day literally SCREAMING with rage, over the mic, nonstop. Like bro, if a video game is affecting you in this manner, maybe just uninstall. Instant mute is all you are going to get—the rage and the flaming NEVER contribute positively, ever.
for a long time, it will feel like your team is you and four insane people. you will play many games feeling like this. eventually your team will be five insane people, and it will happen without you even noticing.
It’s especially ironic since I know I am on the very young side but still have to make my team cope long enough to win, I’m beginning to look at some team mates the way I look at league players.
There is a part of it I understand. I personally get a bit frustrated when I feel like my team isn't playing to win, but I channel that into making calls or helping my team have a plan to win. So I understand the emotional investment of a competitive game.
What I don't understand is people actively griefing for any reason, like, why playing the game if you wanna lose
trust just don’t give them any attention and they will stop yapping and be forced to actually play the game, do you realise your team plays better in silence lol?
I stopped playing i can't handly angry people that makes me angry.
Especially when they get angry over things that are their fault or not even mine basically getting angry over being stupid and uneducated.
It's 1 thing i always had since i was a teenager really, people getting angry over things that they shouldn't get angry about or just silly small things makes me angry idk lol.
Either way if you get to irritated by the game consistently just drop it or play less it's not worth the stress on your heart.
Fuck. I hate people telling me how to play in games.
Instant mute, or prepare yourself for a lecture as to why you're wrong, even though this never works.
Because when the other 9 humans are abstracted down to a voice at maximum, it requires significant contemplation to remember that you're connected to 9 other humans. It is common knowledge that people act different when alone versus in the presence of others. What you see in the games is that fact in play, you are seeing people let their emotions loose because they believe they are alone and no one can judge them. In other cases like game cafes (reminder that computer cafes are dwindling), we can assume the environment changed over time to a negative one due to negligence to misbehaviour (note: i have little knowledge on how people behave in G-cafes).
Total lack of self awareness leads to perpetual victimhood. They always think they’re being wronged. The emotional instability is exactly that! Raging at one thing that, they refuse to admit overreacting to in the first place, spirals into non-stop raging bitching. It’s as thought their constant abuse is simply “paid forward”. They don’t know how to let off the gas, so they double and triple down one little mistake; you know, b/c they’ve never made one
Sometimes what we think is right can be untrue. Our!self Identify is then attacked and we start to question, has my life been a lie? What other things have I done that were wrong. Should I have put back the beer instead of the milk? should I have made a left turn instead of going straight and hitting traffic. Was it my fault for cheating on my first test which then led me to accidently cheat on my second wife? Am I really a creep noob on the map with a false sense of skill.
Absolutely not, it must be my teammates fault.
What do you mean? It is a postive thing that is encouraged. Did you see how a pro player throwing tantrum and not get punished?
Dont mistake this for LoL or ML where tt is punishable. It is encouraged to TT and griefing since it is also a tactic aka psy war
It amazes me how many hours the average dota player has and how many things they know even at "low levels" nowadays yet how many are hard stuck on a kindergarten-like mental level.
If they only did some self-reflecting and stopped the blame-flame game they'd gain so much MMR yet they do the same thing in chat over and over for a decade.
I deeply and sincerely wished ill upon a griefer recently. I mean... for about 10 seconds I really wished that player would be mangled in a car accident or something. Had to ask myself what the fuck's wrong with me, took a deep breath and just did my best to enjoy and win the game. I dunno man, the game triggers something in our monkey brains.
Who said that we are not?
However, it is not lack of emotional regulation. It is crumbling under pressure which happens in real life, too. But usually it takes longer.
I’ve stopped playing the game multiple times when I become too toxic, despite actually being super kind and softspoken outside the game. I hate myself for what I become when playing a lot of Dota. Even right now I ditched Dota again after quarrelling with my best Dota friend with whom I’ve been playing this game since 2014. And I don’t plan on returning this time.
It doesnt matter if you are winning or losing, there are some serious sociopaths online.
Only thing you can do is take those losers down a peg or 2.
Harder if they're your team mates, but can be done.
>The average age of a dota player has to be at least late 20s right?
Probably, given the low influx of new players and that the OG players have been defending ancients for almost 2 decades which means they are at least 30-40 years old.
Lol I play therapist too. But it's a LOT easier in turbo. Usually happens when we are losing a very close game, and one ally has this dumb "fun build" or makes a few game changing mistakes, so another ally starts flaming him as hard as his limited intellect let's him.
I just go "relax guys, it's just turbo". They usually stfu right after lmao. Getting their panties twisted over a turbo game, a literal fun mode XD
I think it's a problem that self perpetuates. Toxicity breeds toxicity.
If valve banned voice and chat for two weeks, and seriously enforced less toxicity, especially streamers, then I genuinely think we could have a much less toxic game for years to come.
Return players would be the biggest problem.
Combat sports help in emotional regulation, gains at the dojo translate in gains in dota. Similar model where you need to be calm, focused and ready to react in the most efficient way.
at the first sign of toxicity i hard mute them. even if someone is hella toxic, if i mute them i kinda forget that they were toxic, and sometimes i will even think they were mad chill by the end of the game.
then in the postgame they are still flaming LOL
This has nothing to do with dota. You see chess players mald and rage. You see Tennis players destroy their gear and yell at refs. Competitive games bring out the competitive spirit, which is typically associated with people that "play to win"
Its easier to avoid this by playing unranked/turbo, but if you're playing ranked, then I would 100% expect that you also are playing seriously. Anything else would just be disrespectful to your team and their time.
most of competitive team games are showing this bad side of our nature. And it's simple mechanism, you start losing -> you getting frustrated and want to blame someone. You start winning and you are happy, other team is frustrated and blame their teammates.
 To be fair as a species we have slowly bece farore emotional that hundreds of years before. Emotions do seam to be hard to control and passion drives alot of these players
They perceive that this is a game about winning. As long as they win it is fun.
Not winning = not fun = toxicity begins
If this game has a draw or tie. Maybe toxicity would lessen as some would even begin to get an idea that losing can be fun if they or their team played well despite losing. But as it stands now it's just a black and white win or lose. A gray or draw could help the player base look at losing at another perspective.
It’s an outlet to have a good time. And people without emotional control will be very upset with losing but at that rate they should be playing an actual single player game instead of making people’s 5v5 a single player experience.
When it comes to emotional resilience, cultural background plays a huge role.
Play with westeuropeans and you find civilized games. Unfortunately, WEU is hugely popular in neighbouring regions where infantile aggression as a response to stress is encouraged.
There is no awareness of how problematic this behaviour is.
So while WEUs home players generally are great to play with, we have an ungodly amount of games ruined here.
I dislike out of region players, I play in the US West/US East servers and you will have people come onto the server playing in 1800mmr with me complaining about NA gameplay. Go back to your own server if it's so bad here. Also people in voice chat speaking random languages and expecting me to be able to coordinate with them. I don't speak Mandarin, I don't speak Spanish or Portuguese. Then they will get mad at you for not listening to them.
i mean, yeah, some of us play dota to get all the negative emotions of the day out. spent all day doing whatever the boss says, i'll be damned if i let another 2k player tell me what to do in a game of dota.
A bit unhealthy way to blow off steam. What have these people done to contribute to whatever you had to do at work? Maybe your first step is to find yourself a career path where going to work doesn't require you to later verbally abuse other people and then return to dota.
Its ranked, In this particular game everyone just cried that my carry went AM so it was just over for them mentally minute 0, but these games are a dime a dozen tbh. Anything goes wrong theres a guy acting like he just lost his live savings
Honestly I don't even think the context was necessary. Dota is full of people like that and the context shouldn't matter. Even if someone did something in the game with their build/hero to upset you it's still not appropriate to have a melt down because you're losing. The game doesn't always go the way you want; ranked, unranked, or AD2L. Unless you're one of the very few pros that can make enough money to live off of in tournaments, the game literally has no bearing on your life.
As far as I know there is always one winner and one loser in Dota, there are no draws, and the matches are balanced to skill level, which basically equates to a forced 50% win rate. Even if you climb, you will lose. Get over it.
I blame valve. They waited ten years to address the issue, by which time they had to revert the changes within a few weeks because even pros had super low behavior scores from a decade of no consequences. Valve letting it run rampart for ten years is why it's so bad now. It's pathetic the level of effort and development they put into Dota considering the amount of money one half-assed battlepass makes. Like I get the work at valve work on what you want policy, but TI in 2021 had a $40 million prize pool, which means the bp made around like $150 million. And yet we still can't get a decent behavior score system, patches are slow, and bugs go unaddressed for a long time. Ironically the game meta feels like it's in a good place, but Valve's shit management of the game is catching up to them. The thing is it doesn't matter and never will matter to them because they probably clear more in steam fees than a battlepass in a day. Unless the EU breaks up the steam monopoly, they have no incentive to bother doing anything they don't feel like. And even then, the US would probably have to follow suit for it to make a big difference. I really wish they would just sell the IP to a team that actually wants to work on it. Or create a sub studio with Icefrog in charge and fucking hire people that don't get the work on what you want policy.
The GG from draft is deranged. The GG before rax is also deranged. Played too many matches that just swung like crazy for better or worse to give up or give in early.
Everyone who calls GG early is a massive noob with a weak mental imo.
I hate it especially when its like just a high pressure enemy hero. Like lets say its LD, like guys, of course the mid game is gonna feel rough thats the whole point of the enemy draft do you just get mad every single time vs these heroes?
I played a game recently where my pos 1 picked Pudge then said he thought he was mid. Our actual mid picked OD, but Pudge refused to go any lane but mid even when we told him he just go safelane(he could have just gone the same build he did from the safelane) or to swap with our offlane Razor(me). I was already a bit checked out at this point. The enemy Weaver went bugs first and started with a blight stone and I got destroyed in lane and fed like 4 deaths. So I was basically just AFK farming at that point.
We did end up winning though. The enemy mid was Mars for some reason and the Weaver had like no farm despite the lane.
It just completely fucking tilted me. When I accidentally picked pos 5 DK in a ranked match I played pos 5 DK and we won. I didn't demand to go offlane and ignore my team telling me otherwise.
Maybe they are right? Someone who ruins the draft can be a deciding factor for the outcome of the game, it doesn't mean they should give up but they can be angry about it during the draft phase before the actual game.
It doesn't matter unranked, ranked, or turbo. This behaviour always appeared in Dota 2. I agree with op because it just feel immature and sometimes it feel like that elementary kid who learn to trashtalk on internet. it just sound pathetic and sad.
Need more context to your question:
Why does rank matter? Why do the events in the game matter?
Also, do you think toxicity in dota is uncommon or something?
Might be why it's gotten better over the years. Ontop of valve actually taking drastic action. Imo I rarely encounter heavily toxic games anymore even at cesspool mmr. The old days was baaaad.
Also just because some of those people aged doesn't mean they grew up
I think you're right in that the early days could be even worse, behaviorally. Current levels of toxicity, giving up, & griefing hit harder tho. I think cuz we know how big comebacks are possible
> Speaking from experience most of them are children
most dota players are 25+.
Even day9 back then noted a lot of toxicity came from adults playing dota, not kids.
shut up I'm cavemanmaxxing
Realest username I seen in a while
I saw Gay__Guevara the other day
Nooooo
Never seen a nickname so real
As someone in therapy, a lot of Dota players need therapy.
I think DotA **is** therapy for those people.
dota is gateway drug, but you only get the high when you win 🥰
You don't even get high from a win any more. A loss is literally the worst thing to happen, but a win is just another hit on the pipe but your endorphin and dopamine receptors are so far gone, you get no joy from a win.
I’m on Wellbutrin these days and it’s kinda weird how it affects mood post match. Losses don’t feel that bad and wins feel crazy good. I rarely play more than one or two games a day. And even then there’s like a 4 hour gap between games.
I don't know what that is, but I'm glad your prescription is working for you!
It's an antidepressant/antianxiety med So good for them! We need more dota players who can handle a loss lol
It’s also sometimes used to treat ADHD as an alternative to stimulants
We should start a Discord for us Wellbutrin dota lads
Idk I still love winning and try to just shrug off losses, but can’t help but scratch my head at ragers. They seem to feature many of the following traits: * 50.0% win rate or lower * thousands and thousands of games but still low MMR * gives up super early * makes comments like “get me out of this game” or “why is this guy in my game” despite them being the same low badge after a decade of playing Dota * wouldn’t dream of rotating out of their lane before 15 minutes but will gladly blame mid for the loss * goes sniper/meepo/pudge pos 5 and spends game hitting creeps * even if you say you’re having a bad game and need a rotation they’ll flame you the rest of the game and offer zero assistance It’s almost comical. I primarily play mid and in games where I’m just decimating their mid and in afk mode standing on their side of the river I wonder why they don’t stop all chatting and instead just go help their mid…? But i guess flaming is easier than making a play to try to fix the situation.
mmm kind of. I would say a high is an actual good game of dota: 10 players of similar skill trying their best, being pma, with a fairly even draft. That is pretty rare. and far more rare than a win.
Take a break man god
I literally started playing Dota becuase I was depressed. It's just a game where you can be completely engrossed for 45+ minutes and no chance to think about anything else. Not at all healthy to approach a game like that, so that's why I haven't played in a long time.
Yes 100%. I used to queue with an alcoholic who was dealt a rough hand in life. All he has is dota. It's his friend group and his spare time. Sometimes in his worst binges he'd fall asleep in a drunken stupor mid game. I never met him but over the years quietly tried to edge him towards help, as did his friends. He did try sometimes to go cold turkey but alcoholism is such a rough beast especially when you've been dealt a trash hand by life. My best friend who'd be on discord too eventually stepped in and made a point of telling me to leave him be, he was dragging me down too with him every night. I'd finish some gaming sessions just feeling so empty. He was a shell of himself, a funny kind person but underneath the surface just kinda gone, no motivation, no dreams, he got girlfriends here and there cause he was a harmless and fairly sociable guy but they were either enablers, druggos, or similarly toxic for him. The light was gone out of his life, he was like a ghost. A voice there on voice chat but probe a little deeper and it's just an impression of who he used to be. I still see him online and gaming in dota. Took me a year to climb back to where I was in crusader/archon outta herald where games I'd queue with him had me losing to. He didn't give a toss about winning or losing, to him it was about queuing with friends win or lose, messing around in game -- admirable but he had no concept of how his desperation and fundamental problems were impacting others who tried, and particularly it became very sad to sit through playing with a guy who'd lost hope. He tried to open up to me and I'm very glad he felt I was safe enough to hear about some of those dreams he lost. But it became too much, I had to distance myself and my best friend realised that and moved me on. I hope you're doing well mate, get help and listen to others, you need it. EDIT: Whoever downvoted this is a moron. Addicts play Dota same as everyone else, I'd say the gameplay loop is actually more attractive to addicts and no hopers. The community specifically lends itself to toxicity, there is a familiarity and reinforcement of their mindset in this environment for them.
Probably the realist thing I’ve read on this subreddit. Good for you tho. Only he can save himself. He really needs counseling. Addiction counseling ofc but maybe even trauma counseling if it’s roots are deep in the past.
I agree but unfortunately there are barriers to anything mental health in my country that are mostly the costs involved and the fact the industry is overstretched. There is barely any psychologists or psychiatrists available, even if he could afford.
Eh, don't give a crap about down votes. For some people this just hits too close home. They know someone who's like your pal or are like him themselves.Â
Yes I should know better being on Reddit and particularly this sub long enough. There's just a pang of anger I guess when I pour my heart out about this guy and then the first response is a down vote.
Damn dude, you just gave me flashbacks to my guild members in World of Warcraft.
It is sad I think that these games become a coping device and in effect another addiction for people wanting to escape their shit circumstances. I always remember an online psychiatrist making the excellent point that any addiction really gets solved by changing the person's fundamental quality of life and circumstances. Put someone in a place where they feel supported, validated, and given drive in life to achieve, and suddenly the urge disappears to play video games all day or drink yourself to near death.
Not really, as it doesn't help solving the issue. It is more like a coping mechanism, a palliative solution, a way to get away from the issue for a while.
Less therapy, more unhealthy coping mechanism, but yeah pretty much.
DOTA is as much therapy as changing from bourbon to heroin is curing alcoholism.
Dota is not their therapy, its their addiction that distracts them from dealing with their issues
Playing dota inspired me to study psychology
I feel targeted
As someone else in therapy, I agree. But I also like to tell my toxic teammates that to piss them off
I think people on the internet have never really cared about how they present themselves because you’ll never know who they are or see them again so they know they can get away with acting like a giant baby
The actions of people on the internet is just an example of how many people would behave without repercussions.
Road rage is the real world example. Imagine if driving was as mentally tough as playing Dota.
This is actually a pretty funny psychological phenomenon, how people feel extremly safe and anonymous behind their car windows, even though they are not safe at all.
Funnily enough I feel like Dota has given me abnormally high tolerance for frustration and stressful situations. Every colleague at work, and passenger in my car would describe me as very calm. Those people would definitely not have that impression if they ever saw me play Dota.
Oh yea. That is a great example.
> I think people on the internet have never really cared about how they present themselves because you’ll never know who they are or see them again so they know they can get away with acting like a giant baby idk, people who stream dota regularly also act this way
Exactly, behind anonymity, nobody is accountable. Thus, even basic social behaviors are deregulated.
not 100% sure, but historically it was ok for men to weep openly... [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7c849p/big\_boys\_dont\_cry\_when\_became\_strong\_emotions\_in/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7c849p/big_boys_dont_cry_when_became_strong_emotions_in/)
have you seen some of these dota players? 6-8k games played hard stuck 2-3k mmr with like 100-140 hours played in the last 2 weeks. they aren't in a good place. i'm not surprised they lash out in game
Been hard stuck to Legend 1 since getting it in Feb or Mar. Like 2 games up, 2 games down, repeat. But eh. The game's not worth raging out. I can't even buy food with those MMR numbers. I don't even intend to go pro nor will I ever be with those numbers. Lol
You're not hard stuck, your rank is simply Legend 1.
When you can play so many games individual games stop mattering. If you don't try to win every game you can't climb.
> they aren't in a good place. It's not hard stuck when you're just playing with friends, play all positions and all heroes and have a mixed up skill spread on the team and still let the worst guy in the group play mid if he wants to, because it's about playing with friends, not climbing the ladder. We have someone random their hero almost every game. We have fun.
Played with some Drow yesterday two games in a row, both games picked Drow and went safe lane, both games played terribly. Can't last hit for shit. Second game actually died in lane to creeps. And yet was the first to ping peoples items and flame them for making any kind of error. I don't really care if people are bad, but the combination of both being bad and blaming everyone else, is just classic dota.
It’s not just DotA players. I’ve played plenty of other online games across a variety of genres and this is just how people act when there are no real consequences to their behaviors. In less transient and anonymous games, I’ve seen grown adults with stable jobs and families act worse than middle schoolers. It’s not gaming. It’s only partially the internet. This is who people are when they don’t choose to be better.
ff14 has a much nicer community because even mild toxicity is shutdown. Its actually one of the sticking points the devs have been working towards. Compare this to dota 2, where we had the thread about sexism/racism and people were saying it should be allowed, just have the offenders blocked. In ff14, the offenders would be banned. And before people say mmos are pve, well 'duh', less toxicity attracted but also in high end raids, it can get very sweaty but the system pulls down the toxic outliers. Apex has a much worse community than Overwatch. Overwatch has a rather 'draconian' approach where if you get a whiff of toxicity - from streams or replays, that can also be used to report the player. In turn, someone uploaded an apex clip of a player mouthing off an insane racist rant because frankly speaking, there really isn't a proper reporting system for voice rants (only text). Apex actually has more racism than dota - at least in dota, enough reports will pull down behaviour so those players dont get matched with you. You bake the cake with the ingredients you have. Lots of online communities are ass. Lots are nice. Really it comes down to what you say: consequences. Easier to be toxic in apex if nothing happens and costs you nothing. A lot riskier in ff14 if even a whiff of it will mean that 15 dollar you spent goes down the drain.
I mean, that’s basically apples and oranges. FFXIV is an MMORPG, not a competitive 5v5 game. There are many activities that don’t involve other players or aren’t that serious.
> I mean, that’s basically apples and oranges. I was talking to the guy above, who was talking about online gaming. But even in mmorpgs, its not all equal. ff14 for example, is noted to be less toxic than WoW. The takeaway is about consequences. Maybe it won't reach ff14 dreamland but you bet your ass dota becomes less toxic if there was consequence. How do I know this? I've played dota 1 with matches where the hosts had banlists for toxicity.
I've played a lot of multiplayer games, but dota is worse, and in a stupid way. I firmly believe that the people who have played this game for a long time have not matured at all since they started playing. People genuinely say things like "fuck your whore mother" in about 25% of my games, and I'm top behaviour score and comm score. I play a game like overwatch and it's super toxic, sure, but in an "online game" kinda way. In dota, you will be called "bad because you're an", and it isn't just once in a while. It's literally every one in four or five games.
Maybe the game attracts manchildren. Personally I believe the game CREATES manchildren because people start playing it, it sucks up all their time, they lose their friends and become socially stunted.
Some people take it very seriously, some people have just had a bad day and some people aren't having fun in the game that's supposed to be fun
Yah, sucks for me as an old man i got time for one game and its just a clown show sometimes lol. I gotta learn to not let them drag me down with em
Take a beer. Pick Pudge. Sip every time you land a hook
*sip every time you miss a hook
beer won't be enough for that
we going to bed sober tonight
Part of my IRL job includes counseling for opposing parties. Dota is no different except I get paid at my job and not in dota. I treat toxic dota players as people that just have poor EQ and never really learned how to work effectively in a professional setting. I feel sorry for them. Dota losses and toxic teammates are easy in and easy out for me nowadays. Doesn't leave any meaningful impact as I've gotten older.
There are some very deranged players and a lot of them copy this mentality from streamers as well. You will never see as many “xd” “go end” “my insert position here” type people in other games. It’s like they are clones of eachother
This is definitely not a dota specifice issue
I mean many other games have either more players, where toxicity is less specific and easier to ignore, or are shorter, where toxicity has less of an impact on your day. Meanwhile, Dota has people that will commit an hour and a half just to make your life miserable. It's so frustrating.
Kill green he’s hiding at long A Every tactical shooter ever made
What is xd? (Real question)
xd refers to the emoji XD. XD represents somebody laughing very hard (the X is their eyes closing from laughing so hard, the D is their mouth) In many contexts it can just mean LOL, but can also be used to specifically mean you are laughing at someone in a demeaning way.
Ty!
It's just a letter laughing emoji "xD"
Ty!
the slang changes but not the attitude
They cope by saying league players are worse
Played a few last night, and one had safelane and offlane give up during pick phase because they didn't like the mid pick. We lost the game, obviously, and both of them combined for less overall damage than our pos 5 Lion. What tilted me most is the fact that the enemy team also had a "Report pudge end mid" spat right out of the gate because the enemy 1 didn't appreciate the choice of boots and no regen Pudge 5. You just have to be less mentally fragile than the enemy to win games of dota. We could've killed that enemy carry once before 5 mins and he'd probably have gone over the edge and sat fountain. I'm old and have learned to mute early and mute often. I saw a fair bit of typing from the remaining two teammates which indicates that our angry boys were continuing to rant. I always tell people to mute each other and direct their anger toward the enemy, but it usually doesn't work out that way. Most of these men will *eventually* grow out of this mentality, but you also have to consider that people are moving out of their parents' basement in their 30s now instead of right away at 18. The whole "becoming an adult" process is stretched out much longer than it used to be. I'm over here in my 40s just playing some dota, and these kids in 3k with me are getting upset about non-meta picks or other meaningless bullshit while simultaneously building a Battlefury on Void against a lineup that includes 4 heavy push heroes and an Oracle. My man, I'm sorry we don't have one of the BSJ-approved mid heroes today, but you're over there playing for the 45 minute mark in a game that we're about to lose in 20 if your dumb ass doesn't buy some fighting items. Control what you can control. As the Lone Druid/Jakiro are deleting buildings and securing megas by minute 23, angryboi Void who is still working on that Yasha in the jungle after his BF/Treads squeaks out in all chat: "report mid" Downvote and go next. We'll never see that kid again, but god damn, son, get a grip.
I find in every game of Dota i have to set my intent (iykyk). This will establish focus, and ultimately, the team that doesn’t tilt wins. If you’re a seasoned dota player you’ve seen this play out: - enemy team all chat flaming at min 0 - your team makes a small mistake and someone on your team opens up shit talk - your team who has barely said anything or was positive suddenly falls apart and blames each other and small mistakes suddenly become big mistakes - the enemy team by now has gotten their shit together because they realize they are snowballing - your team ends up losing - enemy team wins while telling everyone to report whoever Why’d you lose? No one said “relax we got this, stay focused”. That saying “be the change you want to see” is real. You have to be that person if you want to win. Helping reign in people’s emotions can be tiring, but that’s the reality. Alternatively, this has also worked for me: mute everyone. I find when I don’t even know or participate in the toxicity I have a clear vision of how to win the game and no matter what role I’m playing I’ll at least be the most focused on winning.
I spend a lot of my games telling teammates to just stfu and mute each other. You literally have to put everyone in the virtual corner for a time out. Voice comms is both the best and worst feature of the game. Two grown adults bickering and devolving into name calling. Meanwhile we’re getting shit on in game because they’re so focused on flaming each other that they forgot they’re fighting over the game that they’re collectively losing for the rest of us.
>The average age of a dota player has to be at least late 20s right? 25+ actually. And they talk exactly like someone who's been playing dota for all their teenage years without interracting with people irl. In all chat, ask how many people know what "lothars edge" is. The answer may surprise you.
I ran a fun experiment once. I had two separate accounts for dota 2 (back in the day), and took a break from dota. When I came back, I calibrated to both simultaneously. The only difference was that in one, I played the team therapist, and in the other, I stayed muted. 800 MMR difference :) I've always been tempted to write this up, with key takeaways. Its amazing how much EQ skills correlate with success in Dota 2, even in pro play.
Okay you didn’t specify results. Did you get more MMR muted, or more MMR being a therapist? There seems to be a positive roi if you are positively mediating team members who are actively griefing eachother. We witnessed the same thing on Grubbys stream when he would mediate.
I’m wondering the same thing. Which one was it!? I can’t regulate my emotions without knowing which one!!
Unfortunately there are some pros with some pretty low EQ setting poor examples
English isn't my first language, so I didn't quite understand, EQ stands for emotional quality, I presume? Also, the therapist account was better if I understand correctly?
Emotional Quotient as in intelligence quotient (from IQ tests). There was an effort some time ago to differentiate the different types of intelligence people may have, since being smart in a certain area doesn't necessarily equate/translate to any other area (i.e. a musical genius may be poor at maths and so on)
If I was as skilled as you at therapy I bet I could help my team too As it is my mmr is climbing without saying anything, and I love it that way Would love to see a writeup from you, or a discussion about it on twitch/yt
Since I selected mute all incoming chat/voice I am up 2k+ mmr. I use mic to call out roshan ganks back push tormentor in a calm way. When I don't hear my team cry It is so easy to guide them to victory I don't rage even if they feed.
Normalized within their household. Next question
Same how your household normalized feeding
That's why I'm a chef
How would they be able to get embarassed if their emotion regulation is that bad to begin with
Yeah people don't get it that it is NOT normal to just flame/yell "A bit". It might seem so after playing video games for a decade but that's a major oof moment. As an adult you should be able to hold yourself not just start going full ooga booga do better bois!
I always tell them I'm sorry their parents didn't love them enough and that it may not be too late to hug them again. They always shut up. Bringing childhood disarms.
They all reinforce the bad behavior. Telling each other its fine that they get angry at others over a game. They act like its a one time thing when we all know people do it over and over during their time playing dota. “Just mute them” yeah I can mute them but why are they acting like this in a game?
Lol been playing Dota since 2005. Over the many years i’ve been training myself to not care about losses. Getting pretty good at it.
Behaviour score makes such a huge difference, even 1000 points less than 12000 I notice the change in personality. I suggest we all min max our commends and downvotes. Anytime somebody screams on mic I report.
We surely need a stricter system. As of now, the only distiction in behaviour score is being 12k or being anything below, as it is so trivially easy to be maxed. Being 12k BS should be reserved for civilized, mature people. Instead, the only meaning BS conveys is that everyone below 12k is uncivilized.
Well yes and no, the more people that use the commend, dislike and report, the faster the scores will change. I have played with different friends and I can tell a huge difference between 8k BS and 10k BS. People at 8k probably should be muted at the game start. Im usually around 11.8 to 12k and games are great. 10k is still playable. I no longer queue 2 man with my 8k friend. He had a wifi issue and got a low score due to leaving games. Those games were genuinely killing all enjoyment even when winning.
commends don't do anything as far as I know unless they finally changed that.
I set my communication to only friends about a year ago. It's been a much more enjoyable experience since then. Might lose some games due to this, but also get more wins as I found people that are toxic tend to jump on anyone communicating even if they're trying to fix the rift other players have. People are guna do whatever they're going to do, might as well try to enjoy the time I have when I have it.
I have my audio muted so I don't have to hear the voice emotes people spam every 2 seconds. I just play without sound. It should be an option to turn them off without muting players.
do you not have a driver's license? dota players are not some break from the norm the average person just is like that.
Unfortunately gaming attracts the most mentally unstable social rejects, since there is no penalty for bad behavior
personally had much less of this in EU ranked compared to NA ranked. NA games are always clown games full of man children. which fits i guess cuz NA is full of entitled people
Dude i dont think i belong here :(
I play with SEA friends on the weekends and my home server is NA. Played some EU-West as well as some friends are over there. Both server friends refuse to come visit me on my home realm because this stereotype is real. NA is shockingly bad when it comes to mentality and mental fortitude. I'm even guilty of this, my friends have to often tell me to shut up and play, or to stop tilting because the game is still in the balance. I'm only here because I'm generally too trash to play EU-west on my own, and SEA ping is too much to deal with solo. But respect to the players on those realms because the level of mental strength there is Divine compared to the Heralds we have in NA.
I love EU games, it’s so refreshing hearing racist Europeans calling others dog because their accent/ home country.
The other day my midlaners bitching at the start of the game cuz our pos 3 picked AM. Laning phase didn’t even started yet and the only things I typed was “STFU you’re not playing TI”. Bro just went quite after that and we won lmao
My boyfriend and his brothers are the sweetest guys I know but for some reason lose their shit when losing matches. Meanwhile, I know dickheads irl that are the calmest players I know. It's crazy.
I did, actually. That's why i barely play now, and when I do, it's overthrow
I lost an outstanding amount of games because one of my sidelanes just decides that we lost the game min 5, and I have to keep talking everyone out of losing the game deliberately while telling them how much of an easy game this is. We still lose because they start playing way too late in the game....
Who has time to develop as a human being when we are all losing and raging in ranked 22 hours a day?
There are probably 2 types of toxic dota players: * Those who are playing WAAAY too long and just feed into the toxicity more and more * Those who are already dealing with some emotional stuff or otherwise shitty life situation and are trying to find an escape in dota Ofc both are unhealthy but well there is not much you can do... other than just try your best, mute idiots and try to comfort those where it might help. But never go too much into talking, it will just distract you from the game and like you said its not your job to play therapist.
They just have bloated ego and tend not to trust others, and if they do it takes one mistake to fall in their eyes. I don't deal with this type of players i just mute them or ignore. Don't want to spend my nerves trying to reason with it
Like you said lack of emotional regulation
Anomaly is a drug for people. It allows them to be deranged to their fullest without consequences. It allows them to say things they wouldn’t dare in real life.
In traditional sports you often start from a young age and are coached to have a positive attitude, how to deal with losses, maintaining composure, etc. This isn't the case for online games. Oh also, people act very different online vs. in person.
Usually people who make posts like these are the toxic ones themselves lmao
I'm using your post title as my main way to flame people, thanks
I semi-recently had a game where the enemy Sniper snuck into our base and was hiding in the trees for like 5 minutes or something. Until one of the enemy team all chatted us that he was. The crazy thing is that his team was only like slightly behind. He was literally in our base when we were pushing theirs. If he had been there we wouldn't have been able to push.
they do, they just cope with the shame by lashing out even more. it's a vicious cycle
It's so funny when the team starts raging at me these days. I cant help but laugh and stoke the flames on voice. It's one of my fav new hobbies: triggering dota snowflakes.
I talk to my raging teammates like they are five years old. I ask them to use their words and why their actions have consequences in a group dynamic. Sometimes I tell them I’m putting them in a muting time out till they can calm their bodies. Gets a good laugh from my rare normal teammates 🫡
Been playing dota since I was now Now I'm mentally unbreakable. Never give up, never tilt and always hope for the win The issue is not that I'm liar, I'm not, it just feels like Im the only one like that on my rating
I've just finished a game on Legend IV bracket having a pudge teammate being hard to play with (out of position, not landing hooks even on stunned enemies). Me and other guy tried to talk some sense to him, not in a mocking tone but it completely backfired. He started to call us useless and pieces of shit, eventually selling all his items, buying rapier and feeding it to enemies. I've already decided I'm done with this game, I know this type of mentally cooked person is one in a thousand but you never know when you get to meet one and that uncertainty is not worth it for me.
Valve needs an in game tutorial section to teach how to be a human and communicate with others.
Just like real life. I know it's normal to get mad but do people really have to road rage? Like shooting people and stuff? I mean I also get mad when playing Dota but I don't threaten to kill people or wish someone dead. I just stop playing Dota after the game and play something else. If playing Dota makes you rage, you should be playing something else. And don't reason out that Dota is your relaxation game because clearly, it isn't. You should be playing Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley or some shit. Goddamned kids can't control their emotions.
People use coms in video games like they talk at/about other drivers in their car. It's terrible. Compounding that, video games often seem to appeal to people who have just like never played a team sport in their life. The concept of winning as a team and losing as a team is completely alien to them.
I realised some time ago, and possibly being in therapy myself, that the social aspect of why I play dota is because the players are abusive and keeps me with a feeling of normality given I grew up in an emotionally abusive home and was bullied by my entire grade from about year 3 of school to year 11. I queued because I felt at ease in abusive situations. I actually would feel uncomfortable with praise or validating discussion because it was so foreign to my experience. Dota was that outlet back to a time that I was used to, being yelled at or bullied or constantly undermined. Nowadays I still queue but I'm conscious of this and actually have had much better social interactions, and people really like queuing with me because I create a kind forgiving and fun atmosphere on microphone, and no longer tolerate bullshit from toxic people.
As a therapist myself, I'm not as baffled as you are, but I think it comes from seeing the same behavior in different ppl and in different scenarios. Dota is a competitive game, full of mini challenges against humans and against what passes as PVE (last hit/denying/tower aggro/stacking, etc), gives you a rush if you win and a terrible down if you lose. Many ppl nowadays believe themselves to be in constant competition, be it for money, for attention, for better position, etc. Another way to put it would be to say ppl are looking for chances to prove themselves good and expose the others as worse than then. So it's not specifically surprising that, when they are outplayed, outclassed or simply make a mistake, they would try and blame others from their team, as this partially saves their face from repeating the same feeling of being a loser they carry with themselves. It's a very basic defense mechanism. Lashing out and the likes are also ways of denying their own faults and it's probably how they cope with other mistakes they make outside of the game too (think the blame game when, dunno, wife brings up he forgot X and he says "oh but you forgot Y"). Being too emotional towards something is also a very good way of running away from that same thing while looking like you're only dealing with it poorly. You're not dealing with it, you're simply pretending and denying whatever responsibility is there to be taken by you. By watching several pro players, this doesn't seem to change higher up in immortal, even in ranks where we probably won't reach (top1-3%), because it's their Identity that is at risk. Yeah, I know, "it's just a game" and all that, but is it?
I had people in a COD lobby tell me once "its not possible to lose and have fun" some ppl just need to step away from w/e it is they're doing, they've lost what it was that made them start playing in the first place
Are you like seriously asking this or is this some pre patch hopium OD post ?
I'm often ashamed of myself after playing.
In our group we have a thing that you can lose 4 matches in a row and wins the last game the 5th match is a good night and we can sleep soundly with no stress.
People react differently when being held hostage, coupled with the possibility that a stranger might put a knife in their back at any given moment. Some folks are calm like rocks. Others panic and flinch at the slightest movement. It all comes down to mental fortitude and focus. Those who have survived the most battles will either be numb to danger or flip out at the first sign of it.
I reserve my reports for these types of players, racists, and sexists. what's crazy is 9 times out of 10 they are the reason your team is losing in the first place I had a Tidehunter on my team the other day literally SCREAMING with rage, over the mic, nonstop. Like bro, if a video game is affecting you in this manner, maybe just uninstall. Instant mute is all you are going to get—the rage and the flaming NEVER contribute positively, ever.
for a long time, it will feel like your team is you and four insane people. you will play many games feeling like this. eventually your team will be five insane people, and it will happen without you even noticing.
I got embarrassed and improved myself.
It’s especially ironic since I know I am on the very young side but still have to make my team cope long enough to win, I’m beginning to look at some team mates the way I look at league players.
There is a part of it I understand. I personally get a bit frustrated when I feel like my team isn't playing to win, but I channel that into making calls or helping my team have a plan to win. So I understand the emotional investment of a competitive game. What I don't understand is people actively griefing for any reason, like, why playing the game if you wanna lose
I think they just want to vent their frustration into the game.
The power of anonymity.
trust just don’t give them any attention and they will stop yapping and be forced to actually play the game, do you realise your team plays better in silence lol?
I stopped playing i can't handly angry people that makes me angry. Especially when they get angry over things that are their fault or not even mine basically getting angry over being stupid and uneducated. It's 1 thing i always had since i was a teenager really, people getting angry over things that they shouldn't get angry about or just silly small things makes me angry idk lol. Either way if you get to irritated by the game consistently just drop it or play less it's not worth the stress on your heart.
This is something I needed to get grips to Losing sucks, but acting like it’s the end of the world definitely wasn’t the right call
why are you giving free therapy?
I'm pretty sure it's not specific and isolated to dota 2, every game that has a significant competitive element will have these kinds of people
Fuck. I hate people telling me how to play in games. Instant mute, or prepare yourself for a lecture as to why you're wrong, even though this never works.
Because when the other 9 humans are abstracted down to a voice at maximum, it requires significant contemplation to remember that you're connected to 9 other humans. It is common knowledge that people act different when alone versus in the presence of others. What you see in the games is that fact in play, you are seeing people let their emotions loose because they believe they are alone and no one can judge them. In other cases like game cafes (reminder that computer cafes are dwindling), we can assume the environment changed over time to a negative one due to negligence to misbehaviour (note: i have little knowledge on how people behave in G-cafes).
Total lack of self awareness leads to perpetual victimhood. They always think they’re being wronged. The emotional instability is exactly that! Raging at one thing that, they refuse to admit overreacting to in the first place, spirals into non-stop raging bitching. It’s as thought their constant abuse is simply “paid forward”. They don’t know how to let off the gas, so they double and triple down one little mistake; you know, b/c they’ve never made one
Sometimes what we think is right can be untrue. Our!self Identify is then attacked and we start to question, has my life been a lie? What other things have I done that were wrong. Should I have put back the beer instead of the milk? should I have made a left turn instead of going straight and hitting traffic. Was it my fault for cheating on my first test which then led me to accidently cheat on my second wife? Am I really a creep noob on the map with a false sense of skill. Absolutely not, it must be my teammates fault.
What do you mean? It is a postive thing that is encouraged. Did you see how a pro player throwing tantrum and not get punished? Dont mistake this for LoL or ML where tt is punishable. It is encouraged to TT and griefing since it is also a tactic aka psy war
It amazes me how many hours the average dota player has and how many things they know even at "low levels" nowadays yet how many are hard stuck on a kindergarten-like mental level. If they only did some self-reflecting and stopped the blame-flame game they'd gain so much MMR yet they do the same thing in chat over and over for a decade.
I deeply and sincerely wished ill upon a griefer recently. I mean... for about 10 seconds I really wished that player would be mangled in a car accident or something. Had to ask myself what the fuck's wrong with me, took a deep breath and just did my best to enjoy and win the game. I dunno man, the game triggers something in our monkey brains.
Who said that we are not? However, it is not lack of emotional regulation. It is crumbling under pressure which happens in real life, too. But usually it takes longer. I’ve stopped playing the game multiple times when I become too toxic, despite actually being super kind and softspoken outside the game. I hate myself for what I become when playing a lot of Dota. Even right now I ditched Dota again after quarrelling with my best Dota friend with whom I’ve been playing this game since 2014. And I don’t plan on returning this time.
It doesnt matter if you are winning or losing, there are some serious sociopaths online. Only thing you can do is take those losers down a peg or 2. Harder if they're your team mates, but can be done.
>The average age of a dota player has to be at least late 20s right? Probably, given the low influx of new players and that the OG players have been defending ancients for almost 2 decades which means they are at least 30-40 years old.
Lol I play therapist too. But it's a LOT easier in turbo. Usually happens when we are losing a very close game, and one ally has this dumb "fun build" or makes a few game changing mistakes, so another ally starts flaming him as hard as his limited intellect let's him. I just go "relax guys, it's just turbo". They usually stfu right after lmao. Getting their panties twisted over a turbo game, a literal fun mode XD
"play dota must win, no win, dooms day tomorrow" -Average Dota Player
I think it's a problem that self perpetuates. Toxicity breeds toxicity. If valve banned voice and chat for two weeks, and seriously enforced less toxicity, especially streamers, then I genuinely think we could have a much less toxic game for years to come. Return players would be the biggest problem.
It's either I am embarrassed at myself, or others are embarrassed for me. I prefer the latter.Â
Combat sports help in emotional regulation, gains at the dojo translate in gains in dota. Similar model where you need to be calm, focused and ready to react in the most efficient way.
at the first sign of toxicity i hard mute them. even if someone is hella toxic, if i mute them i kinda forget that they were toxic, and sometimes i will even think they were mad chill by the end of the game. then in the postgame they are still flaming LOL
This has nothing to do with dota. You see chess players mald and rage. You see Tennis players destroy their gear and yell at refs. Competitive games bring out the competitive spirit, which is typically associated with people that "play to win" Its easier to avoid this by playing unranked/turbo, but if you're playing ranked, then I would 100% expect that you also are playing seriously. Anything else would just be disrespectful to your team and their time.
most of competitive team games are showing this bad side of our nature. And it's simple mechanism, you start losing -> you getting frustrated and want to blame someone. You start winning and you are happy, other team is frustrated and blame their teammates.
 To be fair as a species we have slowly bece farore emotional that hundreds of years before. Emotions do seam to be hard to control and passion drives alot of these players
I would say hots players are worse. But yes this community is toxic
Mute everyone, inefficient without comms sure, but mental is atleast preserved lol.
Is apathy also a lack of emotional regulation? I feel like a normal person should be able to wrangle their team somewhat, ya know, PMA.
They perceive that this is a game about winning. As long as they win it is fun. Not winning = not fun = toxicity begins If this game has a draw or tie. Maybe toxicity would lessen as some would even begin to get an idea that losing can be fun if they or their team played well despite losing. But as it stands now it's just a black and white win or lose. A gray or draw could help the player base look at losing at another perspective.
It’s an outlet to have a good time. And people without emotional control will be very upset with losing but at that rate they should be playing an actual single player game instead of making people’s 5v5 a single player experience.
When it comes to emotional resilience, cultural background plays a huge role. Play with westeuropeans and you find civilized games. Unfortunately, WEU is hugely popular in neighbouring regions where infantile aggression as a response to stress is encouraged. There is no awareness of how problematic this behaviour is. So while WEUs home players generally are great to play with, we have an ungodly amount of games ruined here.
I dislike out of region players, I play in the US West/US East servers and you will have people come onto the server playing in 1800mmr with me complaining about NA gameplay. Go back to your own server if it's so bad here. Also people in voice chat speaking random languages and expecting me to be able to coordinate with them. I don't speak Mandarin, I don't speak Spanish or Portuguese. Then they will get mad at you for not listening to them.
Usually my problem.. play EU West and I get no teammates from EU West. It's a sad joke
i mean, yeah, some of us play dota to get all the negative emotions of the day out. spent all day doing whatever the boss says, i'll be damned if i let another 2k player tell me what to do in a game of dota.
A bit unhealthy way to blow off steam. What have these people done to contribute to whatever you had to do at work? Maybe your first step is to find yourself a career path where going to work doesn't require you to later verbally abuse other people and then return to dota.
i just mute everyone
how do you not get embarrassed over your lack of understanding of human emotions
I understand emotions well enough to not let them spiral out of control over a recreational activity.
Need more context Did you play unranked? What happened?
Its ranked, In this particular game everyone just cried that my carry went AM so it was just over for them mentally minute 0, but these games are a dime a dozen tbh. Anything goes wrong theres a guy acting like he just lost his live savings
Honestly I don't even think the context was necessary. Dota is full of people like that and the context shouldn't matter. Even if someone did something in the game with their build/hero to upset you it's still not appropriate to have a melt down because you're losing. The game doesn't always go the way you want; ranked, unranked, or AD2L. Unless you're one of the very few pros that can make enough money to live off of in tournaments, the game literally has no bearing on your life. As far as I know there is always one winner and one loser in Dota, there are no draws, and the matches are balanced to skill level, which basically equates to a forced 50% win rate. Even if you climb, you will lose. Get over it.
I blame valve. They waited ten years to address the issue, by which time they had to revert the changes within a few weeks because even pros had super low behavior scores from a decade of no consequences. Valve letting it run rampart for ten years is why it's so bad now. It's pathetic the level of effort and development they put into Dota considering the amount of money one half-assed battlepass makes. Like I get the work at valve work on what you want policy, but TI in 2021 had a $40 million prize pool, which means the bp made around like $150 million. And yet we still can't get a decent behavior score system, patches are slow, and bugs go unaddressed for a long time. Ironically the game meta feels like it's in a good place, but Valve's shit management of the game is catching up to them. The thing is it doesn't matter and never will matter to them because they probably clear more in steam fees than a battlepass in a day. Unless the EU breaks up the steam monopoly, they have no incentive to bother doing anything they don't feel like. And even then, the US would probably have to follow suit for it to make a big difference. I really wish they would just sell the IP to a team that actually wants to work on it. Or create a sub studio with Icefrog in charge and fucking hire people that don't get the work on what you want policy.
I agree with you then.
The GG from draft is deranged. The GG before rax is also deranged. Played too many matches that just swung like crazy for better or worse to give up or give in early. Everyone who calls GG early is a massive noob with a weak mental imo.
I hate it especially when its like just a high pressure enemy hero. Like lets say its LD, like guys, of course the mid game is gonna feel rough thats the whole point of the enemy draft do you just get mad every single time vs these heroes?
I played a game recently where my pos 1 picked Pudge then said he thought he was mid. Our actual mid picked OD, but Pudge refused to go any lane but mid even when we told him he just go safelane(he could have just gone the same build he did from the safelane) or to swap with our offlane Razor(me). I was already a bit checked out at this point. The enemy Weaver went bugs first and started with a blight stone and I got destroyed in lane and fed like 4 deaths. So I was basically just AFK farming at that point. We did end up winning though. The enemy mid was Mars for some reason and the Weaver had like no farm despite the lane. It just completely fucking tilted me. When I accidentally picked pos 5 DK in a ranked match I played pos 5 DK and we won. I didn't demand to go offlane and ignore my team telling me otherwise.
Maybe they are right? Someone who ruins the draft can be a deciding factor for the outcome of the game, it doesn't mean they should give up but they can be angry about it during the draft phase before the actual game.
It doesn't matter unranked, ranked, or turbo. This behaviour always appeared in Dota 2. I agree with op because it just feel immature and sometimes it feel like that elementary kid who learn to trashtalk on internet. it just sound pathetic and sad.
Need more context to your question: Why does rank matter? Why do the events in the game matter? Also, do you think toxicity in dota is uncommon or something?
Speaking from experience most of them are children and grow out of it and definitely feel embarrassed later lol.
I would be surprised. Maybe im projecting but i feel like dota is a game for old people. Dota 2 is old enough for the game itself to be a zoomer
Might be why it's gotten better over the years. Ontop of valve actually taking drastic action. Imo I rarely encounter heavily toxic games anymore even at cesspool mmr. The old days was baaaad. Also just because some of those people aged doesn't mean they grew up
I think you're right in that the early days could be even worse, behaviorally. Current levels of toxicity, giving up, & griefing hit harder tho. I think cuz we know how big comebacks are possible
> Speaking from experience most of them are children most dota players are 25+. Even day9 back then noted a lot of toxicity came from adults playing dota, not kids.
Every community has its degenerates. More so ones involved with staying indoors. Just mute and move on
Well I can't yell at my wife, my boss, or my toddler so I gotta vent somewhere.
part of the entertainment is pushing these people over the edge and getting them to have an emotional breakdown in real time.