It is impossible to get a fair match where people on your team and the opposing team are of a similar skill level. Perusing the group list makes it easy to find multiple 6 stacks of people intentionally throwing games to lower their SR. Once they’re done lowering their SR, they destroy match making for people in Bronze. I’m not asking for magical transportation out of Bronze, I just want a fair opportunity to play against people of my skill level. I’d like to feel like the reason I lose games is because I didn’t do enough to turn it into a win. However, the way games go now is that I always have to wonder if my wins were carried by a teammate that didn’t belong in Bronze, and my losses were carried by the same on the opponent’s team. Sometimes smurfs are completely obvious, level 35 accounts grouped up, and wiping the floor with our team.
I’ve submitted hundreds of reports for these people in throwing groups, yet there are always plenty of people to fill the groups. Every single day Blizzard encourages me that they’ve taken action against the accounts I’ve reported, but the flow is endless.
Some times when I tell people they’ve been reported for throwing, they friend request me and prove that they are truly despicable people with no regard for the players whose game they are damaging. One thrower told me in the midst of his abusive chat that the only way he could have an SR in low bronze was if he literally stood still and did nothing. The pervasive opinion of throwers is that no one actually belongs in Bronze, so it doesn’t matter if they throw down to that level and destroy these games.
I have worked hard, watched videos, studied my own recordings and did everything I know how to do in order to climb out of bronze. Nothing works, and it doesn’t matter how much effort I put forth, there isn’t a reward at the end. I win a few games and get encouraged, only to run into clear obvious smurfs for the next 3-5 games to erase all my progress.
It wouldn’t be hard to monitor the group titles for this type of behavior. They use THROW, DERANK, ROAD TO BRONZE, and other similar titles to entice people to join them. They may feel that grouping up into 6 stacks is absolving them of the responsibility for ruining people’s games, but they completely ignore the consequences of what happens after they have an invalid SR.
If someone is reported for gameplay sabotage, and action is taken against the perpetrator account, the results of the game(s) where they disrupted play should be cancelled. The ill gotten SR gains and losses should be erased. People should be rewarded for reporting violating behavior. Reporting should be encouraged. People who have been reported should be notified and required to respond to make a case for themselves as to whether the report is valid. Just having to defend themselves might make it so they reconsider their actions and stop without having to be reprimanded.
I’ve even seen people twitch streaming and bragging about how they threw down to bronze only to climb back up to where they were before. People do it to laugh at the low skilled players tilt, or to make themselves feel better about how awesome they are at the game.
Please work to end this toxic environment. I want to play comp and get better.