This is probably a stupid question but, I play mainly ranked and to get better at the game. But deranking and losses never really affected me past the loss. By the time I start the next game and the first fight gets going I’ve forgotten about the loss.
As such, I don’t really understand what ranked anxiety is, so if someone could educate me that’d be great
a single loss isnt really a big deal for most people, the problem is when you hit a nasty losing streak and youre trying your hardest just to get one win
in these situations, you can have a lot of anxiety because the stakes are ever increasing, and the threat of deranking could be looming over your head
Yeah I forgot to mention loss streaks, but I’ve gone on huge loss streaks too but still kept playing. As I said, I forget about most losses once the next game has started. And even when I feel a loss a lot, it doesn’t prevent me playing another match
Ranked anxiety is not about losses really.
Its about being harassed for doing poorly (or sometimes doing well but still getting harassed) or being forced out of your safe picks.
id say from how i used to play back in 2016, it was the fear of a loss streak and deranking.
at first you dont really care if you win or lose because your just playing but as time goes on, maybe you start trying to improve and your rank goes up. then if you start losing matches it can be a lil extra tilting.
im lucky that i got over that but its a fairly common thing because people tie their improvement to the in the moment SR/rank. when really sometimes you just get unlucky
ive lost matches in gold and plat before, sometimes ive even gone 5-5 while playing my best heroes
it happens
but i can say that “now” with 5 years of experience in masters, before then i thought the same thing the average player did.
its silly but thats what it was for me, and most of the people i talked too.
Doesn’t that happen in today’s Unranked too? Last I checked Unranked was almost, if not more sweaty than Ranked.
Yeah I understand how MMR systems work so I always knew that whatever rank you’re at is not 100% what you are, but near to it. But I guess that knowledge is the exception rather than the norm
Ranked means there’s actual stakes. Actual stakes make people more likely to flame. It also just feels bad to be on losing streaks if you get there.
Yeah I understand that it feels bad to lose, and I feel that myself, I just never understood how someone would shy away from the gamemode entirely for it.
Like if you’re here to have a good time and chill yeah ranked isn’t for you but the way some people talk about playing in Unranked and how they’re tryharding there confuses me on why they don’t just play Ranked. Heck, the more players you have for a single mode the better the matchmaking gets automatically
It definitely depends on a person’s mentality. I for one, take imaginary numbers in a video game very seriously, and it can definitely be discouraging and annoying when you lose an easily winnable game and get hit with that “DEFEAT”. However, QP feels much more silly in comparison (mentally, if not literally), and can feel much less punishing.
I dont care about winning or losing, but i dont like drag people down with me.
It’s called being soft. MidniteMN came back to playing COD the other day said it when she saw how stats have been removed and other things in the game showing how a player did after a match.
It’s all in the head
I don’t care about wins or losses. I’m not fazed by any toxicity. I know what I’m capable of and don’t need to improve myself for the rank I’m currently at. I log in to Overwatch 2 to have some fun and press Q.
There are people that are the complete opposite of what I just wrote. It’s not their fault and nobody should be harassed for it. If they find other modes more enjoyable than Competitive then let them be.
Previous loss(es)
Toxic playerbase
Fear of false reports
Or get the single bad match and the team flames you
Knowing no matter how hard you try or how you won, your efforts won’t be rewarded unless you keep that up for the next 10 matches
I think for some people ranked anxiety is about the losing streak. For me, it is not that. There’s two things that make me prefer QuickPlay.
The actual anxiety is being stuck in a loop rather than deranking itself.
You are near your peak you want to keep playing the games there and improving, not falling down again and again then stomping to get back etc.
It will get tiring fast for anyone playing ranked for like a hour or two a day.
While basement dwellers doing 8 hrs a day will be like, that;s how you climb and improve, you must carry bad players bad matches and prove yourself.
Lots of folks have this mind set. I admit even sometimes myself I say that, but I play casually. Sometimes I think, just let me get through all these (insert word of choice here) games, and I’ll start getting better ones. (No basement dwelling here, I go outside and stuff 
. )
What’re you talking about ranked? I get regular anxiety just thinking about playing the game, so I actively avoid it. It wasn’t this bad in OW1.
Main factors for me:
Heightened possibility of being harassed/joked about for playing the game, trying new heroes.
I’m probably the worst in the lobby, regardless of mode.
I can only play one hero well, but people are all better than me at them.
It’s all in my head, I know.
It’s just a bunch of people hyper aware of a number on screen it’s overblown seriously
‘Ranked Anxiety’ is basically when you get Anxiety from playing ranked.
I’ll probably start Anxiety in itself varies a lot from person to person and what triggers can be different from person to person and the reason doesn’t have to logical. You’ll need to read up what it does.
Either way, ranked has a lot of pressures and I can list a few.
Basically, things like this take a toll on people but people with anxiety have a limit/can’t let certain things go to a point where it becomes overwhelming/too much/unfun.
Not everyone will feel anxiety from rank, some people will but it’ll have no effect on them, and for others it can be so impactful on them that they need to limit how much they play.
I personally felt anxiety when I was getting close to GM and knowing if I lost I might go on a loss streak and not reach it. The reason I don’t play ranked is the anxiety of committing to playing 8-10 games to get a rank update and it’s too much of a waste of time.
I will say it’s not all bad because the anxiety goes hand in hand with passion and reaching GM was really fun and I don’t think it would have been if I didn’t care so much.
To put it in more simpler terms anxiety is the stress of something you can’t not care about and it varies from person to person. (Even though even this isn’t 100% true as it’s a very complex thing)
well its more that if you hit plat then fall to gold your not thinking “im plat!” your thinking “did i only hit plat because i got lucky?”