First of all, we need to make two things clear
I am against intentionally smurfing in lower ranks to stomp on low ranks
I am NOT against unranked to top 500 for new heroes you haven’t played before or making alt accounts to play for you’re elo.
The forums seems to treat smurfs as one whole batch of people who make alt accounts.
Which does not make sense as playing you’re elo is not a bannable offense.
Making smurfing as a whole a bannable offense is not only stupid but counter productive, the only thing it does is just put anyone whos having a good day at risk and the smurfs who have finished their unranked to top 500 at zero risk.
A smurf is someone of a much higher skill level dumping on lower ranks to ruin the game for at least 5 people. If they are playing against people of similar skill, it’s just an alt account. Huge difference. Smurfs have no business being in games.
One is a smurf another one isn’t. They should be punished regardless because you don’t have a reason to not play on your main account, especially for some dumb reason like practising other heroes, because the burden of not swapping to your main when you get salty or are in a pinch is not something the players can handle at all. Some random singular cases of players not doing this are just completely meaningless when it comes to the variety of damage that playing on alts causes for the game. You will have to tank the damage yourself for your own actions and play on your main or get actioned because you hopped on an alt with your pal’s phone number
This is categorically debatable. Because if it’s like …
Good / Acceptable: “Unranked” in the sense that, say, Defran hadn’t placed on Supports yet, and plays the new hero and gets placed in Masters and climbs to T500? Sure, that’s obviously fine.
Gray area. Skates on scummy ego flexing, but is still kind of acceptable: A T500 player buys a brand new account and stomps Gold lobbies for hours with pistol Mercy while the game figures out what to do with them. Then two days later when they’re GM, claim “See guys? It’s so EZ to rank up in dis game lawl.”
Bad / not acceptable: A T500 player intentionally playing badly on a new account to be placed in lower ranks on purpose, effectively gimping the system and making the climb take longer (ruining more players’ games in that rank), for entertainment factor and, again, ego boost.
And obviously, outright buying a Bronze account to do the above with is the far-end evil of the spectrum.
Anyway, that’s why talking about smurfing is so controversial. People have different ideas of what it means and what’s acceptable. My general rule of thumb is that if a normal person just wants an alt account to avoid pressure / to practice, and does NOT derank on purpose at any point, that’s usually fine and rarely ill intended. But … typically when a streamer does it, it’s for attention and some malice intent is involved. Not always but … well … >.>
Isn’t it instead dumping on people the entire game, but then throwing so that your team loses, therefore causing you to de-rank so you can continue dumping on people?
If all it was is simply beating players of a lower skill level, then we’ve all been guilty of ‘smurfing’ at one point or another.
I think the key is that you intentionally throw the match at the end so you can continue matching with players lower ranked than you. If you’re just working your way up through the ranks, then you will inevitably face players of a a lower skill level, right? But if you continue playing the game as intended, then you will eventually start being matched with people at your level.
The matchmaking system is biased… the playerbase is degenerating as a result of it…
The more it degenerates the worse matchmaking gets…
People just blaming smurfs because they are in denial of the truth and refuse to accept the ever worsening state of the playerbase, and are desperate for something to blame for it…
well not in this game it can’t. in fact, this game welcomes it. since to maintain your same rank or derank, simply leave and rejoin. rank progression resets. even if you win.
Yea, heres the problem. How do you distinguish the smurfs from regular players?
You cant. So by actively combatting it, it just gives the bullys another method of bullying… oh that guy just stomped us, must be a smurf…
It just promotes witch hunting…
Its just like using a xim on console. Yea it violates the ToS but theres no way to prove its use. Meaning they dont, or they blindly enforce based on reports…
early online competitive games (very early ones) didnt have ranking systems or a competitive ladder so basically you boot up that video game you were at risk of going against the greatest player of that game at any time.
then ranking systems happened. higher skilled players were funneled to play against players of their skill level making the game a bit more difficult. said players get tired of sweating and realize hey ill just make a new account… heh
i mean i dont blame them… even streamers do this. especially with battle royales, the high ranking profile streamers want to get that “easy” lobby. makes them look good in the stream which generates views i guess. still it is shady heh
do i have a problem with smurfs? nah not really, i remember playing in the old days and running into players that were way ABOVE my skill level. i mean they are players too and just want to queue into a game as fast as we do. queue times in general shouldnt be in games… comp systems should but there should be a trigger if the palyer waits too long… just trhow him in the next game… too bad if he outranks the lobby lol
Thing is I don’t think smurfing is as prevelant as people assume it is because they never stop to consider the other factors that go into a game.
If you’ve had a 3-4 match winstreak your SR let’s say for understanding has gone up 60- 80 points (assuming 20SR a win and 25 SR a loss.)
Now assuming you were say 2450 at the start of your session - high gold close to plat
You win 3-4 games at 20SR each pushes you up to 2510-2530 SR.
Now assume your average lobby is plat 4/3 because of the divide in match making, that game plays VERY differently to a Gold 2/Gold 1 lobby you’re used to and it may seem like a rofl or a stomp. If you’re not used to it, it may feel like stomping because they have one character who could be plat 2/1 (max diamond 5 but has dropped) who has experienced higher levels of gameplay so you know how to counter/play better.
I’m not saying smurfs don’t exist but there’s a lot more factors at play than the game going “I’m going to pair you with a smurf to mess with your winrate cos I’m a vindictive system.”
Same way as those people you think are cheating are probaly just more mechanically cracked than you are 85-95% of the time.
Ok, here goes…
I conducted an experiment the other day (when I got banned from forums for 24hrs), I created a brand-new account, (but couldn’t use it anyway because I don’t have a million phone numbers), so I played on my husband’s account (not knowing he was gold btw).
Long story short, the gaming experience was much better in gold, maybe because the teams actually communicate and work together, rather than run around like chickens with their heads cut off trying to 1v5 the whole time, idk.
Any who the experiment was to see if I played on a diff account, would my games be better, I’d say yes it was, even in QP. So, I guess I have a better understanding of why people create alternate accounts. I tend to not be as mad about it as before. Yes, getting stomped still sucks, even being the team doing the stomping isn’t fun, but it is what it is.
i rather get beat by a high skilled player then a hacker. there are people better at you in the game. also if you solo queue you put yourself at a disadvantage anyways since YOU CAN team up in this game. people want to blame the game for their shortcomings or yell hey i want to play with people like me
fine there is a ranking system for that but no ranking system is perfect. there are ways to bypass it. when you boot up that game you are in jepordy of going against the greatest player of all time
i only have a problem with hacking. if someone beats me with hacks then yea… thats wrong or not fair. still i understand how its a neverending arms race with them. probably since it generates money and yea i bet most companies dont try very hard since costly or actually are maybe in an alliance with them.
thats gaming i guess. i do wish it could be better… maybe there is a game that has the perfect competitive ladder with no hackers. can anyone name a game like that lol??
This is one of the reasons I don’t like competitive queue. I know that, eventually… assuming I keep focusing on learning… I’ll plateau at a place where each and every game feels like a monday at the office instead of a relaxed sunday afternoon.
Agreed, like your other reply on the other thread. We are in agreement lol.
Going after Smurfs as Smurfs is pointless and can’t be adequately enforced.
Which is exactly why going after things that Smurfs are known to do such as throw games to maintain low ranks, boost, among other bannable offenses will snag egregious Smurfs alongside toxic players participating in these bannable trends rather than targeting Smurfs for being Smurfs.
The game has reports for gameplay sabotage, as well as leaver penalties.
The game has parameters in place that actively state such behaviors are not acceptable.
Smurfing happens to not be one of these offenses, but certain things that Smurfs tend to do are and can/should/are enforced to varying degrees.