Whining in games

I just wanted to ask if there is as much whining in higher tier games as there is in lower tier games? It is very annoying when teammates actually spoil their own and in the same time the whole teams game focusing on totally wrong things. What a hell is wrong with these people? I am 30 years old and I can understand that teens are not very matured but still, it is very annoying. Altough the whine is rarely targeted to me, it breaks the team spirit down when somebody begins to call other people noobs and so on. It spoils the whole game, so i just hope it gets better when/if I can rise my MMR.

Higher MMR = bigger ego + entitlement = more whining.

Only way to escape is 5-stack every game, sadly.

The best solution is to mute someone, like I did in a game with Bunkansee recently. Someone calling: "gg", when unfortunately First Blood occured and then calling everyone a "******" isn't worth listening to.

Personally i think it gets better, whining in games is often biggest at low levels, its so ironic to see one beginner yell noob against another beginner.

Sadly the DotA community is not very brilliant when it comes to having a good team morale - that's something everyone has to deal with not just you. I agree it can be pretty painful.

It definitely doesn't get better with higher MMR - it's actually worse in some way in high MMR because people play ranked and have a more competitive mindset, which is not a problem by itself but that's also where you see massive tryharding and constant *****ing about teammates about anything because people have such huge egos - you'll always see these kind of people who feed and flame their teammates to make themselves look better, it's something you need to know.

To deal with it there's a few solutions :

- Mute them. If someone is flaming his team like "noob", "******", "delete dota", etc, DON'T THINK FOR ONE SECOND and press your best friend the mute button. Don't try reasoning with these people, they have obvious anger issues and a simple button will make your game way more peaceful.

- Report them. This is only when people are overly offensive, if they just call teammates noobs it's not worth it but if it's along the lines of "go kill yourself" then don't hesitate. There's a "communication abuse" report, make use of it.

- Stop playing all pick. This is my favorite solution by far. All pick is a completely toxic mode for a lot of reasons, especially in ranked. Captain's mode instead is a much more balanced mode that encourages teamwork, you say hello at the beginning and establish a strategy with your team which encourages you to communicate in good terms. The skill level is a million times higher in CM and this mode is all about people who have good teamwork because that's why they're there in the first place. I'm not saying it's perfect but even in the worst case when you're playing with 4 russians it can't be worse than AP.

- Play with a few friends. That works very well and if you're queuing with a few guys you know bring good energy to the game then you'll enjoy it even if the rest of the team are complete pricks.

I'm told it gets better at about 4.5K+ captains mode.

But frankly by that stage you should have a 5 stack/Team so it should be fine

The only problem I have in captains mode is that about half of my games; the captain of my team picks shadow shaman and expects me to play him. Even though I am god aweful at playing him. It's always first pick for some people. Even though there are better supports in the pool.

To make matters worse; I am expected to build a mek while playing as 5th role support. >.<

Pretty much, just search the forums for like-minded people and try to find a 5-stack you enjoy playing with.

To be fair, if you play Captain's Mode with people you don't know, you just have to suck it up and play with what you're given. That's kind of the point of Captain's Mode, 1 guy figures out what is needed on the Team and adapts the Picks to the Situation. If you're having trouble playing popular Picks, you may want to practice them a little in All Pick/Least Played.

When I started in an in-house league, I had to play Support Tusk, something I hadn't done in ages (especially not since the Snowball Buff). Instead of complaining or asking for another Hero, I just told them that I wasn't used to playing Tusk and got on with it. I did **** but we won anyway, and by watching the replay and reading up on Tusk, I learned a lot more about how to play him and would definitely feel more confident playing him in the future (I still think I'd be relatively **** though 8{3 ).

If you play captain's mode and you want to play a specific hero it's perfectly fine just asking for it, you know. You can just say "Hi team can I play Magnus offlane please" and normally you'll get it. The captain generally just wants to make a lineup that makes sense, with some good laning and possibly a game plan, but it's just basic stuff like having 1 carry, 1 mid, 2 supports and an offlaner or something, if you want something specific it can fit in your lineup no problem.

I mean, if your captain isn't a russian who doesn't speak a word of english of course. Which admittedly happens but it's not the norm :)

I prefer to play with friends too, but when I do play solo, I try and lead the team and act encouraging in my approach to the match. If they're still acting like brats after that, they go straight onto my 'Mute' list.

I recommend you use it too rather than letting it get to you. At your age, I'm sure there are bigger things to worry about.

(If you aren't aware, click player scoreboard and then the volume icon below a particular player's name).