Level of Negativity and Toxicity in HotS

If you're playing HotS there's a big chance you played LoL or DotA before. Those two are having years-long conflict with toxic players and negativity, a neverending one it seems. I'll share my opinion on how's the situation in HotS compared to the big two leaders in the MOBA genre.

Everyone has bad days now and then, sometimes you're back from work or school and you wanna relax and win a couple of games but you end up in a team with a couple of toxic players that just ruin the playing experience, or are you the kind of player who goes in the game and vents because his boss is a dick or your teacher gave you a bad grade? Maybe you're a person who takes the game seriously just like our HotS boost employees. You're here to win and you regularly tell people to play Quick Match or some easier game like The Sims?

Two main types of toxic players

I started playing the game back in Alpha and with the player base not being large, the toxicity was bearable, every now and then you'd have a kid or a dude coming from work and having a bad day venting in the game. You could just mute him and that's it. But now, when the game is actually fully released, the player base is growing on a daily basis and toxicity is catching up as well. While it still isn't as nearly as bad as LoL or DotA, it isn't pleasant. I'll try to break down the types now and show you that toxic players aren't always just a waste of your chat...

Negative Personality Player

This is the main type, basically this person is generally negative about his life and himself and is venting his frustration in the game. I won't go in how negative and how bad of a person is he because it varies, but his flames are mostly unconstructive and serve only to make you feel bad just like he feels bad. When someone calls you a retard after a bad play, that's not what I mean, this person literally keeps flaming you until you either mute him or try to fight him, feeding him to flame you more. Never talk to that person, just mute him.

Competitive Personality Player

This type of player is a player who takes the game seriously, maybe too seriously? Depends on his goals, if his goal is to become a pro player and actually compete, or maybe apply here and work for us as a HotS rank booster, he is supposed to take the game seriously. But if he's casually trying to win 100% of his games, he needs to realize that will not happen because of how the game is built (I'll get to that later). These types of players don't hesitate to punish you verbally for every bad play you make or a call you missed, sometimes it's just a couple of times during the game, sometimes it's the whole game. But, the difference is that this person will often actually point out what you did wrong and what you should have done. I realize that sometimes it's hard to accept advice from a person who just offended you but tries to get through the initial emotional spike and filter through it, you will often find valuable advice. Note that we do not condone this behavior, our boosters are immediately fired as soon as I find out they flamed during the actual boost.

"You guys are shit" Personality Player

This sub-type is basically a competitive player that regularly watches tournies and streams and he knows the 'meta'. He knows how pros and boosters do it and he is very proud of his knowledge of the game. As soon as he sees someone not following that 'meta' (which is actually fairly often not applicable to the Hero League environment, regardless of rank) he gets mad and starts calling everyone shit, often mentioning how he knows how it should be played. This person likes to write so much that even his gameplay and focus drop, let alone other players who are by now frustrated with this person telling them what to do like it's the only way to win. Don't be this guy, educate yourself, watch tournies, watch streams, but realise that there's a huge difference between Team League and Hero League, between the level of those players and players you meet in the actual game.

You will never win most of your games in HotS!

What are you talking about you think, well, the game is built in a way that Blizzard wants you to win about 50% of the games, and if you do that, you will very slow progress, it is slow, but it's progress, that's how the game is designed. Of course there will be days where you will win 10 in a row, and the next day you will lose 10 in a row. But in the end, it will balance out to around 50%. Now, depending on how good are you for your MMR & Rank you may be able to shift the percentage up to 10%, or even 20% (based on at least a 100 games of course), now, will you increase or decrease the win percentage depends solely on you. There will be bad teams, there will be good teams, but I guarantee you, if you stop being a type of player I described above and focus on being a leader, a positive personality in the team and optimistic that after this loss streak of 4 games you just had, you will win another 5, success is guaranteed. Maybe you are even talented and dedicated enough to start working for us a HotS boost employee or a pro player, believe in yourself.

You can check out another article we have on how to become better at HotS.

If you still have trouble dealing with these flamers and progressing through the game, feel free to check out our HotS rank boost services or HotS coaching services.