How to Stop Being Toxic in League of Legends

The toxicity of our city, of our city

Toxicity in League of Legends is a hot topic right now with content creators speaking out on how it is affecting the quality of their games and their streams. While toxicity is not the only problem that they’re facing, it has an impact on their games- as well as everyone else’s. I feel that we can all agree that League of Legends has become very toxic as of late.

If you’re somebody who has recently been chat restricted, find yourself getting heated in-game or want to reform and be an exemplary citizen of the League of Legends community, then you’re in luck. In this Mobalytics guide by PicklePants, we will discuss some ways you can reform and stop being toxic in League of Legends.

Before we begin, I sympathize with you. I really do. It can be hard to keep your cool when someone is “running it down”, “trolling” or “soft inting” and unfortunately, while I can’t tell you how to stop them from doing it, it’s a horrible situation to be in regardless.

However, it is important that you do not type to them or speak out as it’s not going to help the situation, and realistically- it’s only going to work against you.

Stop watching toxic or negative streamers

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of streamers around who are very entertaining, educational, motivational, and friendly. I’m not here to tell you who you should watch and shouldn’t- that’s nothing to do with me. But if you want to stop being toxic, you need to stop watching players who are toxic and like to flame.

Whether they’re flaming over voice coms or are typing in-game. As a viewer- you’re going to naturally pick up what they’re saying and repeat it: consciously or subconsciously, you’re going to start repeating some of the things that they say. For example, the use of the word “dog” has been used and abused lately.

It’s like with children or animals, they start to pick up on actions they are exposed to. For example, parrots will repeat something if they hear it often.

Dogs will learn to sit if they’re trained to do so, and babies’ first word will be something they hear a lot too. It doesn’t matter what word the players use, if you hear it a lot- you’ll start picking it up and saying it too.

Even if you physically don’t say it out loud or type it in chat, you’ll probably find yourself associating a bad word with a poor action that’s happened in-game.

For example, if your ally dies your immediate action may be to call them something bad.

By limiting your time spent watching streamers that are toxic, you will prevent yourself from picking up the words or phrases they use. This will make you less toxic and less negative when things are not going your way.

A very common thing that toxic streamers will do is make a risky play and underestimate or disrespect the enemy in lane which causes them to fall behind. This will normally result in some toxic behavior and discussion within their stream.

If you happen to make a risky play and it backfires and you fall behind; check out these guides to help you play from behind as a Top laner, Jungler, Mid laner or even in the bottom lane.

Disable all chat

When it comes to competing, people will do whatever they can to get an advantage and that often involves being toxic. One way they do this is by making remarks that are meant to tilt you.

Things that are commonly said are “?” or “lol?”. While these words are not toxic, they’re meant to cause a reaction to make you play worse or speak out.

If you are easily triggered by people typing these things in-game, I would recommend that you disable all chat so you cannot see the enemy speaking to you. Not only will this result in you not speaking back to them, but it will also prevent you from tilting if they say something about the play you made.

You can disable all chat by going to your settings, choose the Interface, and then scroll down until you find chat. Disable the “Show [all] chat”- remove the marker and you’re ready to go.

Honestly, disabling all chat is one of the best things you can do in-game as it not only prevents you from seeing things that might trigger you, but it directly prevents you from being able to spread toxic behavior and flame the enemy.

Disable the entire chat

Just like some real-life disorders, going cold turkey can be your best way to stop flaming as a whole. For example, addictions, like smoking cigarettes or drinking alcohol or gambling, can all be stopped (or at least heavily reduced) if you take away the ability to consume them. While these comparisons are very extreme, the same action can- in this case, stop the reaction.

By disabling the chat as a whole, you cannot type to the enemy, you cannot type to your allies and you cannot read your allies say. While this is an extreme action to take, it might be the most important for players who are toxic and want to type bad things to their teammates.

I personally wouldn’t recommend doing this, but if you are really struggling and are serious about becoming honor 5 and not being toxic anymore, it might be a necessary step in the meantime.

Instead, I would recommend that you mute your teammates or make the chat very small, but I understand this isn’t an option for those with low self-control. You can disable this the exact same way as removing all chat.

Because you’re not going to be talking to your teammates, here’s a guide to help you improve your communication.

Remove emotes

Similarly to our previous points, I would highly recommend that you disable the enemies emotes so they cannot spam them and make you tilt. While not many players actually spam them or use them maliciously, they might be thrown up after a bad play or when the enemy outplays you.

Your first reaction after seeing an emote might be to lash out, but if you can never see them- you shouldn’t get tilted and want to flame.

You can disable enemy emotes by going into your settings, choosing the interface settings, and then scrolling down until you find emotes. Click the “mute enemy emotes”.

Once again, disabling or removing things that can trigger you or make you tilt is important to reduce your toxicity in-game.

Disable names

This doesn’t honestly make much of a difference, but it can be a trigger for some people. Especially if they die to someone named something so stupid or childish like PicklePants :).

From experience, I have removed the naming on champions and in the leaderboard itself.

Now I don’t really know who I play against and I do not see some of the toxic or INTeresting names people give themselves.

While I’m not personally toxic, I have received my fair share of comments when killing the enemy regarding my name. And I would honestly recommend that you disable names if you’re going to talk or flame because of someone’s name.

If you want to disable names on the leaderboard and in-game, you can do so by going to Interface, scroll to “Health and resource bars” and then disable the “Show Summoner Names”.

Limit your game time

When things are not going your way, it’s important to stop before it becomes unbearable.

While we have given you a ton of tips already, sometimes there are things that are out of your control that might make you want to flame such as someone else flaming, some unfortunate RNG, or if you get constantly ganked.

By noticing when you’re getting fed up or becoming angry, it’s important that you do not play any more games afterward if you feel yourself starting to think negatively or becoming toxic.

You’ll not only start playing worse, but you’ll also find your self chatting in-game or flaming your team.

The best thing you can do is to limit how many games you play once you start feeling annoyed. By not hitting the queue button, your frustration towards the game should drop and you shouldn’t start flaming your teammates in future games

One more thing. We all know someone who grinds League all day every day. That’s not for us to judge, but if you’re trying to be less toxic, you should stop playing League so much. If you limit yourself to only playing 5 games a day or something of that nature, you will find yourself being less toxic and less fed up when you play.

It’s easy to get burned out by playing tons of games, and getting burned out will cause you to flame. So if you don’t get burned out, you shouldn’t be as toxic.

If all else fails, taking a long break from the game or not playing for the weekend can help clear your mind and help with a mental reset: allowing you to reduce your toxicity in-game.

Play easier champions

There are over 140 champions in the game with varying levels of difficulty. Some champions take only a few games to learn while overs can take hundreds if not thousands. If you’re somebody who is easily frustrated and will take it out on their teammates, I would recommend you play champions who are easier and less likely to make you flame.

For example, mechanically difficult champions like Rengar, Camille, Riven, and Lee Sin require lots of skill to master. It is also very easy for you to perform poorly on those champions and it’s also easy to mess up. If you mess up and die, you might want to flame the enemy for outplaying you or your Jungler for not ganking.

Additionally, these champions require a lot more skill and have a lot more pressure associated with them.

For example, Riven is a mechanically challenging champion and requires animation canceling, etc. These champions especially have a lot of stress-related to them and if you misplay- you’re going to take it out on anything you can.

I would recommend that you play somebody less difficult and someone whose gameplay is a bit more relaxed. The chances of you becoming tilted, stressed, or wanting to call your allies every name under the sun will be reduced if your chances of misplaying in the early game are reduced too.

Check out our tier list and guide for how to build your champion pool and you’ll be able to our ratings for different champions and find the right balance of difficulty and effectiveness for your playstyle.

Listen to relaxing music

There is a huge variety of artists out there with tons of different music styles that pride themselves in inducing different feelings or emotions.

Some music styles will cause you to be aggressive and make you aggressive in-game. For some players, this can be a good thing and effectively help them play better.

If you want to stop being toxic, do not listen to this type of music. Instead, listen to relaxing music or other music genres that will help you keep your cool.

There are plenty of good playlists on Spotify or Youtube that will help you relax and chill out. I would recommend listening to them while you play so you do not get any urges to flame your allies. Here’s a good live stream if you want to chill out and play.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, it’s up to you to change and we cannot do the hard work for you. Try your hardest to chill out in-game and stop flame your teammates. Given time, you can change and will stop being toxic, but it all starts with and ends with you.

If you have any questions or want to learn more, check out PicklePants stream.

Watch live video from PicklePantsLOL on www.twitch.tv