ELO hell: the discussion

Greetings Summoners!

This isn't going to be an article that is trying to defend the term "ELO hell", or an article that wants to simply say it doesn't exist. It will try to ease the pain for some people who feel stuck in it and feel it to be existent. Defining this term is kind of a difficult job to do - and that is the true aim of this text. The biggest issue is that many people already have pre-defined prejudices about it and it is hard to really lead an open minded conversation on it, because everyone seems to be just and only waiting for those few crucial "moments" in the talk to simply negate the whole exchange of thoughts.

With this being said, I want you to read this exploration of the term with an open mind, without any ideas around it and about it. I will try to write it in such a way so that each of us can read this and experience the idea behind it and afterwards see if it was worth the while and made any sense. So, drop all prejudices about it and allow me to carry you onto a small but decisive analysis.

It is impossible to start a conversation about ELO hell without the term solo queue. After all, solo queue is the main reason why the whole ELO system basically exists. Funny however that you don't see that much talk about the ranked team ELO system, as it simply involves a different psychological approach – it doesn't really reflect "your knowledge" of the game, but that of the whole group and it is kind of easier to hide oneself within the group and simply accept a loss – even though every loss seems to be trying hard to find a certain member of the team as its representative. No matter how hard you try, somehow you always return to this fact – that someone in the team simply didn't execute very well.

And most of the time – it’s true. There are 2 big steps for a team in such a situation. They will either go through the game and try to find out each and every mistake made and analyze what can be done – and if there was a certain member underperforming he would have to show his seriousness for the team by training even harder than before – it is the simple act of respect, honor and discipline that involves such a momentum for a team to become good. The other routine is that certain members will never show enough passion or dedication and simply ignore advice, trainings or special tasks given to them. Those people often lead to roster changes and the endless search for a full team lineup.

Now, there is quite a difference between soloQ and ranked teams. Once such a ranked team failed a few games and made enough adjustments that should allow them to be better, they will simply remake the team and start anew. That is the case that does not work with soloQ. You see, soloQ has an individual approach, and you can't just reset your ranked stats. All you can do for soloQ is acquire better mechanical skill, better map awareness, game knowledge and simply try to influence the game as much as possible with the role you took. It does not matter what role it really is – soloQ represents your total game knowledge and you should understand and be able to play any role – well, you don't have to excel in every champion, but still have a champion pool that can represent each role and brings the most to the team.

You see, that is something that people in soloQ mostly forget – that you are still playing a team game and that the whole unit of a team depends on each and single player. Now, there has been some kind of advancement in soloQ in terms of people calling out roles that they most likely play the best, but it still lacks the overall attitude of winning the game as a team. There always seem to be those special kinds of douchebags who join a ranked soloQ game just for their own egoistic fulfillment. Let us try to explain this.

Each and every one of us had those people that simply type "mid or feed", "me no sup", and so on. Those are people that do not want to grow within this game. Don't get me wrong – it is highly possible that they don't want to play certain roles without runes – but still, those people act differently and talk differently and they hell of a play differently. There is a huge difference in the consciousness of people here. If you know that you can't excel in other roles because you don't have the required runes – you really know that you must win with the role you can represent. If, however, you only want to play a certain role because you are bored, or think that for example, that supports or junglers can't carry a game – then you are a bad player. Those people join ranked games to make up for real life social interactions they are missing. They want arguments, a verbal internet fight. They want to troll and see people's suffering over the internet. I know it sounds harsh – but don't forget that we are open mindedly trying to go through this together.

However, this happens very, very, rarely. The truth becomes really painful to realize. Sitting down to play a ranked game of soloQ becomes similar to playing on a slot machine in a casino. And sometimes the slot machine just seems to be a god damn troll and eats you up, destroys you. Depending on lady luck and your own willpower you might get away with a few scars – but some people get destroyed by this slot machine to a degree where they lose not only their credits, but their sanity as well. This is somewhat the approach to the birth of the term ELO hell. It happens individually, to each his own, but is only „alive“ as long as the individual is being eaten up by this same slot machine. Changing the mindset here doesn't really help much – you can sit to another slot machine, and if it again doesn't give you anything back to be happy about – the hell continues. The hell actually only stops, once the slot opens up and returns some of the credits. ELO hell, respectively stops once you seem to stop having a lose streak.

See, the mind doesn't really register the bad games in itself – it registers the effect of them. You lose, you get sad. You lose again, you get mad. You lose again, everyone seems bad. You lose again, and the curses begin. Now, there are again 3 approaches here that explain this line of events.

The first one is the, I shall call it here, "normal" one. You know you lost those sets of games, but you aren't really mad, because they were good games, well played games, exciting games. And you don't really feel as being in ELO hell – everyone played their best and the better team won.

The second one, is the "angry" one. You know you lost those sets of games, but you are half mad about yourself failing some of those games, and half mad about others being bad in the rest. Being an individual, you will pretty fast overcome the games you lost yourself, explaining it to yourself in a simple and calming manner – "I know what I have to work on". However, the games you lost because others were bad – those are the games that really made you angry. The term ELO hell seems like an escape of reality and you stick to it to simply ease your pain.

The third one, is the most crucial one and therefore I shall apply the term "frustrated" to it. You know you just lost several games, but – and this is the big difference – you didn't lose any of them because of your own play. You played great, you performed well, you won your role, your lane, you influenced the game as much as possible and really tried hard to make the team lineup work, to make calls, to secure objectives – but it just wasn't enough. Certain team members were horribly bad, fed their lanes, failed their mechanics, or simply refused to communicate and play together as a team.

And this is the most crucial part of the ELO hell term – when you realize that you are losing because of other people not being serious about it. And you know as well that they aren't, because they suddenly fail in every aspect of the game – you get AD carries who have no idea how to last hit, how to position, what to build and where to farm at certain game stages. You get junglers who have no idea when to gank, where to camp, what to counter invade, what to tower dive, or again what items to build. You get top laners who perma feed, having no idea how to play a certain matchup or simply refuse to buy wards and influence the game if needed by leaving the lane. You get mid players who have no idea what it means to play against certain matchups, how to gank, how to push the lane in order to secure objectives or simply fail in every aspect of their mechanics. You get supports who do not ward, who refuse to build items that would help the team, but instead build "carry-like items", who refuse to zone or harass the lane and even in the worst cases take farm from their carry.

Those are the people who make the term ELO hell alive and raise it up to its glory and they make this whole conversation a big issue. The individual player, as said, in this frustrated state has no idea anymore what to do about game outcomes. No matter how hard he tries, he loses the game. And those are most of the time end game stats with x-(1,2,3)-y or even x-0-y. In other words, stats that should really only be visible on the winning team most of the times. I myself, have had a set of loses where I literally had 1-0-5, 1-1-23, 5-3-20, 9-0-10, etc. scores and simply lost games. Being crazy about it, you start watching replays and really analyze your own game in hope for finding out simply more things that you could have done.

And that is the truth that hurts the most – there were none. It hurts the most because you can't understand why you keep getting such players, such people and why you are so unlucky. Yet, there is a small but very, very low ray of light here – the truth is – you were not the bad player. You were not the reason you lost. You did well. You did all you could. And even though, the mind can achieve to comprehend this, it still lacks that certain pattern of happiness that would keep it going on optimistically about this whole soloQ idea.

So, we have reached the most crucial part of the ELO hell term discussion. The players. And the individual. Let us first talk about those players that seem to simply fail hard in games and see why they do so.

It seems, now more than ever, that soloQ has become a frustrating place. Being able to see your team mate borders gets you into a pre-judgment state of mind. Silver people, getting suddenly to 1800, diamond players falling to 1600 - it all just doesn't seem to make any sense. And you as the individual can only really spectate this and hope for the best. Some may enter games being very emotional about this, having their starting sentence go like "omg 3 silvers...". Some may be reserved and simply try to overlook this. And some simply know that people can get better – or worse in that case.

Now, the approach is different when a lower bordered person reaches higher ELO. You somehow understand that he had time and chances to get better – or he could simply have luck. Most of the time, you will probably be checking LoLking stats and try to figure out what seems to be the truth. However, when a diamond player suddenly falls so much behind – you kind of get to doubt that person. Has this account been hacked? Can he really have so little luck this season? Checking LoLking gives you again certain security about these questions, but doesn't really offer anything else.

Yet, the truth is very simple – the border doesn't mean anything. It is there just for the show and shouldn't give you any general idea about the player's skill. However, there is one thing I noticed about the borders and I hope you will agree on it. Meeting silver and gold people would prove to be the most serious games I’ve had. Getting platinum and diamond players would become a disaster. They enter the game differently. The first ones try hard, because they want to get better. The other ones enter the game with a "I got this" feeling, neglecting the whole idea of team play. And that’s with an "I", not a simple I. They focus only on themselves and will most of the time pick something completely selfish or simply play solo and try to show off trying to carry it by themselves – alone. Truth be told, you cannot influence any of these things and the only real thing you can do is to simply – accept them.

So, we see that the individual really cannot do anything about soloQ. He cannot. The most honest and respectful thing the individual can do is enter the game with a team play mindset and try to really excel in his role and know his limits, boundaries and chances that he can take.

They just play. And yet, they don't. Because if they would be just playing, they would understand what it takes to play and what is involved in doing so. They would care for the game, its outcome and the players involved in it.

It seems that most people seem to lack certain basic skills in life and they carry this on into the game. Now let us explain this. Take random 5 people and assign them to a group task. Now, if those 5 people are decent persons, honest people, they will accept their own possibilities and try to work out this task as best as possible and in the easiest way as possible, taking over roles that they will excel in and represent the best. Each of those persons has to have enough balls to admit that they either suck at something or excel at something. This simple talk and self-recognition involves a lot of open-mindedness, self-awareness and consciousness. The more conscious a person is, the easier it becomes to work with. This person has lost certain stages of its ego, or completely understands it and can ignore it. Some would call this enlightenment, some would call it illumination. The important part for us here is, that this person thinks – "what’s best for the team?". It doesn't think about "what is the best for me?". There is a huge difference between "what can I be the best in to win this game?" and "what lineup can we make that will lead to victory?". And we all know how we can recognize those people – they call for a lane, they don't get that lane, because there is another player who wants to play it as well – and their first response is "gg you will lose it now, because i didn't get my lane".

I have never really understood the poor mindset of those people. Now, don't get me wrong. I know it sounds harsh, but it’s the simple truth. There has been, years ago, done a small study about gaming intelligence on the HoN forums. There was a high connection between real life intelligent people and good players. The smarter the person was in real life, the better it performed in games – no matter how much gaming experience that "smart" person had in comparison to the "normal" one – the smart guy would outplay the normal one.

This is an important thing to understand as it will lower certain aggression towards the "frustrating" part of ELO hell. If you realize that the people that are causing you to lose so many games are in fact people that don't seem to have a successful real life as well – you kind of a can't really hate to much about them. And the "successful real life" here isn’t about money – its simple human qualities in terms of being a good person, being honest, being open minded, being good in thinking, having good muscular reflexes and a great mind to begin with. No matter how bad your game turns out to be, no matter how bad those people react in those games and no matter how bad they actually play – remember it is not you that is playing bad. It is not you that is acting stupid. So never, ever fall to their level.

It is very easy – don't argue with stupid people – they will drag you down and defeat you. Some of us learn this on time, some of us learn this too late, and some never. Better late than never, otherwise you become stupid as well.

Once you have lady luck smiling upon you, and that "good" slot machine seems to be emptying itself in front of you, you forget all about ELO hell. People play as they should – people know their champions, know their limits, know when to harass, when to engage and how to win games. People time objectives, time wards, call for stuff and simply let you know that they are trying to win the game as well. And those games are really what every game should look like as I feel that soloQ should not be a place to test out champions, test out builds or simply troll and waste some time.

You can always join normal games and do whatever the hell you want to do. No one is denying you this ability. No one is stopping you from it. Yet, there always seem to be those individuals who just want to see "what this ranked talk is all about". And they remain disrespectful and asleep until they really hit either rock bottom or simply see the fury in other people’s eyes when it comes to soloQ. Sadly, seeing the fury isn’t going to be the case for internet games. Every time I see a frustrated player talking to a troll, or to someone who just doesn't care, my heart melts down - because I understand how upset he became and on the other hand I understand that he became upset for no reason as well. He can't change anything about it. He just can't.

The only thing he could do, if this wasn't an online game, but a virtual reality where there was some kind of eye contact, is to show to this person what real passion is, and maybe open his mind about it. You have seen such things happening I am sure, where someone trolled you about playing video games in general, Magic the gathering, or any other nerdy stuff. And there just had to come that moment where you raged hard about it in such a honest manner that this person was literally stunned and disabled to the degree where he would finally understand how much this means to you and how important it gets. I know, not many will get this enlightenment, but it is always worth a try.

Now, the other reason why this can't happen in League of Legends is because literally everything can get you reported and your account banned. Those real life rage-open minders can't happen because the troll won't suddenly become "enlightened" and the only thing that remains is your tribunal chat history case. So try to avoid this as much as possible, avoid the emotional outbursts and avoid simply communicating to those people.

But what then, is the solution of getting out of ELO hell? There seems to be none, right? Some would say that you are making this ELO hell term up. Some would say that you are in it because you think it exists and that the simple thought of it keeps you there. Some would say that you are where you belong.

And some would say, play on. And those are probably most right about it.

But, it gets so frustrating to be in it, what can I do? Well, the "frustrated" version of ELO hell happens when you lose X games in a row where you are 100% sure that you had nothing to do with the outcome of the game – the loss, but really tried everything to make it a victory – and where you know that trolls, dc's and simply utterly bad performance by other people ruined it. The only true answer to this is – get out of it. And even though you may have smiled now, it is the simple truth. However, this truth is a pain in the ass. And this ELO hell with X games in a row applies to any ELO range – as long as you feel being in it and as long as those X games in a row happen. It does not matter whether it is 1200, 1600, or even 2000 ELO. As long as you want to get higher and other people seem to prevent you from doing so – that’s how long ELO hell for you will last and how often it will occur.

So let me just say it straight – you cannot do anything about it. As long as there are people who are not serious about the game on the same level as you are, as long as there are trolls, as long as there are intentional dc's, and as long as there are people who just don’t give a damn – you cannot do anything about it. There are those certain chances that you will get such players 10 games in a row. If you are really unlucky you will get them even 20 games in a row. And that's just it. It’s a game and it’s a gamble. If skill was really a main factor in soloQ it would be a 1v1 game. But, it isn't. It’s a team game, a 5v5 game with random 3(4) people and luck is the highest factor involved in it, as getting good players has nothing to do with you.

And let me get this out as well – I hate the analysis that the win chances are always higher for you than the enemy team since you realize that you are not a bad guy. Who says that there isn't such a guy thinking the same thing in the opponent team? You really think that you connected to a game with 9 other trolls and that it’s only about how well you are that you can outbalance your 4 trolls against the enemy 5 trolls? This is just retarded to even think about, leads to nowhere and is just lying to yourself right in the face.

Always enter the game serious. Always think that there are other people who want to win as well. Always respect them. Always play your best and show them your skill. If you enter the game thinking you have yourself and 4 trolls, while the enemies are 5 trolls – what good will it bring? It’s just a sad state of mind, brought up to try and make life easier for you.

No. Don't accept this and be always ready for the worst and best. That's what life is. And that's what gaming is about.

But I still have no luck in getting out of the hell, I still do my best and keep getting trolls game after game, what can I do? Improve the community – that’s the root of all problems. It’s the player pool playing this game and the overall intelligence of people trying to do so. The hidden truth here as well is – as long as you keep getting trolls, you can't become better either.

Let us say both teams have that 1 good individual, 3 normal players and 1 troll. The team with the better troll will lose. No matter what you do in the end, if that guy decides to throw the game – he will do so. That’s the irony of it. You can play your best and lose. He plays his best as the troll and he wins, since he wants to lose anyways. If such people did not exist, solo queue would become a stable graph, having less and less people with low ELO and lowering the overall difference of ELO ranges – everyone would learn from each other and eventually become good – as long as there is enough dedication.

And one day, the whole fuzz about ELO would become meaningless as experience would become more important and the low ELO difference would lose its value. ELO would only be there to show one's real hard work and dedication about the game.

So how do we change the community? Well, this is a difficult question and involves a lot of real life qualities. As said, the more "good" of a human being you are outside of the game, the better you will be in the game as well. So with the community naturally consisting of humans, it would mean that most people that are acting childish and as trolls, should have a real conversation with themselves in real life as well. It's just impossible that someone is a complete douchebag within a game, while meanwhile being the representation of all that is good in humans in real life. So, changing the community would mean for it to first grow up in most cases. Then it would need to really grow with the game, understand the game and choose their path within it. You can play football for fun and competitive. You don't see random trolls going around competitive players and ruining their games. Being competitive in LoL in its current stage means to aim high in soloQ as well, so those players are naturally competitive about it. Ruining their experience is the same as ruining the experience for those people in real life as well. So play normal if you don't want to go serious about it and enjoy meanwhile the streams.

What else can change the community? Less focus on reports and more focus on winning games. Sometimes I have a feeling that bad people just join the game to send out reports because they have real life problems and just can’t solve them with certain individuals and make up for it by sending random reports in game. It’s stupid, its childish and it’s sad. Reports weren't a bad idea, but somehow everyone seems to think too high of themselves as an example of judgment and truth and wastes too much time about this - instead of the game.

And it has become impossible to literally teach people something in game. Whatever you type, they respond with "flame", "reported", "whine", "u mad?". So, just drop it – they will have to learn it by themselves anyways. You are not there to give them advice, even though there exists a whole honor badge involved around it – it just turns out to be too risky as it can lead to your account suspension and tribunal cases. I know this sounds harsh again and kind of a counterproductive in terms of "teaching" the community – but while in game, it makes no sense and will be a success maybe 25% of the time – a risk you cannot afford.

So yes, once stuck in this frustrated state, every game becomes a burden. And excitement if you are crazy enough – you never know what level of stupidity the next game will reveal, and you never know how well it actually can turn out be. It’s always a gamble.

In the end, the best advice that we can get out from all this talk is to understand that soloQ is not purely about winning. The irony, hm? Yes, it isn't. It’s about dedication. If it was only about winning, at some point all those trolls would fall so deep behind that nothing but normal players would remain around you. At this point, your skill would lead to victories and games would become much less of a burden and actually interesting, competitive and exciting. But, alas, this isn't the case. SoloQ is about dedication – the more you try, the better it will get. Even though you lost a lot of ELO, you were once on that higher amount and will get back. You didn't get there for just any reason, and you will certainly get back there again. It's only a matter of time – as everything in life really is.

However, this again only applies to the idea of ELO hell. Most "hell-ish" things in life evolve around time – money being one of the things. What you can really do about your soloQ performance is to play each game on its own and stop following up a pattern about it. You play each game for itself, with no thoughts about the ones before, or the ones that are about to happen.

So what tips can I give you along the way? Don't just type "me no sup". Type and be honest about it "I can play all roles, excel however in XY“" This sounds so much more mature and gives a better idea about you as a person. Dodge games – a lot. This won't only raise your ELO passively, it will as well force you to recognize working game lineups and counter picks. Playing a game against an out picked team composition because your team didn't want to cooperate won't do anything. While waiting on the dodge time, raise your smurf account – there is nothing better to get more skilled in your mechanics than doing so without runes and masteries, or focusing or champions you usually don’t play on your main. Call people on voice chats – emotional rage stops as suddenly you are working together as a team, instead of just being 5 individuals trying to read each other’s minds. Play without in game music and focus on the game as much as possible – I am not making fun about this part.

I know I’m trying too hard to make it all sound good and reasonable. I won't say optimistic here, cause I think that there has been simply too much optimism involved around the term ELO hell and that pretty much all problems about the community have been taken a bit too lightly. Sometimes it just seems that we accepted the simple fact that there has to be people who ruin game experiences. And that sometimes just doesn't seem good enough as you are pretty much enforced to ignore them as much as possible.

In the end the best thing you can do is to understand this ELO hell conversation, understand the term, understand why it’s happening and simply grow over it, you know? Simply don’t allow it to consume you. Simply denying it won't help. Making excuses about it won’t help. Accepting it to the point where you understand it and can neglect it afterwards will release you from it. Not directly in the terms of "getting out of it" and gain ELO, but in the terms of calming yourself down and not bursting anymore in flames when it shows its face, but rather laugh back at it. They say that people who understand and have seen death laugh back at it, so we could apply this same old knowledge to the term "ELO hell".

Don't let it eat you up. Just don't.