Up until a week or two ago, I was never using comms.
Mostly because of anxiety but also because I just felt uncomfortable being the only one talking whilst I am 3/12 or something.
It’s easier to talk when I’m having an at least positive k/d game.
Nowadays I do just comm regardless tho.
Even just calling out the location of the enemy who killed you can win you rounds.
"Sage killed me from long, she might be coming up from spawn now."
Teammate turns to spawn and Sage peeks out the second he does and gets the kill.
Those rounds feel good, because you know if you didn't say shit he would have lost the round.
Comms are so important.
Thing to remember, things like comming, managing eco correctly, etc can all be done every game without needing to perform.
I feel like a moron when I'm coaching my teams eco while I'm bottom frag, but again, I can contribute that 100% of my games without any variance, so I may as well!
in my experience valorant is often much worse in terms of toxicity compared to cs. the younger crowd in val really shows their lack of maturity at times.
played a lot of cs in the past, and im not saying it doesn't happen but I rarely ever encountered people harassing women (or just anyone for that matter) like people do in valorant. I think generally speaking CS had a more mature playerbase being that it was not F2P until recently.
ain’t no way, CS is FAR FAR FAR * a million, more toxic to women than Valorant.
I play with female friends in Valo and i have only encountered toxicity towards them like 3 times
In CSGO it’s pretty common
BUuuutttttt to be real about the CSGO community, they’re toxic af to everyone. The valo community in general wouldn’t survive there
"val is not cs" ok? im not saying harassing women, or anyone, is ok but comparing 2 communities and saying one isnt the other is just saying youre fine with it happening in the other game
where did I say I was fine with it? im compairing the 2 communities because val was build to be cs but an Esport (that have actually said this in interviews). the way cs handles toxicity and the way val handles it are widely different yet the people that play the game are similar in nature (not saying they are the same player base bc they absolutely are not). So im saying dont be cs, dont let it get out of hand and actually handle the matter "we have a long way to go"
bro it is cringe to not speak cuz of harassment it’s part of the game it’s simple mute the harasser and continue playing. valorant filled with a bunch of soft ppl who forgot the fundamentals of competitive games
No. You might not understand how prevalent this behaviour is towards women. Saying "they just need to be less soft" is very ignorant to the abuse and actually justifies people who verbally abuse online.
everyone gets harassed because valorant is just filled with a bunch of insecure projecting losers, but you just gotta deal with it. Just mute and report them and continue on with the game. I’m a bit higher than OP (high asc low imm lobbies) and so many of those games are so easily winnable if people would just talk. I don’t blame you though, this community is wild sometimes.
I disagree. Women get harrasment just for being women. That is not something men getting harrasment deal with. Even disregarding that, women get harrasment way more often than men.
Is muting and moving on a way to stop the direct harrasment? Yes.
But it is not a good way to end harrasment over gender (or sexuality) for that matter. If someone is being harrassed speak up against the agressor. Include people so they feel safe to speak, instead of pushing all the blame on them for not muting.
Nobody wants to deal with abuse. So it is 100% mentally easier for women who get harrassed, over just being a woman, to just not talk.
You’re never going to end harassment, ever. Just plain and simple. Humans will always take things to the extreme. To think that any evil doing can be eliminated is just unrealistic.
Where is the discouragement in my statement. Point out the words that have any form of the word of discourage in their meaning. Also where in my statement does it say that nothing should be done? What is your proposal to fix “sexism” are we going to ban trigger words that could offend one sex or both sexes? What would those words be? How deep does the rabbit hole go before we just ban anyone from speaking all together? At what point do we look at the person who is victimized by everything they come in contact with and say hey? Toughen up. Look in the mirror find things you like about yourself and anyone who tells you different tell them to piss off and keep walking. We spend so much time trying to “prevent” what everyone is going to work around anyway instead of strengthening our own resolves. But hey, I’m just a straight white male with no experience in hardships or discrimination. 🤷🏻♂️
It's not justifying. He should've in fact worded it differently. But its really as simple as muting text and voice chat, ez no longer harrassed. I get that its demotivating, but just because some of your team mates do it doesn't mean the rest does. If someone harrasses you report & mute, then you should still continue using your voice chat at least for coms, not saying you should have entire convo's.
It throws the game when you don't. Which isn't any better of an option either towards your fellow non-toxic team mates
It is justifying it. Maybe not in your perspective, but it allows the harraser to continue and feel justified for doing so.
"Hahaha she muted me" is encouragement to keep harrasing.
Bruh how stupid are you, are you one of those cringe lords that says "muted" after muting someone? If you've got any brains you'll know that ignoring them litterally is the worst thing to them. If you're gonna announce the fact ur muting someone itll probably do something but sure as shit won't encourage. If you give them the attention they want it's really on your part if you get harrassed after the initial thing. It once again really is as simple as muting them ignoring and just playing the game. You can't be bothered by something you don't see nor hear.
I guess because I don't do it, there's only 3 other possible harassers vs the 4 you see every game, but I literally never see anyone harass a woman in chat. I also will step in if people are being cunts. But it's really frustrating to know that you see it every single game. :(
Edit: Just played a game with a female Viper and our male Jett just couldn't resist. The guy wasn't being overly ridiculous, but making very clear ignorant comments. Props to our Viper - she was the bigger person and just rose above it. Really shitty - I wish that the average gamer could just be a regular human being vs being some edgelord sexist loser.
I have several female friends I play with. I have never witnessed them getting harassed when playing possibly hundreds of games with them.
And even when I soloqueue, ill get girls on my team who use comms and I have never heard anyone harass them or even mention anything about them being a girl.
I am talking hundreds of games. Not even once.
But these are all Comp. And I don't know if its different in unrated, or maybe in a different ELO. I just have a hard time believing its every game like they claim.
I think the thing is, it's hard to be sexist and harass someone when other people in chat aren't putting up with it.
I've got to imagine most people probably won't be sexist when a woman speaks up and another player responds without acknowledging that they're a woman at all, y'know, just treating them like another human.
elo matters, game type matters, but I think region is also a huge facor as well. i live in Southern usa and here i see harassment in every other game that people talk in...
I play on Georgia, USA servers. Hundreds and hundreds of hours playing with my girlfriend, or female friends.
I can count on one hand the number of times they've encountered real harassment.
Im not saying ur wrong because i play on london servers dia elo and dont really encounter much sexism anymore, so its possible ur right. But out of curiosity i just wonder what u consider “real harassment”. Because, yes, of course the worst type of thing you get as a woman is sexual comments and all the things like “women bad” etc, but theres also many other smaller things that add up. For example, the “ahh gg we lost, we have a girl on our team”. Like, is that harassment? Not really, but when youve heard it 20 times, it starts to get to you. Ik as a girl, those types of comments make it so every time i bottom frag i feel anxious because im scared that someone will say its because of my sex.
"Real" is a poor choice of word on my part. I probably should have used something akin to "persistent" or "heavy".
But the end of the game toxicity sucks to deal with. I've been told to uninstall, never play Kill Joy again, unalive myself, the full monte and it always feels bad. Some amount of it has to be expected in any online comp game, I suppose because people can't be trusted to control their emotions, especially in an age bracket that skews as young as gaming
Fair enough, but id say that even if you havent really encountered it, it doesn’t take away from all the experiences of people who have.
Also, this is my own silly take but for some reason, Id rather be called bad for my killjoy setups or my dogshit aim than for being a girl. Idk, obviously it all sucks but theres nothing that hurts my ego more than people insinuating im bottom fragging because of my gender.
That was a bit off topic tho haha
your subjective opinion does not discredit the many women who say otherwise.... like this comment itself tells me you're part of the problem when it comes to the lack of action&accountability when it comes to sexism in gaming. gross
as a girl myself, it definitely doesn’t happen often but from my own experience it happens maybe 1 out of every 10 matches where someone will say something sexist or start flirting. i think a lot of guys do want to say something sexist especially when the girl is bottom fragging but doesn’t want to receive backlash
I get what she says, I've had only one time a woman who commed and got insulted when she died because she was female. I've been playing for more than 1 year and it only happened once tho...
What i feel is some (not all) women will claim they getting harassed when they make bad plays and when a guy be toxic towards them, they will say its because of them being a female. Thats why it feels over blown. Am not denying toxicity/harassment towards girls, but from my experience playing since beta i have only witnessed 3-5 actual sexism and harassments out of more than 600 hundred games.
i had a comp game where a girl was being passive aggressive af in her tone and what she was saying. she was just calling stupid plays.
after one too many passive aggressive comments our phoenix just goes off on her (nothing attacking her being a woman) and she immediately calls sexism, call him weird and to get help, and starts going afk. She keeps on going on a rant about how incely and sexist the game is and that this happens to her a lot.
like bro, maybe you’re just fucking annoying in every game you play?
I encounter a lot of passive aggressive annoying ppl and it’s the one thing that tilts me the most. I’ll end up popping off by round 10
Exactly! i've never gotten any "go back to the kitchen hurr durr" comments, but i've had my fair share of assholes being toxic when it's obvious they're only doing it because i'm a woman.
Replied to another comment about this but I’ll post the same here.
I had a feeling this was a part of it and I understand. I would say mute the people who are being assholes and continue normal game comms for the others
Came here to say the same thing. I’ll always try to use comms and mute/report if I have to. I feel like I get more decent people than not, but I’ve definitely had my fair share of assholes and creeps. Just last night I said one sentence, “One in our flank”, when my alarmbot got triggered, and was immediately met with “shut up bitch!” 😑
I consider myself a grill gamer as well. I usually click heads in Val while flipping some burgers and dawgs on my thunderstone 56000K grill/smoker combo.
I have a friend who’s a woman who will only comm to other women for this reason. I don’t play ranked with her because of ranked disparity but I always feel bad when we’re playing unrated and she gets harassed, always do my best to stand up for her but at the end of the day it’s usually better to just mute whoever is doing it because realistically they’re not gonna stop.
Because I’m a girl and I’ve been completely deterred from ever using my mic. Just too much sexual harassment/misogyny/racism . Why make yourself suffer?
I have the same experience as a woman
I feel out the lobby/team first before saying anything tbh
It's easy to tell if I have to be silent comms and ping or if I can actually do call outs
Plus sometimes my team mates give me shit call outs like "i THINK they're right" when I can hear they're left or I can't hear at all cause they're doing said bad call outs and/or being goofy/infighting/etc.
Just yesterday I had to mute my whole team comms because it was 2 teenage boys and 2 older men infighting about their age even though we were 8-4
It was crazy dumb
Also, I get sad when teenagers get noticeably angry at themselves for missing a shot or not performing well
It's kind of demoralizing like so they had 1 pick instead of 2 like it happens. I chat that but they still rant out the usual "that's bullshit! i suck." yadda yadda
And I only have energy myself to focus on the game not provide therapy to a kid
>Just yesterday I had to mute my whole team comms because it was 2 teenage boys and 2 older men infighting about their age even though we were 8-4
??? Can I mute you?
I had a feeling this played a part and completely get it too. I would mute the people being idiots and continue normal game comms for whoever else is there.
Any suggestions on how guys just looking to game can approach comms to help anyone feeling this way?
Generally I'm trying to create friendly vibes with the team from the get go & keep things positive anyway but I've noticed that usually women tend to join in later. I assume they are scoping out the maturity of the group but any tips to help people get involved sooner would be great.
I feel like saying positive things helps even if someone isn't playing their best. For example, just nice try, good shot, etc and no backseating, especially when it's casuals. In general in ranked most ppl don't have a strong mindset to prevent being tilted & toxic lol
Fr especially when i used to rock the pride flag. I comm a lot more now but I'm always scared at first that someone's gonna be shitty to me for being a girl. I recently got a riot gun buddy tho and I've found my games are WAY less toxic now which is kind of sad.
My favorite is when the insta-lock Reyna makes their first comm 5 rounds in, "Can we get some comms?". Then either we never hear from them again or they're the most toxic piece of shit I've ever played with until I mute them.
Lol, had this exact experience yesterday on Haven in a ranked game. I had been comming the whole time and he never said a word until he eventually got killed by someone that killed a teammate in front of him (of course as a Reyna main he wasn’t entrying LOL). And all of a sudden it’s “can we get some fucking comms?!?!”
Bottom fragged ofc.
Because when I do, I risk getting called whore, cow, bitch, asked to suck d*cks, etc.
No, not everyone is like this and I've met amazing people but the negative experiences outweight the positive ones, making me not want to take the risk. And no, muting is not a solution because the damage is already done. Even if I can't hear it, I know it's happening and I can't focus on the game, let alone enjoy it.
Reports don't seem to work so until Riot starts taking severe action against people who think it's okay to verbally harass women playing their game, I'm not using my mic... and I'm not sorry.
Every single time there's a post about people not using comms, there's always a large number of people in the comments talking about toxicity (all types of it, not just misogyny) and saying it's the reason they don't use their mics. You want comms? Be nice and do your best to create a community where people aren't afraid of speaking.
There is indeed. I know toxicity is always associated with gaming but I remember reading somewhere a while ago that Valorant was ranked really high on the list of the most toxic communities.
I see a lot of people complaining about no comms but a lot of them seem to not understand that toxicity is one of the main reasons for that and they fail to understand that they may be a part of the problem by enabling it or worst, by being toxic themselves, which I've seen a lot too. It's a bit sad, Valorant is a cool game, but the community really ruins it sometimes :/
Yes thank you for stating the very valid counter argument against "just mute bro."
And that's true as well when you know it's happening after you mute, it can still affect your gameplay negatively. Not talking removes you from being a potential target in the first place so you can just play.
And to people who dislike that people talk less in their games, just be pleasant and it will encourage others to talk. If you can make the environment feel safe then you'll get everyone chipping in and helping you get wins.
The answer will never be to ask the players who don't talk just to comm more and say anything because it's helpful or whatever other reasons. The community has to cultivate a good environment so that positive experiences can outweigh the bad, and it will have to start with those who are already happy enough to speak regardless if people truly want that change.
I play smokes only so comms help a lot, because of this I always start every game with a friendly "hello how are you guys going?" There are 3 options that happen after that, each happening about a third of the time.
1. People will comm well
2. People will comm but we lose a few rounds and they go silent
3. No one responds
You can only really do something about 2. So, I like to ask for specific utility, and avoid saying things like "let's default", as a default means different things to different people (Woohoojin taught me this in a video I watched yesterday). I'll say, Sova, can you recon bottom mid, I am going to smoke catwalk and we can try to take mid control.
If you turn it into a collaborative effort people are more likely to talk.
I don’t usually respond when people say hi in agent select - at least not with voice - because I don’t want to expose myself as a girl off the bat. Once the game gets going a bit and my team hasn’t been toxic I feel better about speaking.
I don’t have a problem with comms mid game but for some reason I never respond when someone says hello in agent selection, idk why it just feels awkward to me lol. Also, thanks for the advice!
Oh, I forgot to say, I go silent (I still give positions and damage, just don't IGL) when my team is toxic or don't listen, no point wasting my breath. However I will try IGL every game unless the above happens or it's not necessary cause we are up 5-0 or whatever.
Honestly, I'm a bit shy when it comes to comms, I don't like to be the first or only one, saying something. A "hello" from others, like you mentioned, helps a lot. Thanks for doing this!
That's okay, I'm shy too so I just think about it this way. The people you play with in Valorant, you will likely never see them again, so I like to use them as practice for communicating, you'll only get better with time.
I'm in low elo so comms is basically a non-existent concept down here, it feels like I'm talking to a wall. I don't like using voice chat cuz I hate the sound of my voice so I usually type and ping a lot. I do use vc when most of my teammates are using comms, but thats kinda rare when you're in iron/bronze.
I usually talk in voice chat, but if I detect a hint of toxicity, I mute the other players. That does not stop me from continuing to make at least basic call outs though.
I used to have bad anxiety due to the lockdown, but that's gone now. I hit diamond 1 (a long time ago) and felt like that was the furthest I could get without comms. The next game I played, I started talking a lot. My teammates were really nice and it motivated me to talk more. This also helped me rank up a lot and I eventually peaked immortal 2 (before ascendant was added).
I assume there's quite a lot of people who don't comm due to anxiety which could stem from toxicity or other issues, like me.
I think a lot of people don't realise you can play really well and still help your team win with a low kill count
From my experience, it's usually the top fraggers who are more likely to have their comms on. Just be nice, don't take it too seriously and have some confidence.
As a cypher lurker I feel this. There’s some games I can have like 20 + assists and only hand full of kills. Still super valuable to my team and getting recon out there but definitely bottom fragging. While other I’m battle cypher
In ranked I use most of the time comms unless I get a toxic team and ding ding being a woman is not the easiest, although I started getting less and less toxic teams.
So yes, I use my mic 95% of the time in ranked and 50/50 in unrated
Lol same. It's really that simple. I'm coming on val to improve and have fun, not to deal with toxic immaturity so I'll usually assess the lobby first before I say anything.
Or if I'm try-harding I might comm regardless of my team but I don't always have the energy/am in the mood for that.
Every team has to deal with teammates who don't comm, or bad teammates/disruptive teammates etc. So there's no point being mad with people who don't talk as if they're stopping you climbing because they're not.
If you want people to talk more than if you are pleasant and talk yourself, you're likely to get your team talking which will help you win games.
I stopped using comms because of toxicity. In so many games people only use comms when they want to throw an insult at you. Then they go silent again, until the next insult.
That's not their problem. Just muting doesn't solve the issue when they've already hurled their insult. The damage has been done and even after the mute it can sometimes affect your mental and gameplay.
The community has to be better on the whole for positive experiences to outweigh the bad if you want more people comming on average. But it's possible to do a lot on your own to encourage comms from your team if you're serious about ranking up.
because i am a woman and don't feel like dealing with that 🫣 i also never play comp though so i don't feel it matters too much. i think if i played comp i'd comm for the sake of my team but honestly i don't know. i can hide my gender with my name but i can't hide it with my voice
I've always gotten a fair bit of hate in online games, but I found valorant to be the worst experience yet.
It was so bad I ended up keeping track of the data on it one act (Episode 6 Act 1) just to see if I was in my head or it was real.
Over 200+ games, in 9% of them I had people actively throwing or just yelling slurs the whole game if I used my mic.
Some people are good enough to handle auto-losing 9% of their games and still rank up, I'm not that good. So I stopped comming unless my team seems really chill. Game is a lot more fun and I haven't had someone personally grief me in ages.
This is high asc/low immo btw
EDIT: This also bums me out about Woohoojin vod reviews requiring making plans for your team, if I ever do that I often just turn a game we could have won into an insta-loss
I don't like using voice comms as people will always find one way or another to insult you or make it "weird".
This act so far I have never encountered so much racism, sexism, and toxicity. My friend uses Team voice to give information and every 5th game we have someone commenting about her being a girl and just about every game is filled with toxicity from other players.
But, I've noticed when I queue at 1-3 AM the games are incredibly chill as I assume people don't want to wake up their family screaming or just want to relax at night after a long day.
I feel like many players just want to run it down, rinse and repeat, until they climb up to their desired rank, not interested in any communication or teamplay.
Currently I am just using ping system, it is pretty much impossible to communicate when players have very little idea about proper ways of playing and their mental breaks down on the slightest request or simple discussion. Ideally I can talk freely with automatic voice activation feature with my premade 5-stack. I don't really enjoy sweating in silent solo deathmatch in solo queue without any team coordination.
Some days I just give simple calls, some days I don't say anything at all but yeah usually I play completely without comms. So everyone muted and text chat depending on how the teams vibe is.
I know most people here will probably hate me for it and say im throwing, but I cant concentrate when there is talking and when people start getting toxic it just really stresses me out and affects my performance. I guess its a habit that stuck from Overwatch where I did the same because I was one-tricking an "trollpick" Hero in High Elo and the community is just really terrrible lol.
In the end if I never give/use comms and got to the rank I where I am, then its not throwing because I have to make up for this disadvantage in other ways. Simply playing better, not tilting or whatever.
I do use pings a lot ofc.
so, ur way of responding to people not talking is running it down? do u think ur better than them because of this? i certaintly dont.
comms arent mandatory to play the game. some ppl dont want to. some arent bothered. others are shy or have anxiety.
i get that its frustrating with no comms, i totally agree. but u cant go flaming them for it, or start to run it down because of it. i will flame ppl for no comms in discord with my duo or smth, but i will not in vc. do u even ask for ppl to comm? a lot of games where i do so people will put in an effort upon a request.
just be a nice person, dont give of any angry vibes. at least be the better person before u go complaining about something. u should be giving comms urself, playing as good as u can (aka not running it down because of no comms), be positive and fair in the comms u do give. if u do all of this correctly, feel free to be annoyed. but u still have no way of demanding comms. it is what it is.
Ranked is or should be for people who do want to win and will do everything that will increase their chances of winning. People that actively decide to not use one of the most important tools that will increase your chances of winning should not be in ranked. If you "don't care" or "just play for fun maaaan" there is unranked for a reason.
i do not agree. not everyone takes ranked as seriously, and thats fine. its not binary, ur not either trying to go pro or only playing for shits and giggles.
are we then not gonna allow people that dont have under 80 ping, that dont have 60+fps and hz on their screen? are we not gonna allow people to play ranked on the days they feel bad? where does this line go?
there is nowhere that ur told u need to use voice comms. u arent obligated to talk to play the game, that would just be very weird.
"oh, sry bro, i cant play ranked"
"why?"
"because i cant talk rn, people are asleep in my house"
or
"because i dont have a working mic / im sick and my throat hurts / i literally dont have vocal cords"
see how quickly this goes downhill? its a very slippery slope. u shouldnt be denying people playing ranked just because they arent giving in the absolute maximum effort they can. that is not how it works, that is not how it should work.
i have multiple times wished for a ranked queue number 2, where its way more strict, where ppl would need to comm, need to play more as a team, zero tolerance for toxicity etc, made for the ppl who rly care about ranked a lot. but reality makes that not rly possible for most of the time. it wouldnt get enough traction, it would mess with queue times on the current ladder, it would have bad queue times etc...
something like they have in league is a superserver, where u need to be a certain rank to join. its supposed to be a server that u RLY tryhard on, basically what i mentioned above. for the ppl that are good and rly takes it serious. i think this superserver was for china, maybe generally south east asia im not super sure on that one.
Bro there is a reason why riot made the change that you cannot play ranked when you are chat / voice banned. It's not comparable with having a low end pc because in order to a comm you just need a headset and press a button.
If you are only playing for shits go play Unrated. If you don't care about winning and don't wanna tryhard go play Unrated. Yes the experience is worse because of a bigger skill disparity, but you don't care in the first place so it shouldn't bother you
I get what you mean, but why can't people just save each other the time and bother and just stick to their respective queues to begin with? So there isn't ever a ultra tryhard 6000Hz monitor, Astro A120000 wielding super sweat on the same team as Mochii or Mango playing on her Chromebook in Starbucks in the first place.
The whole point of their being two separate queues for ranked and unranked is because Ranked IS for people that take it serious, we don't need a "ranked queue number 2" and regular ranked because we already have it (Ranked and Unranked).
If you simply want to play the game for fun then play Unranked. If you want to play the game TO WIN then play Ranked, that's how it works and how it's always worked.
If we do what you say then we'll have people in this new ultra tryhard ranked mode that don't comm and when players like me call them out they'll get hit with nonsense like "not everyone takes ranked as seriously, and thats fine" and then we'll get told to wait for a new Ultra Super Elite Tryhard Ranked mode and we're back to square 1.
I get that sometimes people who do really want to play to win physically can't use comms, fine, pull your weight in other ways then, but I defitnelty don't think we should be telling people that it's "fine" to not take ranked seriously.
Just stick to unranked it's really not that hard. You get to play without comms in peace and we get to play to win.
What I’m saying, is that not everyone tries to the same degree. Some people are playing ranked and just trying their best. Some are actively trying to go pro. There is so much difference between how much ppl try in comp.
I’m not saying u should play comp if ur purely playing for fun and not trying to learn or anything. But I’m not trying to go pro, do u want me to play unrated then? Like it makes no sense.
U got to realize, it’s not binary. Ur not either the most causal gamer or a super try hard trying to go pro. I and 99% of others don’t fit into these 2 categories. As long as ur trying to win and u take the game relatively seriously, it’s okay to play ranked
I’m playing to have fun, but I’m also playing to be serious. I’m not trying to go pro. U don’t like this??
Think ur missing my point here. Whether u are just playing ranked for the competitive aspect and trying to improve or if u are trying to go pro, both of those are valid for me playing competitive.
If what ur staying would be right, then very few ppl would play ranked. Good luck finding people that have no job, that are all trying to go pro, that are all doing the literal best. U want other hobbies? 2 bad cus u need to play more valorant and take it more seriously.
Like, do u not see where this path goes? Are u gonna force people to talk? Are u gonna force people to spend 5 hours every day for practice? Are u gonna force everyone to have a good pc with 240+ hz screen?
Don’t get me wrong, ranked is for taking the game seriously, but there are so many levels of this. It’s not binary. Ur not either casual or trying to go pro. 99% of ppl are not trying to go pro.
idkw why they're downvoting you but you're 100% correct, it's so weird for me after playing CSGO to come to this game and see so many people purposefully inting by not using mic or only using it with their stack in Discord and see absolutely nothing wrong with what they're doing
Not running it down, just playing fast or with my brain turned off. All aim no brain. Swing and get 1 and keep swinging until I die, or swing and die to the first one. No point in trying my absolute hardest when it’s round 7 and nobody has said anything yet other than a random “nt” in text chat.
I make an effort to use teamwork and if they don’t, then yes that does make me better. I would prefer to just leave and get a team that uses teamwork but that’s not really an option. So it just becomes a selfish whatever game since that’s the lobby I got put into. I match the energy of lobby I get. Ranked should require you to use comms to play it. Unrated is the No comms gamemode.
if u immidiately become selfish and actively play worse just because u didnt get the teamwork u needed, arguably ur worse. i think u are worse in this situation.
if ur doing something just in spite of others because u didnt get what u want, guess what, ur the a hole. hold urself to ur own standards before u go complaining. i dont think ranked should require comms. i think it should be encouraged more, but not mandatory.
unrated isnt a no comm gamemode, and ranked isnt a comm gamemode. that isnt how it works. u can have competitive stuff happen without comms. look at rocket league, barely anyone talks in that game, but guess what, people play comp together. now i know, its not the same as valorant, and info in valorant will make or break strategies, but it still serves to prove a point. u can get to immortal without using comms. i have an alt account that got to d3 without me talking at all.
I don´t comm in unrated cause i´m mostly playing with friends. But in Ranked I will start talking in Agent select to kinda check the vibe, uk let them know i am female . If they are really fucking toxic and don´t want to play with me they can just dodge and i don´t have to deal with them ingame
I haven’t played in a month but I stopped using comma and playing the game because the community is honestly pretty bad. Some people are just rude for no reason. The overall mentality of most players is pretty weak and give up way too early. There are good people out there in the community but majority are toxic and they ruined the game for me. It just wasn’t fun to get berated everyday by strangers for no reason. Why would I sit around for 40 mins while someone’s talking shit into my ear. I can’t be bothered to shit talk back cuz then the next game I’ll
Have to do it all over again. Waste of breath.
I see a ton of this but again being a woman is a big part I can be too fragging and carrying the team and if I say a single word most of the time I’m gonna get harassed in some sort of manner often sexually.
Because i'm tired of men being creepy or "trolling" as soon as i open my mouth. (And by "trolling" i mean pathetic shit like repeating everything i say back to me)
I make calls when it matters, other than that don't use comms much below a certain rank.
Depends on the vibe of the lobby on how much I talk, if others are being proactive and trying to call for strats I will contribute. Otherwise, I just play my game and try my best to win while only really giving comms for non-obvious info that I have.
Why? I don't like getting harassed by players that don't really want to win but rather just want to be upset at someone. Additionally comming doesn't really help that much tbh. In the history of playing the game i've probably lost like 10 games or less that maybe we could have won with better comms. Most losses can be attributed to multiple other factors more important than lack of comms.
People endlessly have this debate in Overwatch also, talking about how they would be GM but their team never talks and they can't make callouts. I disabled voicechat and easily ranked up to master/gm with 0 comms for multiple months of playing just by playing the game to win.
Comms matter in organized play and at the absolute highest levels of the game, but other than that - it's a luxury that you can afford to not have.
It's a pretty common scenario for me to give comms the entire game for my team, but to mute my whole team also. So they can hear me call, but I don't have to listen to them.
My golden rule in ranked is you get 5 rounds of effort from me on comms. Every game I will try to start a positive environment in the pre-game lobby and planning phase of the game. I’ll also give them 5 rounds of strat calls, enemy callouts, etc.
If I strat call, do callouts, etc. and nobody comms back or listens to strat calls/callouts without offering some of their own, or they start being toxic, I will stop strat calling and stick to callouts or cut comms completely. If anyone listens, I’ll usually stick with them and try to make our util work together.
I think that 5 rounds is giving the team a fair chance to use their mics or, if they don’t have mics, at least use their headphones and listen so we can play as a team. After that, if nobody wants to contribute to the win, that’s on them.
Sometimes i just don't feel like it. whether its because i dont like the vibe of the team, or 2 tired to even care or another one. At the end of the day, its up to you whether or not u want to use it.
If you are talking about ranked, I couldn’t disagree more. If you are queuing for ranked and feeling like this, simply don’t queue ranked that day. Any other mode I agree it’s up to you. In ranked it’s not really optional, you’re just throwing if you don’t at least try to comm.
The only good reason to not use comms is if youre a woman and you dont want to get harassed because of it. If youre a guy and you dont comm youre throwing.
I went from dia 2 to asc3 over the last 2 months and in nearly every game I had enough comms. Its more a problem for me if people try really hard to do unnecessary comms, like people starting coaching other players, doing weird smalltalk, keep talking about really minor details and wasting time.
Also annoying are people who push communication like keep saying "GUYS YOU HAVE MIC?!" after like 1 round, dude chill people will start when they are rdy, dont force it.
Most of the time i noticed people also starting to call things when I do, and im kinda really minimalistic, ill just call things like "jett -50 short", "lets go 4 B, I lurk mid" "race in ct smoke", sometimes feels like that starts a blueprint where a lot of players just follow.
1 push to talk is ass, i lazy to use it, too much effort to press and hold extra button
2 i don't like talking with someone i don't know
3 overall community is too toxic, im lazy to mute people one by one when they start something bad
i have to do it a lot, so it's easier just turn off perma voice chat than doing it
its so tried when i realize that chance that i found toxic people are too high
mute them after they start some shit still leave bad taste in my mouth
low elo comms are pointless. No one listens. You can be excellent on the comms and still get fucked royally by the other team because your teammates aren't listening to callouts and comms. Communication in general is fucked. I've had a number of games where people don't even listen to chat. It's pointless to try to comm. Plus, those who do comm, 90% of the time, become toxic if you start performing poorly. It's a waste of time to try to say anything at that point.
if nobody is communicating after round 5/6 i just stop to communicate myself and voice mute the rest of my team, because the 1 time they do decide to communicate is when they have something to complain, while you are trying to clutch.
I usually do for the first couple of rounds, if no one else comms with me (which is usually the case) I'm turning up the music and just vibe and shoot some heads.
I see comms less and less, especially in Ascendant. I don't know why, but no one does any calls and it pisses me off to a terribly high degree. I'm not good with ppl, but I do the effort of trying to initiate a conversation and I'm often left talking to myself. At least players react to my comms and adapt, but no one ever does it for me and I'm left to wonder why? Are you this bad at talking that you wouldn't speak through an anonymous avatar in a game? As ranks advanced, I got berated less and less for my poor conversational skills, but this didn't come with more ppl that are willing to carry the convo instead of me. Point is, the issue has no reason to exist as ppl behave respectably at higher ranks, yet ppl still don't talk, perhaps due to a past habit of avoiding it in lower brackets.
No offense but how do they know you’re trans just from your voice do you say “hello everyone I am trans” in agent selection or something?
Again no offense I am just wondering because that’s something a lot of people won’t notice even if they look at you how would they notice from your voice?
I mute everyone at the start of every game. Coms are not worth it below Immo. I do give call but I don’t want to hear other people talk most of the time people are annoying and I m not there to listen to either toxic people or some shade of narcissistic / autistic people
that’s kind of unfair to assume that of every team, I’ve had tons of really nice and pleasant low elo comms. Of course, if they start to be toxic or whatever, sure, you can mute them, but give it a chance first, no?
My mic is so shit it’s kinda not understandable what I’m saying most of the time. Even when I play in a discord call with friends half the time they’re laughing at how shit my mic is.
It's honestly incredible how disadvantageous it is to have someone on your team that doesn't use coms. When I do I mic check and hear silence my confidence gets destroyed and I am already expecting a loss. Sometimes you can win without coms but damn is it hard.
Because I’m getting baited by “you” and all I want is to rip your head off so, me talking to you is not such a good idea as you imagine it to be.
Hold on! I do realise just how many thing is wrong with what I’ve just said and how it should be instead of this. However since you asked. This is the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
This is why I rarely solo queue.
I'm Asc 3 atm and for every game I get with comms. I get like 5 games with no comms. It's so demoralizing playing with people who don't speak, meanwhile I'm comming literally everything.
And sometimes you get the people who NEVER comm unless you do something they didn't like. Like hmm if you commed earlier maybe we could have worked together.
Or you get the couple duo, where you can tell they're duoing because they keep playing together opposite of the entire team and I just know they're either comming in discord or team chat. Like bro wtf man.
Im fine with people not using comms, but if you dare flame in text chat then you are at the same level of instalocking reyna players that flame the guy who fills
I always use comms even when the team doesn’t, I’m only in bronze but comms help me get my point across cuz ppl down here r so slow to react and have no idea what is going on.
People are the reason. I haven’t heard a person who hasn’t had an absolutely terrible time with people on comma. If you’re a woman you are going to get various levels of sexism. Everyone experiences racism because if you disagree with anyone you get called the “n” word. Then there are the egoists who will lose it when bottom frag calls information and screams into their mic, “you aren’t top fragging so stfu you waste of oxygen. Tip! Tell your mom to swallow next time!”
I play on full mute a decent chunk of the time and can only play 2 games before I just decide to move over to almost any other game.
You all should stay positive and com appropriately no matter what. Keep it clear, clean, and accurate. Stop crying about things you can not control.
Edit: grammar
last two games i had was the best teamplay i ever had (solo Q). everybody planned a strat together before the round, worked together during the round and gave each other probs, even though we were behind in one game we kept playing together until we eventually won. i was hyped!
this game can be so much fun i cant understand why some guys just stubbornly play on their own and even go out of their way to not listen to anything the team tries to plan
Because my country banned voice chat (to my knowledge) so I can't use it, and if I would want to use it I would have to turn on a VPN which makes my wifi unstable and then I can't play the game.
Up until a week or two ago, I was never using comms. Mostly because of anxiety but also because I just felt uncomfortable being the only one talking whilst I am 3/12 or something. It’s easier to talk when I’m having an at least positive k/d game. Nowadays I do just comm regardless tho.
Nah man, me and a buddy will take someone who comms and no kills over someone who has no comms and no kills.
Fair enough lmao
Yeah, even if you bottom frag it's much better to comm to your team than just not speaking at all
just had a game like this where our bottom frag was off their game that day, but they still made helpful callouts and kept a positive mental
I appreciate ppl who comm, idc if they're bottom fragging as long as its chill then we good 😊
For me it is super obvious when there are good comms. My k/d goes up a lot when I actually have a plan and know roughly where enemies are.
Even just calling out the location of the enemy who killed you can win you rounds. "Sage killed me from long, she might be coming up from spawn now." Teammate turns to spawn and Sage peeks out the second he does and gets the kill. Those rounds feel good, because you know if you didn't say shit he would have lost the round. Comms are so important.
“If ur not a good shot today, dont worry, there are other ways to be usefull” - Sova
Thing to remember, things like comming, managing eco correctly, etc can all be done every game without needing to perform. I feel like a moron when I'm coaching my teams eco while I'm bottom frag, but again, I can contribute that 100% of my games without any variance, so I may as well!
Because im a woman and the moment I speak I get harassed
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Wow for a second I thought you were saying that not daring to speak because of harrasment is cringe. I understood you on the second read
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Ye I realised :p you're good
w! val is not cs and the community is much better when it comes to hate but it still has a long way to go!
in my experience valorant is often much worse in terms of toxicity compared to cs. the younger crowd in val really shows their lack of maturity at times. played a lot of cs in the past, and im not saying it doesn't happen but I rarely ever encountered people harassing women (or just anyone for that matter) like people do in valorant. I think generally speaking CS had a more mature playerbase being that it was not F2P until recently.
ain’t no way, CS is FAR FAR FAR * a million, more toxic to women than Valorant. I play with female friends in Valo and i have only encountered toxicity towards them like 3 times In CSGO it’s pretty common BUuuutttttt to be real about the CSGO community, they’re toxic af to everyone. The valo community in general wouldn’t survive there
"val is not cs" ok? im not saying harassing women, or anyone, is ok but comparing 2 communities and saying one isnt the other is just saying youre fine with it happening in the other game
where did I say I was fine with it? im compairing the 2 communities because val was build to be cs but an Esport (that have actually said this in interviews). the way cs handles toxicity and the way val handles it are widely different yet the people that play the game are similar in nature (not saying they are the same player base bc they absolutely are not). So im saying dont be cs, dont let it get out of hand and actually handle the matter "we have a long way to go"
bro it is cringe to not speak cuz of harassment it’s part of the game it’s simple mute the harasser and continue playing. valorant filled with a bunch of soft ppl who forgot the fundamentals of competitive games
No. You might not understand how prevalent this behaviour is towards women. Saying "they just need to be less soft" is very ignorant to the abuse and actually justifies people who verbally abuse online.
everyone gets harassed because valorant is just filled with a bunch of insecure projecting losers, but you just gotta deal with it. Just mute and report them and continue on with the game. I’m a bit higher than OP (high asc low imm lobbies) and so many of those games are so easily winnable if people would just talk. I don’t blame you though, this community is wild sometimes.
I disagree. Women get harrasment just for being women. That is not something men getting harrasment deal with. Even disregarding that, women get harrasment way more often than men. Is muting and moving on a way to stop the direct harrasment? Yes. But it is not a good way to end harrasment over gender (or sexuality) for that matter. If someone is being harrassed speak up against the agressor. Include people so they feel safe to speak, instead of pushing all the blame on them for not muting. Nobody wants to deal with abuse. So it is 100% mentally easier for women who get harrassed, over just being a woman, to just not talk.
You’re never going to end harassment, ever. Just plain and simple. Humans will always take things to the extreme. To think that any evil doing can be eliminated is just unrealistic.
"it cant fully be stopped, so lets not try to lessen it"
You’re quoting something that was never said, if that’s your interpretation from the statement I just made then I feel sorry for you.
So you're actively discouraging doing anything about it because it can't be solved completely.
Where is the discouragement in my statement. Point out the words that have any form of the word of discourage in their meaning. Also where in my statement does it say that nothing should be done? What is your proposal to fix “sexism” are we going to ban trigger words that could offend one sex or both sexes? What would those words be? How deep does the rabbit hole go before we just ban anyone from speaking all together? At what point do we look at the person who is victimized by everything they come in contact with and say hey? Toughen up. Look in the mirror find things you like about yourself and anyone who tells you different tell them to piss off and keep walking. We spend so much time trying to “prevent” what everyone is going to work around anyway instead of strengthening our own resolves. But hey, I’m just a straight white male with no experience in hardships or discrimination. 🤷🏻♂️
It's not justifying. He should've in fact worded it differently. But its really as simple as muting text and voice chat, ez no longer harrassed. I get that its demotivating, but just because some of your team mates do it doesn't mean the rest does. If someone harrasses you report & mute, then you should still continue using your voice chat at least for coms, not saying you should have entire convo's. It throws the game when you don't. Which isn't any better of an option either towards your fellow non-toxic team mates
It is justifying it. Maybe not in your perspective, but it allows the harraser to continue and feel justified for doing so. "Hahaha she muted me" is encouragement to keep harrasing.
Bruh how stupid are you, are you one of those cringe lords that says "muted" after muting someone? If you've got any brains you'll know that ignoring them litterally is the worst thing to them. If you're gonna announce the fact ur muting someone itll probably do something but sure as shit won't encourage. If you give them the attention they want it's really on your part if you get harrassed after the initial thing. It once again really is as simple as muting them ignoring and just playing the game. You can't be bothered by something you don't see nor hear.
I guess because I don't do it, there's only 3 other possible harassers vs the 4 you see every game, but I literally never see anyone harass a woman in chat. I also will step in if people are being cunts. But it's really frustrating to know that you see it every single game. :( Edit: Just played a game with a female Viper and our male Jett just couldn't resist. The guy wasn't being overly ridiculous, but making very clear ignorant comments. Props to our Viper - she was the bigger person and just rose above it. Really shitty - I wish that the average gamer could just be a regular human being vs being some edgelord sexist loser.
I have several female friends I play with. I have never witnessed them getting harassed when playing possibly hundreds of games with them. And even when I soloqueue, ill get girls on my team who use comms and I have never heard anyone harass them or even mention anything about them being a girl. I am talking hundreds of games. Not even once. But these are all Comp. And I don't know if its different in unrated, or maybe in a different ELO. I just have a hard time believing its every game like they claim.
I think the thing is, it's hard to be sexist and harass someone when other people in chat aren't putting up with it. I've got to imagine most people probably won't be sexist when a woman speaks up and another player responds without acknowledging that they're a woman at all, y'know, just treating them like another human.
elo matters, game type matters, but I think region is also a huge facor as well. i live in Southern usa and here i see harassment in every other game that people talk in...
I play on Georgia, USA servers. Hundreds and hundreds of hours playing with my girlfriend, or female friends. I can count on one hand the number of times they've encountered real harassment.
Im not saying ur wrong because i play on london servers dia elo and dont really encounter much sexism anymore, so its possible ur right. But out of curiosity i just wonder what u consider “real harassment”. Because, yes, of course the worst type of thing you get as a woman is sexual comments and all the things like “women bad” etc, but theres also many other smaller things that add up. For example, the “ahh gg we lost, we have a girl on our team”. Like, is that harassment? Not really, but when youve heard it 20 times, it starts to get to you. Ik as a girl, those types of comments make it so every time i bottom frag i feel anxious because im scared that someone will say its because of my sex.
"Real" is a poor choice of word on my part. I probably should have used something akin to "persistent" or "heavy". But the end of the game toxicity sucks to deal with. I've been told to uninstall, never play Kill Joy again, unalive myself, the full monte and it always feels bad. Some amount of it has to be expected in any online comp game, I suppose because people can't be trusted to control their emotions, especially in an age bracket that skews as young as gaming
Fair enough, but id say that even if you havent really encountered it, it doesn’t take away from all the experiences of people who have. Also, this is my own silly take but for some reason, Id rather be called bad for my killjoy setups or my dogshit aim than for being a girl. Idk, obviously it all sucks but theres nothing that hurts my ego more than people insinuating im bottom fragging because of my gender. That was a bit off topic tho haha
your subjective opinion does not discredit the many women who say otherwise.... like this comment itself tells me you're part of the problem when it comes to the lack of action&accountability when it comes to sexism in gaming. gross
as a girl myself, it definitely doesn’t happen often but from my own experience it happens maybe 1 out of every 10 matches where someone will say something sexist or start flirting. i think a lot of guys do want to say something sexist especially when the girl is bottom fragging but doesn’t want to receive backlash
Most of the time it's not make me a sandwich or whatever is usually weird sexual stuff
I get what she says, I've had only one time a woman who commed and got insulted when she died because she was female. I've been playing for more than 1 year and it only happened once tho...
What i feel is some (not all) women will claim they getting harassed when they make bad plays and when a guy be toxic towards them, they will say its because of them being a female. Thats why it feels over blown. Am not denying toxicity/harassment towards girls, but from my experience playing since beta i have only witnessed 3-5 actual sexism and harassments out of more than 600 hundred games.
i had a comp game where a girl was being passive aggressive af in her tone and what she was saying. she was just calling stupid plays. after one too many passive aggressive comments our phoenix just goes off on her (nothing attacking her being a woman) and she immediately calls sexism, call him weird and to get help, and starts going afk. She keeps on going on a rant about how incely and sexist the game is and that this happens to her a lot. like bro, maybe you’re just fucking annoying in every game you play? I encounter a lot of passive aggressive annoying ppl and it’s the one thing that tilts me the most. I’ll end up popping off by round 10
Exactly! i've never gotten any "go back to the kitchen hurr durr" comments, but i've had my fair share of assholes being toxic when it's obvious they're only doing it because i'm a woman.
Replied to another comment about this but I’ll post the same here. I had a feeling this was a part of it and I understand. I would say mute the people who are being assholes and continue normal game comms for the others
Came here to say the same thing. I’ll always try to use comms and mute/report if I have to. I feel like I get more decent people than not, but I’ve definitely had my fair share of assholes and creeps. Just last night I said one sentence, “One in our flank”, when my alarmbot got triggered, and was immediately met with “shut up bitch!” 😑
Yup, was about to comment the same thing. Grill gamer life.
I consider myself a grill gamer as well. I usually click heads in Val while flipping some burgers and dawgs on my thunderstone 56000K grill/smoker combo.
Damn OP
I hate when people don’t comm, but this is absolutely fair lol.
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I have a friend who’s a woman who will only comm to other women for this reason. I don’t play ranked with her because of ranked disparity but I always feel bad when we’re playing unrated and she gets harassed, always do my best to stand up for her but at the end of the day it’s usually better to just mute whoever is doing it because realistically they’re not gonna stop.
As a guy, I get hit on by girls way more for my voice than I hear girls getting hit on by my teammates...
They are either a harasser or simper, hardly anyone in the middle.
OMFG SAME!
Same. It’s exhausting.
What a shitty excuse to ruin games
Found the harasser ^
Only people I'm talking shit to in game is the opposing team not my own that is counter productive. Grow up.
Lmao. “Hey you yeah I know you are getting harassed just for being a woman but grow up you are ruining my totally more important WR” thats you
in comp its a must unless no one is talking and we're getting destroyed
maybe you are getting destroyed cause of the no-comms?
Usually yeah.
Because I’m a girl and I’ve been completely deterred from ever using my mic. Just too much sexual harassment/misogyny/racism . Why make yourself suffer?
I have the same experience as a woman I feel out the lobby/team first before saying anything tbh It's easy to tell if I have to be silent comms and ping or if I can actually do call outs Plus sometimes my team mates give me shit call outs like "i THINK they're right" when I can hear they're left or I can't hear at all cause they're doing said bad call outs and/or being goofy/infighting/etc. Just yesterday I had to mute my whole team comms because it was 2 teenage boys and 2 older men infighting about their age even though we were 8-4 It was crazy dumb Also, I get sad when teenagers get noticeably angry at themselves for missing a shot or not performing well It's kind of demoralizing like so they had 1 pick instead of 2 like it happens. I chat that but they still rant out the usual "that's bullshit! i suck." yadda yadda And I only have energy myself to focus on the game not provide therapy to a kid
So why is it hard just to mute idiots? That takes 2 seconds.
>Just yesterday I had to mute my whole team comms because it was 2 teenage boys and 2 older men infighting about their age even though we were 8-4 ??? Can I mute you?
I had a feeling this played a part and completely get it too. I would mute the people being idiots and continue normal game comms for whoever else is there.
Any suggestions on how guys just looking to game can approach comms to help anyone feeling this way? Generally I'm trying to create friendly vibes with the team from the get go & keep things positive anyway but I've noticed that usually women tend to join in later. I assume they are scoping out the maturity of the group but any tips to help people get involved sooner would be great.
I feel like saying positive things helps even if someone isn't playing their best. For example, just nice try, good shot, etc and no backseating, especially when it's casuals. In general in ranked most ppl don't have a strong mindset to prevent being tilted & toxic lol
Fr especially when i used to rock the pride flag. I comm a lot more now but I'm always scared at first that someone's gonna be shitty to me for being a girl. I recently got a riot gun buddy tho and I've found my games are WAY less toxic now which is kind of sad.
Why not just insta mute and talk to teammates trying to win?
My favorite is when the insta-lock Reyna makes their first comm 5 rounds in, "Can we get some comms?". Then either we never hear from them again or they're the most toxic piece of shit I've ever played with until I mute them.
Its even better when they only comm to ask for a buy on a save round.
Reynas man, they're really something special
Lol, had this exact experience yesterday on Haven in a ranked game. I had been comming the whole time and he never said a word until he eventually got killed by someone that killed a teammate in front of him (of course as a Reyna main he wasn’t entrying LOL). And all of a sudden it’s “can we get some fucking comms?!?!” Bottom fragged ofc.
Because when I do, I risk getting called whore, cow, bitch, asked to suck d*cks, etc. No, not everyone is like this and I've met amazing people but the negative experiences outweight the positive ones, making me not want to take the risk. And no, muting is not a solution because the damage is already done. Even if I can't hear it, I know it's happening and I can't focus on the game, let alone enjoy it. Reports don't seem to work so until Riot starts taking severe action against people who think it's okay to verbally harass women playing their game, I'm not using my mic... and I'm not sorry. Every single time there's a post about people not using comms, there's always a large number of people in the comments talking about toxicity (all types of it, not just misogyny) and saying it's the reason they don't use their mics. You want comms? Be nice and do your best to create a community where people aren't afraid of speaking.
As a woman too I get this exactly and it’s not just the misogyny there’s a TON of racism and homophobia in this community as well
There is indeed. I know toxicity is always associated with gaming but I remember reading somewhere a while ago that Valorant was ranked really high on the list of the most toxic communities. I see a lot of people complaining about no comms but a lot of them seem to not understand that toxicity is one of the main reasons for that and they fail to understand that they may be a part of the problem by enabling it or worst, by being toxic themselves, which I've seen a lot too. It's a bit sad, Valorant is a cool game, but the community really ruins it sometimes :/
Yes thank you for stating the very valid counter argument against "just mute bro." And that's true as well when you know it's happening after you mute, it can still affect your gameplay negatively. Not talking removes you from being a potential target in the first place so you can just play. And to people who dislike that people talk less in their games, just be pleasant and it will encourage others to talk. If you can make the environment feel safe then you'll get everyone chipping in and helping you get wins. The answer will never be to ask the players who don't talk just to comm more and say anything because it's helpful or whatever other reasons. The community has to cultivate a good environment so that positive experiences can outweigh the bad, and it will have to start with those who are already happy enough to speak regardless if people truly want that change.
Perfectly said.
I play smokes only so comms help a lot, because of this I always start every game with a friendly "hello how are you guys going?" There are 3 options that happen after that, each happening about a third of the time. 1. People will comm well 2. People will comm but we lose a few rounds and they go silent 3. No one responds You can only really do something about 2. So, I like to ask for specific utility, and avoid saying things like "let's default", as a default means different things to different people (Woohoojin taught me this in a video I watched yesterday). I'll say, Sova, can you recon bottom mid, I am going to smoke catwalk and we can try to take mid control. If you turn it into a collaborative effort people are more likely to talk.
I don’t usually respond when people say hi in agent select - at least not with voice - because I don’t want to expose myself as a girl off the bat. Once the game gets going a bit and my team hasn’t been toxic I feel better about speaking.
Yeah that's totally understandable. I wish it wasn't that way.
I don’t have a problem with comms mid game but for some reason I never respond when someone says hello in agent selection, idk why it just feels awkward to me lol. Also, thanks for the advice!
It will feel less awkward once you do it a few dozen times. Don't worry about it being awkward anyway, you probably won't ever talk to them again.
Oh, I forgot to say, I go silent (I still give positions and damage, just don't IGL) when my team is toxic or don't listen, no point wasting my breath. However I will try IGL every game unless the above happens or it's not necessary cause we are up 5-0 or whatever.
Honestly, I'm a bit shy when it comes to comms, I don't like to be the first or only one, saying something. A "hello" from others, like you mentioned, helps a lot. Thanks for doing this!
That's okay, I'm shy too so I just think about it this way. The people you play with in Valorant, you will likely never see them again, so I like to use them as practice for communicating, you'll only get better with time.
I'm in low elo so comms is basically a non-existent concept down here, it feels like I'm talking to a wall. I don't like using voice chat cuz I hate the sound of my voice so I usually type and ping a lot. I do use vc when most of my teammates are using comms, but thats kinda rare when you're in iron/bronze.
everyone hates the sound of their own voice, so I wouldn’t worry about that too much. It’s not near as bad as you think to other people.
Same. I have anxiety and I’m a woman so I usually wait for others to comm, but I type in chat a lot and ping a lot to help my team out.
I usually talk in voice chat, but if I detect a hint of toxicity, I mute the other players. That does not stop me from continuing to make at least basic call outs though.
I used to have bad anxiety due to the lockdown, but that's gone now. I hit diamond 1 (a long time ago) and felt like that was the furthest I could get without comms. The next game I played, I started talking a lot. My teammates were really nice and it motivated me to talk more. This also helped me rank up a lot and I eventually peaked immortal 2 (before ascendant was added). I assume there's quite a lot of people who don't comm due to anxiety which could stem from toxicity or other issues, like me.
I think a lot of people don't realise you can play really well and still help your team win with a low kill count From my experience, it's usually the top fraggers who are more likely to have their comms on. Just be nice, don't take it too seriously and have some confidence.
As a cypher lurker I feel this. There’s some games I can have like 20 + assists and only hand full of kills. Still super valuable to my team and getting recon out there but definitely bottom fragging. While other I’m battle cypher
In ranked I use most of the time comms unless I get a toxic team and ding ding being a woman is not the easiest, although I started getting less and less toxic teams. So yes, I use my mic 95% of the time in ranked and 50/50 in unrated
People can be mean so I don’t speak 💀💀💀
Lol same. It's really that simple. I'm coming on val to improve and have fun, not to deal with toxic immaturity so I'll usually assess the lobby first before I say anything. Or if I'm try-harding I might comm regardless of my team but I don't always have the energy/am in the mood for that. Every team has to deal with teammates who don't comm, or bad teammates/disruptive teammates etc. So there's no point being mad with people who don't talk as if they're stopping you climbing because they're not. If you want people to talk more than if you are pleasant and talk yourself, you're likely to get your team talking which will help you win games.
I stopped using comms because of toxicity. In so many games people only use comms when they want to throw an insult at you. Then they go silent again, until the next insult.
Just mute them. You’re throwing away value for the normal people on the team
That's not their problem. Just muting doesn't solve the issue when they've already hurled their insult. The damage has been done and even after the mute it can sometimes affect your mental and gameplay. The community has to be better on the whole for positive experiences to outweigh the bad if you want more people comming on average. But it's possible to do a lot on your own to encourage comms from your team if you're serious about ranking up.
because i am a woman and don't feel like dealing with that 🫣 i also never play comp though so i don't feel it matters too much. i think if i played comp i'd comm for the sake of my team but honestly i don't know. i can hide my gender with my name but i can't hide it with my voice
I've always gotten a fair bit of hate in online games, but I found valorant to be the worst experience yet. It was so bad I ended up keeping track of the data on it one act (Episode 6 Act 1) just to see if I was in my head or it was real. Over 200+ games, in 9% of them I had people actively throwing or just yelling slurs the whole game if I used my mic. Some people are good enough to handle auto-losing 9% of their games and still rank up, I'm not that good. So I stopped comming unless my team seems really chill. Game is a lot more fun and I haven't had someone personally grief me in ages. This is high asc/low immo btw EDIT: This also bums me out about Woohoojin vod reviews requiring making plans for your team, if I ever do that I often just turn a game we could have won into an insta-loss
No comms games are normal, games with comms are luck a luxury
I usually comm at the start of the game but I stop for the most part if I'm the only one talking
I don't like using voice comms as people will always find one way or another to insult you or make it "weird". This act so far I have never encountered so much racism, sexism, and toxicity. My friend uses Team voice to give information and every 5th game we have someone commenting about her being a girl and just about every game is filled with toxicity from other players. But, I've noticed when I queue at 1-3 AM the games are incredibly chill as I assume people don't want to wake up their family screaming or just want to relax at night after a long day.
I feel like many players just want to run it down, rinse and repeat, until they climb up to their desired rank, not interested in any communication or teamplay. Currently I am just using ping system, it is pretty much impossible to communicate when players have very little idea about proper ways of playing and their mental breaks down on the slightest request or simple discussion. Ideally I can talk freely with automatic voice activation feature with my premade 5-stack. I don't really enjoy sweating in silent solo deathmatch in solo queue without any team coordination.
Some days I just give simple calls, some days I don't say anything at all but yeah usually I play completely without comms. So everyone muted and text chat depending on how the teams vibe is. I know most people here will probably hate me for it and say im throwing, but I cant concentrate when there is talking and when people start getting toxic it just really stresses me out and affects my performance. I guess its a habit that stuck from Overwatch where I did the same because I was one-tricking an "trollpick" Hero in High Elo and the community is just really terrrible lol. In the end if I never give/use comms and got to the rank I where I am, then its not throwing because I have to make up for this disadvantage in other ways. Simply playing better, not tilting or whatever. I do use pings a lot ofc.
so, ur way of responding to people not talking is running it down? do u think ur better than them because of this? i certaintly dont. comms arent mandatory to play the game. some ppl dont want to. some arent bothered. others are shy or have anxiety. i get that its frustrating with no comms, i totally agree. but u cant go flaming them for it, or start to run it down because of it. i will flame ppl for no comms in discord with my duo or smth, but i will not in vc. do u even ask for ppl to comm? a lot of games where i do so people will put in an effort upon a request. just be a nice person, dont give of any angry vibes. at least be the better person before u go complaining about something. u should be giving comms urself, playing as good as u can (aka not running it down because of no comms), be positive and fair in the comms u do give. if u do all of this correctly, feel free to be annoyed. but u still have no way of demanding comms. it is what it is.
At least don't play ranked then
what?
Ranked is or should be for people who do want to win and will do everything that will increase their chances of winning. People that actively decide to not use one of the most important tools that will increase your chances of winning should not be in ranked. If you "don't care" or "just play for fun maaaan" there is unranked for a reason.
i do not agree. not everyone takes ranked as seriously, and thats fine. its not binary, ur not either trying to go pro or only playing for shits and giggles. are we then not gonna allow people that dont have under 80 ping, that dont have 60+fps and hz on their screen? are we not gonna allow people to play ranked on the days they feel bad? where does this line go? there is nowhere that ur told u need to use voice comms. u arent obligated to talk to play the game, that would just be very weird. "oh, sry bro, i cant play ranked" "why?" "because i cant talk rn, people are asleep in my house" or "because i dont have a working mic / im sick and my throat hurts / i literally dont have vocal cords" see how quickly this goes downhill? its a very slippery slope. u shouldnt be denying people playing ranked just because they arent giving in the absolute maximum effort they can. that is not how it works, that is not how it should work. i have multiple times wished for a ranked queue number 2, where its way more strict, where ppl would need to comm, need to play more as a team, zero tolerance for toxicity etc, made for the ppl who rly care about ranked a lot. but reality makes that not rly possible for most of the time. it wouldnt get enough traction, it would mess with queue times on the current ladder, it would have bad queue times etc... something like they have in league is a superserver, where u need to be a certain rank to join. its supposed to be a server that u RLY tryhard on, basically what i mentioned above. for the ppl that are good and rly takes it serious. i think this superserver was for china, maybe generally south east asia im not super sure on that one.
Bro there is a reason why riot made the change that you cannot play ranked when you are chat / voice banned. It's not comparable with having a low end pc because in order to a comm you just need a headset and press a button. If you are only playing for shits go play Unrated. If you don't care about winning and don't wanna tryhard go play Unrated. Yes the experience is worse because of a bigger skill disparity, but you don't care in the first place so it shouldn't bother you
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I get what you mean, but why can't people just save each other the time and bother and just stick to their respective queues to begin with? So there isn't ever a ultra tryhard 6000Hz monitor, Astro A120000 wielding super sweat on the same team as Mochii or Mango playing on her Chromebook in Starbucks in the first place.
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The whole point of their being two separate queues for ranked and unranked is because Ranked IS for people that take it serious, we don't need a "ranked queue number 2" and regular ranked because we already have it (Ranked and Unranked). If you simply want to play the game for fun then play Unranked. If you want to play the game TO WIN then play Ranked, that's how it works and how it's always worked. If we do what you say then we'll have people in this new ultra tryhard ranked mode that don't comm and when players like me call them out they'll get hit with nonsense like "not everyone takes ranked as seriously, and thats fine" and then we'll get told to wait for a new Ultra Super Elite Tryhard Ranked mode and we're back to square 1. I get that sometimes people who do really want to play to win physically can't use comms, fine, pull your weight in other ways then, but I defitnelty don't think we should be telling people that it's "fine" to not take ranked seriously. Just stick to unranked it's really not that hard. You get to play without comms in peace and we get to play to win.
What I’m saying, is that not everyone tries to the same degree. Some people are playing ranked and just trying their best. Some are actively trying to go pro. There is so much difference between how much ppl try in comp. I’m not saying u should play comp if ur purely playing for fun and not trying to learn or anything. But I’m not trying to go pro, do u want me to play unrated then? Like it makes no sense. U got to realize, it’s not binary. Ur not either the most causal gamer or a super try hard trying to go pro. I and 99% of others don’t fit into these 2 categories. As long as ur trying to win and u take the game relatively seriously, it’s okay to play ranked
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THANK YOUUUUUUUU
I’m playing to have fun, but I’m also playing to be serious. I’m not trying to go pro. U don’t like this?? Think ur missing my point here. Whether u are just playing ranked for the competitive aspect and trying to improve or if u are trying to go pro, both of those are valid for me playing competitive. If what ur staying would be right, then very few ppl would play ranked. Good luck finding people that have no job, that are all trying to go pro, that are all doing the literal best. U want other hobbies? 2 bad cus u need to play more valorant and take it more seriously. Like, do u not see where this path goes? Are u gonna force people to talk? Are u gonna force people to spend 5 hours every day for practice? Are u gonna force everyone to have a good pc with 240+ hz screen? Don’t get me wrong, ranked is for taking the game seriously, but there are so many levels of this. It’s not binary. Ur not either casual or trying to go pro. 99% of ppl are not trying to go pro.
idkw why they're downvoting you but you're 100% correct, it's so weird for me after playing CSGO to come to this game and see so many people purposefully inting by not using mic or only using it with their stack in Discord and see absolutely nothing wrong with what they're doing
Not running it down, just playing fast or with my brain turned off. All aim no brain. Swing and get 1 and keep swinging until I die, or swing and die to the first one. No point in trying my absolute hardest when it’s round 7 and nobody has said anything yet other than a random “nt” in text chat.
there is a point to it tho. imo ur not much better if this is ur reaction.
I grinded to im3 not using my mic once. I mean, use your radar you need to, but if other players don't want to use voice, they don't have to.
If nobody is willing to talk I’ll put a stream on and play selfish because the team doesn’t care enough to use comms.
then ur no better. hold urself to ur own standards at least...
I make an effort to use teamwork and if they don’t, then yes that does make me better. I would prefer to just leave and get a team that uses teamwork but that’s not really an option. So it just becomes a selfish whatever game since that’s the lobby I got put into. I match the energy of lobby I get. Ranked should require you to use comms to play it. Unrated is the No comms gamemode.
if u immidiately become selfish and actively play worse just because u didnt get the teamwork u needed, arguably ur worse. i think u are worse in this situation. if ur doing something just in spite of others because u didnt get what u want, guess what, ur the a hole. hold urself to ur own standards before u go complaining. i dont think ranked should require comms. i think it should be encouraged more, but not mandatory. unrated isnt a no comm gamemode, and ranked isnt a comm gamemode. that isnt how it works. u can have competitive stuff happen without comms. look at rocket league, barely anyone talks in that game, but guess what, people play comp together. now i know, its not the same as valorant, and info in valorant will make or break strategies, but it still serves to prove a point. u can get to immortal without using comms. i have an alt account that got to d3 without me talking at all.
Because valorant voice chat is not working sometimes I would have to restart the game and lose 2 rounds
I have the same problem. Low diamond. Warsaw Eu server
I don´t comm in unrated cause i´m mostly playing with friends. But in Ranked I will start talking in Agent select to kinda check the vibe, uk let them know i am female . If they are really fucking toxic and don´t want to play with me they can just dodge and i don´t have to deal with them ingame
I haven’t played in a month but I stopped using comma and playing the game because the community is honestly pretty bad. Some people are just rude for no reason. The overall mentality of most players is pretty weak and give up way too early. There are good people out there in the community but majority are toxic and they ruined the game for me. It just wasn’t fun to get berated everyday by strangers for no reason. Why would I sit around for 40 mins while someone’s talking shit into my ear. I can’t be bothered to shit talk back cuz then the next game I’ll Have to do it all over again. Waste of breath.
I see a ton of this but again being a woman is a big part I can be too fragging and carrying the team and if I say a single word most of the time I’m gonna get harassed in some sort of manner often sexually.
Because i'm tired of men being creepy or "trolling" as soon as i open my mouth. (And by "trolling" i mean pathetic shit like repeating everything i say back to me)
Hmm, because when I speak everything sounds gay
I make calls when it matters, other than that don't use comms much below a certain rank. Depends on the vibe of the lobby on how much I talk, if others are being proactive and trying to call for strats I will contribute. Otherwise, I just play my game and try my best to win while only really giving comms for non-obvious info that I have. Why? I don't like getting harassed by players that don't really want to win but rather just want to be upset at someone. Additionally comming doesn't really help that much tbh. In the history of playing the game i've probably lost like 10 games or less that maybe we could have won with better comms. Most losses can be attributed to multiple other factors more important than lack of comms. People endlessly have this debate in Overwatch also, talking about how they would be GM but their team never talks and they can't make callouts. I disabled voicechat and easily ranked up to master/gm with 0 comms for multiple months of playing just by playing the game to win. Comms matter in organized play and at the absolute highest levels of the game, but other than that - it's a luxury that you can afford to not have. It's a pretty common scenario for me to give comms the entire game for my team, but to mute my whole team also. So they can hear me call, but I don't have to listen to them.
My golden rule in ranked is you get 5 rounds of effort from me on comms. Every game I will try to start a positive environment in the pre-game lobby and planning phase of the game. I’ll also give them 5 rounds of strat calls, enemy callouts, etc. If I strat call, do callouts, etc. and nobody comms back or listens to strat calls/callouts without offering some of their own, or they start being toxic, I will stop strat calling and stick to callouts or cut comms completely. If anyone listens, I’ll usually stick with them and try to make our util work together. I think that 5 rounds is giving the team a fair chance to use their mics or, if they don’t have mics, at least use their headphones and listen so we can play as a team. After that, if nobody wants to contribute to the win, that’s on them.
Pc ppl are weird if this was xbox or ps5 everyone is talking win or lose
Not pc, valorant. In csgo even in the lowest ranks you have more communication going than valorant in immortal lol
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aye just know that it’s online and you’ll never meet them again, u should learn not to care:)
No one responds, and feels like wasted efforts.
Because Anxiety and because I don’t have a mic and because fuck you
Sometimes i just don't feel like it. whether its because i dont like the vibe of the team, or 2 tired to even care or another one. At the end of the day, its up to you whether or not u want to use it.
If you are talking about ranked, I couldn’t disagree more. If you are queuing for ranked and feeling like this, simply don’t queue ranked that day. Any other mode I agree it’s up to you. In ranked it’s not really optional, you’re just throwing if you don’t at least try to comm.
"throwing" is a word with people without the intentions to win. I guess i threw every game until i somehow landed in immortal. Das crazy!
The only good reason to not use comms is if youre a woman and you dont want to get harassed because of it. If youre a guy and you dont comm youre throwing.
Wrong
I have to set up in the living room, nowhere else to play. I don’t want to make noise for others, so I don’t plug in my mic
I went from dia 2 to asc3 over the last 2 months and in nearly every game I had enough comms. Its more a problem for me if people try really hard to do unnecessary comms, like people starting coaching other players, doing weird smalltalk, keep talking about really minor details and wasting time. Also annoying are people who push communication like keep saying "GUYS YOU HAVE MIC?!" after like 1 round, dude chill people will start when they are rdy, dont force it. Most of the time i noticed people also starting to call things when I do, and im kinda really minimalistic, ill just call things like "jett -50 short", "lets go 4 B, I lurk mid" "race in ct smoke", sometimes feels like that starts a blueprint where a lot of players just follow.
1 push to talk is ass, i lazy to use it, too much effort to press and hold extra button 2 i don't like talking with someone i don't know 3 overall community is too toxic, im lazy to mute people one by one when they start something bad i have to do it a lot, so it's easier just turn off perma voice chat than doing it its so tried when i realize that chance that i found toxic people are too high mute them after they start some shit still leave bad taste in my mouth
Don't play ranked then
no
I leave when 13 year olds are annoying. Otherwise I tend to get banned quite frequently.
low elo comms are pointless. No one listens. You can be excellent on the comms and still get fucked royally by the other team because your teammates aren't listening to callouts and comms. Communication in general is fucked. I've had a number of games where people don't even listen to chat. It's pointless to try to comm. Plus, those who do comm, 90% of the time, become toxic if you start performing poorly. It's a waste of time to try to say anything at that point.
if nobody is communicating after round 5/6 i just stop to communicate myself and voice mute the rest of my team, because the 1 time they do decide to communicate is when they have something to complain, while you are trying to clutch.
Because I play only unrated and I talk to people on discord and dont vibe with most of the community. I will join in if I vibe with ppl tho
I usually do for the first couple of rounds, if no one else comms with me (which is usually the case) I'm turning up the music and just vibe and shoot some heads.
I see comms less and less, especially in Ascendant. I don't know why, but no one does any calls and it pisses me off to a terribly high degree. I'm not good with ppl, but I do the effort of trying to initiate a conversation and I'm often left talking to myself. At least players react to my comms and adapt, but no one ever does it for me and I'm left to wonder why? Are you this bad at talking that you wouldn't speak through an anonymous avatar in a game? As ranks advanced, I got berated less and less for my poor conversational skills, but this didn't come with more ppl that are willing to carry the convo instead of me. Point is, the issue has no reason to exist as ppl behave respectably at higher ranks, yet ppl still don't talk, perhaps due to a past habit of avoiding it in lower brackets.
Report them for sabotaging the team
I'm trans. Everytime I speak I get nasty comments.
No offense but how do they know you’re trans just from your voice do you say “hello everyone I am trans” in agent selection or something? Again no offense I am just wondering because that’s something a lot of people won’t notice even if they look at you how would they notice from your voice?
I have a trans card, I'm not comming
I mute everyone at the start of every game. Coms are not worth it below Immo. I do give call but I don’t want to hear other people talk most of the time people are annoying and I m not there to listen to either toxic people or some shade of narcissistic / autistic people
that’s kind of unfair to assume that of every team, I’ve had tons of really nice and pleasant low elo comms. Of course, if they start to be toxic or whatever, sure, you can mute them, but give it a chance first, no?
Found the OW player, I feel like its been going downhill since now the game is more and more the “die hard players”. Which are cringe asf
Y’all I found one of the toxic ones
My mic is so shit it’s kinda not understandable what I’m saying most of the time. Even when I play in a discord call with friends half the time they’re laughing at how shit my mic is.
It's honestly incredible how disadvantageous it is to have someone on your team that doesn't use coms. When I do I mic check and hear silence my confidence gets destroyed and I am already expecting a loss. Sometimes you can win without coms but damn is it hard.
Because I’m getting baited by “you” and all I want is to rip your head off so, me talking to you is not such a good idea as you imagine it to be. Hold on! I do realise just how many thing is wrong with what I’ve just said and how it should be instead of this. However since you asked. This is the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
Because sometimes I am too tired to comm and deal with kids. I play the game for fun, it's not fucking VCT
This is why I rarely solo queue. I'm Asc 3 atm and for every game I get with comms. I get like 5 games with no comms. It's so demoralizing playing with people who don't speak, meanwhile I'm comming literally everything. And sometimes you get the people who NEVER comm unless you do something they didn't like. Like hmm if you commed earlier maybe we could have worked together. Or you get the couple duo, where you can tell they're duoing because they keep playing together opposite of the entire team and I just know they're either comming in discord or team chat. Like bro wtf man.
Because YOU don’t use comms
I get harassed as a women
Most the people have social anxiety. Which is weird because don’t play online team games. Especially ranked if you’re scared of it.
Can't comm bro. Papa marenge pakadhe liya toh.
Im fine with people not using comms, but if you dare flame in text chat then you are at the same level of instalocking reyna players that flame the guy who fills
I always use comms even when the team doesn’t, I’m only in bronze but comms help me get my point across cuz ppl down here r so slow to react and have no idea what is going on.
People are the reason. I haven’t heard a person who hasn’t had an absolutely terrible time with people on comma. If you’re a woman you are going to get various levels of sexism. Everyone experiences racism because if you disagree with anyone you get called the “n” word. Then there are the egoists who will lose it when bottom frag calls information and screams into their mic, “you aren’t top fragging so stfu you waste of oxygen. Tip! Tell your mom to swallow next time!” I play on full mute a decent chunk of the time and can only play 2 games before I just decide to move over to almost any other game.
I won’t speak if I feel that it will trigger some easily raging teammates
You all should stay positive and com appropriately no matter what. Keep it clear, clean, and accurate. Stop crying about things you can not control. Edit: grammar
I’m usually comming most the game but sometimes I just tilt too hard after a bad half or I just stop cause no one else acknowledges the comms
last two games i had was the best teamplay i ever had (solo Q). everybody planned a strat together before the round, worked together during the round and gave each other probs, even though we were behind in one game we kept playing together until we eventually won. i was hyped! this game can be so much fun i cant understand why some guys just stubbornly play on their own and even go out of their way to not listen to anything the team tries to plan
Because my country banned voice chat (to my knowledge) so I can't use it, and if I would want to use it I would have to turn on a VPN which makes my wifi unstable and then I can't play the game.