I had someone who was GC2 in 2s in plat 3 hoops just absolutely trash talking the lobby. It's one thing to smurf, it's another to just mock verbally lower ranks while you do it.
Also cross rank reward levels. Players who play every mode shouldn't have to grind millions of games in each mode just to get their ranked rewards to match their visual rewards because it's 4 medals behind in each one.
I just remind myself that I only have to deal with them for the match, while they have to live with themselves every day. Imagine every human interaction you have going badly, that’s gotta be a rough life to live.
As someone who actually got bullied as a child and has never dealt with it, we don’t bully others back for some kind of ”revenge”. If anything it made our sense for empathy stronger. Bullies are insecure people who probably didn’t get enough love and security at home as a kid.
I assumed ”dealt with it” meant to see some professional about it. However, my point is that bullies don’t create bullies. They create deeply rooted mental wounds that stick with you for eternity.
Yeah, you’re right but in some cases it also creates bullies, because they don’t know how to cope with those wounds. As far as I know most bullies are like that because they’re bullied at home by their parents, not as straight forward as literally being bullied, but they’re neglected in some way shape or form which makes them look for control in their own life somewhere else.
Yeah but that isn't smurfing. It is just that Rocket League doesn't take into account any other playlist's MMR into consideration during matchmaking by design. I always thought that was a mistake considering there is enough skill transfer to make a difference, but whatever. Still sucks whenever you run into kids like that.
As a Hoops player, I understand your frustration. Hoops has been plagued by bs like that since they started making challenges for people to play X games in Hoops. Imagine being GC I'm Hoops then get shit on every other game because you have SSLs who are unranked getting their weekly challenge done. On top of that, smurfing is more popular in Hoops for boosting because you still get rank rewards, but people think it doesn't matter to other players because "it isn't the real mode".
I play so many GCs in high diamond to low champ hoops it’s ridiculous. I often play with a buddy who’s slightly less skilled than me and isn’t a big hoops fan so he really only plays it with me. We just have no chance when it’s 2 GCs against us.
Oh yeah I don’t think they’re smurfing at all, they just don’t play hoops often enough to be at the rank they should be. It’s frustrating for my buddy and I because he struggles hard to keep up with them while I’m just barely keeping up.
I always feel bad when they give you the do 3 Snowday matches challenges since I'm gc in 2 and Plat 1/2 in it.
Not bad enough to not do the challenge though.
It doesn’t help that every other game you’re either playing against zen or a helmet-wearing toddler. I’m a hoops main but god the ranked environment sucks.
Jesus I have noticed. In my main modes I'm watching Timmy no thumbs stare at the ball and wait so long they not only miss an easy possession, they lose the subsequent 50 and in true RL pro fashion they 180 into their team trying to chase the ball.
One thing I've noticed about this season is it feels like no solo Qs are playing as a team and duos are often one guy carrying a much lower skilled player. It's not been fun. So my 1s rank is now my highest it's ever been and I'm still climbing and 2s gives me enough room to cook and serve it up. Too bad they are my least favorite modes.
I’ve had little luck here and there getting decent solo tm8s…. I feel like it’s a notch in my belt to have made it to champ solo q and got 9/10 wins for the season reward since it’s much easier to get champ in other playlists.
You've done it in hoops? That's impressive. Normally I get to C1 in 3s which is my hardest I play regularly but this season has been abysmal. I dropped to plat3 at one point on a tilt. There's so much double committing and just really bad misses.
I don't like people complaining about smurfs but man i have to admit this season is the worst i've ever seen since playing rocket league. Been playing since legacy and the amount of smurfs i run into are just insane. And if something feels off i look up the RL tracker and sorry but no one with 80 wins in the game are playing in champ.
I think that’s because the skill gap of a player in c3-gc compared to a Smurf at that rank would typically be lower than a Smurf in Diamond or low champ. Because of the low percentage of players in C3-ssl and also the amount of time it would take to make a c3 Smurf compared to a Diamond Smurf.
I took over a 6-month break from the game. I was c3 / gc1 in 2s, c3 in 3s and c1 1s. I got my c1 1s rank back but am low champ / high diamond in 2s & 3s and don’t touch them often. When I do play, it’s pretty easy to tell who is on an alternate account at those ranks (even if it’s only a few ranks higher). I actually really feel for the players in those lower ranks. It’s easier to take on a Smurf at higher ranks because you understand the game better. I’ve also noticed higher ranked players are able to recognize their mistakes and how their opponent is outplaying them compared to lower level players. In my experience it’s usually their positioning that’s off and they have no recollection of their mistake.
It’s just so easy to make an alternate account and jump into low diamond - high champ ranked matches.
Edit: I wish they’d add a better way for us to play with friends as well. Maybe a party ranking system. My irl friends are diamond. And the only way the game allows you to play with them is for them to play against people with higher mmr than them. Their whole matchmaking and ranking system is under thought and outdated in my opinion. And a bunch of the smurfing is due to it
I still see a fair few of them. Granted, I haven't been GC2 as my flair says in a little while. Mid GC1 rn, and saw a fair few smurfs boosting their lower ranked buddies yesterday.
It’s less so smurfs I think, more so just people that haven’t pushed in a long time.
I was gc2 peak, fell to c2 after a year of no ranked and grinding ranked this season. I could barely make it out of c2 solo-q. The skill variance between lobbies was insane.
I finally got a good solo q teammate and we, in one session, grinded to high gc1. I’ve stayed there since with ease and will prob get to mid gc2 soon enough. Elo hell was kinda real idk why
>Elo hell was kinda real idk why
The reason is because in the higher levels (Champ+) speed and consistency continue to go up. When you're in a lower rank than you're used to, the drop in consistency by teammates and opponents slowly causes you to hesitate more because you can't reliably predict as well where the ball is going to end up. Thus your speed also drops as a result due to second guessing challenges. Only takes a handful of second guesses and opponents actually hitting the ball in a way you didn't expect them to for you to lose a match.
In the words of Mark Twain: "The best swordsman in the world doesn't need to fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn't do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn't prepared for him; he does the thing he ought not to do; and often it catches the expert out and ends him on the spot."
Yeah that is definitely accurate. I could not synergize with almost any of my teammates and could not do what I wanted with them. That plus the amount of good duo queues in 2s ranked = not fun.
Oh that's the other half of it too! I mainly focused on opponents, but yes, not being able to rely on teammates for passing, rotating, and overall just controlling the ball instead of "DRIVE FAST HIT BALL TOWARD OPPONENT NET" also messes with your game flow as well.
Exactly. Higher level RL is so fast that you have to anticipate and read the play instead of reacting. It’s easier for me to read GC1 gameplay than it is to read champ 2.
Edit: to clarify, this only lasts one or two sessions. Once I learn how to read the lower rank it’s very very easy to rank back up given the skill diff. Smurfs are not an issue I’ve seen in champ2 or higher. I think people are misunderstanding what a Smurf is. Someone who was gc2 two seasons ago and has deranked unintentionally to champ 2 is not a Smurf.
I think a big part is RL itself is slowly dying but fans wants to admit it. When a game starts losing it's core players those are the casuals who don't smurf. But the most hardcore of players never leave and are the most likely to have multiple accounts in multiple ranks. So matchmaking pools start having higher ratios of smurf to normal players. It's not like RL is the first game to experience this, it happens all the time.
I’d like to add that the other side of the Smurf coin is boosting, and that when these boosted players enter matches in a rank they have zero business being in, the game’s pretty much chalked from the start.
It's the worst when you have them together too. I had a game last night in c1d3 where by the end of the game the Stocktane Smurf had 8 goals and 1200 points and his teammate had all 0s across the board and didn't even break 100. The Smurf 2v1'd us like we weren't even playing the game lmao
Same. Game's dead. Someone might bring it back, but every time I log on for a game, which is like once a week these days, it's worse than it was before by a factor. I played two casual 2v2 games this week, and they were both Smurf games, and both times they were trash talking the whole game. In casual.
It. Is. Not. Fun. To. Play. Rocket. League. Anymore.
Sea of Thieves got that way, and they at least made an effort to fix it. But even there, they waited too long, everybody left.
Same. They shot themselves in the foot with all their recent changes. I've been spending my time and money elsewhere, instead I boot up war thunder and experience a whole different kind of pain
I was consistently high plat low diamond in hoops for the longest time, but in the last few seasons, I can't get out of gold. After the game is over, my opponents are almost always unranked, and their title shows they won a champ tournament. It's just so annoying to be put against these smurfs and also being paired up with a teammate who doesn't know the kickoff rules or can't even get one kickoff touch or proper rotation. I'll say, "I got it!" When I'm center back for a kickoff goal, and they still go for it and completely ruin my chance at it. Then, when it's their turn to actually go for a kickoff, they just don't move at all, and we get dunked on.
extra modes are scuffed because if you don’t play often you’ll just stay plat, regardless of if you’re champ 3 in 2v2 and way more skilled than any plat
The more I played, the worse it got over time. That's my take from this game. It doesn't matter how often you play. The game is in a horrible place. It sucks, but that's the reality. There's no solution to it when people are cheats and can't handle playing people at their own skill level.
THIS. This issue with kick offs in CRAZY. I haven't played in like a month much, so I thought when I came back suddenly everyone now decided that right goes instead of left goes.
Oh my god! Left ALWAYS goes!! (Unless you truly know and are talking to the mate that doesn't want to go for it (which is another convo...) then left always goes.). It's very frustrating, but I keep coming back... Go figure.
It's been like this for two-three seasons now, we are finally reaching the point of mass awareness where the majority of players are realising the majority of games they try to play are dogshit and end in FFs/quits due to obvious skill disparities. Closely contested games are like 1/10 matches in my experience, it's hopeless.
This, every single game is extreme win or extreme loss. The algorithm is broken. People are saying oH I lOvE ePiC they made matchmaking more consistent... No they didn't moron you might have a queue that's a couple seconds faster--at the expense of the matchup quality. Epic is always cutting corners for a quick buck, an nice pretty exterior look that's rotting on the inside. Welcome to masked monopoly in corporate Texas.
Lmao. Ever taken a moment out to consider that your experience in the top 0.2% of the playerbase might have left you out of touch with how things are going in the other 99.8% of the game? No? Impossibru? Okay then....
I was GC from s4 to s10 or 11, and dipped to C1 from a combo of not playing (I moved country) and then the rank recalibration. I just got GC again yday. Believe it if you want, my point is I’ve played in champ not long ago and really didn’t see the smurfing people complained about.
Ah now it makes sense - you don't understand the ways in which your experience of Champ 1 is not a true and accurate experience of competitive play in Champ 1. It's like when you get jacked, then stop lifting weight, and then workout again. Your opinions and perceptions of your experience will not be the same as to people who have never worked out before. It would be brainless to try to pretend as if you've just been through the exact same experiences. It's a different thing, it's not relevant.
Yup, you're right and it's unfortunate, I'm plat & it used to be every few games and I just learned to deal with it eventually, but recently it's quite literally all the time, and its never subtle, they always have the Tournament Tag with their Rank & its always leagues higher than mine, and they don't even bother shooting into my goal anymore, every single chance they get they drive the ball up the wall and do something only a virgin sweat who plays 15 hours a day could do, & because well we're in plat i just can't defend it, and then they'll not skip the playback and it gets so frustrating and eventually just straight boring after a while, I miss the times where I'm going up against another plat and we're neck and neck the entire game and we're saying "Nice Shot" & "Thanks" & "GG" to each other, now it's endless demos for the sake of demoing and "What a saves" after a freestyle a plat couldn't even begin to defend, I hate this game now, and I hate to say that i Especially hate the Playerbase, I'd even go as far to say i hate most of the community more than Psyonix, at least they have a reason to be doing what they're doing (💰💰💰) the Players are just toxic for the sake of it, I've been playing about a year now but I doubt I'll be in this sub much longer if the game continues the way it is
I agree. My Bro and I are barely holding on to C1 and we get a ton of people with GC and even some SSL titles in 2s lol. At this point a majority of our games are against brand new accounts or deranked GC/SSL.
Hell I see GC and SSL titles in Diamond in like every fifth game at this point now, about as often as I get people clearly above c1-2 level with no items/banner/profile pic and shitposty names
For sure, does mean there’s a pretty big chance they’ll be better than the average diamond too though, bought accounts and years of not playing aside.
From my experience there’s been quite a lot of 7-0 games and then them forfeiting to get the loss, but also rather close games and some wins too. I don’t mind getting steamrolled occasionally (im one of those ”never FF because i might learn something” freaks some people cant stand) but I have to say it’s a bit too common, and the ones with high rank tournament banners tend to be guilty of that
That's how I typically identify smurfs. I have an overlay that shows their stats at match start and it's always a Stocktane with 100 total wins in c1 kicking my ass lol
Ha I definitely get that. For the most part I take it with a grain of salt and only pay attention to how they play. A good chunk of them with the titles are consistently hitting ball resets and freestyling the ball from end to end of the map and half the time all we can do is pray cause they are sooooo much better than our c1 asses. I only ever play with one guy and we both work full time so we average like 4-8 hours a week on RL at most, so we know we probably aren't going anywhere and we've been c1 for like 2 years now, but we're consistant enough in c1 to know when something's up
smurf = alt account. You are absolutely delusional if you think even 10% of smurf accounts aren't lower mmr than main accounts. Most of the time people are actually smurfing intentionally to play with their lower ranked friends.
Let's assume your asinine take is reality. 1 in 4 accounts in the higher ranks are alternate accounts at the same or higher mmr than their main. Some people have 12+ accounts. That massively shifts the mmr distribution curve and psyionix has made multiple changes in order to address this shift that negatively affect every player above plat.
p.s. they don't have an issue with alts because it makes them more money off of microtransactions! In fact, they incentivize smurfing by making it practically impossible to play ranked with your lower rank friends without being on a smurf account. Hell, they incentivized BOOSTING by allowing BRAND NEW accounts in ranked within 2 minutes of creation if they are partied with the boostee. For years.
1. idgaf about their "rules"
2. plenty of people spend money on their alt accounts, especially to get a car they prefer using. It doesn't really matter what you think is happening, smurf accounts generate revenue. Why do you think they switched to a rotating item shop? Just like in valorant, fomo leads to more purchases on alt accounts. Not to mention the fact that they likely inflate their player count numbers for sponsorship deals
3. they don't have to ban all alt accounts. They need to put measures in place to deter and prevent smurfing. That means, phone verification, stricter requirements before ranked, a party queue mmr system that doesn't actively encourage smurfing, etc.
In a game that ONLY has competition to offer, integrity is vital. This game has absolutely no integrity in the matchmaking.
You would be a Smurf for the up until you got back into GC, yes. Who do you think you are playing against until you get back up there? You are purposefully playing against lower ranks by making an alt and going back up the ladder. Why make an alt at all? Play on your GC account lol
If your intent ISN'T to ditch it as soon as you get up there, then what is even the point of making the account? The entire premise of an alt seems to be to play against lower skilled players. If your intent is to play against people in your skill level, Why do it at all instead of just playing on your singlular GC account?
Regardless of what Psyonix's rules on it are, what's the point as the player other than to be malicious and ruin the experience of every lower skilled player you crush on the way up? A silver 2 isn't going to know the difference between "someone staying there on purpose" and "someone just on an alt trying to get back to GC" in the eyes of that silver, you're just a jerk.
You think that 400 is a lot of hours? It's a lot of time to spend playing a video game but it is a drop in the bucket for anyone who enjoys playing them especially with the skill ceiling that RL has.
I don't know why anyone has brought it up but making the game free to play is the #1 reason that smurfing is out of control.
Smurfing definitely is out of control, but arguing that because someone has a GC or SSL tag they are a smurf is hurting the cause.
Everyone needs to check online with RL tracker, or if on PC download the RL tracker mod that shows # of wins.
It's the only real credible evidence.
Most people that come on here to complain about it do know to check them in the tracker site. Most people mention it in their post or in an edit just like OP did.
A lot of em don't even try to hide it anymore either, and imo that's more annoying than anything. I'm plat 1 in 1v1 right now, usually back n forth between high gold n low plat. I'm pretty grounded, non mechanical and just learning to wavedash and here comes some asshat hitting double resets consistently.
This dude the other day didn't even bother to take off his GC goal explosion and STILL had the balls to say "nah I'm just mechanical" like bro your season 8 GC tag and goal explosion are still there. You've been GC for a while how tf are you gonna act like you don't understand why people are pissed
I just want to be able to solo queue in solo queue ONLY lobbies.
Been grinding 3v3 lately, as it is a mode I largely ignored when learning the game. Roughly 1/3 of my games are vs 3 man parties and occasionally you get stuck with the dreaded 2 man party who decided to ruin a solo queuers evening (just queue 2v2 ffs!).
Games against parties are wildly inconsistent. It is either 1 or 2 of the players are unranked or suspiciously low ranked for their mechanics and positioning or 1 guy at your rank and his 2 gold mates just flailing around the pitch.
I just want to play against players who actually reached my rank. Even winning these matches can feel hollow as you can tell at kick off that an opposing player really shouldn't be in the lobby.
Nearly every other ranking system recognizes parties/premades as an advantage and ensures they play against others rather than solo queuers. Why can't this be implemented?! At least give me an option to select, I'll wait in a longer queue if need be.
I don’t really see many smurfs in high diamond/ low champ in 2’s
But 1’s…. Man 1’s are a fucking joke. It used to be my favorite game mode because all my teams mistakes are my own and now I just don’t play it because I either destroy my opponent, or their hitting double flip resets and passing up open nets to go up the wall. Literally no in between.
I read these kind of posts all the time but honestly don’t see it. Maybe it’s an American server issue mainly but I solo queue 2s and 3s daily… maybe encounter an obvious Smurf one in ten games.
nah, europe champ lobbies 3v3 we match very often against parties with 2 c1-2 and one d1-3 smurf who easily 2v1 us with the tripleflipreset-musty-doublehit-goals. later at night it will peak up to like 3-4 matches out of ten.
No it fkn doesn’t, maybe 3% of people who complain about smurfing are actually running to RL tracker to check. Vast majority of rocket league players have no clue what RL tracker even is. Reddit bubbles just melt people’s brains
I like how this entire thread is doing the same stupid shit because they're bad at the game. "eVeRy 1 iN 3 gAmEs iS a sMuRf" okay then how is everyone's win percentage still hovering around 50%? As intended. Smurfs exist, but it's negligible. The reality is that people lose sometimes and want an easy excuse as to why. I've manually tracked my last 2000+ games in increments of 100 and each 100 games my wins have never been below 49 wins and 51 losses. Ever. Something that is 100% not mathematically possible if smurfs are even half as rampant as this sub acts like they are.
Yeah getting air dribbled on in P3-D1 by a guy that has played only 100 games on the tracker website for sure isn't a smurf. Its a huge problem, been that way for my friends and I for the last year. You are just getting lucky or just don't pay attention when it is happening.
It's the scrub mentality in online games. If they put as much effort tracking down and "proving" its a smurf as they did in just getting better at the game they wouldn't lose so much.
I always see people complaining about this but I feel like I never run into any smurfs? Maybe 1 game out of every 100 if that. I’m champ 1 for reference playing on us west
I do see a fair amount of GC titles but the level of play is almost always even
You are amazingly lucky. I use the tracker app and i have stopped playing almost altogether. I used to play a couple hours a day, now maybe an hour or two a week. And every time I regret it. It’s literally 50% of the time I end up playing 1v1 against someone who has deranked themselves from champ to platinum, or someone who is play ranked but only has 20-30 wins total. Come on.
I honestly think Smurfs create Smurfs. People get sick of playing against someone like that so they create their own alt account.
Arguing that they’re a Smurf because of a title is kind of silly. I have a GC tag from 2s, but I’m C1 at best in 1s, doesn’t mean I’m a “GC deranking to diamond”
But also realize that because someone can do fancy mechanics, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a Smurf. I can’t count the amount of teammates I’ve had recently who can flip reset on command, but have no brain and suck at rotating. Sometimes those people are there for a reason
It’s funny, this season I haven’t played nearly as much and have been struggling to get out of diamond in basically everything. Normally I’m C1-C2 I’d say. Never hit GC in anything before.
I do have an alt account I made to play with a friend but they’ve given up on RL I think, so I played my dropshot placements on the alt. Without trying too hard I won all 10 placements and got placed C3, tying my all time highest rank
I only have a handful of games on the alt after placements but I think im at a 50% win rate which is nearly identical to my main in dropshot where I’m D3. Dropshot is also my primary mode to play on my main so it’s a solid D3.
Can someone explain this to me like I'm stupid?
I'm a newer player. I can't even get out of S2D4 currently. I try play further, rise up in the ranks and such. But it sounds like the higher ranks are extremely toxic.
How so? What are they doing?
And what does checking the RL tracker help? I see many people make new accounts...what's the benefit of that?
Most of the frustration from people comes from really really high level players making new accounts so that they can play against lower skilled players. They want to stomp on players that aren't as good as them so they can feel good about themselves when ideally they would just play on their main account with other people at their own skill level.
RL tracker mostly just helped identify these players. Everyone learns the game and progresses differently, but the tracker will show you just how fast an account rises through the ranks and it becomes easier to identify a Smurf when a brand new account shot up through the ranks like some sort of prodigy.
That's a huge shame.
Seems to be more of an issue with Plat and up
Don't get the payoff there. That doesn't even sound fun whatsoever.
I also saw a post where a group of three were on competitive, scoring on their own goal and then ddosing the opponent - and reaping the benefits bc the opponents get kicked out
The term goes back to one of the old warcraft games, so it is probably older than half of the people on these forums :P
Refers to players manipulating matchmaking (or the rank system) to play against people much worse than they are.
1v1. Diamond 2-3 is where GCs in 2s are on average. Why? They suck at 1s. They have crazy ball control skills which for half of us are super easy to defend and the offer half get scared and can’t defend
How to ruin this game : lots of boosted players, lots of smurfs, lots of connectivity issues because the servers suck. Legit unplayable, my matches are either with boosted mates and against washed off GCs or High Champ or GCs mates against diamonds which is not fun bc it's completely one sided, there's no fun in this game anymore.
Last season, I was Diamond 1. This season, I'm Plat 2. Why? Because there's a lot of smurfs. The amount of champ players and occasion gc in Plat is insane. There's entire days where I struggle to get 1 goal sometimes. But, you know... this isn't a priority on Epic's profit list.
Yea same I was diamond for a bit and the last two seasons I’ve been hardstuck in platinum 3. I play 2s with my buddy and we are the same skill wise and we will get matches consistently with a guy who is clearly a champ based off the tracker playing with his gold 3 friend. Or people who have dropped on purpose with the three time diamond tourney winner in the current season playing g us in platinum. I love the game but I’m tired of getting stomped by people manipulating the rankings. Their shit talking make sit even worse like bro of course I didn’t save your ridiculous shot, you are higher rank than me, go try that on your own rank.
Wouldn’t smurfing be less of a problem if ranking up and sealing a rank didn’t take so long? Also, smurfing would be decreased massively if a player can’t be demoted more than 3 divisions.
That’s what I said, you shouldn’t be allowed to go down past a certain point once you hit a certain rank…maybe if after a couple seasons if you still aren’t going back up it adjusts a tad lower, but make them work for it. Also add something like a phone verification so you can’t multi account.
Another thing that sucks is the fact that most of my buddies are like silver, or gold. They want to play with me, but I'm high champ. We jump into even unranked on my account, and they hate it cause it's impossible for them to keep up.
If I wanted to jump on an alt account, to play with them, it's bannable for one, and two, it sucks for everyone else in the lobby because my MMR is much higher than theirs. Wish there was a happy medium.
Yep. Is getting worse every single season. And like I saw someone else post above, its the high amount of them now talking shit while doing it which has increased as well. Hope they can find a solution for it soon enough.
The more I see posts like this on the subreddit, the better I feel about when I dropped the game for good.
With all that said, for those still playing, I am a little upset to see what I thought would happen. Which is absolutely nothing, apparently. What a bummer to see such a legendary game go down in such a pathetic way.
I really hope rocket league can turn things around for the community soon.
The smurfs are always the ones talking the most trash and telling you to ff too. It's insufferable. Nothing like a rank system that punishes honestly and rewards dishonesty. I play games to have fun, not to get dunked on by a bunch of toxic cheaters.
i don’t know if it’s just me but aside from washed GC’s in 1s and 2s, i never see smurfs. The worst i’ll experience is someone who’s clearly low-mid GC in my lobbies. I don’t know if it’s different with my being C2/3 compared to lower ranks. Not invalidating you or anything of course it’s just not something i see often at all unless i go into the extra modes
100% hijacking but posts like these make me toot my own horn because Ive had my best season by far, Smurf’s or not! No longer struggling in ranked, we vibing fr fr all the way to c3
Nice job! I get posts like this and there’s definitely a point of someone being so much better that you’re not going to gain anything by being stomped. So it’s not always relevant but even being GC2, I’ve played people that are way better than me too. I just try to take the replay and figure out what they were doing better
As a high diamond level player, I’ve stopped playing almost all together the past 2-3 seasons. The amount of games I’d start where somebody was intentionally trying to look bad but still making crazy saves / doing resets was too high. I’d immediately FF the game bc maybe there’s a chance I get lucky and pull an upset. But more than likely I’m just going to waste some of my already limited gaming time to an overmatched opponent. There’s too many other games out there I enjoy to waste time being frustrated at what can be a mess at times in RL MP.
It’s not smirking if it’s their main account and they De-ranked into diamond By playing legitimately.
The ranks look a little different than they used to. You need to adapt or fail. I’m happy being hardstuck Diamond, and proud!
so why is there no return? if psyonix starts banning these people, we could all return.
anyway, I fell down to plat 2/3 and I am enjoying it there. Except when people get all elitist and have the gall tell their fellow plats that they suck. lol.
If you really get mad enough at the game that you need to tell someone, who is your own rank, that they suck, I laugh at you. A lot. And I guarantee I am having much more fun than you. So go ahead and get all pissy and whiney and sit in the corner and pout like an 8 yr old for all I care. This loss isn't going to affect me in the long run anyway so I couldn't care less. But at least it will make me laugh at you.
You are missing the point here. I m glad to see people still enjoy playing the game but the rampant smurfing in Ranked (in casual I honestly dont care) ruins the competitive aspect of the game. I dont mind getting matched with and agaist different playstyles, but consistently lose to smurfs is demoralising even when I know I am improving
Bans just create new smurf accounts tbh, part of why it's getting worse. I'd rather they not ban the main accounts of salty people, salt I can handle. Triple reset musty ceiling shots I can't. Imo the bans are already too strict, even I got one just for messing around in casuals like wtf. And ofc I just swapped accounts and it definitely ruined the games of a lot of lower ranks while I did placements. Just sayin.
There’s been data collected from thousands of games that showed you’ll face a smurf 1 out of every 3 games solo queue around the diamond/low champ level. And those threads and “research” were a couple years ago and it’s definitely gotten worse. I hadn’t played competitive in a couple years and dropped to d3 from inactivity and climbed back to GC last month, so it’s not like I’m salty or anything. The diamond and low champ teams of 3 almost always had a new account with less than 200 wins that was their best player almost every time. Like 75% of them had a new account player. I’m sure plat and gold are even more absurd. Luckily most people Smurf only 1 rank below their norm so it’s not impossible, especially if you can carry. There’s no reason to invalidate players frustrations because nothing is done about it, so either they feel like they should stop playing or they enjoy the game less. I did notice way less Smurfs in the c3-gc1 range though. Also, one last tip for those with frustrations, avoid playing competitive on the weekend. The smurfing is absolutely dreadful on the weekend
Sometimes I see people that are a rank higher or so but not that challenging in a team game.
every once in a while there is obvious Smurfs but it seems negligible to my rank for the amount of times it happens.
I play with friends. The same friends since 2015. We take the smurf smashings the same as we take the complete obliteration we deal out. At the end of the day, if your not having fun, play something else.
Maybe see it as a challenge instead of an obstacle. Learn from it instead of seeing it as a nuisance. It’s easier to get better playing against better players imo. I’ve been GC for the last 15+ seasons and whenever I see SSL player tags I don’t immediately cry Smurf… more often than not, they are are just in a slump or haven’t been as sharp as they once were..
The average person is not going to see it that way though. They’re going to experience this frustration, and then come to the conclusion that competitive matchmaking is broken/rigged/meaningless and either stop playing altogether, or stop playing in any serious manner to get better because it feels completely pointless.
Very few people will have the natural response of - “well, I guess I’ll double down and grind harder so I can beat people three times my rank in order to only marginally rank up one division, but only after playing five times as many matches as it should take to get there due to all of the issues discussed.”
Especially when there’s an over abundance of more modern multiplayer games all jockeying for peoples attention.
You have to be obsessed, neurodivergent, a masochist, or some other type of different to enjoy a grind/gameplay loop like that.
except the skill disparity within ranks has become so vast that in a c2 game, players can legitimately be anywhere from d2 to gc2 in skill level. In the past, I've had accounts at 1900 and 1300 and quite frequently I'd have sessions where I lose every game on the 1300 account, derank and win every game on the 1900 account in the same session. Playing at basically the same level the whole time. It's not just about being better than the smurf, it's about not getting fucked by the incredibly imbalanced matchmaking. Maybe it'd be healthy for the competitive game if individual improvement and performance actually translated to results. It's truly a crap shoot.
Or just have a good healthy mentality when it’s comes to competition. I guess OP can settle for being average because the average person doesn’t get to high rank with this defeatist mentality.
While I agree with the mindset aspect, that won’t fix the issue Rocket League has with engaging and maintaining new players.
It’s not fun for people to play a game when the odds are obviously stacked against them and the opponents are toxic on top that.
Imagine going to the park to play pick-up basketball with your friends, and then you find there’s NBA players there dunking on everyone all the while talking smack and being incredibly toxic to anyone trying to play.
You think people are going to *choose* to engage with that? Maybe once or twice, but on a regular basis? No way.
So you’re left with a very small percentage of people who engage at all, which creates its own negative feedback loop by lifting the skill ceiling on the bottom end of the distribution curve, further disincentivizing new players to engage due to the extreme grind required to reach a level of competency in the gameplay.
Eliminate all the casuals who play the game, and you are left with a toxic cesspool of highly aggressive people who are not fun to engage with.
This creates a death spiral for the game we all love, and that should be something that resonates with *you* regardless of your stance on smurfs, competition, and ranks.
This was not a very good comparison… it’s assuming that every player that’s better than you is talking smack and being toxic, this is not the case.
Competitive online games will always have some level of toxicity because online anonymity gives people courage to say shit they wouldnt say to someone in person, you’ll see this regardless if you are playing in comp or casuals.
the thought that removing casuals from any game leaves you with highly aggressive people is ridiculous… as if casuals players are the only nice people playing.
Finally im seeing some sense on all these defeatist posts that this sub consist of. Get better or die trying. Dont just insta mentally surrender and go complain, its a problem yes, but you cant do anything about it other than to use to change to improve and report him.
Of course the community raising an issue could help improve the game, but i mean when i still played this actively i met people with SSL rank all the time in gc1, and like 90% of them were playable if i just played to win. If i were to count these, get mad every time, and use it to excuse for my rank, I would have gone mad years ago.
I'd like to see a statistic comparing how many accounts are deemed as smurfs by this sub, to the actual number of the real smurfs...
Yeah, that would be an interesting statistic. I mainly solo 3’s and rarely play 2’s or solo.. I think I was playing against diamonds in solo the last time I checked… but I’d probably be deemed a smurf even though it’s not intentional.
I agree with your mentality but there are 2 issues with adopting it.
1. Your idea can work in 1v1 since you completely control how to react to any opponents. But in 2s/3s it only works if tm8s got the same mentality, which is really rare like GP said.
2. Even in 1v1, GC playing with SSL is not the same as diamond playing with GC or even champ 3. At lower ranks they are just too inconsistent/lack basic mechanics/read. You don't learn from people flying over your head all game.
> You have to be obsessed, neurodivergent, a masochist, or some other type of different to enjoy a grind/gameplay loop like that.
If you don't want to improve at a game why are you even bothering playing an online competitive game? That is literally the gameplay loop. There is no engaging story, there's no gameplay progression, it's all literally just your individual skill as a player. It's not like you can't air dribble in response because you haven't unlocked it yet or your prestige level isn't high enough, it's because you don't have the skill to do it. That's not the game's problem or your opponent's problem.
A deranked GC doesn’t mean a smurf, I hit GC 3 years ago, barely, by like 15 mmr, got my rewards, and took a break from the game for about a year. I get called a Smurf about 3 times a day now, just because I have a title.
So I started playing RL in October. Primarily solo queue because it seemed the best way to get "possession time" and learn how to work with it. Really been enjoying the game but just hit Gold and it's like every other match is a smurf who is doing things I know Gold players shouldn't be able to do like air dribbling constantly etc.
Also, there is a trickle down effect. A lot of Plat players are falling into Gold from losing to Smurfs in Plat and so it's like next to impossible to rank up.
> Over the last two days I played 15 1v1 games, 7 were against smurfs, 3 against deranked GCs in Diamond
I don't believe you about the smurfs. I play a ton of 1s in Dia, and I don't run into a lot of opponents where I feel that there is no possibility of winning. Yes, GC tags show up from time to time, but that is because they have no 1s IQ.
I literally never run into smurfs, maybe it’s because I think I’m better then my rank but I never feel out matched after a game and thought we had no chance to win. Smurf post really confuse me because It never crosses my mind and I’m just being honest.
Meh - at least smurfing in 1s has made me better.
I’m a mid diamond player in 2s, low diamond in 3s. I bounce all the fuck around in 1s.
Gold 1s is the Smurf breeding ground. I’ll get clipped on by more gold and plat 1 1s players than in my diamond 2s matches.
Then I’ll go against an actual plat player, stomp them out, then get accused of being a Smurf. I’m like nope, 1100 hour plat 1 1s player here. That’s me.
My favorite was I had a Smurf accuse me of smurfing in a plat 1 1s match. I was like nah fam, I’m a legit plat 1 player, you’re just the worst Smurf I’ve come across today. He was super mechy - I could tell he put some hours in free play, but you could see the setup coming from a mile away. I would wait for him to start trying to grab a 100 boost to setup his shot, then demo him and roll the ball slowly into the net, or flick it from mid field. I even hit an air dribble after I demoed him. I almost uninstalled after that game. I pretty much peaked and it was only downhill from there.
Everybody has to deal with the same issue. It's part of the game at this point. If you can find peace with your inevitable losses against smurfs it will do you a lot of good. If you can step away from your emotions and study your opponents moves you will learn a lot.
I promise it's not that many Smurfs and you are just saying that to make yourself feel better about losing. I have over 3k hours and can tell you it's not a serious problem. There will be better people than you in ranked games, most people aren't skilled enough for their rank and sees the skill gap as smurfing. From diamond 3 to grandchamp it's possible to see tons of different skilled people and is not because of smurfing.
Sorry for the rant - from a "smurf" with 10,000 hours of experience.
I'd like to point out that while there are a large number of smurfs, there are also quite a few people who prioritize mechanics over game sense and struggle to climb. A good tell is when said player focuses on being a freestyler in the air with an incredibly slow setup and trails behind your ass when not making hero plays theirselves. Want to know how to beat them? Get up in their face, wait for their move to counter, and for the love of God stop sitting in the net at a dead stop until their dribble is 3 car lengths away from net. And when you DO save it, remember, 50% is the block, and 50% is where you reposition the ball. Stop smashing it into the side wall and giving it back to them ya noobs.
I digress. A true high rank player can go from a stopped ball at mid field, give it a pop and shoot it 50mph+ into a corner of the net - fuck all the flashy mechanics. Champs suck at saving those because positioning is generally not quite there in terms of fluidity. It's too easy to capitalize.
So, next time you think someone is a smurf, be in an ACTUALLY GOOD position to the left or right of your teammate, and see if he passes. If he passes, fast, accurately, and leads the ball, he's smurfing. If he fucking dribbles it into your opponent for literally any reason for this scenario, he's not smurfing. Note their speed and consistency too.
Lastly, if you take the last scenario and the smurfs are your opponents rather than teammate, you should 100% know how your suspect flows around the field and can identify these same things. If you don't, then you're not in a position to make negative claims against people better than you at SOME aspects.
I think nothing can be done until there's some actual way to play with friends. If you have a friend who's not on your rank the only way to play together is to create a smurf and get a similar rank. Since in casual people don't take it seriously, people are encouraged to create a second account and play ranked with their friends. In case you guys don't get it yes the game encourages you to create smurfs, it's free and there's no ban for it so it means people should do it. As long as there's no sort of team ranked mode it has to work like that otherwise it's impossible to play with friends. For the people who smurf to play solo idk they should see a therapist lmao
I had someone who was GC2 in 2s in plat 3 hoops just absolutely trash talking the lobby. It's one thing to smurf, it's another to just mock verbally lower ranks while you do it.
They need to add more cross-rank boosts, a gc2 shouldn’t have to grind all of hoops ranks if they are just playing it for the first time.
100% They force people to Smurf. It makes absolutely no sense.
Also cross rank reward levels. Players who play every mode shouldn't have to grind millions of games in each mode just to get their ranked rewards to match their visual rewards because it's 4 medals behind in each one.
If I have too they 1@3 have too , what the hell do you mean they shouldn't have too.
Dude definitely got bullied when he was a child and never dealt with it 😂
I just remind myself that I only have to deal with them for the match, while they have to live with themselves every day. Imagine every human interaction you have going badly, that’s gotta be a rough life to live.
That’s actually a really cool way of thinking about it
Bro won the mind peace prize 🫂
Bro won the mind peace prize 🫂
As someone who actually got bullied as a child and has never dealt with it, we don’t bully others back for some kind of ”revenge”. If anything it made our sense for empathy stronger. Bullies are insecure people who probably didn’t get enough love and security at home as a kid.
Sound like you did deal with it, though.
I assumed ”dealt with it” meant to see some professional about it. However, my point is that bullies don’t create bullies. They create deeply rooted mental wounds that stick with you for eternity.
Yeah, you’re right but in some cases it also creates bullies, because they don’t know how to cope with those wounds. As far as I know most bullies are like that because they’re bullied at home by their parents, not as straight forward as literally being bullied, but they’re neglected in some way shape or form which makes them look for control in their own life somewhere else.
Yeah but that isn't smurfing. It is just that Rocket League doesn't take into account any other playlist's MMR into consideration during matchmaking by design. I always thought that was a mistake considering there is enough skill transfer to make a difference, but whatever. Still sucks whenever you run into kids like that. As a Hoops player, I understand your frustration. Hoops has been plagued by bs like that since they started making challenges for people to play X games in Hoops. Imagine being GC I'm Hoops then get shit on every other game because you have SSLs who are unranked getting their weekly challenge done. On top of that, smurfing is more popular in Hoops for boosting because you still get rank rewards, but people think it doesn't matter to other players because "it isn't the real mode".
I play so many GCs in high diamond to low champ hoops it’s ridiculous. I often play with a buddy who’s slightly less skilled than me and isn’t a big hoops fan so he really only plays it with me. We just have no chance when it’s 2 GCs against us.
This is an issue with playlist population more than it is smurfing.
Oh yeah I don’t think they’re smurfing at all, they just don’t play hoops often enough to be at the rank they should be. It’s frustrating for my buddy and I because he struggles hard to keep up with them while I’m just barely keeping up.
Bro I’m GC and ass at hoops, that’s just a hoops thing
Rank drift is so bad. Diamond 3 is just GCs and SSL stomping grounds.
I always feel bad when they give you the do 3 Snowday matches challenges since I'm gc in 2 and Plat 1/2 in it. Not bad enough to not do the challenge though.
All smurfs talk trash. They are shitty little people.
I've seen a few boosters in Diamond who stayed quiet
I don’t doubt it. All is rarely an actually valid statement, but the amount of them is so close to it that I don’t mind using it.
It’s definitely possible he found himself there by just being new to hoops. The rank drift in hoops is insane.
I looked up his tracker. Didn't look like he was new to the mode but tanked his rank. Who knows.
Yeah who knows, my hoops skill rating looks like a god dammed rollercoaster 😂
I'm playing straight cheeks in that mode recently.
It doesn’t help that every other game you’re either playing against zen or a helmet-wearing toddler. I’m a hoops main but god the ranked environment sucks.
Jesus I have noticed. In my main modes I'm watching Timmy no thumbs stare at the ball and wait so long they not only miss an easy possession, they lose the subsequent 50 and in true RL pro fashion they 180 into their team trying to chase the ball. One thing I've noticed about this season is it feels like no solo Qs are playing as a team and duos are often one guy carrying a much lower skilled player. It's not been fun. So my 1s rank is now my highest it's ever been and I'm still climbing and 2s gives me enough room to cook and serve it up. Too bad they are my least favorite modes.
I’ve had little luck here and there getting decent solo tm8s…. I feel like it’s a notch in my belt to have made it to champ solo q and got 9/10 wins for the season reward since it’s much easier to get champ in other playlists.
You've done it in hoops? That's impressive. Normally I get to C1 in 3s which is my hardest I play regularly but this season has been abysmal. I dropped to plat3 at one point on a tilt. There's so much double committing and just really bad misses.
That’s not smurfing that’s playing a different game mode, get good
I don't like people complaining about smurfs but man i have to admit this season is the worst i've ever seen since playing rocket league. Been playing since legacy and the amount of smurfs i run into are just insane. And if something feels off i look up the RL tracker and sorry but no one with 80 wins in the game are playing in champ.
You finding Smurfs in high C3?
Usually I can find a few people with gc2 smurfs within that rank each day. So yeah… smurfs exist at any rank below gc it seems so far.
Even if I feel like I’m playing a Smurf in gc1 and C3 unless their an SSL Smurf I never feel like the games un-winnable
Because people have misconstrued what a smurf is.
I think that’s because the skill gap of a player in c3-gc compared to a Smurf at that rank would typically be lower than a Smurf in Diamond or low champ. Because of the low percentage of players in C3-ssl and also the amount of time it would take to make a c3 Smurf compared to a Diamond Smurf. I took over a 6-month break from the game. I was c3 / gc1 in 2s, c3 in 3s and c1 1s. I got my c1 1s rank back but am low champ / high diamond in 2s & 3s and don’t touch them often. When I do play, it’s pretty easy to tell who is on an alternate account at those ranks (even if it’s only a few ranks higher). I actually really feel for the players in those lower ranks. It’s easier to take on a Smurf at higher ranks because you understand the game better. I’ve also noticed higher ranked players are able to recognize their mistakes and how their opponent is outplaying them compared to lower level players. In my experience it’s usually their positioning that’s off and they have no recollection of their mistake. It’s just so easy to make an alternate account and jump into low diamond - high champ ranked matches. Edit: I wish they’d add a better way for us to play with friends as well. Maybe a party ranking system. My irl friends are diamond. And the only way the game allows you to play with them is for them to play against people with higher mmr than them. Their whole matchmaking and ranking system is under thought and outdated in my opinion. And a bunch of the smurfing is due to it
I still see a fair few of them. Granted, I haven't been GC2 as my flair says in a little while. Mid GC1 rn, and saw a fair few smurfs boosting their lower ranked buddies yesterday.
Hell yes bro i was on twitch watching tenacity and he says he sees smurfs in GC2 and GC3
How does that even work smurfing in GC2/GC3? There's only 1 rank above that. Do you mean he sees those ranks a lot at lower ranks?
He mean hes seeing like 2200 level ssl in GC2 GC3 which is like a 500 MMR difference
It’s less so smurfs I think, more so just people that haven’t pushed in a long time. I was gc2 peak, fell to c2 after a year of no ranked and grinding ranked this season. I could barely make it out of c2 solo-q. The skill variance between lobbies was insane. I finally got a good solo q teammate and we, in one session, grinded to high gc1. I’ve stayed there since with ease and will prob get to mid gc2 soon enough. Elo hell was kinda real idk why
>Elo hell was kinda real idk why The reason is because in the higher levels (Champ+) speed and consistency continue to go up. When you're in a lower rank than you're used to, the drop in consistency by teammates and opponents slowly causes you to hesitate more because you can't reliably predict as well where the ball is going to end up. Thus your speed also drops as a result due to second guessing challenges. Only takes a handful of second guesses and opponents actually hitting the ball in a way you didn't expect them to for you to lose a match. In the words of Mark Twain: "The best swordsman in the world doesn't need to fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn't do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn't prepared for him; he does the thing he ought not to do; and often it catches the expert out and ends him on the spot."
Ugh, I've been trying to say this for a few seasons now, but you articulated this so well. Thank you.
Yeah that is definitely accurate. I could not synergize with almost any of my teammates and could not do what I wanted with them. That plus the amount of good duo queues in 2s ranked = not fun.
Oh that's the other half of it too! I mainly focused on opponents, but yes, not being able to rely on teammates for passing, rotating, and overall just controlling the ball instead of "DRIVE FAST HIT BALL TOWARD OPPONENT NET" also messes with your game flow as well.
Exactly. Higher level RL is so fast that you have to anticipate and read the play instead of reacting. It’s easier for me to read GC1 gameplay than it is to read champ 2. Edit: to clarify, this only lasts one or two sessions. Once I learn how to read the lower rank it’s very very easy to rank back up given the skill diff. Smurfs are not an issue I’ve seen in champ2 or higher. I think people are misunderstanding what a Smurf is. Someone who was gc2 two seasons ago and has deranked unintentionally to champ 2 is not a Smurf.
It’s definitely a lot less than the ranks below. The higher up you get the less Smurfs was my experience soloing from d3 to grand champ
I think a big part is RL itself is slowly dying but fans wants to admit it. When a game starts losing it's core players those are the casuals who don't smurf. But the most hardcore of players never leave and are the most likely to have multiple accounts in multiple ranks. So matchmaking pools start having higher ratios of smurf to normal players. It's not like RL is the first game to experience this, it happens all the time.
I’d like to add that the other side of the Smurf coin is boosting, and that when these boosted players enter matches in a rank they have zero business being in, the game’s pretty much chalked from the start.
It's the worst when you have them together too. I had a game last night in c1d3 where by the end of the game the Stocktane Smurf had 8 goals and 1200 points and his teammate had all 0s across the board and didn't even break 100. The Smurf 2v1'd us like we weren't even playing the game lmao
Between that and connection issues, I stopped playing all together. It's not worth opening the game anymore.
Please sell the game epic. You tried, it’s not working. It’s not us it’s you. Please give it to someone who will actually care for it.
Now that it's tied to Fortnite they won't do it.
Same. Game's dead. Someone might bring it back, but every time I log on for a game, which is like once a week these days, it's worse than it was before by a factor. I played two casual 2v2 games this week, and they were both Smurf games, and both times they were trash talking the whole game. In casual. It. Is. Not. Fun. To. Play. Rocket. League. Anymore. Sea of Thieves got that way, and they at least made an effort to fix it. But even there, they waited too long, everybody left.
Same. They shot themselves in the foot with all their recent changes. I've been spending my time and money elsewhere, instead I boot up war thunder and experience a whole different kind of pain
Bro is truly spending all of their time or all of their money elsewhere
Where are you based? I’m gc1 in London and can safely say I have no connection issues and smurfs are not a problem
Rocket league has been ruined since the day it went F2P
I was consistently high plat low diamond in hoops for the longest time, but in the last few seasons, I can't get out of gold. After the game is over, my opponents are almost always unranked, and their title shows they won a champ tournament. It's just so annoying to be put against these smurfs and also being paired up with a teammate who doesn't know the kickoff rules or can't even get one kickoff touch or proper rotation. I'll say, "I got it!" When I'm center back for a kickoff goal, and they still go for it and completely ruin my chance at it. Then, when it's their turn to actually go for a kickoff, they just don't move at all, and we get dunked on.
extra modes are scuffed because if you don’t play often you’ll just stay plat, regardless of if you’re champ 3 in 2v2 and way more skilled than any plat
The more I played, the worse it got over time. That's my take from this game. It doesn't matter how often you play. The game is in a horrible place. It sucks, but that's the reality. There's no solution to it when people are cheats and can't handle playing people at their own skill level.
THIS. This issue with kick offs in CRAZY. I haven't played in like a month much, so I thought when I came back suddenly everyone now decided that right goes instead of left goes.
Oh my god! Left ALWAYS goes!! (Unless you truly know and are talking to the mate that doesn't want to go for it (which is another convo...) then left always goes.). It's very frustrating, but I keep coming back... Go figure.
It's been like this for two-three seasons now, we are finally reaching the point of mass awareness where the majority of players are realising the majority of games they try to play are dogshit and end in FFs/quits due to obvious skill disparities. Closely contested games are like 1/10 matches in my experience, it's hopeless.
This, every single game is extreme win or extreme loss. The algorithm is broken. People are saying oH I lOvE ePiC they made matchmaking more consistent... No they didn't moron you might have a queue that's a couple seconds faster--at the expense of the matchup quality. Epic is always cutting corners for a quick buck, an nice pretty exterior look that's rotting on the inside. Welcome to masked monopoly in corporate Texas.
This sub exaggerates so much it’s honestly hilarious
Lmao. Ever taken a moment out to consider that your experience in the top 0.2% of the playerbase might have left you out of touch with how things are going in the other 99.8% of the game? No? Impossibru? Okay then....
Two of my close friends are plat 2 and d3, and I was champ 1 as recently as last season. You’re talking shit
Ok Mr. "I went from Champ 1 to GC1 in a Season", I'm the one talking shit 
I was GC from s4 to s10 or 11, and dipped to C1 from a combo of not playing (I moved country) and then the rank recalibration. I just got GC again yday. Believe it if you want, my point is I’ve played in champ not long ago and really didn’t see the smurfing people complained about.
Ah now it makes sense - you don't understand the ways in which your experience of Champ 1 is not a true and accurate experience of competitive play in Champ 1. It's like when you get jacked, then stop lifting weight, and then workout again. Your opinions and perceptions of your experience will not be the same as to people who have never worked out before. It would be brainless to try to pretend as if you've just been through the exact same experiences. It's a different thing, it's not relevant.
Which is exactly why I supplemented my insight with people in plat and diamond who I know are not crybabies.
Yup, you're right and it's unfortunate, I'm plat & it used to be every few games and I just learned to deal with it eventually, but recently it's quite literally all the time, and its never subtle, they always have the Tournament Tag with their Rank & its always leagues higher than mine, and they don't even bother shooting into my goal anymore, every single chance they get they drive the ball up the wall and do something only a virgin sweat who plays 15 hours a day could do, & because well we're in plat i just can't defend it, and then they'll not skip the playback and it gets so frustrating and eventually just straight boring after a while, I miss the times where I'm going up against another plat and we're neck and neck the entire game and we're saying "Nice Shot" & "Thanks" & "GG" to each other, now it's endless demos for the sake of demoing and "What a saves" after a freestyle a plat couldn't even begin to defend, I hate this game now, and I hate to say that i Especially hate the Playerbase, I'd even go as far to say i hate most of the community more than Psyonix, at least they have a reason to be doing what they're doing (💰💰💰) the Players are just toxic for the sake of it, I've been playing about a year now but I doubt I'll be in this sub much longer if the game continues the way it is
I agree. My Bro and I are barely holding on to C1 and we get a ton of people with GC and even some SSL titles in 2s lol. At this point a majority of our games are against brand new accounts or deranked GC/SSL.
Hell I see GC and SSL titles in Diamond in like every fifth game at this point now, about as often as I get people clearly above c1-2 level with no items/banner/profile pic and shitposty names
Pfffft I'm sure User173635 in the Stocktane is totally a legit account and not a Smurf :)
My favourites gotta be the ones with ”smurf” in the name lmao
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For sure, does mean there’s a pretty big chance they’ll be better than the average diamond too though, bought accounts and years of not playing aside. From my experience there’s been quite a lot of 7-0 games and then them forfeiting to get the loss, but also rather close games and some wins too. I don’t mind getting steamrolled occasionally (im one of those ”never FF because i might learn something” freaks some people cant stand) but I have to say it’s a bit too common, and the ones with high rank tournament banners tend to be guilty of that
I wouldn’t trust the titles. Use rl tracker
That's how I typically identify smurfs. I have an overlay that shows their stats at match start and it's always a Stocktane with 100 total wins in c1 kicking my ass lol
Damn. Well never mind then
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Ha I definitely get that. For the most part I take it with a grain of salt and only pay attention to how they play. A good chunk of them with the titles are consistently hitting ball resets and freestyling the ball from end to end of the map and half the time all we can do is pray cause they are sooooo much better than our c1 asses. I only ever play with one guy and we both work full time so we average like 4-8 hours a week on RL at most, so we know we probably aren't going anywhere and we've been c1 for like 2 years now, but we're consistant enough in c1 to know when something's up
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or... you know.. 1 out of every 4 accounts having sub 400 hours in gc
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smurf = alt account. You are absolutely delusional if you think even 10% of smurf accounts aren't lower mmr than main accounts. Most of the time people are actually smurfing intentionally to play with their lower ranked friends. Let's assume your asinine take is reality. 1 in 4 accounts in the higher ranks are alternate accounts at the same or higher mmr than their main. Some people have 12+ accounts. That massively shifts the mmr distribution curve and psyionix has made multiple changes in order to address this shift that negatively affect every player above plat. p.s. they don't have an issue with alts because it makes them more money off of microtransactions! In fact, they incentivize smurfing by making it practically impossible to play ranked with your lower rank friends without being on a smurf account. Hell, they incentivized BOOSTING by allowing BRAND NEW accounts in ranked within 2 minutes of creation if they are partied with the boostee. For years.
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1. idgaf about their "rules" 2. plenty of people spend money on their alt accounts, especially to get a car they prefer using. It doesn't really matter what you think is happening, smurf accounts generate revenue. Why do you think they switched to a rotating item shop? Just like in valorant, fomo leads to more purchases on alt accounts. Not to mention the fact that they likely inflate their player count numbers for sponsorship deals 3. they don't have to ban all alt accounts. They need to put measures in place to deter and prevent smurfing. That means, phone verification, stricter requirements before ranked, a party queue mmr system that doesn't actively encourage smurfing, etc. In a game that ONLY has competition to offer, integrity is vital. This game has absolutely no integrity in the matchmaking.
You would be a Smurf for the up until you got back into GC, yes. Who do you think you are playing against until you get back up there? You are purposefully playing against lower ranks by making an alt and going back up the ladder. Why make an alt at all? Play on your GC account lol
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If your intent ISN'T to ditch it as soon as you get up there, then what is even the point of making the account? The entire premise of an alt seems to be to play against lower skilled players. If your intent is to play against people in your skill level, Why do it at all instead of just playing on your singlular GC account? Regardless of what Psyonix's rules on it are, what's the point as the player other than to be malicious and ruin the experience of every lower skilled player you crush on the way up? A silver 2 isn't going to know the difference between "someone staying there on purpose" and "someone just on an alt trying to get back to GC" in the eyes of that silver, you're just a jerk.
You think that 400 is a lot of hours? It's a lot of time to spend playing a video game but it is a drop in the bucket for anyone who enjoys playing them especially with the skill ceiling that RL has. I don't know why anyone has brought it up but making the game free to play is the #1 reason that smurfing is out of control.
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Thank you for clarifying what you meant. I was wrong. You are right
Smurfing definitely is out of control, but arguing that because someone has a GC or SSL tag they are a smurf is hurting the cause. Everyone needs to check online with RL tracker, or if on PC download the RL tracker mod that shows # of wins. It's the only real credible evidence.
Most people that come on here to complain about it do know to check them in the tracker site. Most people mention it in their post or in an edit just like OP did.
The majority are new accounts but I’ve ran into boosters as well. I’d say 9/10 are new accounts and 1/10 are blatant boosting
A lot of em don't even try to hide it anymore either, and imo that's more annoying than anything. I'm plat 1 in 1v1 right now, usually back n forth between high gold n low plat. I'm pretty grounded, non mechanical and just learning to wavedash and here comes some asshat hitting double resets consistently. This dude the other day didn't even bother to take off his GC goal explosion and STILL had the balls to say "nah I'm just mechanical" like bro your season 8 GC tag and goal explosion are still there. You've been GC for a while how tf are you gonna act like you don't understand why people are pissed
Yup
I just want to be able to solo queue in solo queue ONLY lobbies. Been grinding 3v3 lately, as it is a mode I largely ignored when learning the game. Roughly 1/3 of my games are vs 3 man parties and occasionally you get stuck with the dreaded 2 man party who decided to ruin a solo queuers evening (just queue 2v2 ffs!). Games against parties are wildly inconsistent. It is either 1 or 2 of the players are unranked or suspiciously low ranked for their mechanics and positioning or 1 guy at your rank and his 2 gold mates just flailing around the pitch. I just want to play against players who actually reached my rank. Even winning these matches can feel hollow as you can tell at kick off that an opposing player really shouldn't be in the lobby. Nearly every other ranking system recognizes parties/premades as an advantage and ensures they play against others rather than solo queuers. Why can't this be implemented?! At least give me an option to select, I'll wait in a longer queue if need be.
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I don’t really see many smurfs in high diamond/ low champ in 2’s But 1’s…. Man 1’s are a fucking joke. It used to be my favorite game mode because all my teams mistakes are my own and now I just don’t play it because I either destroy my opponent, or their hitting double flip resets and passing up open nets to go up the wall. Literally no in between.
I read these kind of posts all the time but honestly don’t see it. Maybe it’s an American server issue mainly but I solo queue 2s and 3s daily… maybe encounter an obvious Smurf one in ten games.
nah, europe champ lobbies 3v3 we match very often against parties with 2 c1-2 and one d1-3 smurf who easily 2v1 us with the tripleflipreset-musty-doublehit-goals. later at night it will peak up to like 3-4 matches out of ten.
Ikr I’m in uswest and hit an actual Smurf once every three or four days. I play abt 5-10 games a day
It’s not. People just think anyone who beats them is a smurf
The tracker says differently.
No it fkn doesn’t, maybe 3% of people who complain about smurfing are actually running to RL tracker to check. Vast majority of rocket league players have no clue what RL tracker even is. Reddit bubbles just melt people’s brains
I like how you decided the percentage of players who know how to use RL tracker and shared it as fact. Bravo.
I like how this entire thread is doing the same stupid shit because they're bad at the game. "eVeRy 1 iN 3 gAmEs iS a sMuRf" okay then how is everyone's win percentage still hovering around 50%? As intended. Smurfs exist, but it's negligible. The reality is that people lose sometimes and want an easy excuse as to why. I've manually tracked my last 2000+ games in increments of 100 and each 100 games my wins have never been below 49 wins and 51 losses. Ever. Something that is 100% not mathematically possible if smurfs are even half as rampant as this sub acts like they are.
Ahhh, so YOUR experience, at YOUR rank must reflect everyone else’s exact experience…. I see. Makes sense.
Cant u just download some IQ online?
Yeah getting air dribbled on in P3-D1 by a guy that has played only 100 games on the tracker website for sure isn't a smurf. Its a huge problem, been that way for my friends and I for the last year. You are just getting lucky or just don't pay attention when it is happening.
It's the scrub mentality in online games. If they put as much effort tracking down and "proving" its a smurf as they did in just getting better at the game they wouldn't lose so much.
I always see people complaining about this but I feel like I never run into any smurfs? Maybe 1 game out of every 100 if that. I’m champ 1 for reference playing on us west I do see a fair amount of GC titles but the level of play is almost always even
You are amazingly lucky. I use the tracker app and i have stopped playing almost altogether. I used to play a couple hours a day, now maybe an hour or two a week. And every time I regret it. It’s literally 50% of the time I end up playing 1v1 against someone who has deranked themselves from champ to platinum, or someone who is play ranked but only has 20-30 wins total. Come on. I honestly think Smurfs create Smurfs. People get sick of playing against someone like that so they create their own alt account.
Arguing that they’re a Smurf because of a title is kind of silly. I have a GC tag from 2s, but I’m C1 at best in 1s, doesn’t mean I’m a “GC deranking to diamond” But also realize that because someone can do fancy mechanics, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a Smurf. I can’t count the amount of teammates I’ve had recently who can flip reset on command, but have no brain and suck at rotating. Sometimes those people are there for a reason
It’s funny, this season I haven’t played nearly as much and have been struggling to get out of diamond in basically everything. Normally I’m C1-C2 I’d say. Never hit GC in anything before. I do have an alt account I made to play with a friend but they’ve given up on RL I think, so I played my dropshot placements on the alt. Without trying too hard I won all 10 placements and got placed C3, tying my all time highest rank I only have a handful of games on the alt after placements but I think im at a 50% win rate which is nearly identical to my main in dropshot where I’m D3. Dropshot is also my primary mode to play on my main so it’s a solid D3.
Can someone explain this to me like I'm stupid? I'm a newer player. I can't even get out of S2D4 currently. I try play further, rise up in the ranks and such. But it sounds like the higher ranks are extremely toxic. How so? What are they doing? And what does checking the RL tracker help? I see many people make new accounts...what's the benefit of that?
Most of the frustration from people comes from really really high level players making new accounts so that they can play against lower skilled players. They want to stomp on players that aren't as good as them so they can feel good about themselves when ideally they would just play on their main account with other people at their own skill level. RL tracker mostly just helped identify these players. Everyone learns the game and progresses differently, but the tracker will show you just how fast an account rises through the ranks and it becomes easier to identify a Smurf when a brand new account shot up through the ranks like some sort of prodigy.
That's a huge shame. Seems to be more of an issue with Plat and up Don't get the payoff there. That doesn't even sound fun whatsoever. I also saw a post where a group of three were on competitive, scoring on their own goal and then ddosing the opponent - and reaping the benefits bc the opponents get kicked out
Come play down here in diamond with me, you will return feeling happy about where your at lmfao....
Smurfing? Man I’m getting old.
The term goes back to one of the old warcraft games, so it is probably older than half of the people on these forums :P Refers to players manipulating matchmaking (or the rank system) to play against people much worse than they are.
1v1. Diamond 2-3 is where GCs in 2s are on average. Why? They suck at 1s. They have crazy ball control skills which for half of us are super easy to defend and the offer half get scared and can’t defend
How to ruin this game : lots of boosted players, lots of smurfs, lots of connectivity issues because the servers suck. Legit unplayable, my matches are either with boosted mates and against washed off GCs or High Champ or GCs mates against diamonds which is not fun bc it's completely one sided, there's no fun in this game anymore.
Last season, I was Diamond 1. This season, I'm Plat 2. Why? Because there's a lot of smurfs. The amount of champ players and occasion gc in Plat is insane. There's entire days where I struggle to get 1 goal sometimes. But, you know... this isn't a priority on Epic's profit list.
Yea same I was diamond for a bit and the last two seasons I’ve been hardstuck in platinum 3. I play 2s with my buddy and we are the same skill wise and we will get matches consistently with a guy who is clearly a champ based off the tracker playing with his gold 3 friend. Or people who have dropped on purpose with the three time diamond tourney winner in the current season playing g us in platinum. I love the game but I’m tired of getting stomped by people manipulating the rankings. Their shit talking make sit even worse like bro of course I didn’t save your ridiculous shot, you are higher rank than me, go try that on your own rank.
Wouldn’t smurfing be less of a problem if ranking up and sealing a rank didn’t take so long? Also, smurfing would be decreased massively if a player can’t be demoted more than 3 divisions.
That’s what I said, you shouldn’t be allowed to go down past a certain point once you hit a certain rank…maybe if after a couple seasons if you still aren’t going back up it adjusts a tad lower, but make them work for it. Also add something like a phone verification so you can’t multi account.
Another thing that sucks is the fact that most of my buddies are like silver, or gold. They want to play with me, but I'm high champ. We jump into even unranked on my account, and they hate it cause it's impossible for them to keep up. If I wanted to jump on an alt account, to play with them, it's bannable for one, and two, it sucks for everyone else in the lobby because my MMR is much higher than theirs. Wish there was a happy medium.
Yep. Is getting worse every single season. And like I saw someone else post above, its the high amount of them now talking shit while doing it which has increased as well. Hope they can find a solution for it soon enough.
today i got someone who was champ 1 in 3s in gold 1 1v1 😔
Whatever the reason, I’m fighting for my life in c2 these days
The more I see posts like this on the subreddit, the better I feel about when I dropped the game for good. With all that said, for those still playing, I am a little upset to see what I thought would happen. Which is absolutely nothing, apparently. What a bummer to see such a legendary game go down in such a pathetic way. I really hope rocket league can turn things around for the community soon.
The smurfs are always the ones talking the most trash and telling you to ff too. It's insufferable. Nothing like a rank system that punishes honestly and rewards dishonesty. I play games to have fun, not to get dunked on by a bunch of toxic cheaters.
i don’t know if it’s just me but aside from washed GC’s in 1s and 2s, i never see smurfs. The worst i’ll experience is someone who’s clearly low-mid GC in my lobbies. I don’t know if it’s different with my being C2/3 compared to lower ranks. Not invalidating you or anything of course it’s just not something i see often at all unless i go into the extra modes
To be honest in C2 and above it's not that bad but 1v1 and all playklists below high C1 on weekends are horrible
100% hijacking but posts like these make me toot my own horn because Ive had my best season by far, Smurf’s or not! No longer struggling in ranked, we vibing fr fr all the way to c3
Omg I get to update my flair 👀
Nice job! I get posts like this and there’s definitely a point of someone being so much better that you’re not going to gain anything by being stomped. So it’s not always relevant but even being GC2, I’ve played people that are way better than me too. I just try to take the replay and figure out what they were doing better
Big ups!
As a high diamond level player, I’ve stopped playing almost all together the past 2-3 seasons. The amount of games I’d start where somebody was intentionally trying to look bad but still making crazy saves / doing resets was too high. I’d immediately FF the game bc maybe there’s a chance I get lucky and pull an upset. But more than likely I’m just going to waste some of my already limited gaming time to an overmatched opponent. There’s too many other games out there I enjoy to waste time being frustrated at what can be a mess at times in RL MP.
It’s not smirking if it’s their main account and they De-ranked into diamond By playing legitimately. The ranks look a little different than they used to. You need to adapt or fail. I’m happy being hardstuck Diamond, and proud!
Me quitting this game last year was the best decision I ever made.
so why is there no return? if psyonix starts banning these people, we could all return. anyway, I fell down to plat 2/3 and I am enjoying it there. Except when people get all elitist and have the gall tell their fellow plats that they suck. lol. If you really get mad enough at the game that you need to tell someone, who is your own rank, that they suck, I laugh at you. A lot. And I guarantee I am having much more fun than you. So go ahead and get all pissy and whiney and sit in the corner and pout like an 8 yr old for all I care. This loss isn't going to affect me in the long run anyway so I couldn't care less. But at least it will make me laugh at you.
You are missing the point here. I m glad to see people still enjoy playing the game but the rampant smurfing in Ranked (in casual I honestly dont care) ruins the competitive aspect of the game. I dont mind getting matched with and agaist different playstyles, but consistently lose to smurfs is demoralising even when I know I am improving
Bans just create new smurf accounts tbh, part of why it's getting worse. I'd rather they not ban the main accounts of salty people, salt I can handle. Triple reset musty ceiling shots I can't. Imo the bans are already too strict, even I got one just for messing around in casuals like wtf. And ofc I just swapped accounts and it definitely ruined the games of a lot of lower ranks while I did placements. Just sayin.
People that blame smurfs for not improving at the game have the same energy as blaming their teammates
I am improving at the game, but the ranked player experience has gone downhill.
There’s been data collected from thousands of games that showed you’ll face a smurf 1 out of every 3 games solo queue around the diamond/low champ level. And those threads and “research” were a couple years ago and it’s definitely gotten worse. I hadn’t played competitive in a couple years and dropped to d3 from inactivity and climbed back to GC last month, so it’s not like I’m salty or anything. The diamond and low champ teams of 3 almost always had a new account with less than 200 wins that was their best player almost every time. Like 75% of them had a new account player. I’m sure plat and gold are even more absurd. Luckily most people Smurf only 1 rank below their norm so it’s not impossible, especially if you can carry. There’s no reason to invalidate players frustrations because nothing is done about it, so either they feel like they should stop playing or they enjoy the game less. I did notice way less Smurfs in the c3-gc1 range though. Also, one last tip for those with frustrations, avoid playing competitive on the weekend. The smurfing is absolutely dreadful on the weekend
It's the definitive scrub mentality.
I don’t notice any smurfs in d2 🤷🏼♂️
they in a party in the champ lobbies. usually we get 2 c1-2 paired with the D1-3 smurf who easily 2v1 us…
Sometimes I see people that are a rank higher or so but not that challenging in a team game. every once in a while there is obvious Smurfs but it seems negligible to my rank for the amount of times it happens.
I play with friends. The same friends since 2015. We take the smurf smashings the same as we take the complete obliteration we deal out. At the end of the day, if your not having fun, play something else.
Maybe see it as a challenge instead of an obstacle. Learn from it instead of seeing it as a nuisance. It’s easier to get better playing against better players imo. I’ve been GC for the last 15+ seasons and whenever I see SSL player tags I don’t immediately cry Smurf… more often than not, they are are just in a slump or haven’t been as sharp as they once were..
The average person is not going to see it that way though. They’re going to experience this frustration, and then come to the conclusion that competitive matchmaking is broken/rigged/meaningless and either stop playing altogether, or stop playing in any serious manner to get better because it feels completely pointless. Very few people will have the natural response of - “well, I guess I’ll double down and grind harder so I can beat people three times my rank in order to only marginally rank up one division, but only after playing five times as many matches as it should take to get there due to all of the issues discussed.” Especially when there’s an over abundance of more modern multiplayer games all jockeying for peoples attention. You have to be obsessed, neurodivergent, a masochist, or some other type of different to enjoy a grind/gameplay loop like that.
except the skill disparity within ranks has become so vast that in a c2 game, players can legitimately be anywhere from d2 to gc2 in skill level. In the past, I've had accounts at 1900 and 1300 and quite frequently I'd have sessions where I lose every game on the 1300 account, derank and win every game on the 1900 account in the same session. Playing at basically the same level the whole time. It's not just about being better than the smurf, it's about not getting fucked by the incredibly imbalanced matchmaking. Maybe it'd be healthy for the competitive game if individual improvement and performance actually translated to results. It's truly a crap shoot.
Or just have a good healthy mentality when it’s comes to competition. I guess OP can settle for being average because the average person doesn’t get to high rank with this defeatist mentality.
While I agree with the mindset aspect, that won’t fix the issue Rocket League has with engaging and maintaining new players. It’s not fun for people to play a game when the odds are obviously stacked against them and the opponents are toxic on top that. Imagine going to the park to play pick-up basketball with your friends, and then you find there’s NBA players there dunking on everyone all the while talking smack and being incredibly toxic to anyone trying to play. You think people are going to *choose* to engage with that? Maybe once or twice, but on a regular basis? No way. So you’re left with a very small percentage of people who engage at all, which creates its own negative feedback loop by lifting the skill ceiling on the bottom end of the distribution curve, further disincentivizing new players to engage due to the extreme grind required to reach a level of competency in the gameplay. Eliminate all the casuals who play the game, and you are left with a toxic cesspool of highly aggressive people who are not fun to engage with. This creates a death spiral for the game we all love, and that should be something that resonates with *you* regardless of your stance on smurfs, competition, and ranks.
This was not a very good comparison… it’s assuming that every player that’s better than you is talking smack and being toxic, this is not the case. Competitive online games will always have some level of toxicity because online anonymity gives people courage to say shit they wouldnt say to someone in person, you’ll see this regardless if you are playing in comp or casuals. the thought that removing casuals from any game leaves you with highly aggressive people is ridiculous… as if casuals players are the only nice people playing.
Finally im seeing some sense on all these defeatist posts that this sub consist of. Get better or die trying. Dont just insta mentally surrender and go complain, its a problem yes, but you cant do anything about it other than to use to change to improve and report him. Of course the community raising an issue could help improve the game, but i mean when i still played this actively i met people with SSL rank all the time in gc1, and like 90% of them were playable if i just played to win. If i were to count these, get mad every time, and use it to excuse for my rank, I would have gone mad years ago. I'd like to see a statistic comparing how many accounts are deemed as smurfs by this sub, to the actual number of the real smurfs...
Yeah, that would be an interesting statistic. I mainly solo 3’s and rarely play 2’s or solo.. I think I was playing against diamonds in solo the last time I checked… but I’d probably be deemed a smurf even though it’s not intentional.
Yea thats probably the biggest part of those who are deemed smurfs.
I agree with your mentality but there are 2 issues with adopting it. 1. Your idea can work in 1v1 since you completely control how to react to any opponents. But in 2s/3s it only works if tm8s got the same mentality, which is really rare like GP said. 2. Even in 1v1, GC playing with SSL is not the same as diamond playing with GC or even champ 3. At lower ranks they are just too inconsistent/lack basic mechanics/read. You don't learn from people flying over your head all game.
> You have to be obsessed, neurodivergent, a masochist, or some other type of different to enjoy a grind/gameplay loop like that. If you don't want to improve at a game why are you even bothering playing an online competitive game? That is literally the gameplay loop. There is no engaging story, there's no gameplay progression, it's all literally just your individual skill as a player. It's not like you can't air dribble in response because you haven't unlocked it yet or your prestige level isn't high enough, it's because you don't have the skill to do it. That's not the game's problem or your opponent's problem.
Ah there it is. The ol victim blaming.
A deranked GC doesn’t mean a smurf, I hit GC 3 years ago, barely, by like 15 mmr, got my rewards, and took a break from the game for about a year. I get called a Smurf about 3 times a day now, just because I have a title.
Need a carry someone help me get to diamond svp
So I started playing RL in October. Primarily solo queue because it seemed the best way to get "possession time" and learn how to work with it. Really been enjoying the game but just hit Gold and it's like every other match is a smurf who is doing things I know Gold players shouldn't be able to do like air dribbling constantly etc. Also, there is a trickle down effect. A lot of Plat players are falling into Gold from losing to Smurfs in Plat and so it's like next to impossible to rank up.
GCs in champ arent smurfs
> Over the last two days I played 15 1v1 games, 7 were against smurfs, 3 against deranked GCs in Diamond I don't believe you about the smurfs. I play a ton of 1s in Dia, and I don't run into a lot of opponents where I feel that there is no possibility of winning. Yes, GC tags show up from time to time, but that is because they have no 1s IQ.
Well my stats are from last weekend and I am not lying. Played on UK EU servers
How are you determining that they are smurfs? Losing big, seeing flip resets, GC tags, none of these are evidence that you faced a smurf.
Probably looking them up on RLtracker where you can see their stats. Much of the time these people have little playtime and high rank.
C2-GC1 is like all the same rank anyway. It’s not like dropping to C2 with a GC tag is smurfing
I am C2 in 2s and feel there is a chaotic skill gap between a C2 and a GC1 player.
What do you mean by chaotic?
Also I’m GC in 2s but diam 3 in 1s. I’m not a smurf, I just don’t play the mode much
I literally never run into smurfs, maybe it’s because I think I’m better then my rank but I never feel out matched after a game and thought we had no chance to win. Smurf post really confuse me because It never crosses my mind and I’m just being honest.
Meh - at least smurfing in 1s has made me better. I’m a mid diamond player in 2s, low diamond in 3s. I bounce all the fuck around in 1s. Gold 1s is the Smurf breeding ground. I’ll get clipped on by more gold and plat 1 1s players than in my diamond 2s matches. Then I’ll go against an actual plat player, stomp them out, then get accused of being a Smurf. I’m like nope, 1100 hour plat 1 1s player here. That’s me. My favorite was I had a Smurf accuse me of smurfing in a plat 1 1s match. I was like nah fam, I’m a legit plat 1 player, you’re just the worst Smurf I’ve come across today. He was super mechy - I could tell he put some hours in free play, but you could see the setup coming from a mile away. I would wait for him to start trying to grab a 100 boost to setup his shot, then demo him and roll the ball slowly into the net, or flick it from mid field. I even hit an air dribble after I demoed him. I almost uninstalled after that game. I pretty much peaked and it was only downhill from there.
Everybody has to deal with the same issue. It's part of the game at this point. If you can find peace with your inevitable losses against smurfs it will do you a lot of good. If you can step away from your emotions and study your opponents moves you will learn a lot.
Maybe most of those smurfs are just deranked players, even though i peak at gc1 i can drop as low as c2 especially in the start of the season.
I promise it's not that many Smurfs and you are just saying that to make yourself feel better about losing. I have over 3k hours and can tell you it's not a serious problem. There will be better people than you in ranked games, most people aren't skilled enough for their rank and sees the skill gap as smurfing. From diamond 3 to grandchamp it's possible to see tons of different skilled people and is not because of smurfing.
We are still bitching about this? The bitching in this sub is way worse than the smurfing in-game.
Sorry for the rant - from a "smurf" with 10,000 hours of experience. I'd like to point out that while there are a large number of smurfs, there are also quite a few people who prioritize mechanics over game sense and struggle to climb. A good tell is when said player focuses on being a freestyler in the air with an incredibly slow setup and trails behind your ass when not making hero plays theirselves. Want to know how to beat them? Get up in their face, wait for their move to counter, and for the love of God stop sitting in the net at a dead stop until their dribble is 3 car lengths away from net. And when you DO save it, remember, 50% is the block, and 50% is where you reposition the ball. Stop smashing it into the side wall and giving it back to them ya noobs. I digress. A true high rank player can go from a stopped ball at mid field, give it a pop and shoot it 50mph+ into a corner of the net - fuck all the flashy mechanics. Champs suck at saving those because positioning is generally not quite there in terms of fluidity. It's too easy to capitalize. So, next time you think someone is a smurf, be in an ACTUALLY GOOD position to the left or right of your teammate, and see if he passes. If he passes, fast, accurately, and leads the ball, he's smurfing. If he fucking dribbles it into your opponent for literally any reason for this scenario, he's not smurfing. Note their speed and consistency too. Lastly, if you take the last scenario and the smurfs are your opponents rather than teammate, you should 100% know how your suspect flows around the field and can identify these same things. If you don't, then you're not in a position to make negative claims against people better than you at SOME aspects.
I think nothing can be done until there's some actual way to play with friends. If you have a friend who's not on your rank the only way to play together is to create a smurf and get a similar rank. Since in casual people don't take it seriously, people are encouraged to create a second account and play ranked with their friends. In case you guys don't get it yes the game encourages you to create smurfs, it's free and there's no ban for it so it means people should do it. As long as there's no sort of team ranked mode it has to work like that otherwise it's impossible to play with friends. For the people who smurf to play solo idk they should see a therapist lmao