Why do people wanna ban smurfs?

General Discussion
1

I understand that it can be frustrating to see a low level and they turn out to be a GM but if they buy another copy then they should be able to play that copy. Some smurfs are for trying out new characters whilst not destroying your stats or what if you wanna play comp with someone lower sr than you, even if its by 1 sr.
at the end of the day smurfing isn’t a bad thing. If people are toxic on a smurf account then they should get that smurf banned but not banned for being a smurf.

2

This game is not a fighting game, where you really start from zero or close to it when you try a new character, every damn character in this game except a few requires little to no effort to be played.

Just look a couple of tips and learn a few spicy spots and you are good for it, theres literally no reason to spend more money for the same game just to ruin lower ranks games.

When you do comp you are forced to read some BS every now and then, like one guy was going to buy ow again to smurf as moira.

We know moira requires tons of skill and necessarily needs a second account to be played, right ?

Buying a new account to just try a hero is a GIMMICK. Pathetic excuse to ruin other’s playtime.

Ofc you cannot report them for beeing stupid, but it’s better tell them they are, just to be sure they know it.

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3

…

Reading that made my brain hurt.

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4

I think many players have no problem with a specific type of smurfs: Alt-Accounts who want to learn new heroes. Those players still try their best and get to the MMR they deserved.

However, most players who talk about “smurfs” refer to alt account who derank on purpose, just to have easier games. They manipulate their MMR to have easy games in the future, ruining the gameplay experience of the other players.

Regarding the alt-accounts, the reason they can be tolerated is because the players still try their best. As an example, I’m a low plat Mercy and Tracer main and I want to learn Wrecking Ball. Playing that hero in Comp (or even QP) would be devastating because, as a platinum player, i would play with WB like a bronze player. My teammates would think I’m throwing or got boosted.

Instead of letting that happen, I buy an alt-account where I learn to play WB (and some other heroes for flexing). I’d be ranked bronze because I’m terrible as WB. I still have the unfair advantage of having better cognitive skill but mechanical skill has a bigger impact on the result. Once the hero “clicks”, I start to climb to a point where I’m low plat with the alt-account.

Something that is worth metnioning, Blizzard thinks that alt-account who play seriously are not a problem (Jeff’s definition of smurf). However, they think that boosting accounts, which need to derank on purpose first, is a problem and they were working on remedy that problem.

This is why there is an SR difference limit when playing with friends.

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5

While that is mostly true, and you can learn hero’s solo skills pretty fast, you need time to figure out and train their team position, and what to do in what comp.
So, if you don’t have proper comp, you can’t train hero’s team position, synergy, etc. So, if you go to QP to “practice” hero, after about 10-20 games you’ll start wasting time, because you’ll learn nothing new. So, you need seriuos game to practice, and only other possibility is … comp. So, you don’t want your real SR to suffer(also you probably get reported for playing hero you never played in comp and eventually get banned), so you pretty much must create another account to play that hero. Since none of the heroes is really hard to learn, you will eventually get into that hero and most likely climb into the same rank… but it takes time.
Now, of course, there are griefers, who’s sole point is to beat(badly) someone with less experience and then make fun of them - these people should be banned. There’s no excuse for not banning griefers, but they’re pretty much a part of every multi-player game, mmos being the worst, because there level5 will 99.99% lose to level50 … because of gear, new abilities…

6

Positioning and similiar, are “skills” you learn by just playing.

There’s no reason to smurf in lower ranks just because you feel you need others 2-3 accounts for some useless and pathetic reasons.

If you own a second account to just use the MMR and the rank for selfish reasons, you are a griefer and should be permabanned from the game.

OR we can just ignore them and laugh to everyone who in 2018 still think ranked in OW is some serious stuff.

7

There is a much bigger issue that most do not see, trust me fixing that issue will make alt accounts useless

8

i don’t have a problem with smurfs with a couple of provisos…

if they indeed intended for that account to be used exclusively for training themselves on hero’s they don’t know how to play at their original rank or intend to try out a different role without wanting to tank their SR… this is fine and acceptable

what i do have a problem with… and is a massive problem across the mid ranks no matter how many people tell you otherwise…

is when they are loosing any given match, whilst practising the hero’s they intended to… get so annoyed that they are loosing, and then switch to the hero they are a much higher rank with, and wipe the floor with the unsuspecting enemy… this is very very very VERY! unfair…

unfortunately you cant stop them from throwing a hissy fit at the fact they are loosing and then doing that… so… the only way is to stop them from having a smurf account…

9

I think top 500 smurfs (with a second phone number) should be made ineligible for a top 500 spot or maybe even banned.

10

what would be wrong with creating your own game to learn new heroes? that is a feature in the game and doesnt affect lower ranked players. there are other ways than buying an alt account available, but people refuse to use them. This is why smurfs get such a bad rep.

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11

How to do you find players with approximately good SR for your custom games? Learning something on 2000SR and below level is easy in many ways. Doing the same if you want to reach platinum or above is much more difficult.

12

I don’t understand, if you want to learn new hero, just play damn quick play.

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13

There not going to, boosting and throwing etc however not cool :scream: and yes i mean intentionally throwing, not the kind of throwing for being bad at a hero.

14

Because most of them gets into your game and insult you when your team lose?

15

except no, is not, stop throwing BS, blizzard is already doing it with new hero release.

If you have some sort of extra cool team tactics, you will eventually discuss with your team in private. if you solo smurf you are deliberately abuse the MMR for your own affairs, and thats called griefing.

16

You should also stop throwing BS. The only way to learn it effectively is playing competitive on an account but someone will be whining no matter which account you’re learning on.

If you learn on a new account then some players are whining because of your low level (that doesn’t actually mean much) even if you are playing at your own SR with your new heros. If you learn on your main high rank account then everyone calls you “noob”, “boosted”, “thrower”, etc… Try to learn DPS as a diamond or master healer. And again, at a below average 2000SR I can play most heros - that indeed doesn’t really require skills. Close to 3000SR however I can play only about 5 (including all roles) but usually go with 2-3 DPS heros.

17

You answered your own question:

Because it ruins matches for everyone involved.

1 Like
18

You don’t need comp to build up mechanical skill.

You don’t need comp to know positioning and usefull spot.

You just need to play the game long enough.

You have QP to try out new stuff without trolling ofc, you have custom games made by you and by the whole community.

You have training zone to test out data.

You just are forcing your stupid idea that you need to comp to actually learn to use heroes. Which is objectively false.

19

People like you need to leave.

20

Based on your last post, you have no clue how things work so engaging in a debate with you would be completely pointless.

The pros and cons of each learning methods (and many other problems, like QP quality) have already been discussed and none of the current methods is perfect. Learning on a new account is often one of the best options.

You can tell your opinion/ideas (even if you don’t know what their pros and cons are) and can insult others in whatever ways you want, the last word is that of Blizzard’s who make the rules. They know more about the issues and have more data to base their decisions on. They also know better what their goals are with the game (not only gameplaywise).