If you personally cannot show respect to your opponent, that is entirely on you. Not on anyone else. Stop being disrespectful. "Oh no, other people said 'I am sorry' in a dishonest way. Now I can never apologize for anything ever again." => That is your argument. Stop being a disrespectful shit and stop making up bullshit excuses for it. If you don't wanna be called a cunt, just don't be a cunt.
Same boat, plus, it just grinds my gears when people say “good game” when it’s clearly a one sided stomp someone didn’t have a chance of recovering from.
Theres plenty of times where ive said gg at the end of an online game and felt bad about it, i say it because the person plays well seriously. But, they lost, and its become so BM to say gg after a game now that i either feel bad doing it, or most time, i just dont say it.
@@deejkdeejk In paper sure but online how do you "say" GG in a different way? At least in Arena there is no chat so all you can do is use the exact same emote as everyone else regardless of context so I totally understand ops comment.
I've gotten really good about not getting salty. I've also learned to acknowledge that some days are just not appropriate to play Magic. If I'm overstressed from work or life, then I know that I'm probably not going to be fun to play with. At that point, I'll stay home and play something nonstressful. EDIT: Also, I agree saying "gg" doesn't necessarily mean it was a good game. To me it's like two sports teams shaking hands after a game, no matter how badly one side lost.
Hey good on ya! Yeah the game can be salt inducing but that's bc it truly is a reflection of what your mind can do/build. People want to talk about power level and things but really it's all based on the player and just how experienced they are. Not necessarily the specific cards in the deck. Also understanding it's a card GAME is very important. It's ok to feel tilted for a moment but ehh let it go, you'll have your golden day in the sun, if not for the very next play (sweet revenge lol).
I remember when I was in a pod with a combo player, myself, and two others. The other two had slow starts, and the combo player had a fast start. I wasn't able to draw into any of my removal (I play a lot of removal, just wasn't drawing any of it) so I applied pressure against the combo player's life total with a large flier I had managed to build up. He got very upset I wasn't spreading the love even though the other two players hadn't even established board states yet. The combo player was able to get half of a combo out but I took him out before they could get the other half out. He got so salty he packed up stormed out of the game store without saying a word.
Without having been there to witness all the nuance for myself, and based on this description alone, I don't think the salty player was acting 'wrong'. Perhaps by removing themselves from the store, he wanted to cool off from the frustration without taking it out on you or the other players. Sometimes it's better to say nothing than to say hurtful things when you're in the heat of a moment. Or, he could have just been being passive-aggressive, or something. Like I said, I don't have all the information, certainly not on salty combo player's state of mind.
I have found the best response to the accusation that you are focusing someone down is, "yes, I am focusing you because I respect the way you built your deck. You've built it expertly, and I'm scared of it." Its very hard to get mad at respect.
using 'gg' in basically any online competitive environment in the last 10-20 years has resulted in this experience. its not a genuine expression of sportsmanship anymore, its a sarcastic flex. i played competitive pokemon on simulators for years and years and the number of gg's i got that came at the end of a well-played game were dwarfed by the number of preemptive gg's i go from sweats using it as a taunt when they thought got their sweep setup after a couple turns or otherwise thought they had the game won. its seen as bad sportsmanship because for much of recent history that's in large part how its been used, sarcastically to flex on your opponents.
i end all games with a "good game". you have to take the tone of voice(if IRL) and when said (was it when the game was OVER or when they thought they won) into account to take as well meaning or a flex. if someone crys after a well meaning GG thats a them problem
@@themoops4006 Offensive GG's when they are about to win, or feel like they are, are the worst. Though it's always nice when you manage a come back after an offensive GG.
Saying good game was basically the closing ritual of every competitive sport I've ever played. From elementary Tee Ball to high school football, when the game was over you shook the other teams' hands and said good game, even if they stomped you 70-0. It's both a basic politeness thing as well as a sportsmanship thing. That said, I rarely gg in Magic Arena because I just concede when I don't feel like playing a particular match anymore.
I'm admittedly a guy who's needed to learn not to get as angry as I did before. I do bodybuilding as well as Magic, so if I get upset and hit the table there's a bit of a difference to if another guy there did so. Also not helping matters is the steroids. When I'm On Stack, I'm usually also not eating as much due to the cut. Which makes my temperament worse during that part of the year.
fully agree - espacially on Arena its the signal for "you are done next done" - and if the losing player is responding same way, they would also wait until the final combo is palyed and not quitting the game. Which can then end up in a nice kill where the losing player is gonna die with exactly 0 life points and not with -x trillion damage. - However, in face to face matches or even competitive rounds "good game" is more like a "I respect your gameplay" - so virtual is much different from real world gaming
@@Kyouto_c right - I assume that scooping and quitting a game cause people don't want to wait to see the combo is quite disrespectful while giving them a bad game experience at the same time - let them play their combo. It was a long way to get there, so all participants should enjoy it
I think I agree in part. The only time I WON'T say 'GG' is if _I AM_ the one who stomped someone else - I'll instead say 'Well played', 'Unlucky!' or something similar. It's not directly trying to soften the blow or whatever, but I think it's still part of the sportsmanship rigmarole of being humble in victory
Yeah even if you dont mean it to be an ass, if the game was a one sided stomp, it feels weird to say GGs. It wasnt a good game. I didnt win because I outplayed you. I won because you were unlucky/inexperienced/whatever. Im a farily competitive person, but at the same time its not just about winning - its about winning the right way. I want to win because I was better, not because enemy was worse.
When neobrand was new and no one was expecting the turn 1 win before your opponent played a land, i would start the match by saying "sorry for the sins I'm about to commit" it lessened the salt levels.
This past Saturday I played in a commander pod, I was playing a frog tribal deck, with frog based removal, I turned 4 made an opponents scute swarm into a frog, and he got extremely salty towards me, he had 3 lands, sol ring, mana crypt, yagra, eater of all out, it the moment I said I wanted to slow him down just a little bit, he then vented on how he wanted to play this game because he was having a ruff week. Like dude, you have the most value out this early, my other 2 players in the pod had nothing on the board, but somehow when I enchanted his scute it was a crime against humanity, and he focused all his resources to quickly kill me off in the pod, and then had the nerve to ask if he and I were going to have this beef for the next games
This sounds like the kind of player who uses tilt as a strategy, intentionally or otherwise, to keep heat off themself. If using removal on their stuff becomes a whole production, people will be hesitant to use removal on their stuff. It's terrible sportsmanship and should lead to becoming table nemesis, imo
Whether or not he's having a rough day or week shouldn't matter, for all he knows, you could be having a similarly rough day or week and you're just here to try and slow the game down so everyone has a chance to play some cards. It puts you in a better light being able to handle tough times outside of the game (whether true or not) and the opponent can't be making the excuse of a rough outside life to edge out card advantage
His week doesn't matter but honestly it sounds like his play was pretty normal. It's not that uncommon for someone to pick a target by seeing who targets them first, and especially if you two were the only threats like you said I think he even chose correctly. And as far back as I remember people wanted to clear grudges between games so that's not weird to me. No offense but honestly feel like maybe you're the one who got a little salty. And maybe you're even right to I mean if his week sucked he was probably saying and doing normal things gruffly and making you feel like it was personal, but I've seen that game pattern play out like hundreds of times with absolutely no salt involved.
"venting he wanted to play cos he had a rough week" I think those kinds of people are the ones who show up forgetting that their pod aren't npcs they can roflstomp to blow off steam. If you need to get out the stress but someone messing up your ideal play state is going to make you more stressed/salty, well... he shouldn't be playing against the unknown variable of a real person or someone he hasn't played against enough to know their game habits (which I'm assuming is the case). A game can still be a great way to de-stress, you just gotta come in with the right mindset. I'm a calm enough person that even when stressed I can take losing a game of whatever in stride (until you get that one smug ahole who has to rub your face in it), but I learned long ago if you wanna play with real people you gotta ~approach~ with the mindset of 'I can't win all the time, I just wanna chill and do things".
@@doctordistracto8390 You know that the demeanor isn't the only thing that makes a move salty right? He didn't say he was a threat either. He said he played the card against the scute player because it made the most sense in that moment. If I play one card against you when you are clearly in the lead and you proceed to target me to eliminate me as quickly as possible with a smile on your face, it doesn't make it any less salty. In my opinion at least. Now admittedly, we're getting his side of the story, but I get where he's coming from. He made an understandable play, the guy whined, tried to garner sympathy, targeted and eliminated him and then said "Hey we gonna be good here?" I'd be kinda miffed too.
For me, personally, “good game” is a statement of respect and acknowledgment after a game regardless of outcome. It’s much closer to “thanks for playing with me”.
Problem is when you say it. For example if you say gg when you win a game where some opponent disconnected and enemy team was forced to play outnumbered or surrender that is not a good thing to say.
Saying "Good game" has as you alluded to become largely formulaic, it's the expected polite thing to say at the end of the match. Just the same way we often say "Nice to meet you" to people who it often isn't nice to meet. No one does or should read too much into it.
imo there's _some_ validity to chosing different words when a game clearly wasn't good - I don't think "good game" is _entirely_ devoid of the meaning of its words - but by and large yes, the point of saying it is to be respectful.
Thing is, for example, if I am playing a lol, valorant, overwatch orsomething that is multiplayer, someone disconnects and my team is forced to play outnumbered and enemy says gg that is tilting. You are saying that a game where enemy disconnects and they are forced to play outnumbered is a good game, wich just pisses off anyone that was forced to play with a handicap
Arena seems to be the place where most of the salty players gather, lol. They're allowed to be sore losers with anonymity and they don't pass up the opportunity
Last Friday I played Rescaminator against Nomad Nadu in Legacy. It was bananas, all the legacy and pioneer players were gathered around. We should have gone to turns but the owner himself was like, "fuck that, I'm invested now" 😂. A lot of the legacy players said they had never seen a legacy match like that, it was more like a Vintage "Not so fast my friend" type of matchup.
The Nadu player is just playing the game. But everytime I sit at a table against Nadu I pray whoever designed it got fired and will never get a job related to game design again. It's just way too dumb and I hope it gets banned in commander too, since many casual players built the deck and are ruining games with it
nadu in brawl is not even that strong in my opinion. maybe it's just the types of deck I play but I think nadu in brawl lacks the consistency that 60 card nadu has
I took UW Spirits to an RCQ fully expecting to get 0 match wins, and my first two rounds were against the Nadu players there. To quote my Nadu opp I took to game 3, "Yeah, I won, but you're the good guy here" Nadu players know what they're doing, and I don't blame them at all for doing it while the card is legal.
Really wish more players acknowledged what they know full well they are doing instead of playing stupid like the broken deck they’re playing with is kosher.
I know someone who likes to cause misery on their opponents. They love to play solitaire and have their opponent watch. They absolutely know what they are doing by picking this up.
Coming from someone who used to play a lot of Starcraft, one of the places where saying gg got popularized, I still go by that etiquette. Saying gg is what you say when you concede, it's equivalent to offering your hand. Back in the Starcraft days, it was considered very rude to say gg when you are winning; you only say it after the other playing concedes and says it first. Basically, saying gg when you are the one winning was seen the same as extending your hand after you swing for lethal before your opponent has acknowledged the loss. Personally, I think this is how it should still be done - it's on the loser to say gg/extend their hand first. Then again, there was more focus on that polite concession in general - not saying gg when you lost was also considered rather rude and a sign that you are massively tilted. Either saying gg first when winning or not saying it when losing would both be seen as a bit of a scandal online if a pro player did it back in the SC days. I think that kind of encouragement of the most basic of "sportsmanship" was a good thing for keeping a friendly yet competitive atmosphere around the game, similar to how you always cool down and line up for the post-game handshake in a lot of actual sports.
I’m going to disagree with putting the onus of saying gg on the losing player. I’ve thrown out the gg to people while winning the game to acknowledge how dang well they played the game. If someone gets stomped, I try my best not to gloat or look smug, if someone pushed me to barely take the win, I’ll give them props for playing so well, and hopefully if I’m the one that lost they’ll have the same kind of empathy. I think when your etiquette is spot on is when the game is one sided. If someone gets stomped, then the winning player saying gg can come across as condescending.
@@Zeferet. Yeah, league doesn't have the same culture around it as StarCraft, probably because actual concessions aren't a thing in competitive play. SC games essentially never ended via an actual victory per the game rules, just the loser typing gg and leaving the game to concede.
@@Aldrnari956 it's definitely more situational in magic since you are in person rather than online and having actual conversations. It comes down to how you say it though - it's totally fine to be like "wow, that was a really close game" if it's true, particularly if your opponent was just too caught up in everything to do a normal concession. I don't think it's proper for the winner to just say good game alone and extend the hand after their opponent scoops though. Proper sportsmanship would be for them to extend the hand/fist/verbal gg when they concede defeat in the last game of the round.
literally happened to me while playing brawl like 10 minutes ago. i was against a pantlaza deck with a jetmir cat/token themed deck and arena said "here, have your 10th land" with only jetmir and finneas ace archer on the field
Ok...but...sometimes it IS the fault of the randomness of the cards that cause someone to lose. That is a perfectly valid reason behind why people lost.
That is true and important to recognize, but people are far more inclined to find randomness at fault when it isn't than they are to find themselves at fault when randomness is. The warning against blaming randomness is more a warning against snap judgements. If randomness is at fault, you can get there after determining that none of your choices were proven wrong by that game. If you're at fault in some subtle way, you'll never get there if you instantly blame the randomness which appears to have been the problem, and you'll miss an opportunity to improve.
Even if that's true, It's always better to say "What could I have done to mitigate that from happening?" Even if you could have done nothing that mentality alone will always serve you better than just blaming things outside of your control. There are also players who ARE at fault and choose to blame the randomness while ignoring all the mistakes they made in playing/building/mulliganing because it hurts their ego.
I keep the taunts disabled. I don't like them. Those faceless opponents are jerks and have too much luck. . . . The problem is that MTGA makes you angry because it's a grind and forces to play when you don't want to. And the faceless opponents are just obstacles that are in the way of your grind. No wonder the developers had to reduce communication to a handful of preset taunts since the beginning of MTGA. But I find that limitation dumb, so I don't use it.
Good lord yes, was looking for this comment because all I play is arena due to being in a small rural community with the nearest store being an hour away…plus it’s just cheaper. There HAS to be a better way to encourage people to log in everyday and actually play (and hope they buy something from the shop) than just daily wins.
I don't mind losing as long as it felt like I had a chance. If its a complete blowout, then either my luck was really terrible or my deck was vastly imbalanced against my opponents'. You can't fix the luck issue completely but you Can affect the imbalance by making sure your opponents (and yourself) are honest about deck strength.
I think it's worth having in mind that the game is just another thing in your life and offers a chance to explore the kind of person you want to be in life. Self expression, composure, overcoming difficulty, incresaing your skill. Those are all things that you learn along the way and have an opportunity to make an active choice on. I've both found myself being salty in a crushing defeat or gloating in an unlikely victory. And found that one doesn't fix the other and they both make you look and feel like a twat. So yeah, you can't control what others feel, but you can try to make better choices on your behaviour to create the best environment possible for yourself and others.
Me when the commander game has been going on for 3h and a winning board state gets wiped by a wrath for the 5th time in a row. Doesn't even have to be my board state.
@@jessewallace3805 This happens when we accidentally have 3-4 combo/control decks in a pod. We each have multiple decks (obviously), and sometimes it aligns that no one plays a deck that focuses on killing with combat damage. And those matches often drag out.
the point is whether or not you should say good game to your opponent if they just got steamrolled and are visibly frustrated about it. do you say it for the formality or should you not risk rubbing salt in the wound?
I got a bit frustrated a couple days ago during a tournament. 2 of my opponents took unreasonable long turns to do next to nothing. It wasnt from them attempting to do complicated combos, they would only play 2 or 3 cards. One of them consistently took 5+ minute turns. I didnt flip tables or storm out. After the match, I told her that in a tournament that has a time limit, she needs to be more mindful of how much time she takes.
The only time I take issue with anyone telling me "good game" (particularly on Arena) is when opponent prematurely presumes the win with a "gOoD gAmE" for whatever reason, when there are still cards in hand/mana open, and/or other actionable choices I can make to change their presumed outcome. “The fatal flaw in every plan is the assumption that you know more than your enemy” is the flavored text on the original printing of Mana Leak for a reason.
As a LOL player, I don't get salty about the GG after getting crushed, I don't get salty about the my enemy laner playing Garen, I don't get salty about being camped. I get salty about them being a sore winner, I get salty of the emote spam, I get salty about the GGEZ when crushing with an intro champ.
my favorite totally insane instance of tilt was at a big modern tournament several years ago my opponent started going on a rant about how they never lose at Call of Duty and related that to how they shouldn't lose Magic matches, I still think about it at least once a week
1) Empathy is important. 2) Someone else’s poor response to a situation is NOT your responsibility. I’m stuck between these 2 truths. Ultimately, where I stand, is that everybody has a different need when salting out. I try not to salt, but when I do, a smile and “good game, sorry about the bad luck” with a handshake can go a long way to remind me that my opponent took time out of their day to play a game with me, and I should be thankful, even if it wasn’t how I wanted the game to go. Because of that, I always try to be polite and thank them for their time.
When I say gg after losing, it's because deep down I know the only thing in the situation I really wanted to have been different was my own performance or the outcome. If I genuinely think the game itself has real bs in it that goes beyond the tolerance for bs we need to have, then I'll postpone it. I'll say I need a minute, and then maybe I'll realize it was a gg after all, or maybe I'll stop playing the format, avenue, or person. Salt is pretending there's is nothing you can do, but you can always at the very least walk away and take a minute.
I don't like using GG when I win because i don't want to rub in their face i won and it was a GG for me.... If they say it first I do say it back. Generally if they look like they are tilting or Sad they won it depends on how badly I beat them. If i smashed they really hard and they had bad draws or I just got a crazy bomb they couldn't deal with then i'll say thanks for the game and just leave unless they say something first. If the game was close I'll say so. "Oh that game was close I was worried you would remove this creature i had or draw answer x." and then if they interact we can have a discussion and if not I'll thank them for the game and go.
I've learned to frame it as "We're here to win. I'm not upset at you for doing what works. But i am upset at _it_ for working." Which i think is how people feel about Nadu. If it's with friends, we all kinda agree on a rule of don't play the bullshit unless we're all playing bullshit and if you play it, you'll get salted.
As far as the "go and fetch a land" thing, I recently kept a 1 land hand with three 2 cost mana rocks in it thinking "sure I have like 2 or 3 turns to draw a land" I was mana screwed for the entire game. I felt the same as you. The others offered to let me grab a land but I refused on the grounds of "I did this to myself" and I had fun watching the other players play and trying to draw as many cards as I could to catch up. I think, in commander with the longer games it's OK for a very new person but I should have known better. I was dumb and deserved what I got.,
if you're running 37+ lands you should have had at least an ~87% chance to draw at least one land in your first three draws of the game. i've made this call plenty of times, you made the right decision based on the math but RNGesus stepped in and said 'not today, my child.'
A big thing there is also the level of the game. If it is a just for fun game with some friends, they are probably wanting a good, competitive game. Someone getting stomped by bad draws isn't generally good for anyone's enjoyment. If they suggest you cheat a land in such a situation, I would recommend considering things from that perspective as well.
I've had my fair share of salty moments, but most of them happen due to my own misplay or just poor decision-making on my end, so it ends up being something I keep to myself. There is this one guy at my locals who used to have a really bad time dealing with his own salt, but I played more with him in his pods to try and defuse his temper. Over time, how I manage my own saltiness has rubbed off on him, and now he's much less belligerent when things don't go his way. I'd like to think he's a much happier Magic player now. Sometimes, all someone needs is a bit of kindness and understanding to mitigate an otherwise nasty outburst at a table.
I never understood 'GG' myself. This has several aspects for me personally: 1. It's a modern shorthand acronym which doesn't have the same sincerity or gravity as actually saying 'Good game' [mate] to someone. Use the english language don't speak letters. 2. I am a millenial so i actually said good game to opponents as i shook their hand after a football match or made the rugby tunnel to clap them off. Usually with well played thrown in for variety. Real. Genuine. 2. When used online via the chat function it is faceless and hollow, and comes with the potential to trigger people especially when the game has not been actually 'good' or close. 4. It has become too easy to just robotically type it or mutter it across a table regardless of how the game content played out. There is a real lack of personality to this method of indicating a match played and completed. 5. I prefer 'thanks for the game' and this is what i say and type when applicable - this is far better wording which can convey: match complete, your time was appreciated, a result achieved. There is neutrality yet sincerity in these words. You are not adding an adjective to indicate the state of the match and thereby in theory can reduce triggering anyone. I actually do offer a hand - because i was raised that way, it's polite and gentlemanly to do it. To be clear - in no way does my opinion condone salty bevaviour or seek to avoid hurting some little salt mine's feelings and thereby not trigger them. I don't begrudge anyone saying it, or imply they can't say it. For me personally, well I just genuinely dislike speaking letters when english words have more agency
If "good game" feels like bridge too far, I reach for "thanks for the game." If my Arena opponent sends one emote beyond "Hello" i report for unsportsmanlike behaviour
I'm glad you made the point about deck choice, knowing your matchups, and mulligan decisions. I was in a PTQ playing Eldrazi ramp and ended up matched up against Valakut. It was game 3, and I was on the draw. My 7 card hand and 6 card hand were serviceable, but VERY slow. I knew that a 5 card hand COULD be better, and better for the matchup. I mulled to 5, and drew up a hand that went turn 3 Primeval titan, turn 4 Primeval Titan, turn 5 hard cast Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre.
I may need to add there is a difference from being a salty player to being a toxic player, a player just getting mad and taking it to another level. Also one thing I don't like is playing someone taking a lot of take backs but then they won't let others do the same.
By all accounts he's a nice guy. Just got tilted over Nadu. Has admitted his short coming and wanting to be better. I feel like the mtg community loves to tear people apart :/
@@MisanthropicCurmudgeonAs someone who was one match win from top 8 but ran into Nadu with perfect hands... I don't get it. The kid didn't design Nadu. That being said I remember beating a guy when I was 14 and he cried about the elo hit he will take. Different times same people.
@@MisanthropicCurmudgeonGoing off on a child directly contradicts being a nice guy. Guess what plenty of people struggle with mental illness and don't go off on literal children.
Although I think saying "good game" is perfectly fine, saying "thanks for the game" is arguably a much more empathetic way of communicating with someone who just lost in an unsatisfying way.
For every game I start with a sol ring, I have 1 that I get a 1 lander. And for every game I get a land, sol ring, arcane signet and land tax, I get a game that I can't draw my second land. Sometimes RNGesus is on your side and sometimes it isn't. It's part of the game.
Re: Nadu, I am reminded of one Sanford Kelly when he laid out his manifesto to Pick a Top Tier. If you want to win, play what's good. If you want to have fun with what you love even though it sucks, by all means do so, but don't blame people who do play what's good if you lose. Sagat players might not have to work as hard as you for their wins, but you're the person who chose to not play Sagat. Hate the game if you must, push for it to be changed if you feel like it should be, but don't blame the player for playing what's best, especially when you're choosing to not follow suit. And especially don't spike your stick so hard it cracks the concrete if you lose, Sanford.
My standard is this, if my opponent got to play magic: Good Game. If my opponent didn't get to play magic: Sorry about the luck, thanks for the game. I do this because I've gotten salty and bratty at someone after being told "Good Game" after mulling to 5, getting stuck on 2 lands and discarding to handsize (the deck in question ran 25+ Land in a 60 card format). It was game 3, and winner would go into top 8. I don't remember all the details, I just remember getting so annoyed and after having a horrible game, getting told "good game", I snaped back with "do you honestly think that was a good game". Im fine with getting stomping, getting mana flooded or getting bad draws, as long as I get to play magic.
So I play a different luck-heavy game competitively that can take like 2+ hours to complete a single game (War of the Ring), and a big trick I use there when an opponent (or myself) is starting to tilt is to just call for a short break. Not as much of a thing at an RCQ, but pausing an FNM game to "run to the restroom" or "answer a call" gives everyone a minute or two to breathe and settle, in my experience. Sometimes it's really hard to not respond to tilt with "conceding is a free action," though
I've gotten salty from time to time, and I always regretted it right after I did it. Sometimes it's just an impulse in the moment that I need to get better at restraining. From the perspective of being the salty person, I don't think there really is a "right answer" for dealing with people getting upset about magic, and like you said, it's not the winner's responsibility to do so. I'm not really sure at the time I was getting "tilted" that there was anything someone could have said to me to make me come to my senses so to speak. Online it's easy to just quit a game that frustrates you and move on, but in the real world with real people, that's not possible, or just not proper etiquette, and being stuck in a game you don't want to be in is the worst. I'm not sure what the solution is there. lol.
I actually left a Friday Night Magic draft back in the day because of how rude the other players were. Actually went up against a kid who was like 13 and extremely rude in the way he acted and talked. I conceded the best of three and he was being insulting. I was 18 at the time and just starting college. I scooped up my cards walked over to the owner and told him I’d never be back if that’s was a representation of the players and how they acted. He didn’t say anything and I never went back to that place. Thankfully I found a much more enjoyable pickup group on campus.
There can often be times where a game of magic isn't as great as it could be, I don't like it if I win or lose too easily due to the many factors you mentioned, but if I enjoyed spending time with the person, it's still a good game for me. I really liked the idea of asking what I could have done differently to the opponent after a rough game (or even after a narrow loss!).
Getting mad and tilting is something that happens in life, it's a game with high variance and where luck is relevant. As long as you keep the tilt internal, it's fine. Get quiet and mad, skip a game and go for a walk, take a rage-scoop and apologise. If your anger doesn't spill out on others, you're fine. As soon as it does, you are being a bigger problem than the game.
To me this is an easy problem to solve and this is what I do. If it is an opponent I haven't met before, I make small talk during shuffling before mulligans. Ask where they are from. How their games have gone. If they have been to this area before. If there are good food spots they know of. Etc,. Small talk. Then after the games I say "it was wonderful meeting you and good luck today" and it there is still top 8 contention I add "I hope to see you in the top 8". Then leave. Easy peazy. Just be nice and genuine. Don't just regurgitate the same statements. Ggs and all. I'm not a fan of doing that.
@@hyperchord this is true but I sorta got the implication from the video that that was case. If we are talking about how people deal with anxiety in these situations then I think that conversation could go on for hours. But you do have a fair point.
The language difference is important. In spanish, the equivalent of good game means "we played a great game/the game was good", so it has a different tone. Thanks for the game is even worse, it sounds like "thanks for giving me the win".
My personal belief has always been that it's on the losing player to say good game, extend the hand, etc. As the winning player, if you do it, it can seem like you are trying to needle them a little, even if it's not what you actually intended. This is especially true if the opponent is hard tilting. If you say good game after they mulled to 5 twice and got mana screwed both times, it just comes off as ingenuine. What I will say if that happens though, is sorry for their draws. We've all been there, and it sucks.
it comes with maturity. not every game is going to go your way, and being a graceful loser is just as important as being a modest winner. Celebrate your wins, learn from your loses. plain and simple
I definitely used to be an absolute shit when the idea of losing was on the table. I think some of it was an inferiority issue that was made worse by having some "friends" who were sore winners, and would shame the hell out of the loser. I learned better and gained some self reflection when that salty attitude became an issue for playing with people I really care about. At some point through that self reflection and playing more emotionally conservatively, I discovered that sometimes a spectacular loss is just as, or more fun than a win. In maybe a years time from pulling my head out of my ass, I learned and became probably annoyingly positive in playing Magic. I laugh and congradulate my opponents when they stomp me, and while many love the vibe, some have reacted like my attitude is "wrong". One guy gave me the stink eye for thanking them for the game. Regardless, I have some sympathy for the salty, and try to be helpful, but regardless of win or lose, I have matured and become a much more positive player thanks to being confronted with my salt.
As a Pokemon TCG player, I recently had a player freak on me for saying GG because they started one pokemon and couldnt bench anything else in 3 turns. Told me "it wasnt a good game because I didnt get to play"
This is my favorite of all your takes. It’s a game, so we should try and keep our emotions in check. When we do get frustrated, it’s important to not project that on our opponent. We should all be stewards of the game and do our best to build a positive community. I think thanking your opponent for the game is better than saying good game, because I don’t want to rub wounds. I do like to call out good plays on their part, and if I think they’ll be receptive, I’ll ask about plays during the game.
Getting salty is fine. It’s what you get salty about, how you express the salt, and if you’re willing to learn after that matter. I’m more willing to express my salt if I play Arena, where I know it’s only gonna affect me, than in a game of Commander. However, I will also express frustration, like if my board keeps getting picked off due to circumstance…but I’ll also make sure that people know that I’m frustrated by the circumstances. If I’m already virtually doing nothing and I get taken out “due to experience”, that will cause me to express the salt - I’m already out of the game, don’t try to patronize me, I’m still at least trying to play.
I feel like a lot of his is both very good to talk about as a community yet also very difficult to fully discuss. Each person and playgroup is different from the next, and different actions have different effects. Some people would get tilted over a "GG," others would like it regardless, so it's just hard to quite determine the best thing to do. Same with playgroups as well, mine will let you go get at least a basic land if you really are just in a bad stroke of luck with lands (unless we know they have a very low land amount in their deck, or just took 1 land. I myself never fetch for a land) I think these discussions are prob best effective with each other directly and with groups, simply so we all know how to act according to our gaming spheres.
It's not rude to say Good Game. Even when it's not a good game, it's sportsmanship. As someone who get salty seeing it as a bad game, that's on me, not the person saying Good Game. Don't let anyone tell you how to use the game's predetermined, nearly impossible to actually be toxic (spam aside) communications to speak with your opponent; they know how to turn off emotes. If they have no emotional control, that ain't on you! Besides, getting salty every now and then is good for you. In person, always polite to extend a hand, if they connect, smile and let them know you enjoyed the game. If they flip the table, honestly that's a W long as you've got ULTIMATE GUARD CARD SLEEVES, your shield against Actual Toxicity!
Kinda dumb to talk about sportsmanship with an opponent you don’t see face to face. If it wasn’t a good game, I.e. they got mana screwed, and they don’t say GG first then keep your emote trap shut. You may think you’re being sportsmanlike but you are just rubbing it in. Honestly, the winner should never say GG first unless it was close. Let the loser decide if they want further interaction. The loser saying GG is sportsmanship. The winner doing it is gloating.
Sportsmanship is great, but sometimes it isn't a good game and lying about that is worse than just being honest about it. Sometimes its not even close, those tend to not be good games.
@@alexandercastleberry480 Don't be a salty little cry-baby. I usually say "gg", whether I win or lose. Sportsmanship matters even if you can't see the other person. The fact that saying it when I win upsets emotionally stunted children and doesn't upset normal people makes it even better.
@@hamsandwich6685 It's not lying, it's just a formality. It doesn't literally mean that it was a good game, it's just a way of thanking you opponent for playing. It's like starting a letter/email with "dear [name]" even if you don't actually have a close relationship with the person.
@@hughmortyproductions8562 i value genuine sincerity, personally, so i work to offer others that. Formality or not, i think being honest is better. Part of being honest could even mean saying something like "i dont handle losing like this well, i dont think that was a good game though" and its perfectly justified honesty when your opponent rolls you and you didn't even dent them.
I say before any game "GLHF" with a friendly smile and fist bump. At the end, win or lose, I smile again and say "Thanks for the game" or some variation of. Hearing other comments I agree that some people either say Good Game sarcastically or it's usually the winner who says "Good Game" which comes off condescending. Just say thank you for 'the game or playing me'.
I'm a control player in any card game I play so I have to deal with salt often, the worst was when I stole the win from my opp in game 3 of a digimon regional. He was getting steadily more upset as the game went on insulting me for being "the type of player to bring that s***t", saying stuff like wow can't even afford to max it when he saw I some of my lower rarity cards. needless to say it culminated in the opp accusing me of cheating because I top decked a restricted cards you can only run 1 of saying I multiples and asked to see my deck to clarify. I firmly just said no but I'm more than happy to have a judge come over and do so. (yeah after getting it checked there was no issue with my deck)
I would never get salty with another player because they did something that targeted me specifically or got me knocked out early. I'd usually take it with pride like saying I got targeted because I had a good board state or I was the most threatening player at the table so they had to take me out early. And if I couldn't get my combo off, then I'd blame the luck of the draw or just my own deck building. The only thing that would fire me up is if an opponent conceded when they lost superiority in some way, not that they were losing but, if I just blew up something big on their board. Because my play style is a little more defensive, I'd usually go most of a game with little to no board and especially on arena, when my board ends up being threatening, my opponent just scoops. It's super frustrating because I play the game to play the game and it seems like everyone else is just trying to win.
Man I went to a pioneer event and the guy running the event was calling me out and being rude for no reason (was my first time playing at that store). I ended up winning against him with a card (slip out the back). He talked trash to me, he had a buy the last round and spent the whole round talking to my opponent in the game I was playing about how bad my deck was and how it’s such a bad ruling that you can phase out creatures at instant speed. Not sure what that even means. I ended up winning that event and haven’t been back since. It sucks and it’s really bad when it’s the guy running the event that’s a salt lord.
I use “good game” in a few ways. 0) wishing my opponent and I to have a good game. It’s a greeting and pre game action. 1) telling my opponent I am conceding 2) What I say after I demonstrate a less obvious but deterministic loop that WILL result in the end of their game. That I present them the ways they can interact and can they disrupt that. If they cannot, then I am stating ‘this was the game we signed up for, it was a good game’. 3) A congratulation of an important game and wishing them the best. Maybe once or twice I’ve felt salty but also recognised it was the mechanics and needed to step away from the shitty variance. This was a loss cause of the 1/1000 game I just played that resulted so poorly. If I can laugh about this experience is the goal than to feel physically ill and/or violent. PS: “gg” said literally in person if offensive. Yet when you text it “gg wp” (like a chat to all) is shorthand and acceptable. I get people for effect/fun like to pronounce text acronyms but sometimes it comes off rudely and can be sarcastic. To being authentic and saying “gg” seems impossible.
If my opponents aren't drawing lands where they can't do anything, I ask if they wanna shuffle up and restart. Personally I don't think it's fair for one to be able to do everything they want while the other literally cannot cast anything. Granted my opponents are usually my fiance, my friends, or siblings. But I like fair games where everyone has a fair chance. As long as we're having fun, that's all that matters to me.
I think personally, it feels the worst when my opponents walk away silently at a tilt. Ive tilted very rarely but that happened to me once long ago, and it really made my night worse. I dont blame them, and maybe its a me thing, but it sort of moved the tilt over from about the game to being mad at myself for getting so tilted, ironically keeping me tilted.
I think with letting folks search for a basic when they're down in commander is perfectly fine so long as it's not happening every time. I think we've all had those moments where you're just miles behind everyone else at the table and not having any fun because of it. CEDH aside, I see commander as more of a "play the game to have fun (and yes there will be a winner and some losers that's just how games work)" type of format, as opposed to a "play the game to win" kind of format so letting someone who is behind and maybe not enjoying themselves because of it get some kind of helping hand isn't that big of a deal if it makes the game more fun for everyone playing
I know a Commander player who leaves the table in the middle of the game if he thinks he has no chance to win. He doesnt understand that he changes the outcome of the complete game.
if that decision is well-reasoned and substantiated by the board state i don't see any inherent problem with players scooping to save time in commander. if i think i have zero avenue to victory, the game is on lockdown or whatever and i think my opponent(s) not having to reduce my life total to zero will speed the game up i'll scoop to save some time so we can play again.
You are allowed to scoop at any time for any reason. Simply not wanting to play anymore is perfectly valid. The only time I think this veers into salt is a situation like you're being attacked for lethal and you scoop to prevent lifelink or damage triggers from happening, and I think most tables would rule that the lifegain/triggers would still happen anyway.
I would have one quibble with this which is that magic is a game which contains lots of elements which make people tremendously salty naturally - its an intellectual puzzle you can solve but its extremely hard, in 1v1 this almost necessarily implies having been "outsmarted" by your opponent. People stake a lot of their own self worth on their own perceived intelligence and losing creates a knock to their psyche. Add in every other natural thing about competition - the randomness means someone "worse" can beat you and its unsurprising people get salty. I also think overwhelmingly we forget how it feels to lose and then feel that our opponent is being ungracious about it if someone is new to magic and their opponent stomps them and then smiles and says GG (or online where its just an anonymous GG) its very hard to perceive that as anything other than patronising. If you win and win handily I think you have a duty to your opponent to actually be kind and not just be nice, and commiserate with them if they drew badly etc. I want to observe that because I think magic players have a habit of dismissing this conversation by describing it as manchildren being salty at losing as opposed to the natural human reaction to losing and not meeting your own expectations and that there is in fact bad behaviour all around the table None of this excuses flipping the table or being an arsehole to a 14 year old on the best deck. We should socially punish (and punish at tournaments) behaviour like that. When I was debating competitively at university, tournaments had equity policies and codes of conduct you signed up to on registration. It was basically just like a standard set of "be kind to one another rules" which enabled tournaments to kick people out for bad or bigoted behaviour. I'd be interested to know if magic has a similar type of thing I certainly think policies like that do a great deal of work to make the environment fairer and more fun for everyone, as well as encouraging camaraderie between players. I'd also add, there's people in my own life I refuse to play 1v1 magic with because they cannot help but bitch about the experience of RNG or having their board interacted with to the point that you avoid making the correct decision in a game because they might get salty, I don't know how to remove those people from magic but I sure would like to.
I’m still ashamed of my saltiest moment… in fact I feel so bad about it I havnt invited that group to play again because of how salty I was despite apologizing afterwards. It was a 4 player modern game and I ended up going last. It was the last game so I pulled out my favorite deck I hadn’t played in a really long time. 3rd player is taking their turn and it’s T2 or 3. He plays a “waste not”; by far my least favorite card in all of Magic. That card is an instant game winner in anything more than a 1v1 and is usually an instant win in 1v1. Well… there wasn’t anything we could do. We spent the next 15 minutes shuffling decks, drawing cards and discarding. He won that turn. I got salty because I didn’t even get to play and acted very poorly about it.
I always try to make small talk with my opponent after a game, and especially if I can tell things aren't going well I ask about their deck and what strategy they're using, etc. But I have the advantages of playing at a local game store where everybody knows me, and being someone that people naturally have an easy time talking with. That said, we do have some players who can get pretty salty if things aren't going their way and I've seen them drop out of events after losing a round or scoop if a Commander game turns against them, and there just isn't much to do about it. They're adults, and it's not the responsibility of other players to manage their emotions. We just have to let them go.
Personally, I'm done with people trying to "cheer me up" after they beat me. I might sound like a cynical person saying this, but I've run into way too many smug assholes in my time playing Magic who act like beating me in a single game suddenly makes them better than me, smarter, etc., and I think I've been burned by that so many times that I perceive even genuine attempts to reach out as them taking another opportunity to be an arse. Nowadays, all I do, win or lose, is offer a handshake (or some other form of brief, respectful acknowledgement of the other player) and walk away.
1. I get salty at myself when I misplay. Always. 2. I try not to handshake but sometimes after a really good match between two people that are just having fun, that hand just flies across the table as soon as lethal hits.
honestly the closest ive ever been to salting out was at my first local CEDH tournament where 4 out of my 5 games ended in a draw. at this time ive been playing CEDH for about a year, so im not really new. but pretty much each game ended with one guy blowing all his interaction on one guy and holding the game hostage saying hes probably gonna kingmake if its not a draw since hes already out of the game.
Salt is always amplified by the free-to-play model, because it forces players to play the same few stale decks again and again, and when you grind only wins matter.
The most tilted I've ever been was in a commander tournament when one opponent who was really good at politics was able to convince the rest of the table that his Mystic remora and Rhy Study were to find a solution to me. The fact that none of the other players realized they were being taken for a ride. Super salty at the time but man I wish I was that good rn.
Literally just a week ago or so, one of our playgroup members had a bit of an outburst. It was a bit instigated by another player too, however the other player brought up a good point that at least half of us agreed with. Anyway, earlier in that week, this same player sent me messages talking about how they feel that they "need to run more interaction in his decks" and that they "don't know what to do when I draw a million cards and have a billion mana", or when this other player does the same. Just so I don't ramble about deck construction, I'll just sum it up and say that, by this player's play patterns, they feel the need to answer absolutely every card that is played. This player also claims to be "more political", but in the past they have previously made fun of another player and that player's political treasure deck. Basically, by "politics" they mean things like "I'll let you draw a card if you leave me alone for a turn" and other things like that, these extreme deals that are nearly completely unreasonable. At the end of our session last Friday, they kind of ended up snapping at another player in the group, saying things like "I f***ing hate playing with you, I can't stand you. I f***ing hate you." Obviously it was completely out of left field, and just completely childish to act like that, rather than appreciating the ability to play the game with your friends. Get mad at their deck all you want, but the moment you start going after the other player is the moment where you're no better yourself. Since then, they haven't reached out at all about the event, and haven't apologized or done anything to try and reconcile with anyone. We took a break this week, but if anything like that happens again I'll have to actually do something about it, rather than letting this person work out their issues themselves. They even said "winning has been an uphill battle for me recently." Like, isn't that the point? Not even kidding, they're being a complete and utter hypocrite, behaving exactly the way that this other player used to behave, and nobody liked the way that they behaved. Anyways, I basically created this playgroup and have always been the one to try and organize events and such, and I won't allow people to act like animals in our playgroup, especially when I'm trying to get more people into the game, more people into our playgroup, and I'm promoting our playgroup as a casual place to have fun, enjoy each other's company, and get away from all the things that bother you. Sorry for the rant, I'm just fairly passionate about inviting people into the game, trying to let them have fun, and have a nice and welcoming environment for people. If you've read this far though, here's a gold star 🌟, and much love. ❤
Generally I’d say using the phrase “good game” at the end of a match should be an act of civility. I do think a pre-emptive “good game” before the match has literally ended but that player believes they have the win in hand is rude. It’s something I’ve come across before and it just undermines an opponents agency.
I was in a casual commander group that allowed basically unlimited free Mulligan because it was “casual”. I was OK with this at first until I found out that everybody except myself was playing 30 to 32 lands. Even though I still consider myself pretty casual, I reject the notion of unlimited free Mulligan at tutoring lands because it just encourages Bs
I personnally enjoy making sure to push the buttons that make salty players tilt. At the end of the day, they are the one ruining their own day by focusing on the bad side of their day. I changed many a friends view on salt and tilt by showing them that their salty tangeant just make their MtG experience worst that it actually is even worse.
Asked my roommate to play test some pauper decks. He got super salty, and stormed off after the first loss. Think it’s more the person than the deck. To the point I don’t want to play with him. I’m just looking to build and play the best decks I can and their behavior just sours the experience.
Never been more inspired not to salt than watching AspiringSpike the other day in a modern challenge, and his only losses were Nadu, and he just… shrugged? And said “it is what it is” and moved on with the stream. A lesser player (myself) would have been tilted for hours about how “Nadu stole my challenge!!!”
I do find it a bit gauche when an opponent begins to unpack their game and perspective after I say “good game”. Not that I’m unwilling to hear their perspective, but it does feel like a weird way to respond to what is, in essence, just a courteous way to end something that is competitive. I prefer when people say “good game” back then follow up with a question like “what do you think I could have done better”, etc.
The saltiest i get is if i land go for multiples turns in draft. Variance is a thing and hitting a section of lands is just somthing that can happen, it just feels like the other pkayer didnt win because they had skill, just your deck/shuffle screwed you. So the salt at that point comes from losing in a competition not to a sick topdeck, or some high stress attacks and blocks, but because you couldn't play the game.
Im not tilted because i scoop on turn 5 and call someone scum for running stax that stops everyone but themselves from untapping most of their lands in a "casual" game. This is after i already countered that merfolk that turns nonbasics into islands btw. In fact, im actually righteous in the dispersions i cast at them.
For me personally, in a 1v1 setting in a competitive or casual setting, I tend to go the extra mile and ask firstly if they are alright, if they seem like they are starting to tilt out. But I am a weirdo, and then depending on there response see if there is some constructive feedback I can give them, mostly by asking them more questions about what made them salty in the first place. And then it’s as simple as just having a conversation with the other player I myself also can get quite salty at MtG and other competitive games, and more often than not I am salty because I don’t understand something about what went on in the game, and would be looking for feedback myself. But I know not everyone even knows what feedback to give, and a lot of the time I just need to vent to someone who at least can understand why I was getting tilted.
I do my best to not get salty playing commander, but there was one game I struggled to find a hint of enjoyment in, and everyone else was fine with it. I don't remember much, but it was four players and I'm only focusing on me, playing Gishath, and player A playing a sonic deck, forgot the commander. My dinosaur deck was completely homebrew, only consisting of cards that were sent to me or that I traded for, I never specifically bought a single card for it. Now at the time the ramp in my deck was terrible, most games being a turn 7 commander, 6 if I was lucky. The same applied to this game, but after I got a hit while being behind everyone the sonic player dropped a hullbreach horror and only targeted me, slowing my entire board to nothing the entire game afterwards without killing me. It was painful to beg him to just win which he could have, but he kept saying some excuse until I finally forfeit.
Little late to the party but I was bullied in college cause I stomped a dude with a landfall deck I built out off my packs. Beat his crappy jeskai planeswalker deck featuring rupture spire and his suboptimal Jund deck. He had to bring out his legacy mill list which was obviously faster than the zendikar block constructed landfall list I had. His reason for losing, I was “net decking.” Oh those were the days.
Making another player feel like shit just because you didn’t built your deck right or had a bad hand is shit. Have good behavior and sportsmanship regardless of the level of play you should behave. If you can’t keep composure then don’t play. Loosing and shitting games is part of the experience.
I agree that "good game" is not a phrase meant to convey or connote its meaning literally. In standard usage, it is more of a greeting or formality. (For linguistics nerds, its illocutionary force is to symbolically close the game, and its intended perlocutionary effect is to exit the game on polite terms.) ....However... and this is where I shift to the side of not saying it to a tilting opponent... sometimes it isn't said to be polite. Sometimes, it is said to brag, sometimes its an intentionally premature declaration of victory, when you are implying that there are no further choices that the opponent can make to change the outcome. And sometimes, it is said sarcastically after the game in a rude tone. And quite frankly, someone who is tilting isn't going to be fantastic at reading your tone. They're going to be less charitable. And they are going to be more likely to see you as performing one of the rude uses of the phrase and not the polite uses. So I think the phrase is a bit poisoned by it being used ironically. Maybe I am biased. Maybe my time as a yugioh player, where that is extremely common, has led me to notice it more in Magic, but that's my 2 cents.
I like the "Thanks for the game" replacement for "Good Game." It's likely due to the ASD, but I've taken "Good Game" as literal and not a formality that doesn't actually comment on the gameplay. Kinda like when someone asks "How are you?" they aren't actually asking, it's usually just a greeting. Both of which do irrationally annoy me if I'm not in a good mood. Personally I want to take a break from what's tilting me since side comments of "Calm down" or "It's just a game, don't get so upset" invalidates my feelings. I understand that I shouldn't flip out over inconsequential things, but in the moment it doesn't help by pointing it out.
Good game is to me the equivalent of “thank you for the game.” GG I usually reserve for friends I play with regularly and only online. I moved to fist bumps over a decade back and it made a huge difference to my health. People are generally familiar with and ok with it :)
When I went to locals for yugioh, I had a guy smack my hand out of the way after I extended the hand for the game being over. I do it win or lose. I was on HEROs so my deck wasn't even good
I would say i am very aware of when to say "good game" or "sorry". I use "sorry" only when my opponents got very unlucky or I got very lucky. It doesnt depend on their salt level.
I think the hardest part is people saying "Good Game" after a commander game where they've misrepresented their power level before the match starts, and then they stomp over everyone by playing a very competitive deck with three other more casual deck players. It's often made worse by the fact that they *don't* say "Good Game" when the next match they play, all three players immediately attack that one player collectively, because they want to keep playing the game, and when the power gamer is eliminated first, they sit and pout about how unfair it is that everyone ganged up on them. It's like, kid, you've demonstrated you're playing a high-power, easy-infinite combo deck... you're the threat before the game even started. Everyone has to expend all their energy always killing you first, because otherwise you just combo off out of nowhere and do infinite damage to everyone and win. You did this to yourself. If you say "good game," either do it after *every game, including your losses* or learn to recognize it can come across as rubbing salt in the wound from time to time and learn how to read the room.
I think too many people have said “good game” sarcastically or mockingly that I can’t even say “good game” out of respect of my opponent
If you personally cannot show respect to your opponent, that is entirely on you. Not on anyone else. Stop being disrespectful.
"Oh no, other people said 'I am sorry' in a dishonest way. Now I can never apologize for anything ever again." => That is your argument. Stop being a disrespectful shit and stop making up bullshit excuses for it. If you don't wanna be called a cunt, just don't be a cunt.
It's all about how you say it
Same boat, plus, it just grinds my gears when people say “good game” when it’s clearly a one sided stomp someone didn’t have a chance of recovering from.
Theres plenty of times where ive said gg at the end of an online game and felt bad about it, i say it because the person plays well seriously. But, they lost, and its become so BM to say gg after a game now that i either feel bad doing it, or most time, i just dont say it.
@@deejkdeejk In paper sure but online how do you "say" GG in a different way? At least in Arena there is no chat so all you can do is use the exact same emote as everyone else regardless of context so I totally understand ops comment.
I've gotten really good about not getting salty. I've also learned to acknowledge that some days are just not appropriate to play Magic. If I'm overstressed from work or life, then I know that I'm probably not going to be fun to play with. At that point, I'll stay home and play something nonstressful.
EDIT: Also, I agree saying "gg" doesn't necessarily mean it was a good game. To me it's like two sports teams shaking hands after a game, no matter how badly one side lost.
Hey good on ya! Yeah the game can be salt inducing but that's bc it truly is a reflection of what your mind can do/build. People want to talk about power level and things but really it's all based on the player and just how experienced they are. Not necessarily the specific cards in the deck. Also understanding it's a card GAME is very important. It's ok to feel tilted for a moment but ehh let it go, you'll have your golden day in the sun, if not for the very next play (sweet revenge lol).
I remember when I was in a pod with a combo player, myself, and two others. The other two had slow starts, and the combo player had a fast start. I wasn't able to draw into any of my removal (I play a lot of removal, just wasn't drawing any of it) so I applied pressure against the combo player's life total with a large flier I had managed to build up. He got very upset I wasn't spreading the love even though the other two players hadn't even established board states yet. The combo player was able to get half of a combo out but I took him out before they could get the other half out. He got so salty he packed up stormed out of the game store without saying a word.
Without having been there to witness all the nuance for myself, and based on this description alone, I don't think the salty player was acting 'wrong'. Perhaps by removing themselves from the store, he wanted to cool off from the frustration without taking it out on you or the other players. Sometimes it's better to say nothing than to say hurtful things when you're in the heat of a moment.
Or, he could have just been being passive-aggressive, or something. Like I said, I don't have all the information, certainly not on salty combo player's state of mind.
I don't feel bad for combo players
As a combo player, when I lose, it was destiny
How **dare** you employ threat assessment and pressure the most dangerous player. What a horrible person you must be 😂
I have found the best response to the accusation that you are focusing someone down is, "yes, I am focusing you because I respect the way you built your deck. You've built it expertly, and I'm scared of it."
Its very hard to get mad at respect.
Was he supposed to wait around and watch you finish the game?
I've played so many Arena degens spamming early GGs, that I legit don't understand when they're showing respect, disrespect or just conceding.
using 'gg' in basically any online competitive environment in the last 10-20 years has resulted in this experience. its not a genuine expression of sportsmanship anymore, its a sarcastic flex.
i played competitive pokemon on simulators for years and years and the number of gg's i got that came at the end of a well-played game were dwarfed by the number of preemptive gg's i go from sweats using it as a taunt when they thought got their sweep setup after a couple turns or otherwise thought they had the game won. its seen as bad sportsmanship because for much of recent history that's in large part how its been used, sarcastically to flex on your opponents.
i end all games with a "good game". you have to take the tone of voice(if IRL) and when said (was it when the game was OVER or when they thought they won) into account to take as well meaning or a flex. if someone crys after a well meaning GG thats a them problem
And roping
@@themoops4006 Offensive GG's when they are about to win, or feel like they are, are the worst. Though it's always nice when you manage a come back after an offensive GG.
Saying good game was basically the closing ritual of every competitive sport I've ever played. From elementary Tee Ball to high school football, when the game was over you shook the other teams' hands and said good game, even if they stomped you 70-0. It's both a basic politeness thing as well as a sportsmanship thing.
That said, I rarely gg in Magic Arena because I just concede when I don't feel like playing a particular match anymore.
I'm admittedly a guy who's needed to learn not to get as angry as I did before. I do bodybuilding as well as Magic, so if I get upset and hit the table there's a bit of a difference to if another guy there did so.
Also not helping matters is the steroids. When I'm On Stack, I'm usually also not eating as much due to the cut. Which makes my temperament worse during that part of the year.
fully agree - espacially on Arena its the signal for "you are done next done" - and if the losing player is responding same way, they would also wait until the final combo is palyed and not quitting the game. Which can then end up in a nice kill where the losing player is gonna die with exactly 0 life points and not with -x trillion damage. - However, in face to face matches or even competitive rounds "good game" is more like a "I respect your gameplay" - so virtual is much different from real world gaming
Yeah same, i usually just concede unless my opponent is doing some janky stuff, gotta let the people play out their mtg fantasy
@@Kyouto_c right - I assume that scooping and quitting a game cause people don't want to wait to see the combo is quite disrespectful while giving them a bad game experience at the same time - let them play their combo. It was a long way to get there, so all participants should enjoy it
@@DAsrada you should probably stop using steroids
I always figured if someone ever table flipped me I'd smile, take all the now grounded cards, and ride off into the sunset with a whole new deck
If someone ever table flipped a table with my cards on it, they better be prepared to flip themselves. This cardboard ain't cheap.
I think I agree in part. The only time I WON'T say 'GG' is if _I AM_ the one who stomped someone else - I'll instead say 'Well played', 'Unlucky!' or something similar.
It's not directly trying to soften the blow or whatever, but I think it's still part of the sportsmanship rigmarole of being humble in victory
Yeah even if you dont mean it to be an ass, if the game was a one sided stomp, it feels weird to say GGs. It wasnt a good game. I didnt win because I outplayed you. I won because you were unlucky/inexperienced/whatever.
Im a farily competitive person, but at the same time its not just about winning - its about winning the right way. I want to win because I was better, not because enemy was worse.
If it was a lucky stomp yeah, but sometimes stomps are indeed good games
When neobrand was new and no one was expecting the turn 1 win before your opponent played a land, i would start the match by saying "sorry for the sins I'm about to commit" it lessened the salt levels.
The acknowledgment of unfair nonsense goes a long way.
Humor is great for improving the atmosphere or defusing a yense situation, i love it
This past Saturday I played in a commander pod, I was playing a frog tribal deck, with frog based removal, I turned 4 made an opponents scute swarm into a frog, and he got extremely salty towards me, he had 3 lands, sol ring, mana crypt, yagra, eater of all out, it the moment I said I wanted to slow him down just a little bit, he then vented on how he wanted to play this game because he was having a ruff week. Like dude, you have the most value out this early, my other 2 players in the pod had nothing on the board, but somehow when I enchanted his scute it was a crime against humanity, and he focused all his resources to quickly kill me off in the pod, and then had the nerve to ask if he and I were going to have this beef for the next games
This sounds like the kind of player who uses tilt as a strategy, intentionally or otherwise, to keep heat off themself. If using removal on their stuff becomes a whole production, people will be hesitant to use removal on their stuff. It's terrible sportsmanship and should lead to becoming table nemesis, imo
Whether or not he's having a rough day or week shouldn't matter, for all he knows, you could be having a similarly rough day or week and you're just here to try and slow the game down so everyone has a chance to play some cards. It puts you in a better light being able to handle tough times outside of the game (whether true or not) and the opponent can't be making the excuse of a rough outside life to edge out card advantage
His week doesn't matter but honestly it sounds like his play was pretty normal. It's not that uncommon for someone to pick a target by seeing who targets them first, and especially if you two were the only threats like you said I think he even chose correctly. And as far back as I remember people wanted to clear grudges between games so that's not weird to me.
No offense but honestly feel like maybe you're the one who got a little salty. And maybe you're even right to I mean if his week sucked he was probably saying and doing normal things gruffly and making you feel like it was personal, but I've seen that game pattern play out like hundreds of times with absolutely no salt involved.
"venting he wanted to play cos he had a rough week" I think those kinds of people are the ones who show up forgetting that their pod aren't npcs they can roflstomp to blow off steam. If you need to get out the stress but someone messing up your ideal play state is going to make you more stressed/salty, well... he shouldn't be playing against the unknown variable of a real person or someone he hasn't played against enough to know their game habits (which I'm assuming is the case). A game can still be a great way to de-stress, you just gotta come in with the right mindset.
I'm a calm enough person that even when stressed I can take losing a game of whatever in stride (until you get that one smug ahole who has to rub your face in it), but I learned long ago if you wanna play with real people you gotta ~approach~ with the mindset of 'I can't win all the time, I just wanna chill and do things".
@@doctordistracto8390 You know that the demeanor isn't the only thing that makes a move salty right? He didn't say he was a threat either. He said he played the card against the scute player because it made the most sense in that moment. If I play one card against you when you are clearly in the lead and you proceed to target me to eliminate me as quickly as possible with a smile on your face, it doesn't make it any less salty. In my opinion at least. Now admittedly, we're getting his side of the story, but I get where he's coming from. He made an understandable play, the guy whined, tried to garner sympathy, targeted and eliminated him and then said "Hey we gonna be good here?" I'd be kinda miffed too.
For me, personally, “good game” is a statement of respect and acknowledgment after a game regardless of outcome. It’s much closer to “thanks for playing with me”.
Problem is when you say it.
For example if you say gg when you win a game where some opponent disconnected and enemy team was forced to play outnumbered or surrender that is not a good thing to say.
Saying "Good game" has as you alluded to become largely formulaic, it's the expected polite thing to say at the end of the match. Just the same way we often say "Nice to meet you" to people who it often isn't nice to meet. No one does or should read too much into it.
I actually say, "Thanks for playing with me" instead. Because good game or not, I'm just happy we got to play
imo there's _some_ validity to chosing different words when a game clearly wasn't good - I don't think "good game" is _entirely_ devoid of the meaning of its words - but by and large yes, the point of saying it is to be respectful.
Thing is, for example, if I am playing a lol, valorant, overwatch orsomething that is multiplayer, someone disconnects and my team is forced to play outnumbered and enemy says gg that is tilting. You are saying that a game where enemy disconnects and they are forced to play outnumbered is a good game, wich just pisses off anyone that was forced to play with a handicap
I'd never rage at somebody playing Nadu, but I sure as hell quit out instantly when I get paired with one in Brawl Arena.
Arena seems to be the place where most of the salty players gather, lol. They're allowed to be sore losers with anonymity and they don't pass up the opportunity
Last Friday I played Rescaminator against Nomad Nadu in Legacy. It was bananas, all the legacy and pioneer players were gathered around. We should have gone to turns but the owner himself was like, "fuck that, I'm invested now" 😂. A lot of the legacy players said they had never seen a legacy match like that, it was more like a Vintage "Not so fast my friend" type of matchup.
The Nadu player is just playing the game. But everytime I sit at a table against Nadu I pray whoever designed it got fired and will never get a job related to game design again.
It's just way too dumb and I hope it gets banned in commander too, since many casual players built the deck and are ruining games with it
More is at stake at an actual tournament in comparison to the online version
nadu in brawl is not even that strong in my opinion. maybe it's just the types of deck I play but I think nadu in brawl lacks the consistency that 60 card nadu has
I took UW Spirits to an RCQ fully expecting to get 0 match wins, and my first two rounds were against the Nadu players there.
To quote my Nadu opp I took to game 3, "Yeah, I won, but you're the good guy here"
Nadu players know what they're doing, and I don't blame them at all for doing it while the card is legal.
Really wish more players acknowledged what they know full well they are doing instead of playing stupid like the broken deck they’re playing with is kosher.
I know someone who likes to cause misery on their opponents. They love to play solitaire and have their opponent watch. They absolutely know what they are doing by picking this up.
He won...... but at what cost?
Coming from someone who used to play a lot of Starcraft, one of the places where saying gg got popularized, I still go by that etiquette. Saying gg is what you say when you concede, it's equivalent to offering your hand. Back in the Starcraft days, it was considered very rude to say gg when you are winning; you only say it after the other playing concedes and says it first. Basically, saying gg when you are the one winning was seen the same as extending your hand after you swing for lethal before your opponent has acknowledged the loss. Personally, I think this is how it should still be done - it's on the loser to say gg/extend their hand first.
Then again, there was more focus on that polite concession in general - not saying gg when you lost was also considered rather rude and a sign that you are massively tilted. Either saying gg first when winning or not saying it when losing would both be seen as a bit of a scandal online if a pro player did it back in the SC days. I think that kind of encouragement of the most basic of "sportsmanship" was a good thing for keeping a friendly yet competitive atmosphere around the game, similar to how you always cool down and line up for the post-game handshake in a lot of actual sports.
Huh, Ive never thought of it like that, when I play league I always say ggwp no matter if I win or lose, just seemed like the polite thing to do.
I’m going to disagree with putting the onus of saying gg on the losing player. I’ve thrown out the gg to people while winning the game to acknowledge how dang well they played the game. If someone gets stomped, I try my best not to gloat or look smug, if someone pushed me to barely take the win, I’ll give them props for playing so well, and hopefully if I’m the one that lost they’ll have the same kind of empathy.
I think when your etiquette is spot on is when the game is one sided. If someone gets stomped, then the winning player saying gg can come across as condescending.
@@Zeferet. Yeah, league doesn't have the same culture around it as StarCraft, probably because actual concessions aren't a thing in competitive play. SC games essentially never ended via an actual victory per the game rules, just the loser typing gg and leaving the game to concede.
@@Aldrnari956 it's definitely more situational in magic since you are in person rather than online and having actual conversations. It comes down to how you say it though - it's totally fine to be like "wow, that was a really close game" if it's true, particularly if your opponent was just too caught up in everything to do a normal concession. I don't think it's proper for the winner to just say good game alone and extend the hand after their opponent scoops though. Proper sportsmanship would be for them to extend the hand/fist/verbal gg when they concede defeat in the last game of the round.
@@CaptainKeeez I agree with that
Me playing Brawl on Arena: ANOTHER LAND, F THIS GAME!
literally happened to me while playing brawl like 10 minutes ago. i was against a pantlaza deck with a jetmir cat/token themed deck and arena said "here, have your 10th land" with only jetmir and finneas ace archer on the field
And another land, and another land
And im getting beaten by a one one
And another one, and another one
Four more lands in the deck till its done
I've also had multiple games in a row while playing a 44 land deck unable to draw a land so yeah the Arena shuffler is very scuffed.
Ok...but...sometimes it IS the fault of the randomness of the cards that cause someone to lose. That is a perfectly valid reason behind why people lost.
That is true and important to recognize, but people are far more inclined to find randomness at fault when it isn't than they are to find themselves at fault when randomness is. The warning against blaming randomness is more a warning against snap judgements. If randomness is at fault, you can get there after determining that none of your choices were proven wrong by that game. If you're at fault in some subtle way, you'll never get there if you instantly blame the randomness which appears to have been the problem, and you'll miss an opportunity to improve.
Even if that's true, It's always better to say "What could I have done to mitigate that from happening?" Even if you could have done nothing that mentality alone will always serve you better than just blaming things outside of your control. There are also players who ARE at fault and choose to blame the randomness while ignoring all the mistakes they made in playing/building/mulliganing because it hurts their ego.
it has always been the same... let the player who lost extend the hand and say GG before you reciprocate. its a really simple rule for gaming.
I keep the taunts disabled. I don't like them. Those faceless opponents are jerks and have too much luck.
.
.
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The problem is that MTGA makes you angry because it's a grind and forces to play when you don't want to. And the faceless opponents are just obstacles that are in the way of your grind. No wonder the developers had to reduce communication to a handful of preset taunts since the beginning of MTGA. But I find that limitation dumb, so I don't use it.
Good lord yes, was looking for this comment because all I play is arena due to being in a small rural community with the nearest store being an hour away…plus it’s just cheaper.
There HAS to be a better way to encourage people to log in everyday and actually play (and hope they buy something from the shop) than just daily wins.
I don't mind losing as long as it felt like I had a chance. If its a complete blowout, then either my luck was really terrible or my deck was vastly imbalanced against my opponents'.
You can't fix the luck issue completely but you Can affect the imbalance by making sure your opponents (and yourself) are honest about deck strength.
I think it's worth having in mind that the game is just another thing in your life and offers a chance to explore the kind of person you want to be in life.
Self expression, composure, overcoming difficulty, incresaing your skill. Those are all things that you learn along the way and have an opportunity to make an active choice on.
I've both found myself being salty in a crushing defeat or gloating in an unlikely victory. And found that one doesn't fix the other and they both make you look and feel like a twat.
So yeah, you can't control what others feel, but you can try to make better choices on your behaviour to create the best environment possible for yourself and others.
Me when the commander game has been going on for 3h and a winning board state gets wiped by a wrath for the 5th time in a row. Doesn't even have to be my board state.
Htf do you have a game of edh take 3hrs?
@@jessewallace3805 This happens when we accidentally have 3-4 combo/control decks in a pod. We each have multiple decks (obviously), and sometimes it aligns that no one plays a deck that focuses on killing with combat damage. And those matches often drag out.
I’ve always seen gg to mean “well played” or “well contested.” It’s basically a show of respect/sportsmanship. To me it’s the opposite of salt.
Yep, sometimes a GG is simply a Game that was Good.
the point is whether or not you should say good game to your opponent if they just got steamrolled and are visibly frustrated about it. do you say it for the formality or should you not risk rubbing salt in the wound?
I got a bit frustrated a couple days ago during a tournament. 2 of my opponents took unreasonable long turns to do next to nothing. It wasnt from them attempting to do complicated combos, they would only play 2 or 3 cards. One of them consistently took 5+ minute turns.
I didnt flip tables or storm out. After the match, I told her that in a tournament that has a time limit, she needs to be more mindful of how much time she takes.
The only time I take issue with anyone telling me "good game" (particularly on Arena) is when opponent prematurely presumes the win with a "gOoD gAmE" for whatever reason, when there are still cards in hand/mana open, and/or other actionable choices I can make to change their presumed outcome. “The fatal flaw in every plan is the assumption that you know more than your enemy” is the flavored text on the original printing of Mana Leak for a reason.
As a LOL player, I don't get salty about the GG after getting crushed, I don't get salty about the my enemy laner playing Garen, I don't get salty about being camped. I get salty about them being a sore winner, I get salty of the emote spam, I get salty about the GGEZ when crushing with an intro champ.
my favorite totally insane instance of tilt was at a big modern tournament several years ago my opponent started going on a rant about how they never lose at Call of Duty and related that to how they shouldn't lose Magic matches, I still think about it at least once a week
1) Empathy is important.
2) Someone else’s poor response to a situation is NOT your responsibility.
I’m stuck between these 2 truths.
Ultimately, where I stand, is that everybody has a different need when salting out. I try not to salt, but when I do, a smile and “good game, sorry about the bad luck” with a handshake can go a long way to remind me that my opponent took time out of their day to play a game with me, and I should be thankful, even if it wasn’t how I wanted the game to go.
Because of that, I always try to be polite and thank them for their time.
When I say gg after losing, it's because deep down I know the only thing in the situation I really wanted to have been different was my own performance or the outcome. If I genuinely think the game itself has real bs in it that goes beyond the tolerance for bs we need to have, then I'll postpone it. I'll say I need a minute, and then maybe I'll realize it was a gg after all, or maybe I'll stop playing the format, avenue, or person. Salt is pretending there's is nothing you can do, but you can always at the very least walk away and take a minute.
Bro is salty lmao
I don't like using GG when I win because i don't want to rub in their face i won and it was a GG for me.... If they say it first I do say it back. Generally if they look like they are tilting or Sad they won it depends on how badly I beat them. If i smashed they really hard and they had bad draws or I just got a crazy bomb they couldn't deal with then i'll say thanks for the game and just leave unless they say something first. If the game was close I'll say so. "Oh that game was close I was worried you would remove this creature i had or draw answer x." and then if they interact we can have a discussion and if not I'll thank them for the game and go.
I've learned to frame it as "We're here to win. I'm not upset at you for doing what works. But i am upset at _it_ for working." Which i think is how people feel about Nadu.
If it's with friends, we all kinda agree on a rule of don't play the bullshit unless we're all playing bullshit and if you play it, you'll get salted.
As far as the "go and fetch a land" thing, I recently kept a 1 land hand with three 2 cost mana rocks in it thinking "sure I have like 2 or 3 turns to draw a land" I was mana screwed for the entire game. I felt the same as you. The others offered to let me grab a land but I refused on the grounds of "I did this to myself" and I had fun watching the other players play and trying to draw as many cards as I could to catch up. I think, in commander with the longer games it's OK for a very new person but I should have known better. I was dumb and deserved what I got.,
if you're running 37+ lands you should have had at least an ~87% chance to draw at least one land in your first three draws of the game. i've made this call plenty of times, you made the right decision based on the math but RNGesus stepped in and said 'not today, my child.'
A big thing there is also the level of the game.
If it is a just for fun game with some friends, they are probably wanting a good, competitive game. Someone getting stomped by bad draws isn't generally good for anyone's enjoyment.
If they suggest you cheat a land in such a situation, I would recommend considering things from that perspective as well.
I've had my fair share of salty moments, but most of them happen due to my own misplay or just poor decision-making on my end, so it ends up being something I keep to myself. There is this one guy at my locals who used to have a really bad time dealing with his own salt, but I played more with him in his pods to try and defuse his temper. Over time, how I manage my own saltiness has rubbed off on him, and now he's much less belligerent when things don't go his way. I'd like to think he's a much happier Magic player now. Sometimes, all someone needs is a bit of kindness and understanding to mitigate an otherwise nasty outburst at a table.
I never understood 'GG' myself. This has several aspects for me personally:
1. It's a modern shorthand acronym which doesn't have the same sincerity or gravity as actually saying 'Good game' [mate] to someone. Use the english language don't speak letters.
2. I am a millenial so i actually said good game to opponents as i shook their hand after a football match or made the rugby tunnel to clap them off. Usually with well played thrown in for variety. Real. Genuine.
2. When used online via the chat function it is faceless and hollow, and comes with the potential to trigger people especially when the game has not been actually 'good' or close.
4. It has become too easy to just robotically type it or mutter it across a table regardless of how the game content played out. There is a real lack of personality to this method of indicating a match played and completed.
5. I prefer 'thanks for the game' and this is what i say and type when applicable - this is far better wording which can convey: match complete, your time was appreciated, a result achieved. There is neutrality yet sincerity in these words. You are not adding an adjective to indicate the state of the match and thereby in theory can reduce triggering anyone.
I actually do offer a hand - because i was raised that way, it's polite and gentlemanly to do it.
To be clear - in no way does my opinion condone salty bevaviour or seek to avoid hurting some little salt mine's feelings and thereby not trigger them. I don't begrudge anyone saying it, or imply they can't say it. For me personally, well I just genuinely dislike speaking letters when english words have more agency
The streamer and the 14 year old were sitting next to me at the RCQ this past Saturday 😂
d0d0mwake
what was the rcq event?
If "good game" feels like bridge too far, I reach for "thanks for the game."
If my Arena opponent sends one emote beyond "Hello" i report for unsportsmanlike behaviour
I'm glad you made the point about deck choice, knowing your matchups, and mulligan decisions. I was in a PTQ playing Eldrazi ramp and ended up matched up against Valakut. It was game 3, and I was on the draw. My 7 card hand and 6 card hand were serviceable, but VERY slow. I knew that a 5 card hand COULD be better, and better for the matchup. I mulled to 5, and drew up a hand that went turn 3 Primeval titan, turn 4 Primeval Titan, turn 5 hard cast Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre.
I may need to add there is a difference from being a salty player to being a toxic player, a player just getting mad and taking it to another level. Also one thing I don't like is playing someone taking a lot of take backs but then they won't let others do the same.
ok but who is the streamer who tilted over a 14 y/o lol
By all accounts he's a nice guy. Just got tilted over Nadu. Has admitted his short coming and wanting to be better. I feel like the mtg community loves to tear people apart :/
@@MisanthropicCurmudgeonAs someone who was one match win from top 8 but ran into Nadu with perfect hands... I don't get it. The kid didn't design Nadu.
That being said I remember beating a guy when I was 14 and he cried about the elo hit he will take. Different times same people.
d00mwake
lmao he was being such a baby abt it. the kid didn’t design the card lolb
@@MisanthropicCurmudgeonGoing off on a child directly contradicts being a nice guy. Guess what plenty of people struggle with mental illness and don't go off on literal children.
Although I think saying "good game" is perfectly fine, saying "thanks for the game" is arguably a much more empathetic way of communicating with someone who just lost in an unsatisfying way.
For every game I start with a sol ring, I have 1 that I get a 1 lander. And for every game I get a land, sol ring, arcane signet and land tax, I get a game that I can't draw my second land. Sometimes RNGesus is on your side and sometimes it isn't. It's part of the game.
Re: Nadu, I am reminded of one Sanford Kelly when he laid out his manifesto to Pick a Top Tier. If you want to win, play what's good. If you want to have fun with what you love even though it sucks, by all means do so, but don't blame people who do play what's good if you lose. Sagat players might not have to work as hard as you for their wins, but you're the person who chose to not play Sagat. Hate the game if you must, push for it to be changed if you feel like it should be, but don't blame the player for playing what's best, especially when you're choosing to not follow suit. And especially don't spike your stick so hard it cracks the concrete if you lose, Sanford.
Rico Suave's smile after the spike lives rent free in my head
My standard is this, if my opponent got to play magic: Good Game. If my opponent didn't get to play magic: Sorry about the luck, thanks for the game.
I do this because I've gotten salty and bratty at someone after being told "Good Game" after mulling to 5, getting stuck on 2 lands and discarding to handsize (the deck in question ran 25+ Land in a 60 card format). It was game 3, and winner would go into top 8. I don't remember all the details, I just remember getting so annoyed and after having a horrible game, getting told "good game", I snaped back with "do you honestly think that was a good game". Im fine with getting stomping, getting mana flooded or getting bad draws, as long as I get to play magic.
So I play a different luck-heavy game competitively that can take like 2+ hours to complete a single game (War of the Ring), and a big trick I use there when an opponent (or myself) is starting to tilt is to just call for a short break. Not as much of a thing at an RCQ, but pausing an FNM game to "run to the restroom" or "answer a call" gives everyone a minute or two to breathe and settle, in my experience.
Sometimes it's really hard to not respond to tilt with "conceding is a free action," though
I always took GG as well done. So if you've absolutely smashed someone, I wouldn't say GG. Because I'd feel like I was taking the piss ..
I've gotten salty from time to time, and I always regretted it right after I did it. Sometimes it's just an impulse in the moment that I need to get better at restraining. From the perspective of being the salty person, I don't think there really is a "right answer" for dealing with people getting upset about magic, and like you said, it's not the winner's responsibility to do so. I'm not really sure at the time I was getting "tilted" that there was anything someone could have said to me to make me come to my senses so to speak. Online it's easy to just quit a game that frustrates you and move on, but in the real world with real people, that's not possible, or just not proper etiquette, and being stuck in a game you don't want to be in is the worst. I'm not sure what the solution is there. lol.
It’s funny to me how often topics for magic videos boil down to “how to be a normal person”
I actually left a Friday Night Magic draft back in the day because of how rude the other players were. Actually went up against a kid who was like 13 and extremely rude in the way he acted and talked. I conceded the best of three and he was being insulting. I was 18 at the time and just starting college. I scooped up my cards walked over to the owner and told him I’d never be back if that’s was a representation of the players and how they acted. He didn’t say anything and I never went back to that place. Thankfully I found a much more enjoyable pickup group on campus.
There can often be times where a game of magic isn't as great as it could be, I don't like it if I win or lose too easily due to the many factors you mentioned, but if I enjoyed spending time with the person, it's still a good game for me. I really liked the idea of asking what I could have done differently to the opponent after a rough game (or even after a narrow loss!).
Getting mad and tilting is something that happens in life, it's a game with high variance and where luck is relevant. As long as you keep the tilt internal, it's fine. Get quiet and mad, skip a game and go for a walk, take a rage-scoop and apologise. If your anger doesn't spill out on others, you're fine. As soon as it does, you are being a bigger problem than the game.
To me this is an easy problem to solve and this is what I do. If it is an opponent I haven't met before, I make small talk during shuffling before mulligans. Ask where they are from. How their games have gone. If they have been to this area before. If there are good food spots they know of. Etc,. Small talk. Then after the games I say "it was wonderful meeting you and good luck today" and it there is still top 8 contention I add "I hope to see you in the top 8". Then leave. Easy peazy. Just be nice and genuine. Don't just regurgitate the same statements. Ggs and all. I'm not a fan of doing that.
Easy if you're not socially awkward and literally scared of people like most people who play these games are
@@hyperchord this is true but I sorta got the implication from the video that that was case. If we are talking about how people deal with anxiety in these situations then I think that conversation could go on for hours. But you do have a fair point.
The language difference is important. In spanish, the equivalent of good game means "we played a great game/the game was good", so it has a different tone. Thanks for the game is even worse, it sounds like "thanks for giving me the win".
My personal belief has always been that it's on the losing player to say good game, extend the hand, etc. As the winning player, if you do it, it can seem like you are trying to needle them a little, even if it's not what you actually intended. This is especially true if the opponent is hard tilting. If you say good game after they mulled to 5 twice and got mana screwed both times, it just comes off as ingenuine. What I will say if that happens though, is sorry for their draws. We've all been there, and it sucks.
it comes with maturity. not every game is going to go your way, and being a graceful loser is just as important as being a modest winner. Celebrate your wins, learn from your loses. plain and simple
I definitely used to be an absolute shit when the idea of losing was on the table. I think some of it was an inferiority issue that was made worse by having some "friends" who were sore winners, and would shame the hell out of the loser. I learned better and gained some self reflection when that salty attitude became an issue for playing with people I really care about.
At some point through that self reflection and playing more emotionally conservatively, I discovered that sometimes a spectacular loss is just as, or more fun than a win. In maybe a years time from pulling my head out of my ass, I learned and became probably annoyingly positive in playing Magic. I laugh and congradulate my opponents when they stomp me, and while many love the vibe, some have reacted like my attitude is "wrong". One guy gave me the stink eye for thanking them for the game.
Regardless, I have some sympathy for the salty, and try to be helpful, but regardless of win or lose, I have matured and become a much more positive player thanks to being confronted with my salt.
As a Pokemon TCG player, I recently had a player freak on me for saying GG because they started one pokemon and couldnt bench anything else in 3 turns. Told me "it wasnt a good game because I didnt get to play"
This is my favorite of all your takes. It’s a game, so we should try and keep our emotions in check. When we do get frustrated, it’s important to not project that on our opponent. We should all be stewards of the game and do our best to build a positive community. I think thanking your opponent for the game is better than saying good game, because I don’t want to rub wounds. I do like to call out good plays on their part, and if I think they’ll be receptive, I’ll ask about plays during the game.
Getting salty is fine. It’s what you get salty about, how you express the salt, and if you’re willing to learn after that matter. I’m more willing to express my salt if I play Arena, where I know it’s only gonna affect me, than in a game of Commander. However, I will also express frustration, like if my board keeps getting picked off due to circumstance…but I’ll also make sure that people know that I’m frustrated by the circumstances.
If I’m already virtually doing nothing and I get taken out “due to experience”, that will cause me to express the salt - I’m already out of the game, don’t try to patronize me, I’m still at least trying to play.
I feel like a lot of his is both very good to talk about as a community yet also very difficult to fully discuss. Each person and playgroup is different from the next, and different actions have different effects. Some people would get tilted over a "GG," others would like it regardless, so it's just hard to quite determine the best thing to do. Same with playgroups as well, mine will let you go get at least a basic land if you really are just in a bad stroke of luck with lands (unless we know they have a very low land amount in their deck, or just took 1 land. I myself never fetch for a land)
I think these discussions are prob best effective with each other directly and with groups, simply so we all know how to act according to our gaming spheres.
Thank you for bringing up the conversation. Its part of the game and a hard topic to talk about when emotions are running high / aka its stressful
It's not rude to say Good Game. Even when it's not a good game, it's sportsmanship. As someone who get salty seeing it as a bad game, that's on me, not the person saying Good Game. Don't let anyone tell you how to use the game's predetermined, nearly impossible to actually be toxic (spam aside) communications to speak with your opponent; they know how to turn off emotes. If they have no emotional control, that ain't on you! Besides, getting salty every now and then is good for you. In person, always polite to extend a hand, if they connect, smile and let them know you enjoyed the game. If they flip the table, honestly that's a W long as you've got ULTIMATE GUARD CARD SLEEVES, your shield against Actual Toxicity!
Kinda dumb to talk about sportsmanship with an opponent you don’t see face to face. If it wasn’t a good game, I.e. they got mana screwed, and they don’t say GG first then keep your emote trap shut. You may think you’re being sportsmanlike but you are just rubbing it in.
Honestly, the winner should never say GG first unless it was close. Let the loser decide if they want further interaction.
The loser saying GG is sportsmanship. The winner doing it is gloating.
Sportsmanship is great, but sometimes it isn't a good game and lying about that is worse than just being honest about it.
Sometimes its not even close, those tend to not be good games.
@@alexandercastleberry480 Don't be a salty little cry-baby.
I usually say "gg", whether I win or lose. Sportsmanship matters even if you can't see the other person. The fact that saying it when I win upsets emotionally stunted children and doesn't upset normal people makes it even better.
@@hamsandwich6685 It's not lying, it's just a formality. It doesn't literally mean that it was a good game, it's just a way of thanking you opponent for playing.
It's like starting a letter/email with "dear [name]" even if you don't actually have a close relationship with the person.
@@hughmortyproductions8562 i value genuine sincerity, personally, so i work to offer others that.
Formality or not, i think being honest is better.
Part of being honest could even mean saying something like "i dont handle losing like this well, i dont think that was a good game though" and its perfectly justified honesty when your opponent rolls you and you didn't even dent them.
So who is going to tell me which streamer tilted?
Google?
I'm just going to assume it's Jeff Hoogland until proven otherwise
@Taphosthewarlock THE Google plays MTG?!
Not me 😂
@@justindalrymple2898does he even play MTG anymore? He was the salt king for sure back in the day 😂😂
I say before any game "GLHF" with a friendly smile and fist bump. At the end, win or lose, I smile again and say "Thanks for the game" or some variation of. Hearing other comments I agree that some people either say Good Game sarcastically or it's usually the winner who says "Good Game" which comes off condescending. Just say thank you for 'the game or playing me'.
I'm a control player in any card game I play so I have to deal with salt often, the worst was when I stole the win from my opp in game 3 of a digimon regional. He was getting steadily more upset as the game went on insulting me for being "the type of player to bring that s***t", saying stuff like wow can't even afford to max it when he saw I some of my lower rarity cards. needless to say it culminated in the opp accusing me of cheating because I top decked a restricted cards you can only run 1 of saying I multiples and asked to see my deck to clarify. I firmly just said no but I'm more than happy to have a judge come over and do so. (yeah after getting it checked there was no issue with my deck)
I would never get salty with another player because they did something that targeted me specifically or got me knocked out early. I'd usually take it with pride like saying I got targeted because I had a good board state or I was the most threatening player at the table so they had to take me out early. And if I couldn't get my combo off, then I'd blame the luck of the draw or just my own deck building.
The only thing that would fire me up is if an opponent conceded when they lost superiority in some way, not that they were losing but, if I just blew up something big on their board.
Because my play style is a little more defensive, I'd usually go most of a game with little to no board and especially on arena, when my board ends up being threatening, my opponent just scoops. It's super frustrating because I play the game to play the game and it seems like everyone else is just trying to win.
Man I went to a pioneer event and the guy running the event was calling me out and being rude for no reason (was my first time playing at that store). I ended up winning against him with a card (slip out the back). He talked trash to me, he had a buy the last round and spent the whole round talking to my opponent in the game I was playing about how bad my deck was and how it’s such a bad ruling that you can phase out creatures at instant speed. Not sure what that even means. I ended up winning that event and haven’t been back since. It sucks and it’s really bad when it’s the guy running the event that’s a salt lord.
I was taught to say gg/goodgame after football/soccer or basketball games. I will continue to do so.
Our friend who used to compete back in the day, and owned an LGS likes to say "Thanks for letting me play, guys" after he pubstomps us
I use “good game” in a few ways.
0) wishing my opponent and I to have a good game. It’s a greeting and pre game action.
1) telling my opponent I am conceding
2) What I say after I demonstrate a less obvious but deterministic loop that WILL result in the end of their game. That I present them the ways they can interact and can they disrupt that. If they cannot, then I am stating ‘this was the game we signed up for, it was a good game’.
3) A congratulation of an important game and wishing them the best.
Maybe once or twice I’ve felt salty but also recognised it was the mechanics and needed to step away from the shitty variance. This was a loss cause of the 1/1000 game I just played that resulted so poorly. If I can laugh about this experience is the goal than to feel physically ill and/or violent.
PS: “gg” said literally in person if offensive. Yet when you text it “gg wp” (like a chat to all) is shorthand and acceptable. I get people for effect/fun like to pronounce text acronyms but sometimes it comes off rudely and can be sarcastic. To being authentic and saying “gg” seems impossible.
If my opponents aren't drawing lands where they can't do anything, I ask if they wanna shuffle up and restart. Personally I don't think it's fair for one to be able to do everything they want while the other literally cannot cast anything. Granted my opponents are usually my fiance, my friends, or siblings. But I like fair games where everyone has a fair chance. As long as we're having fun, that's all that matters to me.
I think personally, it feels the worst when my opponents walk away silently at a tilt. Ive tilted very rarely but that happened to me once long ago, and it really made my night worse. I dont blame them, and maybe its a me thing, but it sort of moved the tilt over from about the game to being mad at myself for getting so tilted, ironically keeping me tilted.
I think with letting folks search for a basic when they're down in commander is perfectly fine so long as it's not happening every time. I think we've all had those moments where you're just miles behind everyone else at the table and not having any fun because of it. CEDH aside, I see commander as more of a "play the game to have fun (and yes there will be a winner and some losers that's just how games work)" type of format, as opposed to a "play the game to win" kind of format so letting someone who is behind and maybe not enjoying themselves because of it get some kind of helping hand isn't that big of a deal if it makes the game more fun for everyone playing
I know a Commander player who leaves the table in the middle of the game if he thinks he has no chance to win.
He doesnt understand that he changes the outcome of the complete game.
I do leave “early” as well sometimes. Better to have a rest for a bit, than stare at slowplayers struggling with reading.
if that decision is well-reasoned and substantiated by the board state i don't see any inherent problem with players scooping to save time in commander. if i think i have zero avenue to victory, the game is on lockdown or whatever and i think my opponent(s) not having to reduce my life total to zero will speed the game up i'll scoop to save some time so we can play again.
You are allowed to scoop at any time for any reason. Simply not wanting to play anymore is perfectly valid. The only time I think this veers into salt is a situation like you're being attacked for lethal and you scoop to prevent lifelink or damage triggers from happening, and I think most tables would rule that the lifegain/triggers would still happen anyway.
I would have one quibble with this which is that magic is a game which contains lots of elements which make people tremendously salty naturally - its an intellectual puzzle you can solve but its extremely hard, in 1v1 this almost necessarily implies having been "outsmarted" by your opponent. People stake a lot of their own self worth on their own perceived intelligence and losing creates a knock to their psyche. Add in every other natural thing about competition - the randomness means someone "worse" can beat you and its unsurprising people get salty. I also think overwhelmingly we forget how it feels to lose and then feel that our opponent is being ungracious about it if someone is new to magic and their opponent stomps them and then smiles and says GG (or online where its just an anonymous GG) its very hard to perceive that as anything other than patronising. If you win and win handily I think you have a duty to your opponent to actually be kind and not just be nice, and commiserate with them if they drew badly etc. I want to observe that because I think magic players have a habit of dismissing this conversation by describing it as manchildren being salty at losing as opposed to the natural human reaction to losing and not meeting your own expectations and that there is in fact bad behaviour all around the table
None of this excuses flipping the table or being an arsehole to a 14 year old on the best deck. We should socially punish (and punish at tournaments) behaviour like that. When I was debating competitively at university, tournaments had equity policies and codes of conduct you signed up to on registration. It was basically just like a standard set of "be kind to one another rules" which enabled tournaments to kick people out for bad or bigoted behaviour. I'd be interested to know if magic has a similar type of thing I certainly think policies like that do a great deal of work to make the environment fairer and more fun for everyone, as well as encouraging camaraderie between players.
I'd also add, there's people in my own life I refuse to play 1v1 magic with because they cannot help but bitch about the experience of RNG or having their board interacted with to the point that you avoid making the correct decision in a game because they might get salty, I don't know how to remove those people from magic but I sure would like to.
I’m still ashamed of my saltiest moment… in fact I feel so bad about it I havnt invited that group to play again because of how salty I was despite apologizing afterwards.
It was a 4 player modern game and I ended up going last. It was the last game so I pulled out my favorite deck I hadn’t played in a really long time. 3rd player is taking their turn and it’s T2 or 3. He plays a “waste not”; by far my least favorite card in all of Magic. That card is an instant game winner in anything more than a 1v1 and is usually an instant win in 1v1. Well… there wasn’t anything we could do. We spent the next 15 minutes shuffling decks, drawing cards and discarding. He won that turn. I got salty because I didn’t even get to play and acted very poorly about it.
I always try to make small talk with my opponent after a game, and especially if I can tell things aren't going well I ask about their deck and what strategy they're using, etc. But I have the advantages of playing at a local game store where everybody knows me, and being someone that people naturally have an easy time talking with.
That said, we do have some players who can get pretty salty if things aren't going their way and I've seen them drop out of events after losing a round or scoop if a Commander game turns against them, and there just isn't much to do about it. They're adults, and it's not the responsibility of other players to manage their emotions. We just have to let them go.
Personally, I'm done with people trying to "cheer me up" after they beat me. I might sound like a cynical person saying this, but I've run into way too many smug assholes in my time playing Magic who act like beating me in a single game suddenly makes them better than me, smarter, etc., and I think I've been burned by that so many times that I perceive even genuine attempts to reach out as them taking another opportunity to be an arse. Nowadays, all I do, win or lose, is offer a handshake (or some other form of brief, respectful acknowledgement of the other player) and walk away.
1. I get salty at myself when I misplay. Always.
2. I try not to handshake but sometimes after a really good match between two people that are just having fun, that hand just flies across the table as soon as lethal hits.
honestly the closest ive ever been to salting out was at my first local CEDH tournament where 4 out of my 5 games ended in a draw. at this time ive been playing CEDH for about a year, so im not really new. but pretty much each game ended with one guy blowing all his interaction on one guy and holding the game hostage saying hes probably gonna kingmake if its not a draw since hes already out of the game.
Salt is always amplified by the free-to-play model, because it forces players to play the same few stale decks again and again, and when you grind only wins matter.
The most tilted I've ever been was in a commander tournament when one opponent who was really good at politics was able to convince the rest of the table that his Mystic remora and Rhy Study were to find a solution to me. The fact that none of the other players realized they were being taken for a ride. Super salty at the time but man I wish I was that good rn.
Literally just a week ago or so, one of our playgroup members had a bit of an outburst. It was a bit instigated by another player too, however the other player brought up a good point that at least half of us agreed with. Anyway, earlier in that week, this same player sent me messages talking about how they feel that they "need to run more interaction in his decks" and that they "don't know what to do when I draw a million cards and have a billion mana", or when this other player does the same. Just so I don't ramble about deck construction, I'll just sum it up and say that, by this player's play patterns, they feel the need to answer absolutely every card that is played. This player also claims to be "more political", but in the past they have previously made fun of another player and that player's political treasure deck. Basically, by "politics" they mean things like "I'll let you draw a card if you leave me alone for a turn" and other things like that, these extreme deals that are nearly completely unreasonable. At the end of our session last Friday, they kind of ended up snapping at another player in the group, saying things like "I f***ing hate playing with you, I can't stand you. I f***ing hate you." Obviously it was completely out of left field, and just completely childish to act like that, rather than appreciating the ability to play the game with your friends. Get mad at their deck all you want, but the moment you start going after the other player is the moment where you're no better yourself. Since then, they haven't reached out at all about the event, and haven't apologized or done anything to try and reconcile with anyone. We took a break this week, but if anything like that happens again I'll have to actually do something about it, rather than letting this person work out their issues themselves. They even said "winning has been an uphill battle for me recently." Like, isn't that the point? Not even kidding, they're being a complete and utter hypocrite, behaving exactly the way that this other player used to behave, and nobody liked the way that they behaved. Anyways, I basically created this playgroup and have always been the one to try and organize events and such, and I won't allow people to act like animals in our playgroup, especially when I'm trying to get more people into the game, more people into our playgroup, and I'm promoting our playgroup as a casual place to have fun, enjoy each other's company, and get away from all the things that bother you. Sorry for the rant, I'm just fairly passionate about inviting people into the game, trying to let them have fun, and have a nice and welcoming environment for people. If you've read this far though, here's a gold star 🌟, and much love. ❤
Generally I’d say using the phrase “good game” at the end of a match should be an act of civility. I do think a pre-emptive “good game” before the match has literally ended but that player believes they have the win in hand is rude. It’s something I’ve come across before and it just undermines an opponents agency.
I was in a casual commander group that allowed basically unlimited free Mulligan because it was “casual”. I was OK with this at first until I found out that everybody except myself was playing 30 to 32 lands. Even though I still consider myself pretty casual, I reject the notion of unlimited free Mulligan at tutoring lands because it just encourages Bs
I personnally enjoy making sure to push the buttons that make salty players tilt. At the end of the day, they are the one ruining their own day by focusing on the bad side of their day. I changed many a friends view on salt and tilt by showing them that their salty tangeant just make their MtG experience worst that it actually is even worse.
Asked my roommate to play test some pauper decks. He got super salty, and stormed off after the first loss. Think it’s more the person than the deck. To the point I don’t want to play with him. I’m just looking to build and play the best decks I can and their behavior just sours the experience.
Never been more inspired not to salt than watching AspiringSpike the other day in a modern challenge, and his only losses were Nadu, and he just… shrugged? And said “it is what it is” and moved on with the stream. A lesser player (myself) would have been tilted for hours about how “Nadu stole my challenge!!!”
I do find it a bit gauche when an opponent begins to unpack their game and perspective after I say “good game”. Not that I’m unwilling to hear their perspective, but it does feel like a weird way to respond to what is, in essence, just a courteous way to end something that is competitive. I prefer when people say “good game” back then follow up with a question like “what do you think I could have done better”, etc.
The saltiest i get is if i land go for multiples turns in draft. Variance is a thing and hitting a section of lands is just somthing that can happen, it just feels like the other pkayer didnt win because they had skill, just your deck/shuffle screwed you. So the salt at that point comes from losing in a competition not to a sick topdeck, or some high stress attacks and blocks, but because you couldn't play the game.
Im not tilted because i scoop on turn 5 and call someone scum for running stax that stops everyone but themselves from untapping most of their lands in a "casual" game. This is after i already countered that merfolk that turns nonbasics into islands btw. In fact, im actually righteous in the dispersions i cast at them.
For me personally, in a 1v1 setting in a competitive or casual setting, I tend to go the extra mile and ask firstly if they are alright, if they seem like they are starting to tilt out. But I am a weirdo, and then depending on there response see if there is some constructive feedback I can give them, mostly by asking them more questions about what made them salty in the first place. And then it’s as simple as just having a conversation with the other player
I myself also can get quite salty at MtG and other competitive games, and more often than not I am salty because I don’t understand something about what went on in the game, and would be looking for feedback myself. But I know not everyone even knows what feedback to give, and a lot of the time I just need to vent to someone who at least can understand why I was getting tilted.
I do my best to not get salty playing commander, but there was one game I struggled to find a hint of enjoyment in, and everyone else was fine with it. I don't remember much, but it was four players and I'm only focusing on me, playing Gishath, and player A playing a sonic deck, forgot the commander. My dinosaur deck was completely homebrew, only consisting of cards that were sent to me or that I traded for, I never specifically bought a single card for it. Now at the time the ramp in my deck was terrible, most games being a turn 7 commander, 6 if I was lucky. The same applied to this game, but after I got a hit while being behind everyone the sonic player dropped a hullbreach horror and only targeted me, slowing my entire board to nothing the entire game afterwards without killing me. It was painful to beg him to just win which he could have, but he kept saying some excuse until I finally forfeit.
Little late to the party but I was bullied in college cause I stomped a dude with a landfall deck I built out off my packs. Beat his crappy jeskai planeswalker deck featuring rupture spire and his suboptimal Jund deck. He had to bring out his legacy mill list which was obviously faster than the zendikar block constructed landfall list I had. His reason for losing, I was “net decking.” Oh those were the days.
Making another player feel like shit just because you didn’t built your deck right or had a bad hand is shit. Have good behavior and sportsmanship regardless of the level of play you should behave. If you can’t keep composure then don’t play. Loosing and shitting games is part of the experience.
Sometimes you're fighting your deck, not your opponent. It's the price of those other games that come down to the wire and leave you smiling.
I agree that "good game" is not a phrase meant to convey or connote its meaning literally. In standard usage, it is more of a greeting or formality. (For linguistics nerds, its illocutionary force is to symbolically close the game, and its intended perlocutionary effect is to exit the game on polite terms.)
....However... and this is where I shift to the side of not saying it to a tilting opponent... sometimes it isn't said to be polite. Sometimes, it is said to brag, sometimes its an intentionally premature declaration of victory, when you are implying that there are no further choices that the opponent can make to change the outcome. And sometimes, it is said sarcastically after the game in a rude tone. And quite frankly, someone who is tilting isn't going to be fantastic at reading your tone. They're going to be less charitable. And they are going to be more likely to see you as performing one of the rude uses of the phrase and not the polite uses.
So I think the phrase is a bit poisoned by it being used ironically. Maybe I am biased. Maybe my time as a yugioh player, where that is extremely common, has led me to notice it more in Magic, but that's my 2 cents.
I like the "Thanks for the game" replacement for "Good Game."
It's likely due to the ASD, but I've taken "Good Game" as literal and not a formality that doesn't actually comment on the gameplay. Kinda like when someone asks "How are you?" they aren't actually asking, it's usually just a greeting. Both of which do irrationally annoy me if I'm not in a good mood. Personally I want to take a break from what's tilting me since side comments of "Calm down" or "It's just a game, don't get so upset" invalidates my feelings. I understand that I shouldn't flip out over inconsequential things, but in the moment it doesn't help by pointing it out.
Good game is to me the equivalent of “thank you for the game.” GG I usually reserve for friends I play with regularly and only online.
I moved to fist bumps over a decade back and it made a huge difference to my health. People are generally familiar with and ok with it :)
When I went to locals for yugioh, I had a guy smack my hand out of the way after I extended the hand for the game being over. I do it win or lose. I was on HEROs so my deck wasn't even good
I would say i am very aware of when to say "good game" or "sorry". I use "sorry" only when my opponents got very unlucky or I got very lucky. It doesnt depend on their salt level.
I think the hardest part is people saying "Good Game" after a commander game where they've misrepresented their power level before the match starts, and then they stomp over everyone by playing a very competitive deck with three other more casual deck players. It's often made worse by the fact that they *don't* say "Good Game" when the next match they play, all three players immediately attack that one player collectively, because they want to keep playing the game, and when the power gamer is eliminated first, they sit and pout about how unfair it is that everyone ganged up on them. It's like, kid, you've demonstrated you're playing a high-power, easy-infinite combo deck... you're the threat before the game even started. Everyone has to expend all their energy always killing you first, because otherwise you just combo off out of nowhere and do infinite damage to everyone and win. You did this to yourself.
If you say "good game," either do it after *every game, including your losses* or learn to recognize it can come across as rubbing salt in the wound from time to time and learn how to read the room.