You obviously have blatant issues if you believe that because there are winners and losers, players should do everything they can not to fall into the latter category, at the expense of their opponent's fun.

Traditional boardgames like Chess or Go are bound by extremely strict and very simple rules. It's absolutely impossible to cheese or borderline exploit in those. Gameplay prevents condoned griefing and pushing your opponent's buttons, something which is however the staple of all modern 'competitive' games, such as DOTA-likes, for example, the workings of which are byzantine (champions/items constantly balanced, engine flaws turned into gameplay) and the exact opposite of traditional boardgames, which are brilliantly simple and reward pure skill, not cheap shots.

Those traditional games are not 'competitive', in the way you envision this word, at all. To win, you don't have to "play to win". You just have to be better than your opponent, and focused. In modern online games, to win, having more pure skill doesn't cut it, you have to triple check every patch for new possibilities of cheese, or removal thereof. You must have the "play to win" mentality and be an annoyance.
If there's a bug that multiplies tenfold the damage of an item, you will use it non-stop until next patch because it's going to be so lolrandum to see people rage XDDD. While the majority of gamers won't, because it breaks immersion, and is plainly 'not fun'. You will call them 'scrubs' and mock them.

Winning has become more important than playing, for a minority of players that are into annoying people more than they are into playing make-believe and roleplaying pod pilots. They're not playing for ingame goals, they're using the game for and out-of-game one, reaping Schadenfreude.


It's okay to be competitive, in a broader sense than the one you delve upon. It's fun to 1v1 or have good clean fun with fleets of equal strength. You don't have to enter the 'play to win' mentality to be competitive. It's okay to just play make-believe. It's okay to respect your fellow gamer.


Online communities are actually socializing tools, and a good barometer to check where you're at. When all hell breaks loose IRL, where are you gonna stand? Will you gang up on people trying to mind their own business, because after all, it's only life, and they could have hid themselves better?
You will of course argue that IRL and online behavior have nothing in common, but guess what, ethics are context-irrelevant. Except if you completely roleplay, which is mighty fine, and something you ridicule.

And pray tell, what is sociopathy?