Why coaching in competitive games is immoral

last edited 2026-05-08

I think most people understand that there's an agreement by default when you're playing a ranked game with someone online that neither of you is getting outside help during the match. Sadly, a lot of people still do it in online games, because people at the other end of a screen don't matter I guess. Once, I even played a game whose maintainer wrote a policy officially condoning it. But I will argue that even then, it's still immoral.

It's not just that you harm your opponent by giving them an uneven match when they queued for an even one. It's not even just that you adjust the opponent's rating as if they lost an even match, maybe making them very sad by making think they're getting worse. The problem is also that you create a long-lasting ripple in the rating pool: since your opponent's rating is lower than their skill now, other people who play with them (or you) will have their rating adjusted inaccurately, resulting in less equal matches for everyone for a long time to come.

Smurfing is similar since new accounts usually start at a very low rank, but at least a smurf only harms other people while it's getting up to its proper rating; the disturbance dissipates. Whereas if you get coached regularly (but not all the time) the ripple will never end because you keep producing it.

I don't object in the slightest to "co-op accounts" - separate accounts specifically for a pair of people to play. These don't mess up the rating system because they're indistinguishable from just one more skilled person playing consistently. They don't give other players poorly made matches and lower their rating inaccurately. Though the real solution if you want to play with advice is to play unranked, assuming the game has it.