They Blame Him For Everything

Phreak was once the voice of League of Legends: he introduced the community to all the newest champions, helped viewers understand the game, and was there for some of its most memorable moments.

But when Phreak made a career change from casting to game design, all of the community’s good will and love turned toxic - and, nowadays, Phreak gets blamed for basically everything that’s wrong with League.

But Phreak isn't responsible for everyone's problems, so what's going on? Is all the Phreak hate really a symptom of a bigger problem?

Thumbnail by: Bennett Grainger (insta: @BennettGrainger)

Music used under license from Associated Production Music LLC (”APM”).

[piosenki]

Dearest Karthus,

I hope this finds you well. We seem to have found ourselves in a dire situation at the bottom lane. Please consider casting your ultimate ability to assist us as i do believe Lee sin has come to dive our tower.

Sincerely, Your bottom lane

[dingleberrychipchapichuta]

Never forget "Vel'Koz E doesn't fizzle" by Phreak even though every single Vel'Koz main said it fizzles for years. Then Riot August fixed the bug Phreak denied it exists

[asambi]

The biggest problem with Phreak is his lack of owning up when he makes a mistake and the fact he's condescending (even when he's clearly wrong) Take the Vel'Koz mains giving him feedback and him just saying L2play...that's not how that ability works.

[Kaiser]

- To respond to the ping removal, a system to allow for faster communication, he says "just type Karthus R"
- In the face of Vel'Koz needing buffs, he essentially said that the players who play that champ don't know how he works and he didn't get proper feeback despite there being proper feedback
- Leaves a champion overtuned (Maokai) for over 2 months, abuses said champ to hit grandmasters for the 1st time and posts it on social media mocking the community saying "Maokai nerfs cancelled"

This all happened in like the past 4/5 months and I'm not even including stuff like some champion who were clearly overtuned and annoying to face against being untouched for so long. The death threaths aren't justified in any way, but there are reasons that are clear as day for people to not like what he is doing to the game and how he is communicating about it

[saibot]

Issue with Phreak, Post Game Design role, is the fact he became so HOSTILE. He took everything as a personal attack, and just made it seem like he was a god of knowing what is right. There is a reason people love August, he proves his points or agrees he was wrong, plays goofy builds etc. Phreak just has a severly condesending tone, and talks as if everyone else is a simpletin that has no brain capacity to understand what league really is besides him.

[DamianRavenhold]

The story of Phreak is just a self fulfilling prophecy. Riot makes changes, players get upset and complain to employees that have a public presence. Phreak gives a condescending response, pissing off players even further. Repeat until Phreak ends up becoming the literal devil in the eyes of the players.

He just needs to step away from socials at this point since nothing except him being fired will satisfy the players now.

[window]

Idk not nerfing maokai properly for continuous patches then posting a twitter post of you hitting a rank you don't deserve with the title of "Maokai nerfs are cancelled" Is probably not a good way to communicate with the playerbase.

[cmanic]

Its because he can't keep his story straight. He goes on and on about statistics, and when it gets pointed out that they obviously don't indicate what he says they do, he backtracks into "we you know I really just balance around vibes"

[thesx]

Its honestly impressive how fast he speedran every ounce of respect the community had for him

[AthenesWrath]

I haven't played League in almost 10 years but I still remember him being condescending when I tweeted about a tribunal chat restriction I got where I did not write a single toxic thing in the logs and he responded with "if people voted to punish you, you obviously did something that warranted the vote so you deserve the restriction". At that time you got a reward just for voting on the tribunal so a lot of people just blanket voted yes in the system.

I liked him as a caster but the guy should in no way be involved in any important decisions regarding the game and I am 99% positive he got the position just through him knowing people in the company and being famous. Anyways, League of Legends is a trash game anyways so for all I care it can crash and burn and if it's Phreak who helps with that it makes it all the sweeter for me watching from the sidelines.

[adtyajha]

Dearest Karthus,

I hope this finds you well. We seem to have found ourselves in a dire situation at the bottom lane. Please consider casting your ultimate ability to assist us as i do believe Lee sin has come to dive our tower.

[JgHaverty]

Phreak has made a near consistent habit of being belligerently aggressive, constantly shifts blame and has very very little personal accountability and responsibility, and makes himself the scape goat for an incredibly toxic competitive pvp game. Then spends an exhorbitant amount of time "justifying" what he has to say by using baseless statistics in a misleading way and claims everyone is dumb.

Does the man deserve death threats and personal attacks? No, of course he doesnt. No one does, and thats terrible behavior on its own. That said, he makes himself *very* hard to feel sympathy towards.

[clarence]

Phreak reading patch rundowns after he became lead balance team feels more like him finding reasons to justify his changes rather than explaining why they needed to happen. Back then Phreak had no hand in balance and so explaining it felt more connected because he wasn't apart of the machine yet. Now he has a direct influence, it feels like his current patch note reviews are more of him justifying why he made that change, even though most pros or high elo players would've had a different solution to the problem or wondering why certain champs haven't been touched. Phreak is always right and we're wrong, he sits on this throne of superiority and that all balanced changes they do are the correct choices (even though they arent as they soon have to follow up or revert them.) They will never admit fault for their shitty balance.

[XSoul]

Damn they really blame him for everything, it almost like he buff the champions he use in ranked and is hurt by pings

[jametsu]

7:40 K’Sante mains malding as if they don’t main the most broken over tuned champ in the game

[MysticZefer]

He's literally head of the balance team. He is literally responsible for 100% of the balance changes that come out. Delusional Cope

[dominykaszakrys]

Lol Shaclone saying that "death threats is unhinged" while he himself destroyed his career by actively running it down on many different accounts and explicitly wishing other people cancer, death and to "find a rope" is hilarious

[MaxBurnHeart]

"They Blame Him For Everything"
Yeah, no wonder why. Ever since he joined the balance team, Phreak's ego skyrocketed. Now he's always right while people are obviously wrong. And let's not forget about the things with Karthus and Maokai. I loved Phreak when he was the voice of League of Legends. But the one that is in the balance team? Heck no, fk this guy.

[Magnetcross]

This video is correct, Phreak isn’t the only issue. Riot Auberaun removed @ alive, pings/ ult pings. Because he was feeding as karthus adc in a d1-masters game. His teammate top kept @alive him in the chat lol. Phreak defended this by saying “you can type karthus ult in the chat”
Lmfao

Phreak even got to masters playing maokai support and not nerfing it until AFTER he hit masters. Even posted in twitter joking “maokai nerfs are cancelled” just to add insult to injury.
Phreak is like that Minecraft staff mod you liked seeing in the server then he became an admin and abuses his power

[mandlemannn]

12:30 There's a difference between "unanimous approval" and most patches receiving consistently 70-80% disapproval from the player base which is what has happened since Season 13 to now.