Fresh Water Gaming wants to create a healthy environment for League players

Fresh Water Gaming is a community that brings together members of the League of Legends community who stay away from toxic behavior.

Fresh Water is run by Numinous, a player with a passion for fairness and positivity.

“Fresh Water was founded around a core assumption that the way we speak and the language we use can affect a space,” said Numinous. The organization believes that there are times when not everyone can say, “That makes me uncomfortable,” out of fear or other mental blocks, so nobody should be put in that situation to begin with.

To recruit, Numinous extends their hand to other players they meet showing good behavior.

“When I solo queue or duo queue with existing members, I try to exude a positive attitude myself,” they said. “I reach out to people, say hello, asking them how they’re doing that day. Sometimes it goes pretty well. Usually we get a lot of asterisks in the chat...but with that we run into a lot of people also saying hello or asking how you’re doing that day. If they beat me to the punch, that’s a really good sign.”

Upon being picked up, each Fresh Water recruit has to respond to the “Three Seashells.”

The Seashells are:

1. Are you over 18 years old?
2. Do you rage or flame in game?
3. Are you prone to using homophobic/sexist/racist slurs or rape language in chat or voice communications?

People have joined the group even though they’ve answered “yes” to the last two questions.

“We have accepted people who were willing to reform or who recognized that type of action isn’t how they want to continue playing the game,” said Numinous.

The idea for Fresh Water came from Numinous’ experience with youth groups in Buddhist practice.

“A lot of the experience that I had there was the idea that you can understand people’s experiences and knowledge of their experiences as a valid form of truth,” they said. Because of this, Numinous and the rest of Fresh Water Gaming believes that they can listen to somebody who has problems and try to understand why these problems arise.

“Essentially, we’re a counter movement to the whole ‘git gud’ or ‘Don’t play this game if you aren’t this type of player’ type of attitude,” Numinous said.

The group plays normal games frequently, has a ranked 5s team and a club in the League of Legends client. Their main form of communication is through their forums, where you can apply to join the organization.

Editor’s note: The Rift Herald manager Pete Volk is a member of Fresh Water Gaming.