I don’t know if any other women who game feels like this but if there are, you’re not alone.

i’m a 21 y/o female who has a pretty ugly voice. it’s like a mix of a 13 year old boy / 10 year old girl all mashed into one. i’ve always hated it but valorant players have made me hate it so much more.

I’ve noticed whenever i talk pre-game to my teammates whether it’s to choose someone they’d like me to play or if the teammates are asking who they should play someone always has to comment on my voice. it’s a mix of “omg are you a girl” “are you a little boy or a transgender girl”. i don’t find it offensive to be called transgender but it makes me feel insecure speaking. sometimes when i speak in games i get screamed at, laughed at, or have men start trolling by ulting me, throwing util at me or chase me around the map spraying their gun simply for my gender. it doesn’t matter if i bottom or top frag, clutch every round or even miss a shot, i’ll get called out for being a woman or for my voice.

i’m not saying i hate valorant for it, i love valorant, i play it because i like it, but every single day i choose to play i always wish i just had a grown male voice just to avoid the whole confrontation about me being a woman. do i start using a voice changer? i’ve been 50/50 on this choice for a while.

EDIT: first off thank you to everyone who’s given me amazing advice, tips and tricks to avoid this and some server recommendations as well as voice changer recommendations! i appreciate it a lot. initially i assumed one or two people would help, but having seen hundreds of people show positivity restores my faith in wanting to continue playing valorant.

secondly, to address a few questions that have been repeated (sorry for not responding to everyone):

What region am i and is it a regional thing?

• EU. i live in the UK. my bad experiences come primarily from playing my own servers. i have an NA account that i use and have NEVER experienced toxicity. just pure laughs and kindness

Can you add me?

• of course you can. my main goal since beginning valorant as my first KBM game is to find people who are chill and can have fun while playing at a competitive level

NA account: LICKTHEBREAD#RATIO (don’t ask) EU account: bodyshotbandit#bozo

Could it not be a low elo thing?

• Partially. I experienced no toxicity from iron3-silver3. Gold 1= casual sexism through classic stereotypes aka miss a shot “get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich” that did NOT bother me in the slightest. Gold 3 util dumping, throwing, asking if i get deepthroated a lot because of the depth of my voice as well as slurs etc. etc. PLAT WAS COMPLETELY FINE, NO TOXICITY JUST CASUAL. diamond 1-3 = rape jokes, slurs, toxicity, throwing, giving info to enemy team, blocking me, util dumping etc.

• i cannot speak for everyone who’s been through it as every experience is individual and different from others, however from my personal experience it seemed to get worse as i hit diamond which i found irritating as i assumed people would take the game more seriously at that level (still low elo but bear in mind this was before asc ranks came in so it was close to the higher leagues)

to the one guy who said i should stop expecting people to be my slaves; fuck u (: