An anecdote on my first encounter with toxic players:
I was a complete noobie and not accustomed to rude players when I played my fourth or so ladder game. It was on Seraphim Glaciers (4 islands). I managed to take both of the empty islands and felt pretty good. Then my opponent did a T2 comdrop on my main island, to my absolute surprise. Befuddled, I spammed T1 arty and walked my ACU into his to deal with his T2 PD creep. It ended with both ACUs blowing up in a draw.
Then my opponent started yelling at me and called me an idiot. Being new to FAF, was again very confused: had I violated some kind of taboo? Was this like the old Total Annihilation where it was frowned upon to kill an ACU with your ACU?
Later I realized: no, I hadn’t done anything wrong. It’s just that my opponent was Gmoney. He apparently frequently tried cheesy strategies against noobs, expecting to win easily, and then got very angry if a noob managed to counter him
To all noobs hesitating to try ladder: most other players were friendly and some even gave me tips so just try it.