Guild Wars 2

I don’t mean mostly, or doing some duo queues, but rather 100% of matches in solo queue. If so, how does it compare to S1?

I started late last season from a hiatus, and got to sapphire exclusively solo queuing. This season I’ve consecutively got to ruby on my main, and alts. Trying for diamond but at the same time I am trying to unlock some elite specs on some of my toons while also wanting traveler gear so I will have to pve some (gasp!) Once I hit ruby I kinda just shrugged but yes was exclusively solo que.

I did, I’m ruby now. Haven’t played S1, so.. sorry, can’t tell you much about differences.

I have. I’m in sapphire- tier 3.

I also solo queued last season and got to ruby.

Hit ruby in season1 and season2 quite easily with main account.

Season1 getting up from ruby to diamond was okayish, I started late and when I got to ruby, legendary players were already smurfing like champs.

Season2 getting to diamond has not yet happened. I cant soloqueue because I get players on my team with less than 100 ranked games played. So I only teamqueue now, which slowed my process down compared to season1 when I could just log in, do some matches, win 2/3 and be okay with it.

Basically, you can make it quite easily to diamond if your mmr isnt kittened. If you kittened up your mmr somehow (queueing with guildmates to help them before seasons, trying out different professions), you are kittened. Could be you cant even make it into ruby.

style.6173:

I don’t mean mostly, or doing some duo queues, but rather 100% of matches in solo queue. If so, how does it compare to S1?

99% of the time I have soloqed for both seasons.

I only played 2 weeks in season 1 and got to diamond. I’m mid ruby in season 2 and have played since start.

The difference in match making is obvious as I’m being fed a lot of garbage this season as opposed to the S1 where it was really more random in that aspect.

What made S1 frustrating was the amount of pip you could loose as well as how the loss/win of pips was decided. The match making itself was far better albeit grindy and prone to cheap manips.

But in terms of fun matches S1 was way more fun no comparison.

I’ve been exclusively solo queuing, swapping between classes as needed but mainly playing guardian. I’ve won the overwhelming majority of games and made it to ruby so far. I only get in about 3 games on weekday nights, maybe, but it’s been a lot more fun than S1. I consistently get placed with teammates around my skill level, for some reason they’ve felt perfect in amber/emerald (residents of mmr hell?) and degraded slightly through each division, but there’s only been a few of times that I’ve actually been mad at them for doing the stupidest kitten (all in ruby) and most of the time we pull it together anyways. There’s been a number of blowouts but also a lot of well fought matches and some really close calls. More importantly, the overall balance has been so much better now that things actually die, a lot more exciting imo. There are still certain builds that need to be looked at but they can be dealt with using teamwork, as opposed to S1 where a focused target would just live anyways.

Made it to diamond in S1 with a lot of solo queue but it felt like such a grind with half of the games being won and half being lost, it felt completely dependent on having teammates and getting win streak and then stopping. The thing I hated most about S1 was that I could win and still feel incredibly salty. The balance made things too high strung. While I know I’ve gotten some easy matchups in S2, the games that have been close have been 10x more enjoyable. Even the games I’ve lost; still more fun than S1.

I’ve been reading the forums during downtime at work and I haven’t run into the bad luck that others have. The mmr trench isn’t exactly new but I’ve taken to stopping when I lose a game in an attempt to reset my luck and hopefully continue avoiding falling into the pit.

I’m in diamond, 100% solo q with the exception of a single game because I didn’t want to turn down the guy’s invitation. We lost, and I left. It’s been totally fine, I haven’t had any problems. Did the usual win all the time till early-mid ruby or so, and now I’m at probably 60, 65% win rate. Been really good matches, everyone in mid ruby and above has proven they are at least competent. Very rarely do I just wonder wtf someone is doing, even if I don’t always agree with their choices.

I’ve made it to Ruby, soloing and playing almost exclusively warrior save for a few achievement-seeking games. I did not play much of S1- I played for a little while, got tired of the grind, and left pvp up until the very end where I decided to push up to Sapphire before the season ended.

S2 has been, in my opinion, very preferable. In Amber I got a few crap games, but for the most part I was able to blow right through them. In Emerald and Sapphire things got a bit harder, but I still felt I was making progress. Now I’m taking a break, waiting to see how the population levels out because I’ve not been happy with a lot of my recent teammates. Last few games have generally been close, win or lose.

S1 seemed to me to be mostly a lottery as a solo-queue, at least when playing a class less suited to carrying a match. I didn’t feel like I was improving and going up against better players as I progressed, and that getting to a higher division wouldn’t prove much of anything besides a masochistic streak.

S2, while faaaaaaaaaaaaaaar from perfect, at least allows you to semi-reliably advance if you’re above the average player in your division. It still has a fair bit of luck and gaming of the system involved, but I feel at least like progressing solo is much more feasible. Now if A-net would stop giving new people average MMR and would start seeding people with much more experience, we’d have a workable system

Context: I’ve played a little over 1k games over the span of about a year, almost all of them as a warrior using a number of different builds.

The best bit of advice I can offer to people having trouble is to stop when you start losing more than 1 or 2 matches at a time. Odds are either the current group of players you’re likely to be matched against is higher MMR than you, in which case you’re best off letting them progress a bit, OR you’re getting stuck with people who are less than capable. Give it some time, walk away, and hope they’re gone when you come back.

95% soloq. The experience sux; Very very slow progression, frustrating loss streaks and wild blow outs (The games are rarely evenly matched) Been playing everyday, still only Sapphire T3.

100% soloq,

Next to no losses up till diamond. Up till then i could solo 2-3 ppl np. So even if teammates where bad they where carryable due to that.

Since diamond im bouncing up and down depending on whos on.

Yasi.9065:

Basically, you can make it quite easily to diamond if your mmr isnt kittened. If you kittened up your mmr somehow (queueing with guildmates to help them before seasons, trying out different professions), you are kittened. Could be you cant even make it into ruby.

This…. there’s just no way to get ahead in Ruby once you screw up your MMR.

100% solo. I win streaked to the last tier of emerald when I had 2 losses, then win streaked again until halfway through sapphire. Stalled out a for a day or two in the last tier or so of sapphire with a 10 loss streak then played out of it in a day. Ruby has slowed down a lot I’ve still been able to maintain about a 60% win rate but it’s win 2 lose and the loss of win streaks has hurt.

Matches tend to be blow outs either way which honestly isn’t very fun from either perspective.

Given how much I play I’ll probably get out of ruby the beginning of next week. Hopefully diamond is better because the amount of stupid kitten I see in some games is depressing.

I played 100% solo in S2 and 95% solo in S1.
In S1 I made it to legend and am in Diamand right now, playing not very much anymore sind most games are decided upfront..

I lost exactly 1 game in amber and emerald. “Hard” (and enjoyable) fights started mid saphire where I lost 2-3 in a row but after that I hit ruby easily. Same happened mid ruby – lost 2-3 in a row but after that I went straight to diamand. Most games are a snoozfest and decided after the 1st teamfight bc ppl stop playing.

I had a few enjoyable games. Close ones. They were the most fun for me. But the quality of my teammember is way better than in s1 and that is what I would like to keep.

I started playing this game in S1, I reached Diamond near the end, I didn’t honestly play that much cause of university.

S2 now, I’m ruby so far but matches have been progressing smoothly except for the 30 loss in a row spree in amber, felt like a terrible grind to get out of that division.

Comparing both seasons, S1 was more frustrating cause of the viable builds, dh felt impossible because of revs, bunker mesmer and eles. I had to switch to scrapper to climb thru emerald and sapphire until I learned more about this game and switched back to dh for ruby.
S2 is actually fun, team throwing happens more at lower divisions but now im on a steady pace for diamond and hoping for legendary later.

Soloed up to t1 diamond last season with DH. Marauder meditrapper build (blades, purification, smite, intervention, renewed focus. Overall it was ok.
Stuck t2 diamond this season. Same build just switched marauders with paladins.
Playing necro now. This meta is… less boring than s1’s but more ridiculous with all that aoe and cc spam.

SoloQ to Emerald last season with Thief, I didn’t have HoT until the last week of Season 1, but I was bored so I stopped.
Now I’m Ruby this season with Revenant, and I’m feeling like playing the lottery at that point…

I’ve been soloq only with shatter mesmer. My winrate was almost 100% up to ruby, in ruby i lost a few, and diamond was quite painful. Haven’t played in leg yet.

Sapphire T5.

2 duoqeue games during whole time (and even lost both lmao) and I’m legend. It’s not that hard.

I gave up on soloqing at the end of ruby. The matches are so lopsided it is not even funny. And it doesn’t get any better in diamond. You either lose 50-500 or win 500-50. Neither is fun. Teaming with other people actually gives you more balanced matches.

Played Soloq as a druid/necro with a ~90% winrate untill ruby. Struggled 1 week in ruby, and then passed through diamond in 2 days without even loosing a game. Yet im legend and still have such a high winrate (2 loses out of 10 games usually).

This season 2 is way more simple to carry than previous season. And the winstreak system makes the grind really quick.

ImdA.4701:

Played Soloq as a druid/necro with a ~90% winrate untill ruby. Struggled 1 week in ruby, and then passed through diamond in 2 days without even loosing a game. Yet im legend and still have such a high winrate (2 loses out of 10 games usually).

This season 2 is way more simple to carry than previous season. And the winstreak system makes the grind really quick.

You can only carry if your team is trying to win, and is half competent. Sadly, for most it is impossible. Gratz on your achievement though.

I breezed through everything until getting to Diamond. I am trying for the legendary wings, so needed to do the profession achievements. Bad idea! After three or four good losses, I switched back to main to break the streak, to no avail.

I’ve tried several things to break the streak but have been having a rough go at it. I think, I’ll just need to wait a few days for things to normalize, or find some friends to queue with. Clearly, I’ve been helping complete noobs advance. I am getting teamed with people who quit after loosing a fight or two. Total toxic trash attitude. How did these players ever make it to Diamond?

The worst part is the opposing teams are really not that great, either. Bad gameplay all around. The matchmaker should be changed to use people within your pip range, but should try to balance the teams evenly, instead of stacking. The stacked teams help good people advance fast, but also help unskilled players advance if they get lucky early on. So, in the end, it ends up being similar to last season. The rank/league means little.

Archon.6480:

I breezed through everything until getting to Diamond. I am trying for the legendary wings, so needed to do the profession achievements. Bad idea! After three or four good losses, I switched back to main to break the streak, to no avail.

I’ve tried several things to break the streak but have been having a rough go at it. I think, I’ll just need to wait a few days for things to normalize, or find some friends to queue with. Clearly, I’ve been helping complete noobs advance. I am getting teamed with people who quit after loosing a fight or two. Total toxic trash attitude. How did these players ever make it to Diamond?

The worst part is the opposing teams are really not that great, either. Bad gameplay all around. The matchmaker should be changed to use people within your pip range, but should try to balance the teams evenly, instead of stacking. The stacked teams help good people advance fast, but also help unskilled players advance if they get lucky early on. So, in the end, it ends up being similar to last season. The rank/league means little.

Got carried by the win wave, now they think they are gods and belong there. Sadly that’s what league play brings out in people. The people who want to brag at how easy it was for them to get to where they are, when they just stomped team after team with out really trying. And now they wonder why they are having such long queue times. It’s easy to think your god when you sail up the divisions, means jack in the long run. The system.is set so one team is meant to win over the other. Most people are not as good as they think they are, they’ve not had to work to get to where they are, they had the easy ride. I don’t see how having one sided matches is improving anyone’s ability, or skill at the game. Most games I’ve seen tend to be over once a team gets 150 point lead. People seem to give up. Or see the class stacked teams and don’t even bother.

I can’t compare s1 to s2 since I didn’t take part in s1 due to life etc only doing unranked for guild missions. I have pvpd casually for the last 3yrs however.

I’m just happy you can’t Smurf your way up this season as you could last. The main thing putting me off last season was that.

I’ve only solo queued, only just managing the 3 daily games Mon-Fri, but have more time on saturdays and have reached Diamond this season.

100% solo que, tier 2 diamond atm

amber-emerald felt way smoother, sapphire about the same, ruby was slightly worse.

diamond has been much much better.

Exclusively SoloQ’d to legendary once again. Feels much easier than S1 due to win streaks.

Same as last season. As long as you play enough and are at least mediocre you will make it to legendary.

100% soloq until t5 diamond, than had some duo queues, where i lost more then i won , then soloqed again and got to legendary, as long as you play a class that can carry you can get legendary in a week or two (i played as ele)

I have solo’d all but 2 matches ( I lost both team matches ) and am currently Sapphire T2. It has been an awful slog. Most days I log off depressed and wondering why I’m doing this.

Ithilwen.1529:

I have solo’d all but 2 matches ( I lost both team matches ) and am currently Sapphire T2. It has been an awful slog. Most days I log off depressed and wondering why I’m doing this.

Same here! Tried doing 2 matches with a guildie, ended up losing both, and went straight back to solo queue.
Currently in Sapphire T1. Was on a winstreak and only needed 2 more wins to hit Ruby. Now I need 3 straight wins.

This is my first ranked season, so my game numbers are low and should be different from people who did play S1.
What I experience now is that PvP is a grind up. It’s not really about skill at all. Actually, I think dueling in WvW requires more skill to win than winning PvP. Any class can participate in dueling, although some classes might be a lot better (condi chronos).
But it’s still more fun than trying to go up the PvP ladder.

Another point, relevant to the MMR situation, sometimes the games are a big mismatch. It’s not enjoyable. Team composition is one thing (hello necro stacking), but the skill matchup is different.
My MMR doesn’t reflect my ability, and currently it shouldn’t since this is my first season. So when I, as a DH, can on point 1v1 a scrapper and win, that means our skill matchup was different, immensely because scrappers counter DH. It’s nice to stroke my ego and say “Wow, I beat a scrapper”, but on the other side, his/her teammates were probably grilling him on why he/she lost to a DH.

i started playing ranked pvp this season and i think im doing pretty good, im currently at sapphire T3