Lately I’ve seen some posts in the forum discussing a possible rework for tPvP matchmaking that would create fair and balanced teams on a more regular basis. While keeping in mind that changes like this probably won’t be seen until later this year or early the next, I was hoping that a rework to leaderboards might also be coupled with this new matchmaking’s implementation.
Currently, the biggest problem that the leaderboards contain is that they encourage high ranking players to simply not play. There has been multiple discussions in this forum on possible fixes, one of which is an increase to the rate of ranking decay. This seems like it would definitely be a good way to solve the problem of player inactivity (i.e. punish them for it); however, there is one fundamental problem that prevents this problem from being an actual fix. The problem is that even if a player’s rank begins to decay, all they have to do is play a single game and their status is instantly promoted back up to the point where they initially left off before decay. If you follow the leaderboards like I do then you have seen a few cases where this has happened. In other words, it’s like decay didn’t really affect them at all. Sure, it encouraged them to play, but only a single game. They are then set for another month (which is what I guess is the time for decay to kick in) before they are forced to play another single game.
This is what should happen. If a player is inactive long enough for decay to kick in and is dropped in rank, instead of being able to bump themselves right back up to the top after a single game, the player should have to now work their way back up to their original spot and prove that they still know what they are doing after their period of inactivity.
[quick aside] All this being said, I can’t bring myself to blame the players that take advantage of this system because it’s not their fault that it works. It’s a safe and easy way to remain on top. However, I will say that I have much more respect for the players who have achieved top ranks by playing more than say 20 tPvP games. :P
Another thing that could possibly stand a slight fix is the algorithm that the rating system uses. Take for example, a comparison of Player 1 vs Player 2. If Player 1 were to play say 16 games against top ranked people and win maybee 15 of those and lose 1, then the rating system would promote this person above a Player 2 who has played say around 800 games and won maybee 600 and lost 200 (just some random numbers :P ). Using some cognition, I believe this to be tricky problem with the mmr formula. I understand that the rating of the team Player 1 beats plays a crucial part in his/her ranking, but at some point playing 800 games in soloQ like made-up Player 2 has and keeping a 3.0 W/L ratio becomes much more impressive to me than going simply 15-1. The tricky part is finding exactly where the point that Player 2 trumps Player 1 is, and how to quantify it into numbers.
Anyway, these are just some things that I’ve noticed with the leaderboards that I thought could stand to use some more attention. Seeing as how problem 2 is a lot more tricky than problem 1, I’d honestly just be happy with a fix for decay which would in turn cause more game play which might also solve problem 2 on its own. Or maybe increasing the amount of games before getting a rank to 21 instead of 11 might help? I don’t know. Which is why now I’d like to open this thread to some constructive feedback from the community and devs alike and here some of your ideas.
Thanks for reading!