Here's my solution for dealing with the ranked system, from the perspective of deciding who the best PvP players in the game and on the server are, and how you rank among them.

Full disclosure: I have done 8v8 ranked, and seasons 2, 3, and maybe 4 of arena ranked, but only casually at best.

Step 1:

• Solo Ranked and Group ranked queues become: Solo Practice Arena and Group Practice Arena
  

Conceptually: In the Solo Practice Arena and Group Practice Arena queues, the matches you play never generate rating. They only pop arenas, allowing people to practice their skills in an arena setting without having to deal with gaining or losing rating.

Purpose: Arenas are a very difficult transition for new PvP players or even veteran PvP players that only queue regs. Because no rating is involved this may not get used much, but will hopefully occasionally help encourage good teams to help novice teams improve rather than the farming, queue dodging, queue synching, backfilling, and whisper-screaming situation we have now. Also, I know a lot of people LOVE arenas, so this is also a way for people to queue just for arenas, even if it gets you no elo (ofc we know people still PvP even when no elo is involved).

Step 2:

• Regs warzones now provide elo/rating randomly (no opt-out here)
  
• Only the end-game level PvP queues have the chance of providing elo (lowbies and midbies will never provide elo)
  

Implementation details: you queue in the regs queue (solo or in a group of up to 4 players, as it works now) and you get an 8v8 or 4v4 pop as usual. You do not know at the beginning of the match if this match will provide elo to you or not. You play the match. At the end of the match, when the scoreboard comes up, it is revealed whether or not this was a ranked match for you by displaying a stat of whether you gained or lost ranked points (an elo match for you), or received no ranked points (a non-elo match for you). Points gained or lost are based on the usual things, plus maybe some new things: win vs loss, backfills, combined rating of all members of each team, highest rated member of each team, number of solo kills, number of deaths, etc. The match you just played may provide elo to you, but at the same time did not provide elo to some of your teammates (or even anyone in the 4-man you're running with).

tldr; It is random whether or not a given match will provide elo to a given player in the match, and you don't know until after it's over.

This will have a multitude of positive effects:

• make the regs queues pop faster, more often, and hopefully with more variety of matches
  
• allow players/teams to have their 8v8s ranked matches back, in a manner of speaking
  
• prevent players/teams from gaming the queue system to generate their ranked score (which is not being addressed at all with 5.9.2)
  
• still meshes really well with the upcoming 5.9.2 upgrades to the warzone queue
  
• force players to start doing objectives again in matches unless they don't care that their rating is garbage
  
• more reasonably reflect how good a player is in all types of warzone situations
  
• this even meshes really well with the both regs and ranked dailies/weeklies, making it easier for regular players to get those tasty ranked mats
  
• this will allow all classes and specs to finally be competitive in an elo situation, while simultaneiously allowing the classes to retain their individual identities that makes them different from other classes/specs
  

I would suggest setting the % low starting out, such as 10-20% chance of any given match to be an elo match for a given player in the match. And that's pretty much it.

Here's my solution for dealing with the ranked system, from the perspective of deciding who the best PvP players in the game and on the server are, and how you rank among them.

 

Full disclosure: I have done 8v8 ranked, and seasons 2, 3, and maybe 4 of arena ranked, but only casually at best.

 

Step 1:

• Solo Ranked and Group ranked queues become: Solo Practice Arena and Group Practice Arena
  

 

Conceptually: In the Solo Practice Arena and Group Practice Arena queues, the matches you play never generate rating. They only pop arenas, allowing people to practice their skills in an arena setting without having to deal with gaining or losing rating.

 

Purpose: Arenas are a very difficult transition for new PvP players or even veteran PvP players that only queue regs. Because no rating is involved this may not get used much, but will hopefully occasionally help encourage good teams to help novice teams improve rather than the farming, queue dodging, queue synching, backfilling, and whisper-screaming situation we have now. Also, I know a lot of people LOVE arenas, so this is also a way for people to queue just for arenas, even if it gets you no elo (ofc we know people still PvP even when no elo is involved).

 

 

Step 2:

• Regs warzones now provide elo/rating randomly (no opt-out here)
  
• Only the end-game level PvP queues have the chance of providing elo (lowbies and midbies will never provide elo)
  

 

Implementation details: you queue in the regs queue (solo or in a group of up to 4 players, as it works now) and you get an 8v8 or 4v4 pop as usual. You do not know at the beginning of the match if this match will provide elo to you or not. You play the match. At the end of the match, when the scoreboard comes up, it is revealed whether or not this was a ranked match for you by displaying a stat of whether you gained or lost ranked points (an elo match for you), or received no ranked points (a non-elo match for you). Points gained or lost are based on the usual things, plus maybe some new things: win vs loss, backfills, combined rating of all members of each team, highest rated member of each team, number of solo kills, number of deaths, etc. The match you just played may provide elo to you, but at the same time did not provide elo to some of your teammates (or even anyone in the 4-man you're running with).

 

tldr; It is random whether or not a given match will provide elo to a given player in the match, and you don't know until after it's over.

 

This will have a multitude of positive effects:

• make the regs queues pop faster, more often, and hopefully with more variety of matches
  
• allow players/teams to have their 8v8s ranked matches back, in a manner of speaking
  
• prevent players/teams from gaming the queue system to generate their ranked score (which is not being addressed at all with 5.9.2)
  
• still meshes really well with the upcoming 5.9.2 upgrades to the warzone queue
  
• force players to start doing objectives again in matches unless they don't care that their rating is garbage
  
• more reasonably reflect how good a player is in all types of warzone situations
  
• this even meshes really well with the both regs and ranked dailies/weeklies, making it easier for regular players to get those tasty ranked mats
  
• this will allow all classes and specs to finally be competitive in an elo situation, while simultaneiously allowing the classes to retain their individual identities that makes them different from other classes/specs
  

 

I would suggest setting the % low starting out, such as 10-20% chance of any given match to be an elo match for a given player in the match. And that's pretty much it.

Step two is a stupid idea which will destroy ranked and make great advantage for casual regs players. Many who dont even care about elo will get it without even knowing about it, and many will just stop playing actual ranked arenas and change to regs in hunt for free elo. No thanks.

They should start to think like a big gaming company and throw some money to save this game.

To begin, they could hire some people from Riot Games to help them rework this game PvP, especially ranked.

Regs warzones now provide elo/rating randomly (no opt-out here)

lol

Regs warzones now provide elo/rating randomly (no opt-out here)

 

lol

Stopped reading right there.

Arena practice queues are not a bad idea.

People don't realize that elo is an indication of how good you are (to some extend). Most people just dont realize that the reason they are not gaining elo is not because they aren't cheating, it's because they aren't good enough.

If you are 1.2k and can't climb out, it may be because you can't carry worse players, or you are the burden to your team. Sure some people hack, backfill, que sync, wintrade for elo, but a) everyone knows who they are. Good players know good players, and it's easy to find out if ur rating doesn't match skill. b) it isnt that hard to get gold or 2k if you are good.

As for new players not being able to easily transition from regs to ranked.... it is easy as long as players know their cooldowns. Ranked is supposed to be top tier game play, not an open field for all levels. Thats regs.

People don't realize that elo is an indication of how good you are (to some extend). Most people just dont realize that the reason they are not gaining elo is not because they aren't cheating, it's because they aren't good enough.

In group ranked mostly accurate. In solo, the inability to gain rating might be the result of you "accidentally" getting the same farmer/troll repeatedly while "coincidentally" the other side is the same capable enemy, or when your faction simply has the less good players around. Solo elo will be somewhat meaningful for the first time in forever once ranked is cross-faction, not before.

And for the OP: Sorry, random ELO in regs can't work. If you happen to have ELO in huttball, for example, it would be totally unfair for the best merc in the world who is teamed against a premade of operatives. Or in general, ELO in regs is unfair because premades can be with/against solo queuers completely randomly.

If you are 1.2k and can't climb out, it may be because you can't carry worse players, or you are the burden to your team.

Annnnnd this is why ELO doesn't work outside of 1v1 settings. It doesn't represent your skill because you're reliant on the power of your class ability to carry and reliant on the skill of other players. Its the same reason solo rating doesn't work in other games like overwatch as well and why people can have several accounts all with varying ratings.

Most people just dont realize that the reason they are not gaining elo is not because they aren't cheating, it's because they aren't good enough.

But the opposite is currently true as well : People get ELO not because they are good enough, but because they are cheating.

And sometimes, they combine even both.

And sometimes people get Elo because they are better than their opponents!

And sometimes they get ELo because they are better AND cheat.

In group ranked mostly accurate.

Group ranked elo means nothing. Good players have several alts. Most of which dont break placements. On the other hand, high elo players mostly farm matt farmers. Not to say that there are good players with good elo. But it means less.

In solo, the inability to gain rating might be the result of you "accidentally" getting the same farmer/troll repeatedly while "coincidentally" the other side is the same capable enemy,

Sarcasm aside..... we all get the same bad merc that pops all their cds at the start. We all get the same bad sorc that gets globaled before barrier. We all get pts on our team. It's not just you.

Some of those games, you carry, some of the games you loose. But you play 100 more games to make up for those games with the troll/trash player. When you play 600 games and you are still at silver... there is a reason, either class or player.

or when your faction simply has the less good players around.

You don't que pub side solo ranked on SS

You don't que imp side solo ranked on SF

You don't que pub side solo ranked on DM

You have the ability to swap factions. Don't blame your faction.

Annnnnd this is why ELO doesn't work outside of 1v1 settings.

you forgot to mention 1v1 ,class v class settings. 100% guarantee best operative will not loose to best sorcercer once.

It doesn't represent your skill because you're reliant on the power of your class ability to carry and reliant on the skill of other players.

So skill has no factor in carrying? 600 games played and every single game you either get carried by your class or get carried by other players? You don't carry others? Maybe stop for a moment and realize, that in those 600 games (roughly what is required to climb to gold as dps) you got the win because you carried others? In those 600 games, sure, maybe 100 of them you had a troll on your team, but the other 500 were legitament games?

So skill has no factor in carrying? 600 games played and every single game you either get carried by your class or get carried by other players? You don't carry others? Maybe stop for a moment and realize, that in those 600 games (roughly what is required to climb to gold as dps) you got the win because you carried others? In those 600 games, sure, maybe 100 of them you had a troll on your team, but the other 500 were legitament games?

Where is this 600 games thing coming from? Back when I actively played ranked I'd get to 2k in 50-100 games. Guess how I did it? By putting every bad player on my friends list and queuing after they entered a match. There's no carrying in this game unless you have off heals and even then that's not really carrying, that's just gaming a system that's poorly balanced by having one side with a class that can off heal and the other team doesn't have any.