Hearthpwn

i agree i think it would be pretty cool, the only thing i don't agree is the stars, other than that i'd love those achievements. once you get to legend once, unless you wanna go for top 20 and blizz points, which most people don't, it's kind of whatevs. 

Was reading this thread, and then BAM! there you are on the front page.

Anyway, I usually cap out at around Rank 5-4 (I'm 7 at the moment) and I am motivated to attain ranks by my Battlenet friends who are attaining high ranks and occasionally legendary. 

Here is my idea for a purely aesthetic motivation for grinding ladder.

20-15 Standard new card back
15-10 Bronze framed card back 
10-5 Silver Framed card back
5-1 Gold Framed card back
Legend: Standard Legendary card back + Bejewled (Think high-win arena key) framed seasonal card back

SonofLoke - yes, ladder was created to be competetive and yet blizzard pretty much immediately abandoned that idea by making "card back" and "golden heroes" ranked only, forcing casual players to play it if they want to complete their collection. I believe it is enough that 90% of ranked is just the same old 15 netdecked archetypes over and over again, increasing the value of ranks would only lead to increase of 90% to higher number on all ranks. 

@Ascate2: Well I mean at this point I think we are not on the topic of achievements but deck and game-play diversity. This is very intresting topic but it does not go hand and hand with achievements because as you said people only play the same 15 decks on ladder and it will likely remain that way unless the ladder is changed dramatically. Game-play diversity is hindered by hero powers, number of cards in game and lack of knowledge of opponents deck. Ladder decks have to be built to consistently win against many things and they really can't counter out one thing. That why ladder is the way it is, achievements will not change that, nor help that. I will make another thread soon about diversity please stop by if you see it. 

@Caturdayz: I like you ideas my friend but my only problem is that they don't seem to be reusable once achieved. Continual goals is keeps people motivated because once I have the frame it gains nothing in-game. But I still like shiny things!!!

all these ideas will simply fail for one reason: you want more free stuff and blizz won't give them. This is totally reasknable from their standpoint. They already made a game that is possible as f2p - even on higher competitive levels - if they would add more in game rewards that shorten the grind, they would.simply loose money...

Not that i wouldn't love me some free stuff ;) but i think this discussion, while civil and elaborate, might also be a bit pointless...

Hmm. I think that any changes to ladder rewards would have to start with changing how you earn gold through wins. Because, really, the people who are only interested in gold will either play in Casual, or will smurf down to the lower ranks deliberately. The reason being that that's the path of least resistance - they don't want to have to "work" for every win in their 100-gold-per-day allotment, they instead want to get as many wins in as short amount of time as possible. And they don't care if that also means a lot of quick losses as well.

This disincentivizes trying your best on the ladder in a big way. And the only solution I see right now would be to remove gold rewards for just winning and instead tie them into your highest attained rank in a season somehow. Question is: do we even want such a drastic measure? Somehow I doubt it would be popular with the crowd.

I really like to see an achievement system, somehow. It's not only the reward system that's lacking good stuff, I think the whole ladder system needs an overhaul. For example, check this post:
http://www.hearthpwn.com/forums/hearthstone-general/general-discussion/19748-data-on-how-many-games-it-should-take-to-get-to

Let's say you are a casual player with an average of 51% winrate, so it would take you 617 wins to reach legend, that's about 1234 games to be played. With an average time per play of 8 minutes, that's 9872 minutes or 165 hours per month, so about 5.5 hours a day to play per month! This is way to long, and that's why this ladder system is outdated. (Note again: these numbers are the average)

The idea to give dust/gold is good, for new players, they can get "faster" to the cards, and for veteran players they can get "faster" for the golden version of the cards, so giving all players more stuff can always be a win-win situation.

I don't think we will see any changes to the ladder until Blizzcon, because getting Blizzpoints for the Championchip qualifying rely also on the current ladder system, changing that before Blizzcon might upset the community too much.

Quote from icahavoc »

a) there actually is a reward called WCS points which is awarded every season. This is what ranking up (fun and satisfaction aside) is all about.
b) I am pretty sure there won't be free stuff in the form of gold/ packs.
c) special versions of the season's card back depending on your rank would be a nice and realistic option.
d) what we really need are automatic tournaments as in Warcraft 3 that take place like once in a day or two. Have a Swiss-round followed by single elimination playoffs and all games are BO3. Alternatively, there might also be automated buy-in tournaments a la Arena that give out rewards in forms of cards, gold and/ or dust for the top 3 finishers, say.

Special versions of the card backs would be nice.Also as a player of Hearthstone physical TCG,i am missing the adventures-1 adventure deck vs 2-3-4 players-,something that blizz have to think about it.
Also,yes tournametns would be great.I usually end at 8-7 rank and i stop to play,cause there's no point.Having online tournaments would be great.

I think this is an interesting topic.

I am not against the concept of ladder rewards in principle.  And I definitely support (in principle at least) the notion that the game needs more achievements for players to aim for when playing beyond just the daily quests.

However, I think Blizzard need to tread very carefully here.  I won't pretend to know precisely what the net effect would be on the game as a whole if monthly incremental ladder achievements were introduced.  I don't think anybody here knows that for sure.  However, I can tell you how it would affect my behaviour.  I am a relatively new player.  I am slowly building a collection, but only organically.  When I play on the ladder, it is with all nine classes roughly evenly, with decks that are basically whatever I can throw together with the cards I have.  Through the regular course of play I got to level 14 this month.  If there were incremental rewards for finishing higher on the ladder (and those rewards were significant, like cards, gold and dust rather than just cosmetic), I would immediately focus on one class, build the most competitive deck I could, and try to achieve the highest rank I could each month.  And because I don't have many cards, or much dust, that deck would have to be something like Face Hunter that I could build on the cheap.  It would be less fun for me on the whole, but it would allow me to build my collection faster.

I don't know how many people are like me, but if it is a non trivial number then I don't think that would change ladder play for the better.

I would like to see an achievement system on the ladder, just on the ladder, not casual, not arena (or have a separate one for arena.), not friendly versus. 

it could include things for new players and old ones, like for example to win a game when you are on fatigue range, win a game with one health left. (Freeze mage anyone?), or more specific ones like - win a game as Ragnaros (Via Majordomo) and things like win 20 games by defeating your opponent with pyroblast, or Ragnaros, or etc. 

The rewards could range from gold, card backs, extra dust, tokens to make a normal card golden. And the achievements could be categorized and completing and entire category could reward card backs, or completing a class category an alternate hero art. 

Quote from kappakeepo »

I just achieved rank 4 today and, to be honest, i feel really satisfied by the sheer fact that I am top 1% EU without playing face hunter, and not spending a single cent on packs (i did buy BRM but not NAXX) . Even though I didn't get any rewards I still feel good and satisfied, something which I don't feel when playing normal mode or arena.

If there were to be any awards implemented I would like them to be a bit of extra dust (which for a f2p player like me helps A LOT to get those desired legendaries) and/or aesthetical achievements like card backs and stuff.

As for arena I think there needs to be a serious buff to the reward system. I have played Hearthstone for about 10 months now and the highest arena score i got was 11-3. this goes to show how hard 12 wins is to achieve. For people who do the reward is a shitty 230 gold and usual stuff. Since arena is not competitive getting 12 wins alone won't mean much.

you say that now but try that for like 15+ seasons in a row and tell me if rank is the reward alone, basically if you hit legend once, there is 0 reason to ever try for it again because you have the ultimate reward from it (card back), so hitting legend again, guess what? you hit legend, 0 reward, rank gets reset within 30 days, that's a really crap system.

The biggest problem with the ladder is that the pitiful season length means that you have to invest a ridiculous amount of time in a concentrated burst to reach legend. The game is meant to be casual but ranking up is anything but. Blizzard seems to be married to this season length, probably due to it's role in Blizzcon qualification, so the only fix I can think of for this problem is to give more roll-over stars based on your rank at the end of the season. That way people who don't play religiously can eventually have a shot at it after several months. It'll take much more total time to get there than doing it all in 1 month, but at least it's possible.

Yeah I think we should work for card backs but I've never done very well due to bad luck and I think the card back is ok at rank 20. I would like it maybe if they added like a pack, arena runs and dust as mentioned above but maybe all players can receive something so at least the higher you go the better the reward. Card backs are just designs for a new card while a pack or arena would help to get something that takes a few days to get. More achievement would also be nice but I'm not sure how there can really be many more achievement as many have already been implemented.

Regardless of your opinion on ladder rewards, I imagine most here would agree that a new constructed tournament format (maybe similar to arena but for constructed) would be a good thing.

I like the idea of achievements for ladder. I haven't played it seriously for a year or so and this season was the first time i tried to climb as high as possible. I stuck at rank 4 right now and even though it is not so far away from legend i don't think i will try to reach it. I would really like to reach it, but at the moment i stuck and even though i enjoy playing it is super time intensive and i got a little obssesed to reach it. I started to play in the morning before i go to work and i keep updating myself regular about new decks and the development of the meta. Big effort just to try to reach legendary. But since i stuck at rank 4 now, i am wondering why i should go on. I guess i might try it next season again, but if i can't reach it again, i will stop again, because for me it is not important which rank i have and it is useless to put so much effort in it just to reach a certain rank if it is not legendary. Even when i will become legendary once i guess i won't do it again, because it is too time intesive. So from my Point of view it would make sense to integrate some achievements.

Some said that People just want something for free: Yes, everyone want someting for free. However, i think Blizzard can affort it. They won't loose money on F2P Player. And how many Players have a complete collection already. As long as the collection is not complete people will buy packs. So there is a small disadvantage for Blizzard. However, most people are far from having all the Cards. Even if you spend money, as long as you are not a really good arena player you will still miss lots of cards. It is even worse for People who just started. For those people it seems impossible to get a good collection with more than just a few useful cards. And it will be worse in the future. So if Blizzard want to encourage new Players to stay or old Players to continue it is good to give more packs. And even though it is basically for the F2P Players. Without them Hearthstone lose attention and paying players will stop playing more likely.  

I've been playing the game since beta and the highest rank I've ever reached was 9 I think. You can call me bad if you like, you're probably right. But I think there are a lot of players like me who enjoy the game, but view the ladder as too daunting and give up quickly. There are two reasons for this I see: 1) As the game has grown in popularity, it has become more competitive and 2) With the seasons only a month long, it takes tremendous time and dedication to even get into the single digits for the average player.

My proposal would be a Legend Ladder. This ladder would be available to any player who has achieved the rank of legend in the regular ladder at any time. Blizzard could award their "pro points" or whatever they like to count toward Blizzcon, etc. in the Legend Ladder, thus giving incentive for the pro/serious players to play there. This would let the regular ladder become a bit more casual while still giving players a sense of achievement for climbing to the top. If your desire is to become a pro level player, you can climb the regular ladder to legend for the opportunity to pit your skills regularly against the top players in the Legend Ladder. The same type of system could even be applied to the arena with different rewards for the Legend Arena.

The current matchmaking system works fairly well in many cases, but adding an additional tier to the play would alleviate a lot of the frustrations for new/casual players I feel.

Quote from SonofLoke »

Hearthstone Ladder Achievements

I know many people have made threads about this topic before but I never saw a true Idea I liked. This idea is not for overall in-game achievements it’s very specific to ladder play and they also help with a few problems for newer players. I would like your positions on this idea so please comment if you want.

Ranks 22-16

Any player that holds a rank in this range or higher will receive 60 dust at the end of the season. What this does is allow newer players just starting to have a greater success in crafting cards they need and or want.

Ranks 15-11

Any player that holds a rank in this range or higher will receive the season’s card back and 60 dust. I think you at least have to put in effort to get a card back. Also dust is better for newer players then card backs.

Ranks 10-6

Any player that holds a rank in this range or higher will receive 60 dust, the season’s card back and a free arena run ticket

Ranks 5-1

Any player that holds a rank in this range will receive 60 dust, the season’s card back, a free arena pass and a loot bag. Loot bags can hold a number of things; anywhere from 50-200 dust, a golden card, 50-200 gold, an arena pass or the very rare bonus star ticket. Bonus Star tickets give you 1-2 bonus rank stars when it is spent.

Legend Rank

 Any player who holds the rank of legend shall receive a legacy card print that is printed for that season, a loot bag and the season's card back. Those in the top 50 of legend rank will also receive a legacy hero portrait. Legacy art is just alternate art that I would hope would be really cool.

Legacy art can be purchased with in-game gold (2000g) or real money ($1.99-$2.99) but only after 6 seasons of its original print date has passed.

I like the idea of better rewards, but I think legacy card backs, or anymore ''collectibles'' especially if then afterwards they can be sold, is just horrible. Just give gold or packs based on rank. Please for the love of god, do not add items that will be extremely hard to obtain for everyone....

So I don't get legend, I have to fork over money to get all the card backs? No thanks bro.

I like the idea, but the rewards jump so much.  Why not something simple that scales better.

Rank 20 Cardback

Rank 20-15 100g

Rank 14-10 150g

Rank 9 - 5 250g

4 - 1 350g.  This could include Legend as well, but Legend obviously gets the cardback + chance for Blizz top 100

This reward system is more feasible and isn't a BIG help, but it's definitely incentive that still keeps playing spending cash instead of just playing.

Thoughts?

The biggest problem with the ladder is that the pitiful season length means that you have to invest a ridiculous amount of time in a concentrated burst to reach legend. The game is meant to be casual but ranking up is anything but. Blizzard seems to be married to this season length, probably due to it's role in Blizzcon qualification, so the only fix I can think of for this problem is to give more roll-over stars based on your rank at the end of the season. That way people who don't play religiously can eventually have a shot at it after several months. It'll take much more total time to get there than doing it all in 1 month, but at least it's possible.

This. I fully agree the grind is meaningless because of the short reset.