The Ranked Play Changes Have Been Announced and are Coming in March!
The ranked ladder revamp has been announced! We'll be seeing the changes go live at the beginning of the March season which is roughly a month away! The changes will be patched into the client in February, the same update where we may see a balance update.
Here's how the new ladder will work:
- Card backs will now be earned after 5 wins for a month.
- All ranks have 5 stars.
- When a new season starts, you will reset exactly 4 ranks below your end ranking - stars included.
- Ranked rewards go by your highest ranked earned during the season.
- There may be some rank inflation, but not to the point where everyone will be Legend. (Source)
- No changes to the win streak mechanic. (Source)
- Rank floors (20, 15, 10, 5) are all still in place. (Source)
What do you think? Are these changes enough to make ranked better for everyone? Watch the video from Ben Brode or check out the blog post below. If you think these changes are "simple" and shouldn't have taken this long, Ben Brode gives us some insight into just that.
Quote from DaxxarriBeginning with the start of the March 2018 Ranked Play season, we’re making improvements to Hearthstone’s Ranked Play ladder experience.
Join Hearthstone Game Director Ben Brode as he explains what to expect, as well as the philosophy and intentions behind the update:
Here are the upcoming changes you can look forward to:
- You’ll earn card backs by winning five Ranked games during the season, regardless of what rank you achieve. It will no longer be necessary to reach Rank 20 to earn these card backs.
- After each game, the UI will let you know how many wins you still need to earn the Ranked season card back. You can check your progress between games by visiting the Quest Log.
- All Ranks will now have 5 stars.
- Player ranks will reset to exactly 4 ranks below your current standing, including the number of stars in that rank you earned. Here are some examples:
- Rank 14, 2 stars resets to Rank 18, 2 stars
- Rank 1, 3 stars resets to Rank 5, 3 stars
- Rank 10, 0 stars resets to Rank 14, 0 stars
- Players at Legend reset to Rank 4, 0 stars
Moving to the New System
Some elements of the old and new systems will exist simultaneously when we first make the transition:
- During the February Ranked Play Season, you’ll still need to reach Rank 20 to receive your Ranked season card back. At the season’s end, your rank will reset to four ranks below your current standing.
- Starting with the March Ranked Play Season, you’ll only be required to win 5 games to receive your seasonal card back. At the season’s end, your rank will reset to four ranks your current standing.
The update should allow players at the top of the ladder to jump into the action immediately by matching them against similarly-ranked opponents, providing more engaging matches while reducing the time it will take for them to climb to a rank appropriate for their skill-level each season. This in turn should improve matchmaking for everyone who plays Hearthstone, including those climbing the ladder for the first time. Since players will be more evenly matched at the start of each season, they can make immediately meaningful progress toward their ladder ranking against players of similar caliber. We want the experience of climbing the Hearthstone Ranked Play ladder to be fun, challenging, and satisfying for everyone.
We hope you enjoy the updates to Ranked Play, and we’re looking forward to your feedback. See you on the ladder!
I was going to ask for the Legends reward chest to get boosted, but if you can win it with a net positive of 20 games per month every month then it's probably a bad idea.
Yup, count me among them, dude.
What do they mean by current standing?
Is it best placement or last rank at end season?
If it is the latter, it is an incentive to stop trying.
It's the end rank of the season.
So even if you hit Rank 2 some time in the season but end that season rank 5 (which happens to me smh), your reset rank will be rank 9.
Pros:
Cons:
I shutter to imagine the even bigger shitshow Rank 10 is gonna become. It's gonna be an even bigger ELO Hell.
Guys, these listed Cons are issues by Legend players.
We, the Pleb majority, don't care if we break into Legend with rank 1million. We still want to achieve our Legend dreams, flaunt that super elusive card back, and we are happy with these new changes. Please don't mess it up for us.
Us pertains to my earlier statement of "We, the Pleb majority".
Dude, I meant that post to be a light-hearted and hopefully funny post. Chill out. If you don't share my opinion then fine, I don't speak for you. Jeez.
Well, what I was saying in am admittedly sarcastic way, is that Blizzard have ALREADY simulated this and stated specifically that there will be some small inflation but not huge, and Legend won't have too many more people.
But to your point, if players were at rank 1-2 and stable (ie not hitting legend) before, then they either a) didn't have enough time to play enough games or b) weren't good enough relative to the local players. Note that there aren't and still won't be bonus stars above level 5. So all that will change is players will get to the same rank they finished at faster in the month, meaning that for players in the b) group, they still won't reach legend because they didn't before and are facing the same players, and the players in the a) group have a shot at legend, which is actually pretty good because it was pretty artificial that they didn't reach it anyway.
So no, in theory NOT huge inflation. In Blizzards simulations (that they have already run) NOT huge inflation. So relax.
So February will be last time grinding through the whole ladder. But mandatory to reach legend in February, so that you can really tri-hard in march to reach legend 1st! :D
Dude, the new ladder system will start in March. When February season ends, we will all still reset based on the current rules not the new one. So the March legend grind would still be the same as February... the effects of the new system will be felt in April.
EDIT: I WAS WRONG. Yeah after February, 4-rank reset will immediately take place in March. Sorry.
While the system change isn't quite Shadowverse levels of good, it seems pretty damn good to me. For those who haven't tried Shadowverse, here's how their system works, and here are some of the pros and cons of it (the info on Master Ranks may be incorrect, I never got that far).
Like in Hearthstone, Shadowverse has rank floors. Say you're in rank C. Once you reach the maximum of your rank, i.e. maximum points (read, Stars) in C3, you face 3 (or is it 4?) trials. If you win 2, you progress to the next rank, in this case B0. Once you've passed those rank promotion trials, you won't derank from there. You can derank between B0, B1, B2, B3, but you are locked within that B rank now. Unlike Hearthstone, the ladder does not reset every month unless you're at Grandmaster rank (in which case you drop to Master Rank and have to climb to Grandmaster again). Once you've broken through the trials to a given rank, you stay at that rank forever, even if you take a 6 month break (like me).
The benefit of this system is that new players or players with small collections will NEVER play an experienced player with a large collection unless that player creates a smurf account. If you're playing at D rank, you're playing against people who are just as green as you are, since the more experienced players have long filtered through to higher ranks...unless they just don't play ranked and they build their collection and experience through the Arena. In that case, they'll storm through the ladder very fast and you'll never see them again. The downside of the system is that if you happen to brew yourself a pretty good deck and you climb high with it, you may find yourself forever locked in a region of the ladder where your other homebrews can't get a word in and you have to either play a really good deck and play it well or you'll just be the local punching bag. There is no falling down from there to a rank where you'd be more comfortable. Once you've beaten your way through the ladder to a given rank, that's where you're at. This brings an additional problem of taking a break. If you don't play the game for a while and your collection starts severely lagging behind, your return could be a painful one if the decks you used to play are no longer successful. Thankfully Shadowverse is very generous and you get TONS of free gold and packs constantly to allow you to catch up, but it can be a problem regardless. If you take a break in this new Hearthstone ladder system, you'll gradually demote to a rank where you can get by with an outdated collection and probably still do fine thanks to being more experienced.
TLDL: I like it. No more climbing from rank 17 every darn month on my way to rank 5 and occasionally stumbling into Legend players at rank 16 or so. The system also makes taking breaks easier, since you won't be hitting a wall at 20 the moment you get back. Most of the frequent and experienced players will be at single digit ranks forever so you never have to face them and their thick, throbbing decks.
Man now I need to get legend next month. I usually make rank 5 around mid month but get board and play arena the rest of the month. If I want the back when it was hard card back I really need to push. I week left maybe I can grind it out
Good start. Need more incentives though