hey really well articulated here, but I think you’re overestimating a bit. I would say that the community as a whole has “leveled up” the skill ceiling 250 maybe 500 sr…but definitely not 1,000.
I would also argue that its less about people getting “better” that is adjusting the skill ceiling and more about the overall play in each game collapsing. I would say 2 years ago 70% of my games people tried to form a legitimate team comp, now I would say it’s nearly flipped and maybe only 40% of my solo que games people actually try to work together.
The same can be said for less people in vc.
I think there is less of an increased skill issue and more of a need to play at a higher skill to win the same amount of sr that we used to because instead of coordinated games with communication. We have endless one tricks who are the best ever and refuse to work with the team.
More toxic community is making it feel like the skill required at each rank is going up. Not because players are improving, but because good players have to do more to produce a win.
Additionally from about 1850-2750 this is felt the worst because this is the sr range that new accounts are thrown into, adding to the chaos.
in summary, sure more skill is needed, but not because the community has gotten better, but more so because the community at large has gotten worse.
Couldn’t disagree with you more. I believe you’re seeing things that aren’t there and you’re confused. Maybe you lack the ability to discern. Or maybe you haven’t played enough. Whatever the case, you’re way off.
Not really considering a decent portion of gold players are actually worse than bronze. They just haven’t played enough to drop there yet. That is what happens when you start everyone in the middle instead of at the bottom.
As a person who was VOD reviewed and helped a lot of lower ranked players and observed gameplay from all ranks and understood their differences (I have even tried playing in the lowest ranks as an experiment) I can easily tell the difference in skill level between Bronze and Gold players. Gold players are usually better than Bronze players in every aspects, but mainly the things I have highlighted in Bold:
Aim
Movement
Positioning
Ability Usage
Target priority
Gamesense
Teamwork (A bit improved)
Counter picking (Heavily depends on the flexibility of a player and willingness to switch)
This is just a generalizing of course, different players will have different strengths and weaknesses, but this is generally what I have noticed.
I can quickly somewhat accurately estimate a player’s rank by looking at their gameplay and looking at the above points.
I have seen a bronze zenyatta player who had an aim of high plat and even above. He was constantly flanking and wrecking our teammates. His positioning was good too and he knew when to retreat so he never died once. But bronze being bronze, his team needed heals, so he lost the game with PotG and most frags. I asked if he was smurfing but he said he was genuingly hard stuck (this is in OCE). So it depends imo on why some people are hard stuck. Some people just aren’t willing to adapt to the needs of their particular elo.
I don’t believe him as well and I think he was just annoyed that his skill wasn’t rewarded. My guess is that he eventually climbed but had to endure many losses due to him wanting to be a flanking zenyatta. It’s much easier to climb out of low elo by healing more AND fragging instead of just doing one or the other.
Going to nit-pick, but I take offense to saying Gold ranks lack basic understanding of the game.
Gold players are generally playing a pretty solid game, but lack one or more advanced things such as:
Playing as a coordinated team (especially solo queue this is probably the biggest reason they stay in gold)
tracking ults (which I would put above “basic understanding” and more in moderate game sense skill)
Aim
Knowing which counters to use when (or not being a one trick)
Avoiding tunnel vision
But my point is Gold players are generally solid but unpolished players. They are not running around not knowing how to capture points or not at least trying to utilize cover or not understanding that tracer will recall backwards or that a roadhog hanging around a cliff is trying to get picks.
Gold aren’t pro players, but they are average - and certainly not lacking basic understanding of the game.
Anyone who questions the skill inflation in sub 2500 games need only look at overbuff
ANA yes I said it ANA is the most picked support hero in freaking BRONZE. Probably the highest skill floor healer outside of maybe baptiste is the highest picked support in what is supposed to basically be a beginner’s bracket.