From the data in this post (posting to discuss/document changes)
Rank population is
- Bronze : 10.2%
- Silver : 19.2%
- Gold : 26.7%
- Plat : 26.2%
- Diamond : 12.2%
- Masters : 3.9%
- GM : 1.6%
In OW1
- Bronze: 8%
- Silver: 21%
- Gold: 32%
- Platinum: 25%
- Diamond: 10%
- Master: 3%
- Grandmaster: 1%
The biggest take away is
- Bronze is 25% bigger (likly new players)
- Gold is a lot smaller 25%ish
- Diamond 20% bigger
- Masters 25% bigger
- GM 60% bigger (but the old data is rounded so who knows)
Metal ranks went from 86% to 82% of people
The 50% point is still in gold but in ow2 Gold and lower is 56% and in OW it was 61% making Plat still a place where you can say you’re better than half of the player base.
Rank inflation for older players in higher ranks is huge while the ranks are bigger now with an increased population-based most older players would most likely be pushed up a rank or 2. Without accurate population data, it’s hard to infer tho. This is probably the biggest takeaway.
In my opinion, the distribution is more healthy as populating the higher ranks of the game should mean it’s easy to make matches for them but it does ask the question why have there been plats appearing in master games and such.
They also explained their MMR decay and how it messed up bronze players.
If I had to comment on it. It looks like things are getting better and some big bugs are still being fixed which gives some hope to have a system on par with OW1.
Still with patch cycles being so short meaning skill sets become more/less valuable and players that take breaks getting soft MMR reset it’s hard to see how the MMR will be ever accurate enough to make high-quality matches.
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Wasn’t the old gm data said to be less than 1%? Just didn’t specify how much less.
There are certainly tons of s1/2 plats who jumped straight to gm the next season they played.
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Yeah, those plat → gm extremes are definitely frustrating. There’s still plenty of players who have genuinely improved and earned their rank, but at the same time there’s soooo many more who have artificially climbed. Nobody genuinely goes from plat → gm level gameplay in a single season. Even in GM the skill disparity between low and high GM gameplay is massive, let alone between there and plat. In my opinion, climbing one full rank in a season (in metal ranks) is pretty manageable if you take it seriously and really try to learn from your games. Especially if you’re looking for VOD reviews from high-rank players. But to go from plat (even diamond) to GM in a single season is not normal.
That assumes the game ranking algorithm is flawless and always places people to the rank they belong. This is most definitely not the case.
In my experience: competitive was at its best in S2…S4 of OW1. Not in the sense of game balance, but in the sense of competition. Back in S2 the master league really meant it. It was try-hardy as hell, I never remember getting a leaver or a thrower. I only got to high diamond there and then to masters in S4. GM was mostly for pros and semi-pros (folks which were close in skill to contenders at least).
Was the ranking algorithm better then? Definitely not (I even excluded S1 and its SR shenanigans). But the people playing competitive mode were actually competitive. There was no throwaway attitude. People tried incredibly hard to win. It was impossible to imagine plat → GM in one season not because ranking was better but because competition was insane.
Climbing just 300-400SR was considered good. And if any “artificial” opportunities a-la OP heroes appeared? Everybody jumped onto those because everybody wanted to climb, so guess what? The better players and better teams climbed because both teams were in the mindset to win and utilized whatever OP ruled the day. So OP stuff or game balance was not a big deal before the face of that fierce competition.
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That’s true, I don’t disagree at all. I didn’t start playing until the end of 2020, but competitive definitely does have a different air to it in OW2 than it did in OW1. Even when I started playing around s25 or so (I don’t know for sure because Blizz won’t let me see any of my comp profiles from OW1), it was sweaty as hell. The transition from 1-2 caused a shift downward in match competitiveness, which (aside from simply getting so many new players in) I feel like was partly due to how they moved away from the SR system and only show you “gold 3” or “platinum 1” etc instead. Definitely not the only thing at play, but I do miss how intense ow1 comp games got!
S5+ is where throwers, smurfs, griefers and the rest of them started to pick up the pace. Ironically, it was because of lack of serious support for the game from the devs side - so a lot of those throwers initially were the same try-hards who were the backbone of the competitive play in earlier seasons. They already climbed to their masters / GM and there was not much else to do so they decided to downrank and stomp on lower leagues.
So… well, especially after mid-season it was just bad quality and rolling a roulette - especially given how punishing losses were to SR back then. I also do not think the OP captures earlier stages of competitive in OW1, I’d wager S2…S4 it was 1% in masters and then maybe a couple of thousands in total of GM players. Later on they overhauled it, made it easier to climb and yada yada, casuals whined loud enough that they can’t get into “rank they deserve” and admitting they just aren’t good enough was never an option.
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