My ranks are plat 3 tank / bronze 4 dps / plat 2 support. I generally play plat.
I was a gold 1 dps until I had a friend join the game. We started playing comp together and to no one’s surprise we started losing. A lot. I still enjoyed playing, but we lost almost 50 matches in a row consecutively. Naturally, this tanked my rating. I don’t mind.
However, Blizzard a while back announced what I refer to as the “rival system.” The matchmaker ‘vies’ for fair matches more than anything, including rank, by trying to create teams composed of players of similar skill level. This means that every time I solo queue for DPS, usually the enemy team also has at least one Plat/Bronze/Plat ranked player in the DPS role.
I’ll tell you, each of these matches are insanely wild. Every bronze match I play has two smurfs in it against their own wills – myself and my rival. As a result, ranking back up to gold has been a nightmare. It’s amazing watching myself and my rival dominate each others’ teams with the exceptions of each other. It’s become a game where, every match, I must identify my rival and try to bully them as quickly as possible else my team becomes obliterated. If I fail to focus my rival and instead just wipe their team, my rival does the same, and then I must still win that duel. It’s crushing.
Why is this the case? Why does the matchmaker bias to put me against (platinum) bronze players? That isn’t really bronze. Rank means nothing when this is the case.
