This is good to know. And im glad youre talking to us. What are the chances we could have some form of “Mid-patch check-in” with the PVP devs so we could hear how theyre thinking about everything?
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Horrible change. Should have made a post before the season began telling us from the start how it would work and that rating would be lower. The amount of people that quit doing 3s because of the lack of progress is crazy.
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I think that this was simply them underestimating just how much participation solo shuffle would siphon away from 2v2 and 3v3. Like, shuffle is a few hundred points higher than either, on average, so unless you’re glad+ there’s no reason to bother with anything other than shuffle.
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Thanks for the clarity. Agree should probably start a bit earlier. Although now I feel like people will only start to actively play once this rating inflation becomes active. Something to experiment with for sure.
While we are talking about ratings, can you please consider increasing the max PvE ilvl upgrade for PvP gear?
I know I am probably in the minority here, but it was also nice to supplement my PvE gear with some Elite (2400) PvP gear early or sometimes even late in the season. This season though, there is almost no crossover between gearsets. 408 ilvl is way to low to get into any kind of high lvl PvE, when in the past the 2400 upgrade level was at least equivalent to the highest M+ upgrade (currently 415 ilvl) and helped PvPers get into PvE or use a few PvP items in their Mythic gear sets.
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im cheering greatly for the bills next season, mr holinka.
fantastic work and communication. this explains so much. i think waiting 10 weeks was a bit much however.
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We understood the risk here with Solo Shuffle and its impact on 2v2 and 3v3, but felt it would lead to more people participating in Arena overall. For many players, earning Conquest to complete a full set of gear is their primary form of progression and they have no aspirations of earning Duelist much less Gladiator. They queue up, cap conquest each week, then stop playing. Their presence in 2v2 and 3v3 lifted up the ratings of all of those people really striving for end of season titles. Now, those players are able to get their Conquest in Solo Shuffle instead. We’ll look for ways to make 2v2 and 3v3 worth queuing for that player type.
Fun tidbit: One of the surprising beneficiaries of Solo Shuffle has been Skirmish, where it appears players often spend their time while waiting for their Solo Shuffle queue to pop.
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Yeah, I thought that shuffle was really cool for this. Like, a lot of people feel stressed about finding partners, or feel bad about sitting in LFG getting declined, and solo just let them pop in and play regardless of skill, exp or spec.
That’s cool. I’ve chatted with a lot of people in the various Discords who’ve had trouble finding people interested in playing 2v2 or 3v3 now that shuffle is available and just so much quicker and easier to push rating in.
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I understand this and hear ya but its a really bad having friends quit due to them feeling they are hard suck at 1800 etc and dont progress at all even if it was 20 points a week.
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I’m curious why you think this won’t result in people who typically play arena for duelist/gladiator to just not queue at all until later in the season. Wouldn’t a decay system be better at stopping ladder squatters while not feeling overly punishing for players that can typically achieve certain ratings in a normal season?
It definitely feels beyond demoralizing to be able to hit X rating in one season and then playing the same comp with the same players not being able to get close to that rating in the very next season. Even if it’s early in the season.
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Yeah, the whole mid range of kind of scuffed. If you poke a friend to push 2100 3s but they’re already 2500 shuffle and have all the non-gladiator rewards it feels kind of…awkward. To have a lot of people be “done” this early.
Minus glad-r1 range, of course.
Shuffle is also really good for knocking out elite sets.
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I wonder how a best of 3 would work for 3s 60 rating a win. This might be kind of how solo shuffle can get more then 24rating based off how many rounds you win
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I find it hard to believe that an AVERAGE skill pvper is 1500 rating. More like 1200 maybe, especially this expansion.
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I don’t think that model would work for normal 3v3 as you’re staying with your same team and keeping the same composition the entire time.
If you were to queue into a team that “counters” you it would feel terrible to lose 60 rating when you have a very small chance to win to begin with.
I would much rather queue into a team we have difficulty beating, and take the loss and then hopefully not queue into them again for another five or so games and continue to climb outside of that specific match up.
The current matchmaking also assists with this because it tries to avoid placing you against a team you just fought unless you’re sitting in a queue for a bit.
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That’s where people start in terms of mmr. If they’re going even then their CR will quickly approach this number. Also just think of it as an example of where most people are kind of pushed towards.
Over the course of the season they can kind of nudge everybody up, with a notable example being Unchained where you’d mess around on an alt and be 2300 mmr.
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Yeah and I can understand why they waited so long to start introducing artificial MMR to the ladder, much to the chagrin of most of the player base.
You really don’t want to end up in a season like unchained where inflation gets so ridiculously high that rewards are almost meaningless…but at the same time you also don’t want to end up in a season where you realize the train is running off the tracks and try to reel it back in and end up with something like sinful where people are sitting safe R1 for 3-4 months without a second thought.
The start slow and tweak along the way is definitely the safest and most logical approach.
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I love the fact that solo was introduced, and for the most part has been fun whenever queues pop.
There are too many instances of lower MMR people showing up in solo shuffle (500+ point disparity) and the usual end result equates to tiny gains/losses for the majority of participants. Overall I’m glad the wow team recognized the community’s comments/concerns/etc, and hopefully more will be done in the future to improve the overall quality of Rated Solo Shuffle.
My only question: Wasn’t it the intent to reward those who didn’t leave during the solo shuffle? Seems like players (especially those that lose a game or two before someone quits) are still getting punished. MMR changes should be null and void imo for those instances.
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Why do players always bring up the absolute worst case scenario? Yes, unchained took inflation too far too fast. But to say that the system is good where you have only r1-caliber players able to get gladiator for the first 10+ weeks of the season is actually insane. There is a very large spectrum of “good” between unchained and crimson.
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I mean, it already happened with shuffle.
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