Shadowlands has seen tremendous participation in Arena with the number of unique players and total matches exceeding those seen in recent seasons. As some have noted, this level of participation has had some unintended effects at the very top of the ladder. The nature of our rating system means that the more people that participate, the more likely it is that the very best players in the world will reach extremely high matchmaking ratings. In this case, a number of players have reached the upper boundary of our rating system and as a result, they may achieve victories that don’t result in rating increases. Since the number of players capable of playing at this level is limited, if they choose not to participate, it becomes difficult for those players immediately below them to also gain rating.
We have two solutions to this problem, one of which is already in place and the other will take effect with weekly restarts on Tuesday.
First, over the past 7 years World of Warcraft has had a rating inflation system in place that increases the mean rating of competitors at a rate of 10 points per week (note: This is the rate of increase for clarity but the number is actually increasing with each second). This means that the number that all ratings – including the highest rating possible – are calibrated at increases by 10 points each week, so players that continue playing throughout the season have an advantage compared to those who stop when it comes to end of season rewards. Ultimately, if high end players choose not to play, their rating will be overcome by those who do.
Second, we are going to increase the upper bound of our matchmaking rating system with weekly restarts this week. This should mean that players at the top of the ladder should have less matches that reward no rating change.
We appreciate everyone letting us know about this issue and hope that the upcoming increase the matchmaking cap will improve the situation for the few players affected.
Where to begin… you know… On second thought . I even lost interest in communicating. Do what you will. The communication has been none existent And with everything wrong with PvP this is what you guys drop by to talk about… I don’t even care.
Unfortunately, the perception that PvP participation is up definitely is a false positive of results. The reason you guys think there is regular active participation is due to PvE’rs receiving less gear in raid content than PvP and look to obtain boosts and carries to overcome that issue. Now, does the PvP community want more participation and do we benefit from this? Of course, but as the season has progressed there has been limited changes to problematic gameplay and less incentives overall for both communities. Raiders can use gold to buy carries, PvP’ers suppliment that and as a result either choose to continue providing carries or simply refusing to play because there is no reason to play if you either obtained what you wanted or you’re losing more than you gain.
Along with that problem ties into the difficulties of being able to gear mains/alts because of the previous issues mentioned. Less experienced players will look to rated battlegrounds as a solution which is obvious to do but these are the same players that once they’ve obtained gear feed the cycle of boosting and sitting at low mmr’s.
Catching up is a huge time investment and while we get that blizzard wants to farm time metrics, short term, it seems like a great idea, long term people will simply stop playing. Maybe blizzard can scrape buy with the people who will play anyway but there should be quality control. PvE’rs are unhappy. PvP’ers are unhappy. Clearly something is not working all around. Implement significant conquest catchup, reduce the requirements for honor, tune the classes that have practically gone unscathed without changes and get rid of 1-2 button 1 shotting gameplay. It’s bad game design and it creates the most degenerate meta. Scale up m+ gear a bit so that there are actual options for pve’rs to look to instead of raiding once or twice a week for two pieces of gear. The m+ gear is practically the same as covenant gear. It’s hardly an upgrade for them.