Since player activity has dropped significantly, cr above the rank 1 cutoff has been exponentially harder to get. Over 90% of toons above 3kcr on the ladder have been sitting rating and haven’t played in months. When you q up with rating over 3k you will almost certainly lose rating even going 60/40 due to there being lower mmr in the system as player activity continues to decline. Players who are currently striving for r1 find it more and more difficult as spots are being taken by players who are no longer active and achieved their rating when it was significantly easier because of player activity.
What does this mean for the rest of ladder? Well these players now make alts and play them instead, doing carries, boosts and generally playing at lower mmr. This hurts the lower brackets as now you have people in 2400/2600 playing against players who should be at 3k this late in the season. This trickles down as the 2400 players now get pushed to 2200, 2200’s get pushed to 2k and so forth. Many players who are trying to achieve gladiator or duelist or rival now suffer the consequences of having to face players who are more skilled AND more geared. Then you see these players coming to the forums and complaining about these issues.
LoL had this problem, CSgo had this problem, and many other competitive games decided to deal with it in the same fashion. CR decay. CR decay above 2800 would solve many of those issues. This would make players continue to play their main chars instead of terrorizing the lower brackets through boosts/alts. This would also allow current players striving for a r1 spot to be able to compete and keep playing instead of facing exclusively awc players at 2.8/2.9cr.
Please change this system that rewards people for sitting rating for months because they played when player activity was high. This hurts the entire ladder, not only the 1% because the effects trickle down.