"Perfect" ranked.. What are your thoughts and suggestions?

General Discussion
1

So, this is kind if a ‘for fun’ thread…

How would/should/could you design a ‘perfect’ ranked system? One that truly rewarded player skill and not just player time? How could the system be reworked to more accurately reflect skill-based rankings? No system can be flawless, but its an interesting topic to me. How do you sort the baddies from the goodies from the greaties from the goddies?

Its not that the current system seems ‘bad’ to me by any stretch, but it seems to me that once you can maintain a positive record in the higher echelons of play (ie you are skilled enough to be in the top 50% of people with the Killer rank) then its not about personal skill so much as time invested from that point… Ie, I dont have to be better than the best players the game has to offer to be number 1, I just have to invest more time than them once I reach a certain point in skill. Not that this is some low point that anyone and everyone can reach with no work, obviously that’s not true at all, but I think most of you will understand what I mean. There has to be some measure of time invested obviously, someone shouldn’t be able to show up and win a handful of games and then sit at some absurdly high rank forever after… but where is the sweet spot?

So, what do you all think? I know this is an odd thing to post randomly (I have no stake in ranked yet) but its 2am and I cant play because my fight stick wakes up my whole apartment… I gorilla-hand it too so its even worse than it should be. I find myself wide awake and super bored.

2

I’ve thought about this kind of thing before, and it’s a really difficult proposition.

Some current systems appear to have a “skill” factor built into match-making that is outside of purely player-rank; however, all it can really do is collect and categorize data, which by design isn’t optimal since the data cannot be interpreted in context and likely won’t carry the same values/meanings or significance from one match-up to another.

3

The game should take the first time you go to ranked during S3:

-Your historical win-lose ratio in ranked leagues during s2
-Your player lvl
-How many lvl 50 characters you have, and their win ratio in ranked and exibition
-Your rank during s2

After gathering all this data, you are set in qualifying, but with diferent tiers:

-Qualifying Lvl 1: Lvl 1 player, new to the game
-Qualifying Lvl 2: S2 veteran, not more than Gold rank, not more than 60% win/lose ratio
-Qualifying Lvl 3: S2 veteran, killer rank, not more than 70% win/lose ratio, no stars
-Qualifying Lvl 4: S2 veteran, killer rank, more than 70% win ratio, at least 1 top 32 star
-Qualifying Lvl 5: S2 veteran, killer rank, more than 80% win ratio, more than 5 top 32 stars

You still have to play 10 matchs to get into any rank, but your rank determinates the points your opponent loses when you win.(For example, you are a Qualifying Lvl 1 and face a Killer, if you win, he loses A LOT of points, if you are a Qualifying Lvl 5 and win he loses fewer points than losing against a regular gold rank)

Once you are placed in any rank, your initial Qualifying Lvl determines how many points you or your opponents gets from each match. Lower Qualifying Lvl gets more points from higher opponents, and lose fewer in the same scenario. The opposite for higher Qualifying Lvl.

The Bronze, silver and Gold rules are the same. Once you are Killer, each month the game calculates:

-Your win ratio last month both ranked and exibition
-Your top 32 stars
-How many times you played in both exibition and Ranked, and the rank of your opponents

This leads to “invisible” lvls between killers. Example:

Killer lvl 1: less than 50% win ratio, few matchs, no stars
Killer lvl 3: More than 60% win ratio, a lot of matchs against similar rank opponents or higher, less than 5 stars
Killer lvl 5: More than 80% win ratio against Killers lvl 4 and 5, more than 400 ranked matchs last month, more than 5 stars

Killers lvl 1 lose fewer points against lvl 5, and get more points from them.

Summary: The more you play, the more you need to win to mantain your points, a single lost against a lower rank rival can be fatal for your points. Also, lower ranks get less punishment for losing against higher rank characters. Killer lvls are hidden, to avoid exploits.

Character lvls are also relevant. You lose less points if you lost using a lvl 1 character than a lvl 50, and also you get more points for wining with a lvl 1 character than a 50.

This is a sketch, still has to be polished, but what do you think?

4

Really complicated was my initial thought :disappointed_relieved:

I actually really love the current Ranked Leagues system. You get a ton of points for beating someone who’s spent inordinate amounts of time grinding if they’re not up to snuff, and since you don’t lose a billion points for a loss there’s flexibility to mess around with another character or something if you run into someone who’s maybe not at your skill level.

I also think organizing people by how many level 50’s they have is kind of pointless. I have very few characters at 50, but my win rate with Hisako recently is at like 90% - whether or not I’ve devoted time into Kan-Ra (hint: I haven’t) doesn’t have anything to do with what’s going to happen if I feel like pulling Sako out.

I feel sometimes like I’m in the minority here, but I think the S3 Ranked Leagues system is about as close to perfect as you can reasonably expect.

5

I do love how S3 ranked leagues are too.

My point with the characters lvl its not for organizing people: it’s for doing the math of how many points you lose when using that character. It’s a way to pull a character in ranked(like every newcomer each month to get the achievement), and lose less points than using your main. There are still more factors, but for example, you could face a similar player with your Hisako, lost, and lose like 100 points. But if you lost using a lvl 1 Gargos, you lose like 75 points.

Just an example, the idea is not being so afraid to pull a non main character into ranked. For example, if I’m paired in ranked against a lvl 1 player, I choose one of my alts, I dont want to pummel a new player with my main, even when ranked points are on the field. And I dont care if I lose, but maybe there is people who would pick an alt in this scenario if the penalty of loosing wasn’t so high

6

Just take the current system, make it so that you can rank down from losing too much and make it so that you need a higher win loss ratio to move up. Currently you can maintain a 50% win loss and still make it all the way to killer which doesn’t make any sense, if you’re winning and losing evenly then you should stay in your tier not continue to move up.

7

Personally, I would do away with any kind of ranked or stat-tracking altogether. All you get is a win, loss, or tie for the match you just finished, but it’s not recorded anywhere else. It’s only there for the immediate satisfaction of that fight, then you move on. Stats could still be tracked, but it would be hidden and solely for developer use. This way, the game focuses more on fun and not necessarily on being super competitive - that can be left up to the tournament scene.