September 2022
I'm really trying to figure out why Diamond rank even exists at this point. From Rookie to Plat it's basically a cakewalk and the level of enemies/teammates is usually low, but in D4 I'm pretty much exclusively getting ranked against Master/Pred stacks as a solo player. I don't mind fighting them with a team of randoms, but why pretend like there's differences in the lobbies when it's obvious that there aren't any? Today I fought the #3 pred with his stack a couple of times in D4 lobbies and I'm mostly fighting against Master teams. Either remove Diamond and go straight to Master or fix the matchmaking.
September 2022
The point of this rank is to do exactly what you're having a problem with.
It's designed to divide those ranks between the lower ranks due to skill disparity.
From Rookie up to Plat you won't be learning a lot to get a higher rank, this makes sure that newer players can still get a sense of progress whilst they aren't really getting that much better.
Diamond is designed to make players get used to the short exponential learning curve that they'll find when they reach Masters and so forth.
Learning to use proper comms, certain tactics, playstyles and so forth.
By removing Diamond you'll be assigning either Plat to take over the job of Diamond or you'll make the learning curve even steeper as Master will become the gateway despite it being much different, thus resulting in another issue.
Adjusting the ranks themselves wont help much, changing something with the matchmaking is a realistic goal.
Though there also is the chance that you're getting higher ranked players in your matches due to there being less players of your own skill in your ranking, meaning that you either get long queue times or short queue times with lower quality matches.
The game also tries to balance the lobby itself more, as an example they could put in 1 pred squad against a larger number of lower squads.
Whilst numbers do overwhelm this pred squad, they can win if they just pick off teams one by one.
Since it's a BR game it's much more likely that the second scenario happens, thus creating our current problem.
So indeed, their system is flawed in some aspects.
September 2022
In any ranked system, players will have peak ranks ofc, i.e any given player will have a certain rank where his current skills in the game can take him. But the difference in Apex is that those peak ranks usually happen at the 4th tier of each rank division, silver4, gold4, plat4, diamond4, etc. In Apex, if you are good enough to advance out of the 4th tier of your current division, you usually are good enough to advance through the entire division, with varying required time depending how good you are. I am fine with being a hard stuck Plat4 as solo and hardstuck Diamond4 as a premade squad in this new system. In the old system, it was the same, only that I then was a hardstuck Diamond4 as a solo and hardstuck Master 10.000 rp as a premade squad. So I dont think that much has changed; it just got a little bit harder.
September 2022
September 2022
I think Diamonds is designed correctly. Calling someone a masters in anything means they are really good. Masters used to be too easy to get. Get a few KP and play end game.
Only thing i hate about Diamond lobbies is that there is no US West Diamond + lobbies.
West coast players are thrown into the hard lobbies and have higher pings.