How bad is the new BG format? Season ends in half a week and Uru 2 is empty

The new vibranium levels are a miserable, unpleasant slog. Even with a 2/3 win rate, the odds are that you’ll have at least one stretch where you absolutely waste a half hour of time or more and either move backwards or make no progress.

Especially with the solo event rewards back to a 300,000 final milestone and solo rank rewards being largely insignificant, this season is a huge disappointment.

The only good thing that’ll come from it is the package of trophies I get for making vibranium when I advance in rank next season, assuming that functions correctly.

Is +2/-1 trophies too generous? Then go to +3/-2 and make it 7 trophies to advance. That allows a 3-1 record to advance (fair imo) and a 3-2 record to be at 6 trophies, with two shots to advance. Make it 8 or 9 if that’s too easy for you.

Playing the game should be rewarded. I’ve got platinum 3 alliance war rewards coming my way and the randomness of progression (whether that’s from matchmaking, the very occasional input issues, or whatever else) makes me want to just stop and do something else.

Comments

hefy2000

Keep in mind that this season is a one-off in that we have the post-seeding vt tiers without seeding actually being implemented. I would reserve judgement until after seeing the impact of seeding next season.

Ortoun

I just home they make it so there are no matchmaking restrictions anymore, if you are in the same tier then you are a valid match.

TyEdge

This is true, but that only changes how much of a slog it is to reach vibranium. Vibranium itself will still blow if they adhere to the basically-zero-sum medal setup.

Also, given that there were additional unanticipated delays to the war season (not a full season’s worth, but some) and this season was going to be grindy and miserable, the solo rewards should’ve matched last season, not reverted to the season before.

GroundedWisdom

Next Season it will be just as much of a slog with the added benefit of having to fight all of the GC from Plat and up. So it's going to suck any way you look at it.
Not a fan.

ItsClobberinTime

It's terrible, the people who are already in GC will spam disagree regardless but to everyone else who isn't, to put things into perspective, Uru 3 and Uru 2 being empty means there are about 5k spots left in GC that have not been taken, that's just ridiculous lol does anyone have any idea how many Paragons are still stuck in Vibranium 3, 2 and 1? I just made it to Vibranium 2 and I haven't fought a single TB or Cav since I got to Diamond 1.

TyEdge

Yeah. I don’t have any r3 in my deck and I’m largely up against my peers

Greekhit

I’m going to grab my popcorn and wait for these people that are already at lower GC to fight each other on upcoming seasons for a spot there.
If things don’t change participation drop, weaker players will step out, competition will get stiffer from lower BGs levels, and those who are now at the lower tiers of GC will find themselves out soon, and then instead of bragging and adding nothing to the conversation by telling others to get good, they will come in forums complaining.
Then the others above them and the story goes on.
It usually takes few months for Kabam to evaluate the data and proceed to changes.
I hope this time their reflexes are faster, because the mode is currently not in a good state.
After a good season, Kabam somehow decided it’s time to take some steps back and bring the mode nearly to it’s original despised state.

Standardman1989

I don't like it either, in addition they removed the two win bonuses and there was no reason too bad it was a good idea. If I don't say stupid next season we'll start higher

Ashacekar

Just made it to GC. I thought i won't this time. I had given up in week 2 after after reaching vibranium 1. I gave it my last shot today and did it. Vibranium 3 was very tough for me.

I see it's very lonely here. Less than 7k people, maybe around 5k. My voice echoes as well. I didn't understand Crit me meta but i manged to win my second match and went straight to Gamma. Less people, more rewards, no issues. I do agree this season is tough due to more tiers and wins needed hence less people in GC.

Skydad23

Only Kabam could follow up the best season ever with easily the worst season ever! Kabam logic yes we got everyone playing battle grounds again, let’s see how many people we can get to not play this season! Lol

DUHveed

This was my experience as well. I’ve got a pretty decent (subjective word) roster consisting of about 7 r5s and getting out of Vibranium was a chore. I lost a few matches due to skill issue but there were quite a few that I was just simply outmatched, meaning I’d win 3, lose 2, win 1, lose 1 etc. I’d estimate it took me about 30 matches to finally get out of there

EDIT: Since finally getting to GC I’ve had a much better time. I’ve only done objectives resets and I’m undefeated

KTPrimal

That's the domino effect. The players in GC now who are invalidating the concerns are doing it for that very reason. They speak on "competitive" and "competition", but really want to keep it easy too.

ItsClobberinTime

Me too, can't wait for those complaints to come in when they have to fight five Beroman level players in a row and win to move up since most of us will be leagues below them or just not bothering with BGs in the first place. It's wild to me that there are 5 000 spots that haven't been taken in GC and there are people out there who can't or refuse to see that that is an issue.

ItsClobberinTime

I had to play 21 matches earlier today just to get to Vibranium 2, my elder marks are almost completely gone and honestly, I'm not gonna bother going for Vibranium 1 this has been annoying and not fun at all.

GroundedWisdom

Its overkill. I get the theory behind it. They wanted to make it harder for lower Accounts to get into the GC. It would have been enough to seed next Season, leave the Tokens as-is, and maybe add a Tier or two. It was overshot.
Now we have a system that makes the GC exclusive to about 80-90% of the people in BGs, and the rest barely even care to try.
I'm hopeful that Kabam commented about continuing to make changes and efforts. All I know is if it continues as it is now, it will kill the game mode, and I'm not Henny Penny about many issues on here.

TyEdge

The closer your win rate is to 50%, and the larger the medal requirement is, the harder it is to ever get out. With a 50% win rate and 3 medals, if you won a match, there was a 25% chance to go win-win after that and move. Shields could further assist. This is a mess

JT_Supreme

The one positive is that if you can manage to squeeze into gc it’s way easier to hit gamma. Last season you needed 100+ to get out of uru3 and that also felt like a slog. So don’t give up!

TyEdge

I just hit V2. That’s something. I guess if I can push through one more level then win a GC match I’ve got it.

ItsClobberinTime

Yeah my win rate since I hit Diamond 1 has been about 60% but it's still not enough to get me into GC without using a bunch of shields so I'm just going to chill in Vibranium 2. Let's hope seeding system fixes this issue next season, this has been the worst BGs season for me so far.

TyEdge

I save my shields until I’m one medal away. Sigh.

BeastDad

The rewards are simply not worth maximum effort. Do the bare minimum and move it along until things change.

Kappa2g

The entire victory track should be based on a system where if you have a 50+% win rate, you can slowly grind your way into the GC. Wins should always net more tokens than losses, adjust the number of tokens needed per rank as see fit. The system currently feels awful as you can easily lose all progress you've made in those 5 token tiers.

Oakenshield

I can get that they felt like too many people were in GC last season given the crazy scores needed to even get out of Uru 3, but in reality it was a predictable outcome of the increased scores and rewards they had implemented given the War hiatus. Clearly this change was far too much of an overcorrection. With any luck they will display some agility and correct back in the other direction next season.

For me it was much less enjoyable. I made it pretty comfortably into GC both of the last two seasons and had some time to generate some points. This season I just made Diamond 3 today.

Between the tier changes and the matchmaking changes its not a mode I’ll spend more time on until they correct it back.

Eb0ny-O-M4w

All they needed was to not scrap the +2/-1 medal system from platinum and above. That should make it far less painful while not touching the number of ranks

DrZola

The issue has (in my opinion) always been one of wasting time. Putting effort in and playing while making zero progress isn’t a great recipe for enjoyment. Unfortunately, that feedback was somehow forgotten.

That doesn’t mean anything has to be easy—in a competitive mode it shouldn’t be—but this also isn’t a truly competitive mode because of the way matchmaking has been designed.

I suspect the team will decide to dial back some of the changes they made to the advancement structure this season. Whether that happens with the next season or not is anyone’s guess—mainly because I also think they will wait until seeding effects are known to retool the mode.

But it often amazes me how the community often gets it mostly correct upfront, warns the team, then winds up suffering through the poor design and/or decision-making they warned about before anything gets adjusted.

Dr. Zola

BringPopcorn

You might be right or not, but its the way it is. Just because there are empty seats in 1st class doesn't mean someone can just walk and take a seat.
There are less players in GC; but they all went thru the same process to get there.
I will admit the changes to VT complicated things; but its also an outcome of 4th of July roster bumps. I still have my theory that they did this changes because they realized they made VT way too easy and too many people were able to get to some tiers way too easy. Specially the Vibranium changes.

DrZola

Did they all go through the same process though?

I’m curious whether each GC player faced the highest available competition each time.

Dr. Zola

BringPopcorn

They all had to win the same string of matches to move up, there used to be this theory that the last week was the easiest to climb up, not anymore though...
Also i do believe this season is a bit harder due to the burn out of casual players from the last season event.

DrZola

I agree the team should have considered burnout from last season, as well as the differential in solo event prizes. A participation drop-off was inevitable.

Dr. Zola

BringPopcorn

I believe that added to the difficulty a lot, this season you have a lot of "try hards" and facing them from Plat and up is rough and then you add the Coin change and added tiers; but like i said before its a competition. Just because there are empty seats in 1st class (GC Uru for example) doesn't mean someone from coach can just seat on it. There is a process and all the people in GC had to go thru the same process of winning an x ammount of matches to climb.