Since their release the ranks in VALORANT’s ranked matchmaking have been a hot topic of discussion. One of the main reasons was the confusing name of the top rank.
After launching on June 2 VALORANT will implement changes to the current ranking system. These will not only change the name of the first rank “VALORANT” but also deliver a better way to distinguish the best players.
In an Interview with Polygon.com VALORANT’s Senior Designer Seaon Szopinski said: “When we were brainstorming these names, Valorant seemed like a really awesome choice for the top rank.”
The idea to become the personification of the game itself seemed especially compelling to the developers, but they never considered that the name might be confusing.
Example:
“What rank are you in VALORANT?”
– “VALORANT.”
-“Yes, VALORANT, what rank are you?”
Better differentiation at the top
Another issue besides the naming of the top rank deals with the lack of differentiation at the highest level of play. As soon as players arrived at “VALORANT”-rank you were unable to distinguish their skill from each other. A problem familiar to many Counter-Strike players as their corresponding Global Elite bracket suffers from the exact same issue.
One of the possible solutions would be displaying the MMR of each player as it is done in Overwatch or implement leaderboards with the ranks being shown in-game like Dota 2 handles it.
Riot has promised to tackle the lack of differentiation but players will have to be patient as it is not scheduled to be done at launch. Ranked matchmaking will also be disabled at launch.
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