An Open Letter to Blizzard Regarding Divisions - Page 14

On May 23 2010 12:43 PREWTAHS wrote:
(edited for tone and clarification)
Some food for thought: Lets look at the many tasks Blizzard has in front of them and what their main objectives are. One of the most prominent of these is to bring in as many players as possible. The way Blizzard has gone about accomplishing this goal is (from what I can currently assess) quite fantastic, and believe it or not, good for the competitive scene. Having less cut-throat, black and white statistics and ranking system allow for newer players to slowly integrate themselves into the competitive scene. This means more players, and more competition. Drawing from WC3 as an example, many new players became quickly discouraged when they couldn't keep a 50% winning rate. As a result, many of these players soon abandoned the competitive heart of Blizzard's RTSes (1v1) and permanently migrated to the realm of UMS and 4v4.

Having a fan-made fringe site which aggregates the global rankings instead of official integration into BNet allows the best of both worlds: the pros get what they want, and new players will stick around because they'll be having more fun. I want as many people as possible to enjoy Starcraft, and in the long run, a more transparent ranking system would (in my opinion, and depending on method) hinder the community more than help it. I wouldn't be surprised if Blizzard did integrate this though, as nearly all of TL wants it (and understandably so).

In a selfish way, I'd prefer to have global rankings. But I also am heavily concerned with SC2's accessibility. I don't want all the newer players solely playing UMS because they see they're rank 10,000. I want them to have a chance to experience the true essence of Starcraft and continue to have enough incentive to stick around.

I think it's important to have this discussion, and express the community's yearn for this feature, but I would hope if Blizzard decides to listen, they integrate it in a fashion that doesn't hinder SC2's already abysmal accessibility to new comers.

P.S. I love your site and use it all the time!

On May 23 2010 14:49 gk_ender wrote:

This is a great point on integrating new players, which is why i suggest, instead of us having to create this content, blizzard could do something to help it out, like create a global ladder separate from the regular b net ladder. Because the issue as it stands is, who knows what division is good and what divisions not, there are far to many random players who simply dont get to play eachother because the isolation that blizzard is creating, and simply dont have the information about who else is good besides the more famous players.

Also I want to point out to this "business" standpoint is this, 10 years of starcraft was not done by casual gamers. A ladder with 3000 players at any given time playing hundreds of thousands of games, was not done by the casual gamers. An e-sport that has taken over crashed every livestream type website by sheer numbers of people watching players "explain" or stream live games, was not created by casual gamers. And millions of dollars in tournament prizes, advertisement space, and television networks was not created by casual gamers. So the idea that it is the smartest thing from a business perspective to cater to casual gamers always sounds so ludicrous to me, because the money is in completion.

Not to mention I dont think any casual gamer is going to go, oh shucks im not on the top of my ladder I hate this game, because if they did, theyd probably try to get to the top of their ladder, in which case theyd literally seise to exist as "casual gamers." So plz blizzard your sparing no one.

who knows what division is good and what divisions not