EPTThe recent active player-base has been dwindling for 1v1 and this has been a major concern for me. Recently, I looked at my own situation to see if there could be some solutions.
I played a fair bit of 1v1s in the past but stopped due to the amount of stress they caused me. At the start of each new season, I would play 1 game to be placed and would then stop there. I wanted my 1v1 rank to be my 'serious' ranking. I considered my team ranks to be my fun ones where I would try builds and play the random race.
Lately I started a small dedicated team rank (3v3) that we have taken seriously (playing 1 race only, after warm-ups and learning from mistakes). We have had some success and fun doing this and I realized that this could become my new "serious" ranking. I then decided, after much deliberation, that I would stop caring about my 1v1 rank and play the random race on it for fun only. This has been a great success and I have started playing a lot more 1v1s lately.
I then thought: could something like this be the solution to increase (or at least maintain) the active player base on the 1v1 SC2 ladder? I know a lot of people want to keep their 1v1 ranking as their 'serious' ranking so I decided it would be a great idea to allow an account to have multiple 1v1 rankings. I have created a poll below to see whether people would like this idea and see how many 1v1 rankings would be preferable. I understand that having unlimited (or just too many) 1v1 rankings would lead to a lot of smurfing and abuse so I have limited the options to 1 through 4 (explained in the poll).
Poll: How many 1v1 ranks should an account have?
4 (1 for each race) (1458)
56%
2 (1 main and 1 fun) (474)
18%
1 (stay as is) (393)
15%
3 (1 for each race - no random) (297)
11%
2622 total votes
2 (1 main and 1 fun) (474)
1 (stay as is) (393)
3 (1 for each race - no random) (297)
2622 total votes
Your vote: How many 1v1 ranks should an account have?
(Vote): 1 (stay as is)
(Vote): 2 (1 main and 1 fun)
(Vote): 3 (1 for each race - no random)
(Vote): 4 (1 for each race)
Personally, I would like to see 2 1v1 rankings (in my case: 1 main, 1 fun).
Happy polling! Please post if you have further ideas or comments!
(Clarification: You can think of these seperate 1v1 rankings as "teams" as posted by a very helpful liquidee)
(More Clarification: It's not just about the points, achievements or the rank you are in but more importantly about what MMR you have which affects how well you get matched up with an opponent)
Also, before you start saying I'm a noob or post something moronic like that, I used to be in 1v1 Diamond, now in Platinum. I have ranges of Diamond and Master in team league. Cheers.
-- UPDATE - October 18th, 2011 ---
56% of players (1438) wanted 4 rankings (1 for each race).
18% of players (468) wanted 2 rankings (1 main and 1 fun/off-race).
15% of players (387) wanted it to stay at 1 ranking.
11% of players (294) wanted 3 rankings (1 for each race - no random).
Here are the summarized results and some interesting points from the conclusion of the first poll (October 18th, 2011) and discussion:
- A seperate ranking for each race option on the 1v1 ladder stream would make the most sense if multiple rankings would be implemented. This would simplify ladder rankings in that each player could potentially have a zerg, protoss, terran and random ranking and MMR. Perhaps the Grandmaster league would let in the top race ranking per player only.
- A practice ladder was proposed and some details of how people would like it to work were ironed out: the ladder would not affect your ranking or MMR but would use your MMR to match opponents. I am not keen on having a practice ladder as this would surely curtail the use of the real ladder.
- Very few players seemed adamant about keeping only 1 ranking per player for 1v1. The reasons were usually concerns over smurfing. I must state, however, that I do not think this is valid as the match-making system should match people up correctly shortlfy after starting a new ranking (as it currently does).
- Adding multiple rankings should keep the flux of active players on the ladder the same or increase the amount of active players (fear of off-racing ruining your ladder rank would be gone thus encouraging people to play more 1v1 ladder).
I have continued this discussion on the SC2 Battle.net forums:
http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/3413401490#1
. Also it doesnt matter for me whether there is 1 account for each race, since i am just gold and looking to have fun. I just fear the ladder 
