• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EDT 17:06
CEST 23:06
KST 06:06
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
[ASL22] Ro8 Preview: In A Tizzy2[ASL22] Ro16 Preview: Holy Diver5[ASL22] Ro16 Preview: Rough Waters10[ASL22] Ro24 Preview: Siren's Call8[ASL22] Ro24 Preview: Summer's End9
Community News
Weekly Cups (Sep 7-12): SHIN, ByuN, MaxPax double down1StarCraft open world shooter announced at BlizzCon101Weekly Cups (Aug 30-Sep 7): herO thrives amid growing schism10Official StarCraft website teases new content ahead of BlizzCon?179Stellar Fest TWO the Moon (Dec 16-20)9
StarCraft 2
General
StarCraft open world shooter announced at BlizzCon Balance hotfix patch 5.0.16b (July 16) SC4ALL II: StarCraft 2 Player Announcement 8/8 The Death of Cheese: From a Professional Cheeser Yamato Cup Series
Tourneys
2026 GSTL Announcement Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament RSL Revival: Season 6 - Qualifiers and Main Event RSL goes to London! 2026 Offline Finals Nov 21-22 SC2 AI Tournament 2026 Fall
Strategy
[H] ZvP Mid-Late Game: Stalkers Collossi HT
Custom Maps
Nexus Wars 2021 GUIDE [M] (2) Industrial Park
External Content
Mutation # 544 Double Trouble The PondCast: SC2 News & Results Mutation # 543 Enhanced Defenses Mutation # 542 The Ascended
Brood War
General
Bot on ladder an AI researcher's take on the ladder bot BGH Auto Balance -> http://bghmmr.eu/ [ASL22] Ro8 Preview: In A Tizzy BW General Discussion
Tourneys
[BSL23] SM: Ret vs TerrOr -> DragOn vs StRyKeR [Megathread] Daily Proleagues [ASL22] Ro16 Group D [ASL22] Ro16 Group B
Strategy
Cliff Jump Revisited (1 in a 1000 strategy) Replay Review Process - What do you do? Simple Questions, Simple Answers Odyssey Mineral Stack Saturation
Other Games
General Games
Nintendo Switch Thread Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread EVE Corporation Diablo IV
Dota 2
Dota 2 Champions League Season 3 Begins April 25! Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion
League of Legends
[TL LoL EUW IHs] Teemo shall perish
Heroes of the Storm
Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug
TL Mafia
TL Mafia Community Thread
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread Things Aren’t Peaceful in Palestine All you football fans (soccer)! Russo-Ukrainian War Thread Canadian Politics Mega-thread
Fan Clubs
MarineLorD Fan Club The Creator Fan Club The ShoWTimE Fan Club
Media & Entertainment
Movie Discussion! [Manga] One Piece Diablo Animated Series on Netflix
Sports
Football (Soccer) Thread TeamLiquid Health and Fitness Initiative For 2023 MLB/Baseball 2023
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
Computer Build, Upgrade & Buying Resource Thread
TL Community
Recent Gifted Posts
Blogs
Gaming Intensity, Problemati…
TrAiDoS
38 yo Retired SWE loo…
PurE)Rabbit-SF
Can Bots Beat Pros?? Starcr…
namkraft
[meme] I finally understa…
LUCKY_NOOB
Regacy Esports:Our Goa…
regacyesports
Dreaming of BW patches (mod…
c3rberUs
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 10277 users

[R] Ladder Rank Distribtion

Forum Index > SC2 General
Post a Reply
1 2 Next All
Commodore
Profile Joined January 2008
United States97 Posts
March 16 2010 17:49 GMT
#1
How is Blizzard distributing players into the different ranks in the SC2 ladder? i.e. what portion of players are platinum, gold, etc?

There was a post about Iccup's distribution a while back, and it was determined that at the higher ranks, there are much fewer players.

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=99016

On August 03 2009 11:34 Commodore wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 03 2009 10:35 stroggos wrote:
A+ .05%
A .14%
A- .36%
B+ .48%
B .68%
B- 1.4%
C+ 1.9%
C 3.3%
C- 7.7%
D+ 14.8%
D 62%
D- 7.1%


[image loading]
Inschato
Profile Blog Joined November 2009
Canada1349 Posts
March 16 2010 17:56 GMT
#2
Well, I am in bronze division 26, I don't think there are nearly that many platinum divisions, so obviously there is some difference (I don't know precisely how many there are in each league, and that would take some work to figure out as far as I can tell)
3.
Dionyseus
Profile Blog Joined December 2004
United States2068 Posts
March 16 2010 18:03 GMT
#3
I know there's at least 57 copper divisions, i'm pretty sure there's more than that because that division is filled up. I know there's 19 platinum divisions, there may be a 20th or 21 but I haven't seen anyone from those yet.
9/5/10 P acct: NA D 10,683 651pts 69w56L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/290365/LetoAtreides T acct: NA D 16,137 553pts 70w67L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/1560008/Khrone Z: NA G 16,058 465pts 28w26L http://www.sc2ranks.com/us/1997354/Omnius
MMmmmmmmmm
Profile Joined May 2009
United States36 Posts
March 16 2010 18:04 GMT
#4
im bronze 45
ForTheSwarm
Profile Blog Joined April 2009
United States556 Posts
March 16 2010 18:06 GMT
#5
MOAR MATH POSTS!!!!!!!

Go commy! Ha ha. I'm actually interested to find this out as well.
Whenever I see a dropship, my asshole tingles, because it knows whats coming... - TheAntZ
Go0g3n
Profile Blog Joined December 2009
Russian Federation410 Posts
March 16 2010 18:07 GMT
#6
I'd say there are 60 platinum divisions in all 3 realms combined, about 100 players each, - 6k out of 25.000 testers, of course, mostly StarCraft and WarCraft enthusiasts.

Using the graph above, I'd say everyone above D+ is in platinum.
Perseverance
Profile Joined February 2010
Japan2800 Posts
March 16 2010 18:07 GMT
#7
Hopefully the distribution ends up being somewhere near ICCUP's as I would like Platinum to actually mean something.
<3 Moonbattles
Irrelevant
Profile Blog Joined June 2009
United States2364 Posts
March 16 2010 18:22 GMT
#8
Meaning something is what the Pro league is for, plat us just to make people feel good about themselves.
Ruthless
Profile Joined August 2008
United States492 Posts
March 16 2010 18:27 GMT
#9
atm there is also another divider, that being the top 8 in each division could be thought of as a seperate "league"
spinesheath
Profile Blog Joined June 2009
Germany8679 Posts
March 16 2010 18:30 GMT
#10
On March 17 2010 03:07 Go0g3n wrote:
I'd say there are 60 platinum divisions in all 3 realms combined, about 100 players each, - 6k out of 25.000 testers, of course, mostly StarCraft and WarCraft enthusiasts.

Using the graph above, I'd say everyone above D+ is in platinum.


Maybe around 50-60 on average, but 100 is way too much. I know platinum divisions with as few as 35 players.
If you have a good reason to disagree with the above, please tell me. Thank you.
HalfAmazing
Profile Joined May 2008
Netherlands402 Posts
March 16 2010 18:35 GMT
#11
Can't wait until they open the pro league. Getting really tired of having to play these imbeciles every game.
You can figure out the other half.
Dionyseus
Profile Blog Joined December 2004
United States2068 Posts
March 16 2010 18:35 GMT
#12
On March 17 2010 03:30 spinesheath wrote:
Show nested quote +
On March 17 2010 03:07 Go0g3n wrote:
I'd say there are 60 platinum divisions in all 3 realms combined, about 100 players each, - 6k out of 25.000 testers, of course, mostly StarCraft and WarCraft enthusiasts.

Using the graph above, I'd say everyone above D+ is in platinum.


Maybe around 50-60 on average, but 100 is way too much. I know platinum divisions with as few as 35 players.


Yea, 100 is the maximum a division can have. Your estimate of around 50-60 on average sounds about right to me.
9/5/10 P acct: NA D 10,683 651pts 69w56L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/290365/LetoAtreides T acct: NA D 16,137 553pts 70w67L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/1560008/Khrone Z: NA G 16,058 465pts 28w26L http://www.sc2ranks.com/us/1997354/Omnius
BlasiuS
Profile Blog Joined September 2007
United States2405 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-03-16 18:47:41
March 16 2010 18:45 GMT
#13
One big difference between Iccup and SC2 B.net is that in iccup, you 'start' at one of the ranks (D). You are essentially assigned a skill-level before you have even played any games.

SC2 B.net is different. Before you play your 1st 10 games, you are unranked, and don't belong to any league.

This helps separate the new players from the established players, which is much better (and helps against smurfs).

I would be interested to know from your pie chart, how many of those D players legitimately play at D rank level, and how many are new accounts/old accounts/smurfs.

edit: I am a C- level BW player, and I reached platinum league easily, and have not moved since I was placed about 3 weeks ago.
next week on Everybody Loves HypnoToad:
Excalibur_Z
Profile Joined October 2002
United States12255 Posts
March 16 2010 19:02 GMT
#14
On March 17 2010 03:07 Perseverance wrote:
Hopefully the distribution ends up being somewhere near ICCUP's as I would like Platinum to actually mean something.


I wouldn't count on it. From what we can gather now, B rank and beyond in ICCup amounts to about 5% of the entire playerbase. Estimates are that Platinum will include roughly the top 10% of players.

If we assume this (and there is no factual basis for this whatsoever):

Pro represents the top 0.1% of players
Platinum 0.1-10%
Gold 10-25%
Silver 25-50%
Bronze 50-75%
Copper 75-100%

Then that will already distribute players more evenly than ICCup, though what the last poster in this thread said about ICCup starting everyone out at D is an important point to remember, as it doesn't factor in inactivity in the way that the SC2 system will (likely by reassigning you as your relative MMR falls compared to others as the overall skill level increases over time).
Moderator
Disastorm
Profile Joined January 2008
United States922 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-03-16 22:43:22
March 16 2010 22:42 GMT
#15
What somoene said earlier about not starting you off at the lowest and work your way up is the biggest flaw in blizzard's system. especially if they plan to make u take the 10 game test every season (not sure if they are gonna do that though). If they do that, that would mean when the new season starts your league would be determined by luck, by who you happen to play in the 10 game placement matches (and since everyone would be the same rank, you have equal chance to fight a good player as a crappy player).
"Don't worry so much man. There won't be any more zergs left to QQ. Lots of QQ about TvT is incoming though I bet." - Vrok 9/21/10
Dionyseus
Profile Blog Joined December 2004
United States2068 Posts
March 16 2010 22:54 GMT
#16
On March 17 2010 07:42 Disastorm wrote:
What somoene said earlier about not starting you off at the lowest and work your way up is the biggest flaw in blizzard's system. especially if they plan to make u take the 10 game test every season (not sure if they are gonna do that though). If they do that, that would mean when the new season starts your league would be determined by luck, by who you happen to play in the 10 game placement matches (and since everyone would be the same rank, you have equal chance to fight a good player as a crappy player).


I think the biggest flaw in the system is that you don't get a seperate rating for each race. I played only as P for my first 300 games, and now I started testing out Z and am getting placed against people as if I were still playing my favorite race, which doesn't make any sense to me.
9/5/10 P acct: NA D 10,683 651pts 69w56L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/290365/LetoAtreides T acct: NA D 16,137 553pts 70w67L http://sc2ranks.com/char/us/1560008/Khrone Z: NA G 16,058 465pts 28w26L http://www.sc2ranks.com/us/1997354/Omnius
duckhunt
Profile Joined June 2009
Canada311 Posts
March 16 2010 22:56 GMT
#17
cool iccup graph =] makes me feel better about my high rank lols
Sere
Profile Blog Joined March 2010
158 Posts
March 16 2010 23:00 GMT
#18
I think at the moment the large majority of it has to do with when you start playing. I was a B- ICCUP player back when I played BW a few years ago but I got stuck in a Gold league. My brother, who has never played Starcraft before, got placed in Platinum (he's really bad) but he got his key two weeks before mine.

I'm guessing he was placed in Platinum because he was one of the first players to join, and they started filling at the top. Likewise, I was placed in Gold because I haven't seen any new Platinum leagues since I started. I've been #1 Gold for a tad over a week, if that matters.
semantics
Profile Blog Joined November 2009
10040 Posts
March 16 2010 23:03 GMT
#19
Quick take the derivative of something!

not quite sure how you can mine the data for your iccup rank and battle.net rank and the data be reliable

might be able to find the data for the b.net rank distribution
Excalibur_Z
Profile Joined October 2002
United States12255 Posts
March 16 2010 23:07 GMT
#20
On March 17 2010 07:42 Disastorm wrote:
What somoene said earlier about not starting you off at the lowest and work your way up is the biggest flaw in blizzard's system. especially if they plan to make u take the 10 game test every season (not sure if they are gonna do that though). If they do that, that would mean when the new season starts your league would be determined by luck, by who you happen to play in the 10 game placement matches (and since everyone would be the same rank, you have equal chance to fight a good player as a crappy player).


Think about how the system operates, and you'll discover why it's vastly superior to the ICCup system (or any legacy system). When you're 0-0 playing your placement matches, your MMR is of course going to be 0 (though this may be influenced by how experienced in RTS games you declare to be when you first start). Let's say the newbiest newb would have an MMR of 0 and the highest end Platinum player would have an MMR of about 3000 (to use WoW arena values).

Your first match is going to be against someone who also has a very low MMR, so probably not a very good player, or someone also on his first placement match. Beating this person will probably net you about 300 MMR.

Your next match is going to be against a rather low-end player, again with a similar MMR. Your volatility rating is still very high because you have so few games played, so if you beat this guy, you'll probably get another 400 MMR.

Game 3 will be against someone who is low-mid range, again similar MMR. You win, and say you get 600 MMR for this.

At this point your MMR is about 1300, and game 4 is against someone who's pretty solidly mid-level. You win this one and get 800 MMR.

Now you're starting to play against people who are pretty good with your 2100 MMR. Let's say you lose game 5. Your MMR falls by about 400, because the system knows that you're better than the 1300 guy but not quite up to the 2100 guy.

Game 6 you win and get 300 MMR, so you go back up to 1900. You still have a pretty high volatility rating, maybe that last game was a fluke. The system still believes you're pretty good, because after all, you've been winning more than you've been losing.

Game 7, you win, you're up to 2400.

Game 8 you're playing against someone who's very good, but you lose. You go back down to 2000 and the system is starting to think that maybe you're not quite as good.

Game 9 you lose again, you go down to 1800. It's starting to get a pretty good idea of where you should be and your volatility drops.

Game 10 you win and you go up to 1950. You get seated in Gold, being among the top 25% of players. This MMR will continue to change, sometimes wildly according to your win and loss streaks, as it constantly determines where to place you. If you all of a sudden get your MMR up to 2600 and hovers around there, you may suddenly find yourself promoted to Platinum.

This is a way better system because those ten placement games more or less put you where you need to be at first. I don't expect people's MMRs to change every season either (there would be no reason for them to do that).
Moderator
1 2 Next All
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
BSL
19:00
S23 - Announcement Showmatch
Ret vs TerrOr
DragOn vs StRyKeR
ZZZero.O222
LiquipediaDiscussion
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
mouzHeroMarine 534
ProTech140
-ZergGirl 89
JuggernautJason62
StarCraft: Brood War
Shuttle 498
ZZZero.O 222
Dewaltoss 113
Trap 40
NaDa 18
soO 16
zelot 9
Dota 2
monkeys_forever226
NeuroSwarm65
febbydoto19
League of Legends
Doublelift2672
JimRising 305
Heroes of the Storm
Grubby3653
Liquid`Hasu593
Khaldor286
Other Games
summit1g3777
FrodaN3058
Liquid`RaSZi2596
B2W.Neo672
KnowMe292
XaKoH 176
ZombieGrub67
Mew2King58
CosmosSc2 17
[ Show 15 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• mYiSmile121
• Reevou 11
• intothetv
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• Kozan
• IndyKCrew
• Migwel
StarCraft: Brood War
• FirePhoenix12
• BSLYoutube
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
Dota 2
• masondota21191
Other Games
• Scarra636
• imaqtpie619
• Shiphtur189
Upcoming Events
Replay Cast
2h 54m
Afreeca Starleague
12h 54m
Shine vs Rush
WardiTV Weekly
13h 54m
Monday Night Weeklies
18h 54m
Sparkling Tuna Cup
1d 12h
Afreeca Starleague
1d 12h
Light vs EffOrt
OSC
1d 14h
PiGosaur Cup
2 days
Kung Fu Cup
2 days
The PondCast
3 days
[ Show More ]
Replay Cast
4 days
Korean StarCraft League
5 days
CranKy Ducklings
5 days
GSL
6 days
Yamato Cup
6 days
Liquipedia Results

Completed

K-JUNGMAN
Blizzard Classic Cup 2026
Big Dog Cup 2026 Div 1

Ongoing

ASL Season 22
Super Anchor Qualifying S3
CSL 2026 AUTUMN (S22)
Acropolis #5
Acropolis #5 - GSA
Calamity Invitational
Logitech G Play Connect 2026
SL StarSeries Fall 2026
FISSURE Playground #3
BLAST Open Fall 2026
Esports World Cup 2026
BLAST Bounty Summer 2026
BLAST Bounty Summer Qual
Stake Ranked Episode 3
XSE Pro League 2026

Upcoming

Acropolis #5 - GSB
Acropolis #5 - GSC
SC4ALL II: Brood War
BSL 23: Non-Korean Championship
HSC XXX
Stellar Fest 2: Lunar Cup
SC4ALL II: StarCraft II
Kung Fu Cup 2026 Grand Finals
RSL Offline Finals
Copium Cup
PGL Major Singapore 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 6
BLAST Rivals Fall 2026
IEM Beijing 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 5
PGL Masters Bucharest 2026
1win Private Club #2
Thunderpick World Champ. '26
ESL Pro League Season 24
Stake Ranked Episode 4
1win Private Club #1
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2026 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.