Patch 16.0 arrived on the servers yesterday with many changes in both Hearthstone and Battlegrounds. Descent of Dragons is ready to be implemented, and three new heroes have arrived in Battlegrounds. In addition to all these changes, another one came along that hadn't been announced, and it had to do with the ranking system — the MMR. The modification was planned to arrive later, but it is already available on Live servers.
The problem
Players with very high MMR continued to climb by playing many games, despite the fact that they played with players with lower MMR. Indeed, the increase in MMR attributed at the end of each match was still very high. Many high-level players then asked Blizzard to adjust downwards, even if it meant a decrease in their rank and the speed of its future increase.
The solution
At a very high level, you are much more likely to face players with a lower or higher ranking than you. In these cases, the multiplier has been considerably increased.
In the old system, if you played against 7 opponents with an average of 1000 points below you, you would still get ~90% of your points for first place. In the new system, you will get about 50% of your points for first place in the same situation (please note that these figures are not 100% accurate). So, if you get 8th place by playing against 7 opponents with an average of 1000 MMR below you, you will now lose many more points than before.
If you are paired against opponents with an average score equal to yours, nothing changes. This means that players around 3,000 to 5,000 MMR will not see any difference.
Players with a very high MMR will see many changes in the way their points are awarded, while the majority of players will not see any change.
In the future, MMR standardization should take place. This means that the level of all players will be reduced to 4,000. The players at the highest level should be reduced to a score of 5,500.
Changes will continue to be made to the way the ranking is calculated in order to provide the best possible gaming experience.
Alongside Descent of Dragons and Patch 16.0, Battlegrounds is also receiving its share of new contents and features: three new heroes and two new minions are entering the fight!
