Colosseum: Ranked Battle Changes

Ranked Battles offer the most competitive mode available in Conqueror's Blade. We’ve always strived to have players feel and experience their own development as they climb the ranks, and for each rank to be seen as a milestone of that growth.

Our long-term goal is to make Ranked Battles into an experience that revolves around competitiveness and cooperation. We have developed plenty of changes, big and small, in previous Seasons, with the biggest coming in Helheim when we changed the previous scoring mechanic.

We received plenty of feedback from players throughout the latest Season, and your responses helped us realise the true competitive state of the new system, as well as areas for improvement.

Evaluating the Current System

We added star protection throughout the ranks of New Blood to Gladiator, but when we looked at the results, this protection did not enhance the experience of earlier ranks, and instead robbed players of a sense of achievement and competitiveness for ranks before Gladiator. A completely safe battle with nothing on the line is unfair to those who give their all in every battle.

This protection has also made it possible for players to reach the rank of Arena Hero where they would not have been able to otherwise. All in all, this has given the ranks of Arena Hero and Imperial Hero negative vibes. Those capable of reaching the rank on their own and those who wouldn't have been able to otherwise all made it to the rank of Arena Hero. As they clash, the latter is met with players of much greater power, while the former gets matched with weak allies.

Additionally, Arena Hero and Imperial Hero ranks gain as much from a win as is lost from a loss, which leads to frustration. As your stars are protected, players who are at just the right power level for the ranks fall into a never-ending cycle of win-lose.

The current state of the final rank, Grand Champion, is closer to what we want to see. However, one shortcoming is that the top players stop caring about winning and only about getting the MVP, so they stop working with teammates. This goes against our idea of Ranked Battles being a cooperative experience.

Incoming Improvements

We are making big changes in the upcoming Season, Conqueror’s Blade: Colosseum, to try and improve Ranked Battles:

We're Removing Star Protection & Extra Score for Grand Champion MVP

We have thought long and hard about removing star protection, and we believe that it only serves to add more pressure overall. Removing this mechanic is important and we want to make up for this loss of protection in another way. Our goal with the MVP getting an extra score was that each player would give each game their all, and for there to be possible rewards even in defeat. The actual effect this system had was different from our aspirations, and we want to realise our initial goal in another way.

We’re Introducing New Rules: Points

Allow us to introduce the new Points system:

1. You will be able to earn Points by playing well in Ranked Battles and by raising your ranking. The top 5 players on the winning side and the top 10 players on the losing side will earn Points.
2. Points can be used when you lose a match to protect your stars/score. While at max Points, you also get an extra star. Players in the Grand Champion rank can use Points to protect their score.
3. The Points required to protect your stars/gain an extra star differs based on the rank, with the cost going up at higher ranks

Our goal with star protection is to improve the overall experience of Ranked Battles, and we'll be using Points to this end. Our first step in ensuring a better experience has been to give Points to the top five of the winning team and ten on the losing team. Players stuck in limbo with win-loss, win-loss in the Arena Hero and Imperial Hero ranks will accrue Points throughout this which they can use to raise in rank. The MVP will no longer gain extra points in the Grand Champion rank, but instead, the top five on the winning side and ten on the losing side will be rewarded. This will mean that each player will want to strive for the win, as opposed to getting the MVP.

These changes will speed up your Ranked Battles journey, which is why we've added new stars to some ranks to keep the pacing solid. We've added 1 star to the Rookie, Contestant, Brawler, Fighter, Slayer, Gladiator and Arena Hero ranks.

We hope that these changes encourage more players to join Ranked Battles, to fight tooth and nail, and help reduce behaviour that negatively affects the game, such as idling and throwing games.

Future Changes

We will continue to improve on Ranked Battles in the upcoming Colosseum Season and keep an eye on feedback from our community. We want to hear your ideas on how to improve Ranked Battles so that we can create a competitive, cooperative and rewarding experience, so please share your thoughts via Discord!

IMPORTANT: This article is accurate as of the time of publication but may be subject to change. Please read the Colosseum patch notes throughout the new Season for the latest information!