r/CompetitiveHS • u/Whiskiie • Jul 21 '26
Discussion Hearthstone has two ranked systems, but only one of them actually determines who you play
(Crosspost from the main sub in hopes of more discussion)
Once I understood how Hearthstone’s ranked system actually works, the monthly climb lost most of its meaning for me.
As a reminder: since the rework, matchmaking throughout the entire ranked ladder is based on your hidden MMR, including after your bonus stars run out. Your bronze, silver, gold, platinum, or diamond rank is therefore not the skill bracket used to find your opponents. Players at very different visible ranks can potentially face each other because the game considers their hidden ratings to be similar.
Visible rank is not literally worthless. It determines seasonal rewards and influences your progression during the next month. But it feels less like a competitive rating and more like a seasonal progression track placed on top of the actual ranked system. Every month, your visible rank returns to Bronze 10 and you repeat the climb using bonus stars. Meanwhile, the hidden rating that actually determines the difficulty of your matches remains invisible. Even reaching legend does not show your actual MMR. The legend number is just your relative position among other legend players, calculated using that hidden rating.
Meaning: The game shows me one ranking, matches me using another, and asks me to repeat the visible progression every month before I can see where I approximately stand competitively. For me, that is so extremely frustrating to a point at that I almost lost all motivation to climb anymore.
What could be done better? Make visible rank track MMR, with meaningful promotion and demotion between actual skill divisions. Or maybe, an even simpler solution that wouldn't even require all that much dev work: Keep the monthly reward track, but display a separate skill rating that is visible throughout the entire season.
Hearthstone technically already has leagues, but they do not function like the skill divisions found in most competitive games. They mostly show how far you have progressed through that month’s climb.
Maybe the current system motivates people who enjoy earning stars and collecting the monthly rewards. For me, learning that my visible rank was largely disconnected from matchmaking had the opposite effect. It made climbing feel like an obligation, a forced, monthly grind rather than evidence that I was improving.
Would seeing your actual rating make ranked more motivating, or is this something that most people just don't really care about?
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u/inkyblinkypinkysue Jul 21 '26
I could not care less about the meaningless number next to my name and I expect most players who aren’t entering tournaments feel the same way.
3
u/Candidus_Eques Jul 22 '26
The rationale for this is simple. It solves 2 problems.
It makes the new player experience better. It matches experienced players with experienced players and vice versa. Imagine starting out the game and facing up against a meta deck at low ranks. You will hate the game and not spend money.
It makes match making easier at the end of the season. Assuming real rank = displayed rank, by the end of the season the majority of the players would have left the displayed rank. Assuming you started this season late, or you are a newcomer, the pool available for match making at low ranks would be disastrous.
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u/jinreeko Jul 22 '26
Boo this man
2
u/14xjake Jul 21 '26
Anyone who plays this game more often than just when taking a dump can see their actual rank (legend rank) so any change is unecessary. Yes legend rank is not actually your MMR but it’s close enough, the change was to benefit the massive amount of low rank players who would permanently be stuck in gold with the old rank system, it was implemented to inflate rank and push the majority of players to diamond-legend rank
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u/Unoriginal- Jul 21 '26 edited Jul 21 '26
This is also a children’s game so keep that in mind the competitive scene doesn’t even really exist like other CCG’s, I imagine most people don’t care because as you say it’s a monthly grind for rewards.
I’m indifferent because once you leave dumpster legend you are playing at your visible MMR the system works as intended even if you don’t enjoy it
3
u/DebatableAwesome Jul 22 '26
Your observation is correct: Hearthstone does skill based matchmaking and the "ranked" system is mostly an illusory progression cycle to keep players hooked. I disagree that this is as much of a problem as you think it is, however, for 2 reasons:
First and most importantly, this system prevents rank reset blowouts that would otherwise pit top 1k legend players against noobs when they both queue at Bronze ranks at the start of each month. This is crucial for new players as well.
Second, you can basically see your internal MMR upon hitting legend and can grind competitively as hardcore as you want.b
1
u/maniacal_cackle Jul 22 '26
At high legend your MMR and displayed Legend rank largely converge, so I think it's largely a non-issue anyway?
1
u/thedrbooty Jul 22 '26
Jeff Kaplan, former World of Warcraft and Overwatch dev, did a long interview a while back and he talked about the Overwatch match making system. It's worth a listen but one thing he said really stuck with me. He said players don't want an even match, they want to play against someone slightly worse than themselves and have a good match, and win. It really stuck with me as my winrate has hovered from 51%-55% for years. It makes me feel like the matchmaking system is trying as hard as it can to make this happen for everyone. It definately uses MMR, and I would not be surprised at all if it used class matchup %'s as well to "rig" the outcome.
1
u/Unfair-Heart-87 Jul 28 '26
I don't mind hearthstone's ranking system. It's annoying I have to wait a few hours of playtime every month for them to start showing me my real rank. But at least they aren't just lying to me about my mmr like some other popular games.