"Rank" VS "Skill"

[Kokuendan 10]

"How much the skill level of a player is related to his rank?"

This is a question that is pretty much haunting me since I started playing the game 4 months ago, it seems that having average skills and netdecking can carry you very far if you have enough time and I feel that the game as it is can be mostly draw and match-up based, so it's hard to me to judge a  "good" player as opposed to a "bad" one.

To worsen the situation, Youtube Comments. That moment when an argument inevitably starts and insults fly and I start seeing like "Rank 20 loser (in truth, they use a word that you can guess but I don't remember if the forum allows it so I'm not risking)" but at times the mentioned rank gets up as far as 10, people saying that Legend is easy and you get "at least to" Rank 5, and me having problem to get to Rank 10 doesn't exactly boost my confidence.

Then the Server part appears where people start saying NA is easy, EU and Asia is where you find the challenge and a whole other pile of stuff.

Last thing, I feel that since I started the level got raised quite a lot, I remember ranking from 25 to 20 was easy the first time, but now I actually had problems (admittedly it was Wild, but I still faced Control Warrior at 24, and I spectated C'thun Druid VS Aggro Shaman at 23).

So to sum it up, how much of a connection resides between "Skill" and "Rank" and at what Rank can you roughly consider yourself a "good" player?

 

 

[positiv2 953]

Those players in comment section who say that legend is easy usually haven't got past rank 5. The main difficulty in reaching legend is that rank 5 onward doesn't have win streak, so you have to win over 50% of games, and the progress slows down significantly. You have to be in the better half of players who got to rank 1, which isn't easy itself, to get to legend. Legend IS hard.

You can get to rank 5 even with winrate lower than 50% (45% is still somewhat manageable) thanks to winstreaks, but it takes sooo much time. However, some players are willing to invest that much time and reach at least rank 5 every season, and then say that you should get to rank 5 hurr durr. However, they don't get farther than that because, as I said previosly, those ranks stop having winstreaks, and they don't have the skill to get 50%+ WR. So, don't worry about not getting rank 5 each season.

Blizzard's blogpost  "You are better than you think!" says that when you reach rank 10, you are already in top 7,5% of players. Even rank 15 means top 25%. That means you are in the better half of players.

NA is generally thought to be easier as (from what I have heard) players who play on EU get better winrate on NA, and vice versa. Asian servers are said to be the real challenge as there were cases when a pro NA/EU players lose on ranks 25-20 (for example Amaz). I personally play on NA and EU. The ladder feels about the same, but arena feels easier on NA. However, lower ranks (20-15) on NA are much more pay-to-win with more full-budget decks.

So, you can consider yourself as a relatively good player when you reach rank 16 or 17 - that's where you are in the better half. However, I wouldn't differ between "good" and "bad" player by ranks, as good ranks don't mean real skill. Tournaments are in my opinion one of the best ways to see how good a player is.

[PancakeMonk 12]

hey there kokuendan ..first of all the rank you achieve has nothing to do with how good you are in the game for many factors 

basically you would want to look at it like the following then evaluate 

1- what deck are you mainly using on the ladder in which meta 

2- time invested in reaching a specific rank 

3-how your overall drawing quality was in all of your games you played through that period ..sometimes you are having rng on your side sometimes not ..but again its up to you to get the most out of you hand 

so dont be frustrated because the game is not that linear when it comes in evaluating your skill ,so relax and maybe watching some pure salty pro players might make you feel better :P ... enjoy the game man its all about having fun in the end so dont be to hard on yourself :)

[Mursilis 34]

Same thoughts have gone through my mind while I played.  I also see the comments on how getting to rank 5 should be easy and if you can't, then something is wrong with you.  Ignore them.  A lot of it depends on what decks you play, how much you actually play each month and what your personal goals are for HS.  Personally I only get in 4-5 games a day, and I switch between the 9 different classes constantly to get the daily quests done.  So my highest rank in having played for over a year is 12, and I only did that once.  But rank isn't a worry for me, I just do this for fun.  So overall I feel I'm decent, but not spectacular. In the end whether you feel you are a good player or not is really up to you, and whether you are enjoying yourself or not.  As long as you're having fun, keep at it.

Besides, reading the comments in any YouTube discussion is just toxic, just don't and you'll be a happier person.

[Kokuendan 10]

First of all, thanks for participating in the discussion, I mostly wanted some feedback on this since there were so much contrasting opinions on it, about me I can say I'm a F2P and I started not too long ago so while I'm more of a Control player (based on my other TCG experiences) I'm forced to play Aggro and I had to basically "learn how to go face".

Aside this, I find that lately I haven't much control over my games in standard since I'm facing competent enough players that the most relevant part of it becomes the card draw (I had disgusting games on Wild where I won lost games by double Fireballs or a guy that while I had 3 health and him 1 topdecked Arcane Intellect into Azure Drake and thankfully nothing else).

I do think however that this game is unforgiving, I lost a game on turn 1 once because I misclicked and played Clockwork Gnome instead of Tinkertown Technician and that single choice forced me to play from behind the whole game and I never recovered in the end. The skill is a factor so subtle in this game that it doesn't surprise me that most players believe luck reigns sovereign.

So, as a player that before getting stuck gets at least to around Rank 10 I should be actually ok, right?

1 minute ago, Mursilis said:

Besides, reading the comments in any YouTube discussion is just toxic, just don't and you'll be a happier person.

It's like Junk Food, not good for your health but can't help but eat it.

[positiv2 953]

Rank 10 is perfectly okay.

Sometimes the game is unforgiving where one single misplay costs you the game, sometimes playing like trash will still result in victory. It's all about how the opponent is able to punish you for the misplay.

If you are forced to play aggro because of low amount of dust, I can help you out, if you want. Just PM me your deck(s) and/or your collection (you can sync it through Innkeeper or add it manually on hearthead).

[Kokuendan 10]

23 minutes ago, positiv2 said:

Rank 10 is perfectly okay.

Sometimes the game is unforgiving where one single misplay costs you the game, sometimes playing like trash will still result in victory. It's all about how the opponent is able to punish you for the misplay.

If you are forced to play aggro because of low amount of dust, I can help you out, if you want. Just PM me your deck(s) and/or your collection (you can sync it through Innkeeper or add it manually on hearthead).

About unforgiving games, I just came out from a bit of ranked in Wild, just hit Rank 10 from Rank 12, then 2 consecutive losses and back to 11, it seems like a curse because one was a close Zoo (I needed a Fireball to win and it just didn't came) and the second one was a Freeze Mage (Alextrasa on curve and he drew both the Ice Blocks AND the Pyroblast). In my perspective they were close enough, and the funny part was that I fought 2 Rank 10 to get the rank myself and I dropped to 11 by fighting another Rank 11. Seems just a matter of patience here.

About the decks, I'd gladly take your help even if I'll probably stick to aggro for now, true bred control seems too expensive, at least until I get the last LoE wing and I finally get the damn Pillager that's in every Rogue ever (by the way, it's normal that the Innkeeper link leads me to Amaz?).

[mimech 24]

Interesting.

This thread makes me feel better about my performance in ranked.  I was watching a Kripparian video the other day and he was saying something like "so if you only reach, say, rank 2, hey - even rank 6 - don't feel so bad", and I was thinking "man, I must suck: I've never reached rank 6".

So, it's really nice to have the reminder that (for example) rank 14 puts you in the top 25%.  

[demonardvark 556]

In many ways too with card games how much money you throw at the game can greatly help your standing. I invest only 10-20 dollars a month at best into hearthstone and a buddy has dropped thousands. Of course he has better cards by far and even has decks that are all full legendary just for the luls. Now hearthstone does have ways to get the same cards for free but you have to put extraordinary amounts of time into the game to obtain them. Most things are pay wall locked in a lot of ways. So you get people who will dump incoherent amounts of money into the game so they can wave around their internet erm wave around their false pride. 

sorta reminds me as a kid playing yu-gi-oh. every weekend there was a tournament at the local card shop. the same four guys were always in the top. they would come in and blow entire paychecks on boxes of cards. one kids dad would come in and just outright buy decks. like buy each individual supah rare card. i remember the one deck ran up a tab of 3,400 dollars. dad just threw money at it.

now of course skill and luck do play a part. however, its hard to build a Ferrari out of sand and glue. so with only X time and X currency to invest obtaining rank 15 can be a huge accomplishment. especially at the beginning of the month when more vested players are trying to burn their way up the ladder. so as with everything money wise, people will troll and gloat and crow, ignore them. if you play and have fun whatever rank you reach is a worthwhile accomplishment :D Think in some ways musicians. There are exceedingly talented musicians who will never reach the public eyes, and then there's Miley Cryrus.

[Damien 1,514]

I'd say that starting with Rank 5, you're decently good :p There's still a huge gap before you reach the level of someone like Sottle, let alone an actual pro.

[Kokuendan 10]

That was a nice example, especially because I'm so familiar with that background (losing to shit players because you lacked that quality was hard indeed).

Honestly, if it wasn't for the Rank 5 golden epic reward I wouldn't be that concerned with the constructed rank (300 dust are a lot of difference when scavenging for dust like a hungry hyena), aside the fact that in my opinion it makes grinding gold less boring than casual because playing loads of games with aggro isn't the most fun thing ever and at least having some achievement to it is a nice distraction.

The other side of it is that unless you have faced accomplished players and got a good game out of it there's not much real way to estimate your skills outside laddering (and that takes serious amount of times) since the "OMG all the legendary cannot beat his wallet" argument doesn't go far when the 2k dust aggro is the game right now, so there are times where people may feel the need to assest if they are good or not at the game.

[positiv2 953]

That is why arena is better. No matter how much the player spent on the game, he will get his average based on his skill. On top of that, if a player is able to average above 7 wins, he can have an infinite dust mine and Shrek and wreck the ladder. So, in the end, money don't matter if a player is good enough.

1 minute ago, Damien said:

There's still a huge gap before you reach the level of someone like Sottle, let alone an actual pro.

Shots fired.

 

[Damien 1,514]

Just now, positiv2 said:

Shots fired.

 

Haha, I'm just checking if he actually reads this forum :p

[batanete 28]

After you manage to reach ranks 3-4 getting legend is just a matter of how invested into the game you want to be.

I used to keep track of what match ups I was facing and try to tech my decks according to them, as well as giving some serious analysis to my gameplay for each match up and what I could do to improve it and increase my win rate. Even went as far as writing a python program to keep track of all this. In the end, I managed to hit legend rank 157.

Nowadays I just don't have the patience to take Hearthstone as seriously, and usually just grind rank 5 for the end of season rewards. I face some pretty awful players at any rank above 5, as well as the odd decent one who probably also can't be arsed grinding legend. 

With this in mind I'm going to say that having a high/low rank doesn't necessarily reflect skill level, but good players tend to be the ones with the highest rank MOST of the time.

[PancakeMonk 12]

14 minutes ago, batanete said:

With this in mind I'm going to say that having a high/low rank doesn't necessarily reflect skill level, but good players tend to be the ones with the highest rank MOST of the time.

This (Y)

[batanete 28]

Something I'm going to go ahead and mention though, a "good" hearthstone player isn't as easy to spot on ladder as some people make it sound(mostly because you have no sure way to know what decisions he had to make without fully knowing his hand).

Hearthstone is a very RNG based game, and the "better" players are, by definition, the ones that make it the most likely to win games. Just because you beat someone after getting a perfect curve of threats with a deck like shaman or midrange hunter, doesn't mean the guy you just faced didn't make the correct decisions to increase his odds of winning over the course of the game.

Likewise, just because you got steamrolled yourself or your opponent had double call of the wild from his Yogg-Saron doesn't necessarily mean you got beaten by an actual better player, or that he played that individual game better than you did.

Edited July 12, 2016 by batanete