With Apex Legends’ latest season well under way, Respawn Entertainment has released a blog detailing their findings on the current Ranked experience. With current LP distribution resulting in a shift towards having too many Master players, a new Apex Legends ranked update slated for Season 18 will tighten LP gains and improve matchmaking, among other things.
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Respawn posted a graph showing the Ranked ladder distribution for Apex Legends’ playerbase, which shows a staggering amount of players in Masters tier:
According to Respawn, this inflation of Masters players is due to bugs and “generous” LP tuning, which gives players more LP per win than necessary. Moving forward in Season 18, these gains will be decreased, and players in Diamond+ can expect higher stakes in their matches to make it more difficult to reach Masters.
The generous LP gains provided by the current Ranked system have also affected matchmaking, resulting in games where players of completely different MMR ranks may be matched together due to having similar LP rankings. Season 18 will now focus on matching players who are “actively challenging their MMR” for more competitive matches regardless of what rank you play at.
Aside from matchmaking and LP tuning, Respawn has also addressed various other issues, including queue times, match quality, and end game, among other things. While these changes may result in quite a few players reaching lower ranks in Season 18 than before, it should provide a more competitive ranked experience for all skill levels.
Source: EA