Riot Games has released a developer diary update detailing the two new ranked tiers for LoL in 2019. There will be two new ranked tiers for the upcoming year: Iron and Grandmaster.
The Iron Tier will be at the very bottom of the ranked ladder. It will allow players to feel a sense of achievement when they see their progress from Iron to Bronze. One issue that the dev team highlights in their video is the disparity in the climb. Often times players feel as if they are improving over the months, but they don’t see a significant rise in their ranks. This is because of the structure of the rank system. The dev team gives an example of some tiers such as Gold, where a few wins or losses can move you, several divisions, up or down.
We wanted to solve that problem because ranks like Diamond, Master, and Challenger should have a consistent meaning. Our first idea was to break Master into divisions and make it work more like the tiers below it. Ultimately, we didn’t feel like that would do enough to differentiate the tiers and make them feel meaningful; we were worried it could make a new Diamond V-style meme out of Master IV. With divisions, you’d get a more accurate rating but not an especially meaningful one, which would only end up solving half the problem.
A sense of Improvement for players
But at the same time, in other ranks such as Bronze might not see a significant improvement in the divisions despite being much better. With the new tiers, Riots Games wants to give players a sense of improvement in the game. The addition of more ranks definitely provides players with a sense of development and progress.
If you’re Master or below, you might be worried that we’re just adding more distance between you and your Challenger dreams, but our goal is actually to kill a meme: the Diamond V scrub. No offense, but the meme exists because there’s a very real skill difference between the top and bottom of Diamond—and it turns out this is true within most of the top tiers. This difference in skill muddies the meaning of the entire tier as well as the achievement of reaching it.
In order to compensate for the addition of new ranks, Riot Games will reduce the number of divisions per rank. While previously, every rank would have five divisions, the new system will feature only four divisions per rank. So there won’t be any meme of a Diamond 5 player in LoL anymore.
New Visual Updates to the ranks.
In addition to the changes in the ranked ladder, the ranks themselves will also be getting a visual update. While previously ranks would just be a metallic color representing the ranks, the new update will bring several artistic updates.
League of Legends tournaments, like CSGO, have been updated throughout the two new tiers, as well as affecting the csgo gambling space.
The new rank logos definitely provide a very visual look that aptly demonstrates the feel of the rank you have reached. So while a lower rank like Silver would show off a soldier, higher ranks would have wings and more details. This would demonstrate a higher tier just like in real life armies.
You can check out further details of the new competitive system on the official webpage.