I’ve done a lot of thinking about how players measure themselves against each other, various statistics, all the discussions about ranked, arena, 1-50 etc.
I believe Halo 4 needs a seasonal stat and rank reset.
One of the problems all systems of measuring skill or competitive success is one way or another it encourages cheating or farming stats or other ways to artificually increment your “number.”
Resetting this in a new season would actively discourage that.
The system I propose is that every few months, a new season of Halo starts, and everyones kills, deaths, win, losses and competitive rank will be reset. (note, this does not include the rank that you earn with exp from playing or your spartan credits or any of that social stuff. This would also NOT include any hidden ELO or truskill type rank that would be used to put you up against similar skilled players).
A fresh slate for all players.
This will eliminate the desire to boost or farm these indicators for some sort of bragging rights. Eliminate the ability to sell accounts to folks so they can pretend they earned a high rank. It will also foster a competitive environment as each fresh reset provides a new opportunity for players to climb to the top, or defend their position from last season.
The downside, lack of persistance to any stats. However, these could still be available. You could see how players did in previous seasons, or, if you want, what their all time stats are.
However, all time stats would have less meaning. Sure my all time kill to death may be 1.2, but if my recent seasons are all 1.8, its obvious I’ve improved, and folks should and would judge me more on my recent trends rather than how I played 2-3 seasons ago.
A 1-50 type “competitive” rank, or something new along those same win/loss based lines would also exist with its own playlist, allowing players a fresh start in the competitive environment.
The only downside is that in the first few days or week after the reset, you may see some bad matchups in the competitive playlist because good players have been reset to a low rank. But this will sort itself out. And there is really no way to prevent players from simply making new accounts or de-ranking to achieve this anyway.
However, the reset idea will lower the focus on farming these stats and instead focus them as an indicator of natural gameplay. It will also increase enjoyment out of those players having bad games, or getting killed, because their stats wont have quite the same long lasting impact, so they can recover from a few bad nights instead of worrying about how it impacts their stats.
The other downside would be folks who dont want to ‘re-work’ for their rank or stats. However, that in of itself proves that its needed. Stats shouldnt be something you work for, they should be an indicator of your play. And rank shouldnt feel like work to obtain, it should simply be the result of playing competitive matches in an attempt to win.
The reset would refresh players who found themselves stuck at certain ranks, unable to move forward. Giving them a chance to start refresh and see themselves climb the ranks again.
Arena had a lot of things wrong with it, but the concept of resetting seasons was absolutely a good one. Extending it to all statistics would serve to help these stats be an actual indicator of gameplay rather then something to specifically farm.