i made a thread about this a while ago, nobody came up with any legitamate problems with it. as for your points, i hated how rank was forcibly reset in reach, as did many others obviously (poor population). I think h2/3 did it almost perfectly but a rank reset could have fixed many issues. i present to you my plan on the perfect 1-50 ranking system:
This visual in game ranking system is what SHOULD be implemented for Halo 4’s matchmaking.
Main Characteristics: Based on Halo 2/3’s 1-50 ranking system with some small tweaks to curb cheating and general unfairness that comes with any ranking system. I will not go into detail on how those ranking systems work because any competant halo player already knows, I will only highlight changes.
The reason why we see so many people complaining and crying about how 1-50 ranking systems will pretty much be addressed by the following (with exception to those people being upset because they aren’t good enough to achieve the rank they want [probably the biggest reason for complaining])
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Boosting/DeRanking and how to stop it:
First off, you can’t fully stop boosting in a ranked playlist, its just a part of the game, but this will help to curb it. In halo 3 from time to time it was common to run into a deranker. I noticed this a lot in team dubs (partially my fault for always playing on my own). They would either quit out at the start of the match, sabotage you, or on occasion help you win and quit out at the last second. The only way to deter from people deranking is to put a restriction on the account to not allow a player access into the ranked playlist until they hit a milestone, for example SR50. There will certainly be a lot less people willing to derank AFTER they invest the time into reaching SR50. Especially because the derankers are using a 3 day to 1 month xbox live pass for their deranking account, now such a short xbl pass becomes a problem.
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The Purchasing of 50’s & Becoming “Rank Locked”
Let me say this to start. I really could care less is some scrub feels the need to buy a 50, it doesn’t bother me, in fact, I think its kind of funny. If you are a competent player you will be able to see they are terrible and didn’t earn their 50 very quickly. It doesn’t really undermine the system because to be honest, what is there like 5% of all 50’s purchased, big deal.
People also complain of becoming Rank Locked, which was actually annoying. Halo 3 was the first game I played a lot of online. I was a noob at first, but I became pretty good after learning the game. I progressed to about a level 43 or 44 (cant remember) but had a hard time getting over the hump. I believe part of that was because I had so many games logged that I got at least partially rank locked. Of course I could have played better or played with friends more often.
The solution to this problem is simple, 343 should allow people to reset their rank back to 0 2-4 times a year in a 2 week period in ANY playlist AND they should allow you to prestige your rank once/if you hit 50 back to 0 (Might as well, they already ripped off most of CoD anyway). When I was stuck at 43, I could have reset my rank to 0, cleared my true skill and worked my way back up the ladder with a fresh start.
Now lets say you earned yourself a 50 and you want more motivation. You reset your rank (but keep your General or whatever status and visual marker that you are indeed a General) and work your way back to 50 vs other people that have done that too (to make it fair for people who are new). Then once you get to 50 again you can be a 2 Star General and then reset your rank again and go after 3 Star or something to that equivalent. This system will also combat boosters because sure anybody can buy a 50, but can that person then earn a second 50 after they purchase it, NO. Also it would increase the amount of work (thus deter) people from wanting to start boosting up to a 5 Star General after of course leveling that character to SR50. If you want to complain that there won’t be enough people to compete against at that point than they can lump Gen. Grade 2+ all together or something. Also, there were many people who achieved a 50 and because they were scared of losing it for whatever reason, they would stop playing in that playlist even if they really wanted to play it; this system would fix that problem.
Resetting your rank back to 0 (from below 50) will put you back into play with everybody (except Generals who prestiged) but the MM system can primarily try to match you up against those who have also reset. Because you would only be able to do this a a few times a year, there would be an influx of others who have reset for you to match up against to help keep newer players and those who are legitimately terrible unaffected by the influx of more skilled players.
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Cheaters/Modders
There will always be cheaters at any game whether its a video game or pro sport. However, Xbox Live is pretty good at detecting and banning cheaters/modders, at least its way better than PC, Wii, and PS3. The only real cheating that can be done is by people who use Jtag’d or RGH’d 360’s that can also unban themselves from xbox live which is possible but very very very rare. I played a lot of Reach and ran into only one modder that was doing stuff like that. The only other forms of cheating are lag switches and bridge hosting which is watched by the ban hammer and whose detection can always be increased. I guess you can lump HLG/hiders into this category too, but if you look up hiding spots on youtube than you can end that pretty quickly on your own.
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Egotistical A-holes, Trash Talkers, Mean People
MUTE THEM, MUTE THEM, MUTE THEM, MUTE THEM.
Also Play Social, Or maybe just trade in your 360 for a Wii and play animal crossing because as long as their are headsets some immature people are going to be annoying.
TL:DR
A ranking system is needed to increase the longevity of the game. Arena in Reach was a joke and not even a consideration IMO. If you think 1-50 ranking wasn’t fair you are either bad at the game or had minor gripes that I addressed with easy fixes above.
Please let me know what you think, I would be interested to see feedback and/or constructive criticism. Do you think 343 would ever implement something like this?