I've never seen the ladder this competitive, with over 200 players participating and almost 150 ranked players many players have suffered a massive ranking loss. This has lead to some of the big names we are used to seeing in the top 30 or even 20 on the second page. The top of the ladder looks to become equally competitive with Dreamer, apr and Ko all gunning for the top spot.

The intensity even seems to have scared experienced players Arun and players like Motocross off!

Your thoughts?

I think the *free* points for the top 30 is an incentive for good players.

Furthermore, better players leads to a higher quality ladder, and a higher quality ladder attracts higher quality players, in turn leading to an even better ladder. Essentially, it's an upward spiral!

It's excellent though - a really good challenge.

I just left because i want all my games to expire. and while they are expiring, i will try to get better at Strategic 1v1, then when all of my games expire, i will try to get in the top 50 or so.

I hoped to get into the top 30 of the ladder, but this competition is quite strong (and i ruined a game I should have won :p) so I think I`ll have to adjust it for now.

I completely agree Dom, I'll have to get my act together and start practising.

It's only unfortunate that all of this will die down with the end of the summer...

looks like we found the first good thing points brought, and its member exclusive: more competition in the ladders

To emphasise the competition:

The top 9 of the ladder are over 2000 rating, and 10th is 1997! That's spookily good!

Well as more and more people buy memberships, they join the ladder. In my early ladder days I was around 100th (very near last :D) Now I have reached the top 70/60 with 200 players in there :)

But equally, as time passes, people drop out of the ladder..

True - the time of year is an important factor. Also looking at rankings there are only 146 ranked players.

once i saw a ball which

Edited 9/3/2013 17:22:56

Possibly. Indeed, I made that point immediately in the first reply. But whatever the reason, the quality level on the ladder has risen immeasurably recently!

Edited 9/3/2013 16:48:38

A ladder milestone: I believe this is the first time the first three pages have been completely filled? 150 ranked players.

Edited 9/6/2013 12:03:11

Last time I tried the ladder (4 or 5 months ago) I made it to 24th place with a rating of 1775. I rejoined a couple of weeks ago and managed to get a higher rating (1789 right now) but only I'm ranked 39th. The ladder is more competitive than i've ever seen.

tell me about it.... im all the way in 18th now XD

[WM]doggy is in 78th! Just let me into WM now! :D jk doggy was a boss on the 2v2 ladder with trillussa

the ladder is an obese middle-aged man. the middle is heavier bit the top is the same. ask dead foxy. he can rejoin and after 15 games he'd be back to familiar territory: #1.

motocros sno one f***ing cares about you, this is about the ladder, not some subaverage player that left the ladder
EDIT: to clarify, everyone elses storys are about their expereince of how it is harder, you seem to think it is waaaaay easier

Edited 9/4/2013 03:14:20

Gotta agree with Gui. The new players are mostly bottom and middle. There are only 20-25 guys I would consider very good on the ladder currently, and that's about how it usually is, ranging from 15-25 depending on the time of year.

To be honest the ladder has gotten easier for me, too, as the surge of players joining the ladder is preventing me from getting 1800/1900 rated people now.

That being said my ranking (as well as everyone else's around me basically) has gone down 10+. :/ Surely, there's a lot of competition now, but if you're outside the competitive range nothing has changed except your rank just shot up 10+.

There should be a lot more quality games with higher-skilled players being matched up against each other more often, though, so there's plenty of content to look over if you're bored :3