[#SomeChanges Suggestion] Removal of arena titles and end of season rewards from 2v2 and 5v5 brackets

[Nazpvp]

The removal of titles and end of season rewards from the 2v2 and 5v5 arena brackets has been a topic of discussion among players for quite some time. I believe there is a reason Blizzard removed rewards from these brackets originally, and I think they should consider removing titles and end of season rewards again in their classic predecessors.

Here's why:

Uncompetitive Gameplay:

• 2v2 and 5v5 arenas in Cataclysm have long been criticized for their lack of competitiveness. Unlike the 3v3 format, which demands strategic depth and balanced compositions, 2s and 5s often devolve into matches driven by burst damage or sheer numbers. This undermines the essence of PvP, which should reward skill, teamwork, and strategy.

• It is the general consensus among the arena community that 2v2 specifically in cataclysm is simply not that fun due to long drawn out games as a result of dampening not existing, or dominant easy to play comps such as hunter rogue. It is not uncommen for games in 2v2 to go 30+ minutes and reach the maximum time limit.

• PvP is at its best when it's competitive, strategic, and most importantly, fun. Unfortunately, many players feel that the 2s and 5s arenas in Cataclysm fail to deliver on these fronts. By removing these formats, we can refocus our efforts on enhancing the 3v3 arena experience.

MMR Exploitation:

• In the 5v5 bracket particularly, players have been exploiting the MMR system to secure easy Rank One and Gladiator titles by coordinating with friends or even alts, some players artificially inflate their MMR, allowing them to face significantly lower-rated opponents.

• It is no secret that teams will que 5s at times with very low activity for example any time from 6am-5pm. High MMR teams do not que up until later in the evenings, and as of result of this teams can almost guarantee they will play extremely low MMR teams and consistently farm wins that give them a +1 gain with almost 0 risk involved.

• A prime example of exploitation of the MMR system within the 5v5 bracket can be seen from the last two WOTLK seasons: WOTLK Season 8 Rank One Standings: https://imgur.com/a/h9MjuyZ WOTLK Season 7 Rank One Standings: https://imgur.com/a/VS002eI

• It is no coincidence that 12 of the 13 players that achieved rank one in season 8 in 5's were the exact same rating at 2517, with the last player of that group being just one point ahead at 2518. These players communicated through discord or other means of communication to all farm easy +1 wins at low activity times and sit at the same rating.

• The exploitation of MMR creates unfair advantage and diminishes the prestige associated with these titles. It is no secret players throughout Wrath of the Lich King have been abusing the MMR system mainly in the 5v5 bracket.

• Titles like Rank One and Gladiator are meant to be prestigious achievements, earned through dedication, skill, and perseverance. When these titles are obtained through exploitation rather than genuine competition, it devalues the accomplishments of those who have earned them legitimately.

Spreading the Arena Community Too Thin:

• As we saw in WOTLK, arena participation was very low in what was glorified to be one of the best PVP expansions ever. Was participation low, or is the arena community being split too thin?

• With titles and end of season rewards being obtainable in 2v2, 3v3, and 5v5, this spreads the PVP player base which is already relatively small among 3 different brackets.

• If titles and end of season rewards were only obtainable in the 3v3 bracket, the game would feel much more alive and fun as a result.

Ultimately I believe arena titles and end of season rewards should only be obtainable in the 3v3 bracket. 2v2 and 5v5 can still exist for fun but they should not be receiving completive rewards and I think most of the arena community agrees upon this topic.

Key Takeaways:

2v2:

• Uncompetitive gameplay, and was not designed to be competitive in Cataclysm which is why titles we're removed from it in original Catacylsm
• People will continue to play 2v2 even though it is unplayable and uncompetitive as long as there are title rewards from it which is unhealthy for the game

5v5:

• MMR exploitation is too easy which devalues the accomplishments of Rank One and Gladiator titles from those that have truly earned them.

[Apesznw]

It is pretty absurd to see the amount of abuse that goes on in the 5s bracket for sure. The most prestigious and most strategic bracket, by far, is the 3s bracket. Would love WoW to go back to having titles only in 3s going forward.

[Thedream69]

As much as I hate to say this but I think 2v2 should at least reward Gladiator title + Mount. It's the easiest bracket to get into and not everyone can get a 3v3 team together to push for titles due to schedules etc. 3v3 should be the only bracket that awards Rank1 titles + mount. 5v5 has been a collusion bracket for the entirety of WOTLK and should award no titles. I myself would prefer only 3v3 for rank1 titles but I know removing 2v2 completely could potentially jeopardize the arena player base which is something that's not worth messing with in it's current state.

[Nazpvp]

As much as I hate to say this but I think 2v2 should at least reward Gladiator title + Mount. It's the easiest bracket to get into and not everyone can get a 3v3 team together to push for titles due to schedules etc. 3v3 should be the only bracket that awards Rank1 titles + mount. 5v5 has been a collusion bracket for the entirety of WOTLK and should award no titles. I myself would prefer only 3v3 for rank1 titles but I know removing 2v2 completely could potentially jeopardize the arena player base which is something that's not worth messing with in it's current state.

The arena community has essentially come to the realiziation for the most part that cata 2s is not enjoyable nor competitive. People would have much more fun in 3s if that is the most active bracket. Having too many brackets where titles are obtainable splits the player base way too much and makes it feel less alive.

If everyone was pushing 3s for titles the game would feel so active.

[tmpnm099]

Unfortunately I think it would be dangerous to interfere with 2s. Finding partners has always been the bane of arena, and in classic 2s has served as an "easy access" bracket. 5s however is a low activity, gatekept and corrupt bracket. If people weren't playing it early season for a higher cap, it would have no titles in the first place. They'd still manipulate the ladder to stack on the singular spot available though.

[Nazpvp]

Unfortunately I think it would be dangerous to interfere with 2s. Finding partners has always been the bane of arena, and in classic 2s has served as an "easy access" bracket. 5s however is a low activity, gatekept and corrupt bracket. If people weren't playing it early season for a higher cap, it would have no titles in the first place. They'd still manipulate the ladder to stack on the singular spot available though.

With everyone playing 3s there would be no problem finding partners. If you have not played cata 2s i would suggest you do research on it and you will find that most games are 30-45 mins or go to the timer cap.

[Thedream69]

Unfortunately I think it would be dangerous to interfere with 2s. Finding partners has always been the bane of arena, and in classic 2s has served as an "easy access" bracket. 5s however is a low activity, gatekept and corrupt bracket. If people weren't playing it early season for a higher cap, it would have no titles in the first place. They'd still manipulate the ladder to stack on the singular spot available though.

Agreed. 5s 100% has to go.

[skinnay-dev]

2v2 being easier to get into doesn't justify having titles, the bracket isn't gone and you can still queue it for fun/practice. And retail having 2s titles removed for many years since original WotLK makes calling it "dangerous" a bit silly.

[tmpnm099]

Both TBC and WotLK had many match ups with incredibly long games as well, and people play it by choice, incentivized by rewards. It doesn't change the fact that given the opportunity, 2s will always be the most active bracket. There's no good reason to take that away from them. 5s is an entirely different case, directly opposite on the spectrum where it will always be the bracket with the lowest activity. People have voted with their "time" and opted out of it almost entirely if you don't include capping arena points. However as suggested by @Thedream69, a possibly middle ground would be to restrict R1 to 3s.

[Nazpvp]

Both TBC and WotLK had many match ups with incredibly long games as well, and people play it by choice, incentivized by rewards. It doesn't change the fact that given the opportunity, 2s will always be the most active bracket. There's no good reason to take that away from them. 5s is an entirely different case, directly opposite on the spectrum where it will always be the bracket with the lowest activity. People have voted with their "time" and opted out of it almost entirely if you don't include capping arena points. However as suggested by @Thedream69, a possibly middle ground would be to restrict R1 to 3s.

The easiest bracket to get titles will always be the most popular. Hence why solo shuffle is the most popular on retail and why 2s is popular on classic. That does not mean at all that it is good for the game.

[skinnay-dev]

5s is a small population, R1 2s is a small population. It will help to some degree but it won't do much towards the goal of making 3v3 an active, thriving bracket unless you get the larger pool of 2s glad/duelist players involved.

[Rio2345]

I agree, 2s requires next to no skill to get titles and in cataclysm 2s as a bracket is so bad due to long drawn out games and two comps being extremely dominant. 3s is much more balanced and competitive to play.

5s for sure needs to be removed as there is no competitive integrity in that bracket at all.

[tmpnm099]

In my experience 5s has always been the easiest bracket to get titles in and yet its not enough to drive activity there. I don't think it's up to us to decide if people want to compete in 2s, which they clearly do.

[Cataenjoyer]

2s and 5s titles NEED to go.

5s is just corruption at its finest and people doing whatever it takes BUT actually play the game to get rank one or gladiator.

2s was fun but the cata meta in 2s does not seem enjoyable at all and i would much rather have 3s be active

[tmpnm099]

Why should you decide on behalf of other people what they should play? If 2s will be as "unenjoyable" as you suggest, wouldn't that naturally drive activity to 3s? There's no reason to take away their choice.

[Cataenjoyer]

Why should you decide on behalf of other people what they should play? If 2s will be as "unenjoyable" as you suggest, wouldn't that naturally drive activity to 3s? There's no reason to take away their choice.

People can play what they want but ultimately people that originally loved 2s myself included are now discovering that 2s is not fun at all nor completive in catacylsm. It should not reward titles or mounts

[Iceblockxx]

Please remove 2s and 5s titles. There was a reason they did it in original wrath of the lich king. 3s is the best showcase of skill out of all of the brackets, it should be the one that gives rewards.

[Balofowow]

2s and 5s are garbage brackets thus titles should only be awarded in 3s for the health of the pvp ladder, 2s was not meant to be played competitively in cata since titles were removed in original wrath and the game is not balanced towards 2s and 5s.

[dedestus]

i fully agree with this post. 5vs5 has been nothing but some "mafia" gatekeeping titles basically throughout all of wrath of the lich king. tbc was similar but not to this extent since it had more rank 1 spots but cataclysm will end up like wrath of the lich king so i beg you blizzard, please remove gladiator/rank 1 titles from 5vs5.

2vs2 gladiator/rank 1 titles should also be removed but more because of balancing issues since back in the day the game was not meant to be balanced around 2vs2 after titltes there got removed during season 7 (yes you did it back then already, no clue why you did not do it in classic wrath of the lich king)

titles up to duelist should however still be awarded in those brackets, just not gladiator or rank 1.

[CarloHormoz]

Most of the good points made really only apply to 5s exploitation.

I don't see much of a point in removing the 2s bracket titles completely. You can see plenty of people on the ladder that aren't gladiator+ in 2s who do not participate in 3s. Doesn't seem worth it to lower 2s and possibly overall participation in hopes of improving 3s. Most people that strictly play 2s do it because it's less stress / serious than 3s, but still fun to chase gladiator ranks. Maybe only r1 in 3s is a good compromise, but no glad/mounts in 2s seems gatekeepey as hell for minimal benefit.

Also, looking at the 2s and 3s ladder for Wotlk US S8, you can see some classes were very unviable in 3s (rogue jumps out as an obvious one) but were R1 in 2s. Meanwhile ele shaman is the opposite. Meh in 2s, dominates 3s. Sure it may be unbalanced (wow is unbalanced), but having 2s and 3s adds to the balance of arena overall. It allows certain classes to get titles that may not be feasible in other brackets.

[Kenniflopper]

Completely agree, 2s is super drawn out in Cataclysm, not a fun bracket for anyone apart from the 2-3 god tier comps, usually ur stuck in 30-45min games and if the enemy really wants to draw the game, they can do that easily. and 5s is just being exploited as many have stated in here.

[dedestus]

Most of the good points made really only apply to 5s exploitation.

I don't see much of a point in removing the 2s bracket titles completely. You can see plenty of people on the ladder that aren't gladiator+ in 2s who do not participate in 3s. Doesn't seem worth it to lower 2s and possibly overall participation in hopes of improving 3s. Most people that strictly play 2s do it because it's less stress / serious than 3s, but still fun to chase gladiator ranks. Maybe only r1 in 3s is a good compromise, but no glad/mounts in 2s seems gatekeepey as hell for minimal benefit.

Also, looking at the 2s and 3s ladder for Wotlk US S8, you can see some classes were very unviable in 3s (rogue jumps out as an obvious one) but were R1 in 2s. Meanwhile ele shaman is the opposite. Meh in 2s, dominates 3s. Sure it may be unbalanced (wow is unbalanced), but having 2s and 3s adds to the balance of arena overall. It allows certain classes to get titles that may not be feasible in other brackets.

i disagree, first of all we should never look at the NA ladder for title distribution, secondly all classes were viable to get a r1 spot in 3vs3, most people did not bother because they could just do it in 2vs2 and not care. if people are worried about the number of spots available if the other brackets get removed, blizzard could just give r1/glad to 0.2% or 0.6% w/e 3vs3 players instead of 0.1%.

[CarloHormoz]

Most of the good points made really only apply to 5s exploitation. I don't see much of a point in removing the 2s bracket titles completely. You can see plenty of people on the ladder that aren't gladiator+ in 2s who do not participate in 3s. Doesn't seem worth it to lower 2s and possibly overall participation in hopes of improving 3s. Most people that strictly play 2s do it because it's less stress / serious than 3s, but still fun to chase gladiator ranks. Maybe only r1 in 3s is a good compromise, but no glad/mounts in 2s seems gatekeepey as hell for minimal benefit. Also, looking at the 2s and 3s ladder for Wotlk US S8, you can see some classes were very unviable in 3s (rogue jumps out as an obvious one) but were R1 in 2s. Meanwhile ele shaman is the opposite. Meh in 2s, dominates 3s. Sure it may be unbalanced (wow is unbalanced), but having 2s and 3s adds to the balance of arena overall. It allows certain classes to get titles that may not be feasible in other brackets.

i disagree, first of all we should never look at the NA ladder for title distribution, secondly all classes were viable to get a r1 spot in 3vs3, most people did not bother because they could just do it in 2vs2 and not care. if people are worried about the number of spots available if the other brackets get removed, blizzard could just give r1/glad to 0.2% or 0.6% w/e 3vs3 players instead of 0.1%.

Do you have anything that backs the claim that people didn't bother due to 2s being available?

[Scrynax]

To begin with I would like to remove 2vs2 glad/r1 rewards from the bracket as that should only stay as a fun thing to do (as someone mentioned here). I would be open to keep titles from 5vs5 if there was enough interest from the community as I find it less evil and rather relaxing bracket.

I believe 5s bracket was removed completely at the end of MoP.

Aside from end of season rewards there should be dampening (even its one of the worst game designs to ever exist in WoW) considered for 2s in order to close games before reaching maximum limit.

Another thing to consider would be restricting certain composition in 3vs3 / 5vs5 bracket.

Such as (3vs3): Double healer, triple DPS, classes that can play TANK specs...

[uzbuzbuzb]

I wasn't a fan of the idea when people suggested it for TBC/Wotlk but for Cata it REALLY should be done imo :)

[Bhot92]

Both TBC and WotLK had many match ups with incredibly long games as well, and people play it by choice, incentivized by rewards. It doesn't change the fact that given the opportunity, 2s will always be the most active bracket. There's no good reason to take that away from them. 5s is an entirely different case, directly opposite on the spectrum where it will always be the bracket with the lowest activity. People have voted with their "time" and opted out of it almost entirely if you don't include capping arena points. However as suggested by @Thedream69, a possibly middle ground would be to restrict R1 to 3s.

This would kill the game so fast.

[Bhot92]

Titles in anything but 3s needs to go. Should have happened in wotlk. Having the title in 2s just obliterates 3s and some classes are just immensely worse to play in 2s. I'm not even talking in terms of balance, they are just lame in 2s.

[Bigslappyx]

Be careful what some of you wish for. Remember that there's about 300 of us that play this game at a high level (in NA). MMR gaps are everywhere and queues are often dry at high MMR (even for 2s). If we're going the 3s only route, we certainly would need rating decay over time as well as an MMR squish. The amount of time I've tried to queue R1 MMR range 2s and get no queues is comical. Perhaps this is more of an NA problem, but it's very common. We need MMR decay above all (certainly not inflation like we have now), but besides that, forcing 3s will only reduce the amount of people playing in an already niche segment (arena) of a niche expansion (Cata) while 4 other versions of WoW are still offered (Era, HC, Retail, SoD).

If you want a game where high MMR 3's are only accessible from 10pm-2am and be forced to schedule your queue sessions as an adult, then by all means, 3's only. If you want to be able to play mostly when you want to against a variety of teams, 2s is all we have left. Remove 5s bracket entirely. Keep 2s titles.

Active season = MMR decay, MMR squish, and only the highest team gets Rank 1, like the old days.

[CarloHormoz]

Titles in anything but 3s needs to go. Should have happened in wotlk. Having the title in 2s just obliterates 3s and some classes are just immensely worse to play in 2s. I'm not even talking in terms of balance, they are just lame in 2s.

Why? Ele shaman was lame in wotlk 3s. It's not a great argument. People play for fun not balance. There's no data to back the claim that 2s is cannibalizing 3s.

Relegating everyone to 3s will piss off any spec that is stronger in the 2s bracket, creating more of a headache for blizzard. They don't intend to do any pvp balance. Leave some rewards for 2s, and let people compete in the bracket in which they are stronger.

[oldspices]

imo its going to hurt arena participation in general. personally i hate 3s and 5s and wont play them. its hard enough to find one good partner for 2s....

i love 2s and thats all ill play . fast ques any time of day basically. also will there be solo que 3s? there should be for us people who dont have every rank1 player on speed dial.

[Nazpvp]

imo its going to hurt arena participation in general. personally i hate 3s and 5s and wont play them. its hard enough to find one good partner for 2s....

i love 2s and thats all ill play . fast ques any time of day basically. also will there be solo que 3s? there should be for us people who dont have every rank1 player on speed dial.

2s in Cataclysm is not fun nor competitive with games consistently going 35+ mins. If 2s and 5s titles are removed finding partners for 3s would not be a problem because the pool of players would be so large.

As seen from this post, the majority of players prefer 3s in a competitive setting, and what would make the bracket the best is if 2s and 5s titles are removed.

If 2s and 5s titles stay in the player base will be way too split again in later seasons and all the brackets will be borderline dead.

[SimonBpvp]

My two bob: Cata 2s is rubbish, it should be deleted altogether, but for sure don’t have it give titles.

I don’t know much about wrath but as far as I know certain specs like SP were not viable in 3s pre s8? So maybe it makes sense that they had a fair chance at a title? Cata isn’t really like that, you can queue 3s on anything. I’m not talking shit on wrath just saying that it’s diff.

[Rivahlol]

Would be nice to have some communication about this. Cataclysm was not an extension designed for 2v2, in original cata, we couldn't get any kind of titles in this bracket. Originally, the game wasn't made for it. In my opinion, and due to Blizzard removing all the rewards in 2v2, it is just a bracket made to learn a class/spec or to warmup before playing 3v3. Allowing it now, wouldn't make any sense, i'm sure 99% of the pvp players understand this, games just can't end and is too unbalanced in 2v2. Hoping to have some transparency on what will be the final decision on this important topic.

[oldspices]

Would be nice to have some communication about this. Cataclysm was not an extension designed for 2v2, in original cata, we couldn't get any kind of titles in this bracket. Originally, the game wasn't made for it. In my opinion, and due to Blizzard removing all the rewards in 2v2, it is just a bracket made to learn a class/spec or to warmup before playing 3v3. Allowing it now, wouldn't make any sense, i'm sure 99% of the pvp players understand this, games just can't end and is too unbalanced in 2v2. Hoping to have some transparency on what will be the final decision on this important topic.

I think they just need to add dampening. or maybe restrict titles to a much smaller pool or something like that for 2s-

people here don't realize that most people on this GitHub are arena addicts (myself included) and what we think is "good for the game" may not be what's good for the greater population of the game

[Rivahlol]

Would be nice to have some communication about this. Cataclysm was not an extension designed for 2v2, in original cata, we couldn't get any kind of titles in this bracket. Originally, the game wasn't made for it. In my opinion, and due to Blizzard removing all the rewards in 2v2, it is just a bracket made to learn a class/spec or to warmup before playing 3v3. Allowing it now, wouldn't make any sense, i'm sure 99% of the pvp players understand this, games just can't end and is too unbalanced in 2v2. Hoping to have some transparency on what will be the final decision on this important topic.

I think they just need to add dampening. or maybe restrict titles to a much smaller pool or something like that for 2s-

people here don't realize that most people on this GitHub are arena addicts (myself included) and what we think is "good for the game" may not be what's good for the greater population of the game

i think this is a bad idea, it'll just favor some comps over the others and be even more unbalanced

[ratzy1]

Would be nice to have some communication about this. Cataclysm was not an extension designed for 2v2, in original cata, we couldn't get any kind of titles in this bracket. Originally, the game wasn't made for it. In my opinion, and due to Blizzard removing all the rewards in 2v2, it is just a bracket made to learn a class/spec or to warmup before playing 3v3. Allowing it now, wouldn't make any sense, i'm sure 99% of the pvp players understand this, games just can't end and is too unbalanced in 2v2. Hoping to have some transparency on what will be the final decision on this important topic.

I think they just need to add dampening. or maybe restrict titles to a much smaller pool or something like that for 2s-

people here don't realize that most people on this GitHub are arena addicts (myself included) and what we think is "good for the game" may not be what's good for the greater population of the game

3v3 has some additional stepping stones to get into yes, like finding an extra person or a healer for example. But I do believe if you have everyone actively queuing 1 bracket only for titles - it will in turn make it a better experience for most, if not all players who are actively seeking titles.

Even myself as mainly a retail player, I'm not even a glad on classic and only played 1 season of WoTLK but I find the imbalance of 2v2 very frustrating and do not enjoy 45min War/Hpal, Lock/Hpal ect. And that was just in WoTLK, Cata 2v2 is even more imbalanced from what I've seen and remember. Yes ofc you can say "well if you don't want long games play double dps" but you can bet people are just going to play whatever gives them the best chance of winning, even if that is a dampener. 3v3 seems like the games are a great pace: not too slow, not too fast.

I also feel like the number of viable comps in 3v3 in Cata is tenfold of WoTLK. Meaning you can do well, with a lot more things then just Thunder/LSP or some variant of each. 2v2 and 5v5 titles were taken out of the game for a reason, I'd like to think Blizzard recognizes that and does it again.