This is how it used to be:
http://i.imgur.com/0JArBCj.jpg
As you can see from being around 88% now it dropped to below 70%
WHY DO YOU THINK THIS HAS HAPPENED?!?!
Stevev4554 votesthe second time you get to a promo series you start with 1 win now. It wasn't like that before.
Apocyliptic6 votesThis and I doubt that the percentages have ALWAYS been steadily at 88%. I'm sure they fluctuate throughout the years, and it's got very little to do with the changes the game has gone through, I believe.
It's honestly hard to rule out if it's just randomness or some change(s) that have been made, which to me, that signifies randomness more than anything.
ShinkoMinori3 votesIn Season 1-2 it used to be fixed at 90% the seasons afterwards fluctuated around 88% but stayed around that area, first time it has dropped like this, now even less than 70%, and the season isn't over so it might drop even further.
blackfootedfox6 votesbut the flip side to that is the percentage could rise before the end of the season too
Simplicate3 votesOf course it will, boosting an still in issue.
Mig891 votesWhy is your graph dated 2013?
Serika Zero3 voteslook at the tiers: bronze, silver, gold, plat, dia, challenger what we currently have now is bronze, silver, gold, plat, dia, master, challenger
i think the addition of master tier was done in season 4. So, the graphs are before s4
ShinkoMinori1 votesWAS THE ONLY GRAPH I COULD FIND
Serika Zero1 votesoh, i'm not bashing on your findings. I just explained why it looks different and why its dated as 2013 sadly, the time of the year when its taken also matters a lot as even on the same year, they are different between start and end ^^"
chipndip111 votesWell, there's that new thing where if you repeat promos, you get a free win until you're PLATINUM. Start with that.
Last year ~70% of the population per server was Bronze/Silver, give or take depending on the region (where more skilled regions had more Gold/Plat players). I'm still seeing about 70%...
Linna Excel10 votesThe most interesting thing I see on that link is 1.5 less deaths is all that differentiates challenger from bronze. I thought bronzies fed more than that. Challangers also only by 2 more wards per game on average. There's also a 19 CS difference.
So all you need to do to get from bronze to challenger is die one and a half times less, buy and use 2 more wards, and get 20 more CS.
Kodyack4 votesThat's also a product of better opponents, mechanically, though.
If I play against bronze players, you can be SURE i'll get more kills and die less than nearly any of them. (proven anecdotally by a guy who wanted to 1v1 my summoner level 6 smurf... and lost)
but against my own rank? it's more even.
in fact, as much as I hate to say it, that's good evidence of decent match-making.
(the wards thing is interesting, but seeing as pink wards are the only wards now, good placement can last games)
TotalJerk5 votesSince bronze players no longer have to pay for wards they've been a lot more prone to use them, plus there's less wards to go around period in challenger.
Apocyliptic24 votesWell, thing is, Challengers are also facing Challenger level opponents... think about it, they are facing people of equal skill level, which to you is exactly like playing at your elo... see what I'm saying yet?
If you stuck a challenger in bronze, there's a reason they'd hard carry, but it's not because of 20 more cs and 2 wards.
Disco Djanet1 votesthe game time is longer in bronze.
IAMS4T4N10 votesdynamic queue boosting its so obvious
AdeBug2 votesoh definitely, and smurfs. cus what works, fair or not, is deemed to be used more. bring back solo q! bring back solo q! who's with me?
ACENOX8 votesmaybe because the number of players have decreased because people stopped playing dynamic queue? is there a way to know?
HateDaddy8 votesThere's also a point where it should be accepted that the general population has simply gotten better. Honestly, s6 plats would stomp s1 plats, it's not insane to imagine the lower end of the ladder would improve, too. There's more general information about the game, there's universally a better understanding and grasp of how to play and it's mechanics and a few small changes make in addition to that, it doesn't shock me.
Bronze players are definitely better now than they were 4 years ago, though people don't like to hear it, there's still very little that separates bronze and silver players, even low gold. It's just that entire population has vastly improved compared to what they were in the past. Trust me, you don't know bad until your top morde with TP/Ignite is 0/11 spamming "gibbe all ur monee"
Ash Roller5 votescomparing plats in s6 to plats in s1 isnt fair because they are playing practically different games the reason why its like this is prob because of a change in the ranking system theres always going to be bad players
edit: also worth noting plat in s1 isnt even the same thing we had a true skill rating back then
underscores2225 votesConsidering the Imgur image says it was uploaded 3 years ago, I don't think this data is relevant. There is also no dates in the data (such as 2015, 2016 or season 5, season 6)
If I remember correctly, however, three years ago League changed how the ranked system works, moving it to the point system from a ladder system, and consequently they lost the ability to dictate exact percentages for each tier.
JerulEon5 votesI find it funny how Bronze 1 and Silver 5 are just enormous in size now and disrupts the once smooth log curve.
PiVoRx5 votesDynamic Boost working as intended. And Riot will only see adventages of it.
DeathBurst5 votesThis is interesting, and a good piece of evidence to show that DQ is distorting the ladder. (EDIT: assuming the data is right, which I have no way to check, and some people here say it is not. Also, it's a piece of evidence, not a definitive proof. There are plenty of other hypothesis that could explain that, like the free win mechanism for promo series.)
But!
Who cares if you are Silver or Gold? What I see is that there is still less than 10% of players in Plat+, and that as I always suspected, the masses of Silvers being boosted all the way up to D5 by their friendly Challenjour friends are a bloody legend.
ThePartyLeader4 votesSo that's 2013 and 2014?
Wolfram Oxford4 votesDynamic boost perhaps...
Celeste Benal4 voteshttp://na.op.gg/statistics/tier/
Plz just use the current information. At the beginning of the season, the distribution is more of a decaying curve. Once bronzies start to climb, its not unusual for some of them to end up in silver. 70% of the player base in NA is still bronze or silver. This has not changed. Its also roughly the same distribution as last year at this time. (Yes, I checked back then, too.)
Sammystorm2 votesBut you don't understand by using inaccurate data that is pro solo queue the op gets upvotes.
Zero0004 votesHow do you know this season is the season with lowest % of bronze and silver players of all time? All you are showing is an graph. We have no idea if its real and from which season it is. Since there is no Master it should be Season 3 or even befor that.
In Season 1 only 25% were bronze or better, 10% were silver or better. With every season it changed, especially when there was a new tier. Like diamond is season 2, challenger in season 3 or master in season 4. So the only season which should be similar in tier distribution to season 6 is season 5.
And even if there is a big difference in the tier distribution, we don't know if it is because of the DQ, like some claim, or if Riot just changed the requirements.
Edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/3c0wvi/player_tier_distribution_euwnaeunekr/ here they talk about the tier distribution in season 5 around july
EUW Tier // Percentage // Cumulative Percentage Challenger // 0.0092% // 0.0092% Master // 0.04% // 0.05% Diamond // 2.18% // 2.23% Platinum // 8.67% // 10.9% Gold // 25.1% // 36% Silver // 49% // 85% Bronze // 15% // 100%
So around july.2015 15% were bronze, now it's 29,55% 49% were silver, now it's 39,15% 36% were gold or higher, now it's 31%
Which mean there are more(%) bronze and silver player then last season, at least in euw.
DREADN0UGHT1 votesDid u take the UK into account?
Daddy Gangplank4 votesBoosting.Most people that got out of silver and bronze are boosted.
DREADN0UGHT1 votesMost people that got out of silver and bronze are not braindead
FTFY
dragon1xx3 votesTFW you are part of that Bronze crowd still......
Wheatloaf3 votesIt could be that people who haven't played ranked much historically (including myself; been silver II or I most seasons, just recently promoted into plat) are now playing more ranked. Old champ select was pretty toxic. Regardless of your opinion on DQ, you have to admit the new champ select has been an improvement.
Or it could just be boosted monkeys. I'd place my bets on a mix of both, plus some of the possibilities all of the other nice people in this thread are pointing out.
Noblewind3 votesLess new players in Ranked and new players from last year improving. They also added the bonus win for when you get demoted and get back to a series. I think this helps out people stuck in bronze to get out more than other divisions.
Lirik3 votesi know why, its called DynamicQ bullshit queue
Vistha Kai2 votesThose graphs are pretty old, though. Will never believe the population of EUW multiplied by x2.5 in a year.
Weathered2 votesIts because I got to gold ;)
BloodyTompon2 votesFirstly, I can't find that graph/data on the na.op.gg. Where are you finding the different regions? Where are you finding the different years?
The ranks are only an overlay for MMR. The TL:DR is Riot has made the tiers less strictly bound to MMR. The reason this has occurred is due to some changes in the way people are demoted and promoted. E.g., it's much more difficult (or is it impossible?) for people to change from Silver => Bronze. If I recall correctly, and I usually don't, they made it impossible to fall from Silver to Bronze last season. That's why the shape went away from a smooth curve.
To address a common theme. The player base becoming better does not lead to this. The only thing that leads to the graph morphing from the first to the second (assuming the data is fine) is changing the algorithm that ties MMR and Rank/Tier. The algorithm is now more lax.
MMR is what's called an ordinal system i.e. it puts things in order (First, second, third..... ) The Tiers in the first graphs are coded such that 50% of people are in bronze, 30% silver etc. In the first graph, if everybody got better at the same rate, there would still be no Tier progression for two reasons. a) the order has not changed. First is still first. Second is still second. Third is still third. et cetera. b) The Tier overlay is much more strict. As soon as there are there are too many people in one tier it spits them into another. If there are too few, it snatches them from a neighbouring tier.
In the second set of graphs, there is more leeway in the tier overlay. For instance, there is now less than 50% of people allowed in bronze.
GULAG 4 U2 votesDynamicQ getting those boosted animals outta bronze
Lugg2 votesPeople are getting boosted really hard this season. Plus people are spamming the hell out of the stupidly broken champions this year.
Dotte2 votesDid they die?
Kodyack1 votesI don't mean to sound cynical or put a damper on the DQ hate, as I hate it too, but the AVERAGE should be around sliver 3... yes?
so... wouldn't it make sense if the MOST players were closer to silver 3 than not?
mathmatically speaking, it would make perfect sense for a drift that has the most players in silver rather than bronze, as the system starts out assuming everyone is a low/mid silver level of play.
if it started by assuming everyone was bronze 5, then the shift would be more noticable but... yeah..
edit; to clarify, it would make sense if the average, being in silver, meant that over time more people shifted upwards to accomadate for that "average", with the most noticable increase being in gold and the largest decrease in bronze.
LazyW0lf3 votesEven if it assumed the average player was to be placed in Silver 3, the graph should've became a exponential curve by now. Also, looking at the link he provided (as of the time of posting) the majority of players are in Silver at 39.05% rather than all the seasons before being Bronze (which is now at 30.31%) which is not okay.
Kodyack1 votesperhaps, but neither of those graphs have dates, I acutally think that the second one, with the non-exponential curve, was from when the LP system was introduced, or sometime in season 3 if I remember when I looked at a graph that looked remarkably similar to that one.
deadlychuck1 votesClearly everyone got good
shalexade1 votesPlat is the new Gold.
Taco15181 votesWell, I'm still stuck in bronze. This chart doesn't pertain to my knowledge.
WoonStruck1 votesI think its more proof that the bullshit gating mechanism of promotion series is, indeed, bullshit.
