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The effect of nerfs/buffs on gaining S rank for Mastery

XL BENCH PRESS·7/13/2018, 1:30:25 PM·2 votes·1,729 views

The consensus as to what the criteria for S-ranks seem to be is that this is determined by ratios of KDA/CS/Damage dealt/Damage taken, in some unknown order or combination. This figure is then benchmarked against past performance of other players.

What I’m wondering is that if a champion is reworked or nerfed/buffed, how does this affect the ability to acquire S ranks and therefore Mastery 6/7?

For example, when Zoe released she was WTF OP, but has since had a bunch of nerfs. Are today’s Zoe players expected to hit the same numbers as Zoe players nearer to her release, when people were getting 1-shot with ease?

Or, as another example, when Katarina was reworked, her skill cap was raised quite a bit - were players at that point still held to the same numbers as pre-rework?

No doubt, as time goes on, the benchmark average is forever shifting, but it would still be harder/easier to get an S immediately after a nerf/buff, if the premises above are true.

3 Comments

Ratpie7/13/2018, 2:46:01 PM2 votes

I have thought about this as well. There are certain champs that I could easily get S+ on, but then some nerf or change happens that makes it a lot harder to achieve the same stats and I go from getting S every other game to struggling to get an S- on. So I have some champs sitting at m6 and it is more about getting a random game vs an idiot that feeds rather than showing consistent good play.

Is there a point where the players you are compared to is reset so that you are not competing against previous conditions that no longer exist?

Khristophoros7/13/2018, 4:07:55 PM1 votes

I assume as players continue playing in the new patch, the average performance of that champ will adjust. So even if the champ was doing better/worse last patch you're gonna get millions of new games played that adjust the average. After the champ has remained in a stable state for many patches, the average will be dominated by games played in that champ's current state.