Panther
[09] Warrior
These are basically my findings regarding ranked matches online. Note that I only reached C-rank so far and the highest on PSN is B-rank right now, Dinozsc (aka. D.I.N.O. here on the forums).
Ranked matches are a great way to level up your rank and profile level for the game if you feel like playing against people who actually care. The good thing about it compared to player matches is that it simply looks for matches based on your choices, which are just regionally based, and also connection based. From experience, 3+ bars and above is good enough, but the default is set to 4+ bars for an optimal experience. As you should know by now, there will always be lag, but it has been pretty good so far.
Ranked matches are 1 set and that is it. You lose means you gain one loss. There is also no way to punish quitters, people who purposely pull their connections in order to avoid having another loss on their column. It is sad but we have to live with it. As a matter of ethics, I always stay to the end even if I lose. It is great experience when you lose because you can save the replay and you can go over it and ask yourself where you went wrong. It is also a matter of etiquette, be respectful to the other player who is stronger and give them the win. Take the loss as a chance to improve.
Ranked matches are also the only way to increase your own player rank in your player card. You could play a thousand Player Matches and it will not increase your own rank one bit, from what I know. I could be proven wrong, but so far, I tried playing in a few and it never raised my rank experience by any. This included games in Global Colosseuo, random or tournament.
An important thing to note is that your rank does not mean you are a better player. Players with a great win ratio could just have been lucky with their matches. In general, it does mean that the player is likely to be rather good, but go into any match with the mindset that the player knows how to play the game, then observe and play on as you go.
Winning a ranked match usually gives you around 100 base points. You could gain less if you fight an opponent lower than you by one rank (as in, C/D/E as opposed to grade within the rank). The amount you earn apparently depends on your perfects, HP bar left, time left, RO's, and more. This is all guesswork as I had different calculations for different victories, and there is no actual statistic recording mechanism for us to visually observe.
Now here is a short breakdown of the ranks and the ways to level up in them. Everyone starts out at the lowest E5. By the way the colors for the headings follow the dark theme, so if you have trouble seeing them in the light theme, just highlight the words.
E-Rank
This is the rank where you lose or win, you gain experience. You need 600 experience points to reach the next level within the rank (from E5 to E4, 600 experience points, same with E4 to E3, etc.). You gain 45 points for losing a match to anyone from any rank/grade. You gain 100 points or more from winning. Promotion within this rank is automatic. If you have excess experience points, they will carry over to the next level.
D-Rank
This is where you start being a little concerned about losing. However the penalty is very small for losing a match, for example 10+ to 20 experience points or slightly more. It depends, again, on what rank/level you lost to. Winning is based loosely on the same system as E-Rank, so you need not worry too much about advancing.
For promotion within this rank, promotion is automatic but experience does not carry over to the next rank. I might be wrong though. The experience required to reach the next level within this rank is 1000.
C-Rank
It starts getting interesting. At C-Rank you gain lesser than 100 points for winning anyone in E-Rank usually, and what makes it worse is if you only managed to win 3-2 against an E-Rank player, you will gain something like 50-80 points or so (depending on what happened during the match).
You lose quite a bit more points, but nothing you cannot gain back with victories over time. Promotion in this rank is not automatic. You will have to gain all the way to 3000 experience points first. Once you reach 3000/3000, you must look for a C-Rank player to fight against. The words "Rank Up Match" will appear during the loading screen and during the match if this is a match you can rank up with. It need not be a player with the same level as your current C-Rank, any C-Rank player will do. This is why a lot of people are currently stuck in C-Rank in the PSN rankings - they have no idea that they have to use a C-Rank player to promote. Fighting D/E-Rank players gives you absolutely ZERO experience points. Losing to them may or may not reduce experience points. See below.
Now if you failed in your first rank up match, do not worry. Your experience points are kept the same and you are left at +0, and 3000/3000. However, if you fail it a second time, the game instantly punishes you by deducting 200 points from your experience points, meaning you have to regain all 200 points, hit 3000/3000 again to get another chance at the Rank Up Match. This could easily mean the same for losing to D/E-Rank players but I had no chance to find out.
B-Rank
B-Rank seems to work the same way as C-Rank even in terms of promotion. You only need a C-Rank player or B-Rank player to level up, as per D.I.N.O's finding below (see 4 posts below this). The experience points you require is 5000 to advance to the Rank Up Match.
A-Rank
A-Rank takes the same amount of experience at A5 to reach the next rank and should be the same for all levels. Again, you need a minimum of C-rank as your opponent to rank up in the match to the next level. The maximum level is A1, 5000/5000.
If any of the information in here is incorrect please post and let me know and I will correct this first post. Thanks!
Ranked matches are a great way to level up your rank and profile level for the game if you feel like playing against people who actually care. The good thing about it compared to player matches is that it simply looks for matches based on your choices, which are just regionally based, and also connection based. From experience, 3+ bars and above is good enough, but the default is set to 4+ bars for an optimal experience. As you should know by now, there will always be lag, but it has been pretty good so far.
Ranked matches are 1 set and that is it. You lose means you gain one loss. There is also no way to punish quitters, people who purposely pull their connections in order to avoid having another loss on their column. It is sad but we have to live with it. As a matter of ethics, I always stay to the end even if I lose. It is great experience when you lose because you can save the replay and you can go over it and ask yourself where you went wrong. It is also a matter of etiquette, be respectful to the other player who is stronger and give them the win. Take the loss as a chance to improve.
Ranked matches are also the only way to increase your own player rank in your player card. You could play a thousand Player Matches and it will not increase your own rank one bit, from what I know. I could be proven wrong, but so far, I tried playing in a few and it never raised my rank experience by any. This included games in Global Colosseuo, random or tournament.
An important thing to note is that your rank does not mean you are a better player. Players with a great win ratio could just have been lucky with their matches. In general, it does mean that the player is likely to be rather good, but go into any match with the mindset that the player knows how to play the game, then observe and play on as you go.
Winning a ranked match usually gives you around 100 base points. You could gain less if you fight an opponent lower than you by one rank (as in, C/D/E as opposed to grade within the rank). The amount you earn apparently depends on your perfects, HP bar left, time left, RO's, and more. This is all guesswork as I had different calculations for different victories, and there is no actual statistic recording mechanism for us to visually observe.
Now here is a short breakdown of the ranks and the ways to level up in them. Everyone starts out at the lowest E5. By the way the colors for the headings follow the dark theme, so if you have trouble seeing them in the light theme, just highlight the words.
E-Rank
This is the rank where you lose or win, you gain experience. You need 600 experience points to reach the next level within the rank (from E5 to E4, 600 experience points, same with E4 to E3, etc.). You gain 45 points for losing a match to anyone from any rank/grade. You gain 100 points or more from winning. Promotion within this rank is automatic. If you have excess experience points, they will carry over to the next level.
D-Rank
This is where you start being a little concerned about losing. However the penalty is very small for losing a match, for example 10+ to 20 experience points or slightly more. It depends, again, on what rank/level you lost to. Winning is based loosely on the same system as E-Rank, so you need not worry too much about advancing.
For promotion within this rank, promotion is automatic but experience does not carry over to the next rank. I might be wrong though. The experience required to reach the next level within this rank is 1000.
C-Rank
It starts getting interesting. At C-Rank you gain lesser than 100 points for winning anyone in E-Rank usually, and what makes it worse is if you only managed to win 3-2 against an E-Rank player, you will gain something like 50-80 points or so (depending on what happened during the match).
You lose quite a bit more points, but nothing you cannot gain back with victories over time. Promotion in this rank is not automatic. You will have to gain all the way to 3000 experience points first. Once you reach 3000/3000, you must look for a C-Rank player to fight against. The words "Rank Up Match" will appear during the loading screen and during the match if this is a match you can rank up with. It need not be a player with the same level as your current C-Rank, any C-Rank player will do. This is why a lot of people are currently stuck in C-Rank in the PSN rankings - they have no idea that they have to use a C-Rank player to promote. Fighting D/E-Rank players gives you absolutely ZERO experience points. Losing to them may or may not reduce experience points. See below.
Now if you failed in your first rank up match, do not worry. Your experience points are kept the same and you are left at +0, and 3000/3000. However, if you fail it a second time, the game instantly punishes you by deducting 200 points from your experience points, meaning you have to regain all 200 points, hit 3000/3000 again to get another chance at the Rank Up Match. This could easily mean the same for losing to D/E-Rank players but I had no chance to find out.
B-Rank
B-Rank seems to work the same way as C-Rank even in terms of promotion. You only need a C-Rank player or B-Rank player to level up, as per D.I.N.O's finding below (see 4 posts below this). The experience points you require is 5000 to advance to the Rank Up Match.
A-Rank
A-Rank takes the same amount of experience at A5 to reach the next rank and should be the same for all levels. Again, you need a minimum of C-rank as your opponent to rank up in the match to the next level. The maximum level is A1, 5000/5000.
If any of the information in here is incorrect please post and let me know and I will correct this first post. Thanks!
