NEXT SEASON: A NEW RANK MODLE/RULE?

@BettercallSu

"Under the new rules."

Interesting idea. It's essentially Infection from Halo. I could see it as an LTM but would not like to see it replace the main game. Hey, wait a minute. Don't we already have an LTM like this? Fight Or Fright?

"We know that at the beginning of a match, players can be quickly eliminated due to lack of weapons or other reasons, leading to a frustrating cycle of entering and exiting games. With this new mode, we aim to eliminate this frustration."

Big mistake, imo. Not saying it wouldn't make kids happy. I'm sure it would. But at some point, five years in, it's time for people to learn to play the game less recklessly, and if they can't do that then they need to be making constant round trips to the lobby. This game already has too many crutches for bad decision makers. The last four or five LTMs have been almost exclusively about encouraging bad behavior by not penalizing it, and in some cases by outright rewarding it. Very bad idea. Kids need to learn the rules, learn the best practices, and stop treating BR like team death match. IMO.

"many skilled players often find themselves unable to showcase their abilities due to the lack of weapons or early eliminations. This is a waste of their time and skill."

If they get killed because of a hot drop and a lack of weapons, then that's demonstrating a lack of skill. It's just not the same kind of skill that we're used to talking about. People need to learn to manage luck or else go play team death match where aiming is all that matters. Or be prepared to re-queue no matter how good their aim may have been if they'd got the gun they wanted.

"High Damage Output / High Kill Counts / Clear Rewards"

These are, I would say, exactly what you might want out of an arena shooter. They are not necessarily at all what I would want out of battle royale. BR is, to my mind, a survival game type. The shooting is incidental. It's one way to survive, but not the only way, and at many points in a match it is not even the advisable way if survival is the ultimate goal. I know this takes us back to the perennial debate around just exactly what it is that a ranking system should reward: engagement or placement. In my opinion it should reward both equally so that the ultimate decision as to play style is left to the individual player and not dictated by the multiplayer lead.

"Allow players to bet..."

Now that's a slippery slope, in-game currency or not. I'd be curious to hear EA lawyers sound off on the idea. If EA isn't too cheap to hire lawyers that is.

Sorry to be all resistant and contradictory. I like how much thought went into this. I just don't think I would care too much for the game as you describe it. I'd rather see more or less what we have now, but with a viable anti-cheat and a ban on secondary accounts. And I'd like to see Respawn cut itself loose from EA, who is, I'm convinced more and more, the source of most of the problems in this game.