RedSec BR issue in OCE

Open Letter to EA – The Oceanic REDSEC Community We are writing as members of the Oceanic (OCE) REDSEC community regarding the recent APAC playlist changes announced for Season 4.

EA stated that these changes were intended to "improve matchmaking health, queue time, and create the best experience for players across the most popular modes." Unfortunately, for the Oceanic region, the practical outcome has been the exact opposite.

Prior to this update, OCE consistently supported multiple Standard Battle Royale (100-player) matches every evening on local Sydney servers. During peak hours, it was common to have two or three active lobbies running, with a healthy, competitive player base. This wasn't a struggling mode - it was the mode that kept the OCE REDSEC community alive.

With the removal of Standard Battle Royale from APAC, local players have effectively been left with only two options:

• Casual Battle Royale, which is limited to a maximum of 32 human players with AI filling the remainder of the lobby. This is an onboarding experience and is fundamentally different from competitive Battle Royale.
• Ranked Battle Royale on Singapore servers, where Oceanic players typically experience 90–110 ms latency, inconsistent matchmaking, and queue behaviour that appears unpredictable. Players can queue for extended periods without finding a match while others queueing at the same time are placed into games. Unlike Standard matchmaking, Ranked also provides no visibility into whether a lobby is actually filling, making it impossible to know whether to keep waiting or give up. 

These are not equivalent replacements for the local 100-player experience that previously existed.

What makes this even harder to understand is that this playlist reduction appears to have been applied specifically to APAC. Other major regions continue to have access to local Ranked, Standard, and Casual playlists simultaneously. If those regions can retain all three experiences, we ask:

What data demonstrated that APAC - and specifically OCE - required the removal of its only local competitive Battle Royale playlist?

From the perspective of the Oceanic community, this change has fragmented - not improved - matchmaking. Instead of improving matchmaking health, it has: 

• Driven players away from REDSEC altogether. A majority or players in the community are looking for alternative games to play in the absence of normal REDSEC quads.
• Removed the primary competitive local playlist.
• Forced players onto higher-latency overseas servers.
• Left many players unable to reliably access Ranked matches despite active queues. 
• Reduced local Battle Royale to an onboarding mode dominated by AI. 

This isn't simply frustration over change. It is a significant reduction in the competitive experience that Oceanic players have supported for months. Many of us purchased Battle Passes and cosmetics because we expected to continue playing the local competitive mode that existed when we made those purchases.

We are asking EA to:

1. Explain the data that led to this APAC-specific decision. 
2. Clarify exactly how Ranked matchmaking currently functions in APAC, including how players are selected into matches. 
3. Investigate the widespread reports of inconsistent Ranked queue behaviour affecting Oceanic players. 
4. Reconsider restoring Standard Battle Royale for OCE, or provide an alternative solution that delivers an equivalent local competitive experience. 
5. Work with the Oceanic community before making further changes that disproportionately affect our region. 

We appreciate that playlist decisions are difficult and that different regions have different player populations. However, this update has had consequences that do not appear to reflect the reality of the Oceanic player base, nor reflect the intended outcomes EA had when they initiated these changes.

Our goal is not simply to complain. We want REDSEC to succeed in our region. The Oceanic community has remained active, competitive, and passionate despite being one of the smallest player bases globally. We believe this decision has unintentionally undermined that community rather than strengthened it.

We respectfully ask EA to review the impact this change has had on Oceanic players and engage with the community on a better path forward. We also ask all APAC REDSEC players, please use this template, adjust to your region and let EA know what's happening.