Master Tier LoL Ranked Distribution comparison

Every League of Legends rank, especially the Master tier, is about to undergo major changes. With the end of the first ranked split in season 13 coinciding with LoL patch 13.13, many new changes will come to live servers. Ranking up will be much easier now that promotion series are removed. We will even see a new Emerald rank being implemented. But what does that mean for the legacy of the game? How has the rank distribution of high ranks changed over the years? Are old ranks even comparable in the season 13 League of Legends ranking system?

Ranking up in League of Legends

If you are a new player, you are probably happy about this. If you’re a more experienced member of the League of Legends community, this probably raises concerns. Back in the day, there used to be promotion games between every division. Once you got to Platinum 2 with 100 LP, you needed to win 2 of the next 3 promotion games to enter Platinum 1. On the other hand, once you got to 100 LP in Platinum 1, you needed to win 3 of the 5 promotion games to rank up to Diamond. This was a grueling process that rewarded dedication to the game.

The worst thing that can happe to you as a one trick or someone that plays just one role, was being auto-filled in a promotion match. But this also prevented rank inflation, as players who were excelling in only one dimension of the game were gate-kept out of the highest ranks. You can be the best Riven player in Diamond 1 mechanically. But if you don’t understand macro and map movements, you will not climb. The Riven mechanical skills don’t transfer across champions, but having a solid grasp of game fundamentals which include team fighting, objective control, and map movements are the same on Maokai and Irelia.

Comparing S6,S10 and S13 Master Tier Ranked Distribution

This created a major cluster in certain ranks, and made climbing a gruesome experience that caused many players to leave the game. Riot Game noticed this and got to work. Adding the Grandmaster rank so recently promoted Diamond 1 Riven players don’t end up in the same games as professional players. Lowering the number of promotional games leading up to the current removal of promotion series entirely. League of Legends exists for 13 years, and a lot of new accounts are new. With certain popular streamers and personalities owning upwards of 60 accounts, the rest of the community is following suit.

Players can resort to toxicity and start a new ranked climb with improved LP gains because they can buy accounts for less than $5. This created a massive shift in the League of Legends ranked distribution. Back in season 6, players in Master and ranks above constituted just 0,04% of the entire League of Legends player base. Today in season 13, that percentage is up to 0,64%, a 16x increase. Even if we take data from March 2020, when Covid started, the player base increased and a year had passed since the Grandmaster rank was added. Master tier and above was approximately the top 0.085% of the player base, which is 7,5 times less than the current amount.