Marvel Rivals' competitive mode isnot in a good place right now. Hell, it was in arough place last season, with constant complaints about matchmaking and hero balancing.Season 3 has done little to address our concerns, and now, NetEase’s latest attempt to fix the issue is already making people mad.
As of the Season 3.5 update, Marvel Rivals will put limitations on how many people you can queue with in competitive. Overall team sizes are still six, but as you climb through the ranks, you won’t be able to six stack, and will instead have to rely on random players being matched with you.
Don’t Get Higher Than Platinum In Marvel Rivals If You Like Playing With Your Friends
You can check out the wording of this change over in theSeason 3.5 patch notes, alongside all of the other new features and rebalances coming to the game. Right now, it seems like this is getting the most attention, and perhaps the most backlash.
Judging by how this is explained to us, we’ll be under the following restrictions in competitive:
All in all, this is pretty bizarre, but I can see what NetEase is trying to do here - it’s trying to stop a six stack from steamrolling other teams, and perhaps even stop players from being carried to the higher tiers. True enough, if you’re only queuing with one other friend, all the communication in the world doesn’t change the fact that you have to be bringing your own skills to the table.
With that said, this feels like setting the house on fire because there’s a spider in the bathroom. Six stacks were hardly the biggest problem in competitive, and any benefit it does have feels like it will be outweighed by the negative impact it will have on friends wanting to play together. Also, as my fellow resident Marvel Rivals fanJoshua Robertsonpointed out, there’s a good chance that six stacks of players Celestial or above will just terrorise quick play now, making it harder to use that mode to practice with new characters.
So, to summarise, we’re getting fewer social opportunities and a higher chance of getting destroyed in non-competitive modes. Perhaps NetEase should just finallyconsider the placement matches that fans have been begging for.
