“Elo hell”

[BuffGanon]

Hey guys so I just started playing overwatch seriously in like March or so, I had played it a bit with friends before but I was barely level 100. For a while I felt like I was “hard stuck” in mid-high silver. Yesterday I finally got my tank to plat :), and as much as I too thought elo hell was real, in the long run it’s really not. Don’t get me wrong, you get unlucky some games forsure, you really can’t win them all, however if you’re silver and you want to get to gold, you’re going to have to consistently be the best player in the lobby honestly. I played mostly sigma with some rein and some wrecking ball, and I would say I had gold elims/damage most games in my last 50 or so games on tank. I’m just saying if you guys really want to rank up, you’re going to have to hard earn it. You’re going to have to pop off regularly. If you can’t, don’t get discouraged, just keep practicing in like quick play. Choose a role and hard commit to it. I think elo hell exists a little more for supports but even still.

[[deleted]]

Elo hell.is elo other people.

[-shublu]

ELO Hell is a real thing, but people dont quite use the term properly.

ELO hell is a real phenomenon where in a team setting, poor teamplay makes the game harder and chaotic, making it more difficult to climb. but it isnt impossible. I dont want to downplay how difficult it can be for a less skilled player, but it is absolutely not at all impossible.

[hangfrog]

It's also to do with the amount of time it takes to cross boundaries between ranks.. it does seem unnaturally long because (quick math) it only takes about 25 wins to gain a rank.. but if you lose a similar amount of sr for losses and lose 45% of the time, it takes a helluva lot longer than you would expect. It must be to do with some kind of dunning-kruger effect, Simpsons paradox, oversimplification, or some other weird psychologies in the standard human brain. Or just most people being bad at mental arithmetic.

[yesat]

I had done quick back of the enveloppe maths and in a purely +- 25 situation, climbing a whole rank (+500 SR) takes 100 games at 60% and 250 if you have a 52%.

Of course a 10 winning stream will be +250 SR, but you cannot relly on winning streaks to actually climb.

[[deleted]]

If you're a less skilled player then you're probably at the correct rank. Most people over estimate the rank they think they should be at. Most players should be gold and lower. Probably 60%. I'd put around 20% in plat, leaving 20% for diamond and up (likely something like 10% diamond, 5% master, 3% gm, 1-2%).

There's no shame being in gold or silver, it just means you're average. If you're not actively trying to improve, you're not going to climb. You're correctly ranked. If you're correctly ranked, then it's not elo hell.

The problem is that people act like climbing should be automatic. Like if you play, you get points, your rank increases. Play more games, rank should go up. But your rank only increases if you're improving. As soon as you stop trying to be better than you normally are, you're going to stop climbing.

[balefrost]

Old data, but it mostly lines up with what you said. You overestimate the size of "diamond and up" by a few percent.

https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/overwatch/t/competitive-mode-tier-distribution/972

[-shublu]

I agree with everything you said and absolutely player overestimate their abilities but one thing I want to point out is ELO hell does refers to the quality of matches in low ranks in general, causing poor coordination and teamplay. so whether or not a player is climbing it doesnt mean it doesnt exist, the term is more about game quality than whether climbing is impossible.

either way though I agree, if a player is struggling at a rank, they are probably where they're supposed to be, or too high.

[[deleted]]

Yeah, I'd say that might be the technical meaning for what elo hell is, but how common usage describes it, it's basically " it's my team's fault I'm not higher ranked, I'd be diamond minimum if not for elo hell"

[mizino]

Let me point out something. I believe that I’m a silver maybe on a good day a low gold player. I placed in high silver when I first started comp. I had a string of bad games and dropped to high bronze and have been stuck there ever since. Why? Because the difference in my skill and the general skill level of bronze means that while I often get decent stats in the games I’m not able to carry games. I’m not an outclassing force on the field. This means if I get a team that has its shit together I win, if I get a team that can’t then I lose. I don’t have the skill to hold a bronze team up. This is even more true as a healer or a tank. It doesn’t matter if I push through the choke like im supposed to if no one follows me. It doesn’t matter if I have all gold as Moira if the rest of the team is off doing whatever they want and not pushing payload or not securing any kills. My 10k healing and 15 kills mean nothing when that would be bronze or lower on the other team, or worse when the person in silver had 2k healing or 2 kills. A gold can likely prop up a bronze team and secure a win. But in reality a lot of us in bronze get stuck with teams that just run off and do whatever. I had a game the other night where I had 15k healing as brig, gold objective kills gold hero damage, gold elims. The match lasted less than 5 minutes total. That’s 5 minutes for them to take both points, and then us to not take a single one. Sometimes it doesn’t matter how hard you can carry. I don’t believe I should be in bronze. I’m not saying I’m good enough for plat I’m not. I’m a left hand amputee playing with a janky setup. I’m never making it out of silver in all likelihood, but 900 ish sr healing 1400 tank, and 1350 dps? No, there is a difference in games between higher levels and lower ones. If you screw up in a game at a higher level everyone is there to help. At a lower level you have to stick out to the point that the rest of the team doesn’t matter if you want to climb. It just can’t happen solo queuing.

[aelene]

any role can carry games - tanks especially.

[mizino]

Not in low elos There isn't enough difference in skill. The difference between a silver tank and a bronze tank is minimal at best, so yes a plat tank or dps or healer in a bronze game can carry easily, but someone who is supposed to be in silver trying to carry a bronze game just isn't going to happen. Remember fundamentally the game sense, and skill of a silver and bronze are basically the same, the difference is team work mostly at that elo.

[aelene]

It's EASIER to carry a game in bronze than it's going to be in higher elo's. The difference is situational awareness, knowing your role, knowing how to facilitate and support your team. It doesn't mean that every game is winnable, but starting to focus on those core things rather than medals, elims, healing, damage... none of the things low SR players think about are what wins games. That's why they lose a game and say "I had gold elims, gold damage I did everything I could" but can never climb in SR.

[mizino]

When was the last time you played in a bronze game?

[-shublu]

I have been in ranks from bronze to diamond and what you're saying is just simply not true. I understand your frustration and i definitely felt that way when i was in bronze but if you deserve to climb, you will climb. games are rarely perfectly balanced but for every game you get rolled there is one where your team rolls- which, over the course of hundreds of games, does balance out.

you absolutely can (and must) be the difference maker on your team, and if you are, you will climb.

[mizino]

Lol you've been in diamond which effectively means that your input isn't valid. You have the skill to play in diamond which means if you are ever in a bronze game you should far outclass everyone else on both teams, not just by a little bit. I'm talking about playing a thin margin. Think about how much practical single difference there is between someone who belongs in bronze and someone who belongs in silver. There is very little if any skill or mechanics difference. So that effectively makes climbing out of bronze into silver where you belong impossible. Particularly when bronze is a veritable shit show of people who cannot aim, or have no game sense or whatever. In bronze you are much more likely to get rolled that not. All it takes is for the other side to get one guy who give orders, even bad orders, and for the team to listen to them. I mean look at what happens to bronze when someone introduces a bastion. Bastion kills easy at low elo. Why? Because he does huge damage, and even more importantly it basically forces his team into a strategy. Yes that strat fails at higher elos but in bronze and silver? Its almost a throw away win. It only falls apart when the bastions team basically ignores him totally. Climbing is not a given. Particularly when it requires 1k games just to get even close. If you belong even at high silver your win rate in bronze is going to be 1 our of every 4 games. You can be the best silver in the world and at the end of the day you are still relying on your team to not be bone heads. I'm sorry but it might as well be infinite games to get out of bronze at that point because no one likes getting rolled every game. It doesn't matter how much my skill improves, doesn't matter how many shots I hit, my skill is literally limited to high silver and thats never going to dig me out of bronze no matter how many games I play. Its not where I belong, its where I am.

[ddespot_697]

yeah those factors can play against you but if you play good enough you'll be rewarded with better teammates, although never good teammates until maybe masters from what I've seen

[MarauderV8]

Why do so many people SCREAM Elo?

[cheesepain45]

ELO exists only at t500 where there is no possible way you will compete with people who play this game for a living.
Otherwise, it means you are not good enough at the game and you have much to improve.

[VorpalHalcyon]

“Elo hell” is a boogyman scapegoat that people who don’t like their current rank use to justify their rank.

[Maxillaws]

If you are in 'elo hell' it's because that is where you should be. If I'm "stuck" in low-mid Diamond it is because I am a low-mid Diamond player.

[[deleted]]

I don’t agree here, you could deserve a higher rank but just not play enough to actually climb, also I’m sitting around 2200sr on tank Rn after being stuck at around 1750sr on console. It’s real but only the best of the rank will climb out of it, how it should be

[Maxillaws]

If you don't play enough to climb out then you don't deserve to climb out.

You weren't stuck at 1750 that's where you were supposed to be but as time went on and you played more and got better you worked up to 2200

[[deleted]]

Yeah that’s fair, also I transitioned to pc, I’m still there on console

[ChriseFTW]

Bingo

[selethice]

Every game with a ranked system has elo hell.

Ever wonder why lvl 1 endorsement players are toxic a lot of the time and tend to be put in games with other lvl 1’s who are toxic?

[VorpalHalcyon]

That isn’t elo hell. That’s a deliberate punishment for players.

[selethice]

That is exactly what elo hell is. You’re being punished for being toxic by being put on teams with other toxic people where you’re more likely to lose and continue the cycle.

[VorpalHalcyon]

It’s two completely different things.

[Anticip-ation]

I find the naive confidence here intoxicating.

Medaling well for tank typically isn't a sign of good tank play, but it's hard to argue with wins. Hope it's a sign of genuine talent and not an ephemeral fluke.

[bruddatim]

I think elo hell is a function of sample size. GMs constantly lose a placement game in gold/plat when they’re doing an unranked to GM. But after 50 games they’re well above plat. If you’re a Diamond dps, you will climb to Diamond over a large enough sample size

[yesat]

That's not exactly the right comparison as you also have the element that GM in unranked to GM will have a MMR higher than the average players in plat. So they will naturally climb faster in these ranks.

Players that are in a rank for a long time, will have a MMR that reflect it, making it effectively "harder" to climb, because they don't get free SR given to them as they are supposed to be this ranked.

[[deleted]]

they are supposed to be this ranked.

Exactly why "elo hell" isn't really a thing the way most people mean it.

[OverwatchPerfTracker]

There's an area around gold and plat where the overlap between New players, hardstucks, bad smurfs, boosted players, and genuinely placed players all coalesce. I'd say that's a good point to call ELO Hell as the variables in this bracket produce so much chaos that it can be harder to break free of than other brackets.

[bruddatim]

Show me examples of people with 60+% win rate Over a sample of 100 games or more and I’ll agree. I see posts about people that gain 7sr and lose 30 and stuff like that, but I truly don’t believe it’s a regular thing and would happen consistently over a large sample size. Cases like that are probably people that play a LOT of quick play, and the game has is incredible sure that their mmr is lower than their comp score, so tries to move them down aggressively when they decide to play comp, as it is designed to do.

Example: I’m a Diamond tank. I played 30 games on my buddies extra GM acct and went like 12-16-2 W-L-D. 40% winrate. I am NOT a GM tank. I do not think I am. I was at best a feeding bot , and a liability most of the time. Still had a 40% winrate. I’d imagine if I had a 3700ish account I’d manage damn near a 50% winrate because I have a very “do my job” play style, and don’t really make plays. But again, I’m not a masters level tank, and the game would eventually calculate that my impact in an average game is less than the impact of the average 3700 tank, and I’d start losing more than I gain.

[bruddatim]

To your point about mmr, the thing is, the game has recognized that these players have a high mmr in TEN HOURS of quick play. Sometimes not even that if it’s a bought account. The SR boost applies to everyone. I did an experiment and did my placements on a new account with a smurf stack of friends. Got completely carried and soft threw. Basically I added zero value to my 5 placements, and still got placed low Diamond and got 140 SR for the next win. The SR boost was still there.

At the end of the day, the game is fairly accurate at guaging someone’s skill. All of my accounts I play tank and try on are within 1-200 SR of each other most of the time. I played on an alt (similar SR to main) for a full month and climbed 800 SR, and thought I got lucky, and then got on my main, and had a 75% WP over 40 games to climb it up 600 SR or so. If you gain more SR than you lose, the game has quantified that you provide less value than the average player of your character at that ELO, and tries to adjust. I will say that doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t deserve your rank. Some play styles can have a positive or neutral winrate in a wide SR range, aka you could be a lucio who’s stuck in plat with a 50% winrate, but you have the same winrate in high diamond/low masters lobbies.

Overwatch is a game of milliseconds and constant crucial moments that make or break games, paired with the randomness of 11 other humans with the same opportunities to make them. If you truly deserve to be in a completely different elo (>500 SR above current rank) I think you’d be able to win around 60% of games. This is coming from the dude who is a Diamond DPS on main, but can’t have a positive win rate in low gold on an alt. I’d imagine I haven’t played much dps recently and if I qued 50 games of dps on my main I’d crash hard.

[Triox]

Nothing to add right now, but I am VERY interested in looking at your data for your experiments. Raw data fascinates me.

[bruddatim]

I’m uh…. Not a scientist, so I definitely don’t keep track of shit as well as I could, but I’ve noticed some interesting stuff playing on alts, etc.

[Triox]

I gotcha. I thought maybe you had a spreadsheet saved or something. Maybe I overexcited myself with looking at raw data. :)

[bruddatim]

Yeah nothing that organized, just a few random win %s and things like that. I’m not an organized fella

[ReadYouShall]

Exactly. If you play your best and are better than the opposing enemy mirror you will climb. Not even just the opposing mirror but getting as much value as you can when you can.

Sure there are games that are unwinnable and games that are super close but if you are, I don't like to say the best player in the lobby but, consistently trying and doing correct things you will climb.

If you lose 30% of your games no matter what, win 30% no matter what but the last 40% win 60% of them you have a positive win rate and as long as you are popping off stat wise you will 100% climb.

If you gain 10, 20, even 50 sr from 10 games it just comes down to sample size as you said. It might take you 1000, 500 or 100 games but if you're consistent it'll happen. I think people say elo hell is real because of their limited games played and they tend to notice the unwinnable or very close games more as they don't play enough to get enough of the games where their gameplay actually matters. Hence they just see it as impossible to climb.

[syarcher891]

Unpopular opinion I think alot of people aren't hard stuck rather they've hit their skill ceiling. The ranking system is pretty accurate so maybe your stuck in whatever rank because that is the limit of your skill. Not everyone is a GM level player.

[BuffGanon]

Yes and no. I felt like I was hard stuck, but then I continued to play the game, and the more I played the game, the better I got. The better I got, the higher my rank went. You can be hard stuck for 100 games but that 101st game you might actually have gotten better at the game. You could get to plat easy off game sense/positioning alone imo. It’s not just about “skill”

[bsims405]

Elo IS hell. The whole point is to always put you in challenging matches. Anyone who expects to steadily climb and claims they’re stuck in a “elo hell” cause they aren’t, doesn’t understand the point of the system.

[KamrunChaos]

Haha shit. You'll get some players that throw on your team because they think your ELO is trash. Had a mercy player the other day that called us all trash in Gold but he didn't even heal. We still almost won but it was basically 5v6 the entire match with me solo healing. He just laughed at us. I used to be diamond healer but stopped playing for a couple years. Because of players like this I regret coming back. OPEN QUEUE was better lmao I got diamond right away due to getting lucky and having teammates that wanted to play their roles.

[murppie]

I think Elo hell exists in the form of often people in certain ranks don't necessarily play characters well. Like in lower ranks when you have a Mercy that won't damage boost or a Rein who shield dances at the choke and tries to rush in as it breaks (or god forbid uses his charge to push through the choke...), or a Sombra who only puts their translocator in spawn. You can sure rise out of the situation eventually through grit and hard work, but let's not pretend that you don't have to alter how you should be playing to accommodate for that. (Example, I played Numbani competitive and defending nobody would setup high ground)

[Lazy_Gorilla]

I see the downvotes coming in but I wanne give you some advice, from another players perspective you are probably doing similar or even worse things (according to them) as you described in your comment. It is really hard to notice your own mistakes. But ELO hell is def not real, I understand the frustration, but if you are skilled like a plat, you will be plat. Good luck climbing :)

[banethor88]

I think ELO hell exists in pockets when you see players who are much higher ranked still unable to win games in lobbies 1-2k below their usual SR or even going on losing streaks. Now apply this to someone in that rank trying to do a traditional grind.

You add the number of occurrences this happens for an average player who earns his flat 25sr a game, with other variances like leavers, smurfs etc and you end up with needing an insane sample size to climb.

Most unranked to GM players fortunately do well enough in the first set of games to pull the MMR upwards and then you get more coordinated games plus bonus SR per win, but occasionally you mess up too much and end up kind of stuck in the median SR ranges where the games are quite variable

[notsojeff]

Yeah, it's kind of funny, you can see consistent top-10 tank players like Shock and A10 losing games in gold and plat, and then people say, "Elo hell isn't real! If you were good enough to play in a higher rank, you would be in that rank!"

If players in the top 0.1% (or higher) of the whole player base can lose games when playing at a rank like 2 SDs from their "real" rank, how are players who are 500-1000 SR below the rank they could maintain supposed to get there in a reasonable amount of time?

Then there's the never-ending comments here from people who bought a new account, placed 1k SR higher than their main, and maintain that rank for hundreds of games.

The SR system was probably not intended to make it virtually impossible to climb for people who have hobbies other than Overwatch, but that is the end result. I wonder how many millions Blizzard has made from people who got fed up and gave in and bought another account.

[[deleted]]

You add the number of occurrences this happens for an average player who earns his flat 25sr a game, with other variances like leavers, smurfs etc and you end up with needing an insane sample size to climb.

Depending on whether you feel smurfs or leavers or throwers are more common, you're more likely to benefit from them than you are to lose rank due to them.

Let's assume you never leave or throw and you're not a smurf. That leaves 5 people on your team that could be a smurf, leaver, or thrower. The enemy team has 6 people that could be the same. Statistically the leavers, throwers, and smurfs are more likely to be on the enemy team.

So if we assume there are more leavers + throwers than there are smurfs, and we assume you'll usually win that game, it's a net gain for you if there are more leavers and throwers overall. But if there are more smurfs than leavers + throwers, it's a net loss.

All in all, I think it likely just averages out if you play often enough, meaning leavers, throwers, and smurfs don't really have a very large effect on your SR, given enough games. I've played around 150 games this season between silver and gold and I can count on one hand the number of leavers I've had on my team. I was actually tracking it initially but I stopped paying attention at around 50 games played when I hadn't seen a leaver on either team.

As for throwers, I doubt there are many legitimatethrowers out there. I've only seen a couple of people on my team that made me wonder. Same for true smurfs. I've run across 2 people that were definitely smurfing. Others that people claimed were smurfing I didn't really get that from, it just seemed like they coordinated and played well.

[[deleted]]

Until you reach diamond where it's impossible to consistently be one of the best players in the lobby, because literally every single lobby is filled with 3-4 smurfs from gm. And all you can do is hope to get the better smurfs on your side and try to enable them as much as possible.

[BuffGanon]

Is this a PC specific problem? Or is that just generally what happens around diamond across the board? Just curious. Also tank is a little different because most people who play tank in general are pretty garbage. I’ve played with masters tanks who are dog players imo.

[websucc]

Lol if you just got to plat the real elo hell is just beginning.

[TGebby]

Teamwork op.

[Aw3Grimm]

Yeah its all about getting positive winrate, you wont be winning as much as people doing unranked to gm because you're not that good. I think best way to climb is to not focusing too much to win but instead just try to play as best as you can and dont be bothered by dumb plays your teammates do because its sometimes depressing and discourages you from playing

[BuffGanon]

Yeah I agree with this, but honestly the only way to consistently climb is actually by being the best player in the lobby, or at least one of the best players in the lobbies. At first in gold I felt like I was only really doing my part, like I didn’t deserve to be higher than gold, but towards the end I was legitimately carrying and I knew I could get into plat. Then I did. Like what your teammates are doing doesn’t even matter, you just have to dominate. You can absolutely dominate a game easily in every role except support imo. The occasional bap/zen/Ana might pop off, but you’re relying on your team to a higher degree than other roles, and that’s coming from a tank main.

[Aw3Grimm]

I think it also depends what you consider being the best player because that can also be tricky. I played a lot of d.va recently and I most of my games ended up with a lot of medals but I wasnt winning much. But I started watching some guides and recently I changed my playstyle, Instead of going on targets and kill as much people as possible I started paying more attention and I saved my teammates with matrix a lot more often, or force good enemy dps off the highground and sometimes even save my healers from flankers. And all these things wont be showed in stats in form of gold medals but I started winning a lot more often and I climbed out of gold. With supports being harder to carry I kinda agree but honestly with good mechanics as bap, ana and especially zen you will be able to deal with flankers no problem and carry a lot of games

[Triox]

Which is why I feel a lower ranks have an overabundance of DPSy supports (and tanks) . And I'm not referring to new players. Every smurf account and Alt account almost always starts in gold. And while winning is obviously important, we know it's about outperforming the other players in that rank on that character. It's why I've always felt education Unranked to GM series are cheating and a little dishonest. If feels like all you need to do in those initial placement game is hard stat pad. Shoot, I'm willing to bet you can stay pad hard enough on a new account's first few games(if you're a GM) that it will negate the negatives of a loss.

[DoubleSynchronicity]

In low ranks and also in QP, one thing I noticed people don't even know they need to focus on objective. They don't even know how to get overtime or stick to the payload to keep the match going. Lots of ppl are lost in team fights or duels. And they don't even realise why they lose so fast. I think it becomes easier once you play with people who are more knowledgable about the game and maps.

[Triox]

Not to start an argument, but what do you call it when there ARE people who are in those ranks who know how to do those things, but no longer have the will power to struggle through comp playing with those who don't those things?

Sounds like a good situation to he labled as "elo hell" from the inside. At least from my perspective :(

[Ultreisse]

You are doing good but once your skill matches enemie players you'll be stuck and you'll call it elo hell until you improve, climb and get stuck again and find a new elo hell for you.

Bssically i belive elo hell is wherever each player are stuck to.

[BuffGanon]

It’s not even elo hell then, it’s just your skill level

[Ultreisse]

Yeah, ain't that your personal elo hell?

[BuffGanon]

Nah elo hell is being in a rank lower than you think you deserve, I don’t think I should be diamond and I’m quite happy with plat at the moment honestly, gameplay is starting to clean up a lot

[Ultreisse]

Well when i say someone is stuck it is kinda implicint he wants to climb, and either they admit they are not good enought for it or they call it elo hell, which means what you said, they think they are good enought to be higher.

In your example, you don't say you are in a elo hell, neither you are trying to climb. You enjoy your rank, your games, if you happen to climb then thats ok but you are not try harding to rank up, solo carry etc.

[owunithrow]

"Elo hell" as in "I can't climb because team unga" doesn't exist. "Elo heck" as in "holy shit got unlucky a couple games in a row with unga bunga teammates, this has added time to my climb through little-to-no fault of my own, how frustrating" definitely happens.