Dear friends!

Some of you know that some time ago I suggested the introduction of mastery titles for outstanding Warzone players. The initiative was supported in principle, but I was not able to suggest good criteria for awarding such titles. Today I would like to present an alternative approach based on mastery standards rather than scoring numbers.

My idea of the practical implementation is that a small committee checks whether the proposed player meets the criteria. If this is the case, the committee awards the title in a special thread. Since each standard is either fulfilled or not fulfilled, there is no subjective element. Fulfilling it once means you fulfill it permanently.

I designed the requirements for the titles in a way that with each lower title, exponentially more players meet the requirements. If the claimed Quickmatch rank was achieved in the past, a screenshot must be proposed unless the committee remembers that the player had this rank. The requirements are completely up to debate.

When you are awarded a title, you acquire the right to prefix the short form of the title with your player name (e.g. CM John Johnson). If players turn out to give themselves titles that they do not have, the thread will contain a list of these players. A player who has done so cannot be awarded a real title for a year.

Following the chess sport I propose four titles, which could be called Candidate Master (CM), Warzone Master (WM), International Master (IM) and Grandmaster (GM). For each title there is a catalogue of standards. The requirements for a title are met if the player meets three out of five standards.

Please take a look at my following draft of possible standards.

Grandmaster (GM)
1. Trophy of the MDL
2. Five other trophies
3. Winner of the AWP World Tour
4. Winner of the AWP World Tour Finals
5. Place 1st on the global Quickmatch leaderboard

International Master (IM)
1. Place 5th in the MDL
2. Three trophies
3. Place 5th in the AWP World Tour
4. Reach the Semifinals of the AWP World Tour Finals
5. Place 5th on the global Quickmatch leaderboard

Warzone Master (WM)
1. Place 10th in the MDL
2. Two trophies
3. Place 10th in the AWP World Tour
4. Reach the Quarterfinals of the AWP World Tour Finals
5. Place 10th on the global Quickmatch leaderboard

Candidate Master (CM)
1. Place 20th in the MDL
2. One trophy
3. Qualify for the AWP World Tour Finals/Place 16th in the AWP World Tour
4. Win a tournament of the AWP World Tour
5. Place 20th on the global Quickmatch leaderboard

What do you think, guys? Criticism and improvements are encouraged!

To avoid people just changing their names (which is guaranteed to happen), maybe contact Fizzer about implementing it officially. For each gold trophy you go up a rank for example.

Fizzer implementing it officially would be the ideal way of course, but somehow I don't believe that will happen. I think that trophies alone are an even worse skill indication than my first suggestion from last year to be honestly. Through my eyes, there need to be certain requirements which can't be passed with ladder runs.

Would you also implement titles lower than Master?

Apprentice titles could be cool as well, for players that show great potential, but just need to develop theirs skill some more.

yes! This is great alexclusive! Even though I, myself, would not officially get any Mastery Tiles yet, it is still a great idea to motivate players to go out and accomplish things! Maybe, there will be more competitive players out there if this is implemented. Not even implemented officially, but just with you and a couple of other people to help you. The only hard thing would be people not wanting to change their name, or having to level up 5 levels to change it (which is very hard for someone like Buns157). Grandmaster seems extremely hard to get, but I'm sure someone has already gotten it! **looks at Timinator**

I encourage you to keep working on it!

@JK_3: I don't think many people would be interested to change their name to add a title with "Apprentice" in it, what do you think?

Edit: If you have a concrete idea, maybe you'd like to suggest requirements for Apprentice titles?

@Viking: Thanks so much, that's exactly my intention! I think a wide agreement in the strategic community is necessary to introduce this, because a mastery title isn't so cool if half of the people don't accept it. This thread is a first step, I hope it's better than my last one and will lead to something! Let's discuss the details first. :)

As for the name change, I can imagine that some people won't want to change their names. Still, they can place their title in the tagline or bio for example. Also, they will be mentioned in a hall of fame thread/post which will include all bearers of titles.

Edited 4/24/2020 14:38:12

Sounds good! One question: if you start as a CM, you can make your way up to a WM, then IM, then, finally, a GM, correct?


One Downside: some people will probably go as far as creating their own clans exclusively for the "GMs" or "IMs".

But, overall, great idea!

Edited 4/24/2020 14:55:34

@alexclusive, on the GM title idea. Since it's ultimately a bit subjective, and there can be endless disagreement, I have a suggestion ...

Have a group of players who are clearly GMs decide the criteria/how it happens. (And maybe first have a community vote on whether they'll accept what the group come up with, to legitimise the process.)

And then who are clearly GM's? Well, players who have got first on MDL and also won a seasonal is a good place to start (since they are the two hardest).

So, I would start with: Deadman, Timi, Rufus, Mod, Buns, Timon, and NoMercy.

They all pass that bar, and they're all clearly (from my eyes) are GM level. And I think the community would mostly agree on all of these - maybe less on NoMercy. Although you can ask the other GMs I'm suggesting if they agree with each other being on the panel.

If they want to do this, they have my vote.

Edited 4/24/2020 15:11:40

4 quick points:

1. QM

To me is not a great indicator of skill and your rank mainly is driven by how active you are. The whole ranking system of QM is an experience driven system, which is great to get people playing, but it does not show skill well.

2. AWP

AWP is a good format, but giving it requirements simply does not do the job. It values it twice as much as MDL.

3. Seasonal ladder

I feel like the seasonal ladder is a tough trophy to get and should be taken into consideration more strongly (while the rtl trophy probably shouldn't count!).

4. Team competitions

Feels like that aspect is not represented well enough.

@Viking: Sure, you can claim higher titles step by step when you meet the requirements.

@Quick: The opinions of these players are highly interesting, but your last sentence is true too. If they want to share their opinions on the criteria, isn't this thread a good place to do so?

As for the vote, yeah, if we make it beyond the level of major disagreements, a vote is a nice way to decide whether to introduce it or not in the end.

@krunx: Would you replace the 2nd AWP criteria with the Seasonal trophy? If yes, what would you do with the titles below GM? I think it's a too high requirement for them.

I'll go ahead and take Grandmaster for 800 alex. Thanks for the award and I'll see you all next time.

What do you think, guys? Criticism and improvements are encouraged!

I am still at the same point as last time. Good in principle, but not sure this will (ever?) work. Firstly, I am unsure if there is a point. If this is based on Trophies and QM rank, you can already see that on someones profile. The only thing that you can't see is the AWP part. Making the tag a bit redundant. Also even if name changes was free, I would not change my name to WM TBest. Simply TBest looks better.

PS. shoutout to the first [GM] : https://www.warzone.com/Profile?p=9132263556
PPS. This clan has a lot of WM's :P https://www.warzone.com/Clans/?ID=45

Basically, using a prefix is not going to work. This is why the clan [20] was made back in the day iirc. A clan tag to 'show' the 20 best players.

I wouldn't put a title in front of my name, but having a list would be a nice recognition for newer players or players that improved a lot recently

I propose a FM title: FarahMaster. Only for pretty players!

i propose a Fm Title: goralgntheduck for ducks

DOUBLE POST AGAIN

Edited 4/24/2020 17:56:42

So I would start with: Deadman, Timi, Rufus, Mod, Buns, Timon, and NoMercy

Quicksilver, there is already a clan those people, whom most of them are in! "MASTER Clan". (https://www.warzone.com/Clans/?ID=11)

I just realized most people who would get GM, are probably already in MASTER Clan, so we don't need a second MASTER Clan!

Still , I stick with it, that this is a great idea!

Edited 4/24/2020 18:32:42

If this was something that Fizzer got behind it would be cool to have the title underneath your username. When Fizzer comments you can see "Warzone Creator" underneath his username. I think that would be a neat way of notating it.

My "criticism", most players that have achieved such statuses already have the recognition and acknowledgement of anyone that they care about and anyone that cares about those events/ladders knows who the top players in the business are. It seems like a lot of extra unnecessary work.

I would think 2 AWP world tour criteria are excessive, Also, like krunx said, too much 1v1 focus.

Also, clan league is notoriously absent from these. Perhaps replace one of the AWP requirements with one related to clan league? Both are stamina based events so if your goal is showing prominence over a long period of time, I think both are good choices.

Edited 4/24/2020 19:10:11