REDSEC Ranked Battle Royale - Season 4 Update

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• RECAP: OUR FIRST RANKED SEASON
• SEASON 4 RANK RESET, REWARDS, LAUNCH CHANGES
  • VEHICLE KEYCARDS, MBTS, AND IFVS REMOVED
  • RECALIBRATING RANKED POINTS (RP)
  • REGARDING MATCHMAKING
• COMING DURING SEASON 4
  • STRICTER LEAVE PENALTIES
  • AFK KICK CHANGES
• THE FUTURE OF RANKED, INCLUDING BF6 MP

RECAP: OUR FIRST BF LABS IN LIVE RANKED SEASON

Hello to our Battlefield REDSEC competitive community. 

We are thrilled to see you all support Ranked Battle Royale through its inaugural Battlefield Labs in Live season. As part of this initiative, we gathered both direct feedback and analyzed in-game data to determine key learnings for future seasons and a full Ranked experience release.

From this inaugural season, our most important finding was around how it housed a motivated community. Whether they livestreamed their climb or focused solely on ranking up, there was a high concentration of competitors who, regardless of their final Rank, put in hundreds - if not thousands - of matches into this mode. However, we saw a very high amount of players end up towards the bottom of our Ranks, which indicated that the progression through these initial Ranks proved slower than intended.

Based on your feedback, we are making several changes to Ranked Battle Royale in Season 4: Namely, we are removing Vehicle Keycards, MBTs, and IFVs, readjusting Ranked Point (RP) earn rates, and adding features in-season such as stricter leave penalties. In addition, Ranked Battle Royale will remain a Battlefield Labs in Live experience as we welcome further feedback from you, the community, in pursuit of the best competitive experience for REDSEC. 

SEASON 4 RANK RESET, REWARDS, LAUNCH CHANGES

At the start of Season 4, players will have their Rank reset to the following values:

For future Ranked Battle Royale seasons, expect a similar reset based on your previous season’s Rank.

Your End of Season rewards from Season 3 will be granted upon entering Battlefield REDSEC (or Battlefield 6) for the first time after Season 4 is live; simply hit the “View Results” button or go to the Ranked Battle Royale mode to see your results. 

If you need a reminder of your rewards, see our original guide to the mode here. And if you’re curious about the Ranked Rewards for Season 4… expect to find those among other exciting announcements in our upcoming Season 4 Roadmap blog.

In addition to resetting Ranked Battle Royale Ranks, Season 4 will launch with the removal of heavy vehicles and a recalibration of RP values.

This seasonal reset also gives us the opportunity to implement major changes to Ranked Points and vehicle availability: 

VEHICLE KEYCARDS, MBTS, AND IFVS REMOVED

Vehicle Keycards, Main Battle Tanks (MBTs), and Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFVs) are out of Ranked Battle Royale in Season 4.

While armored fighting vehicles are a critical facet to Battlefield’s identity, we understand that competitive players prefer an experience more focused on infantry. There is still a home for these vehicles in the core Battle Royale experience, but in this upcoming season, we are removing these vehicles, Vehicle Keycards, and related Missions while we have internal conversations about how they can be balanced for Ranked.

RECALIBRATING RANKED POINTS (RP)

Throughout Season 3, our data - and direct feedback - showed that early Ranks were taking too long to progress through. 

Namely, our Placement, Kill, and Assist values were too low to earn a considerable amount of RP. Especially after our matchmaking changes to preserve match quality, competitors were stalling in Rookie and Bronze due to a high placement threshold for additional RP.

Therefore, we are changing our approach to RP in Season 4. 

Mainly, in the spirit of Battlefield putting squad over soldier, RP earned from Confirmed Assists is now equal to RP earned from Kills. 

We are also doubling the Assist and Kill “cap” from 4 to 8, meaning you will earn full RP up to your eighth Kill and eighth Assist until earning more at a reduced rate. However, to prevent over-importance of these stats over placement, the amount of RP earned after reaching the cap is being reduced from 50% of RP to 10% of RP; your ninth (capped) kill will now be worth 10% as your eighth uncapped kill.

Combined with reducing the thresholds to reach each Rookie Division by 100 RP and each Bronze Division by 50 RP, we are confident that these changes will move players faster towards their true skill Rank. That includes those who remain at the Rookie Rank, which is designed to represent the group of new and novice competitors.

Still, we want each Ranked match to matter, hence why every match outside of Rookie has an entry cost of some RP. With our RP changes in mind, we are also increasing match entry costs across all Ranks (outside of Rookie) for Season 4. This RP cost change will substantially impact entries at the Master and Elite 250, where it should be a challenge to remain atop the Ranked hierarchy.

There’s a few minor additional changes, including awarding RP to the top-22 squads instead of the top-14, which you can see through our in-game scoring table at launch.

REGARDING MATCHMAKING

One ongoing change we will work on during Season 4 is matchmaking, a major reason for keeping Ranked Battle Royale as a Battlefield Labs in Live experience.

In Season 3, our initial Ranked bands did not deliver the experience we originally intended, so we adjusted our matchmaking rules to better support queue health while the team continued working on long-term improvements. 

For Season 4, we will continue allowing broader matchmaking across Ranks as we gather additional data and further develop an updated Ranked band infrastructure.

Our learnings during Season 4 will help inform a more refined Ranked banding structure planned for Season 5, which will be focused on balancing fair competition, strong match quality, healthy queues, and a Ranked experience that feels rewarding to play.

Regardless of matchmaking, players will only be allowed to squad up with those within two Ranks of their current Rank (e.g. Silver can squad up with fellow Silvers, reach out to Golds and Platinums, or carry along Rookies and Bronze players).

FEATURES ARRIVING MID-SEASON

Later in Season 4, we look forward to deploying two features centered around combatting those who abandon matches.

STRICTER LEAVE PENALTIES

Serial quitters will soon be on notice:

During Season 4, we will implement a cooldown mechanic for repeat quitters, in addition to them losing all RP accrued when quitting each match and being charged the match entry fee if applicable. This penalty will prevent a serial quitter  - and their squad - from playing Ranked until the timer expires.

AFK KICK CHANGES

While we want to be stricter on leave penalties - on top of encouraging our community to report inactive players via EA Connect, within reason - we understand there is no warning before you are kicked for being AFK (away from keyboard… or technically AFC, away from controller). 

In a future Season 4 update, all modes, from Ranked Battle Royale to Battlefield 6 experiences, will display an inactivity warning for AFK players before they are kicked, regardless of whether they are idle in-game or in a menu. 

THE FUTURE OF RANKED, INCLUDING BATTLEFIELD 6 MULTIPLAYER

Battlefield REDSEC set the marker for our most ambitious and dedicated built-in competitive experience in our franchise’s 23+ year history.

Beyond Season 4, we intend to expand our competitive Battlefield community with our future launch of Battlefield 6 Ranked Multiplayer, as well as the eventual return of the REDSEC Elite Series. 

Thank you again for joining us on this journey. We look forward to continuing our conversation on what competitive Battlefield looks like on our social channels, including our official Discord… And also in-game, because as some of our competitors know, our Dog Tags are always up for grabs if you can take them.

We’ll see you on the Battlefield.

For more information about Battlefield, bookmark our website, subscribe to our newsletter, and stay connected with our Community across all our social platforms @Battlefield, including on Discord.

This article may change as we listen to community feedback and continue developing and evolving our Live Service & Content. We will always strive to keep our community as informed as possible.