Patch 7.33 was released last year in December. The update came with several big changes including the new MMR [matching making rating] system, the addition of portals and the Tormentor, two Roshan lairs, and a new drafting system for Immortal-ranked players. Former Nigma Galaxy offlaner Ivan “MinD_ContRoL” Ivanov took to X to voice his dissatisfaction with the drafting system in ranked games and pleaded for a change or a rollback to the old system that had predetermined teams.
MinD_ContRoL’s Dissatisfaction WIth the Drafting System
On 3rd January, Former Nigma Galaxy offlaner MinD_ContRoL tweeted, “Hello guys, the drafting system in MMR is pretty bad, can you fix it or bring the old one back or create a new one? Half of the games are pointless.”
For context, with the release of patch 7.33, the drafting system in the Immortal bracket was changed.
The old system for the Immortal bracket was similar to the current system in Herald to Divine ranked games. The teams are predetermined from Valve’s servers and are designed such that both Radiant and Dire sides are balanced and are based on the players’ MMR. However, the new system follows a captain-based system, meaning two players with the highest MMRs in the respective teams become the captains for the Radiant and Dire sides, accordingly. The captains can then choose four players from the remaining eight players into their team.
Since there is no necessity for a role queue in the Immortal bracket, some players deliberately mark themselves as versatile players, thus resulting in bad gameplay. Drafting in Immortal is a big gamble as the captains may draft the perfect team composition or may have a team with two mid-laners and two safe lane carries which could mean a bad team synergy. This in turn can be exploited by the opponents.
While this new captain-based system may not be the best, some players like Janne “Gorgc” Stefanovski believe in it. Every time Gorgc ends up as the captain, he makes sure to draft the players with the lowest MMR in the game, hoping to secure high MMR points after a win. This way he can also lose an acceptable amount of MMR in the event of defeat.
MinD_ContRoL, who recently parted ways with Nigma Galaxy, is now a free agent. The offlaner has not revealed his next steps and has not hinted at joining any new organizations.
