Board Game Arena

I'm not sure whether this topic has already been discussed or not but what about a new system for arena where end-of-season standings should be based on the best rating achieved during the season instead of final rating ?

This would encourage players to surpass themselves and could take away the pressure that some players may experience when they play arena.
This could also prevent suspicious behaviors every seasons (in some game) and reward the most consistent player throughout the entire season.

Any thoughts on this suggestion ?

I'm not sure what you mean...
Should everybody who reach the top of the list be a Arena-Champion?
So that we'll have a lot of champions may hundrets...?
For me it looks like the alltime ELO-System.

Yohan06 wrote: ↑17 October 2025, 21:17 reward the most consistent player throughout the entire season.

It doesn't seem like this change would reward consistency

bergerOUS wrote: ↑21 October 2025, 13:49 I'm not sure what you mean...
Should everybody who reach the top of the list be a Arena-Champion?

They said best "rating," not best "ranking."

To clarify: I believe what the OP is saying is this:

if a player achieves an arena score of 2100 purple tokens, for example, and nobody else has reached that score, that player would then be in first place. Additionally, 2100 would be the "score to beat", even if that player falls down in the rankings after playing more games. This incentivizes everyone to keep playing, and to play consistently. If nobody else attains 2100, that player who did attain 2100 would be the champion, regardless of that player's final arena points.

I like this idea.

FrankJones wrote: ↑21 October 2025, 23:19 To clarify: I believe what the OP is saying is this:

if a player achieves an arena score of 2100 purple tokens, for example, and nobody else has reached that score, that player would then be in first place. Additionally, 2100 would be the "score to beat", even if that player falls down in the rankings after playing more games. This incentivizes everyone to keep playing, and to play consistently. If nobody else attains 2100, that player who did attain 2100 would be the champion, regardless of that player's final arena points.

Exactly this

This also prevent top players to sit on their rating for the entire season without playing.

For exemple player A get to 2200 rating arena then drop to 2000, if no one else gets to the same rating (2200) during the season, he wins the season even if his rating is lower at the end of the season.

The leaderboard would be something like this
Player 1 : top rating achieved = 2200 / actual rating 2000
Player 2 : top rating = 2170 / actual rating 2100
Player 3 : top rating = 2167 / actual rating 2167
Player 4 : top rating = 2150 / actual rating 1800
...

+1

I do agree that the current system is not working. However, I am not so sure if the suggested system would necessarily lead to more play.
While it would incentivize playing at the very top, it also has a "downside" that many players might just get satisfied with their highscore at some point and stop playing. Once you happen to fall back somewhat below your personal highscore, you might think that's that for the season, and an improvement in ranking seems far away. I think for many players, the thrill of Arena also comes from the immediate effect that each game has on your score and ranking. Certainly the highscore system would make the ranking much more stable which is both good and bad.

I have to say though, I think playing less games per specific boardgame would be a good thing in the long run. We could be incentivized to compete in more different boardgames rather than the heavy (and I'd say unhealthy) grind of single boardgames that is incentivized with the current system. In the long run, BGA could profit from users finishing Arena seasons in a satisfied good mood rather than the loss frustration that is often caused in the current system.

In the end, it's all speculation and changing it up would be absolutely worth a try.

While the suggested idea has also some drawbacks, I think it’s the simplest idea to improve the current system.

People may be discouraged to continue playing when they fall behind their personal best, but that is a personal choice. When the top players at a ridiculously high score like 2200 continue to play, it’s almost surely making them end up much lower than that at the end of the season.

TopTierReindeer wrote: ↑22 October 2025, 21:05 People may be discouraged to continue playing when they fall behind their personal best, but that is a personal choice. When the top players at a ridiculously high score like 2200 continue to play, it’s almost surely making them end up much lower than that at the end of the season.

I agree.

I still want to raise one more point, you also have to consider it from BGAs perspective. For them it's important that we play a lot, and not necessarily that it is the most fun or the best competitive environement. They are in some way incentivized to optimize playing time, and it's probably one of their KPIs, and they be reluctant to implement something that reduces frequency of play. It's certainly true that some of the bad psychological mechanics that draw you into mobile games like Candy Crush or whatnot Farmville, etc., are also in place on BGA (even though BGA is mostly a fun and kind place). The big swings of Arena score/ranking is one of those bad mechanics. I am hesitant to believe that these mechanics are here by accident, rather BGA should have some insight on what keeps people playing on the site. Probably the biggest reason why they never changed Arena mode so far, because it continues to be very popular (as surprising and appaling that is to me).

Anyway, whether the suggested highscore system would decrease playtime or simply change user behavior is something no one knows without try.