Pokémon UNITE just got its next big update, which included the usual battle adjustments and a bit of new content ahead of future events. Among some familiar changes, however, the developers also finally gave players an update to how Ranked matchmaking.
According to an update from TiMi Studio, starting in version 1.5.2.7, players will now be awarded Performance or Master Points when a certain set of conditions are met in a loss. These are specifically tailored to reward good players who suffer losses due to a teammate disconnecting or going AFK during a match.
Here is the full set of requirements that need to be met for this new feature to come into play:
- One of your teammates was idling maliciously during the battle.
- You are defeated.
- You remained active in the battle until the end of the game.
- You are not in a party with the player who maliciously left the game.
Essentially, if you lose a match when a player was AFK and wasn’t in a party with them, you will be awarded points instead of being penalized as long as you continued to play the match. If you meet all of these conditions, you will be notified via in-game mail, which should reflect on your Ranked ladder standings.
Related: Here are the notes and updates for Pokémon UNITE Patch 1.5.1.7
It is currently unclear if the “remained active until the end of the game” means you have to play until the timer expires and won’t count if your remaining teammates agree to surrender. Either way, this is the first step to try and mitigate the issue and the developers also plan to “continue to improve the detection accuracy of malicious abandonment” in matches.
Unfortunately, these changes don’t include general improvements to the matchmaking system, but players should be happy knowing that they will no longer be as heavily penalized as before when dealing with poor teammates.
