DARWIN PRO LEAGUE
The DPL is rated with Glicko-1 — every DPL season has used the same settings. Each player has two numbers: a rating, and an uncertainty (RD) that measures how sure the system is about it.
- The number on the ladder is the conservative estimate: rating minus 1.5 × uncertainty. As you play, the uncertainty drops and the displayed rating climbs toward your actual level. What you see is what the board sorts by.
- Anyone with fewer than 5 sets this season is provisional: the rating shows dimmed and sorts below everyone with 5 or more, so a hot first night can't leapfrog a season's work. It clears on your 5th set.
- Sitting out doesn't move your number on its own — it's frozen at your last set. What it costs you is certainty: when you come back, the system re-widens your uncertainty for the sets you missed, so your first set back moves you further than usual. Separately, top-15 players with 5 or more sets lose rating to inactivity decay — see the penalty system.
- If a recorded set is corrected, everything after it is re-priced. Sets form a chain, so an old fix can move a number you earned weeks ago.
The S2 formula had two known flaws, confirmed by backtesting the full season: it rewarded volume (grinding sets beat playing well) and it was blind to opponent strength (beating a stacked lobby paid the same as beating a quiet one). Glicko-1 fixes both. Every result is weighed against who was actually in the set, and the uncertainty model keeps small samples from outranking a season's work. Replayed over the whole S2 record, it called 72.1% of head-to-head results right against the old formula's 69.6%, over 6,222 pairs.
- Play the community scrims, organized on Discord.
- The moderator team records each set as it's played; results land on the ladder when the set publishes.
- Sign in with Steam once, so your avatar and profile link show on the ladder and your player page.
A typo on a scoresheet or a rename split your record. Ask on Discord and a moderator merges it — your full history follows your canonical name.
Separate ladders. Rating chains never mix across platforms, so a PC player guesting in an Xbox set doesn't move their PC rating. Every DPL season is PC-only, so the picker only shows on the older S1 and S2 boards.