Ranked play has issues - improvment suggestions

[Oncus]

Introduction of ranked play has be one of the best things that happened to the game. It reduced leaver frequency, made games more competitive, while at the same time gave players something else to play for.

That being said, the current ranked system has IMO significant downsides. Let's go tier by tier

Bronze-Gold
I think the way it works for Bronze-Gold is fine. I understand that is was a intentional decision to not penalize losses in Bronze-Silver so people could climb more and get excited over it. While this does inflate the rank, I don't see it as a big problem. Gold is similar, but as long as you keep 50% winrate, you should still climb.

Platinum
For a tier before Masters it doesn't feel like anything else than Gold for people with more time. Reaching Master tier should be an achievement, but because it works exactly like gold, it feels more like an exercise in patience than anything else. I firmly believe that Platinum tier should impose star loses for 3rd place, making it so that getting to Master's isn't just because someone has time to grind.

Master tier
The most problematic of the tiers IMO. The biggest issue is that you consistently fall in rank by the virtue of going to sleep. Next time you log in, you could be 30 places behind. This is because in the meantime other players played more games. And secondly, new players that join Masters typically start (at least in my experience) around 50-60 rank, pushing anyone else out. The Master tier needs two things: 1) New players entering Master should start at the bottom. 2) Introduction of point decay if players don't play for X days so people need to play to keep their rank.

I don't have a solution how to deal with losing rank because of logging off, but I'm sure there is a solution to it. For me personally, it has been demotivating to play at Master tier because even after wins, it feels like I'm losing ranks.

Any suggestions are welcome.