Welcome to part four in our series on Stadium, Overwatch 2’s newest way to play! We’ve looked into how Stadium is played and planned the best Powers and Items for your Heroes, and now you’re ready to bag some bounties on the battlefield. Let’s take a deep dive into Stadium's competitive ranking system and the sweet rewards that only the best competitors will claim.
Stadium is ready to test the skills and strategies of every player—whether you’re Bronze or a Grand Master in Competitive Play, Stadium will be a whole new challenge. With a separate ranking system, there are different rules for climbing the ranks, and new rewards that you can only earn in Stadium.
Can You Make It to Legend?
There are seven Stadium Leagues with five skill divisions to progress through. First, you’ll start on the very bottom of the Rookie League—no placement matches. You must win games to reach higher Leagues and unlock better rewards, including exclusive Weapon Charms and exclusive Epic Skins.
Win Games to Gain Stadium Points
Working your way up in Stadium works differently to Competitive Play, where your gains and losses are based on how your internal matchmaking rating is adjusted after every match. In Stadium, you’ll earn Points through winning games—to help you climb to new skill tiers and divisions—and you will lose points when you are defeated in higher leagues. You'll also have a separate rank for all three roles: Tank, Damage, and Support.
No points will be lost in the first two Leagues: Rookie and Novice. In Contender and Elite, after a loss, you will lose a small number of Points, meaning you risk being relegated back to Novice if you lose too many matches. At Pro and above, all wins and losses are worth close to the same amount of Points.
Due to the evolving nature of Stadium—with new Heroes, maps, modes, and abilities changing the meta every Season—your rank will reset at the end of each Season. You will be granted the rewards of the highest League tier you reach by the end of the Season.
Build Your All-Star Team
While good teamwork is important in all areas of Overwatch 2, Stadium is best played when you can plan and test strategies that complement your teammates. With an entirely separate ranked ladder that is more about winning games than showing who is best of the best individually, Stadium is all about teamwork.
We want those of you that group up with friends to be able to play together regardless of the League each is ranked in, so there won’t be grouping restrictions, nor will you be separated by Narrow or Wide groups.
Glory, Honor, and Glittering Prizes!
With Stadium comes new rewards for you to collect. You'll have the chance to unlock Stadium-exclusive Weapon Charms, Name Cards, and Titles based on the highest rank achieved. You will also earn exclusive skins for reaching certain Leagues.
Players will have a chance to collect exclusive Epic Skins are one-time, lifetime rewards, and will change every season. There is one per role, and you will receive them the moment you hit Elite with that role. For the opening season, you’ll earn an Orisa skin for the Tank role, a Genji skin for the Damage role, and a Moira skin for the Support role.
And get ready to shoot for the stars! If you can reach the All-Star rank in any role, you’ll unlock the Legendary Juno All Star skin. This highly elusive skin is only available only in the inaugural season for Stadium.
Playing Stadium will also earn you Competitive Points to unlock Gold, Jade, and Galactic Weapon Variants for your Heroes. Every win will grant 10 Competitive Points.
Get Ready for Initiation!
To celebrate launch, we’re kicking things off with a season-long event, Stadium: Initiation. Jump in and complete challenges for a variety of rewards including Name Cards, Player Icons, an Epic Loot Box, a Legendary Loot Box, an exclusive Rookie Soldier: 76 Epic skin, plus Battle Pass XP bonuses to kick off your progression through the Season 16 Battle Pass.
It's time for Stadium
We took you through the key features of Stadium, what we learned in its development, talked about important strategies to secure that big win, and in this blog, wrapped up on ranks and rewards. We know you may still have questions, so we have prepared a special forum post for everyone to answer questions about the new mode that we may not have covered here. And we’ve still got more to talk about for Season 16 in the days ahead, so stay tuned. We’ll see you in Stadium!