Competitive Season 8 Begins with Several Changes

If you're into Overwatch competitive play, you'll definitely want to check out a recent developer blog post about changes coming to Season 8 which has now kicked off. Most of the changes come through matchmaking including limiting the "maximum Skill Rating" differences between the highest SR player and the lowest SR player on the same team.

• The maximum Skill Rating difference between the highest and the lowest skill rated player on the same team has been reduced. The ranges have been changed to the following:
  • 1000 SR for Bronze through Diamond
  • 500 SR for Master
  • 250 SR for Grandmaster  
• This change should help players at both the lower and higher limits of Skill Rating get placed with allies and against opponents of a similar skill level, which in turn should lead to more satisfying games overall. 

In addition, alterations in in SR adjustments have also been put into place.

There is also another factor in determining the SR change after completing a match, and that’s a measurement of how well you personally performed during the match. If you perform well then you gain more SR when you win, and lose less SR when defeated. The reverse is also true, so if you perform very poorly you gain less SR for a win and lose additional SR when defeated. The personal performance adjustments have been controversial amongst the community for quite some time, especially since the calculations for these adjustments are not at all transparent.

The Overwatch site has a nice guide on how to get started in Competitive Play and also provides a list of rewards that can be earned

You can read the full blog post on the Overwatch site.