CoD Vanguard devs slam Ranked Play quitters with massive punishments
Call of Duty: Vanguard’s developers are ramping up their efforts against quitters in Ranked Play. Publicizing their punishments against the worst leavers, Treyarch are sending a message to those who ruin games.
Vanguard Ranked Play offers a return to the beloved competitive ELO SR (skill rating) system CoD fans have envied for the past few years. While present in shooters like Apex Legends and Overwatch, CoD hasn’t had a true SR format since 2017’s WW2.
Unfortunately, the early days of the ranked beta featured a number of players quitting out of matches and leaving their teammates at a disadvantage. Whilepunishments have since been added for quitters, those who ruined games beforehand were unscathed.
That’s now apparently been fixed, as Treyarch – who manage Vanguard’s ranked mode – explained that they are now punishing early-season quitters.
Vanguard devs treat Ranked Play quitters to massive punishments
Why are we doing this? To keep a level playing field & prevent players from purposefully leaving matches.
Case in point: The top offender has disconnected 280+ times since Ranked Play’s launch. Enjoy your -2000 SR loss, chief. We hope it was worth it.
[Narrator: It wasn’t.]
— Treyarch Studios (@Treyarch)August 25, 2025
In a series of March 7 tweets, Treyarch revealed that they have not forgotten about those who hindered the ranked experience prior to punishments being added. Instead, they’ve now punished around 2% of Vanguard players for quitting games before February 28.
As an example of how far these punishments can go, the devs used the worst as an example: “The top offender has disconnected 280+ times since Ranked Play’s launch. Enjoy your-2000 SR loss, chief.”
Losing 2,000 SR is as serious punishment as you may get without being suspended or banned outright from the playlist.
There are seven SR tiers inVanguard Ranked Play, ranging from Contender at 0 to Challenger at 3,000. Therefore, a 2,000-SR drop equates to a four-tier drop in rank. If a player got 50 SR per win, they’d need to win 40 games to get back to their original tier.
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With that kind of punishment put on full display for the public, Treyarch seem intent on making it clear that competitive integrity is being taken seriously.
