Your first ranked match

This is the walkthrough for your first game. The same steps are in the in-app Guide & rules door on the ranked screen's toolbar.

Before you queue#

The ranked screen checks everything for you. The big button names the first thing to fix instead of saying FIND MATCH, and while your account setup is incomplete a SETUP tab in the room shows a Systems check list. Fix them in order:

1. Sign in. The button reads "Sign in to queue". Anyone can watch the ladder and read the chat signed out; queueing and posting need an account.
2. Link Battle.net. The button reads "Link Battle.net to queue" and takes you to your settings. Results are verified against the players inside the replay, so the site has to know which player is you.
3. A verified character on each region you queue. Your servers belong to regions (Americas, Europe, Korea/Taiwan). A server whose region has no verified character of yours is locked with "Needs a verified Battle.net ID on this region". Running the Battle.net link again rescans all three regions.
4. Pick a race. Terran, Zerg, Protoss or Random. Click a lit tile again to clear it.
5. Pick at least one server. On a first visit every server you can use starts selected, and a quick ping check switches off the ones too laggy to be fair. You can override both. See Servers, regions and ping.

The Companion app is optional. It uploads your replay the moment the game ends, which is the fastest way to report. Without it, either player uploads the replay by hand after the game: same checks, same result.

The one-time league question#

On your very first queue, if the site has no SC2 replay of yours to read your MMR from, it asks "What league are you on the SC2 ladder?" Pick a tile and it queues you straight away. Your answer only sets where your rating starts, and it is asked once. If you are not sure, the "Unranked / not sure" tile starts you low (600) so you climb rather than drop. See Ratings, placement and leagues for the full table.

Queue up#

1. Choose RANKED or UNRANKED on the command bar. Unranked still matches you fairly on a hidden rating but shows no number and moves no league.
2. Optionally set a backup race on the "2ND" tile to avoid mirrors.
3. Press FIND MATCH.

The scan strip shows your search range and the clock. You can browse the rest of the site while you wait: a floating chip keeps the clock running, and the match-found screen takes over wherever you are. Do the next step now while you wait.

Join the meet-up channel in SC2#

Every Patch Clash match meets in one chat channel. In StarCraft II press Enter (or click the chat bar), type /join patchessc and press Enter again. Doing it while you queue saves a scramble later.

Match found#

A full-screen board appears with your opponent, the server and a countdown.

• Start banning, or press READY. Either one tells the site you are here. You have about 35 seconds, including the short VERSUS intro.
• Ban up to four maps. Your opponent cannot see your bans and you cannot see theirs. Bans are optional: pressing READY with none is fine.
• When the window closes, a roulette picks the map from everything that survived.

If you do not answer in time and your opponent did, the match is voided, your opponent goes back into the queue, and you can take a short queue lockout. See Match found and the map draft for the full picture, including what the card colours mean.

Meet up and play#

After the roulette, the screen and the lobby chat give you concrete orders: the region to log into, who hosts (decided by coin flip), the map, the server and your opponent's battletag with a copy button.

1. Log into the right region. SC2's regions are separate worlds: channels, friends and lobbies on one are invisible from the others. Your match names a server, and both players log into that server's region:

Server	Log into
US West, US Central, US East, Brazil, Singapore, Australia	Americas
Europe	Europe
Korea, Taiwan	Korea/Taiwan

Switch region with the globe icon at the top right of the SC2 home screen, or the region picker above PLAY in the Battle.net launcher. When two players "can never find each other", this is almost always why.

2. If you host:

1. Custom Games, Melee tab, search the drafted map by its full name.
2. Choose Create with Mod and search PatchesSC Versus Mod (its PTR version, PT: PatchesSC Versus Mod (PTR), counts too). A plain custom game without the mod does not count: the replay is rejected.
3. Maps ending in PCE are the mod's own Patch Clash Editions. Host that exact map; a game on the similarly named ladder map is held for a moderator instead of counting.
4. In the lobby set Game Server Location to the match server. That dropdown picks the datacenter; the region you logged into is what decides who can see the lobby.
5. Type /lobbylink in the patchessc channel. SC2 posts a clickable line that puts your opponent straight into the lobby.
6. Start the game once they are in.

3. If you join: watch the patchessc channel for your host's /lobbylink line and click it. That is the main route on purpose: direct invites are often blocked from non-friends, and an invite cannot reach you while you sit in another lobby. If you must use an invite, leave any other lobby first.

The SKIN SET option you may notice in the lobby is vanilla SC2 cosmetics. It has nothing to do with the mod and changes nothing about the game or the result.

4. Play. Once the game is really under way, press GAME STARTED on the match screen if you have a moment (the Companion does this for you). It tells the site you are both there, which closes the AFK challenge so nobody can use it to escape a losing game.

The result#

When the game ends, the replay is the report:

• With the Companion running, it uploads the replay and the result appears on its own, usually within a minute or two.
• Without it, open the match (the ranked screen shows it) and press Upload replay / report, then drop the newest file from Documents > StarCraft II > Accounts > ... > Replays > Multiplayer. Either player's copy settles the match.

The result card shows Victory, Defeat or Draw, your rating change, your Clash XP, replay buttons and a Match debrief with both build orders and key fights. If the result moved your league, a promotion or demotion screen plays. From there, FIND MATCH again queues you straight back up.

If nothing has arrived 20 minutes after the game went live, both players get a reminder to upload the replay. A match with no result at all voids after three hours with no rating change.

If something goes wrong#

• Opponent never accepts: the match voids and you go straight back into the queue with your wait time kept.
• Opponent accepted but never arrives in SC2: press Opponent AFK? on the match screen within the first few minutes. If they do not answer its two-minute clock, the match voids and you are requeued. See Fair play: voids, strikes, AFK and disputes.
• You cannot find each other in SC2: check the region first, then use /lobbylink instead of invites.
• The result looks wrong: use Result is wrong on the match in your HISTORY tab within 72 hours. See Leaderboard, player cards and match history.
• More in Ranked ladder FAQ.