Epic Games may give Gears of War 2's multiplayer ranking system a major overhaul.

Executive producer Rod Fergusson proposed on Epic's official forums a change from the primarily team-based performance rankings to more individual-focused rankings akin to RPGs.

"What if, instead of skill rank, we instead showed your experience level," Fergusson explained. "You would gain experience through your individual performance in public multiplayer matches--the higher your score at the end, the more experience you acquire.

"Of course, the experience gained across the different match types would be balanced so you couldn't just grind on the respawning game types to try and level faster. The experience requirements for each level would grow with each level gained (like a typical RPG) and we'd have 99 levels of experience for you to show off your 'leetness.'"

The current TrueSkill ranking system in Gears of War 2 has five ranks. If the system predicts a player to lose and his or her team wins, the TrueSkill ranking rises more than if the player was predicted to win, and vice versa. Currently, rank does not constantly increase in value as in RPGs.

In the proposed new system, players who quit multiplayer matches mid-game will receive an experience penalty.

Fergusson said Epic would not be able to implement Achievements with any potential new system, initially, as Microsoft requires all post-release Achievements to be tied to new downloadable content.

But he added, "...When new DLC is released, it's a whole new ball game, then."