Why an in game ladder is more important now than later.

To be fair, it seems they did prepare some matchmaking, they just kept it under the hood, as per trialq's mod enabling a button to use it.
Matchmaking without a proper ladder being nothing more (no disrespect to PA Stats' one here) than a shortcut (auto create game + load 1v1 system for 2 players) compared to manual game creation, I can only assume they will "polish" both before releasing anything.
A fully functional ladder surely need a lot of time.
A bit disappointed too, afraid of potential consequences, but I'll live with it.
If it can be implemented in the first 2 months post 1.0 release, there's still hope.

I don't mind

I completely agree.

Ladders/matchmaking are critical for easing in new players and preventing them from running away screaming because they haven't gotten used to PA's fast pace.

From a project management point of view I completely understand why you would need to drop features. I feel that is most likely could hurt PA in the long run due to people seeing the lack of ladder, matchmaking, and ranking features simply not coming back. Also word of mouth and user/professional reviews would hurt because of it. I understand you have to keep your internal deadlines and agreements with partners. Planetary Annihilation will be a success in the long run hopefully.

P.S. This is one of the essential features and as consequence this is likely going to hurt. Just like a contextual tutorial is needed but isn't there. Hopefully these two things can be implemented reasonably quickly post-release so the damage can be mitigated. I'm not even a competitive player but this is concerning.

Just a question. Does Minecraft have random matchmaking? Or does it generate a server list for you?

Seriously, everyone hating on the legacy of games with server list. Long live call of duty 1.

I don't know; never really used multiplayer part of the game.

Not hating on. My perception is that there is owned to be a massive blow up on steam, reddit, etc without some kind of basic ladder/matchmaking/ranking features. It also could be a possibility that a simple server list will work but most likely not. Expectations that have been created by other RTSs such as starcraft 2, etc. will cause this because its seen as an essential characteristic of the genre.

Minecraft is 100% completely different than PA.

More reasons why we need matchmaking at 1.o.

About 25% of Steam games have less than 10 hours played, and 17% have less than 1 hour played. If people have a bad first experience, they don't come back. (source)

If newbies go up against experienced players over and over again, they'll leave and won't come back.

"1.0" is a label. People will judge PA by the "completed" label. If they play a "completed" game and have a bad experience or don't feel that it is feature complete, PA will get bad reviews, a bad reputation, and people won't come back or buy it.

Matchmaking is critical for easing new players into the experience as well as keeping players around.

I'm mainly a multiplayer guy ( not necessary competitive )
I did play Heroes of Newerth and Left 4 Dead before they had a matchmaking and I always waited more than I did play.. trying to find a good game. Or being kicked at the last minute because I don't have the level.
It was quite frustrating and that's an experience I don't want to repeat with PA.

Without some matchmaking, I can not consider the multiplayer part of the game finished.
Hopefully I know that 1.0 will not have matchmaking, so I will wait before trying to have real games.

PAStats will expand to cover it hopefully if it isn't covered in vanilla PA 1.0.

I don't run PAStats, but such is my hope, that if the game has that many players, that PAStats can matchmake by rank with that many people to feed the matchmaker.

I still prefer legacy matchmaking, AKA find a lobby...

Didn't know so many people wanted ladder for so long........

holy mother of necro!