My point about “gaming” is that what matters most is the rigor, not the rank. As I mentioned up-thread, our school has very modest weighting, so the val took a much less rigorous schedule than my kid. He got shut out of pretty much all of his desired (very elite) schools despite being val. Kids quite a bit lower down in the ranking who did take a more rigorous schedule, did “great” and got into pretty much all their desired schools. Anecdotal of course, but I think the ranking isn’t “all that.” The rigor, and performance at that level, is. Aiming for val, while ignoring rigor, can really backfire.