So i assume the answer sadly is no...... Was just enough to freeze the ranks.
You assume incorrectly. As I already said the answer is yes. One of the purposes of the system is to prevent spammers ranking up but not those that deserve to, so it is working on that level.
For that beside there was no need to come up with a bad idea poorly executed.
Another purpose is to highlight content worth reading and on a personal level I have found using the Recent merits page has led me to all sorts of great threads that normally would have been buried in all the noise. The system is a great idea that has been executed well. It's early to see its full effects, but so far the results have been very positive.