138 replies to this topic

[Coolant]

all mechs are valuable for once in a Mechwarrior game...i would not want to face a team of lights, nor would I want to face a team of assaults. Games are winnable regardless of tonnage. I've been in games where the team I was on won 8-0 or 8-1 facing much lighter tonnage or much greater tonnage. I've been in games where the team I was on lost 8-0 or 8-1 with various tonnage. I've been in close games with both much lighter or much heavier team tonnage. It really doesn't matter much. More important is the ELO which still seems to be off. Although, Bryan did say the ELO is close to what they are looking for and Soon™ they will open up groups to 5 or more rather than just 4 or 8. But, ultimately, the biggest factor in balance is teams on comms. I've been in matches where only 2 or 3 of us on a team are on comms and the rest lonewolfs (maybe the rest are also on comms who knows), but facing a nearly full team on comms tilts the balance toward them regardless of tonnage or ELO.

Edited by Coolant, 03 June 2013 - 09:32 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

Screech, on 02 June 2013 - 09:42 AM, said:

Come up with a theory and the craft the data to support that theory. Works in a lot of other fields why not here.

And do not forget to use a total Sample size of 10 as a base.

[MaddMaxx]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 03 June 2013 - 05:20 AM, said:

This is where the terribad that is PGI's expectation management comes in.

If they had come to us and said "Hey guys, during certain times, you may see a 3-5 minute wait to create the best matchup possible. This will of course be a non-issue when we get lobbies into the game, but we feel it will create a better user experience. And as the population goes up, you will see that wait go down".

Instead they portrayed the new matchmaker and ELO as some kind of savior to this game, and it's clearly not working properly due to low population, crazy meta, or whatever.

It's all about managing expectations.

Same deal as when they said they'd look at ECM, had us post in a huge thread for like a month, then didn't listen to anything we said. It's amazing how they work.

What would be "truly" amazing, is if the Dev thought they could actually come on here and say that exact type of thing. But we all know that is utter BS.

It's amazing how the Forums work.

P.S. Almost forgot. It's all about managing expectations.

[MaddMaxx]

Mister Blastman, on 03 June 2013 - 09:12 AM, said:

If the matchmaker used "tonnage" based matchmaking and not "class" based matchmaking, things would be considerably more interesting.

Likely very true but would also likely add to wait times. Wait times are way worse than the other team having "more" than us...

Zypher, on 03 June 2013 - 09:17 AM, said:

Imagine what they could do if the population was bigger

As the word spreads that the MWO Forums are better stayed away from, when looking for any sort of intelligent game play break down, then the MWO Community will grow. No worries. lol

[tenderloving]

Coolant, on 03 June 2013 - 09:31 AM, said:

all mechs are valuable for once in a Mechwarrior game...i would not want to face a team of lights, nor would I want to face a team of assaults. Games are winnable regardless of tonnage. I've been in games where the team I was on won 8-0 or 8-1 facing much lighter tonnage or much greater tonnage. I've been in games where the team I was on lost 8-0 or 8-1 with various tonnage. I've been in close games with both much lighter or much heavier team tonnage. It really doesn't matter much. More important is the ELO which still seems to be off. Although, Bryan did say the ELO is close to what they are looking for and Soon™ they will open up groups to 5 or more rather than just 4 or 8. But, ultimately, the biggest factor in balance is teams on comms. I've been in matches where only 2 or 3 of us on a team are on comms and the rest lonewolfs (maybe the rest are also on comms who knows), but facing a nearly full team on comms tilts the balance toward them regardless of tonnage or ELO.

A team of mediums? Would you be afraid to face a team of mediums?

[Asakara]

MaddMaxx, on 03 June 2013 - 09:15 AM, said:

And not surprisingly, the Dev have stated they can do exactly that. All that group has to do is possibly wait 5+ minutes for the proper mechs and ELO to show up in the Pool when it is short. Imagine the OP's outrage at having to wait for his "fair" match then... please.

A perfect example of wanting your cake and eating it too.

Assumptions.. LOL. I would be happy to wait. I already wait a long time now and the longer the wait the more unbalanced the match ends up being in my experience. I would rather that long wait lead to better balanced matches.

[MaddMaxx]

Asakara, on 03 June 2013 - 10:19 AM, said:

Assumptions.. LOL. I would be happy to wait. I already wait a long time now and the longer the wait the more unbalanced the match ends up being in my experience. I would rather that long wait lead to better balanced matches.

Assumptions seem rampant around this thread. You play with 3 friends at what? "2:00 am in the morning EST" and expect the MM to accomadate you and your buddies as if the whole world was awake?

[Deathlike]

tenderloving, on 03 June 2013 - 10:16 AM, said:

A team of mediums? Would you be afraid to face a team of mediums?

If they are all Cents, then heck yea.

[Asakara]

MaddMaxx, on 03 June 2013 - 10:23 AM, said:

Assumptions seem rampant around this thread. You play with 3 friends at what? "2:00 am in the morning EST" and expect the MM to accomadate you and your buddies as if the whole world was awake?

I play generally from 6:30-7 PM PST to 11 PM PST. The times we played in the OP was a special thing on a Friday night. Of course 8:45 PM PST when we started is not 2 AM EST.. But I am sure you already know this.

Also, there are more than a few people on the west coast of the north american continent.. And some in between the coasts too.. So the world does not stop when the east coast goes to bed. LOL.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

MaddMaxx, on 03 June 2013 - 09:47 AM, said:

What would be "truly" amazing, is if the Dev thought they could actually come on here and say that exact type of thing. But we all know that is utter BS.

It's amazing how the Forums work.

P.S. Almost forgot. It's all about managing expectations.

Well, PGI set super high expectations (go read their original Role Warfare posts), then completely and utterly went away from them with no real explanation as to why.

They set expectations about P2W, went away from it, then got creamed by the forums.

They set expectations about something simple like AtD and have failed miserably at it.

They set major expectations about the matchmaker and it's a VERY uneven playing experience.

The problem is...you base it on the forums now. The forums now are a very different beast than they would have been if PGI had a real community manager, and really done an great job communicating.

Some companies are TEFLON because of things like that. But PGI did such a terrible job of it, that now that they almost can't get out of their own way.

Edited by Nicholas Carlyle, 03 June 2013 - 12:21 PM.

[Dakkath]

Just a friendly reminder to please stay on topic and leave the personal attacks out of your posts.

Thank you!
-Dak

[SpiralRazor]

Ghogiel, on 01 June 2013 - 10:17 PM, said:

There is skewing. The mech weight sample you used is biased compared to the known mech weight distribution in the pool.

Your attempt to suggest that PGIs statistics are less accurate that yours is amusing.

Dont be supertarded....A light lance shouldnt be "skewing" anything. You need to go back and learn the application of the word. And if it IS skewing, its entirely on PGIs side/fault because its not like a Light Lance is an uncommon thing.

[Vodrin Thales]

SpiralRazor, on 03 June 2013 - 01:11 PM, said:

Dont be supertarded....A light lance shouldnt be "skewing" anything. You need to go back and learn the application of the word. And if it IS skewing, its entirely on PGIs side/fault because its not like a Light Lance is an uncommon thing.

Actually in MWO at this time it is very uncommon, and a medium lance is even less common. The overwhelming majority of 4 man groups that are queuing are doing so with a mixture of heavies and assaults. So yes if you are running with a lance composed entirely of medium and light mechs I would expect the number of matches where you faced a higher tonnage opposing force to be much higher than what PGI has tabulated.

Edited by Vodrin Thales, 03 June 2013 - 01:21 PM.

[Alekzander Smirnoff]

For the majority of matches I run with friends, I'm usually the only assault mech in the lance with a light or a pair of mediums and a heavy. Damn those near invincible centurions! I've come across that particular four man running three jenners and a centurion one time. It was a slaughter for us and we had at least 100 tons advantage. Pilot skill can vastly outweigh tonnage gaps. Unless you drop with like, eight AS7 then there might be an issue...

[NinetyProof]

All you did with is to prove the basic tenant:

Size ... Doesn't ... Matter

Lots of games where the team with more tonnage lost ...

It's amazing how people are so laser focused on a particular piece of minutia that they don't see the big picture. Big picture is that you get matched quickly so you can get in, play, and get out. Also, you have no idea what the system does with 4 man when you throw that into the mix.

Bottom Line is that you don't know what the MM was doing, and it might have been doing exactly what it was told to do, or it might have been scrapping the barrel to make teams and going outside it's scope. We don't even know if weight matching is even turned on at all, or if it's being basically ignored.

[Deathlike]

NinetyProof, on 03 June 2013 - 01:22 PM, said:

All you did with is to prove the basic tenant:

Size ... Doesn't ... Matter

BJs and Wangs would like a word with you.

[Wispsy]

Zypher, on 03 June 2013 - 07:51 AM, said:

I hate this misconception, truth is excellent gunnery > then all other skills. You can try to change the out come of someone's firing by being fast, erratic, and manuverable. However, it's up the the shooters skill rather than your piloting that predicts the outcome. Good piloting just makes things more difficult for the shooter, with pro gunners, it makes less difference. Take out the PPC and Gauss and I would say the game might be quite a bit different. Playing lights, while fun, is playing with fire if you run up against skilled opponents.

As a result more tonnage > less tonnage because of pin point quake style alphas. Until there are objectives that mean something, MM should never have unbalanced total tonnages, but I fear there won't ever be enough players to give MM its full credit.

I do not think you read and understood what I wrote.

I did not speak of moving randomly, I spoke of moving the instant before they fire to a place they are not firing. So you need to be a better pilot to beat them in a 1v1 fight? well yes that it how it works when you choose maneuverability over armour and weapons. If you go for being a pinpoint alpha sniper you need to be a better shooter to win, if you go for a brawler you need to be better at positioning to win.

"pro gunners" are often easier to dodge, they hit where they aim and it is often much easier to predict where they will aim then some random guy shooting all over the place which may just hit you with luck and instakill you.

[StuffYouFear]

Monky, on 01 June 2013 - 09:28 PM, said:

Matchmaker doesn't handle groups of lights very well, I've been matched with so many '4 man spider lance' teams that I basically just expect to lose when I see it. Part of this is 8 man with 2 - 4 'teams' (2 4-mans to 4 2-mans) the math just isn't always going to be able to throw in 4 Atlai or highlanders to counter it and then fill out an enemy team. ELO also likely interferes as lighter mechs are more likely at lower ELO due to the high risk of dying early (speed + fragility = quick engagements and bad luck/poor piloting means a likely drop in ELO) and lower damage output prevents ascension into high ELO as easily as assaults, so it likely gets very heavy weight classes at high ELO.

That said, match maker has been gradually improving over time (very slowly), and while I can complain about the time frame, I can't complain that it isn't moving in the right direction at least.

Our 4 man team of lights went 15 straight wins last week(frist night of that 25 win thingy)
Around half of our wins were thourgh cap, rest we murdered the other team. Most of that put us in the top dps for our lance vs our other 4 PUG lance. So what do you think that would make our ELO in these "weak" mechs we have been playing?

[Mawai]

Ok ... I am not sure what your complaint is ...

The tonnage in these matches was mis-matched ... you were always on the lower side anywhere from 0 to 145 tons ... mostly because you fielded a lance with 3 or more light mechs in all the matches and the match-maker had to come up with something to oppose you.

HOWEVER ... your side won 9 out of 15 matches. This would seem to indicate that despite the tonnage difference - the matches you played in were generally balanced.

Would you like the tonnage to be equal so you could win 15/15?

Or would you like to wait 15 minutes in the queue while the game waited to find 3 equally skilled light mech pilots to oppose your lance? Light mechs appear to be the among the least frequently played these days and ELO will be all over the place ... if you want matched tonnage when you tip the scales with so many lights the ONLY feasible way to achieve this is by including lights on the opposing team ... but then comes the issue of ELO and the match-maker appears to be balanced towards matching ELO first and tonnage second.

In the end, although the tonnages are outside the range PGI was quoting as acceptable ... the W/L record for your team would seem to me to indicate that it was working as intended AND achieving that goal for the most part.

Edited by Mawai, 03 June 2013 - 03:15 PM.

[RG Notch]

Asakara, on 03 June 2013 - 08:05 AM, said:

LOL.. 3 friends playing what they prefer (in this case light mechs) is exactly what it is.. I suspect other groups of friends play what they want as well, as they should in this video game.

I made my point with evidence.. PGI's "fact" does not coincide with my friends and my reality. When 3 friends play light mechs (or 4 friends play lights and mediums) together the matchmaker ends up setting up a large weight discrepancy for the majority of games, even though PGI says it only happens 7% of the time.

No special queues are needed.. LOL, just perhaps they could try to improve weight matchmaking a bit. I would prefer to fight other lights in high-speed frantic combat.. Rather than slowly bleed an assault with a 1,000 paper cuts as he rages at the screen and calls me a "Bundle Of Sticks" over and over.

I'd say you do obviously understand that the 7% is in the aggregate for the entire player base and that your individual experience will vary? You do .... right?