8 replies to this topic

[RickySpanish]

I recently purchased the Grid Iron HBK because it looked like a bit of fun, and began running it with various builds, all of them functioning under some sort of support role. I don't know if my different positioning of the Mech made me see my team mates in a new light or if I just got really, REALLY unlucky, but while playing the GI and afterwards, the 4SP and 4H, here's what I encountered:

1. An ENTIRE lance of Mechs, seemingly a premade, walking into the cave on Frozen and becoming turrets for the rest of the match. The enemy then walked in and strafed side to side, and the D-DC I was spectating was not able to track his targets. I exploded in a 5v1 fight expecting them to fight alongside me, but not before doing more damage than their lance combined.

2. [redacted]

3. Teams of enemy D-DCs mounting LB-10x cannons and LRM launchers, who my team mates were utterly unable to avoid.

4. No one using artillery or air strikes, ever.

5. Quickdraws.

Now, I was under the impression that after my 33:1 KDR on my Shadowhawk phoenix variant ( which has now dropped to a far more reasonable 2.5:1), I had climbed out of the 'beginner' area for the matchmaker. However the level of play I witnessed while playing my Hunchbacks wasn't just indicative of something a new player might do, it was genuinely, trollingly, the absolute worst I have seen in this game ever. As in purposefully bad.

Needless to say I got incredibly frustrated and jumped into my Shadowhawk 5M in hopes of encountering the same players again. However, I then suddenly started encountering players that were of the usual, expected level of competence - team work, use of cover, arty / UAV, no dashes through open terrain etc.

This must be just coincidence though right? I was under the impression that matchmaking was made on a weight class level, so how come when I run my Shadowhawks both teams are usually competent, but when I run my hunchbacks they're usually SO BAD? I don't mind being blitzed in the HBK, but I would expect to see the same dopes in my 5M for some payback after encountering them several games in a row on the HBKs...

Edited by Egomane, 14 January 2014 - 01:25 PM.
Name and Shame

[Wintersdark]

Coincidence. Elo scores are tracked per weight class, so your SHD and HBK share the same score.

It's not unusual to have strange results in a small sample size. Consider, in a given play session, you're going to meet the same set of players over and over because you're all clicking Launch at more or less the same time. Just because they are vaguely around your Elo range doesn't mean too much: They could be just messing around, not playing seriously today; or maybe they're new players with very few matches overall and have simply been "lucky" enough to win their first matches and end up higher than they should be.

Elo isn't going to work well at all until you get a _lot_ of matches under your belt(think 100+ per weight class), so the variables are mitigated except for the one we're most concerned about: Player skill.

Also, keep in mind, KDR has nothing to do with Elo whatsoever.

[RickySpanish]

Wintersdark, on 10 January 2014 - 08:04 AM, said:

Coincidence. Elo scores are tracked per weight class, so your SHD and HBK share the same score.

It's not unusual to have strange results in a small sample size. Consider, in a given play session, you're going to meet the same set of players over and over because you're all clicking Launch at more or less the same time. Just because they are vaguely around your Elo range doesn't mean too much: They could be just messing around, not playing seriously today; or maybe they're new players with very few matches overall and have simply been "lucky" enough to win their first matches and end up higher than they should be.

Elo isn't going to work well at all until you get a _lot_ of matches under your belt(think 100+ per weight class), so the variables are mitigated except for the one we're most concerned about: Player skill.

Also, keep in mind, KDR has nothing to do with Elo whatsoever.

KDR doesn't, but I was also winning 4 out of every 5 matches for a while too, so I assumed I had dragged myself out of that range once my win / loss ratio evened out. In honesty I just had to get that rant off my chest, since those matches were just so incredibly surprising in their execution. On a more positive note, the HBK losses will make the SHD wins more likely I just wish I would encounter the same twits in both Mechs so that I could teach them a bit of a lesson!

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

If I had to guess I'd say when you switched to your SHD from your HBK it took you long enough that you got in on a slightly different launch cycle (and thus different set of players).

[Goose]

This thread gives me hope Teh Devs are using moar then 4 Elos per player!

[RickySpanish]

Levi - that is likely, however I switched Mechs *very* fast (didn't take more than a few seconds) with the intention of staying in that cycle, which made me even more angry when I didn't drop with the suckers.

[Reitrix]

Goose, on 10 January 2014 - 12:34 PM, said:

This thread gives me hope Teh Devs are using moar then 4 Elos per player!

Given my experiences, I'm fairly sure its it's giving me a score per weight range, not class.
My Catapults and Cataphracts are both Heavies, but my Cataphracts (Mets and my dakkaphract 4x) Get far superior players than my muck about Catapults. Likewise, when i ran my Locust, i felt like i was in the Steering Wheel Underhive compared to when i run my Raven, and it feels like I've got a NARC jammed up my *** all match long.

[Goose]

[Klappspaten]

I really know that feeling.

A few days back me and my mates droped in our medium brawlers. Shadowhawks, Wolverines, fast, jump capable with a lot of close range punch, that kind of stuff. We usually do serious damage when we go out in those things.
Things that day went as usual, neither particular good nor bad. Until we droped on canyon network skirmish.
We as a 4 man premade were on bravo so we figured the 4 assaults on alpha would be premades too. So we went to support them. As they saw that we were going in formation behind them they started to move towards where epsilon is in conquest.

Long story short, enemy flanked us we took out a poptart and then I got crushed. **** happens I thought, and my position hadnt been good anyway. So I started to spectate.
And then I realized that our assault premade had vanished on the first sight of the enemy. Two of them in their Battlemasters were sitting in the canyon shooting walls like a bunch of morons. And the other two went straight on completely ignoring all the targets and trying to go for a cap. Until they encountered two more mediums. Then they turned around went back to the first guys and got stomped after shooting not even once.

Those people are out there and they are nothing other than bright as a wall of bricks.
And somehow they end up in every Elo circle I´ve been at. (I moved from really really bad to quite good and back to mediocre)
You cant escape them. The only thing you can do is to give the best you got and have fun, period.