7 replies to this topic

[Garegaupa]

Hi, everyone!

(Sorry, no “TL;DR” version here, as I am unable to convey my thoughts with fewer words than this… But to possibly save some of you from some unnecessary reading, this has nothing to do with streak missiles, I'm talking about another kind of "streak" here! )

As I needed a short break from playing MWO (due to a phenomenon I will be describing shortly), I thought I would share some “philosophical” musings of mine and get some of your thoughts and opinions on the matter. I do not know if this is the right forum for such a post, as it does not directly have anything to do with game balance as such, but I could not find a better place for it.

The thing is, every single time I start playing, I seem to get into what I call either a “good streak” or a “bad streak” – there seems to be very little in between. Either I am having many good games in a row interrupted by a few semi-bad ones, or I am having many bad games interrupted by a few “meh” ones.

Note that I am not talking about winning or losing streaks – I have those as well, but they seem more random. Moreover, when I am on a “good streak” even my losses are good, with me having one to three kills, tons of damage and often one of the highest match scores on the losing side. When I am on a “bad streak”, even my victories are bad, typically with me either getting killed in the start of the game, or surviving until the end having accomplished just about nothing – zero kills, 20-30 damage and maybe one or two assists.

Sure, we all have good games and bad games. What is puzzling to me, however, is that when I am on a “bad streak” I can play two games, five games, fifteen games – I just cannot seem to be able to turn the tables. When I get into one of my “bad streaks” I may as well log off, take a break for an hour or two, and then try again – which is the reason why I’m sitting here typing this instead of playing at the moment…

Likewise, when I am on a “good streak”, nothing seems to “break the magic” no matter how many games I play. If I then take a break and get back to playing an hour after, however, I might get straight into a “bad streak”.

So, what could be causing this? Here are some of my random thoughts:

• Could it have something to do with the amount of players playing at a particular time, causing me to get worse teammates during my “bad streaks”? This sounds plausible enough, but I have yet to find any connection between the times and days that I am playing and the “bad streaks” and “good streaks”. Additionally, I never like to blame anyone but myself for my own failures – even with a bad team, I should be able to perform well and have a good game for myself.
  
• Is it possible that the first game I play during a sitting sets some kind of standard? I.e. if it is a good one, I get into the right state of mind and get more good games in a row, and if it is a bad one, I get into the wrong state of mind and start playing like a doo-doo? I suppose this is possible, but I am no psychologist, so I could not really say. It does not really sound likely to me that this should have so much of an impact, though.
  
• Could I be on the pivot point between two ELO levels? Perhaps, when I play several good games (a “good streak”), I jump into a higher level, get my rear end thoroughly handed to me (a “bad streak”), just to fall down into a lower level again and start functioning normally? Not likely, as far as I can tell – I consider myself to be well rooted in average-ness, and it does not make sense that I would be getting into such high skill levels.
  
• Finally, could it be that I am just imagining the whole thing? There are no “good streaks” or “bad streaks”; I just remember the very good games and the very bad games? This one might sound plausible enough, but it does not seem to me to be the case – to me there is too much evidence that the “good streaks” and “bad streaks” are really happening.

Now, if you have not been bored to sleep yet, it would be interesting to hear if there are others with similar experiences of “good streaks” and “bad streaks”, and what you think the reason(s) for them might be? I am not really looking for a solution here, because there may not really be one. I would just like to know if there are others who experience these kinds of “streaks” here, or if I am just plain old nuts.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and have a nice day – both on and off the battlefield!

Edited by Garegaupa, 18 April 2014 - 05:40 AM.

[El Bandito]

Depends. I usually play my online games such as MWO and LoL during the time when most of North America is asleep, so that the ping difference will hopefully be minimal (I have 255ms ping).

Many of my loss streaks are caused by my negative emotions carried from one bad match to the next. Therefore, I usually play other games once I lose a few times in a row.

[Artgathan]

I would argue that what you're experiencing is largely psychological (especially if your "good / bad streaks" don't actually have anything to do with whether you're winning or losing). It's very possible that your first game of the play session just sets you up for the rest of the night. This is incredibly common for people - we very often interpret events to suit our mood (for instance, if you're in a good mood and you find $5 on the ground, you might think "Sweet! Free money!" whereas if you're in a bad mood you might think "Some idiot lost that.").

Therefore, I would suggest that if you're having a "bad streak", try to break the spell. Do something you enjoy (such as playing a favorite mech, or listening to music you enjoy) to help put you back into a positive frame of mind. Once you're feeling good, you're likely to keep feeling good - humans tend to have a sort of "emotional inertia" that helps maintain their current mood.

[FerretGR]

If I was going to guess, I'd say what you're experiencing is a combination of what El Bandito describes (if you don't play well, you carry that negativity into your next match, and it effects your play, which could lead to some mini-streaks of bad or good play), and something along the lines of confirmation bias where you remember in particular the streaks and highlight them even if they're minor... cognitive bias effects impact the best of us.

[Jman5]

I have found that the time you play has a noticeable impact on the player skill around you. NA prime time will pit you with and against the most skilled players, the people with the lowest latency, the most premades, and the most meta mechs. The result is that even if you win, your higher skilled teammates will be taking a larger share of the damage and kills. Play some games in the early morning at 5 or 6 am EST. Then play some matches at 8 or 9 pm EST. Pay attention to the mech loadouts as well.

Edited by Jman5, 30 March 2014 - 05:12 AM.

[Duncan Aravain]

There are times that I have learned to avoid PUGing; mainly when people predominately have triple digit ping. For me, it is at these times that advice typed in match chat is ignored and I watch as mechs impale themselves on base turrets early, assaults slowly make their way across large open areas, SRMs are fired at 400 meters, ETC. Cultural differences? Language problems? I don't know why, but the statistics I've kept show that this is happening.

Now, don't get me wrong. I have had this happen during my time zone's prime time, but it is at a far lower rate. I cannot believe play styles are that different across the world, but the difference between prime time and off time is very noticeable, especially after 9.3k in drops.. Too bad I like the game enough to keep trying it even when I know the odds appear to be stacked against me.

That being said, there does seem to be some distilled perversion that PGI has incorporated into its Match Maker.

[Daekar]

I blame negative emotions and a sadistic matchmaker that alternately puts me on teams of Urbanmechs to bolster them (even though it rarely works) or once my Elo has tanked again from a losing streak it puts me on teams with brains.

I have definitely noticed this phenomenon, and if I ever quit MWO, the frustration associated with it will be the reason.

[Garegaupa]

It is interesting to see that when looking at the sum of all of the replies to my post so far, some aspects of all my four possible causes for this "phenomenon" are being referred to! I must be on to something, then!

For my part, I'm quite sure that El Bandito, Artgathan and FerretGR have good points - after doing something else for a while I went back to playing again and had quite a few good games. The power that our minds have over us is a fascinating thing! I'll certainly try to go for a coffee break sooner when my MWO performance plummets from now on and see if that helps.