795 replies to this topic

[Roadbeer]

Ok, I've said this in a couple other threads, but I figured I might as well put it up front, and also create a new topic so it's easy for me to find when the inevitable "I told you so" links need to come around.

Lets take what we know, and explain how easy it's going to be to game the system.

1.Each team with have 3 of each weight class, I don't think I really need to explain what that means.
2. Each player will reside in an Elo "bucket" for each weight class, and there are 3 buckets.


So, because my friends and I all play together, it's safe to assume that for the most part, we'll reside in the same bucket, and with the stats page, it'll be pretty safe to assume which 'bucket' we reside in for each weight class. It's not an exact science, but with a little guesstimating, it should be fairly easy to accomplish.

So, with that information, lets say I have 6 other friends on, making a 'group' of 7.

Knowing that each team will only have one group per side on it, we'll form a 4 player group leaving the other 3 as "solos".

The 4 player group will take maximum weight, because well, why would we want to give that firepower to PUGs. So the group will be 3A and 1H.

The "solos" will now take whatever mech they want, though it'll be safe to assume that they'll take the maximum weight still open, so "Solo" 1 & 2 bring heavy and "Solo" 3 will bring a medium or light.

Because Matchmaker is now pulling from weight classes, and with everyone launching at once, The group will be assigned to a match, and with MM looking to fill the remaining weight slots, and with our "solo" players meeting that criteria, I'd say the odds are pretty good that our "solos" will be filling those slots. At least, I give this a higher degree of probability than we have right now.

So, what does all of this mean?
The example I used was just with 7 people, the more people you have, the odds of a successful sync actually go up, ultimately, in the interest of making 'fairer' matches, they've actually created a system that is infinitely easier to game.

Like I said, it'll take a little guesstimating and trial and error at first, but I bet by the end of the second week, seeing 10 player "premades" in the public queue is going to be quite common.

Just leaving this here for posterity, do with it as you will.


Taken from later in this thread...

Roadbeer, on 06 April 2014 - 11:22 AM, said:

I don't disagree that it's completely conjecture, but having said that, every layer of the match maker you expose, you increase the level to game it exponentially.

I'm going to let you in on a dirty little secret. I'm actually glad for this.

Given the changes of the LM, and the lack of implementation for large groups of 5-11 in a free mode, that doesn't require 3rd party software, and rewards me in Cbills, XP or achievements . If there is a way I'm going to continue to play this game, gaming this system is going to be it. Because I'm not doing anything different than I'm doing now in an attempt to play with my more than 3 friends, I'm just happy they've made it easier for me to do so.

Just wanted to clear up my position on all this

Edited by miSs, 14 April 2014 - 10:35 AM.

[FupDup]

Another reason why 3/3/3/3 is a sloppy bandaid at best.

What should be done for mech class balancing is... http://mwomercs.com/...-3-role-warfare

[kapusta11]

I can already see the whining "3 Spiders/3 Shadowhawks/3 Cataphracts/3 Highlanders always win nerf them now!!"

[FupDup]

kapusta11, on 06 April 2014 - 09:11 AM, said:

I can already see the whining "3 Spiders Jenners or Firestarters /3 Shadowhawks/3 Cataphracts/3 Highlanders always win nerf them now!!"

Fixed that for ya.

[Mystere]

kapusta11, on 06 April 2014 - 09:11 AM, said:

I can already see the whining "3 Spiders/3 Shadowhawks/3 Cataphracts/3 Highlanders always win nerf them now!!"

Bah! It could be W/X/Y/Z of anything and people will still whine to the high heavens that things are extremely unfair.

[East Indy]

It won't easier to create illicitly larger premades, since there are currently no weight restrictions.

Nor does the premade limit have anything to do with weight classes; the limit could be implemented under the hood tomorrow.

I see what you're saying but your thread title is incorrect and misleading.

Quote

I bet by the end of the second week

People will notice and players will get banned, and there may be a helpful, neighborhood watch-style list of units/clans so groups larger than four can be easily identified.

Remember, we're dudes playing a game run by other dudes actively monitoring us. It's not like there aren't social controls to prevent cheating.

[DeathlyEyes]

All it's going to do is force people to use certain chassis. Who would want to use a Trebutche versus a Cataphract when the Cataphract gives you extra tonnage. Who would take a locust? A better system would have been a total BV system. It should not copy Battletech since some weapons have more use in Mechwarrior than Battletech. Jump Jets on heavier mech's should be weighed a lot more and PPCs, Auto Cannons and Gauss Rifles would need to be weighed heavier than LRMs and Lasers.

[Edustaja]

Only thing more annoying than PGI's slow develompent is the constant whine emitted from a few select forum users.

[Malcolm Vordermark]

I think any system will have some way it can be gamed. Overall I like the idea of 3/3/3/3 but you do raise a good point.

I'm not sure what you could do to 3/3/3/3 itself to prevent this but I can think of one way to mitigate it.

Lets change the 12 vs 12 queue (which will probably be pretty vacant after private matches arrive) into an "unlimited" queue. In this queue anything goes, any group size, any tonnage, any number of groups per team. Give us a launch option to be included into both queues and maybe an slight reward increase if we are going in lone wolf or in groups smaller than 4.

You may still have people gaming the 3/3/3/3 but I'd be willing to wager the majority of people who will do this are doing it to play in their groups, not to stomp pugs.

Edited by Rouken, 06 April 2014 - 09:22 AM.

[ApolloKaras]

SLDF DeathlyEyes, on 06 April 2014 - 09:18 AM, said:

All it's going to do is force people to use certain chassis. Who would want to use a Trebutche versus a Cataphract when the Cataphract gives you extra tonnage. Who would take a locust? A better system would have been a total BV system. It should not copy Battletech since some weapons have more use in Mechwarrior than Battletech. Jump Jets on heavier mech's should be weighed a lot more and PPCs, Auto Cannons and Gauss Rifles would need to be weighed heavier than LRMs and Lasers.

At least its going to do something besides looking at 8 assaults lol

[Roland]

East Indy, on 06 April 2014 - 09:15 AM, said:

It won't easier to create illicitly larger premades, since there are currently no weight restrictions.

You aren't understanding the op.

It's the weight class restriction which ENABLES abuse of the system to get larger teams into a match. Because you know what weight classes are required to fill out a team, you can dramatically increase the chances of your guys getting matched with you by taking those chassis.

If pgi wanted to address this, they would just set up the system with two queues, a solo queue and an unrestricted one, where groups of any size could play.

[East Indy]

Roland, on 06 April 2014 - 09:24 AM, said:

You aren't understanding the op.

What currently prevents/complicates sync-dropping now?

[o0Marduk0o]

You assume that nobody else is in queue for this Elo bracket and all wait for the last 7 players to complete the team. This is not the case. When one match is open and only 1-2 assaults are needed, the lance with 3 assaults will open another game or join a game without assaults. The "solos" will join any open game where their weight classes are needed.
It will be even more difficult to join the same game because of the class restrictions, where ppl are put in different open matches to match the weight class.

[DeathlyEyes]

East Indy, on 06 April 2014 - 09:27 AM, said:

What currently prevents/complicates sync-dropping now?

The match maker right now isn't looking for 3 assaults 3 heavies 3 mediums 3 lights. If you sync drop your premade as 3 mediums and a lights odds are the other permeade will be 3 assaults and heavy that is dropping at the same time. So now you drop the rest of your guys as 2 lights 3 heavies and 3 assaults then you have a high chance of landing them in your group. Furthermore since lobbies will be persistent you can have people retry the next time to get into your match since you will know what specific weight classes the match maker is looking for. It would be way easier than sync dropping now because the match maker looks at ELO and tries to make teams with balanced ELO. A lot of the high ELO player's ELO's are too high to pug drop together as of now anyway as the result of a sync drop. Whenever we tried sync dropping we always played against eachother because very few players exist in our ELO bracket to begin with.

Edited by SLDF DeathlyEyes, 06 April 2014 - 09:36 AM.

[Roadbeer]

East Indy, on 06 April 2014 - 09:27 AM, said:

What currently prevents/complicates sync-dropping now?

The complete randomness of the matchmaking with no set parameters and using Elo scale rather than Elo buckets.

It's the buckets and known composition of what a team is going to be that makes this a much easier task than it currently is.

[JeepStuff]

East Indy, on 06 April 2014 - 09:27 AM, said:

What currently prevents/complicates sync-dropping now?

Here's the key concept the OP was trying to get across: If the MM imposes criteria in what a team must look like, then here's what happens:

1. One half of the premade chooses their chassis
2. Doing this immediately excludes some huge subset of the player population from joining the same group, because those slots are filled.
3. Now if the second half of the premade chooses their chassis correctly, they are NOT excluded.
4. This means you have better chances of joining your friends, because you are "competing" against fewer players for the same slots (see point #2, where a huge subset of the player population are no longer candidates).
5. Now if you all launch at exactly the same time, your odds of getting on the same team have been substantially increased (again, because you now have a way to exclude a subset of players who don't fit the pattern, but you guarantee that your team does).

Does that make sense?

[-Natural Selection-]

Like they said. As of now, there is an art to sync dropping but still pretty random as to making it work. With more defined guidelines as to what is needed for the group to assemble the easier it is. The lighter solos dropping with you may get washed around between the teams, but the odds seem greater that it would work.

At any rate,, trying to keep us from assembling? Challenge accepted!

Edited by Dozier, 06 April 2014 - 09:38 AM.

[Daekar]

Most team players aren't the scum-sucking douchebags that try to ruin the game for everyone else by synch dropping. They're team players who want challenges, not endless pugstomping. This will happen, but less than you might think. Still, another reason I'm glad I never play during NA Primetime.

The least consolation will be that it won't be teams of assault mechs anymore.

SLDF DeathlyEyes, on 06 April 2014 - 09:33 AM, said:

A lot of the high ELO player's ELO's are too high to pug drop together as of now anyway as the result of a sync drop. Whenever we tried sync dropping we always played against eachother because very few players exist in our ELO bracket to begin with.

I hope you know how deliciously ironic I find this. You get no pity from me, and deserve your long wait times for intentioning manipulating the system.

And developers wonder why so many of us want single-player games... maybe they just need to meet more PLAYERS.

Edited by Daekar, 06 April 2014 - 09:45 AM.

[DeathlyEyes]

Edustaja, on 06 April 2014 - 09:20 AM, said:

Only thing more annoying than PGI's slow develompent is the constant whine emitted from a few select forum users.

Only thing more annoying than PGI's slow develompent are the personal attacks coming from a few select forum users whenever a flaw is pointed out. Did you even read the thread?

Edited by SLDF DeathlyEyes, 06 April 2014 - 09:41 AM.

[Roadbeer]

Daekar, on 06 April 2014 - 09:38 AM, said:

Most team players aren't the scum-sucking douchebags that try to ruin the game for everyone else by synch droppin are just trying to play with their friends at all costs and have gotten pretty sick of having restrictions to do so imposed on them.

FTFY