46 replies to this topic

[Joseph Mallan]

Blue Drache, on 21 April 2014 - 04:09 AM, said:

No. Half the fun is learning how to beat the other team when you're out-tonned.

Nope. That isn't the answer of someone who is the other half of the problem!

[Nicholas Carlyle]

There are a lot of players, who are...whatever you want to call it, new, less skilled, noobs, etc. in this game.

And it's rather unfortunate that they get stuck with good players, because either the matchmaker sucks or the population is too small.

I'm seeing it a lot more now for whatever reason. I realize not every game is going to be perfect, but spectating some of these people has been super frustrating.

And while I may not be an amazing ELO wunderkin or anything, I've been dropping in 4 mans more lately with players I consider to be good. So It's a bit confusing.

[Joseph Mallan]

Why is it always a bad thing to be playing against players better than you? I have always found playing and practicing against people better than me improves my level of play when I am against those more my level.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 04:46 AM, said:

Why is it always a bad thing to be playing against players better than you? I have always found playing and practicing against people better than me improves my level of play when I am against those more my level.

What i'm seeing is more akin to a little leaguer vs. the Yankees. It's not practicting against people better than you, it's getting stomped by adults.

Whereas it would be fine, if it was something like the Marlins vs. the Yankees. They are both in the same league at least.

[Joseph Mallan]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 21 April 2014 - 04:48 AM, said:

What i'm seeing is more akin to a little leaguer vs. the Yankees. It's not practicting against people better than you, it's getting stomped by adults.

Whereas it would be fine, if it was something like the Marlins vs. the Yankees. They are both in the same league at least.

Back in the day... We had a friend that was stuck in the middle. To old to play baseball with the lil kids and and to young to play against us. But being the nice guys we were we let him play. He was a good fielder, but at the plate not a threat. He finally joined a little league team... Kid was a super star.

We aren't playing the game as intended (I F*ing hope)
Elo works as intended from what I am seeing.
Sometimes it's good for everyone to be the either the lil fish in a big pond or the big fish in a small pond. Keeps us in perspective.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 04:59 AM, said:

Back in the day... We had a friend that was stuck in the middle. To old to play baseball with the lil kids and and to young to play against us. But being the nice guys we were we let him play. He was a good fielder, but at the plate not a threat. He finally joined a little league team... Kid was a super star.

We aren't playing the game as intended (I F*ing hope)
Elo works as intended from what I am seeing.
Sometimes it's good for everyone to be the either the lil fish in a big pond or the big fish in a small pond. Keeps us in perspective.

I don't think that is the case.

You have a bunch of people getting torched by high end players with kitted mechs, who I'd wager don't stick with the game very long unless they have a strong attachment to the IP...not to the game itself.

[Screech]

Sorry someone "stole" your kill. I hope this thread provides the soothing balm needed for you to overcome this life altering event. I will go talk to some of the noob pilots and see if they will ease up on you.

[Joseph Mallan]

What do we have that would keep players here though Nick? We have no goals. No real objectives, it is all just pointless fighting for bragging rights. I have yet to wrest a Planet from your control. I have yet to defeat a Clanner in his preferred Omni. So why would someone stay other than the love of the IP?

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 05:06 AM, said:

What do we have that would keep players here though Nick? We have no goals. No real objectives, it is all just pointless fighting for bragging rights. I have yet to wrest a Planet from your control. I have yet to defeat a Clanner in his preferred Omni. So why would someone stay other than the love of the IP?

People stay for good gameplay.

There have been a multitude of FPS games that really were just lobbies, maps and weapons. Where people played FOREVER.

Because the game was fun.

This game is not fun most of the time.

Edited by Nicholas Carlyle, 21 April 2014 - 05:10 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 21 April 2014 - 05:07 AM, said:

People stay for good gameplay.

There have been a multitude of FPS games that really were just lobbies, maps and weapons. Where people played FOREVER.

Because the game was fun.

This game is not fun.

This isn't a game yet. I'd be bored to death of a FPS that was just drop and shoot. I am staying to see what the game will be like. Since I know this isn't the final product.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 05:09 AM, said:

This isn't a game yet. I'd be bored to death of a FPS that was just drop and shoot. I am staying to see what the game will be like. Since I know this isn't the final product.

As always, you are a special snowflake here Joe.

[Joseph Mallan]

Thank goodness for that Nick!

[Ultimax]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 04:46 AM, said:

Why is it always a bad thing to be playing against players better than you? I have always found playing and practicing against people better than me improves my level of play when I am against those more my level.

I love playing against better players than me to learn, I always learned more in BJJ against higher skilled opponents.

It doesn't often feel like that when my team gets roflstomped.

Usually you can tell if you are likely to lose in the first 30s of the match by watching how your teammates are moving and if they respond to your futile attempt to put some good sense into them.


Those matches that end 12-0 in under 3 minutes, almost no one learns anything.


On the other hand, there are matches that are actually close but end 12-3 (or the epic 12-11), but your/their team wasn't routed until some mistake wass made during the slow tug-of-war trying to gain advantage during a stalemate.

Those matches are great, you can learn a lot from a loss by analyzing what went wrong or even from the win by analyzing what you did right or they did wrong.


Unfortunately there are a lot more of the former than the latter in my experience and it almost universally comes down to watching players make humongously obvious blunders even while you tell them in team chat that they are, in that very moment, making a huge obvious blunder (like trying to assault big mountain, from the bottom, in the open, while missiles hit them in the face).



I doubt my Elo is amazing, it's probably middle of the pack, maybe above average.

I know when I am teamed with or facing good players pretty early on and I know when I am teamed with the late night paint sniffing club just as easily.


I don't mind teaming with a few new, or newer, or lower skilled players but they can't fill half the team or more and get roflstomped - that doesn't help anyone.

[Joseph Mallan]

Ultimatum X, on 21 April 2014 - 06:04 AM, said:

I love playing against better players than me to learn, I always learned more in BJJ against higher skilled opponents.

It doesn't often feel like that when my team gets roflstomped.

Usually you can tell if you are likely to lose in the first 30s of the match by watching how your teammates are moving and if they respond to your futile attempt to put some good sense into them.


Those matches that end 12-0 in under 3 minutes, almost no one learns anything.


On the other hand, there are matches that are actually close but end 12-3 (or the epic 12-11), but your/their team wasn't routed until some mistake wass made during the slow tug-of-war trying to gain advantage during a stalemate.

Those matches are great, you can learn a lot from a loss by analyzing what went wrong or even from the win by analyzing what you did right or they did wrong.


Unfortunately there are a lot more of the former than the latter in my experience and it almost universally comes down to watching players make humongously obvious blunders even while you tell them in team chat that they are, in that very moment, making a huge obvious blunder (like trying to assault big mountain, from the bottom, in the open, while missiles hit them in the face).



I doubt my Elo is amazing, it's probably middle of the pack, maybe above average.

I know when I am teamed with or facing good players pretty early on and I know when I am teamed with the late night paint sniffing club just as easily.


I don't mind teaming with a few new, or newer, or lower skilled players but they can't fill half the team or more and get roflstomped - that doesn't help anyone.

First thing I was ever told in my Apprenticeship is that you can learn as much from a Bad Journeyman as you can from a Great one... so long as you compare notes on the two.

Short crappy game you learn

Breaking up into 8-12 different directions is bad.
Not focusing fire is bad
Not locking R is bad


But if all you do is rage and blame you only learn you are a bad player.

[Wispsy]

Whilst i do agree the problem with tighter Elo is a number of us cannot then play the game for more then an hour total a day (failed to find). Also in a weeks time they are effectively removing Elo for 3-3-3-3. If you are an above average player do not worry, you will get an awful lot of free kills and whilst people may be bad on both sides, things are not purposefully stacked against you. Not only that but with only 1 premade per team it is basically a high Elo pugger/4man dream (if you only dream of constant easy wins). If you happen to pilot an Assault as well.....hello super stat padding season?

[Ultimax]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 06:16 AM, said:

First thing I was ever told in my Apprenticeship is that you can learn as much from a Bad Journeyman as you can from a Great one... so long as you compare notes on the two.

Short crappy game you learn

Breaking up into 8-12 different directions is bad.
Not focusing fire is bad
Not locking R is bad


But if all you do is rage and blame you only learn you are a bad player.

Those are all fair points, but once you have actually learned those 3 things you need to move into a bracket where you learn new things.

Once you have learned those things should you really be repeatedly teamed with people who have not learned those things and won't do that even after you tell them?


I start most of my matches by telling people to stick together, focus fire and lock targets - when they just ignore all of that repeatedly there's nothing I learn except that I should probably log off the game for a bit and wait for the current online pop to change (weekends anytime seem massively better vs. late night EST).

[Joseph Mallan]

Ultimatum X, on 21 April 2014 - 06:32 AM, said:

Those are all fair points, but once you have actually learned those 3 things you need to move into a bracket where you learn new things.

Once you have learned those things should you really be repeatedly teamed with people who have not learned those things and won't do that even after you tell them?


I start most of my matches by telling people to stick together, focus fire and lock targets - when they just ignore all of that repeatedly there's nothing I learn except that I should probably log off the game for a bit and wait for the current online pop to change (weekends anytime seem massively better vs. late night EST).

If you don't start winning after you learn these things you are not ready to move on. In your last statement... you haven't learned to join a Guild yet.

[Ultimax]

Joseph Mallan, on 21 April 2014 - 06:36 AM, said:

If you don't start winning after you learn these things you are not ready to move on. In your last statement... you haven't learned to join a Guild yet.

Of course I have, but that's not the conversation.

The conversation is Elo and the Matchmaker in a game where the devs profess that '84% of drops are solo drops'.


I've played competitive premade play in another game, I play with some of those same guys here (although we're much more casual here for the most part - we only do 4 man drops, but I drop solo a lot as well).


However I did post that "almost no one learns from Roflstomps". That includes the winning team.

You learn from good close matches, not matches that are totally lopsided.



That's not the focal point though, the focal point is Elo.

That needs to encompass the whole of player experience, the MM needs to encompass more than just Elo.

3/3/3/3 is a heavy handed measure attempting to address that in a broad way - but my opinion is that more needs to be done on the back end in how player values are calculated, how mech values are calculated.



In that other game I played competitively I watched a single player develop a match making tool that was better balanced than this one.

It took a lot of work, it took volunteerism on the part of the playerbase.

Premade players willingly sacrificed playing with their own friends and fleet mates to be mixed up in matches based on the best balance with players who were basically organized PUGs.

The result was that after a few matches of gathering data - the matches often got closer and closer as the data analysis sought equilibrium.

Match one might be the equivalent of 12-3, but by the time they played (and continually mixed teams up) round 3 the matches were the equivalent of 12-11.


Good players had fun, newer/less skill players learned from the better ones.


That system took a lot of work, and active player assistance - so I'm not saying it could be transported here.

I am saying this current system seems to have several flaws, and could definitely use improvement.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 21 April 2014 - 07:39 AM.

[Clit Beastwood]

I love the "Why did I drop on a team with 11 noobs?" posts.

[Ultimax]

Fierostetz, on 21 April 2014 - 08:01 AM, said:

I love the "Why did I drop on a team with 11 noobs?" posts.

It's pretty rare that it's 11 noobs.

Usually it's enough players who do something obviously bad, get themselves killed in the first 30s to 45s of spotting the enemy and that severely reduces your team's firepower and ability to soak damage.

Sometimes a lance will get caught out on their lonesome due to spawn placement and bad luck, I'm not talking about that.

I've seen plenty of players charge the other team without knowing where the rest of the opponents were with their team still not even set up yet simply because they were the closest to the BIG CENTRAL OBJECT that attracts all moths to it (Central Caldera, Big Mountain, Volcano, etc).

I've watched players literally stand completely out in the open while eating incoming fire and LRMs without even flinching.


It doesn't take 11 noobs to lose a game. Having 3 or 4 duds on a team is enough to give the other team the advantage and let them murderball into a unit of 12 and steamroll the rest of you.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 21 April 2014 - 08:39 AM.