88 replies to this topic

[maniacos]

Joseph Mallan, on 08 May 2014 - 06:06 AM, said:

So... I have yet to see a Mech that is BS in the game. I have faced all of it and have had fine success. I am presently using Stock Mechs in PUG matches have a 100% death rate and a 55% win rate, Match maker does not seem to be broken to me! It does seem to be using the wrong metric to place us, but it is working correctly.

Beside this is a totally different discussion from the debate about custom matches, if the matchmaker uses the wrong metric, it is in fact broken, because metrics is what makes the matchmaker what it is.
I am a programmer, and when I use wrong parameters in my application, the application doesn't work as intended and therefore is broken.

[Joseph Mallan]

Jherek C, on 08 May 2014 - 06:53 AM, said:

Beside this is a totally different discussion from the debate about custom matches, if the matchmaker uses the wrong metric, it is in fact broken, because metrics is what makes the matchmaker what it is.
I am a programmer, and when I use wrong parameters in my application, the application doesn't work as intended and therefore is broken.

Custom matches are off topic here in this thread. Now IS the Match maker using the wrong Metrics? I tend to think so, But as my Priority is winning first, killing second, surviving third... I am fine with how the MM is working right now. I would like to live more, But I am using a Stock Victor in a Custom Que. So its a matter of perspective.

[Boris The Spider]

Jherek C, on 07 May 2014 - 11:53 PM, said:

Your conclusion here is wrong too. It is not the same if you always play with the same guys like 1000 times, the odds will always be the same. But with mm you play with totally random guys and the win/loss should even out. If I am on a lucky streak, I win like most of the games I play and the losing team is always below 5 kills. If the mm would equal all player skills and mech strength in a match fairly, this shouldnt happen that often. It can happen, but if you have the very majority of the games ending like this, this game is not fair.

Jherek, in the example I gave you we spent 4 hours in a public channel on a public team-speak grabing randoms from the LFG channel and switching players around, the vast majority of whom had never played with each other before. Even if they started with 4 man groups (which I know I didn’t), after 3 matches everybody would have shuffled randomly between the teams. I also think you may have a misconception about public server pre-mades, Players on there play PUG as in 'Pick Up Group' not PUG as in 'Lone Wolf'. Yeah, people have friends they drop with more often than others, but lance composition is typically pretty random.

So our experiment shows exactly the same thing with random groups on VOIP as it does with pre-made groups on VOIP, two roughly equal teams will not guarantee you a close match. Now your saying otherwise but have nothing but your feelings to back up your position. I think you just need to get used to the way no-respawn/long-respawn game play works and accept that this is the way its always going to be and if we couldn’t balance a team in 4 hours with full control over what mechs people were piloting then a matchmaker with a 100x times more random variables is never going to do it better.

[Raggedyman]

As the game is a knockout process the first team to get a single kill has got a massive edge, because it moves from 12 1-on-1 to 10 1-on-1s and a 2-on-1 to 9 1-on-1s and a 3-on-1 onwards. Basically the first kill can easily cause a stomp as Every Mech Counts, one mech down mens your whole team is a 12th less powerful overall.

The key indicator of if the matchmaker is working is your win/lose ratio over a statistically significant number of drops, If that's around the 0.45 to 0.60 marker after a hundred or so matches then it's doing things right. If its below 0.45 then you're going against people too skilled, if its above 0.60 then you're the one doing the stomping. Basically if you are matched up against people of the same playing level it should be a coin-toss as to who wins. Also your first 50 or so drops really won't count as you are learning the game and the game is learning you. If you have never played the game before and lose your first 25 drops to fresh players who've grown up on a strict diet of FPS and mechanomics then that it's a broken system, as they will soon be wizzing past you to their correct level as you are filtered to yours.

Please note that your personal Kills are a secondary consideration for your ELO/ranking/where the matchmaker should put you, so don't worry about those except for personal bragging rights. Any low number streaks (ie 'the number of matches most people play in a day') are also not that relevant, or surprising, as you're looking at a statistically insignificant number of games. It's also worth noting that the whilst the bulk of players will be in the 0.45 to 0.60 grouping you will talk to more people in the +0.60 ranks than the -0.45 ranks, this is due to the tendency for people who lose a lot to quit a game and those who win to play more so you are never going to find the bell curve distribution by talking to people on the forums.

^{Please note all figures based on post-it note maths, experience with games, and a moderate understanding of statistics rather than raw and specific data from PGI, exact figures/your personal millage may vary. But trust me on the KDR}

[Boris The Spider]

Raggedyman, on 08 May 2014 - 12:46 PM, said:

As the game is a knockout process the first team to get a single kill has got a massive edge, because it moves from 12 1-on-1 to 10 1-on-1s and a 2-on-1 to 9 1-on-1s and a 3-on-1 onwards. Basically the first kill can easily cause a stomp as Every Mech Counts, one mech down mens your whole team is a 12th less powerful overall.

Right you are Raggedy, but there is also the momentum to consider. If your team has it when you take that 1^st mech down, the mechs that fought in that initial engagement have the luxury of deciding if they can continue to the head the surge, or if they are too damaged to slow their roll and allow fresh mechs to take their place. The team without the momentum is on the back foot. They must weather the storm to survive, if they try to cycle damaged mechs to the rear it becomes a rout and a rout inevitably leads to a stomp.

Losing the 1^st couple of mechs reduces your chance of winning, but if your team can simultaneously hold the line and locate a weak link in the other team to organise a counter punch, they can switch it up, gain the momentum and stomp them right back. The matchmaker though cannot make this happen by putting 'the right people' on each team, the players need to make it happen themselves.

[Khujjo]

Even if the teams were identical in terms of exact load outs on the same mechs piloted by players with identical elo scores close matches are not likely to be the norm. Matches are won or lost due to a large number of variables: could be pure chance such as which side your team is on in a map; or decisions those equally skilled players make that puts them in a good or bad spot. Maybe one team is better with battlefield awareness, but you get the point. As others have stated, once there is an advantage for one team it has a tendency to snowball rapidly into what ends up looking like a stomp. Match making isn't perfect but it also isn't the cause of everyone's losses. People don't want to actually admit they had something to do with their team's defeat so it's also blamed on match maker or bad teams, or anything else. I personally can't stand the guy that makes bad decisions, gets rolled, then blames the "**** team" because of it. Take responsibility for your selves people.

[Flaming oblivion]

People complain this games community has gone down hill in recent months , You often find someone raging every battle sometimes me .... PGI has reaped what they sew good game - good community , Terrible game - terrible community , What makes it worse for this game it has the title and the potential to be the biggest game out there more so with the downfall of city of heroes/villains , But instead they're content with being a pretty tiny game that's rapidly losing player base support, Match making is a joke , ECm is a joke, No solo que , no in game voice chat , Certain weapon systems far out classing others, Certain mechs no matter what anyone says far out classing others (the less you have to expose a mech to fire the better it is,)

[Curccu]

No close pub games Yesterday either stomps to both ways.

[Black Ivan]

Match making is horrible. I only had stomps during the last days.

[Koniving]

Had a match today as a 3 man premade, we were in Charlie.

Why is that significant?
Alpha is reserved for a premade. And if there's more than one premade and Alpha has a 3 to 4 person premade then the second one is put in Bravo. If it is two players, then a third is also put into Bravo. But if it is 3 or 4 players, the third premade is put into Charlie.

3 premades in one match. o.O; And we still got curb-stomped horrifically.

[maniacos]

To the latest bigger answers: It seems you got me wrong.

I am NOT complaining about losing games at all. I am complaining about how I win OR lose games. If I win with my team, I mostly win 1-3/12 the same goes for losing. You either stomp or be stomped.

This is simply not a fair game and it is frustrating for anyone who's on the losing side also it gets quite fad if you are on the winning side, when you meet no equal opponents but bad teams that fail on the whole level. The game is either easy mode or hard mode, depending on luck where you are dropped in by the MM. There is almost no in-between. A fair game would have more equal distribution, more close games.

And if this is because the game advantages the team who scores the first kill too much, then it is still a flaw in the game.

Also, what other said here is true too and was a side-topic in this thread: The game is too small. You have no proper in-game chat, no lobby, no interaction with other players after you are out of the match. You have to go to the forum or third-party sites to get all the features that actually should be IN game but are boldly missing and no where near to be implemented.

Mechwarrior offers many more opportunities, that are all unattented here and lots of gaps this game leaves are filled by thirdparty sites. This alone already indicates a badly designed product. It feels too much as a beta or even worse a proof of concept, not a full featured product.

Yesterday someone yelled at me, that I need to find a pre-made team to win and PUG is always losing on the long run. Defending the game this way pretty much shows what's wrong here: The intention of the MM is to drop random people into fair matches. If I need premade to benefit, the whole makeup is not working at all.

Edited by Jherek C, 09 May 2014 - 01:05 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

Jherek C, on 09 May 2014 - 01:00 AM, said:

I am NOT complaining about losing games at all. I am complaining about how I win OR lose games. If I win with my team, I mostly win 1-3/12 the same goes for losing. You either stomp or be stomped.

Wrong - you can't and you shouldn't use the "points" to define a stomp.
What is a stomp:
a stomp is when i death ball and wait for the others to come drop by drop - Mech by Mech and get shot into pieces.

(that happen with bad coordination - when the team did split up - another stomp is raining LRMs at the target that don't have a single ECM while you have 3)

A fight eye on eye - (for example private matches) will also end as what you call stomps - if you only see the "points"

The problem is PGI - also see only the points - 12:0, 12:1 and they read your complains and then they try to fix what is not broken (you know something like adding splash damage to missiles)

From my subjective feeling 12:5 or 12:6 are stomps - because the enemy did something right and still didn't have a chance.
Mostly games will be 12:<=3 or 12:>=10 (at both extreme ends the game is even)

Edited by Karl Streiger, 09 May 2014 - 01:13 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

Black Ivan, on 09 May 2014 - 12:12 AM, said:

Match making is horrible. I only had stomps during the last days.

Were they wins? Losses? That is all that Elo Considers. There is no calculation for GGClose! I played 5 games yesterday won 3 lost 2. That is all that MM Is looking at. Now how YOU and OUR group does. Its a W/L.

Karl put it diplomatically, I'm going to put plain, If you play bad you will be beat bad. That is as a team. If you play smart you win... as a team.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 09 May 2014 - 01:24 AM.

[LiGhtningFF13]

Will this complaining/issue about Matchmaking never end?! Just annoying.

[Joseph Mallan]

LiGhtningFF13, on 09 May 2014 - 01:28 AM, said:

Will this complaining/issue about Matchmaking never end?! Just annoying.

7.6 Billion Opinions in the world... No the complaining will never end.

[maniacos]

Karl Streiger, on 09 May 2014 - 01:11 AM, said:

Wrong - you can't and you shouldn't use the "points" to define a stomp.
What is a stomp:
a stomp is when i death ball and wait for the others to come drop by drop - Mech by Mech and get shot into pieces.

That's a question of definition. I won't go into that debate. What I see is does someone have a chance to have a reasonable entertaining game experience. I am not a game developer, I am a player and what a player cares for is entertainment. This entertainment is not only winning, that entertainment for most players on the long run is what they have to do and what do they get. That's also why easymodes are fad for the most players and why games should always require some effort, effort = entertainment, if the effort is fertile. If my effort is not fertile, the game gets frustrating, if my returns require no effort, it gets dull on the long run...

LiGhtningFF13, on 09 May 2014 - 01:28 AM, said:

Will this complaining/issue about Matchmaking never end?! Just annoying.

Yes, when the game starts working as it should. Don't care if by MM update/fix or what else. I am not paying for a proof of concept.

[Joseph Mallan]

Jherek C, on 09 May 2014 - 01:31 AM, said:

That's a question of definition. I won't go into that debate. What I see is does someone have a chance to have a reasonable entertaining game experience. I am not a game developer, I am a player and what a player cares for is entertainment. This entertainment is not only winning, that entertainment for most players on the long run is what they have to do and what do they get. That's also why easymodes are fad for the most players and why games should always require some effort, effort = entertainment, if the effort is fertile. If my effort is not fertile, the game gets frustrating, if my returns require no effort, it gets dull on the long run...

Define that. I have had a reasonably entertaining time dying 40 out of 41 matches (I broke my streak ). Yet winning more than 50% of the matches. And my worst in game complaint has been, "That didn't go as planned!"

A player died after me yesterday and blamed the team cause HE was fighting 6:1 odds... Did he ask for help? Was he on Comms? He got a Kill which is more than I got that match and HE was whining cause nobody helped him. The Radar showed our team as surrounded on 3 sides, Everyone was quite occupied.

"Stop trying to save YOUR life and fight my fight!"

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 09 May 2014 - 01:40 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

Joseph Mallan, on 09 May 2014 - 01:35 AM, said:

Define that. I have had a reasonably entertaining time dying 40 out of 41 matches (I broke my streak ). Yet winning more than 50% of the matches. And my worst in game complaint has been, "That didn't go as planned!"

This
I run a stock armament AS7-D and i have no chance in brawl vs a Brawling DDC - hell i never have a chance vs a DDC at any range. (LRMs will not work - and at short range my additional 2 MLAS are no match for his 2 SRM 6s)

OK - i'm able to fire the LRMs without lock and hit that guy when he thinks he is can not be hit by LRMs (this alone is fun)


OK I admit - the MM - and it is not yet supposed to do - should split the roles equally - so that there are not the Light SPotters on Team 1 and the LRM boats at Team 2.

(but you need a role system - and you need to make the role clear for the MM)

Edited by Karl Streiger, 09 May 2014 - 01:42 AM.

[maniacos]

Joseph Mallan, on 09 May 2014 - 01:35 AM, said:

Define that. I have had a reasonably entertaining time dying 40 out of 41 matches (I broke my streak ). Yet winning more than 50% of the matches. And my worst in game complaint has been, "That didn't go as planned!"

That's exactly why I didnt want to define it because it's a matter of experience. It can be entertaining even if you die, when you know you did a good job for your team and didn't just waste yourself, of course. I never questioned that.

[Joseph Mallan]

Karl Streiger, on 09 May 2014 - 01:40 AM, said:

This
I run a stock armament AS7-D and i have no chance in brawl vs a Brawling DDC - hell i never have a chance vs a DDC at any range. (LRMs will not work - and at short range my additional 2 MLAS are no match for his 2 SRM 6s)

OK - i'm able to fire the LRMs without lock and hit that guy when he thinks he is can not be hit by LRMs (this alone is fun)


OK I admit - the MM - and it is not yet supposed to do - should split the roles equally - so that there are not the Light SPotters on Team 1 and the LRM boats at Team 2.

(but you need a role system - and you need to make the role clear for the MM)

You know That roles can be easily defined using TS3 I'm sure. The matchmaker only looks at our W/L not Mech loadouts. Why do we want the game to do everything for us anyway. Things like Unit composition is our job to figure out!