11 replies to this topic

[Barakus]

Lately I have been playing more than in the past and I am trying to stick to a
small number of mechs to play.

I have found my personal in game performance to be getting better as you would expect from practice.

I heard it on the forums that the lances are ordered by ELO. I was consistently dropping in Alpha and Beta for a time and I was getting more wins than before.

My question to you guys is why I am now landing more in Charlie lance? Does that indicate I am getting into higher ELO matches?

The reason for my confusion is that I could be dropping in ELO for real or simply relatively to everyone else or I could be rising, but the evidence (which is very subjective I know) is contradictory:
I am winning more games and doing more damage and kills, but now when I drop in Charlie I often die quite quickly and then when I spectate my team, the strategy and tactics employed by the team seem rather poor and mostly end in a loss. When I drop in Alpha I and my team do a lot better.

I am not overly concerned if I am good, bad or average I am trying to work out if I am getting better or worse?

[SprechenSieSexy]

I only dropped in Charlie prior to the patch, and I got roflstomped all day long.
Now it's mostly in A or B, and the games are more even.

It seems improved to me, but I haven't really played enough matches post-patch to be sure.

[Karamarka]

You die more in Charlie because they often spawn in the worst possible place, dictating your play for that match.

River City, Charlie always spawns in the middle of nowhere, where the enemy is routed too straight away.

Tourmaline they spawn off to the far flank and the group of 4 goes rambo suicide.

Mordor, they spawn far away near Epsilon in on north side team and 4 people vs 8 people always loses.

[Kibble]

Too bad pgi will never post Elo however maybe, just maybe when cw hits we will have player rankings much like WoT does. That'll give us all a decent indication of our Elo without having an actual Elo number.

I've head rumors that the age of your account dictates what lance you get placed into but I personally feel the lances better represent your Elo.

Who knows.

[Barakus]

Thanks Karamarka. I did not think to consider starting points and how they may affect the play. This may be part of the answer.

[Roland]

Your lance placement is not affected by your elo rating. It's determined by your order joining the match, which used to be heavily determined by whether you were on a group. Groups would tend to go into alpha or beta lances. they would also tend to do better than rabble, which led to the mistaken assumption that better players went into the higher lances.

[Sandpit]

Barakus, on 19 July 2014 - 04:43 PM, said:

Lately I have been playing more than in the past and I am trying to stick to a
small number of mechs to play.

I have found my personal in game performance to be getting better as you would expect from practice.

I heard it on the forums that the lances are ordered by ELO. I was consistently dropping in Alpha and Beta for a time and I was getting more wins than before.

My question to you guys is why I am now landing more in Charlie lance? Does that indicate I am getting into higher ELO matches?

The reason for my confusion is that I could be dropping in ELO for real or simply relatively to everyone else or I could be rising, but the evidence (which is very subjective I know) is contradictory:
I am winning more games and doing more damage and kills, but now when I drop in Charlie I often die quite quickly and then when I spectate my team, the strategy and tactics employed by the team seem rather poor and mostly end in a loss. When I drop in Alpha I and my team do a lot better.

I am not overly concerned if I am good, bad or average I am trying to work out if I am getting better or worse?

we just had another thread like this, this week...

Lances are random
The reason you got charlie a lot (if you're a solo player) prior to patch is because premades landed first and then solos were used to fill out the rest of the slots. Lance designation has nothing to do with skill or Elo. Granted Charlie lance became a bit of a joke within the community but that's usually because they didn't fare too well against premades a lot of times. That helped fuel the thoughts that lances were assigned by skill and Elo levels

[Davers]

Barakus, on 19 July 2014 - 04:43 PM, said:

Lately I have been playing more than in the past and I am trying to stick to a
small number of mechs to play.

I have found my personal in game performance to be getting better as you would expect from practice.

I heard it on the forums that the lances are ordered by ELO. I was consistently dropping in Alpha and Beta for a time and I was getting more wins than before.

My question to you guys is why I am now landing more in Charlie lance? Does that indicate I am getting into higher ELO matches?

The reason for my confusion is that I could be dropping in ELO for real or simply relatively to everyone else or I could be rising, but the evidence (which is very subjective I know) is contradictory:
I am winning more games and doing more damage and kills, but now when I drop in Charlie I often die quite quickly and then when I spectate my team, the strategy and tactics employed by the team seem rather poor and mostly end in a loss. When I drop in Alpha I and my team do a lot better.

I am not overly concerned if I am good, bad or average I am trying to work out if I am getting better or worse?

The higher your Elo the less LRMs determine who wins the match.

[Barakus]

Thanks everyone.

If lance placement has nothing to do with ELO, then my observations make more sense. Also as it is the simplest explanation it is the most likely one too.

[The Amazing Atomic Spaniel]

Sandpit, on 19 July 2014 - 07:20 PM, said:

we just had another thread like this, this week...

Lances are random
The reason you got charlie a lot (if you're a solo player) prior to patch is because premades landed first and then solos were used to fill out the rest of the slots. Lance designation has nothing to do with skill or Elo. Granted Charlie lance became a bit of a joke within the community but that's usually because they didn't fare too well against premades a lot of times. That helped fuel the thoughts that lances were assigned by skill and Elo levels

Not sure about this. I play 100% solo and have been in alpha lance almost all the time. In fact, since groups were removed from the solo queue I can't recall ever being in B or C. It just can't be random.

I doubt that it's Elo related because I am a terrible player, but it's definitely not random. Maybe related to ping or total number of games played? Don't know.

(PS - haven't had chance to play in the last week so it's possible the last patch changed things)

[Galenit]

We do not know enough about the matchmaking to say anything.

This types of posts are based on assumptions and rumors and people that judge about the performance of alpha or charlie based on that are really simple minded.

The bad reputation of charlie is based on the pug-farming-days and groups, that make bad jokes about the solos that landed mostly in that lance, you will find some of their names in the "premades against premades is unfair give us our pugfarming back" topics.

But lets try to figure something out together about the solo mm:

There are 2 possible ways to start the matchmaking:
1. We start with elo
2. We start by mechclass

Then the ranks have to be filled, there are 2 possible ways again:
1. lets fill one team, then the other
2. lets fill both teams alternating

The lances have to be build, 2 ways again:
1. Fill a lance with 1/1/1/1
2. Fill the lance as they come

If you can say witch way is choosen for this 3 basics, we can try to figure out what happens next and why you may land in a special lance.

[Willard Phule]

I'm not entirely sure Elo even applies to anything at all, anymore...at least as far as the solo PUG queue is concerned.

I saw a post out that quoted Russ earlier that explained that the Developers know what the problem is...it just didn't explain any solutions they may (or may not) be working on.

According to the post, the MM tries it's best to make sure that both teams have as equal an aggregate Elo score as possible. If someone with a really high Elo gets put on a team, the MM evens the score out by packing the other slots with newer players, resulting in a team where one person is expected to carry everyone else. (Not to mention brand new players start out in the middle of the bell curve, giving them an inflated score compared to their abilities).

I've seen that a LOT lately....in fact, ever since they "re-wrote" the matchmaker, it's gotten worse. I supposed that's as reasonable an explanation as any. However, being an exclusive solo dropper, I've come to a couple of other conclusions. Granted, they sound like they're coming from the "tinfoil hat brigade," but the perception from actually being in that queue is different than that of people that rarely play the game and when they do, they play in a group...thus removing them from what I'm experiencing.

1 - It seems to me that we, the unwashed masses of the solo PUG queue, simply don't matter to the Developers as anything other than a herd of cash producing animals to be harvested at every opportunity. Their focus is all on the Group Queue/Private Match crowd....and, from a business standpoint, it makes sense. The Group Players tend to be on organized leagues that do their own version of "Community Warfare" and tend to spend their cash on the game regularly. I doubt that the Group Queue is the largest source of income for PGI, but it's got to be the most consistent. Us solo people...if we leave, it doesn't matter, there will be another player that looks just like you coming along in a minute.

2 - Whether an "Elo" based system is even viable is completely moot at this point. The Elo system developed for this game never worked properly for the majority of people. When you give an artificially inflated score to new players, it wrecks the entire bell curve from the beginning. Add to that the problem of giving it a HUGE spread with which to fill the teams, the entire thing becomes completely irrelevant. Back when 4 man groups were allowed into the solo games, the group's Elo score was averaged...which, again, skews the entire process. Granted, that doesn't happen anymore, but it just goes to illustrate how wonky the entire thing has been.

Yes, we got weight class separation. Sweet. Awesome. I'd STILL rather have an experienced person in a crap mech on my team than a brand new player in a Trial Assault Mech that just stands in the middle of the field, wondering why the LRMs are tearing him apart.

I'm beginning to understand PGI's mentality, though. I doubt many, if any, of them are high enough on the Elo food chain to be out of the mid-rank games. So, to them, it doesn't really matter whether or not there is any separation by experience/skill. Their biggest problem, when they actually played, was most likely getting pugstomped by a 4 man group of Assault Mechs.

It doesn't really matter why they have ignored both the concept of separating people by skill/experience, ultimately it simply boils down to "don't hold your breath while waiting for them to fix it. 12-0 roflstomps are working as intended. Just fork over your money and go away."

Edited by Willard Phule, 20 July 2014 - 01:14 AM.