946 replies to this topic

[Sandpit]

Roland, on 24 August 2014 - 03:07 PM, said:

If you see a bunch of folks in the solo queue with the same unit tag, it's gonna pretty much mean they're sync dropping.. because since there are multiples online, there's little reason they wouldn't be grouped and in the group queue.

That's no different than Mud's assertion that he "knows" when he's facing a group because he sees them using teamwork.

I just don't think making assumptions is the way to go. I still dont' see how they could regulate something like this

Roland, on 24 August 2014 - 03:32 PM, said:

This is really weird, as I would expect the Lords to be good enough to win handily in the group queue.. I would think they wouldn't want to tarnish their reputation by sync dropping.

Although I suppose today it may have been in order to get the free loot for winning.

can't tell you why they did it, just that they did it, and lost. I've noticed a few things in the solo queue. The higher your Elo the smaller the gap in advantages. PUGs at higher Elo levels work together ALMOST as good as most groups.

[Nightmare1]

I've seen some sync dropping but, to be honest, the guys I saw doing it got rolled. I can't say it's as big an issue as the overwhelming number of overpowered LRMs that keep flogging Mechs into the ground. I finally gave up and joined them with my own missile boating BLR-1S and a TDR that has twin LRM-10s. I feel dirty.

[Vezm]

Mudhutwarrior, on 24 August 2014 - 05:00 AM, said:

Thing is how many new players did you turn off the game by your practices. By synch dropping your harming PGi's odds of growing the game. Of course no one thinks of that past the grouthink responses of carry harder or get better.

No one is fooled by such selfish behavior and lets hope certainly not PGI. It may well have been fun but at others expense.

Thing is it wasn't an argument against you. I know you're getting a heap of flak here, and that has made you defensive, but don't shoot everything that moves until you're in Solaris.

I don't like sync dropping, it violates the spirit of the solo queue. There is a group queue which provides a fair place for people who have friends to group up. However, sync dropping has no guarantees and for all the times it works out, there's a plethora that don't. Furthermore it is hard to police, any algorithm searching for them would pick up all sorts.

I don't think the issue is prevalent enough to warrant PGI diverting precious CW making resources.

[MischiefSC]

Dealing with sync dropping - 15 minutes work twice a week.

Export login/logout launch report to an excel file. Do the same with match populations.

To put each on a different tab in the same report.

You write a formula in the spreadsheet to sort by player ID for match populations and duplicates get put on top. You set a threshold for whatever is atypical, call it 4 duplicates in 2 hours. You get any repeat hits you check the launch tab and see what their variance is. If they are consistently logging in and launching together it would be ideal if you just tap a flag for them and the mm won't put them in a match together. Where I work we call it the bronze queue. They get their wait time extended to push them into alternate matches.

Maybe 3 or 4 hours to script and 30 min a week to check.

[Ryoken]

Sandpit, on 23 August 2014 - 01:32 PM, said:

I find it funny that it's the same guy posting the same thing last year even though PGI gave you, and those like you, EXACTLY what you asked for in a separate queue.

Quoted for golden truth!
And still the pugs are crying at the imaginary evil premade...

[Sandpit]

MischiefSC, on 24 August 2014 - 04:19 PM, said:

Dealing with sync dropping - 15 minutes work twice a week.

Export login/logout launch report to an excel file. Do the same with match populations.

To put each on a different tab in the same report.

You write a formula in the spreadsheet to sort by player ID for match populations and duplicates get put on top. You set a threshold for whatever is atypical, call it 4 duplicates in 2 hours. You get any repeat hits you check the launch tab and see what their variance is. If they are consistently logging in and launching together it would be ideal if you just tap a flag for them and the mm won't put them in a match together. Where I work we call it the bronze queue. They get their wait time extended to push them into alternate matches.

Maybe 3 or 4 hours to script and 30 min a week to check.

you realize you are talking about PGI right? The company that shut down production on everything for 6 months to implement 10 mechs.

[Tesunie]

Mudhutwarrior, on 24 August 2014 - 02:20 AM, said:

Try looking at the thread sometimes. I stated clearly PGI asked me to post here and posted the email proving such.

Which of the 6 pages of the thread should I have looked at before posting? I also find it very strange/odd that Support (presuming here) would tell you to create a post on the forums about this topic. Doesn't exactly seem like something I typically would hear them doing...

PS: It would be really rather helpful to you (and thus me as well) if you quotes the post you are referring to. I am not about to go searching through 6 pages (I did peruse the first page fairly well I thought) to find the one singular post you refer to.

[Stormyblade]

Nick Makiaveli, on 24 August 2014 - 07:32 AM, said:

Really? Please post a link or give the page number where this email is posted (BTW, I will be looking for edited posts).

Not that I'm on Mud's side or anything, but he re-posted that e-mail in this thread.

[MischiefSC]

Sandpit, on 24 August 2014 - 04:40 PM, said:

you realize you are talking about PGI right? The company that shut down production on everything for 6 months to implement 10 mechs.

I would script it for them for free. I'll even gussy it up for them with color coded cells and buttons to launch scripts. Even a logo pic background!

[Tesunie]

Stormyblade, on 24 August 2014 - 04:47 PM, said:

Not that I'm on Mud's side or anything, but he re-posted that e-mail in this thread.

If you know where, mind quoting/linking us to it? Would be much helpful.

[Aresye]

Roland, on 24 August 2014 - 03:29 PM, said:

One caveat here, I don't mean during weird contests or things, where you are specifically forced to play solo if you want the loot... In those cases, yeah, I'd expect to see multiple folks even if they weren't sync dropping.

But in normal play? If you've got a bunch of folks dropping, in the same unit, at the same time.. .then there's really no reason why you wouldn't be grouped, unless you are specifically trying to avoid the group queue.

I completely agree, but in normal play there's no reason that units would sync drop instead of just creating a larger group in the group queue, which is a much simpler and more efficient way of stacking the odds in your favor.

[Sandpit]

MischiefSC, on 24 August 2014 - 04:53 PM, said:

I would script it for them for free. I'll even gussy it up for them with color coded cells and buttons to launch scripts. Even a logo pic background!

Again, we're talking about PGI here, the dev team that's produced 10 maps in 3 years and won't accept community help in that regard either. I keep my expectations realistic lol

[Tesunie]

I'd also would like to point out the difficulty within the system to be able to sync drop with friends:
- You all need to have a similar Elo ranking. You can't see this, so you don't actually know what each other's Elo would be.
- You have to press and search for games at the same time. (Can be done over TS, I know.)
- You may end up on different teams, and may end up fighting against each other.
- There is a very likely chance (unless it's during a rather slow time) that you wont even end up in the same match and be spread out over several matches/teams instead of in the same one.
- It is just more effective for teams to continue to use the group queue compared to the difficulty of trying to sync drop.

I'm not saying it's impossible, but the odds of managing to actually sync drop with any one person on a regular basis is fairly difficult. It's ineffective and is not often attempted any more with the ease that groups can now be made.


(I still would appreciate a link to that e-mail from support telling him to post this on the forums, but it still is not going to be easy to attempt to sync drop with others.)

[MischiefSC]

Aresye, on 24 August 2014 - 02:39 PM, said:

Also, I'm not trying to downplay the act of sync dropping nor encourage it.

It is so rarely successful and carries such a minimal advantage, that it would literally be a waste of time for PGI to actively try and fix it, which, given PGI's track record, a fix for something so unpredictable and difficult to categorize would (at the very least) create much longer search times.

It's a simple risk assessment, and one of the key pillars of risk assessment is, "Accept no risk unless the benefits outweigh the costs." As it stands right now, the potential costs for fixing this near non-existent issue far outweigh the potential benefits.

The only thing that PGI can really do, is add a line to the Code of Conduct that says, "The act of multiple players all timing their drops into the solo queue (aka: sync dropping) in the hopes of having multiple players on the same team, is forbidden." Unfortunately, there's really no way that PGI can enforce this, unless you can send them a screenshot and/or video of multiple players openly admitting that they are sync dropping, which is about as likely as having a player admit, "Yes, I am teamkilling."

There is a plus side though. If PGI adds that line to the CoC, what was once a gray area issue before is now, without a doubt, a clear violation of the game rules.

Most units have their own rules, but they're still held liable to MWO's policies, meaning that even if a unit was okay with sync dropping before, they are now required to police their own members to ensure they aren't breaking the new MWO policy.

I just wanted to reiterate this Aresye;

You've made a lot of reasonable and well-backed points about why some people would sync in the pug queue for the contest. I understand and appreciate them and absolutely appreciate you being so honest about it.

I saw prior where someone was talking about wanting to split the queues *again*.... which would change nothing. The competitive teams would scorch earth the competitive queue, everyone would move to 2-4s and the competitive teams would sync in the 2-4s and feast upon them again. At which point they would (if they hadn't already) move to syncing in the pug queue and saying it's not their fault they're too weak to play except at an advantage.

That's what's at issue. Most groups play in the group queue - I know, I play with a lot of people. One of my favorite things in the group queue is the chat; both sides chat back and forth, there's a friendlier atmosphere in general. Most groups and by most I'd even go nearly all groups seem like they're largely comprised of good folks having fun. I'd love to pug in the group queue; I never use voip anyway and it's not that hard to just read the play and wingman for someone you know.

This isn't about that or those people. This is about people who find the group queue, as fun as it generally is, too competitive. The stated goal is to play in groups against pugs. They don't really want groups vs groups - we've got that queue and calling it 'competitive' is like calling a Toyota Corolla a 'sports car'. Nobody is fooled. Once in a blue moon you get a competitive team on the other end - in the solo queue once in a while you get a well organized team on the other end too.

This is about people who only want to play when they have an advantage and they make a lot of excuses as to why. The tournament was a wonky one-off and I get that. I wouldn't go as far as to say 'it was fine' because you don't solve a broken mechanic by breaking something else. I do understand it though and it doesn't bug me, never did. This is about the argument that sync-dropping in the solo queue is legit... since 2-4s are not allowed to drop against pugs anymore - since, you know. They split the queue specifically to prevent that.

Anyway, I appreciate the arguments you brought to the discussion, they were well-worded and brought something valuable to the topic.

[MischiefSC]

Sandpit, on 24 August 2014 - 05:46 PM, said:

Again, we're talking about PGI here, the dev team that's produced 10 maps in 3 years and won't accept community help in that regard either. I keep my expectations realistic lol

Hey, you wanted a suggestion for a fix. That's my suggestion. People think that catching sync-dropping would be hard, I'm saying it wouldn't. We know they can log match populations and obviously have to know when people are on/off server. Export those bad boys to Excel and make someone for your Resource Management team do it then take credit for bang out some scripts. You can get most of them free online even and then take credit for them, all while complaining to RM that it always takes them SO LONG to get these requests done that sometimes you just have to take the 20 minutes to do it yourself. That way they don't see how much you actually need them to do that stuff for you so you're not working 60 hour weeks all the time.

Also keep in mind that PGI is in Canada. $250k in Canadian dollars to make a map is like $200 US or like £1.35 British pounds. I think productive hours work the same way - you factor in driving through the wilderness and time spent drinking or recovering from drinking and you've got like 18 productive hours in a week

[Sandpit]

MischiefSC, on 24 August 2014 - 07:09 PM, said:

length

Now THAT was much better. I think we get too caught up in the "trolls" sometimes. There's always going to be the min/max type players whose only idea of fun is to win by the largest margin possible margin and that includes trying to game the system to their advantage, but that's not the majority

[Aresye]

I'm completely onboard with that, but then we're back to thinking of ways to prevent that from happening.

As much as it would suck knowing I would never be randomly matched with a member from my Clan during these kinds of events, the simplest solution would probably lie along the lines of coding the MM in a way where it will take a member's unit tags for CW, and ensure no other matching tags exist in the game. That's assuming each person guilty of this are in larger units however, and doesn't prevent those who don't have a unit designation from grouping up and coordinating a sync drop.

[Mystere]

Almeras, on 24 August 2014 - 03:32 PM, said:

zero tolerance take a 10 higher profile players caught doing it and reset their accounts to zero. Let it be know this is how PGI will treat exploiters

The fear of being caught exploiting and receiving a harsh punishment far greater than the benefit is a better deterrent than trying to fix every exploit and work around players find.

I got my 50 the hard way by far the most annoying was the deathrun/dc crowd Friday was the worst. Reset their accounts and divide up their cbills/mc between all the team mates they screwed over.

PGI should first either declare a rule or write a forum post that explicitly says it is forbidden. Only then can they do what you are proposing, if at all.

[MischiefSC]

Sandpit, on 24 August 2014 - 07:21 PM, said:

Now THAT was much better. I think we get too caught up in the "trolls" sometimes. There's always going to be the min/max type players whose only idea of fun is to win by the largest margin possible margin and that includes trying to game the system to their advantage, but that's not the majority

One thing I am protective of about the solo queue is that going forward with CW groups are going to have all the advantages. That's fine; it's the only way TO do it. The idea that people can play solo on an even field in that regard is all the solo queue has going for it. Regardless of the intent any sync dropping there now that groups have their own queue is going to be viewed as griefing or, lack of a better term, bullying. I get that it's not that significant an advantage. It is one that flies in the face of the whole purpose of the queue.

No groups in the solo queue. No sync-dropping. That's why it's the solo queue, that's why it's not the group queue or CW queue or private matches or anything else.

Aresye, on 24 August 2014 - 07:26 PM, said:

I'm completely onboard with that, but then we're back to thinking of ways to prevent that from happening.

As much as it would suck knowing I would never be randomly matched with a member from my Clan during these kinds of events, the simplest solution would probably lie along the lines of coding the MM in a way where it will take a member's unit tags for CW, and ensure no other matching tags exist in the game. That's assuming each person guilty of this are in larger units however, and doesn't prevent those who don't have a unit designation from grouping up and coordinating a sync drop.

Nah, that would still happen - just not all the time. You set a threshold of no more than, say, 4 shared matches every 12 hours or the like. Even if you hit it and it's worth looking at and they click the other tab and search your login/logout and find you were nowhere near synced it was just luck then you're golden.

The only time it would come up would be with people who were pretty clearly syncing.

[Joseph Mallan]

MischiefSC, on 24 August 2014 - 07:40 PM, said:

Nah, that would still happen - just not all the time. You set a threshold of no more than, say, 4 shared matches every 12 hours or the like. Even if you hit it and it's worth looking at and they click the other tab and search your login/logout and find you were nowhere near synced it was just luck then you're golden.

The only time it would come up would be with people who were pretty clearly syncing.

What about like the games Saturday. You and I ended up in drops together what 4-5 times? Did we sync drop? Can PGI prove we were not on TS3 together?