38 replies to this topic

[Reitrix]

Glythe, on 09 November 2014 - 09:30 AM, said:

Hated starcraft but my friends told me all about that Elo system. You log in fresh for a season, throw all the games in a horrific manner and you're set to pub stomp for a long long time.

This game had the highest population with the most satisfied players when there was no Elo.

In SC, In order to keep pushing yourself down to curbstomp nubs you would need to lose pathetically over and over and over for hours to get down to Bronze level if you were any good to start with.
And once you get there, you would need to continue playing terribly to stay there, otherwise the MM would push you straight back up to whatever rank you should be in.
(Nothing stopping people doing this now with the Elo we have)
Also, the Ranking System in SC would frequently make players skip multiple ranks entirely. Whatever formula Blizzard uses for that, works well.
Personally, I've even gone from mid Bronze -> high Gold after taking a break from the game for a few weeks, coming back to a couple of bad games and then getting familiar again.

Since you would be evaluated for your performance during each match via the Reward System, it would be bloody difficult to purposefully tank your rank.
The reason for that is because if you simply suicided within 3~ minutes of the game starting (like running into the enemy right off the bat and getting blown apart) you would get nothing under the Reward System, and the system could label it as "Unremarkable".
Any match that is flagged as a "Unremarkable" would not be eligible for ranking up OR down.
If you're in a Light and were legitimately killed fast, say by a GR/PPC DWF Boat, it benefits you by not penalizing you being unlucky.
And if anyone was willing to play for multiple hours so badly that it caused their rank to plummer from mid - high to lowest of the low, the MOMENT they started getting games with huge Kill/damage/assist/misc rewards, the MM would push them right back up to where they started, and they'd need to do it all over again.
At worst, That player would dominate 2 - 3 matches before being shunted up where that skill level belongs.

Also, the system could flag people whose rank was pretty good, and then suddenly tanks hard, only to just as suddenly get amazing games. That player can then be investigated etc.

Edited by Reitrix, 09 November 2014 - 10:30 AM.

[Aresye]

Alek Ituin, on 09 November 2014 - 06:59 AM, said:

Visibly displaying rankings would result in an e-peen display of unprecedented proportions. It would be the E-Peen-ocolypse, with equally horrible e-peen aftershocks. These forums are already bad enough, we do NOT need to make them worse.

We already have leaderboard tournaments with multiple players using screenshots of their ranking as their signature, threads about how people did in said leaderboard tournaments, and random people throwing in their KDR every now and then to brag about.

It wouldn't be the e-peen apocalypse. It would simply be another thing players will occasionally choose to throw around, but it gives players a much more accurate representation of their own skill level than KDR or W/L ratios.

Overall, I feel it would be more beneficial than detrimental.

[Bishop Steiner]

John1352, on 09 November 2014 - 03:29 AM, said:

Because some very experienced players would choose to play with newbies and abuse the system, probably earning 250k credits a game, so they would have plenty of reason to do it.

while true, listening to all the 1337 forum warriors, I would say some are "choosing" their own Elo, regardless of where the game actually places them.

Like: "I'm a high Elo Player! And LRMS are out of hand!".

Anyone spot the discrepancy in the above statement?

[pyrocomp]

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 10:25 AM, said:

In SC, ...

Once again, this can only evaluate personal skill, with total disregard of team work. I was thinking about that and couldn't find a solution. Some things in team play I just don't know how to 'digitize' of simply how to evaluate. You can be lowdamaging and so on, but keep that crowd together of direct them via example or direct typing/voicing good ideas. A good pilot isn't necessarily a good commander and vice versa, a good commander may be a crap pilot, but with quick grasp of the situation. And... all those distractions caused by 'squirrel syndrome' not in a single match. How you will weight that?
Team isn't just bunch of individuals. And there is still no clue how to evaluate a team. Elo is some kind of measure, but looks like completely dissatisfactory.

Edited by pyrocomp, 09 November 2014 - 11:48 AM.

[Deathlike]

FupDup, on 09 November 2014 - 08:56 AM, said:

I for one welcome the opportunity to ravage the Underhive™.

My Underhive is better than your Underhive! Oh wait...

Bishop Steiner, on 09 November 2014 - 11:35 AM, said:

while true, listening to all the 1337 forum warriors, I would say some are "choosing" their own Elo, regardless of where the game actually places them.

Like: "I'm a high Elo Player! And LRMS are out of hand!".

Anyone spot the discrepancy in the above statement?

Well...

"My Elo is ______. And Flamers are useless!"

You don't need an imagination to work hard at madlibs...

[pyrocomp]

Deathlike, on 09 November 2014 - 12:18 PM, said:

Well...

"My Elo is ______. And Flamers are useless!"

You don't need an imagination to work hard at madlibs...

Still, better will be "My Elo is ______. And _____ are useless!"

[Reitrix]

pyrocomp, on 09 November 2014 - 11:48 AM, said:

Once again, this can only evaluate personal skill, with total disregard of team work. I was thinking about that and couldn't find a solution. Some things in team play I just don't know how to 'digitize' of simply how to evaluate. You can be lowdamaging and so on, but keep that crowd together of direct them via example or direct typing/voicing good ideas. A good pilot isn't necessarily a good commander and vice versa, a good commander may be a crap pilot, but with quick grasp of the situation. And... all those distractions caused by 'squirrel syndrome' not in a single match. How you will weight that?
Team isn't just bunch of individuals. And there is still no clue how to evaluate a team. Elo is some kind of measure, but looks like completely dissatisfactory.

The game already evaluates us based on our personal skill. Thats where c-bills come from.
Someone who commands well will end up getting a lot of reward by 'proxy' which are indicative of good teamwork, the new Protection and Formation rewards reflect this. It can be expanded.
If you constantly 'command' well and thus bring victories to your team often, you would be evaluated on your constant victories, along with your Piloting performance, since you may not always be in the 'Commander' position in every PuG, improving your Piloting skills is essential anyways.

The biggest issue MWO has is trying to gauge your skill(Elo) on team performance. What I'm proposing is to move away from that. Base our 'Elo' or rank on our well we do personally.
As an example, if we had 4 'Ranks' for players, Cadet/Private/Officer/Commander, the MatchMaker could pull together 12 Officers for both sides. Since the players are all of the same Rank, you can reasonably expect them all to on a similar level skill wise.
Since those players achieved that Rank on personal skill, the resulting match would be more balanced than pulling together a team that has a bunch of players who aren't so great, but keep ending up in winning teams which jacks up their Elo, since the MM assumes they must be good because otherwise how else would they be winning all these matches?
(I regularly see winning teams with a number of players at very low match scores)

Even squirrels can get good match scores, since once they get the attention of their victims, they usually (good ones anyway) lure them into an ambush in which they can rack up Damage/Assists/etc, while also getting Hit & Runs during the Lure process.

The reward system can be expanded upon. The problem we will always have is being judged as a Group rather than a Pilot in the current system.

Edited by Reitrix, 09 November 2014 - 12:34 PM.

[pyrocomp]

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 12:32 PM, said:

The game already evaluates us based on our personal skill. Thats where c-bills come from.
Someone who commands well will end up getting a lot of reward by 'proxy' which are indicative of good teamwork, the new Protection and Formation rewards reflect this. It can be expanded.
If you constantly 'command' well and thus bring victories to your team often, you would be evaluated on your constant victories, along with your Piloting performance, since you may not always be in the 'Commander' position in every PuG, improving your Piloting skills is essential anyways.

The biggest issue MWO has is trying to gauge your skill(Elo) on team performance. What I'm proposing is to move away from that. Base our 'Elo' or rank on our well we do personally.
As an example, if we had 4 'Ranks' for players, Cadet/Private/Officer/Commander, the MatchMaker could pull together 12 Officers for both sides. Since the players are all of the same Rank, you can reasonably expect them all to on a similar level skill wise.
Since those players achieved that Rank on personal skill, the resulting match would be more balanced than pulling together a team that has a bunch of players who aren't so great, but keep ending up in winning teams which jacks up their Elo, since the MM assumes they must be good because otherwise how else would they be winning all these matches?
(I regularly see winning teams with a number of players at very low match scores)

Even squirrels can get good match scores, since once they get the attention of their victims, they usually (good ones anyway) lure them into an ambush in which they can rack up Damage/Assists/etc, while also getting Hit & Runs during the Lure process.

The reward system can be expanded upon. The problem we will always have is being judged as a Group rather than a Pilot in the current system.

Wait, wait, wait.
First. Your piloting skill should and only should correlate with you teamplay skill in ideal world only. You write about c-bills that add more to damage deallers rather than to those who organize that group.
You state that if someone constantly bring victories through commander skill than he is evaluated on team base level. And on the next sentence state that such avaluation is the main MWO issue. I don't get it. If it's good that I can aid team on the level other than kills why thats an issue that should be corrected to the level 'kills only matter'?
You state that 'squirrels' can get good match score. Yhe essential thing is that mainly from such actions benefit only team, but not pilot and to become really good there... well, I'm for one not that good pilot to do that and not to recieve damage.
Your proposed system is... don't get it wrong... clannish. The personal pilolting skill evaluated mostly as damage done means that you are a good officer. This can lead to more delfish gameplay (why bother brinning BAP, ECM, AMS to match if you can cram extra ML or bit of ammo). The solo queue already suffers from that and new reward system is intended (or I think it is intended) to change that. All the forum here is about coordination, battlefield awariness, support. If you'll present a way to organaze a match that will allow to evaluate that, I'll sing under your proposal. But now it looks in opposite directions, quoting directly

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 12:32 PM, said:

Base our 'Elo' or rank on our well we do personally.

This is a way to make team support and teamplay irrelevant. It becomes irrelevant wether adding you to the team strengthen that team or not. The team skill is not a direct algebraic sum of players skills. It's should be higher than that. Or I would like it to be higher.

Edited by pyrocomp, 09 November 2014 - 01:04 PM.

[Deathlike]

pyrocomp, on 09 November 2014 - 12:24 PM, said:

Still, better will be "My Elo is ______. And _____ are useless!"

No, that's just how all complaints are worded.

With my previous statement, it's true on all levels.

[pyrocomp]

Deathlike, on 09 November 2014 - 01:16 PM, said:

No, that's just how all complaints are worded.

With my previous statement, it's true on all levels.

I don't know, maybe there exist a lavel when flamers rule... Not that I believe there is anybody at that level... But I know when flamers are usefull though.

[Reitrix]

pyrocomp, on 09 November 2014 - 01:03 PM, said:

Wait, wait, wait.
First. Your piloting skill should and only should correlate with you teamplay skill in ideal world only. You write about c-bills that add more to damage deallers rather than to those who organize that group.
You state that if someone constantly bring victories through commander skill than he is evaluated on team base level. And on the next sentence state that such avaluation is the main MWO issue. I don't get it. If it's good that I can aid team on the level other than kills why thats an issue that should be corrected to the level 'kills only matter'?
You state that 'squirrels' can get good match score. Yhe essential thing is that mainly from such actions benefit only team, but not pilot and to become really good there... well, I'm for one not that good pilot to do that and not to recieve damage.
Your proposed system is... don't get it wrong... clannish. The personal pilolting skill evaluated mostly as damage done means that you are a good officer. This can lead to more delfish gameplay (why bother brinning BAP, ECM, AMS to match if you can cram extra ML or bit of ammo). The solo queue already suffers from that and new reward system is intended (or I think it is intended) to change that. All the forum here is about coordination, battlefield awariness, support. If you'll present a way to organaze a match that will allow to evaluate that, I'll sing under your proposal. But now it looks in opposite directions, quoting directly

This is a way to make team support and teamplay irrelevant. It becomes irrelevant wether adding you to the team strengthen that team or not. The team skill is not a direct algebraic sum of players skills. It's should be higher than that. Or I would like it to be higher.

You have misread or misunderstood my posts. To quote myself:

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 12:32 PM, said:

The game already evaluates us based on our personal skill. Thats where c-bills come from.

That quote, i assume is where you got your misunderstanding from. Let me explain.
Currently, To earn c-bills you must perform well. YOU, the Pilot, NOT the team.
As evidenced by earning upwards of 200k on defeats, so long as YOU Pilot well. (I got 344k off a Defeat in my CN9D earlier)

In the current game, Winning or Losing is the only thing that affects your Elo ranking.
So i could take a Locust out, be terrible and die within seconds in every match, but my team can carry me to victory a lot. The game now believes I am a good Locust Pilot, because my Team wins. NOT because i Piloted my Locust well.

Now, If the game utilized the Reward System to determine how good you are with a certain 'mech, much like it already does for c-bill earnings, weighing things like Scouting, Hit and Runs, Spotting and UAVs etc differently per weight class based on Roles, It could realistically put together a team of 12 people who are reasonably evenly skilled, since they would only be matched together with Pilots who are AS capable in a match as everyone else in that Team.

Would that improve your Teamplay? Well, first you have to define Teamplay. Generally speaking, 'Teamplay' is sticking with your Lancemates and the other 2 Lances and shooting what they shoot at.
There are offshoots here like Lights going ahead and spotting for LRMs etc, but on the whole, its just a matter of sticking with the team and shooting what they shoot at.

We know from prior experience that a small group of skilled players will completely curbstomp 12 average players. Thats why the Groups are all off in their own separate Queue now.
So what then might happen if the MatchMaker was able to consistently put together teams that are, Pilot for Pilot, evenly matched for Piloting skill?

For a start it would lessen the instances of the MM putting unbalanced teams together.

Edited by Reitrix, 09 November 2014 - 01:34 PM.

[Water Bear]

...Isn't the point of ELO to ensure that fair matches happen?

Then the answer to the question "why not" is obviously "because it would cause unfair matches, thereby failing to serve it's original purpose."

[pyrocomp]

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 01:32 PM, said:

You have misread or misunderstood my posts. To quote myself:


That quote, i assume is where you got your misunderstanding from. Let me explain.
Currently, To earn c-bills you must perform well. YOU, the Pilot, NOT the team.
As evidenced by earning upwards of 200k on defeats, so long as YOU Pilot well. (I got 344k off a Defeat in my CN9D earlier)

In the current game, Winning or Losing is the only thing that affects your Elo ranking.
So i could take a Locust out, be terrible and die within seconds in every match, but my team can carry me to victory a lot. The game now believes I am a good Locust Pilot, because my Team wins. NOT because i Piloted my Locust well.

Now, If the game utilized the Reward System to determine how good you are with a certain 'mech, much like it already does for c-bill earnings, weighing things like Scouting, Hit and Runs, Spotting and UAVs etc differently per weight class based on Roles, It could realistically put together a team of 12 people who are reasonably evenly skilled, since they would only be matched together with Pilots who are AS capable in a match as everyone else in that Team.

Would that improve your Teamplay? Well, first you have to define Teamplay. Generally speaking, 'Teamplay' is sticking with your Lancemates and the other 2 Lances and shooting what they shoot at.
There are offshoots here like Lights going ahead and spotting for LRMs etc, but on the whole, its just a matter of sticking with the team and shooting what they shoot at.

We know from prior experience that a small group of skilled players will completely curbstomp 12 average players. Thats why the Groups are all off in their own separate Queue now.
So what then might happen if the MatchMaker was able to consistently put together teams that are, Pilot for Pilot, evenly matched for Piloting skill?

For a start it would lessen the instances of the MM putting unbalanced teams together.

Well, you worded it all differently and now you idea has a stress on all thosee actions and I tend to agree with you that this 'grade' is better than Elo... It just would not help much. You will have to find a way to balance teams stuffing them with pilots with different 'grades'. Will your 'garde' help solve problem like 'team A hase 6 high Elo players in Lights and meds and team B has high Elo players in assaults and heavies, the rest are players with low Elo, are those teams balanced?' Will introduction of your score remove such question? In the end, teamplay is good, but it compensate for bland DPS only to certain degree/

[Reitrix]

pyrocomp, on 09 November 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

Well, you worded it all differently and now you idea has a stress on all thosee actions and I tend to agree with you that this 'grade' is better than Elo... It just would not help much. You will have to find a way to balance teams stuffing them with pilots with different 'grades'. Will your 'garde' help solve problem like 'team A hase 6 high Elo players in Lights and meds and team B has high Elo players in assaults and heavies, the rest are players with low Elo, are those teams balanced?' Will introduction of your score remove such question? In the end, teamplay is good, but it compensate for bland DPS only to certain degree/

Under a personal ranking system, you would never HAVE the issue of getting half your team with "good" players and the other half are all barely out of Cadet training runs because the System would ensure that those cadets are only playing with other cadets.

I've seen Locusts take down Dire Wolves. I know I've taken down my fair share of them in my Centurion too. Its not impossible.
And since the system made sure that there are Assault Pilots of similar skill on both sides, it all becomes a non issue.

[pyrocomp]

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 01:57 PM, said:

Under a personal ranking system, you would never HAVE the issue of getting half your team with "good" players and the other half are all barely out of Cadet training runs because the System would ensure that those cadets are only playing with other cadets.

I've seen Locusts take down Dire Wolves. I know I've taken down my fair share of them in my Centurion too. Its not impossible.
And since the system made sure that there are Assault Pilots of similar skill on both sides, it all becomes a non issue.

It still may come to too many grades and too few players. And you cannot keep player in queue long. You will have to allow more flexibility to MM. Or rather PGI will do it anyway, so the question 'how to balance' still stands, maybe as precaution, but still.

[Reitrix]

pyrocomp, on 09 November 2014 - 02:04 PM, said:

It still may come to too many grades and too few players. And you cannot keep player in queue long. You will have to allow more flexibility to MM. Or rather PGI will do it anyway, so the question 'how to balance' still stands, maybe as precaution, but still.

Nothing stopping the system from mixing it up so you get some Officers with some Commanders. Just so long as you dont get Commanders against a group of Cadets, it'd work out fine.

[GRiPSViGiL]

You can choose your own ELO with Private Matches.

[pyrocomp]

Reitrix, on 09 November 2014 - 02:06 PM, said:

Nothing stopping the system from mixing it up so you get some Officers with some Commanders. Just so long as you dont get Commanders against a group of Cadets, it'd work out fine.

Ahem... You have a mix and difference in skill levels, so the balancing is inportant now. To make this system better than Elo, implement balancing. Group of commanders in heavies will stomp through ranks of opposing team commanders in mediums and after that through the rest of the team.

[ShadowWolf Kell]

Deathlike, on 09 November 2014 - 12:18 PM, said:

My Underhive is better than your Underhive! Oh wait...

Mine runs 8 Flamers on FS9-As and pilots with these puppies!