2 replies to this topic

[Xavori]

tl;dr
-Remove win/loss from consideration
-More value to non-damage, but high skill/value things like staying together and concentrating fire
-Much more value to targeting assists (ie. make light mechs worth playing)
-Balance ratings vs mech tonnage
-Harsher penalties for friendly fire

I'm making this suggestion because currently, pilot skill rating is much more about either "lucky matchmaking rating" or "having a coordinated unit rating".

What I mean is that as long as wins and losses have such a dramatic impact on pilot skill, it's not really rating pilot skill. If a player can die without doing anything, but their team still wins, that shouldn't be a push on a change to their pilot skill. And if a guy or gal can normally tear up mechs, but gets on a bad team, he or she is just as dead as everyone else.

So the first change is dump win/loss as part of the equation. If need be, create an actual unit skill ranking that shows this, but it has no place in "pilot" ratings. Pilot ratings should be about how well you fight, not how lucky you were that you got a good group.

Next up is rewarding smart play. For all of this, I'd working with the idea that 400-600 points scored should be the target of holding your ranking steady. More than that, you go up. Less than that, you go down.

Currently there is a tiny bonus given to people who stick together. This needs to be bigger. Staying together and fighting together should be the epitome of pilot skill for anything other than the scouts. Yet it current is an afterthought compared to damage and kills. Instead, for every 30 seconds that you are in range of a lance member, you get 5 points. That means that if the entire lance sticks together, everyone is earning 15 points (because you're near 3 other lance members) every 30 seconds. Just staying in formation for a 15 minute match becomes worth 450 points which would keep your rating from going down.

Next, are the value bonuses for sticking together. AMS firing down a missile is worth 1 point a missile for missiles not targeting you that you destroy. Keeping your lance covered with ECM is worth 1 point every 30 seconds per mech covered. Damaging a mech that has been targeted (actually have a teammate hit R) by another teammate gets you a full point per damage you do.

Of course, can't forget scouts. Scouts should get 1 point per damage for anything they've designated with laser or narc. In other words, if they tag something, any damage to the target is the same as if they'd done it themselves. Kill rewards should also be given identically to actual kills, albeit with a different name, like maybe Kill Support. Lastly, because they are giving up formation bonus to help their team, they need a replacement. For that, any mech they actively target (hit R) gives them 40 points when a teammate actually hits their target the first time, meaning they can earn 360 points just by targeting enemies that get hit which is roughly the same as what the other mechs get for staying in formation.. Oh, the matchmaker should also aggressively work to keep light mechs, and light medium mechs in the same lance when it throws the groups together so as not to take points away from the bigger formation-friendly mechs.

Points should also be given 1 per 5 seconds for conquest captures, and 1 point per second for assault captures.

Regular damage points (ie. those not from working with a teammate) should be .5 per damage. This number then gets reduced by 25% times a mech's tonnage. So an Atlas at 100 tons only get 75% of the damage score they earned (because an atlas takes less pilot skill to rack up damage on enemies). A 50 ton mech would be earning 87.5% of their normal damage score. And so on.

The last suggestion is a big, big hit for negative actions. You should lose 1 point per damage done to a teammate, with an extra point lost per center torso point of damage. If you do 25% of the damage to a teammate, and they subsequently die, you lose 50% of your points when tallied at the end of a match. In other words, don't be a scrub at target recognition.

[Ukos]

er no...

[Xavori]

Ukos, on 15 January 2016 - 06:52 PM, said:

er no...

Care to explain why?

I posted this after a match in which I screwed up, died without doing anything, but didn't lose pilot rating.

Add in how switching from light mechs where I would tag and mark but not get kills wrecking my rating, but suddenly switching to an Atlas made my rating start to recover. Being a good light pilot takes more skill than just wandering with my Atlas, and yet, the game thinks I'm getting better because I'm in the big boy?