213 replies to this topic

[Khobai]

justcallme A S H, on 27 September 2018 - 01:15 PM, said:

Yes we all want even-ish matches. Is it always possible? No.

you clearly dont want even matches since youre in direct opposition to everyone else here that does want even matches.

you cant have even matches without giving up your ability to play with your friends. thats the reality of the current state of the game. and youre not willing to give that up. so you dont really want even matches.

justcallme A S H, on 27 September 2018 - 01:15 PM, said:

You were told stomps happen even against the elite vs the elite.

elite vs elite matchups arnt the problem though. because theoretically either elite team could win that matchup.

the problem is when the game puts elites vs casuals. and the casuals have no chance of winning the matchup.

the whole topic is about group queue not being receptive for casual groups. we know its fine for elite groups.

Nightbird, on 27 September 2018 - 01:26 PM, said:

Group size is just a scapegoat.

group size is not a scapegoat and ill explain why. because when you have a bunch of good players stacked on one team it becomes that much harder to find an equal number of good players in the queue to place on the other team to balance the teams out. there simply arnt enough good players still playing the game to consistently fill up both teams with good players.

but if you reduce the number of good players that can be on one team, via a matchmaker forcefully splitting up groups, then it increases the number of good players in the pool that can be placed on the other team.

essentially the matchmaker would be distributing all the good players evenly between both teams to make games more balanced instead of allowing them to stack all on one team which is never balanced.

and it wouldnt just be good players, it could break up groups of bad players too. essentially preventing both extremes of teams full of good or bad players. the law of averages combined with some type of group ELO matchmaking would result in more balanced matchups.

I dont see any other way to balance group queue because of the low population issues. Leaving group queue in its current unbalanced state is certainly not going to help MWO at all. Although one could argue nothing could really help MWO at this point, which is probably how PGI feels so they wont do anything.

Edited by Khobai, 27 September 2018 - 02:30 PM.

[justcallme A S H]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 02:01 PM, said:

you clearly dont want even matches since youre in direct opposition to everyone else here that does want even matches.

you cant have even matches without giving up your ability to play with your friends. thats the reality of the current state of the game. and youre not willing to give that up. so you dont really want even matches.

I would love even matches. You put a lot of 'you you you'... Why? I pretty much play SoloQ only. I occasionally GroupQ but it is rare because of my timezone. So drop the 'you you you' like you actually know something here. Fact is you don't, as usual, and as I've proven many a time that you have no idea what you are on about. This is just another example of it.


Either way at the absolute highest level of the game, if there are 8-1 rolls occurring... Guess what?

It ain't gonna be possible there - it ain't possible anywhere.

[Nightbird]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 02:01 PM, said:

you clearly dont want even matches since youre in direct opposition to everyone else here that does want even matches.

you cant have even matches without giving up your ability to play with your friends. thats the reality of the current state of the game. and youre not willing to give that up. so you dont really want even matches.



group size is not a scapegoat and ill explain why. because when you have a bunch of good players stacked on one team it becomes that much harder to find an equal number of good players in the queue to place on the other team to balance the teams out. there simply arnt enough good players still playing the game for that to ever work.

but if you reduce the number of good players that can be on one team, via a matchmaker forcefully splitting up groups, then it increases the number of good players in the pool that can be placed on the other team.

essentially the matchmaker would be distributing all the good players between both teams to make games more balanced instead of allowing them to stack all on one team which is never balanced.

and it wouldnt just be good players, it could break up groups of bad players too. essentially preventing both extremes of teams full of good or bad players. the law of averages combined with some type of group ELO matchmaking would result in more balanced matchups.

I dont see any other way to balance group queue because of the low population issues. Leaving group queue in its current state is certainly not going to help MWO at all. Although one could argue nothing could really help MWO at this point.

The match maker doesn't differentiate between good and bad players? If you're talking about tiers that's a joke. The MM puts together teams without regard for skill.

[Khobai]

Nightbird, on 27 September 2018 - 02:16 PM, said:

The match maker doesn't differentiate between good and bad players? If you're talking about tiers that's a joke. The MM puts together teams without regard for skill.

obviously. there is no matchmaker right now. thats the whole problem.

im saying there should be a matchmaker. and if it isnt able to match groups against other groups of equal skill then it also needs the ability to forcefully break up groups in order to balance the two teams. that is preferable to allowing stacked teams.

how else are you going to balance two teams when good players are such a limited commodity? breaking up groups of good players and distributing them evenly between the two teams is the only viable option left at that point. theres no other way around the low population problem.

the only way to make group queue better for casual players is to balance the teams better. and the only way to balance the teams in a low population environment is with a matchmaker that also has the ability to prevent team stacking by breaking up stacked groups and swapping players around.

Edited by Khobai, 27 September 2018 - 02:48 PM.

[K O Z A K]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 02:35 PM, said:

obviously. there is no matchmaker right now. thats the whole problem.

im saying there should be a matchmaker. and if it isnt able to match groups against other groups of equal skill then it also needs the ability to forcefully break up groups in order to balance the two teams. that is preferable to allowing stacked teams.

how else are you going to balance two teams when good players are such a limited commodity? breaking up groups of good players and distributing them evenly between the two teams is the only viable option left at that point. theres no other way around the low population problem.

the only way to make group queue better for casual players is to balance the teams better. and the only way to balance the teams in a low population environment is with a matchmaker that also has the ability to prevent team stacking by breaking up stacked groups and swapping players around.

somehow I think all you'll accomplish is just get more high end players to quit (unless that's the goal?), occasionally people like to enjoy a drop where half your team doesn't ram in your behind every time you start working a corner and prevent you from taking a step back to cover. Effectively you'd be turning group que into a form of solo que

[Y E O N N E]

Shifty McSwift, on 27 September 2018 - 12:41 AM, said:

LoL blaming casuals for the state of the game, nice.

The issue isn't casuals, it's casuals screaming bloody murder after they have voiced their refusal to learn how the game works and got smashed in-game as a result. The bar to clear "average" is set so very, very low and still they fail to meet it, let alone exceed it.

Shifty McSwift, on 26 September 2018 - 11:14 PM, said:

It was an offhand comment referring to the flaws in that idealism, they were rhetorical questions, and sure they are pretty flippant and not grounded in argumentative logic, and just a couple of several different responses, I was mainly just pointing at the potential ends of that line of reasoning, not accusing... But apologies if that is how it came across, the "you"s were more general and not specific to you. But I get it I responded to your quote, so again, my apologies if it came across that way.

Even still, it was an offhand comment creating a false dichotomy, implying a reality where you are either playing only against peer-level players or you are seal clubbing bads, with no room for mixed games. In my anecdotal-but-considerable experience, most games have a handful of decent players across the two teams and, even with rockstars, you still can't really say it's "clubbing seals" because so many paper cuts from mediocre players with some good hits from the good ones are still incredibly debilitating and can cost a win. And on that note, we can then move on to the discussion about TTK and how long raw TTK (low damage-to-hitpoint ratio) makes rockstars even more powerful, because it reduces the chance that lesser players will take them down through lucky opportunity.

Quote

The sentiment "I only group with +99%ers" and that everyone else just needs to "get on your level" and everything would be okay, I would think is one that pretty apparently does not work, at least in this environment. Whether you adhere to that sentiment or whether I interpreted the intent wrongly of Vxheous (which I still don't think I did, it is pretty clear) is beside the point really, I am saying that ideal is flawed.

TBQH, you are reading it wrong. He's not saying he will only play with you if you are 99%, he's saying that if he plays with you then you will be 99%. As in, all of his friends happen to be 99%, and he happens to be friends with them because he enjoys the way they are of like mind and motivation in how they play. There's a correlation, but it's not causation.

As for whether or not 'git gud' works, how can we know when so many refuse to even try? This game offers equality of opportunity. It does not offer, and nor should it, equality of outcome. The latter is ultimately what all this boo-hooing is trying to achieve; these people apparently never read "Harrison Bergeron".

Quote

It's a joke ffs, willfully obtuse much? Relax.

A bad joke; your target and timing are both poor. At the same time, the joke is being aimed at what you perceive to be an audience that does not include the group you are using as the punchline and it is therefore not funny to members of the latter.

Edited by Yeonne Greene, 27 September 2018 - 08:49 PM.

[Vxheous]

Yeonne Greene, on 27 September 2018 - 05:09 PM, said:

TBQH, you are reading it wrong. He's not saying he will only play with you if you are 99%, he's saying that if he plays with you then you will be 99%. As in, all of his friends happen to be 99%, and he happens to be friends with them because he enjoys the way they are of like mind and motivation in how they play. There's a correlation, but it's not causation.

Pretty much this. At this point in the life of MWO, the only people I know still play are all 99%ers on my team. I don't play enough solo queue/group queue nowadays to make new friends, nor do I have the need to make such new friends. However, when other players have asked me for advice in game, I freely give it, and have offered to go into private lobbies to demonstrate, teach, etc. It's not that I refuse to group with anyone that's not a 99%er, it's that I don't know anyone at this point in the game that's not a 99%er. Most of my MWO time is spent practicing for MWOWC, with occasionally derping around in solo/group queue. Rest of my gaming time has been spent playing World of Warcraft as of late.

Edited by Vxheous, 27 September 2018 - 06:23 PM.

[Khobai]

Hazeclaw, on 27 September 2018 - 03:04 PM, said:

somehow I think all you'll accomplish is just get more high end players to quit (unless that's the goal?),

its not the goal. but its a bonus. nobody would miss them because theyre a toxic element of the game. look how many comp players already left the game, and nobody even cared. the rest could all leave and still nobody would care. they wont be missed.

they constantly tell everybody else to git gud but fail to realize that theyre a trivial minority (less than 5% of players). your typical MWO player doesnt want to "git gud". they just want to have fun with a couple friends and have a reasonable expectation of the game being balanced. its unreasonable to expect 95% of players to change for your own benefit. thats not going to happen. its the 5% that should change to accomodate everyone else.

group queue can never be balanced as long as you have elitest players constantly abusing the lack of a matchmaker and stacking teams lmao. the same exact thing happened in MWLL, all the good players that knew eachother would stack on one team, and they would gang up on the newer less experienced players. And thats one of the biggest reasons why MWLL failed. And it was failing even before PGI asked them to stop development on MWLL. Allowing team stacking is not how you sustain your player population.

Edited by Khobai, 27 September 2018 - 07:57 PM.

[Vxheous]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 07:46 PM, said:

its not the goal. but is a bonus. nobody would miss them because they are a toxic element of the game.

And there the bias comes out

[Khobai]

Vxheous, on 27 September 2018 - 07:49 PM, said:

And there the bias comes out

obviously im biased. its not a secret. everyone who gives their opinion is biased.

the difference is my bias wants the game to be balanced. your bias wants the game to remain unbalanced so you can play with your friends and continue abusing a broken system.

I also dont expect 95% of the players to change to accommodate me. I dont go around telling the majority of people who play the game to "git gud" if they want to have a fair chance of winning against me and my friends. Because I understand that people play at different skill levels. Not everyone has the time or inclination to improve their MWO skills. Many people just want to play casually with one or two friends and have fun and a reasonable chance of winning. And theyre not able to do that in group queue because of unbalanced crap like team stacking.

group queue is absolutely toxic for small casual groups. its not an enjoyable experience at all.

Edited by Khobai, 27 September 2018 - 08:14 PM.

[Vxheous]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 08:00 PM, said:

obviously im biased. its not a secret. everyone who gives their opinion is biased.

the difference is my bias wants the game to be balanced. your bias wants the game to remain unbalanced so you can play with your friends and continue abusing a broken system.

I also dont expect 95% of the players to change to accommodate me. I dont go around telling the majority of people who play the game to "git gud" if they want to have a fair chance of winning against me and my friends. Because I understand that people play at different skill levels. Not everyone has the time or inclination to improve their MWO skills. Many people just want to play casually with one or two friends and have fun and a reasonable chance of winning. And theyre not able to do that in group queue because of unbalanced crap like team stacking.

group queue is absolutely toxic for small casual groups. its not an enjoyable experience at all.

Yeah, we get it, you don't like good players, you wish they would be out of the game. I don't actually go around telling people to git gud, more like get competent. Most of the groups in group queue aren't high skill groups, they are just competent players playing with other competent players. Apparently that's too hard for the average player.

Same with the whole "if good players didn't play meta, they wouldn't be good" argument. MWOWC is played in 3039 stock mech tech, the bracket build types should have equal chance against the historical top comp teams right? Doesn't seem to be that way either.

Edited by Vxheous, 27 September 2018 - 08:23 PM.

[cougurt]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 08:00 PM, said:

obviously im biased. its not a secret. everyone who gives their opinion is biased.

the difference is my bias wants the game to be balanced. your bias wants the game to remain unbalanced so you can play with your friends and continue abusing a broken system.

I also dont expect 95% of the players to change to accommodate me. I dont go around telling the majority of people who play the game to "git gud" if they want to have a fair chance of winning against me and my friends. Because I understand that people play at different skill levels. Not everyone has the time or inclination to improve their MWO skills. Many people just want to play casually with one or two friends and have fun and a reasonable chance of winning. And theyre not able to do that in group queue because of unbalanced crap like team stacking.

group queue is absolutely toxic for small casual groups. its not an enjoyable experience at all.

group queue isn't your safe space. either get better at the game and find a decent group to play with, or suck it up and accept that you're going to get smashed by better players every once in a while. besides, it's not like there's a shortage of casual/lesser skilled groups playing at any given time. in fact, you're far more likely to run into them than you are any 99% players.

go sync drop in solo queue if you can't handle the possibility of encountering a half-decent team.

[Y E O N N E]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 07:46 PM, said:

they constantly tell everybody else to git gud but fail to realize that theyre a trivial minority (less than 5% of players). your typical MWO player doesnt want to "git gud". they just want to have fun with a couple friends and have a reasonable expectation of the game being balanced. its unreasonable to expect 95% of players to change for your own benefit. thats not going to happen. its the 5% that should change to accomodate everyone else.

The game is reasonably balanced, they just don't want to actually be playing a PvP game.

[MischiefSC]

Eisenhorne, on 25 September 2018 - 01:49 PM, said:

Group queue in my experience doesn't have much coordination, beyond people generally taking mechs that work well together. Larger groups have big tonnage penalties, so it's not bad. Generally the team with the better players wins. I'd suggest playing group play anyway, or find a large group that runs 12 man FP and is short a few players and join in. 9 players + 3 newer players on comms who listen is generally better than 9 players + 3 randoms.

The other night in an 8man we dropped against a team with 10 assaults, 1 light and a medium. Ugh.

[Shifty McSwift]

Khobai, on 27 September 2018 - 08:00 PM, said:

obviously im biased. its not a secret. everyone who gives their opinion is biased.

Yeah being human creates levels of biases that you may never be able to even identify within yourself though some are clearer than others, I am pretty sure by bringing up your bias he is denying he has any, or downplaying his own biases, which is either incredibly short sighted, or purposely underhanded.

[SarMajor]

I have read through most of this thread and believe there have been some good points made about the matchmaking system, relative skill levels, and so forth. I believe there is a good way to alleviate some of the tension with these issues, but not a complete fix.

I am in a small unit and have observed many of the issues discussed. We have had discussions about this very thing amongst ourselves as well. My unit commander has convinced us that even units with mostly casual players (as we are), can win against more seasoned players through a better understanding of the strategic game, practiced teamwork, and good mech design. He believes that units of mostly casual players must step things up so that there isn't as much of a disparity between pilot skill levels. To that end, he has been building a website and YouTube channel for casual units looking to improve more quickly. Its sort of a boot camp for casual units. I believe he is going to make a post about it in the next week when he is finished.

I very much hope that when War Council makes his post about his efforts, it is met well by the MWO community. He's a very thoughtful, strategically minded guy and has been working on this project bit by bit for months. I was skeptical on some of his thoughts, but so far it is making a big difference for our unit play, so I'm putting it in the category of "works for us". Some units may find it useful, some may not. Despite the problems that MWO has from time to time, it is our favorite game to play and a great unwind from a stressful day. I guess that is the casual player perspective.

[Shifty McSwift]

justcallme A S H, on 27 September 2018 - 01:15 PM, said:

Because at some point you're just going to have to accept you're wrong.

There was enough posted about the topic and thus we were there a while ago. You are just being a stickler for the sake of it, no real reason.

You were told stomps happen even against the elite vs the elite. You were shown proof (and there is PLENTY more). It just comes to a point where there is just no point trying to discuss something with an individual who just refuses to accept the fact they are wrong.

I was told, sure, by a guy who has a clear bias of his own, then I was shown 3 images of him and his friends and told to accept that as evidence of his claims, after I complained about that ****... I was then given reference to some gallery that he asserts exists, I actually do believe his assertion that it exists. If he had pointed to THAT instead of expecting me to just eat up the **** he says without evidence we would have saved a lot of time.

But sure, I should have just straight up believed him without question, right? Is that what you are saying?

justcallme A S H, on 27 September 2018 - 01:15 PM, said:

Yes we all want even-ish matches. Is it always possible? No.

Did I ask it to be always possible? No, I suggested that IF the averages (of actual match outcomes) are showing a majority of stomps, then the focus one would think would be getting the average to at least near 12-6 through whatever methods you could. What is this putting words in my mouth ****?

[Vxheous]

Shifty McSwift, on 27 September 2018 - 08:52 PM, said:

Yeah being human creates levels of biases that you may never be able to even identify within yourself though some are clearer than others, I am pretty sure by bringing up your bias he is denying he has any, or downplaying his own biases, which is either incredibly short sighted, or purposely underhanded.

Nice ad hominem by the way. We differ in viewpoints in that Khobai, yourself, and some others seem to think we need to dumb down the game, or exclude high skilled players/break them up so that the average players can "have fun and be able to win". I'm of the viewpoint that instead lowering the bar, we should try and raise the bar, raise the average skill of play. There are many different skill levels of people in the game, and that's ok. I'm not trying to exclude the low end, like some are suggesting to exclude the high end.

[Shifty McSwift]

Vxheous, on 27 September 2018 - 09:02 PM, said:

Nice ad hominem by the way.

What? Ad hominem? Where did I personally attack you? Please point out where I personally attacked you?

[Vxheous]

Shifty McSwift, on 27 September 2018 - 09:07 PM, said:

What? Ad hominem? Where did I personally attack you? Please point out where I personally attacked you?

"I am pretty sure by bringing up your bias he is denying he has any, or downplaying his own biases, which is either incredibly short sighted, or purposely underhanded."