406 replies to this topic

[Horseman]

GuardDogg, on 04 November 2019 - 08:02 AM, said:

So what about the stats. It should not even exist.

Stats are a tool, nothing more. And they absolutely should exist. . If you're offended about the idea of player stats, you're offended by the idea of competitiveness, and if you're offended about that you have no business playing PVP games.

Quote

Trying to burn it into my head, that I am not a worthy player.

I am not. I am trying to burn into your head that the position you're constantly claiming you are in and the position you hold in reality are radically different and that you have a lot of room to improve - if you were truly inclined to - which you're not doing because your ego doesn't allow you to.
You keep insisting you're already a "pro" player due to being T1 and repeatedly pin bad results on external causes instead of trying to analyze your and your team's actions for things you could have done better.
Your attitude is exactly what I was referring to when I said "these lies may "feel good" to someone, but they're actively harmful (...) to the player"

Quote

I am good as everyone else.

How good a player you are is quantifiable based on your stats, and they do not support that claim. Insisting otherwise just makes you look bad.

GuardDogg, on 04 November 2019 - 08:06 AM, said:

I made a point, "Lower" vs "Pro"

And then you claimed that everyone is pro.

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If the Tier system had us in places we should be, then I can accept.

The tier system doesn't have most of us in the place we should be - it was broken when introduced and over the years it broke completely. That's the point you're repeatedly refusing to accept.

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laughing at players stats,

You are not being laughed at because of your stats. You are being laughed at because of your arrogant, entitled attitude and self-serving false claims.
The only thing the stats do is give a context to your actions and attitude.

Quote

I will not let this go, until it is accepted.

GuardDogg, on 04 November 2019 - 08:17 AM, said:

I have improved over the years, from bad times.

You did - but not as much as you could (and should) have with the amount of time you're investing in the game. There's clearly a problem with either your methodology or attitude.

Quote

I am a skilled pilot.

Unfortunately that is not the case.

Skill is the ability to perform a task (in this case: play a game) well. Which you are unable to manage consistently - the more matches you play, the more consistently you and your gameplay affect the average success rate of your team as other random factors even out. Since your teams lose more often than win, the only logical conclusion is that you consistently play badly enough that it hurts your team's efforts.

Experience is the amount of familiarity with the task and understanding of it. You have plenty of the former, but the latter is questionable, as you've shown you're inclined to pin bad outcomes on external factors that are conveniently out of your control, absolve yourself of any fault in them and draw incorrect conclusions about the game balance as a result - and then you stick to them, because your pride doesn't let you accept being wrong on any matter.

We've seen that when you took a 38.5 KPH assault into quickplay, were eaten by enemy lights and drew the conclusion that assaults are underpowered when the one you should have arrived at was that 38.5 KPH assaults are too slow to perform well in quickplay (which doesn't mean they can't find a niche when speed is not a factor, eg in Solaris or on Siege Defense in Faction Play) - and when outright told the latter by more skilled players you vehemently argued in favour of your erroneous premise instead of even considering the possibility you might have been wrong.

Prototelis, on 04 November 2019 - 05:45 PM, said:

In short; you played about 5 hours a day on average that month and you're telling people to get a life when you have played a game almost like a full time job.

With queue time and mechlabbing time, you can expect about 15-20 minutes per match (I know because Steam tracks how much time I spend in the game each month). Even if his average match time is lower, with the amount of matches he clocked in during March a 10-15 minute range would still comes to 220-330 hours during that month (or an average of 55 - 82 hours a week).

GuardDogg, on 04 November 2019 - 06:06 PM, said:

Did I tell anyone to get a life? Please point it out. Maybe I did?

Twice in this thread, you've made assertions that anyone who made T1 faster than you didn doesn't have a life and made assertions that players who disagreed with you did not have personal lives, families or health problems.

GuardDogg, on 31 October 2019 - 07:52 PM, said:

Unless you do not have a life (No kids, no family, no job, have no feelings for others only yourself..etc), then ya. You can make it to T1 no problem, and call your self a pro.

GuardDogg, on 01 November 2019 - 12:28 AM, said:

Yeah, I am backing many others up (not all), and it is becoming tire some (those who have children, grandchildren, family, personal lives (called to a big job), disasters, health issues, etc.).

Tesunie, on 04 November 2019 - 08:19 PM, said:

I think his problems stem from people who will throw your stats or ranking (or what they presume your ranking to be) into your face and try to dismiss everything you say simply because "you aren't good enough to speak, so shut up and go away".

When the stats were brought against him in that fashion, it was in response to making false claims about game balance (specifically "assaults being the weakest class in the game" ). Poor understanding of a game is typically the primary cause for poor performance, and that is what his stats were used to show.

Edited by Horseman, 05 November 2019 - 05:10 AM.

[GuardDogg]

^^^
Man, then they say I have problems in the forums. Look who writes a whole page. Better off writing a book in trying to explain. You are just as bad (actually worse) as I am when it comes to the forums. Maybe you should be in the same Tier as me in MWO. Same Tier, but up further in the bar. Hey!..I looked up your stats. LMAO!! Not laughing at your stats or any ones. Just pointing out a obvious problem. ;-)

Edited by GuardDogg, 05 November 2019 - 05:24 AM.

[Mystere]

Prototelis, on 04 November 2019 - 09:43 PM, said:

The key takeaway is this;
Pilot Skill Rating - The Elo Replacement


The purpose of the new Pilot Skill Rating (PSR) system is to make your pilot skill values based more on individual performance, rather than the binary win or loss outcome of a match. This new PSR system will effectively remove the current Elo system from the game and the matchmaker.


I bolded and biggie texted the relevant parts because you refuse to read them.

SHOUTING ALL YOU WANT will not change Paul's clarification issued a month later regarding:

Quote

a few rumors and assumptions that are being made about how PSR works

which are:

Quote

Tiers are NOT a RANK.

Quote

... Tier 1 is just a way for us to make sure you never play anyone in tier 4 or 5.

Quote

… eventually everyone will bubble up to Tier 2 or Tier 1.

Edited by Mystere, 05 November 2019 - 05:24 AM.

[Sjorpha]

Mystere, on 05 November 2019 - 05:21 AM, said:

Paul's clarification issued a month later regarding:

To that reads like "Oops the system doesn't work, let's pretend it wasn't even meant to work."

[Mystere]

Sjorpha, on 05 November 2019 - 05:25 AM, said:

To that reads like "Oops the system doesn't work, let's pretend it wasn't even meant to work."

Maybe. But then again maybe not! This is PGI.

I trust more how the system actually acts.

Edited by Mystere, 05 November 2019 - 05:32 AM.

[Sjorpha]

Mystere, on 05 November 2019 - 05:27 AM, said:

Maybe. But then again maybe not! This is PGI.

I trust more how the system actually acts.

To me the fact that the system doesn't work as a source of data for matchmaking is much more relevant than whether it was intended to or not.

It's like if I ask someone to buy milk for me so I can make pancakes and they arrive with yogurt. I ask if they accidentally took the wrong package? They answer "No I just decided to get you yogurt instead of milk". Ok, so what if it was intentional idiocy rather than a misstake? I still need milk to make my pancakes.

What's needed is and always was a functional matchmaker that creates more or less well balanced teams. That has been the request all along. We don't have it. So did PGI fail to do it or just decide not to do it? What difference does it make?

If they intentionally made a non-functional system that didn't meet the requests of the player base like you claim, then that is actually much worse than it just being a failure. That means they have intentionally sabotaged their own game and undermined their own matchmaker. What I'm doing is giving PGI the benefit of the doubt and so I'm assuming they actually tried to solve the problem but failed, which is actually much more charitable than your view.

Edited by Sjorpha, 05 November 2019 - 05:45 AM.

[Mystere]

Sjorpha, on 05 November 2019 - 05:38 AM, said:

To me the fact that the system doesn't work as a source of data for matchmaking is much more relevant than whether it was intended to or not.

If the "intent" of their "matchmaker", as they clarified a month later, is just simple player separation -- nothing more, nothing less -- then it is actually relevant.

Heck it's relevant to this very topic. A quick learner or good player can be quickly separated from the ones who still need to get some/better experience with the game. If players can get to T3 in a handful of games, then they are well on their way to being separated from the T4/5.

Sjorpha, on 05 November 2019 - 05:38 AM, said:

It's like if I ask someone to buy milk for me so I can make pancakes and they arrive with yogurt. I ask if they accidentally took the wrong package? They answer "No I just decided to get you yogurt instead of milk". Ok, so what if it was intentional idiocy rather than a misstake? I still need milk to make my pancakes.

That's a really terrible analogy.

Edited by Mystere, 05 November 2019 - 06:33 AM.

[Dimento Graven]

Mystere, on 05 November 2019 - 05:21 AM, said:

SHOUTING ALL YOU WANT will not change Paul's clarification issued a month later regarding:



which are:


[/left][left]

First - FYI: Caps are for emphasis, same as bolding, italicizing, etc.

Second - I truly believe Paul understood it that way, or rather, after realizing they'd f*cked up the Tiering system, INSTEAD of actually putting forth a modicum of effort towards FIXING it, they, Russ/Paul changed their stance.

It was easier to just put out a few sentences that are actually contrary to what was originally stated when PSR was introduced than tweak the PSR code to allow for a more generalized static Tier progression (probably not using the right syntax there, I've yet to get my caffeine), where a person will go up, or down, to the skill level they are performing at and more or less maintain that as long as they play in a consistent manner.

Unfortunately even Paul's explanation really doesn't make sense, and is yet again an example of him either being ignorant about the game and/or what the players ACTUALLY wanted, or more probably just coming up with a statement that deflects PGI's need to spend time and resources on correcting the F up.

To keep Tier 4's and Tier 5's away from Tier 1, by the very literal definition implies that the ranking system is supposed to keep some players in those ranks, and NO, NOT EVERYONE will eventually move up to Tier 1 (which even with the system broken as it is, has managed to do for some people playing on potatoes, or with some other physical challenge not allowing them to perform at higher levels).

Paul and Russ can occasionally make dumb and/or untrue statements from time to time and this just happens to be one of those occasions.

[GuardDogg]

The math that created the "Tier system". How it creates salty players. Used with Stats.

Edited by GuardDogg, 05 November 2019 - 06:45 AM.

[Mystere]

Dimento Graven, on 05 November 2019 - 06:34 AM, said:

First - FYI: Caps are for emphasis, same as bolding, italicizing, etc.

And shouting, especially on the net.

Dimento Graven, on 05 November 2019 - 06:34 AM, said:

Paul and Russ can occasionally make dumb and/or untrue statements from time to time and this just happens to be one of those occasions.

You're not going to get any argument from me on that point.

But then that begs the question: Which one was the "dumb and/or untrue statements"? The original announcement? The clarification? Both?

As such, I just go by what the "matchmaker" has been observed to be actually doing.

Edited by Mystere, 05 November 2019 - 06:43 AM.

[Vxheous]

Mystere, on 05 November 2019 - 06:39 AM, said:

And shouting, especially on the net.




You're not going to get any argument from me on that point.

But then that begs the question: Which one was the "dumb and/or untrue statements"? The original announcement? The clarification? Both?

As such, I just go by what the "matchmaker" has been observed to be actually doing.

What the "matchmaker" has been observed to be actually doing is poor matching being made worse as unskilled players eventually filter into Tier 1 over time. That makes for a poor matchmaker. If the system cannot differentiate between a player of Bows3r's caliber, and a player of GuardDogg's caliber, and assume they're equal (they're not, regardless of what the Tier 1 badge says) then you are going to have unbalanced matches, over and over. Which is what we have now.

The PSR system is Garbage In, Garbage Out, which is why quick play games are such Garbage. Right now, the PSR system can throw 5 EmP players onto team 1, maybe another EmP player on team 2, along with names like GuardDogg, Khobai, Dee Eight, Dimento Graven (I'm choosing players listed as Tier 1 in this thread, not name and shaming, this also assumes I can actually get 4-5 players from EmP to actually want to play quick play at this point). Team 1 will roll Team 2 99 times out of 100 games, even with the most basic of comms. That is inherently inbalanced as a matchmaker, yet even last one of the players is listed as Tier 1 and the matchmaker assumes every player listed is the same skill level.

Instead, if we actually had proper metrics to place players into proper skill tiers, then the above scenario wouldn't happen. Assume all 6 EmP players in queue remained Tier 1, and the other players named were marked Tier 2 (just for easy maths). All of a sudden, the matchmaker ends up throwing 3 EmP caliber players onto each side, and splits the others 2 per side. Now you actually have a balanced match because the relative skill level across both teams is roughly equal.

I'm making an extreme example using EmP as a metric, I'm not saying that only players that are on EmP's level should be Tier 1 (that would make for an extremely small Tier 1 group). What I'm saying is that there should have better metrics to sort players into appropriate Tiers so that the matchmaker can make properly BALANCED teams for quick play purposes.

Edited by Vxheous, 05 November 2019 - 07:25 AM.

[Tesunie]

FRAGTAST1C, on 04 November 2019 - 10:38 PM, said:

But when you compare yourself with other pilots who, too, play wonky builds 'cause it is fun and still perform like the top tier pilots, then their skill is higher than yours. I'm just saying that people treat this as a game and can also say who is a better player no matter what.

Things aren't mutually exclusive and in MWO, winning is more or less "Fun". I don't mind finishing outside the top 20 for 20 games straight in, say, PUBG 'cause I can easily play with friends. But in MWO, outside of FP, you have to rely on chance to play with your friends. I don't want to keep losing constantly when I'm not with my friends. Some might consider that fun and all the power to them.

But our friend here gets upset with words. So, MWO is more than just a game to him 'cause it offends him to his core. Why else would he get hung up over the fact that someone can point out the difference between Lower and Higher tiers? But he masks it by attempting to speak for others.

The only true way "average" player stats could be a real indicator (not that I'm disagreeing with you here), would be in said players always played the same mechs with the same exact builds against the same players. Even then, you can get a rough concept by taking mech stats with mechs with the same builds and compare them.

I'm in no way disagreeing that there are players who are more skilled than another player. We are not all made equal, and even "equally skilled players" is incorrect because no two players are perfectly equal in all aspects of game play. However, "similarly skilled players" is most accurate, but often implied when talking skill levels. (Ex: "If two equally skilled players fought each other with X and Y builds, this one is more likely to win due to how the build was created." This is a generalized statement promoting favor of how effective a build in theory should run, and there are builds which it can easily be true.)

Most of what I say is more so "It's a game, don't worry about winning or losing, go have fun". I mean, for some people winning "is the only way to have fun", and for those who wish to pursue a more comp style of play by all means can and should. I'm just requesting that people realize it's not the "only" way to play this game. If the match is close, I can, and have, had fun playing a match where I lost. It's a PvP game, so someone has to lose for someone else to win. This should not be a shame nor an embarrassment.


As a notation on "High and low" tier, it's not just divisitory (spelling? Is that even a word?) term, it's a distinction between skill levels and even play levels. Even within tiers (especially T1 and T5 being the most common brackets for this) there are different levels of player skill.

There is nothing wrong with players being "lower" or "higher" skill. This only turns "wrong" when that said skill is used to try and shame or get someone to shut up. "You need to have X stat to talk here." I've seen it actually used in threads, and often times when I've seen it used it's been used by someone with good Jarl's listing stats and PSR rank, but they are sharing incorrect information... but don't want anyone to counter them because "I'm better than you".

AKA: Player skill and PSR rank have nothing to do with the value of what someone says. It shouldn't be used in that manner, but I've seen it used as such all to often. It's not an indicator on the value of a person. Of this I do believe many of us here agree on. (But considering how GuardDog has been acting here, his own words and actions are what we are using to "scale" him... and I tried to find a middle ground "terminology". I really did...)

Horseman, on 05 November 2019 - 04:59 AM, said:

Stats are a tool, nothing more. And they absolutely should exist. . If you're offended about the idea of player stats, you're offended by the idea of competitiveness, and if you're offended about that you have no business playing PVP games.



Poor understanding of a game is typically the primary cause for poor performance...

Stats absolutely should be used as a tool, one for MM purposes and for a direction on personal improvement. MM needs some quantifiable measurement to gauge a player to place them against a player "of similar skill level". Stats (in some form) is what any MM will use, be it "experience", "level of gear" or "in match performance".

I like to use stats to determine how well one build works from another, so I can find what works (statistically) best for me. That doesn't mean that sometimes, screw stats, I use what seems fun and I feel I do well in. (Sometimes, stats can surprise me when I think a mech is on average "doing well" and then I find out... "Oh... maybe it's not doing as well as I thought... but hey! It's fun to play with!")

I will comment though, I hate PvP games for the most part. I'm here because this game is a Battletech game and I LOVE Battletech. It's one of the very few PvP games I've actually gotten into, and I actually enjoy. I'm here mostly to have fun, though I have entered into the comp scene from time to time...


On the last segment I left of your quote (and pardon me chopping off the last half of the sentence, I didn't want to deal with that specifically), I'm going to want to leave a notation that, sometimes a player may "know" what to do, even if they can't achieve it with their skill level. So skill level shouldn't be used to invalidate technical knowledge, as you'd be surprised how often some high skilled players are about the technical specifications of some things. Now, if comparing builds or a specific weapon system, stats and player ability may come more into effect. For example, I really do suck with a Gauss rifle. I'm not going to claim they are bad weapons, but I know it's not a skill I'm good with. If I was to make the claim they are bad weapons, I'm certain people would approach with their personal stats about how I'm incorrect. As an average, they would be correct that I am wrong. Just because "I" am bad with them, doesn't mean Gauss is bad overall. However, how accurate either side is on anything is still limited, because we don't have global stats for said weapon usage. (It's one of the ways to use Stats, not as a "shame on you", but rather to say "well, my stats say counter to what you are saying".)

(I think I'm droning right now... sorry. Still too early...)

Sjorpha, on 05 November 2019 - 05:38 AM, said:

To me the fact that the system doesn't work as a source of data for matchmaking is much more relevant than whether it was intended to or not.

With this, I'd like to add that the basis of PSR is solid and can work. However, it needs some (rather mild honestly) adjusting.
W/L connection is the first thing that should go. If it wants to balance by skill, then W/L needs to be a lower factor.
It needs to go up and down more upon match score (our current best way to gauge player skill at the moment), with more consistent poor performance resulting in drops (more ways to go down), more average performance keeping you in place, and above average performance making you go up.
It needs to more move fluidly through the tiers, so PSR adjusts WITH the player, rather than adjusting after hundreds of matches (excluding the new player bonus, as mentioned within this thread's OP).

Honestly, these should be minor changes to the PSR calculations from my best guess. Even if the last point (More PSR loss/gain per match possible) wasn't possible as an easy change, the rest would still put the system on better tracks.

The whole of the system doesn't need to change, and the overall concept hasn't failed. The only part that failed was how it ended up being implemented. Some of us have been saying these problems since day one of it's release. (I never liked it's strong reliance on W/L, personally.)

[warner2]

How about the idea that the tier system, with it having an upward bias even for very average players, was intentional as a sense of progression in the game (no matter how flawed) to keep players playing?

MWO is a free to play built around the premise of getting players to start playing for free and keeping them around somehow (hopefully spending money). Having a sense of progression, a tier bar that slowly increases, fits in with that model.

Perhaps PGI are OK with this, and it is working as intended?

Even average players bubble up eventually, keeping the lower tiers for the really hopeless and the new players, and so solving the problem of keeping new players away from veterans, whilst also giving even average players a reason to play (again, no matter how flawed).

It does tie in with what Paul says. Players get better over time, he says, and if the game reinforces that, maybe they'll stick around.

https://mwomercs.com...-tiers-and-psr/

[Tesunie]

warner2, on 05 November 2019 - 07:42 AM, said:

It does tie in with what Paul says. Players get better over time, he says, and if the game reinforces that, maybe they'll stick around.

I'd want to point out Monster Hunter progression. In MH, there is no progression bar. Sure, collecting armor and weapons as you go from defeating specific monsters enough to let you make them can be progression, but the real progression is seeing your skills in the game improve. When a Yian Kut Ku went from being this deadly prey to, even with the same old gear on, a minor nuisance you can easily beat because you know how it now moves... that really adds to the sense of accomplishment.

I don't think we need a "progression bar" for this game to be good and retain players. Maybe I'm wrong, as I'm not a market analyzer or anything. What this game really needs is probably more "open warfare", with possibly drop and join "matches" with "huge" maps we can roam around on and "get objectives" for our faction? Or some other motivator improvement for FP?

This game I feel has a lot of good base material. It's a solid foundation. But it honestly needs more to work off. I see it as a foundation with some poles/structure walls and a roof. It's good enough to keep the rain off you, but nothing keeps the pests out or the wind... The base game is, basically, enjoyable as is, but it could be better and still has a lot of potential. (Which way to take that potential is the biggest question.)

[thievingmagpi]

Tesunie, on 05 November 2019 - 07:50 AM, said:

I'd want to point out Monster Hunter progression. In MH, there is no progression bar. Sure, collecting armor and weapons as you go from defeating specific monsters enough to let you make them can be progression, but the real progression is seeing your skills in the game improve. When a Yian Kut Ku went from being this deadly prey to, even with the same old gear on, a minor nuisance you can easily beat because you know how it now moves... that really adds to the sense of accomplishment.

I don't think we need a "progression bar" for this game to be good and retain players. Maybe I'm wrong, as I'm not a market analyzer or anything. What this game really needs is probably more "open warfare", with possibly drop and join "matches" with "huge" maps we can roam around on and "get objectives" for our faction? Or some other motivator improvement for FP?

This game I feel has a lot of good base material. It's a solid foundation. But it honestly needs more to work off. I see it as a foundation with some poles/structure walls and a roof. It's good enough to keep the rain off you, but nothing keeps the pests out or the wind... The base game is, basically, enjoyable as is, but it could be better and still has a lot of potential. (Which way to take that potential is the biggest question.)

While I'd agree that more content is always good.... This whole thread demonstrating how it is absolutely detrimental to everyone's gameplay experience to have 20%ers dropping with/against 99%ers and you've come to believe that no skill measurement of any kind would be good?

This isn't a single player game.

Edited by thievingmagpi, 05 November 2019 - 08:25 AM.

[Tesunie]

thievingmagpi, on 05 November 2019 - 08:25 AM, said:

While I'd agree that more content is always good.... This whole thread demonstrating how it is absolutely detrimental to everyone's gameplay experience to have 20%ers dropping with/against 99%ers and you've come to believe that no skill measurement of any kind would be good?

This isn't a single player game.

Ummm... What?

I said nothing there about "no skill measurement"... Most of my posts in this thread have been the opposite, especially when inconsideration with a MM to produce balancing matches.

The post you quoted was saying we didn't need an "experience and/or progression bar" to retain players... my example was a single player game (poor example, I know) where player progression isn't in an obvious "You've leveled up, yay!" for player retention, but rather a slow building of materials and gear along with person player skill being evident when facing "old opponents".

I was only pointing out that we didn't need a "everyone progresses to T1" progression in the game. Not that we didn't need any skill measurement in the game... I'm not sure where you exactly got that, but that wasn't my intention to say in the least...

[Tesunie]

Tesunie, on 05 November 2019 - 07:50 AM, said:

I'd want to point out Monster Hunter progression. In MH, there is no progression bar.

I have to amend this a little, it does have a bit of a progression bar. Hunter Rank, which is earned after completing specific missions. However, HR is never seen as anything more than a mission progression, opening up more challenging missions as you go... But it's not the same progression "bar" being portrayed within MW:O PSR tier progression being an "experience bar".

Figured I'd correct my little mistake there...

[thievingmagpi]

Tesunie, on 05 November 2019 - 08:30 AM, said:

Ummm... What?

I said nothing there about "no skill measurement"... Most of my posts in this thread have been the opposite, especially when inconsideration with a MM to produce balancing matches.

The post you quoted was saying we didn't need an "experience and/or progression bar" to retain players... my example was a single player game (poor example, I know) where player progression isn't in an obvious "You've leveled up, yay!" for player retention, but rather a slow building of materials and gear along with person player skill being evident when facing "old opponents".

I was only pointing out that we didn't need a "everyone progresses to T1" progression in the game. Not that we didn't need any skill measurement in the game... I'm not sure where you exactly got that, but that wasn't my intention to say in the least...

oh ok, yeah. that's right. It's not the kind of game that needs some cheap instant gratification sort of mechanic like..well, a large amount of modern games.

[Horseman]

GuardDogg, on 05 November 2019 - 05:10 AM, said:

Man, then they say I have problems in the forums. Look who writes a whole page. Better off writing a book in trying to explain.

Actually, nearly half of that post consists of quotes - mostly from you.

Quote

Maybe you should be in the same Tier as me in MWO. Same Tier, but up further in the bar. Hey!..I looked up your stats. LMAO!! Not laughing at your stats or any ones. Just pointing out a obvious problem. ;-)

The obvious problem with your statement is that the gap between our performances literally contains half of this game's playerbase.
And unlike your lurid portrayals of competitive players as explosive, entitled egomaniacs, we do not enjoy playing against less capable opponents.

Tesunie, on 05 November 2019 - 07:33 AM, said:

AKA: Player skill and PSR rank have nothing to do with the value of what someone says. It shouldn't be used in that manner, but I've seen it used as such all to often. It's not an indicator on the value of a person. Of this I do believe many of us here agree on. (But considering how GuardDog has been acting here, his own words and actions are what we are using to "scale" him... and I tried to find a middle ground "terminology". I really did...)

You're conflating two different things.
In-game skill levels do not indicate the value of someone as a person, true.

However, when discussing the subject of gameplay mechanics and gameplay balance? Not everyone's opinion has equal merit.
In-game skill levels do indicate the level of someone's competence with the gameplay mechanics.
They're not an absolute guarantee that the given player will be right (or wrong), but there is a high degree of correlation between competence in a field and knowledge of said field.
When discussing game balance, the assessments of skilled playersare more authoritative than those of newbies, casuals or diletantes.
In a similar vein, the assessments of competent players are more valuable than those of merely tenured players.

Tesunie, on 05 November 2019 - 07:33 AM, said:

That doesn't mean that sometimes, screw stats, I use what seems fun and I feel I do well in.

So do I. So, probably, does Ash. Success is part the mech and part player skill, though - a good player can do well even with otherwise bad mech, whereas a bad player put into a meta mech still won't know how to handle it.

Quote

Now, if comparing builds or a specific weapon system, stats and player ability may come more into effect. For example, I really do suck with a Gauss rifle. I'm not going to claim they are bad weapons, but I know it's not a skill I'm good with. If I was to make the claim they are bad weapons, I'm certain people would approach with their personal stats about how I'm incorrect. As an average, they would be correct that I am wrong. Just because "I" am bad with them, doesn't mean Gauss is bad overall.

And when comparing mechs or mech classes, agreed. The problem there was when Dogg was making an argument that assaults are bad based on his personal experience and vehemently refusing to accept basically everyone else telling him he's wrong. Eventually his stats were dug up and presented to show that the problem was with his skills, not with the mechs.

[Tesunie]

thievingmagpi, on 05 November 2019 - 08:47 AM, said:

oh ok, yeah. that's right. It's not the kind of game that needs some cheap instant gratification sort of mechanic like..well, a large amount of modern games.

This game doesn't need a progression bar that pushes players into the same ranking, and tossing all the players into the same category for MM. That is not a progression bar we need. That's not instant gratification mechanic, that's "sabotaging of the MM system", which throws match balance (and this fun and evenly matched teams) right out the window.

THAT kind of progression bar is NOT needed in this game.

This game, if it's going to aim for progression marks, should shoot for goal post progression rewards rather than an "experience progression bar used to determine MM systems". These goal posts are already sort of in the game right now. Deal x number of assists in a medium mech. Get 8 kills in a single match. etc.

If we wanted more goal post awards, then we can easily add them in, which is far more "progression" and "instant gratification" than our current PSR bar, which slowly moves giving the appearance of an actual lack of progress for many players.

Additional goal post awards could easily be:
- Deal 100/300/500/800/1000 damage in a single match.
- Gain a match score of 100/200/300/500 in a match.
- Deal 1000/5000/10000/100,000,000 damage with x weapon/damage type.
- Kill an enemy hero mech.
- Own a special mech variant. (Encourages purchasing stuff, and PGi gives enough special mechs out for prizes it wouldn't be unobtainable for free players.)
- Own a mech of each class (light, medium, heavy and assault).
- Destroy or get KMDD on X Light mechs. (Fly swatter?)
- Destroy or get KMDD on X Medium mechs.
- Destroy or get KMDD on X Heavy mechs.
- Destroy or get KMDD on X Assault mechs.
- Own a Clan mech. Own an IS mech.
- Own all variants of a single mech chassis.
etc.

These are more progression awards (or just instant gratifications at least) than PSR tier is/was and/or should be... We could even have some in match awards that show up in any match achieved, such as "survive a match with 15% health or less" as a "Survivor award", and then the game could log and track how many of each award you've earned over the life of your account.

PSR is NOT suppose to be a progression bar. I'd even argue that hiding PSR tiers from players may (or may not) be a good idea, and have it linked only to the MM algorithm. The concept of using the PSR tiers as a progression bar in the game to retain players would be foolish if said "progression bar" is a gauge on a player's skill for matching... This point has been beaten to death in many threads.

PSR should be reserved for match making purposes. It is by no means should be a progression bar. I've never indicated it's removal, nor that it should be a progression bar. PSR should only be worked to help provide better, more fair and balanced, matches with players who are on more even skill levels. It should be viewed as nothing more than that.

If people want a "progression bar", there are other ways of doing that not linked to a MM tiering system. Warframe has a good one, were the number of gear you have leveled to max level adds to their Mastery Rank, star map completion, etc, which shows actual player progression and is not used for anything other than a progression bar. We can have milestone achievements as a progression bar. We can have "stacking" earn-able match awards which could provide a flavor of progression (I've earned "Survivor" award 26 times!). None of these involve MM functions, nor interact with skill level perceptions.