1579 replies to this topic

[Blackhorse11Cav]

Excessive Paranoia, on 16 May 2020 - 07:52 PM, said:

Did you forget that you literally asked me this question 2 days ago and both me and Anomalocaris gave you detailed, informative responses? Perhaps it's not even worth engaging with you as you appear not to be even reading our responses except to look for some phrase or point on which to attack or position.

"[color=#959595]And for two, it's hampered MY play by depriving me of an enjoyable experience. Dropping into matches now is a roll of the dice as to whether you're going to be on a team with a bunch of low-skill players, or if you're going to be faced off against a pre-made of the highest skilled players in the game. At least prior to this, I had a reasonable expectation that each team would be at least approximately balanced in both tonnage and skill. Now that expectation is completely out the window, with teams having severe tonnage and skill disparities, made all the worse by the fact that high-skill groups can now ensure they are on the same team. Again, prior to the test, you might have seen the same high skill players, but it was just as likely that group would have been split across both teams, or even different matches, thereby smoothing out the impact they have on the match."[/color]

Nope, didn't forget. Just didn't really understand the issue...Perhaps I am dense, but seeing your skill rating I just don't see how anything about the group play would be an issue to you. What you wrote above is literally what all of us experienced before SOLO play. What is the difference?

Edited by Blackhorse11Cav, 16 May 2020 - 08:45 PM.

[Blackhorse11Cav]

i've been going tinto battles asking which players are on teams...Surprisingly few... YMMV.

[Brauer]

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:29 PM, said:

Then how can he know how it is working? One battle, two battles, even three battles does not provide us the information we need. Many, MANY battle are required, yet he is not willing to put in the time or effort, and thus his OPINION, and it is just that (OPINION) is flawed. You gotta put in the time and effort to speak and comment from a position of both knowledge and experience.

If a player opposes a change playing encourages PGI to retain the change. So it makes sense if someone is strongly against it to not play.

Additionally, it was quite easy to predict how this change would turn out and public stats showing players with double digit KDRs and WLRs makes the impact of groups on matches quite clear.

Edited by Brauer, 17 May 2020 - 06:27 AM.

[Flyby215]

I gave this merger a chance, played a lot of solo matches and group matches. Conclusion: firm no.

I left Faction Warfare because I was tired of being cannon fodder. I left group queue because I was tired of being cannon fodder.

I've nowhere else to go now.

I suspect group players feel the same way no longer being able to find matches with friends: perhaps that is the result of too few players wanting to play with friends, or too many players feel like myself having retreated to the solo queue for a more enjoyable Mechwarrior experience.

Either way. My two cents.

[Horseman]

Excessive Paranoia, on 16 May 2020 - 04:20 PM, said:

The matchmaker sets 1-2 groups up on each side of the match and then fills in the rest with solo players. Again, this means that the likelihood that any match will have only one group is low, as groups are given first priority in the MM and solos are considered "filler".

The matchmaker will put groups on one side until 4 grouped people are exceeded. That is not speculation either, so if it's not working as intended PGI screwed up somewhere.

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 05:39 PM, said:

perhaps....What it does prove is that Jarls's website ain't all its cracked up to be. if his stats are as FUBAR as that, maybe everyone else's are as well and maybe we can't use that particular website to prove/disprove ANYTHING.

Or maybe - just maybe - your expectation that Jarl's should be up to date daily was unfounded to begin with?
Because, you see mein freund, Jarl's updates with data scraped from PGI's leaderboards, but it only does so when each month-long "season" completes and its' statistics are not going to change any more.
The stats aren't FUBAR. In fact, this approach prevents them from becoming FUBAR.

Ballistic Panicmode, on 16 May 2020 - 06:10 PM, said:

Rather than trying to fix the broken PSR system, why not rework the match scoring system to reflect the most fair assessment of player performance, then track average match score per owned mech? For new mechs, simply start with the player's average for the weight class then refine from there as matches are played. It would better account for the strengths / weaknesses of different builds and the individual's affinity for different playstyles. The MM could start with the 3/3/3/3 search for weight classes then tweak from there based on scores.

I mean, that was suggested. PGI hasn't considered it apparently.

Zulu211, on 16 May 2020 - 06:28 PM, said:

Well, I know you keep implying you've told me something but, I haven't been reading anything you've said because I dont care what you think. You're OBVIOUSLY not comfortable or remotely acquainted with the truth.
You fancy lads stick with your list.
As of my writing this Anomalocaris has no results found on the leaderboards in game.
https://mwomercs.com...er=Anomalocaris
Again, showing quite a bit of concern about a game he doesn't play. Or is the game file not a good enough source?

You realize, of course, that the leaderboard is divided into month-long seasons?
All you're seeing is that he hasn't played in Season 46, ie from the beginning of May until now.
Switch the drop-down from Season 46 to Season 45 and you'll see he was actively playing until the beginning of May.

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:29 PM, said:

Then how can he know how it is working? One battle, two battles, even three battles does not provide us the information we need. Many, MANY battle are required, yet he is not willing to put in the time or effort, and thus his OPINION, and it is just that (OPINION) is flawed. You gotta put in the time and effort to speak and comment from a position of both knowledge and experience.

Ash - and not just he - has been keeping a running tally. https://www.twitch.tv/justcallmeash

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:41 PM, said:

based just on a "gut" notion.

That's patently incorrect. He has explained this to you before:

Anomalocaris, on 16 May 2020 - 07:27 PM, said:

(3)I've probably surveyed 100+ games on stream since the merge began, recorded by players I am familiar with and who are, mostly, playing at a very high level. They have invariably returned exceptional WLR while grouped up, even when playing derpy troll builds. When playing meta their win rates are in the 90% or higher range. Looking at current leaderboards we also can show that there are a lot more people at the top end of the curve when it comes to WLR distribution despite playing a large number of games. While I haven't surveyed the bottom yet, I suspect we'll see a bit of a dumbbell effect at the top and bottom of the curve once this is over.

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:41 PM, said:

average in this game has never been defined.

It doesn't require special definitions, and any attempts to impose such amounts to special pleading on your side.
An average player will have W/L of 1.0 (which is the global average), K/D of close to 1.0 (which the global average tends to, although we have to allow for occasional mech dying to overheat) and the average match score (representing his contributions to the team) around the 225 mark. The global average score has oscillated around the 225 point mark since July 2017, with May and June 2018 (213 and 216) being the only months in past three years when it hasn't been within six points of that value (with a possible correlation to a large influx of new players around April and May )

Quote

As a top tier player, you could easily have chosen to mentor and guide up and comng players

That presupposes they are willing to learn in the first place.
My experience tells me few are, and that being exposed to a torrent of blithering stupidity and blatant ignorance that rejects any correction eventually burns out any willingness to mentor people.

Edited by Horseman, 17 May 2020 - 01:59 AM.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 08:07 PM, said:

Nope, didn't forget. Just didn't really understand the issue...Perhaps I am dense, but seeing your skill rating I just don't see how anything about the group play would be an issue to you. What you wrote above is literally what all of us experienced before SOLO play. What is the difference?

The issue boils down to match quality. Skill rating aside, the thing I value the most in online PvP is that each match is enjoyable, yet challenging, and that I'm able to make a meaningful impact upon the outcome of the match. As I said, in the old system I had a reasonable expectation that the match would be approximately balanced on skill and tonnage. Sure there would be better players and worse players, and sometimes people would luck out and manage to be on the same team with a sync drop, but on average, each match would be filled with people who I could expect be able to carry their weight on both sides. In this environment, I won some and lost some, but was more often than not dropped into decent quality matches where I felt I was able to make a decent impact upon the outcome.

Now all of that is gone...

First of all, thanks to the poor MM "valves" that PGI have included with the new system, both tonnage and skill balance are just missing, even on apparently fully solo matches. I've had matches this month where I saw player behavior that I'd not seen since my time in T5 after the new system was implemented, so its pretty clear to me at least that even the weak skill segregation we had with the PSR experience bar is not even implemented anymore. Additionally, there seems to be little to no balance even between the two teams in the same match, as I've see more than a few matches where large sections of one team were just face tanking without even trying to roll damage while the other team was able to coordinate fairly proficiently. I can't rule out dumb luck for both sides of that, but it seems indicative to me that one team had a much higher average skill level.

Then you have the tonnage disparities that have been showing up. I've not personally experienced the 500+ ton imbalance that others have, but I've definitely been in matches where we had 1-2 assaults to their 4-5. There is a reason we've had the 3/3/3/3 setup for basically as long as we've had 12v12 and the fact that now we don't have it dramatically impacts match quality in a negative way, especially when combined with the much higher skill variance... Nothing like needing an extra 1k damage to kill the extra assaults on the other team while also not having a team capable of dealing even 2k damage in total...

Those are just the structural issues, which would be enough reason by themselves for me to want this whole thing rolled back, even without the issues introduced by adding coordinated groups into the mix. Those are a whole extra level of problems. For one, because the combined strength of a coordinated group is so much greater than a solo player it makes it much more difficult for solo players to make a meaningful contribution to the outcome of the match. Not only that, but the groups are usually able to exploit mistakes made by the solo players more rapidly and more effectively, meaning there is almost no room anymore to work on skill improvement... Poking at the wrong time, pushing past the wrong hill, even falling a little behind, all now carry a greater risk of getting instantly deleted than before the merge, so where you once might have been able to pull back with some yellow / orange armor and a realization that you've just made a mistake, now you're lucky to not be cored out, or dead. Add to this the fact that many of the pre-made groups only communicate in their own private voice comms, and in a lot of ways the game feels like a 4v4 with 16 extra wheels just along for the ride.

There is also a less tangible psychological component to all of this in that just seeing a group of high level players on the opposing team can easily impact the way people play. Seeing a 4-man of a recognized unit opposing you could easily lead to a sense that you're going to lose the match from the beginning and lead to a reluctance to play aggressively, or even pre-match disconnects.

Now I'll admit that I don't personally suffer as badly from playing with groups in the mix as others might since I've dropped with so many disparate groups over the years that I've developed a decent ability to contribute to a match in most circumstances (though I've definitely had some skill decay in the years I was away), but that doesn't mean I'm doing well per se. I still get deleted a fair amount more often than I did last month. And I still find myself falling into the psychological trap of writing off a match when I see one of the high-skill groups on the other team. More importantly though, I'm finding my match quality down markedly since last month. Prior to the test, my experience was that the majority of matches went at least into the 12-6 to 12-8 range, and 12-4 or worse matches almost never happened, at least for me. But now 12-6 and below are the majority of matches I've played in the test, with only about ~30% being better, and I've only had a couple of matches go to 12-10 or better. The problem is that I personally don't consider a match to have been of good quality unless it gets up above 12-8 and I consider anything worse than 12-6 to be a stomp, which means that, by my definition at least, the quality of matches has literally gone inverse.

This is definitely not the experience I had with the solo queue prior to the test, so when you try to attribute the same experience to what we were seeing prior to the merge, I can say with some high degree of certainty that it most definitely was very different. Now many people might be ok with the new normal, but personally I'm finding it very difficult to stomach. I don't like being stomped and I don't like stomping... neither side is enjoyable for me... Victories in this context are meaningless since we've often just mowed players down like we were cutting the grass, and losses are intensely demoralizing because who wants to be on the losing side of a 12-0 or 12-2 that ends in just a couple of minutes? Heck, between the match search, the map select screen, and the pre-game screen, I've often spent more time getting into a match than the actual match lasted during this test...

So yeah, that's why this whole thing is impacting me...

And I'll say again, all of this isn't necessarily to say that there isn't a way to merge group and solo queues so that groups can play again, but it needs to be done correctly. Balance needs to be preserved, both in tonnage, and in skill, and that will take work that I don't think PGI is willing to do...

Edited by Excessive Paranoia, 17 May 2020 - 05:10 AM.

[Horseman]

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:48 PM, said:

OK, And what exactly has your issue been? What about the new group play is causing you trouble?

Let me show you something:
https://mwomercs.com...93-feb-27-2014/

Quote

A big problem we had back in Closed Beta was the fact that a 4-man group in an 8-man team could sway the course of a battle drastically. This became less of an issue when we increased the size of teams from 8 to 12. Just because it was less of an issue does not mean it went away completely.

Somewhere between April and October 2014, this led to PGI splitting the original combined queue into separate Solo and Group queues - initially with two-man groups still allowed into solo queue, if I understand correctly, which was eventually changed because they still had too much ability to sway match outcomes.

Understand: PGI is repeating their own old mistake, one they have long ago admitted was a mistake.


EDIT: Found the exact date for when the queuest were originally split: https://mwomercs.com...02-02-jul-2014/

Edited by Horseman, 17 May 2020 - 05:40 AM.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Horseman, on 17 May 2020 - 04:51 AM, said:

Let me show you something:
https://mwomercs.com...93-feb-27-2014/

Somewhere between April and October 2014, this led to PGI splitting the original combined queue into separate Solo and Group queues - initially with two-man groups still allowed into solo queue, if I understand correctly, which was eventually changed because they still had too much ability to sway match outcomes.

Understand: PGI is repeating their own old mistake, one they have long ago admitted was a mistake.

Another important part of the post you linked:

Quote

Let’s start with some surprising facts pulled from the game server’s metrics:

• Out of all matches launched, 84% are solo launches.
  
• 16% are group launches. (We omitted our 12-mans because they will be dealt with separately)
  
• Of that 16%, 8% are 2-man groups, 4% are 3-man groups and 4% are 4-man groups.

I'd be willing to hazard a guess that even now the vast majority of players are solo players by choice and not because they are group players who can't find a match. Its interesting to see that PGI are willing to erase 6 years of history to revert the game back to the state in which it was when they first realized that it was a mistake to have merged queues just so some small percentage of the population is satisfied. IDK why, but it seems like PGI just can't wrap its collective heads around the idea of doing the most good for the most number of people being the best way to ensure success...

Edited by Excessive Paranoia, 17 May 2020 - 05:06 AM.

[Horseman]

The reason they have split the queues in the first place was because their matchmaker was incapable of properly balancing teams. This was with a vastly greater population than we have now.
They haven't done anything to fix the problem, so of course going back to the old status quo produces the same damn result as before.
I mean... you know the definition of madness, right?

Edited by Horseman, 17 May 2020 - 06:08 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

Horseman, on 17 May 2020 - 04:51 AM, said:

Let me show you something:
https://mwomercs.com...93-feb-27-2014/

Somewhere between April and October 2014, this led to PGI splitting the original combined queue into separate Solo and Group queues - initially with two-man groups still allowed into solo queue, if I understand correctly, which was eventually changed because they still had too much ability to sway match outcomes.

Understand: PGI is repeating their own old mistake, one they have long ago admitted was a mistake.


EDIT: Found the exact date for when the queuest were originally split: https://mwomercs.com...02-02-jul-2014/

The general queue still had max 4-man groups, not just duos, aware you may not have edited the actual post details after including the link.. PGI furbar the 12-man group queue setup, causing 12-man to drop into the normal queue for a short period of time. They were not able to nor did they take the time to fix the setup for the splitting the 2-4-man groups between the general and group queue.so they pulled the groups completely out from the general queue.

Also recall the MM still used Elo, and that was the AVERAGE Elo of a formed group. And with a vastly larger population they could afford to split the queues.

Quote

Groups of 2 to 4: Groups of 2 to 4 will be matched up in the Solo players queue or the group queue. When they are placed in a Solo queue there will be a group of 2 to 4 on the opposing team. When matched in the Group queue they will be playing with groups of various compositions. Keeping an eye on the matchmaking queue status for each weight class will reduce wait times

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 17 May 2020 - 09:50 AM.

[Horseman]

Tarl Cabot, on 17 May 2020 - 09:49 AM, said:

The general queue still had max 4-man groups, not just duos, aware you may not have edited the actual post details after including the link.. PGI furbar the 12-man group queue setup, causing 12-man to drop into the normal queue for a short period of time. They were not able to nor did they take the time to fix the setup for the splitting the 2-4-man groups between the general and group queue.so they pulled the groups completely out from the general queue.

Also recall the MM still used Elo, and that was the AVERAGE Elo of a formed group. And with a vastly larger population they could afford to split the queues.

My key points:

• PGI was well aware that four-man teams have - and always had - drastic impact on match results.
  
• PGI was well aware that this occurred even with a much larger playerbase and a more accurate performance metric
  
• Now they're retracing the same situation using a worse performance metric (the PSR) that they themselves designed to have upward bias relative to matches played

I mean, what they hell did they think was gonna happen? Aleksandr Kerensky dropping out of the sky to endorse their brilliant tactical maneuver?

Edited by Horseman, 17 May 2020 - 11:49 AM.

[Anomalocaris]

Blackhorse11Cav, on 16 May 2020 - 07:41 PM, said:

Actually, what you have done is show everyone how you are in no position to pass any sort of judgement on this at all. And to even insinuate or threaten that i have some how insulted you is, well,...insulting.

What you have proven is that you judge a game change without experiencing it based just on a "gut" notion. You also attached another forum member for claiming he was average, yet average in this game has never been defined. you, sir, are the one attacking other players and making them feel less about themselves in this game. Clearly, you are t top performer, who has stopped playing. There is no reason to lambaste lesser players. There is no reason to insult or minimize the gameplay of players who are not as skilled as you. As a top tier player, you could easily have chosen to mentor and guide up and comng players, yet you chose to retreat and quit. The shame, sir, is on you.

You're really reaching now. And I can see that others here have handed you an object lesson in history and stats that I hope you've taken to heart.

You still imply that I have attacked lower skilled players, all because I said that a player "was not average". You wish to question the notion of what is average and you say that identifying someone as not average is an insult. You have an issue with facts. There is little hope for someone like that, until reality mugs them so thoroughly that they finally open their eyes.

Many of us, myself included, identified a number of issues we predicted would occur with this queue merge. Lack of competitiveness resulting from the mixing of groups with solos was the biggest concern. We also predicted this would eventually impact solo player population, particularly among newer solo players. I don't think any of us realized that the tonnage and tier restrictions would be pretty much gone which is a big issue as well.

I believe (like many others) that trading the inclusion of groups in solo for reduced competitiveness is bad for the game. I don't want that. You may argue that reduced competitiveness is ok, but what you cannot argue at this point is that Competitiveness has been harmed by this change and the associated matchmaker issues. Paul and Russ have stated so in their limited communications with us. We can also see from numerous match examples that tonnage balancing is often really skewed. And the WLR ratios posted by many top players also support the reduced competitiveness.

So if you want to keep arguing with me, fine. Tell me why less competitive matches are better because that's the only point you can debate. But you cannot argue that competitiveness has been harmed in the pursuit of group drops and queue times. I do not want to play a less competitive game. We all have a limit on what we will tolerate. I will not tolerate that sacrifice. I don't need to play it to see it, it's plain as day from multiple sources of info, even from those (PGI) whose interests would be to hide/deny it.

[Brain Cancer]

Flyby215, on 16 May 2020 - 10:49 PM, said:

I gave this merger a chance, played a lot of solo matches and group matches. Conclusion: firm no.

I left Faction Warfare because I was tired of being cannon fodder. I left group queue because I was tired of being cannon fodder.

Given your skills, I doubt seriously you were cannon fodder in any sense of the word even soloing.

A W/L well over 1 and K/D over 2 indicates you were and still are quite capable of tipping any match you end up dropping in, never mind one with a group you can take advantage of for further opportunities. Literally chase for the Alpha lance spawn if there's a group in your team, do what comes naturally, and you'll end up turning a large share of the reds into creds with a group screening your aggression.

[MOBAjobg]

Finally, my W/L ratio has managed to become +ve [after playing > 500 matches just dropping solo on my own].

Currently, there is just a little time to farm for high damage so, to kill enemies quickly to look for the win is my objective now.

Edited by MOBAjobg, 17 May 2020 - 02:01 PM.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Horseman, on 17 May 2020 - 11:48 AM, said:

I mean, what they hell did they think was gonna happen? Aleksandr Kerensky dropping out of the sky to endorse their brilliant tactical maneuver?

Probably exactly what is actually happening: A small group that was under represented now gets to play a little more and they are highly vocal in their gratitude. While the rest of us who are voicing serious concerns are able to be written off as a vocal minority because they saw their numbers get a bump. I mean, this is far from the first time that PGI have decided to make a change and then cherry picked the results to make them look like they made the right choice. As I've said before, the way Russ has been talking about this on twitter would have you believe the test is a resounding success with only a need for minor tweaks here and there. I have to imagine PGI sitting around with their eyes closed and their fingers in their ears screaming "LA LA LA LA LA" at the top of their lungs so they don't have to hear or see how badly things are really going...

[Zulu211]

Constalation, on 16 May 2020 - 07:26 PM, said:

Wait, so you are complaining about a feature test that you haven't experienced? You are going off anecdotes, VODs, preconceptions and cherry picked screenshots? (cherry picked because no one I know takes screenshots of literally every single match result and compiles them)

In fact wouldn't you playing lets say, 5 matches, then quitting work as better data? PGI would in theory see that and think "Huh, this person quit after playing 5 soup queue matches" Compare that to someone who quit after simply hearing that the test was happening. They would just remove you from the data table and you wouldn't be a +or- result.

His stats might be affected. You see, this Anomoly is all about manipulating the data for prestige. I struggle to comprehend a guy so concerned about stats believing a player that averages 3 games a day will be a noticeable loss. that's his claim. He played 100 battles LAST MONTH and thinks he's statistically significant. What else do you need to
know about THAT ego?

[Kin3ticX]

I am warming up to this a little but solo play is an act of masochism. The nascar is worse than ever which I am guilty of. There isn't much choice and I don't like trying to pug command. In my few attemps to not nascar, call for a reversal on voip, turn back, do something different, it has resulted in getting blasted by all 12 of their mechs. I try to never run anything slower than 64 kph as a personal rule.

So now I just push W to go get that booty and use my teammates as speed bumps for the enemy.

It works. The more I hear don't nascar I am going to just nascar harder because like I said, nobody actually commits to turning around except the slowest player. Everyone just wants to use each other as a speed bump.

Edited by Kin3ticX, 17 May 2020 - 02:47 PM.

[Excessive Paranoia]

Anomalocaris, on 17 May 2020 - 01:29 PM, said:

So if you want to keep arguing with me, fine. Tell me why less competitive matches are better because that's the only point you can debate. But you cannot argue that competitiveness has been harmed in the pursuit of group drops and queue times. I do not want to play a less competitive game. We all have a limit on what we will tolerate. I will not tolerate that sacrifice. I don't need to play it to see it, it's plain as day from multiple sources of info, even from those (PGI) whose interests would be to hide/deny it.

The sad / funny thing is that at many times of the day, my average search time is actually just as bad as it was prior to the 28th. It had indeed gone down for a while, but now its right back to where it was, so likely there was a solid bump of players returning to play with friends for a couple of weeks and then either got bored or frustrated with to pathetic state of match quality and left again, making the entire reasoning behind the merge a failed proposition.

Brain Cancer, on 17 May 2020 - 01:51 PM, said:

Given your skills, I doubt seriously you were cannon fodder in any sense of the word even soloing.

A W/L well over 1 and K/D over 2 indicates you were and still are quite capable of tipping any match you end up dropping in, never mind one with a group you can take advantage of for further opportunities. Literally chase for the Alpha lance spawn if there's a group in your team, do what comes naturally, and you'll end up turning a large share of the reds into creds with a group screening your aggression.

Right, because that's the epitome of enjoyable gameplay... chasing the local group around hunting for kills and damage like dogs begging for table scraps...

[Anomalocaris]

Excessive Paranoia, on 17 May 2020 - 02:45 PM, said:

The sad / funny thing is that at many times of the day, my average search time is actually just as bad as it was prior to the 28th. It had indeed gone down for a while, but now its right back to where it was, so likely there was a solid bump of players returning to play with friends for a couple of weeks and then either got bored or frustrated with to pathetic state of match quality and left again, making the entire reasoning behind the merge a failed proposition.

[color=#222222][font=&amp]

Go check steamcharts. You can only look at hourly data for the last month, so the last event weekend is already off the charts. I did archive the data though for my own purposes at the end of this test.

[/font][/color][/left][color=#222222][font=&amp][/font][/color][/left][color=#222222][font=&amp]

But what you can see is that we saw a jump in players the first weekend this went into effect. They went up even further the next weekend. This weekend they're actually slightly below the first merge weekend both in peaks and averages. In fact, some player numbers this weekend have been below the last pre-merge event weekend which was 4/17-4/18. The event juicing can only help so much, and people are probably starting to get a feel for the ups and downs of the merge. If we continue to see a drop during this week it won't be a good sign, but its too early to tell at this point. Not that I think PGI will change direction. They're going to point to any player increase as a sign of success, even though avg. player numbers per month have been increasing at a steady rate starting in March. The trend for May looks right in line with the gains in March and April, suggesting that the merge didn't really do anything for participation.

[/font][/color][/left]

[Anomalocaris]

Zulu211, on 17 May 2020 - 02:41 PM, said:

His stats might be affected. You see, this Anomoly is all about manipulating the data for prestige. I struggle to comprehend a guy so concerned about stats believing a player that averages 3 games a day will be a noticeable loss. that's his claim. He played 100 battles LAST MONTH and thinks he's statistically significant. What else do you need to
know about THAT ego?

Damn, looks like I'm living rent free in several people's heads. Don't worry about my opinion, just look at the facts. Stomps are up. Matchmaking is of poorer quality (all tiers in play, no tonnage matching). And players numbers already appear to be trending down from the peak last week (still higher than the last event weekend pre-merge, but barely). I don't want a less competitive game. That's what we have now. Inarguable. You can quote your anecdotes about your match experience, but the numbers remain unchanged.

These are not my opinions. These are facts. From PGI, from steam, etc. You're essentially upset that I didn't choose to group up and pugstomp fellows such as yourself. Think on that for awhile - do you think your game experience would be better right now if I was playing? The only opinion here is that I believe a less competitive game (again, what we have now) will hurt participation in the long run. Argue that all you want, time will tell, but I have to believe PGI wouldn't have gone all radio silent the last week or more if numbers were looking better.

p.s. - if you want an anecdote from someone who trudged through 100 merge queue games, here ya go. He'd post it here, but is not allowed to. Wonder why....

https://www.reddit.c...er_my_findings/