Personally I like 4 v 4, however you and I may be in the minority.
Thing is Long. But its guid so you should totally read it, devs too.
TLDR: If you been reading my posts of late you can guess, aka MMing.....wait wait dont switch off, it a master piece, true, story....Here's the opening scroll....Once upoin a time in a G......
IMO they, the community despite whats said don't really want "open competitive"
And this is perfectly normal.......Strikes Back
Sports and MWO's history can give us an insight.
Lets look at the facts.
All the "open competitive" queues have fared the worst
For example in order of "open competitiveness" and by some free keen coincidence level of inactivity, go figure, just like sports
The list is.....drumroll..... Faction scouting 4v4, Solaris, Group queue , Faction queue.
All those queues are doing it tough because of the reason in the second sentence, IMO they community despite whats said don't really want "open competitive"
Same as in the sporting world, open class is the least popular, ie their are less of them open classes compared to other classes.
Maybe with functional matchmaking these queues would be less "openly competitive" and more level and thus more popular but like in sports world from local level to apex level.
Apex dont do Local and Local don't do Apex in sports, unless for charity or sumting.
I say this as facts show us.
People don't want open competitive that's why all the open competitive queues died and open classes are the least popular in the sporting world.
Have a think about it.
Now you may say but in the hey day of MWO we didn't have this problem.
I say rubbish as in the hey day we had not had a mech title in a decade.
A starving man will eat crap but once satiated will not put up with it, crap no moar.
Now you may say but low population.........
I say sports can help give idea's once more.
What sports?
Playground sports! They have low population but can still make fairly level teams.
How?
Just like a playground game their are spots to fill on each team.
Choose two Captains, they will be seed/leader for each group. Use Highest PSR solo or groups for seed/Captain on each side.
Their are 12 spots to fill on each team.
The over all logic is that each Captain (Match maker) takes turns each selection round to pick up the next highest PSR teammate/group available.
This way both sides have a chance choosing the next best player/group available to ensure a level palying field.
How do you measure level playing field, I'd say PSR delta between teams untill someone comes up with something better.
Works in an Ideal a world.
With groups well they can throw the above scheme out of whack due to the large skill gap and thus PSR delta some groups can create.
So working with the first system which works under expected team PSR delta conditions, in unexpected team PSR delta conditions I propose:
If a group is seed of Team1, use highest PSR Group or solo to balance PSR total so delta is small.
Teams take turns selecting the next highest PSR pilot/group available.
But if PSR delta conditions RUNWAY and PSR delta is large and getting larger give the weaker team the next highest PSR pilot/group which ever is higher
and give the stronger team the weakest PSR pilot/group which ever is lower, from the selection pool that selection round.
Repeat until PSR delta between teams equalizes. That's a rough sketch start. Not the full flow chart .
Adding content to MWO to fix its problems is like an open class motor race between a ride lawn mover and NASCAR and a F1 car. No not the fact that NASCAR will win.
I talking about that adding content is like changing the ride lawn mover and NASCAR and a F1 car from 2019 models to 2020 models, or changing the circuit they race on.
Still not gonna make it compete with other forms of racing in terms of success.
And matchmaking is just a bunch of logical rules to level the playing field, just some instructions on how to run things a little bit of code.
The important thing is that the rules are good rules which level the playing field just like sports, as sports and games with level the playing fields are more successful, A Simple Fact
Its the foundation of the success of many sports and imo games too.
MWO can learn from this.
Plus a lil code of well thought out rules to level the playing field I think is much cheaper than a silly ole map,
Don't get me wrong, maps/mechs are nice unless open competitiveness is making the game unpopular due to reasons.
300 The worlds not Flat IQ on the case