12 replies to this topic

[SidequestsYT]

Hello everyone. I have some experience with MWO, having played on another account years ago. Now I'm back, and playing again daily. One thing I never understood about MWO is the Pilot Skill Rating (PSR). All the information I've been able to find about it is outdated by between a few to several years. Can someone give me a current breakdown of how the PSR works in 2024? It seems like no matter how good or bad I think I did in a match, it's always a guessing game as to whether my PSR will go up, down, or stay the same. Ultimately, I play to have fun and the PSR is not something I focus on, but it would be nice to understand how it works. Thanks in advance to anyone who responds.

[martian]

Greetings!

There have been no significant changes in how PSR works for years. The last big change happened in mid-2020 when the entire PSR was reworked.

You can watch this fan video:


Imagine it as a list of 24 players, sorted according to their Match Score (the players of the victorious team get a small bonus) after the game. The upper 12 'Mechs get the green arrow, the lower half of the list gets the red arrow. The higher you are among the "green" 'Mechs, the higher is your PSR raise. The same is true for the "red" Mechs - in the negative sense, of course.

Thus, in one game some Match Score can be good enough to place you in the upper half of the list, and in the next game the same Match Score could place you in the lower half of the list.

[Void Angel]

It's a way of roughly dividing players based on their experience and effectiveness. Originally it was more of an experience meter, because certain mechanics created an upward trend in rating, but that was corrected quite a while ago, by now. The primary determinant is your match score, which is primarily determined by damage done. Your score is then compared to the average and adjusted for win/loss before your PSR adjustment (the arrow) is applied.

Matchmaking then uses PSR to assemble teams for Quickplay matches. By default, a match looks for players in the same PSR, but if there aren't enough people it will open the range to go +/- 1 tier. Thus, a Tier 5 can be matched with Tiers 5, 4, and 3 - while a Tier 2 will match with Tiers 3, 2, and 1. However, in extremely low traffic periods, emergency "valves" open and you can find opponents and teammates outside of that range - this is rare, though. Usually if you see people outside of their normal Tier range it's because they're grouped with higher or lower Tier friends.

[VeeOt Dragon]

for the most part its not something you need to any attention to. i honestly wouldn't even think about it. the PSR system as others have said is just for the purpose of matchmaking.

[CFC Conky]

Welcome back SidequestsYT,

While PSR may be mainly used for matchmaking, it can also give you a rough indication on your overall skill. For example, if you are stuck in a certain Tier, you might need to adjust your builds and/or play style I’d you wish to progress upwards. I’ve also found that when first moving to a higher Tier, my match performance suffers until I get used to the higher-skill players I am now encountering.

Good hunting,
CFC Conky

[w0qj]

Hey SidequestsYT, a warm welcome to MWO!

===================================
Executive Summary:
Quick + dirty way to get a green PSR "up" arrow:
~Just do 500+ damage, and get 8+ Kill Assists. Voila!

(Actual Killing Blows count for very little to PSR).

- - - - - -
Anecdotal PSR observations for playing many QP games:

Winning Team PSR changes:

Anecdotal PSR observations: the bottom two players on the winning side gets a "red arrow" for PSR down, as a general rule of thumb.


Losing Team PSR changes:

Anecdotal PSR observations: the top two players (1st & 2nd) on the losing side gets a "green arrow" for PSR up.
Anecdotal PSR observations: the top 3rd player (3rd) on the losing side gets a "yellow arrow" for no PSR up or no PSR down).
Everyone else on the losing team gets a "red arrow" for PSR down.

Focus on your total damage dealt (aim for 300+ damage to start off with; the more the merrier), and Kill Assists (aim for 8+).
Killing Blows actually matter very little to your PSR rankings.
A well placed UAV would also help your match score.
This would also pad up your match score, thus giving you more CBills and XP!


It's very well documented that your PSR is determined by:

~How well you do in the overall 24-player ranking from both teams.

~How well you do in your 12-player team.

[Edit: deleted the PSR - UP/DOWN ==> martial beat me to it; he showed the same video!]

Edited by w0qj, 07 September 2024 - 04:22 PM.

[TheCaptainJZ]

The good thing (I think) about PSR now is that whether you move up or down is entirely limited to that match and your movement is relative to all 24 players from that match. However, about half of your match score comes from how much damage you did, so if you did 200 dmg, but 12 players did more than that, you likely are going down in PSR. With the game being weighted towards Assault mechs and high damage, if you're not one of them, it might be harder to consistently go up in PSR. Also keep in mind the arrow is the same whether you lost 3, 4 points or lost 20, so to estimate where in the pack you ended up, just sort the end mission screen by Match Score and that'll tell you whether you moved a little or a lot. The actual math has been worked out, but I don't have the formula.

Also, what time you play the game will affect how "good" you do, since the player mix is simply different at different times of the day.

[Void Angel]

The weighting toward damage has been a semi-controversial element of PSR calculation since day one. I can see where its detractors are coming from, but it's also true that in a game of skilled attrition, doing damage - specifically exchanging damage at a favorable rate for your weight class relative to the enemy - is going to be paramount.

[Faxes]

Void Angel, on 27 October 2024 - 09:42 PM, said:

The weighting toward damage has been a semi-controversial element of PSR calculation since day one. I can see where its detractors are coming from, but it's also true that in a game of skilled attrition, doing damage - specifically exchanging damage at a favorable rate for your weight class relative to the enemy - is going to be paramount.

It`s a weird system where kills are the goal but not how you get points. I know its to keep it from being a kill stealing fest but lights backstabbing an assault is absolute shite:
"You killed the atlas but you only did 30 damage so GoFYrslf" ~ The Points system

also It feels like enabling the damage with tag-narc you get zero credit:
My anecdotal QP matches where i nacred and had indirect LRM rain 4-5 mechs to death and still get down arrows:
"...Yay team... I guess..." ~ NARC Enjoyer

[Void Angel]

There's a trade-off with support systems like Narc and TAG - or even just spotting from cover. Because while I'm enabling damage by doing that, if I don't have to actually do any damage myself to get rewards, it can result in people showing up with those support systems and expecting the team to carry them - and they're probably not enabling a whole 'mech's worth of extra damage from those systems... I think that the rewards for spotting, scouting, and TAG/NARC damage are a bit sub-par, personally, but wherever the balance point lies, the trade-off still exists.

And speaking of trades, the reason damage is paramount in match scoring isn't hard to understand. You cannot play a match reasonably expecting to avoid all damage; you're going to take damage, that's how it works. MWO combat is a complex exercise in exchanging armor for damage dealt; your goal is always to trade up, getting a favorable exchange of effective damage for armor lost. Accuracy and positioning matter a lot, because that allows you to make good trades; mobility and range can allow you to make uncontested trades, but sooner or later you're going to take some fire - it's all about trading up. It's all about damage.

The match score's damage focus recognizes this; it's not perfect, but it's not wrong to do it that way - and it's not incompatible with rewarding certain activities more than at present.

[Strelok7]

Welcome Back. 07. HF!

[Rux Trok]

I've got myself 5 kills in a match by back stabbing assaults and still got red arrow... so I dont really care about psr anymore

[martian]

Rux Trok, on 01 January 2026 - 09:13 PM, said:

I've got myself 5 kills in a match by back stabbing assaults and still got red arrow... so I dont really care about psr anymore

Could you post both the Mission Summary Team Stats Table and the Mission Summary Player Stats Table, please?

Without seeing both of those tables, it is impossible to judge your performance relative to the other players. Any serious discussion about your performance in that game is not possible without those tables.

Thank you.