277 replies to this topic

[Sprouticus]

80 bit, a couple of points

1) Where does combat score come into play? I dont see it in your analysis at all. Now mind you right now I hate combat score. It is basically damage plus a few points and no more. Which means assaults and missile boats end up with high combat scores, and lights and snipers end up with (proportionately) lower.

2) As someone else pointed out, the elite solo players will need to adjust and play with their teams to stay in tier 3. If they dont they will bound between 2 and 3. If they do, they will be fine.

3) Where is the quote on the 4/8 man queues? I have not seen any posts on that. Same with equipment not being a modifier and separate ELO's for different mechs. I would really like to see that thread if you can find it.

[Artgathan]

80Bit, on 16 February 2013 - 09:43 PM, said:

Ah I understand. A mountain of demolished mechs, with a Raven 3L riding a jump jetting Cataphract 3D to the top.

This is the greatest image ever conceived in all of Battletech. I had a good long laugh!

More seriously, OP makes a good point. Elo has its merits but it has some issues as well. I, for one, am looking forwards to getting grouped up with players of (roughly) the same skill level as me (be it good or bad). I may get trapped in a small bubble up top (I play with a 4-man once in a while, but 80% of my games are just PUGing it), which will be interesting.

What I'm most interested in is to see if there's a specific set of builds that dominate the top tiers of play (D-DCs, 3L, A1, 3D).

[Khanahar]

Obligatory bit of pedantry:
ELO is incorrect. It is not an acronym.
Elo is correct. It is a system named after Arpad Elo.

*The More You Know...*

http://en.wikipedia....o_rating_system

[arghmace]

It just occured to me that there is a way to make the game rewarding even with ELO. The higher you are, the more you get xp and credits. Voilá! Now we have incentive to play well and not just goof around.

[Goose]

Sprouticus, on 17 February 2013 - 09:49 AM, said:

… Where does combat score come into play?

Er: Where's this "combat score" discussed? It might be the "extra factors" mentioned in the original post, but what do we know about "combat score" in the first place?

[Jman5]

Vlad Ward, on 16 February 2013 - 10:34 PM, said:

People said all of this when Phase 2 was introduced. Then people realized they didn't actually want to be challenged, they just wanted to win games where there were "real bragging rights". When they found those opponents and got mercilessly beaten into the ground, they cried Cheese and went back to business as usual.

Granted, they won't have much of a choice with Phase 3, as the only way to reset your ELO is to make a new account that you can't transfer anything to/from. I just find the symmetry ironic.

This bears repeating. The vast majority of players don't want hard fought games where they have put everything on the line just to win occasionally. They want to win almost every game they play, and winning handily is an even bigger ego boost. This is the number one reason why so many people quit back to 4-mans and don't even do 8-man premades. Because if they did, they would have to really try, and they would most likely fail quite a bit. Sure they used plenty of other excuses like: 8-man is just ecm cheese, or stating you have to be in a D-DC or 3L to compete. Or, you have to sit and defend too much!

The truth is they faced real competition and it was hard. So when the going got tough, they quit.

With Elo on the way, they are going to be facing people at their level and it's going to be hard on them. They are going to have to actually work at winning, which they secretly don't want to do. Expect a lot of complaining and ragequitting in the week/s that follow elo release. Especially when you rebalance items and nerf FotM builds.

edit: And don't be surprised when the mid-level elo games turn into a cesspool of all the whining criers.

Edited by Jman5, 17 February 2013 - 10:06 AM.

[Goose]

Jman5, on 17 February 2013 - 10:04 AM, said:

The truth is they faced real competition and it was hard. So when the going got tough, they quit.

That's wrong: When 8-man returned, it was claimed by Goons using wall-to-wall cheese builds. Wha'na' compete here? Bring said cheese. Wha'na' drive stuff you like? Go someplace else …

It does bring up the point "What's sync-dropping mean in this new world".

[JeepStuff]

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 05:56 AM, said:

I thought that Elo was based on damage. Is it confirmed that Elo is based on wins and losses?

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 06:08 AM, said:

Who says it is?

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 06:13 AM, said:

Damage should be a better measurement of individual performance than win/loss that depends on the performance of the team.

I scanned through all the posts so far and it seems like you've had a hard time getting someone to answer your questions. Elo is, by definition, a win-loss based thing. Here's a general link to Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia....o_rating_system

But more specifically, there is a big write-up specific to the MWO implementation in the Command Chair here:
http://mwomercs.com/...79-matchmaking/

Hope that helps.

[Leimrey]

Goose, on 17 February 2013 - 10:09 AM, said:

That's wrong: When 8-man returned, it was claimed by Goons using wall-to-wall cheese builds. Wha'na' compete here? Bring said cheese. Wha'na' drive stuff you like? Go someplace else …

It does bring up the point "What's sync-dropping mean in this new world".

If you cannot beat Goons in 8mans, then you should probably go back to 4man drops until you get somewhat better at the game. And no, I'm not trying to insult you.

[Goose]

…

[Riffleman]

Actually steering wheel underhive sounds fun. Imagine a game mode where the game checked to see if you were using a joystick, and only joystick users were able to que. Muh immursion


.....also mechs wouldnt even need double armor, nobody would ever die from missing crucial shots due to terrain differences, bad hotas, overshooting, ect...

[Riffleman]

Goose, on 17 February 2013 - 10:09 AM, said:

That's wrong: When 8-man returned, it was claimed by Goons using wall-to-wall cheese builds. Wha'na' compete here? Bring said cheese. Wha'na' drive stuff you like? Go someplace else …

It does bring up the point "What's sync-dropping mean in this new world".

Goons are good at aproximatley 2 things.
Playing in organized groups against randoms, and claiming "skillz" pay the bills.
Playing in 8 mans with the cheeziest flavor of the month builds that take any chance of them messing up the game for lack of skill out of the equation.

Dont worry too much about them, they will be stuck in tier 2 hell on launch forever, or resort to trying 8 man single sync dropping to have any hope of winning any games again.

[Mackensen]

EJT, on 17 February 2013 - 10:11 AM, said:

I scanned through all the posts so far and it seems like you've had a hard time getting someone to answer your questions. Elo is, by definition, a win-loss based thing. Here's a general link to Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia....o_rating_system

But more specifically, there is a big write-up specific to the MWO implementation in the Command Chair here:
http://mwomercs.com/...79-matchmaking/

Hope that helps.

Having a hard time? Hell yes! Much BS floating around here. Thank you for providing some real information. I think that MWO could benefit from som kind of rating system that match players of similar skill against each other. But I'm sceptic against ratings based on Win/Loss only. I see players performing very well and still lose. There is a DC and maybe an AFK early in the game, the players left do their best and lose despite being good players. I see teams where one half of the players each doing 400+ damage and the other part 0-40 damage. I would like to see the 0-40 guys being moved to another playground. I hope that Elo is the answer but I´m sceptic.

[Star Colonel Mustard Kerensky]

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 11:11 AM, said:

Having a hard time? Hell yes! Much BS floating around here. Thank you for providing some real information. I think that MWO could benefit from som kind of rating system that match players of similar skill against each other. But I'm sceptic against ratings based on Win/Loss only. I see players performing very well and still lose. There is a DC and maybe an AFK early in the game, the players left do their best and lose despite being good players. I see teams where one half of the players each doing 400+ damage and the other part 0-40 damage. I would like to see the 0-40 guys being moved to another playground. I hope that Elo is the answer but I´m sceptic.

If people consistently do <100 damage they are going to cause their teams to lose most of the time. And while chances are you will only have to have him on your team once, he is going to have to deal with the consequences of his poor performance every single game. So he WILL get moved down to the "steering wheel underhive" It's just going to take a few matches.

[Jman5]

Goose, on 17 February 2013 - 10:09 AM, said:

That's wrong: When 8-man returned, it was claimed by Goons using wall-to-wall cheese builds. Wha'na' compete here? Bring said cheese. Wha'na' drive stuff you like? Go someplace else …

It does bring up the point "What's sync-dropping mean in this new world".

Thank you for epitomizing my point. People you faced used unorthodox or powerful builds while working well as a team. Instead of adjusting and working hard, you gave up. You made the claim that the only way to compete is to drive some min-max "cheese". You blamed external factors instead of your team's own shortcomings.

Also for the record, I play a hunchback in all my 8-man premades and I think I do pretty well with it. It may not have ecm, long range weapons, super speed, lots of armor, or a crazy amount of firepower, but it does have versatility. And that fits my playstyle perfectly.

[De La Fresniere]

I'm usually (about 60% of the time) on the losing team; I'm fairly good, but am only worth 60 tons among roughly 600 tons' worth on my team so I have very limited influence on a match's outcome.

This is actually very good for me. I figure my Elo rating will stay rather low, so I'll be matched against poor opponents (obvious benefit) and with generally poor teammates (my team won't steamroll the opposition, leaving time for me to rack in damage and kills).

[RiceyFighter]

As always the top 1 percent will always stay top 1 percent.

[Rahnu]

Man, all I want is for the matchmaking to prevent match-ups like this:


As far as I'm concerned, if matches are even 50% more even after Elo is introduced, it will be a rousing success.

[Vassago Rain]

Jman5, on 17 February 2013 - 10:04 AM, said:

This bears repeating. The vast majority of players don't want hard fought games where they have put everything on the line just to win occasionally. They want to win almost every game they play, and winning handily is an even bigger ego boost. This is the number one reason why so many people quit back to 4-mans and don't even do 8-man premades. Because if they did, they would have to really try, and they would most likely fail quite a bit. Sure they used plenty of other excuses like: 8-man is just ecm cheese, or stating you have to be in a D-DC or 3L to compete. Or, you have to sit and defend too much!

The truth is they faced real competition and it was hard. So when the going got tough, they quit.

With Elo on the way, they are going to be facing people at their level and it's going to be hard on them. They are going to have to actually work at winning, which they secretly don't want to do. Expect a lot of complaining and ragequitting in the week/s that follow elo release. Especially when you rebalance items and nerf FotM builds.

edit: And don't be surprised when the mid-level elo games turn into a cesspool of all the whining criers.

It's funny, because we roped Mr 144 into dropping with us, called up some guys, and had about an hour of 8 man drops out of the blue 'because.'

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 11:11 AM, said:

Having a hard time? Hell yes! Much BS floating around here. Thank you for providing some real information. I think that MWO could benefit from som kind of rating system that match players of similar skill against each other. But I'm sceptic against ratings based on Win/Loss only. I see players performing very well and still lose. There is a DC and maybe an AFK early in the game, the players left do their best and lose despite being good players. I see teams where one half of the players each doing 400+ damage and the other part 0-40 damage. I would like to see the 0-40 guys being moved to another playground. I hope that Elo is the answer but I´m sceptic.

If you underperform, you get put with others who underperform. In such an environment, no one is gonna get mad at you for doing 100 damage, and you can focus on improving, or simply not get worse.

Except for tier 2, there's always time to improve.

That's the whole point of the system.

[Wintersdark]

Mackensen, on 17 February 2013 - 11:11 AM, said:

Having a hard time? Hell yes! Much BS floating around here. Thank you for providing some real information. I think that MWO could benefit from som kind of rating system that match players of similar skill against each other. But I'm sceptic against ratings based on Win/Loss only. I see players performing very well and still lose. There is a DC and maybe an AFK early in the game, the players left do their best and lose despite being good players. I see teams where one half of the players each doing 400+ damage and the other part 0-40 damage. I would like to see the 0-40 guys being moved to another playground. I hope that Elo is the answer but I´m sceptic.

0-40 aside, damage is just not an accurate measure of skill.

Poor players with certain builds can rack up huge damage done numbers with little effect, and generally speaking the better a player is, the less damage per kill he'll do: It means he kills more effectively.

Yes, there's also the "I walked in and 'stole' the kill" low-damage kills; but that just means that player was using focus fire techniques. That's a good thing.

The reality is, while your being rated on your team, team performance is heavily impacted by each and every player. Give me an A1, I'll take one long range (150-200m) shot at every enemy player. I'll wrack up huge damage done, and contribute almost nothing overall.

Or, kills? Then kill stealing becomes a problem instead of being good team play.

What about behavior that leads to team victory but doesn't net you kills/assists/damage done? A light scout that regularly leads enemy players into traps, for example.

A light hunter, who's specific job is to protect team assaults from enemy lights. If he's good, he'll never get anywhere near as much damage done as the assault's he's protecting. In fact, he could arguably be credited for some of the damage the assaults do as his actions lead to their success.

No, the best way overall is wins/loses. While yes, you'll get dropped on teams with terrible players originally, as people are mixed around the teams with more good players will win more, and the poorer players will lose more, causing their Elo rating to shift. You'll get matched less and less with poor players, and the system will balance out nicely. It takes some time, but it absolutely does work.

Players who contribute to their teams victory will win more, and gradually raise in Elo rating.

So, in essence, the Elo system will do exactly what you want it to do, Mackensen. Assuming you're a decent player, you'll find yourself Elo'd away from the bad players reasonably quickly.

Edited by Wintersdark, 17 February 2013 - 12:18 PM.