277 replies to this topic

[80Bit]

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

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.

Much of the info I state comes from http://mwomercs.com/...lo/page__st__60

This post talks about combat score:

Karl Berg, on 01 February 2013 - 10:43 PM, said:

By the time we launch the ELO system, all the various games you guys will have been playing on production will have already seeded your ELO values, so the system won't be going live with everyone at 1300.

Also, right now you guys are playing with a matchmaking system that has no concept of skill ratings at all, it's basically random. We're certainly hoping this new system does better than random, so it should be a significant improvement for you guys.

The ELO ratings themselves are very unbiased, it's concerned only with your probability of winning based on your past history, and is recalculated based on the result of every game you play. The new matchmaker however cares about more than just ELO. It's examining mech weight classes like the old system did; game mode preferences, how long you've been waiting for a match, your ELO, and a few other factors to try and create balanced teams. We'll still be tweaking this whole system even after it's been launched to improve it even further.

The combat score which has been talked about elsewhere is an entirely separate concept from your ELO. The combat score is kind of like a 'match score' for a single game to try and give you an idea of how well you did. We're not currently persisting the match scores, and I suspect it will get tweaked quite a bit over the next few patches.

My comments on 8 man queue were just to let the uninformed know that there is already a separate 8 man queue.

And as far as Elite Solo players, I was only thinking about the small number of players who can single handily push their PUG team over the top. Players this good can either work hard on communicating with all the groups they will drop with in high elo land, or play like they have always played to live on the edge.

[ReD3y3]

I want ELO to be visible.

So I have something to work towards.

[Mackensen]

Wintersdark, on 17 February 2013 - 12:17 PM, said:

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.

Yes, I see the logic in your reasoning. I really hope that you are right. Over time Elo may round off the rough edges of MWO.

[80Bit]

Zyrusticae, on 17 February 2013 - 12:04 PM, said:

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

PGI stated that internal testing has seen a large reduction in lopsided victories when Elo is used.

[arghmace]

I just opened all basic efficiencies for CN9-AL without upgrading it with DHS, Endo or Ferro. Why? Because I sold it right away and didn't wanna lose money. Sure, I lost a lot more battles than I would've with DHS and Endo. But hey, that just means I will win more in the future thanks to ELO MM. It will all balance out.

And then it hit me!

Running SHS and standard structure and armor is the way to go with ELO. Those upgrades are supposed to give you an edge so you win more. But you don't, since you're moved to harder battles. Without the upgrades you get easier battles and just the same amount of wins, kills, xp and credits. Only difference is, you don't have to spend 2 millions on DHS and Endo so you end up on the plus side running stock builds.

With the saved credits, it's easier to buy the Mechs I want with in-game currency instead of real money. Bad for PGI not getting as much euros from my pocket.

Tell me again, what's the sense in this ELO MM?

[p4r4g0n]

No one is stopping you from trying to game the system but I think the rest of us just want to have a majority of our matches be engaging and challenging regardless of win or loss as opposed to the current state of going through many roflstomps to get one good match.

Also, if you accept the assumption that Phase 3 MM will result in approximately 1:1 win / loss ratio as long as you are in the average skill band, your strategy to game the system doesn't really make any sense since you'll earn approximately the same amount of xp and C-Bills anyway over the same amount of matches.

The only difference is in your perception since you are intentionally losing NOW (and earning less C-Bills / XP) and if the assumed effect of Phase 3 is correct, will have a winning streak later to counter-balance the losses.

You should be aware that roflstomps are more likely to occur at both extreme ends of the player base. Hopefully, you haven't put yourself in that situation with the losses you've been having.

Edited by p4r4g0n, 17 February 2013 - 04:44 PM.

[Vassago Rain]

arghmace, on 17 February 2013 - 04:12 PM, said:

I just opened all basic efficiencies for CN9-AL without upgrading it with DHS, Endo or Ferro. Why? Because I sold it right away and didn't wanna lose money. Sure, I lost a lot more battles than I would've with DHS and Endo. But hey, that just means I will win more in the future thanks to ELO MM. It will all balance out.

And then it hit me!

Running SHS and standard structure and armor is the way to go with ELO. Those upgrades are supposed to give you an edge so you win more. But you don't, since you're moved to harder battles. Without the upgrades you get easier battles and just the same amount of wins, kills, xp and credits. Only difference is, you don't have to spend 2 millions on DHS and Endo so you end up on the plus side running stock builds.

With the saved credits, it's easier to buy the Mechs I want with in-game currency instead of real money. Bad for PGI not getting as much euros from my pocket.

Tell me again, what's the sense in this ELO MM?

You get matched against people on your own level.
If you gimp yourself with a bad mech, you play others who have the same powerlevel. You can't game the system, and if you do, you're stuck in tier 2 forever.

[arghmace]

That's the point. I get the good fun even battles no matter what I do. So why spend 1.5 millions on DHS? You don't get more wins, you don't get more even battles, you get nothing, just lose money.

[Vassago Rain]

arghmace, on 17 February 2013 - 04:46 PM, said:

That's the point. I get the good fun even battles no matter what I do. So why spend 1.5 millions on DHS? You don't get more wins, you don't get more even battles, you get nothing, just lose money.

So you can win 50% games with a good mech...or 50% games with a bad mech. You understand that's how the system works, yes.?

Play in a trial mech if you want to be edgy. You'll play others who are in trial mechs.

What did you accomplish?

[arghmace]

What did I lose? Or what do I accomplish by playing better and/or in better mechs? That's right, nothing.

As I said earlier, at least make the ELO rating visible so you see that yeah, I've gotten better! Also, playing good should give you more xp and credits. So apply a multiplier to both incomes based on ELO rating. Then there's once again incentive to be good. What's the point with nothing to win?

[arghmace]

p4r4g0n, on 17 February 2013 - 04:33 PM, said:

your strategy to game the system doesn't really make any sense since you'll earn approximately the same amount of xp and C-Bills anyway over the same amount of matches.

You don't seem to understand my point. Yes, I earn the same. BUT without spending millions on mech upgrades. So I end up on the plus side.

[Broceratops]

if you want to run around in an industrial mech no one is going to stop you

[Roland]

arghmace, on 17 February 2013 - 04:54 PM, said:

Then there's once again incentive to be good.

The incentive to be good is that you are then good, rather than bad.

Why do kids these days need to have little imaginary trophies given to them in order to justify their own self worth?

Pro-tip: nothing in any video game, ever, means anything.

[arghmace]

What I want is to gain something by purchasing expensive upgrades and playing good. Simple as that. Otherwise it's all pointless.

On a side note, it's ridiculous you don't get anything by selling the upgrades. Even without this ELO system, it makes you wonder if it's wise to buy DHS and Endo just for the few battles it takes to unlock all basics before you sell the mech. My situation being that I already have 3 Hunchies mastered so I only need to elite one Centurion. So just quickly play basics on two variants and then sell them.

[arghmace]

Roland, on 17 February 2013 - 05:06 PM, said:

The incentive to be good is that you are then good, rather than bad.

How can you tell if you've gotten better? You don't see your ELO score and all the time you win 50%. You might just be getting worse all the time and thinking you're doing good. There's no feedback at all.

Quote

Why do kids these days need to have little imaginary trophies given to them in order to justify their own self worth?

I'm not a kid and mainly I feel that playing better should reward you with better xp and credits. And there should be some way to tell if you're playing better than you were a month ago, you know? Trophies don't matter.

[Villetta]

I'm sure someone's going to beat me for this but... I just worry the "ELO" in this will turn into the horrible pile of something I cannot say that is the Matchmakeing in APB reloaded. Anyone who plays that game can most likely tell you how horrible that system is and it's no where near a 50/50 split for wins and losses. It's just broken beyond words and I wanna cry when I think we may get the same system here. It was explained much like this one, Wins/losses play the only role it gives you a score yada yada match makeing is "fair"

Also if we have a 50/50 chance to win/lose what the heck is that going to do to CW when we're trying to take ground?




Edited for spelling.

Edited by Villetta, 17 February 2013 - 05:19 PM.

[arghmace]

The sad thing is that the main reason for pug stomping and uneven battles are the premades. Instead of fixing the original problem we try to solve it by ELO. Kinda reminds you of fixing the streaks and LRM's with ECM, sigh...

[Mackman]

arghmace, on 17 February 2013 - 05:15 PM, said:

How can you tell if you've gotten better? You don't see your ELO score and all the time you win 50%. You might just be getting worse all the time and thinking you're doing good. There's no feedback at all.

I'm not a kid and mainly I feel that playing better should reward you with better xp and credits. And there should be some way to tell if you're playing better than you were a month ago, you know? Trophies don't matter.

See, here you're actually making a valid point. I agree with you that without a visible Elo, it's going to take a lot of the fun out of really knowing that you've gotten better. If they don't want to make Elo visible, they could copy LoL's League system, which would both keep Elo invisible, and provide a valid way of gauging your own skill and improvement. I hope they at least do something to let us measure whether we're improving or not.

Villetta, on 17 February 2013 - 05:17 PM, said:

I'm sure someone's going to beat me for this but... I just worry the "ELO" in this will turn into the horrible pile of something I cannot say that is the Matchmakeing in APB reloaded. Anyone who plays that game can most likely tell you how horrible that system is and it's no where near a 50/50 split for wins and losses. It's just broken beyond words and I wanna cry when I think we may get the same system here. It was explained much like this one, Wins/losses play the only role it gives you a score yada yada match makeing is "fair"

Also if we have a 50/50 chance to win/lose what the heck is that going to do to CW when we're trying to take ground?




Edited for spelling.

It won't have any affect on it, unless one faction is just super-loaded with crappy pilots, which I really doubt is the case. Elo will try to put you against people of equal skill. How is that possibly bad?

[Zylo]

Most of what 80bit posted to start this thread makes sense. I didn't see any mention of the removal of group size limits which might happen due to Elo narrowing the range of potential matches. Leaving the current 8-man system in place with Elo would result in even fewer matchs due to Elo rating differences. I suspect on the 19th we will see a return of any group size between 2 and 8 with matchmaker using weight classes + Elo ratings to build teams for matches. I believe this is also how phase 3 will solve the sync-drop issues.

I expect organized teams will see more fights against organized teams so those who have spent time in 8-man drops facing other competitive 8-man teams will be farming the current sync-droppers for a bit until the sync-droppers get pushed down to a lower Elo rating after getting constantly stomped.


If the group size change happens I suspect many teams that claimed they never could get 8 players online will be running with full teams of 8, just like they did in closed beta. I think the addition of Elo ratings will have limited effect on those of us who did 8-man drops.

The sync-drop exploiters will probably be hit hardest by Elo which is the way it should be.

[Naitsirch]

arghmace, on 17 February 2013 - 05:10 PM, said:

What I want is to gain something by purchasing expensive upgrades and playing good. Simple as that. Otherwise it's all pointless.

On a side note, it's ridiculous you don't get anything by selling the upgrades. Even without this ELO system, it makes you wonder if it's wise to buy DHS and Endo just for the few battles it takes to unlock all basics before you sell the mech. My situation being that I already have 3 Hunchies mastered so I only need to elite one Centurion. So just quickly play basics on two variants and then sell them.

First of all, what you say about getting money back for purchased upgrades is true, especially when selling an upgraded mech, as the explanation for repeated upgrade-cost, (getting dhs 2mn, reverting to shs again some amount), goes with the installment of upgrades making up the cost mainly, would not be valid.

{caution: only applies to random games, not CW]
That said, what I read from your posts is, you want to win no matter what the game is and/or no matter what the background of a game is. This is by FAR not the case for most of the playerbase, but highly typical for the group of players making up pugstompers/noobcrushers/welprapers etc. in any game.
MOST of the BT-fanbase wants to be in a mech, even better in their favourite mech and come across the map stomping, firing and listening to metal or whatever meanwhile. This is exactly what Elo can and hopefully does provide: cool and interesting, hasty or slowplayed, brawls and snipefests of mechs - since the fun is in the game, not in the useless bragging
(if you want that, go to EvE/caod or was it coad?)

Seriously, learn to enjoy the games you play, since only wanting to win no matter the fun in A HOBBY makes you look... unfriendly.

edit: oh and the reason for buying dhs and xl-engines or ferro or whatever is to fit that last LL/LPL/ML/MPL/SRM2/SL/ additional ton of X-ammo that you so desperately want and need for the damn built to be as sweet as you allways dreamt it to be... not just to have an edge over others in random games.
Also wait for ClanWars... that is where you will be able to brag and where that is wanted.

Edited by Naitsirch, 17 February 2013 - 06:22 PM.