Broken match making

[TrixxieTriss]

9 hours ago, septru said:

I'm not sure PvP is completely gone yet. 

 

I played some PvP last night in premades of various sizes and almost always got against different premades of similar sizes. I think in general during primetime, you have a 70/30 solo/premade split. BioSword has the exact numbers. 

 

Your argument is actually pretty reasonable, if it was true. I just don't agree that solo players outnumber premades that badly. It may seem like it, because they disproportionately come here to the forums to complain. But again, BioSword has the exact numbers. If it was closer to a 90/10 solo/premade split I might agree with you. 

 

But honestly, IMO, if it ever got to the point where it was justified to remove the ability to group up... this game should just shut down. I know we all love the game. But if the devs literally cant get any money from group players to justify keeping the ability to group, the game would literally be beyond hope. It would already be dead. 

I don’t think PvP is dead yet, but if BioSword (I like that term 😉) don’t do something soon, it will be impossible to resuscitate it from life support. 

I also don’t think they should actually remove grouping either. It’s an important part of the game for those who want to play that way. And it definitely has its place to help improve player skills. 

My argument has always been to accommodate both play styles and make the game more fair by keeping premades & solo players mostly seperate. Wether that’s seperate queues or matchmaking that enforced separation. My concern is BioSword are taking too long to address this issue & by the time they do, it might be too late or have too few players to make any significant impact. 

When they introduced PvP seasons,  they should never have added 8 man premades to the WZ queue & IMO, should have made Arena a solo environment entirely or capped the premade size to 2 man (inline with half the team size as WZ’s had).

From what I can tell, the whole idea of PvP seasons was to increase the PvP community size by bringing new players to the game & exposing non pvpers to the game format.

Sadly, BioWare made it so unenjoyable, as well as unfair with poor design choices, that those people they planned to gain, didn’t end up staying. On top of that, the format & poor design choices actually drove away a large portion of the PvP community that were already playing. So now the game actually has less pvpers than before PvP seasons started last December. Arguably, they could have left the PvP game as it was & we would have more PvP players now 🤦‍♀️

What is sad, frustrating & what actually makes me mad, is the poor design choices could have been fixed before season 2 started. Which would have given PvP seasons a chance to work. But BioWare in their wisdom refused to even discuss the problems or acknowledge there are any. It is their institutional arrogance that has led to this point. It’s their lack of communication on the issues driving players away that is the main problem with this whole game & why people keep leaving it.

[TrixxieTriss]

12 hours ago, Lord_Malganus said:

I'm glad someone else finally said it!

To be fair, none of us know the actual split. It could be 51/49, 60/40 or 70/30 in favour of solo vs premade numbers. All I do know is before PvP seasons started, solo PvP players out numbered premades & probably still do. Even though BioSword have driven many solo players away from PvP. 

I do agree with Krack & Prum that there aren’t that many 8 man premades in the queues. And that most premades are probably smaller & unrecognised by most people because they are only 2-3 man sizes. 

The issue has always been the matchmaking system. It’s possible to always have premades in the queue as long as the matchmaking algorithm works properly to keep solo & premades seperate. Which it doesn’t. 

The reason myself & others started to call for a seperate queue was because BioWare seemed incapable of writing an algorithm that worked. Wether it’s because they chose not to or because they’re incompetent, we’ll never know 🤷🏻‍♀️

The issue about premades has always been around perceived fairness. That is because this game developers refuses to incorporate voice chat directly into it for the solo masses. And because the matchmaking is so rubbish that even against poorly stacked premades, it won’t build a proper team to go against them. 

I’ve been complaining about the WZ matchmaking since before 4.x. And just about every suggestion myself or other players have had to fix it, has been totally ignored by BioWare. The only matchmaking I’ve ever seen them try & make work was solo ranked. And I think that’s because they are incapable of writing a real matchmaking algorithm with groups in the mix. Which is why I started pushing for a seperate queue for solo players to make it easier for the devs to at least try. 

Personally, I’d prefer them to write a proper matchmaking algorithm that has both solo & premades in the queue. But 100% enforces solo & premade separation. But I don’t think they can do it or they already would have. 

Edited September 6, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[Lord_Malganus]

Yeah.

[krackcommando]

1 hour ago, Lord_Malganus said:

Yeah.

there's a like button at the bottom right (gray circle around a white heart) to click if you agree with someone but don't have anything to add. 😉

Edited September 6, 2023 by krackcommando

[Lord_Malganus]

I can agree anyway I like.

[krackcommando]

2 hours ago, Lord_Malganus said:

I can agree anyway I like.

no kidding.

[septru]

On 9/5/2023 at 9:34 PM, TrixxieTriss said:

The issue has always been the matchmaking system

Ya the matchmaking is pure garbage. But, like, what do you expect? The devs don't care about the PvP community. They actively forced 90% of them out of the game with the 7.2 PvP "devamp." Mark Biggs, the best PvP content creator this game ever had, literally told them "your changes will make every PvPer quit." And Eric Musco said "we get it." PvP is a minigame for the devs. For them, PvP is not serious enough to even create a simple leaderboard that works with combat styles, much less create proper matchmaking. 😂

 

And even if they tried to create proper matchmaking (setting aside the fact that the devs are probably too incompetent to develop a proper matchmaking algorithm given that they cant fix half the bugs in their game 😂), I don't think they could create any algorithm that took into account the ocean sized skill gap between players. 90% of the playerbase spam clicks the node and the other 10% have been playing this game for 10 years. Even the best matchmaking algorithm developed by the most elite dev team couldn't possibly hope to balance that disparity in skill. 

Edited September 7, 2023 by septru

[TrixxieTriss]

2 hours ago, septru said:

Even the best matchmaking algorithm developed by the most elite dev team couldn't possibly hope to balance that disparity in skill.

It could still be better than it is now though. Ie if there are only 2 players in the queue with much higher skill, you don’t put both of them on same team. If there is a bunch of low skilled players, you split them so that each team has a similar amount. And at the same time you try & split them up based on class roles/builds & gear.

But you are right that this dev team doesn’t care. If they did they would have walked back or at least addressed the 5-8 man premade issue by now. Instead, they seem to be happy to just let PvP die a faster death than it would have if they’d done nothing last December 🥺.

I honestly can’t ever see them fixing it now. So I’ve moved on from PvP in this game. 

[septru]

2 hours ago, TrixxieTriss said:

It could still be better than it is now though. Ie if there are only 2 players in the queue with much higher skill, you don’t put both of them on same team.

Sure. But chances are that one of those two players has a winrate of 20% because he actively avoids objs. You would have to find another way to matchmaking that isn't based on winrate. Which gets back to the bigger issue that Seasons actively encourages skilled players to lose games and provides no performance based rewards..... 

 

Idk the way I see it, Seasons could have been great... instead it is either directly or indirectly contributing to every issue that is killing PvP. 

Edited September 8, 2023 by septru

[RACATW]

On 9/5/2023 at 9:34 PM, TrixxieTriss said:

To be fair, none of us know the actual split. It could be 51/49, 60/40 or 70/30 in favour of solo vs premade numbers. All I do know is before PvP seasons started, solo PvP players out numbered premades & probably still do. Even though BioSword have driven many solo players away from PvP. 

I do agree with Krack & Prum that there aren’t that many 8 man premades in the queues. And that most premades are probably smaller & unrecognised by most people because they are only 2-3 man sizes. 

The issue has always been the matchmaking system. It’s possible to always have premades in the queue as long as the matchmaking algorithm works properly to keep solo & premades seperate. Which it doesn’t. 

The reason myself & others started to call for a seperate queue was because BioWare seemed incapable of writing an algorithm that worked. Wether it’s because they chose not to or because they’re incompetent, we’ll never know 🤷🏻‍♀️

The issue about premades has always been around perceived fairness. That is because this game developers refuses to incorporate voice chat directly into it for the solo masses. And because the matchmaking is so rubbish that even against poorly stacked premades, it won’t build a proper team to go against them. 

I’ve been complaining about the WZ matchmaking since before 4.x. And just about every suggestion myself or other players have had to fix it, has been totally ignored by BioWare. The only matchmaking I’ve ever seen them try & make work was solo ranked. And I think that’s because they are incapable of writing a real matchmaking algorithm with groups in the mix. Which is why I started pushing for a seperate queue for solo players to make it easier for the devs to at least try. 

Personally, I’d prefer them to write a proper matchmaking algorithm that has both solo & premades in the queue. But 100% enforces solo & premade separation. But I don’t think they can do it or they already would have. 

I don't consider a duo a premade. Even a trio is not quite premade territory unless they're a trinity or class stacked

[krackcommando]

22 minutes ago, RACATW said:

I don't consider a duo a premade. Even a trio is not quite premade territory unless they're a trinity or class stacked

that's nice for you, but that's not how the world works. not trying to be chippy. it's just that you're not the first person to say that, and it's utterly irrelevant because anything you do to legislate your personal idea of a "premade" has to apply to every other "pre-formed group" in the queue. (and your definition of it isn't the same as others who have their own personal definition).

the game already (supposedly) balances tanks and heals so premades with h/t aren't gonna be on the same team if 2 h/t aren't on the other team. usually (at least in arenas) the only thing that breaks that MM is back fill b/c the matches "pop" before players accept. then (e.g.) a healer doesn't accept and the system scrambles to replace him with w/e.

holding the pop until every player accepts would fix ~90% of those "broken from the start" pops. ofc, when players leave after they port in, the same issue arises, but at least the MM has a better excuse there for throwing in a 2nd (or 3rd) healer.

Edited September 8, 2023 by krackcommando

[TrixxieTriss]

4 hours ago, septru said:

Idk the way I see it, Seasons could have been great... instead it is either directly or indirectly contributing to every issue that is killing PvP. 

100% agree

[TrixxieTriss]

2 hours ago, RACATW said:

I don't consider a duo a premade. Even a trio is not quite premade territory unless they're a trinity or class stacked

So a duo or trio in an arena isn’t a pre-made? 

[Beyrahl]

2 hours ago, krackcommando said:

that's nice for you, but that's not how the world works. not trying to be chippy. it's just that you're not the first person to say that, and it's utterly irrelevant because anything you do to legislate your personal idea of a "premade" has to apply to every other "pre-formed group" in the queue. (and your definition of it isn't the same as others who have their own personal definition).

While this completely debunks it, it's likely they don't imagine the two or three players making much of an impact. However, I promise you even just a two-man group will turn the tide completely. I have plenty of videos showcasing this but I have to say these two are my favorite.
Here's another example of a slightly larger - 3-man group versus a near 8stack. 
One and two. Sure there may be groups that don't do much but it's silly to say a group isn't a group. 
The simplest way to put it - the damage required to keep someone on respawn for nearly the whole game is only around 8-14k DTPS depending on spec, Let us say it is a full damage game and I play in a duo of two DPS players. I am already going to give you a hard time, Now if I have someone else doing the same to you, immediately the game becomes far less playable and you'd be completely justified to say "premade." You don't get that coordination from pugs usually and even if you did the game doesn't usually match make like that. 

Alternatively, breaking it down in another easy-to-understand (I am not trying to be condescending, simply trying to explain something) level is that in a full-on "tryhard" 8-man would be 2 tanks, 2 heals, 4 dps. Before 8mans was a thing that was also the most effective comp. Except it was halved. So with that information, those games would play out a bit more fair but obviously class choices and skill levels would vary the outcome. 
Now you can group with as many as you want so that makes groups like 5-6 way more common and they typically have 3-4 DPS in them, that's the same amount of damage you'd normally have a full-on tryhard 8v8 yet you're in a smaller group that isn't treated like a full 8stack. Along with that, it works the same way with even smaller groups which is rightfully so, but with all the advantages. As soon as you throw a tank or healer into the mix with a 2-3 player damage group they'll start going against other premades of similar or larger size, including generally having more balanced matches instead of just running into pugs over and over as most pugs are DPS players. 

[RACATW]

8 hours ago, krackcommando said:

that's nice for you, but that's not how the world works. not trying to be chippy. it's just that you're not the first person to say that, and it's utterly irrelevant because anything you do to legislate your personal idea of a "premade" has to apply to every other "pre-formed group" in the queue. (and your definition of it isn't the same as others who have their own personal definition).

the game already (supposedly) balances tanks and heals so premades with h/t aren't gonna be on the same team if 2 h/t aren't on the other team. usually (at least in arenas) the only thing that breaks that MM is back fill b/c the matches "pop" before players accept. then (e.g.) a healer doesn't accept and the system scrambles to replace him with w/e.

holding the pop until every player accepts would fix ~90% of those "broken from the start" pops. ofc, when players leave after they port in, the same issue arises, but at least the MM has a better excuse there for throwing in a 2nd (or 3rd) healer.

Generally, in a game with a trinity (dps, tank, healer), you need the trinity to form the definition of a premade.

If you're beating people with 1 or 2 extra dps players, chances are you would have done the same thing as one person. Dps players make up the vast majority of the game, so if it can't match you with any, then there's none available during the 15 minutes you waited regardless.