Fixing PVP 8x8

[kjarnage]

Before you can fix something you need to define if and how broken it is. There are clearly a lot of stats gathered on each and every character which is good.  How many times you are killed was removed which was depressing even if you won a pin cushion rewards for 16 or more deaths, Not sure you can still get that reward. I am not sure what overall battle stats are being recorded. In doin a small sample of 30 8x8 battles across more than one server the results were roughly 10% under dogs (worst battle team won just by objectives), 20% of the time matches were close, 40% of the time a very clear victory (2-1 or 3-1 in objectives, kills...), 30% of the time a total rout, worst scores 6-0 in huttball, battles with 12-1 15-1 50-1 in kills,  600-0 hypergate,...  I was as likely to see a team totally destroyed as a tight or underdog win. Not in my opinion something to encourage people to play. This may not reflect the experience of everyone as we do tend to remember the best and worse matches.

I hope Bioware is looking at a more refined analysis of overall battle results which would be my first recommendation. A metric to analyze how changes effect battles is important to report on the effectiveness of changes. Also queue times over the days, number of people queuing....

The top two complaints seems to be premades and sorting algorithm which are likely perceived based on total routs.  Premades should be a metric analyzed and corrected if need be.  Without knowing exactly what these are it is hard to suggest changes. Can you have more than one premade in a group? Eliminating premades will have good and bad effects on queuing and changing the algorithm is no easy task that could make things worse. One thing the algorithm seems good at is as an average player (my opinion) my characters are running 40% to 55% wins. 

The other option is to make changes to the play itself aimed at evening the battles such as:

Huttball variable release times depending on the difference in scores.

Huttball.  automatic release for the team scored on or both teams.  

hypergate and huttball auto release if four characters in death box

hypergate prevent spawn camping on ramps

What I am asking for is Bioware to set up matrixes on the overall battles so they can see how changes affect the game independent of player complaints if they do not already have these and report on the general effects of changes. For players to suggest other changes like above that would help even the battle field a little. Lets see how damaged PVP really is, start applying bandages and band aids, and learn if the changes are helping any.  Some progress is better than no progress. Lets be positive and help them improve the game for us.

 

 

[krackcommando]

I like the variable release idea for HB.

but that also assumes both teams are trying to win. unfortunately, the latter is more problematic than the former atm. I think they need to come up with ways to make winning according to the "rules" of the map more important first. still, I do really like the variable release idea. you could also play with that in other maps like VS maybe based on different metrics.

[Prapcaster]

I think bioware heard you say you want a 4th huttball map.

[JowyyKazza]

On 10/4/2023 at 7:41 PM, Prapcaster said:

I think bioware heard you say you want a 4th huttball map.

But this time, add more levels to the huttball map, if queshball has 3 levels, why not 4? 5 even!

In all serious though I wish I understood how the matchmaker works, I can be in a warzone q, see that a warzone has just ended, and people from that warzone get a q pop before me. I’m mostly solo q so that probably affects it. Still annoying though to wait 10 minutes for a q pop and others get immediate pops. 

[Lord_Malganus]

Matchmaking is  jacked because they can't code an algorithm that can separate groups from solo'ers in the same Q.

They could have made a no grouping allowed True Solo Q a long time ago to give players the choice. But they have never done that either.

Currently, Pre-mades are the only way to insure playing with consistent success and why they are so popular and rule PvP.

[krackcommando]

11 hours ago, Lord_Malganus said:

Matchmaking is  jacked because they can't code an algorithm that can separate groups from solo'ers in the same Q.

They could have made a no grouping allowed True Solo Q a long time ago to give players the choice. But they have never done that either.

what on earth makes you think that they're trying to separate groups from solos? there will always be solos and groups in the same match unless there's an actual 8m premade, which occurs about as often as a Biosword employee post in the PVP section.

they put premades on opposing teams when possible.

11 hours ago, Lord_Malganus said:

Currently, Pre-mades are the only way to insure playing with consistent success and why they are so popular and rule PvP.

premades have always been the best way bolster consistent success. the more known quantities you have on your team, the fewer slots available for possible derps to pug into it. honestly, man, what has changed is the population size and composition. the number of players with a clue how to play has dwindled, and the number of bots has increased in droves. if you solo queue, you run the risk of having to carry 2-7 bots every match. if you premade, you have to carry 2-7 fewer bots. from a rules perspective, Biosword seems to have gone full **** by allowing more than 4m premades. but this idea that you should ever enjoy "consistent success" as a solo pug in an 8m format is...what's the word...naive? unless you're a god amongst mortals who can carry 7 teammates, solo queue is random luck. if you're actually bad, your win rate will be below 50%. if you're (I hesitate to say normal but) the middle of the road, your win rate should be around 50%-65%, and if you're winning in the 70%+ area solo queuing then you're a god amongst mortals, and please accept me into your cult. I'll strike any bargain your demand of me, my dark master.

[psycoq]

On 10/6/2023 at 9:06 AM, krackcommando said:

but this idea that you should ever enjoy "consistent success" as a solo pug in an 8m format is...what's the word...naive?

naive isn't even close to the right word. to be even remotely applicable you'd have to use a term like "psychotically delusional".

 

that said, regarding the pvp itself and not matchmaking. it's definitively not broken, it's PvE centric trash by design. if they wanted the pvp to be good 8v8's would be a deathmatch too.

[krackcommando]

5 hours ago, psycoq said:

that said, regarding the pvp itself and not matchmaking. it's definitively not broken, it's PvE centric trash by design. if they wanted the pvp to be good 8v8's would be a deathmatch too.

no. back in the day RWZs were quite fun. intense. it wasn't all this "pvp is popping heads" vs. "all these premades are just farming kills." good players were maxing out their talent to win objective maps against each other. WZs for the past 6+ years have been a sad parody of that.

[kjarnage]

Worst match ever 175 kills to 0.  Not fun. I do not think you can do anything with the premades without an analysis of their impact. Sorting out truth from conjecture. What are the premade limits? On one hand we need the players that want to play together on the other hand wipe outs deter players from return.  While grouping dynamics is important to understand, it maybe difficult to further restrict. A weighting factor might be more reasonable. if there is not one already

In GSF they assign the group as if it is the best of the four. Not saying that would work in pvp but weighting a group differently is an option. 

I think if you want to discuss alternative maps that should be on a separate thread. The discussion brings up the question of metal weights and should that be discussed again possibly in another thread. Minor changes here.

Sometimes a small change like no longer allowing people to hide under the ramp to the end zone to catch passes helped the original huttball game.  Adding the speeder cappers helped the Yavin map as well as the back door stairs both in their original design. So focus on new ideas to help balance the games no matter how small.   

Also as there is a limit to the time one player can have the ball maybe there should be an overall team time limit to prevent a team from  just holding the ball and running the clock.  A shot clock.  Teams do run up the kills and metals passing the ball around to each other, after all in huttball a 6 goal leads end the game before the final clock runs out.  As in chess make it so you can not return the  same position three times. Maybe a player can not hold the ball three times in a run to the goal.  Alternatively limit non-forward passes.

More ideas please.

[kjarnage]

I have seen a first warning sign. Four people dropped out of a match because it  was lopsided. Willing to take the stick of not being able to queue. This and the longer queue times seem to me to reflect dissatisfaction. The stick was needed at the time but now we need the carrot. It is time to apply a carrot while working on other options to even the battlefield.

The carrot should be to give two rather than one credit for a lose. Now people who are constantly winning may object that this is rewarding failure. I agree! But I rather reward failure than spend longer in a queue, or worst not seeing a pop at all.  Try to keep things going while you consider other changes. Do not drivee people away from PVP with the status quo.

 

[krackcommando]

28 minutes ago, kjarnage said:

I have seen a first warning sign. Four people dropped out of a match because it  was lopsided. Willing to take the stick of not being able to queue. This and the longer queue times seem to me to reflect dissatisfaction. The stick was needed at the time but now we need the carrot. It is time to apply a carrot while working on other options to even the battlefield.

The carrot should be to give two rather than one credit for a lose. Now people who are constantly winning may object that this is rewarding failure. I agree! But I rather reward failure than spend longer in a queue, or worst not seeing a pop at all.  Try to keep things going while you consider other changes. Do not drivee people away from PVP with the status quo.

 

the person who enjoys pvp and has a general sense of justice screams hard no to this. 1 credit for a loss is more than fair.

however, awarding 2 per loss gets rid of the lemmings quicker b/c they complete their weekly seasonal targets quicker. all of the rewards are already grindable for...Pete's...sake!

unfortunately, that also reduces the pool population and makes literally every problematic thing about BW PVP over the past 12-odd years worse.

Edited October 11, 2023 by krackcommando
typos

[Lord_Malganus]

12 hours ago, kjarnage said:

 Do not drivee people away from PVP with the status quo.

 

Yes that would be a logical approach.

[kjarnage]

What is sad is nothing was said about 7.4 about even minor changes to PVP.  to help balance the games.

The issue of 1 vs. 2 points for a lose works two ways.  It is true that those that losers would finish their weekly faster with a 2 point lose.  Reducing the repeats by that alt. The benefit of the 2 point lose is so the losers will not drop out permanently before they get better.  This also goes to the point if the fights are so unbalanced that will discourage players also. 

The kills by player is also a good way to discourage players. It provides emphasis like on a 6-0 huttball game the kill ratio was 15 to 1. Clearly the kills contributed to the score.  MVP voting was better, and could be better again especially if making and receiving the  votes had more value.

 

[TrixxieTriss]

7 hours ago, kjarnage said:

What is sad is nothing was said about 7.4 about even minor changes to PVP

What’s sad is the devs don’t care that they’ve mortally wounded swtor PvP over the last several years. And they’d rather let it bleed out now than apply any sort of triage to slow the decline 🙁

[kjarnage]

Updated survey of 20 matches showed six close matches, three matches the under dogs ( fewer kills) won Big cheer for objectives),  eleven matches totally unbalanced with the worst having 54-1 and 23-1 kill ratios. So more than half the matches were mismatched.

I tend to agree 4 to a premade group should be the max and premade groups set on opposing sides. PVP might be the best place to look at balancing classes although not sure if the two class system makes that harder to track.  

Bring back the ability to hover the curser and see the player's character class, as I really do not want to memorize the symbols. 

Players should take responsibility to call out players hiding in the corner. You can see them in the battlefield map. I have gone a step further and have pulled a stealth character hiding on the wrong side of the bridge for no good reason!   Maybe like GSF a contributing warning given before being kicked, Here guarding should be contributing as well as being near objectives.  Similarly the character ratings should be increased whn in a premade maybe not like GSF where each is treated as the top ranked in the group.

As far as PVP gear effectively at level 80 this has been brought back to some degree. It seems this is more balanced not to give a huge advantage as PVPers once had.  I am ok with this balancing letting PVErs have fun too.  Let us not make the balance worse by have a huge difference in PVP and PVE gear as existed before.

I tend to see a lot of complaints but few suggestions of how to improve pvp or even comments on my suggestions. Minor suggestions are not going to tip PVP to bring total balanced but lets put forth ideas to change the status quo. If they change the balancing some other minor revision would but guard rails on things getting a lot worse.  Complaints are good, suggestions are better, debate on suggestions is also good. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[TrixxieTriss]

8 hours ago, kjarnage said:

Bring back the ability to hover the curser and see the player's character class, as I really do not want to memorize the symbols.

100% this 👆

[kjarnage]

The random sequence of the 8x8 maps should be modified. If the huttball score is 6-0 or any score with the score win (having 6 more goals) the next map should never be the same huttball map.  A similar approach on other maps. Change the maps if the fight was not balanced well. 

If the scores and kills are balanced then do a replay of the same map. 

I see a lot more people dropping out and taking the time delay when the game is a slaughter.  I should not be seeing 33-1 kill ratios! It kills people desire to play PVP.

 

[kjarnage]

Another 50-1 kill ratio again showing the problem with balancing.

[BallisticKaine]

Lets be honest, Madness/Balance needs nerf for its mobility, stun/slow, selfheal, damage output. When premade teams run multiple of these classes together full well knowing what they are doing it ruins the game. There is no counter to it. Also lets not forget Sniper/Gunslinger Engineering/Saboteur with Broken Ionic Discharge tactical. Can't counter a premade of that as well.

Class/Spec stacking needs to be prevented all around. 

Edited November 12, 2023 by BallisticKaine

[kjarnage]

Not stacking in pre-mades is a good idea but groups need to know the limits. You can stack not healers already.  

Saw a 40-1 kill ratio, a person dropped out. It would seem better to take the penalty because the grouping will not get better. Point in fact the next group recorded ZERO kills and as expected there was one person dropping out. 

The point is this is bad for the game and rather than just concentrate on improving graphics make changes to PVP.  You already have lots of doable ideas!

 

 

[TrixxieTriss]

20 hours ago, BallisticKaine said:

Lets be honest, Madness/Balance needs nerf for its mobility, stun/slow, selfheal, damage output. When premade teams run multiple of these classes together full well knowing what they are doing it ruins the game.

Class/Spec stacking needs to be prevented all around. 

Let’s be more precise instead of just saying let’s nerf the whole of the class’s abilities into the ground. 

Yes, madness’s damage is OP, but you don’t need to nerf their mobility, heals, slows or stuns.

What they need to do is reduce their easy damage output to a similar lvl as Lightning. Because once you start messing with all their other abilities, it flows into Lightning & Healing specs too, which ends up ruining those specs. 

As for class/role stacking. It doesn’t matter the class, if they stack in a match it can be a problem. Ie whole teams of Assassins, operatives, juggs, Maras, PT’s or Mercs is as bad as whole teams of Sorcs or snipers. Same as having a whole team of healers or tanks is a problem. 

Class stacking is a result of the devs not  balancing the classes better & not implementing a better matchmaking system.

Lastly, wether people support premades or not, it’s impossible for matchmaking to fix class stacking with premades mixed together with solo players unless they put restrictions on how many of “x type” can be in one group. Which we know the devs won’t do. 

Edited November 13, 2023 by TrixxieTriss

[TrixxieTriss]

Ive seen one really mediocre group of players running an 8 man premade, with 2x Assassin Tanks, 2x operative healers & 4x DPS mixed Sin/Ops in the group. Besides the fact that they are already in a 8 man premade. That sort of combo gives them a massive advantage over every team in every map type if they play to the stealth’s tactical strengths. 

Anyone who actually wants proper matchmaking, needs to honestly recognise that it can never happen while premades are mixed in with solo players. 

[RACATW]

2 hours ago, kjarnage said:

Not stacking in pre-mades is a good idea but groups need to know the limits. You can stack not healers already.  

Saw a 40-1 kill ratio, a person dropped out. It would seem better to take the penalty because the grouping will not get better. Point in fact the next group recorded ZERO kills and as expected there was one person dropping out. 

The point is this is bad for the game and rather than just concentrate on improving graphics make changes to PVP.  You already have lots of doable ideas!

 

 

I agree. The devs should put a limit to the amount of sorcs / whatever that can q together at once.

[BallisticKaine]

1 hour ago, TrixxieTriss said:

Let’s be more precise instead of just saying let’s nerf the whole of the class’s abilities into the ground. 

Yes, madness’s damage is OP, but you don’t need to nerf their mobility, heals, slows or stuns.

What they need to do is reduce their easy damage output to a similar lvl as Lightning. Because once you start messing with all their other abilities, it flows into Lightning & Healing specs too, which ends up ruining those specs. 

It didn't mean nerf everything, but something needs to be nerfed to Madness/Balance Spec. 

[TrixxieTriss]

2 hours ago, RACATW said:

I agree. The devs should put a limit to the amount of sorcs / whatever that can q together at once.

The problem with that is the queues would get longer between pops. They won’t even reduce premade sizes.