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Post by Deleted on Jan 31, 2017 18:11:33 GMT -5
Since you guys said about the same thing.... I don't think I was saying the same thing. I am Mr. Positivity when it comes to slugging away with the big boys. It sounds like I clearly need more awesome lessons from you, but I am not complaining or saying the game cannot be played as is. I relay my experiences on Android to others (about win rate, etc) as a means to share information to help others. As for being a better player, and wrecking Top Tier face, yes, I am all for it. In order of importance, I think it is this: 1) I agree with you that the reading your randoms is a huge skill in this game (as someone that does not clan, I really enjoy this element). What are they doing? Who is capping? Are all 5 going one way and leaving the other route exposed? Read and react. 2) Next, i think general map understanding is the next most crucial skill - where are the reds going? How many are lights based on their speed to flank? How many are using plasma? (you can tell by the ones that shoot off at their own spawn if you have a view) Where are your blues going? What is their mix? Anyone you should "follow and support", etc, etc. 3) Third most crucial to me is when to engage. Blue Plasmahad vs Red Plasma Griff or Carnage? Yes please. My RDB Griff vs pair of fast aphid Geps? No thanks. Sometimes, you have to plug a hole with whatever tools you got, but most often it is beneficial to pick your battles carefully. 4) Little tricks like figure 8s and corner-shooting, I think are the least impactful from the above list. I can corner shoot the 12/12 Lance and sneak in a few more damage, sure, but hopefully doing #1-#3 above keeps me from facing down the 12/12 Lance to begin with. Mistakes in #1-#4 above get me fried. End of story. Cheers!
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Post by anindyameister on Jan 31, 2017 18:15:59 GMT -5
The MM can't make other players play with more skill and it can't make more skilled players downscale their hangar This is the core of the problem imo. If only we lived in an ideal world where unicorns were real, and every level of gear was associated with a perfect player pool with skills ranging from worst to best.
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Post by Muhlakai on Jan 31, 2017 18:25:27 GMT -5
The MM can't make other players play with more skill and it can't make more skilled players downscale their hangar This is the core of the problem imo. If only we lived in an ideal world where unicorns were real, and every level of gear was associated with a perfect player pool with skills ranging from worst to best. But we don't. So if only someone wrote a short guide to help target the learning efforts of folks who used to have a high win% and are now struggling...
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Post by anindyameister on Jan 31, 2017 18:26:55 GMT -5
I had a shower thought moment. What if pix introduced AI bots ? That way any desired level of "player" with predictable skills can be generated to pad a team of insufficient players with similar skill AND gear level.
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Post by boomsplat on Jan 31, 2017 18:27:45 GMT -5
Put it another way. In order to win, you must have SOME advantage over your opponents that you can exploit. If their speed, health and weapons are all far superior, the only thing left is tactics. In other words, it is possible to use superior tactics to defeat a stronger opponent. But if your opponent also is equal to you in tactics, there's no way to win against them. Obviously you have found a way to exploit a tactical advantage against stronger opponents who are not tactically equipped to counter you. I guess I'm still not finding that tactical advantage in very many matches. SUPERIOR TACTICS ARE RUINING THE GAME. WHY CANT WE ALL JUST BE MEDIOCRE AND HAVE FUN? WHY MUST WE TRY TO BETTER OURSELVES?
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Post by Spoopy Scary Haunter on Jan 31, 2017 18:36:42 GMT -5
Put it another way. In order to win, you must have SOME advantage over your opponents that you can exploit. If their speed, health and weapons are all far superior, the only thing left is tactics. In other words, it is possible to use superior tactics to defeat a stronger opponent. But if your opponent also is equal to you in tactics, there's no way to win against them. Obviously you have found a way to exploit a tactical advantage against stronger opponents who are not tactically equipped to counter you. I guess I'm still not finding that tactical advantage in very many matches. SUPERIOR TACTICS ARE RUINING THE GAME. WHY CANT WE ALL JUST BE MEDIOCRE AND HAVE FUN? WHY MUST WE TRY TO BETTER OURSELVES? Agreed! i mean, who needs ''Progression'' and ''skill''. we should just go back to the old MM so we can go back to destroying noobs in Bronze/Silver. i mean, its not like what we are dealing with now is what the newbs how to deal with, pffffft. ;3
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Post by Muhlakai on Jan 31, 2017 20:46:41 GMT -5
I had a shower thought moment. What if pix introduced AI bots ? That way any desired level of "player" with predictable skills can be generated to pad a team of insufficient players with similar skill AND gear level. First, AI bots would be really difficult to program to an adaptive degree, especially with all of the different bot setups you'd want them for. Second, why bother calling it a multiplayer game at that point?
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Colonel Angel
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Kickin' Butts n Takin' Names
Posts: 9
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Pilot name: Colonel Angel
Platform: Android
Clan: [IM-R] IronMERK Reserves
League: Gold
Favorite robot: Orkan/Aphid Gareth
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Post by Colonel Angel on Jan 31, 2017 21:03:35 GMT -5
its because the new MM benefits players using with their best equipment the most. if your level 30 and still running 4/6 or whatever bots, you arent running what you should be, hence you are penalized because you are identified as a clubber by the elo. all you have to do is level up your gear a bit, and play smarter instead of charging out into center beacon with 4 reds locked onto you and whining about how its the MM's fault you died I have got to disagree unfortunately, ive only played three months, almost to 2k wins, have given close to three hundred bucks cause this is (was) truly a fun game, now with what ive paid good money for, two gallahads two gareths, and a lancey, i cant break 4th place, what a croc... all i see is lvl 12 bots and lvl 12 weapons... i dont care how stromg it thinks i am, how the 「fluffernutter」 do my lvl 8 gallahads go toe to toe with lvl 12 cossack even with lvl 12 orkan... im not gonna admit to having to play the garbage non paying players play... all my paid bots and lvl 3 lvl 8 orkans and 4 lvl 8 aphids have to sidelined? And i have to play all poop bots and weapons, while upgradin stuff im not playing with or using now?
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Post by Spoopy Scary Haunter on Jan 31, 2017 21:13:42 GMT -5
its because the new MM benefits players using with their best equipment the most. if your level 30 and still running 4/6 or whatever bots, you arent running what you should be, hence you are penalized because you are identified as a clubber by the elo. all you have to do is level up your gear a bit, and play smarter instead of charging out into center beacon with 4 reds locked onto you and whining about how its the MM's fault you died I have got to disagree unfortunately, ive only played three months, almost to 2k wins, have given close to three hundred bucks cause this is (was) truly a fun game, now with what ive paid good money for, two gallahads two gareths, and a lancey, i cant break 4th place, what a croc... all i see is lvl 12 bots and lvl 12 weapons... i dont care how stromg it thinks i am, how the ?firetruck? do my lvl 8 gallahads go toe to toe with lvl 12 cossack even with lvl 12 orkan... im not gonna admit to having to play the garbage non paying players play... all my paid bots and lvl 3 lvl 8 orkans and 4 lvl 8 aphids have to sidelined? And i have to play all poop bots and weapons, while upgradin stuff im not playing with or using now? odd. ive played about 1-2 months of this game and only saw about 10 12/12 guys for my first couple of matches and from then on ive been getting great matchups, and have been getting 10 gold most matches. maybe its all your britbots bumping you up?
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Colonel Angel
Recruit
Kickin' Butts n Takin' Names
Posts: 9
Karma: 4
Pilot name: Colonel Angel
Platform: Android
Clan: [IM-R] IronMERK Reserves
League: Gold
Favorite robot: Orkan/Aphid Gareth
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Post by Colonel Angel on Jan 31, 2017 22:00:07 GMT -5
I would say thats safe to assume, but bumping to facethe like of team flex? So many time ive seen flex on the other side, and never is there not at least four guys from clan rating 300 or under... even on my team, its just annoying, i wish i hadnt wasted all that money, thought it would be more fun, it only screwed me, just went looking for screen shots ive taken, found proof of my quick advance tho Play one match nov 5th to lvl 20 nov 5th.. made lvl 30 in a couple days... only just got my workshop to 15 yesterday, but now its always the same.... always fourth by at least 400k difference to first... often more than doubled what i get.... but its always... every time... i collect beacons, we lose, i go for damage i place last anyways, no beacon gold... so i have to pretend i didnt spend three hundred bucks, pretend i dont own 5 camebots, and a fury btw... and play all new bots? My golem and vityaz i started with are lvl 10 and ô now, so cant touch them either... have to buy 5 grifs? And not use the aphids and orkans i lvld over 8? Wow.... unbelievably stupid and boring
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Post by SuperHero on Feb 1, 2017 5:06:04 GMT -5
Hey Muhlakai, perhaps showing some of your own stats might help to show folks here that it's possible? Perhaps some matches and the corresponding hangars that opposed you? All talk doesn't help anyone here.
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Post by boomsplat on Feb 1, 2017 7:24:01 GMT -5
See, it recognizes that we're better than the average pilot, so it's giving our opponents a handicap just so they can survive our face-wrecking skills. It does this because they CAN'T get a fair match against us otherwise! You are so powerful that they need better weapons just to keep up! The best skill is learning to read your random teammates better. Muhlakai, I agree with a lot of your points - just maybe you can clarify these statements that I highlighted as I keep tripping up on them. The MM is handicapping you, right? Not your opponents because it is seeking balance. Skills vs bot/wep level - you see opponents who are heavier as a trade off vs your skill in fighting them. Am I getting something backwards on handicapping? And because you are not as powerful but more skillful that is translating into more powerful/heavier vs comparable level opponents. Said another way, if you were a H6/6 player, you would decimate other H6/6 players so that is why MM is giving you matches against pilots 4 levels above you. Maybe I am just reading these statements wrong....because I agree with your points on needing to better understand the intent of your team and the Reds and to have situational awareness in the match. I'm also fighting above my weight class on bot level and doing okay for some of the same reasons Muhlakai states....I'm a H6/9 player and now leveling up my bots to H9/9. My opponents are typically H9/9 through H11/11 players. I used to be a +80% plus win rate pilot in silver with geps and in a mixed line up in lo gold. Nowadays, I average around 60% with the normal fluctuations between 50-68%. I'll capture some screen shots of my latest matches per Super Hero's request as well as add in some things I've learned along the way in another post - nothing earth shattering, but fundamentals that I really have to pay attention to in these matches where opponents are less predictable on power levels based on the variety of skill levels you see in matches - in the old tier system, the bot/wep power was in a more predictable range so you knew how long you could trade fire against someone and last....now I can't make those assumptions unless I know their clan tag or have played against them enough to know their levels. Cheers!
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Post by frunobulax on Feb 1, 2017 8:35:28 GMT -5
Knowing when you can move actually lets you draw a ton of Reds way off to the side and out of position. When you can draw just three Reds towards you it gives the rest of your team a 5:3 advantage on the rest of the field. [...] The best skill is learning to read your random teammates better. As you figure out whether they're consistently capping and under which conditions you can learn how to better carry a game EVEN IN GOLD. Understand that you have to read the field, predict where your teammates are heading, evaluate their expected resistance, and place yourself as though you are the most important pilot on the field. You raise some points that I noticed in my play, too. But I'm afraid I have to go with an old Frank Zappa quote here: Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe.
Maybe I had a bad day yesterday, but I ran about 20 solo matches and my conclusion is that the main competition are idiots with hangars a few level above my own. I run a 6/7ish hangar and had games against 9/10ish hangars that just were horrible, and the bad thing is that the vast majority of the games horrible while hardly any games were fun. Fewer Zenit Nori Natashas, but still... So let's see, what happened in those 20 games yesterday? - Springfield. We win easily because we both spawn in the city, and I'm actually the only robot that ever crosses to the farm side and captures the 3 beacons there.
- Springfield, twice. We lose in a landslide because I am the only robot trying to capture the beacons on the farm side.
- Canyon, twice. Two red Treb Furys set up on the far side and I'm the only one attacking them. Since the reds protect them and I don't get any support I can't get in range. We never got close to capping the center beacon (except maybe for the first 60 seconds).
- Springfield, twice. Both spawns in the city. I head towards the far beacon in a Galahad because nobody else goes there. Just as I'm about to reach the the beacon, a blue Stalker (a) overtakes me and beats me by 2 meters to the beacon, center beacon is capped by the enemy, game lost, or (b) a blue Gary sprints from the center beacon that he capped (yay!) towards the beacon I'm just about to reach, while the other far beacon is captured by a light red robot that would have been easy meat for the Gary.
- Several games. 4 blue heavy robots pushing each other out of the way after spawning to get to a near beacon (that is of course out of the way, like the left beacon in DC).
- Shenzen, endgame, 4 red players left, while we were 6 blue players. I'm in a Fury, center beacon is red, enemy has the lead and 3 beacons. All of my teammates are on "our side" of the square. Eventually I make my way towards the center, very slowly, in my Fury as I have no robot left and none of my teammates tries to do anything. I actually manage to reach the center beacon but am shot down after turning it white. All the time my teammates neither gave me cover nor did they try to flank. No idea what they were doing, but some of them were in much faster robots. Don't know what is worse, getting no support from my teammates or being able to reach center beacon in plain sight of 4 reds that were not otherwise occupied.
- On DC, endgame with half a minute left, we're equal in domination but down in beacons. I'm spawning my last robot (Trident Fury). Enemy pushes towards the high left beacon and captures it. A Natasha is close to the beacon and kills the red, but then turns around and heads toward center without capping the beacon which would have been 10 steps away. Game lost, as the Fury was too slow to reach that beacon in time.
- Shenzen. I start with my Trident Fury for a change. The game proceeds up with 12 robots trying to shoot each other across the city, for 2 minutes nobody even tries to either flank or attack the center. Boring as hell. Funny thing is that the enemy didn't even hit me once in those 2 minutes. The game got a bit more interesting when the first midrangers were destroyed.
- In general, in the games I won I often had the least damage but often a few beacons. Seems like most players that don't try to snipe will head towards largest group of reds without thinking, like Lemmings. They do more damage this way, true...
- Shenzen, I'm in a Plasmahad and poledancing with a Aphid Stalker. The stalker always stay behind cover, goes to stealth, chucks a few Aphids and is back behind cover before I can really get a shot at it. (That was truly masterful use of a Stalker.) What pisses me off, at our side of a corner, so there were several blue robots behind me. I of course stayed on the outside, pushing the Stalker to the inside whenever it was not in stealth mode. So that stalker was in plain sight from the spawn corner. Do you think a single one of my teammates thought about shooting it? No, we continued this dance for maybe 2 minutes, at which time he got me with an Aphid burst.
- PP, about 1 minute left, 3 red beacons, domination about equal. We are 5 blue to 2 red. I'm spawning my last robot (Fury) and see that all 4 of my teammates are standing on the spawn hill, trying to snipe. Not a single one tries to reach a beacon. Of course I started crawling towards the nearest red beacon, but at some point it is clear that I won't reach it in time. I turn around and see that all teammates are still on the hill, waiting for a red to leave cover - in a variety of medium robots, every single one a lot faster than mine.
I will change my hangar now, at least for a time (and for random games), and will use my ragtag collection of midrange weapons (2 Zeus, 2 Tridents, 1 Trebuchet, the last one a snowflake win) to equip two more midrangers. Have a 2xTrident 1xZeus Fury now, might switch to Trident/Treb Fury and a Zeus/Pin Natasha. I also have a Molot Griff in storage (level 5 weapons only though) that I might dust off, giving me a total of 3 midrangers. But I am sure that I won't care much for this playing style.
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Post by [AurN]Zenotaph on Feb 1, 2017 8:48:11 GMT -5
You know, what I hate the most about the new MM? I haven't been able to smack mageps for quite some time now...
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Post by buzzard on Feb 1, 2017 9:03:22 GMT -5
- Shenzen, endgame, 4 red players left, while we were 6 blue players. I'm in a Fury, center beacon is red, enemy has the lead and 3 beacons. All of my teammates are on "our side" of the square. Eventually I make my way towards the center, very slowly, in my Fury as I have no robot left and none of my teammates tries to do anything. I actually manage to reach the center beacon but am shot down after turning it white. All the time my teammates neither gave me cover nor did they try to flank. No idea what they were doing, but some of them were in much faster robots. Don't know what is worse, getting no support from my teammates or being able to reach center beacon in plain sight of 4 reds that were not otherwise occupied.
Haha! This one made me laugh. I have one fury in my hanger as well and I feel your pain. You know your team is clueless when you are trying to cap beacons in a fury.
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Post by Trogon on Feb 1, 2017 9:07:41 GMT -5
I'm also fighting above my weight class on bot level and doing okay for some of the same reasons Muhlakai states....I'm a H6/9 player and now leveling up my bots to H9/9. My opponents are typically H9/9 through H11/11 players. I used to be a +80% plus win rate pilot in silver with geps and in a mixed line up in lo gold. Nowadays, I average around 60% with the normal fluctuations between 50-68%. I see from your profile that you are playing on ios. It sounds like the matches you are getting are not quite as ridiculous as the typical ones I've gotten the past couple days on Android. I run 6/8 mediums and heavies, and consistenly was getting matches where at least half the other team is 11/11 to 12/12, and I'm often the lowest levels in the match. If I'm in a match where the competition is 1-2 above me, its usually very competitive and enjoyable, unless my team are idiots. But when there are 3-5 top tier clan players on both teams, with bots 6 levels above and weps 4 levels above, who are no slouches when it comes to skill and tactics, boy I'd have to be one superstar pilot to consider that a fair fight.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2017 9:11:27 GMT -5
Before the new MM I was blowing up bots and having fun, then the dark time arose over War Robots, I was consumed over who I was playing, what their hangars looked like and their individual stats.
Then old woman definitely my better half, brought me to my senses. She understands my love of games and always have. She saw I was too consumed in the trivial, and not concentrating on what I like about games. Having fun. I can't repeat exactly what she said because there are some young tender ears here.
It's all relative to where you are in the game. If you just downloaded and played your first match, you have nothing to compare to. If you have been playing a while, you noticed and your climb to the top falter a bit, you are upset. TT, less so because they have been battling TT, so I think they were less affected. Their only drawback was boredom. I doubt the majority of them have fun blowing up lvl 6 bots.
So there are a lot of arguments as what you like or dislike about it.
This is what I think is awesome, I'm back to blowing up bots and having fun, win or lose.
Old man
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Post by Trogon on Feb 1, 2017 9:21:23 GMT -5
Before the new MM I was blowing up bots and having fun, then the dark time arose over War Robots, I was consumed over who I was playing, what their hangars looked like and their individual stats. Then old woman definitely my better half, brought me to my senses. She understands my love of games and always have. She saw I was too consumed in the trivial, and not concentrating on what I like about games. Having fun. I can't repeat exactly what she said because there are some young tender ears here. It's all relative to where you are in the game. If you just downloaded and played your first match, you have nothing to compare to. If you have been playing a while, you noticed and your climb to the top falter a bit, you are upset. TT, less so because they have been battling TT, so I think they were less affected. Their only drawback was boredom. I doubt the majority of them have fun blowing up lvl 6 bots. So there are a lot of arguments as what you like or dislike about it. This is what I like, I'm back to blowing up bots and having fun, win or lose. Old man I dont need a 90% win rate and ultimately I wouldn't care what levels I was facing if the match is competitive and feels like a fair fight. That's all I and others are asking for, is a fair fight, and for me, the new mm is not giving me that. I'd be thrilled with a 50% win rate if it was a fair fight.
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Post by frunobulax on Feb 1, 2017 9:40:44 GMT -5
The fun in the game is if you have close matches, and win them about half the time or better. I still have a win rate over 50%, but it feels like most games are pushovers, one way or the other, and most of the close ones are lost due to stupidity of some blue players. If I play for 3 hours and have maybe 3 games where I say in the end "good one, this was close", that's not enough.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2017 9:51:01 GMT -5
Trogon I was giving my answer to the original post question. I am guessing you fall into the middle of my "It's all relative" statement. I wasn't trying to argue the merits of the new MM, right or wrong. Or express what anybody else thought or felt about it. I was just answering the question of the OP. So now I'm going to go blow up some bots and have fun, win or lose.
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Post by Conflict's Student on Feb 1, 2017 9:56:55 GMT -5
The fun in the game is if you have close matches, and win them about half the time or better. I still have a win rate over 50%, but it feels like most games are pushovers, one way or the other, and most of the close ones are lost due to stupidity of some blue players. If I play for 3 hours and have maybe 3 games where I say in the end "good one, this was close", that's not enough. It would be nice if the matchmaker preferentially grouped by player rating, only resorting to hangar strength as an equalizer when forced to "rubber band" to get matches going. That way more sophisticated players would be satisfied with the quality of their gameplay while less-experienced players wouldn't feel like they were usually irrelevant to the outcome.
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Post by boomsplat on Feb 1, 2017 10:26:12 GMT -5
I'm also fighting above my weight class on bot level and doing okay for some of the same reasons Muhlakai states....I'm a H6/9 player and now leveling up my bots to H9/9. My opponents are typically H9/9 through H11/11 players. I used to be a +80% plus win rate pilot in silver with geps and in a mixed line up in lo gold. Nowadays, I average around 60% with the normal fluctuations between 50-68%. I see from your profile that you are playing on ios. It sounds like the matches you are getting are not quite as ridiculous as the typical ones I've gotten the past couple days on Android. I run 6/8 mediums and heavies, and consistenly was getting matches where at least half the other team is 11/11 to 12/12, and I'm often the lowest levels in the match. If I'm in a match where the competition is 1-2 above me, its usually very competitive and enjoyable, unless my team are idiots. But when there are 3-5 top tier clan players on both teams, with bots 6 levels above and weps 4 levels above, who are no slouches when it comes to skill and tactics, boy I'd have to be one superstar pilot to consider that a fair fight. Brother, I feel your pain. That was my experience my first 4 days on the new MM. I have no idea why it has settled down for me. It was going in streaks for me - win 6 out 8 and then lose 8 in a row where red bot/wep level were the key drivers. now it is more about 3 and 4 slot hanger pilots and the occasional mismatch in bot/wep level. i have no idea why android and iOS are having such different experiences in our second week. I agree with you that fighting a number of 11/11 and 12/12 opponents is a sure way to lose no matter your skill level so don't take my comment as just being more skillful will make up the difference....as things become more equal, it can make a difference. The stupidity of the whole thing is that MM does not seem to be settling down more uniformly for all of us. If it doesn't, I know a number of pilots will be making decisions to stay or go - about half of my clan is on the fence about quitting...100% of us are playing less....and overall most of us do well in the new MM. the unpredictable nature and inability to be competitive with 12/12 squads in 6v6 matchups are our key issues.
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Post by buzzard on Feb 1, 2017 11:13:30 GMT -5
On IOS, the random matches have mostly settled down for me as well. I am noticing if I have a streak or my win% touches 70% I have a few matches where I am WAY outgunned (my 7/8 hangar VS 11/11 r 12/12 just like others are seeing). Your point on the clan squad matches is an important one though. Trying to squad up matching hangar strength still ends up with us over-matched 80% of the time. I am crossing my fingers that once they have the MM where they want it and have the league tiering in place, that this aspect of the game becomes manageable again. As it stands right now, I am noticing a lot less clan squading going on since we are often getting destroyed. It is disappointing since nice strategic matches, with the entire team on the same page are few and far between in random play. To me these are the most fun.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 1, 2017 11:31:23 GMT -5
My win rate has deteriorated sharply after the 29th. I was at high of 76% and have fallen steadily to a low of 42% In some aspects I believe my skill has improved but the OVERALL play experience has DECREASED substantially!! I can live with 50ish win rate with increased competition, I want that! When I review my numbers my efforts have not had a substantial impact on the result. I started to track (write down) specs on blues and reds after 2 full days of heavy play. I do not understand what calculation / formula / statistically analysis would continue to place me in TT battles. A VERY disappointing aspect come from the hollow wins. I am on the sidelines of these rare wins, net zero to little gold. My level 6 bots do NOT compete with level 10-12 bots. My level 8.5 weapons do NOT compete with level 10-12. After taking the time to write it down it looks more dismal. I have 5 wins in 13 battles: 6th x2, 4th, 2nd, & 1st. 8 losses ranking: 5th x2, 4th x2, 3rd x2, 2nd x2, 1st. I am predominantly the weakest hanger in the group, so those that I perform better than have better equipment.. There is VERY LITTLE satisfaction resulting from this, as the rewards are few & far in between. How do I ever expect to compete with the top tier if it will take approximately forever to get there. At a mid 40ish win rate and only earning any Au 50% of the win = equals forever. I have been trying to play through & was around 1000 cups ave. There seems little point to play being reduced to be target practice for those with better hangers. Not to derail the OP, but I run a similar strength hangar, had my 76% win rate get smashed down to 34% by facing level 10-12 hangars, but then the MM let up, and I am currently back at 68%. Now getting another round of max 12/12 hangars to face begining this morning, and am expecting to ride down to the 30% range again. Just my experience. You may be due for a run of easier play. Back to the OP, very good outlook. But it definitely takes some heavy patience to practice the "selective engagement" style of play against better equipped hangars, when so often, a single mistake means instant death, where the opponents can make several mistakes per match and get away with it. Heavy patience is just what millennials and mobile gamers have. Lol.
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Post by Dredd77 on Feb 1, 2017 11:58:36 GMT -5
I think it's important to recognize that different players want different things from the game. The reasons we come to play this game we have in common are quite varied. Yes, some do want a challenge. Others just want to go pew-pew and blow up a few things when they're sitting on the john. Reading this thread, I'm seeing different perspectives, but they're sort of talking past one another.
Hardcore players might do well to remember that the game thrives when you have more players playing it. People posting here about how their casual level of enjoyment is gone do warrant some sympathy. Not everyone who enjoyed lower-tier play was a clubber. Under the new MM, it's a very different model now.
Casual players might need to come to terms with the fact that indeed, the game is now on a progression model. For some that's disappointing- I also liked lower tier play. I've also been chewed up by the MM because of the disparity in progression between my hangar and my player stats (level 30, etc). There is hope on the horizon for the ability to have casual play as a mode, as mentioned by Pixo, but that is not today.
I've had to respond to the new MM by moving towards more Heavy bots, and leveling up my gear. What I have found, though, is that the game is a different kind of fun. I can't just grab the phone and jam out a few casual runabouts. Rather, I have to be in the mood for a hardcore competitive challenge. I'm not loving it less in some ways, but I am playing a little less often.
There are definitely other games out there. It might well be that War Robots, in its current configutration, just isn't for everyone. But the same goes for any game, really.
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Post by ł⸰§ĦȺĐ◎ŴƧŦḀɌ on Feb 1, 2017 12:04:26 GMT -5
Even under the old MM, I found myself describing it as 'bipolar' at times. The new MM seems to exaggerate this effect to a degree that is intolerable to a lot of players. It seems to oscillate between a maniac phase where my PR is too low and my matches are easy, and after a few OP (and typically boring) wins, the MM falls to a depressed phased where my PR is too high and my opponents can cream me with little to no skill. Rinse and repeat. What's different now (and what's awesome to me in the new MM) is a greater range of "sweet-spot" matches, where I'm paired with competent teammates, decent opponents, and relatively close equipment levels. I get a much bigger hard-on from a tooth&nail match with high quality fighting on both side, then what I ever got back in my gold-farming days from thrashing idiot noobs for higher AU gain rates.
It's strange, dealing with human reactions, because they aren't always logical or rational about it. Committing high damage relative to your 'peers', regardless of winning or losing a match, seems to be generally perceived as a punishment because of how the new MM appears to work. Doing so increases your performance rating and gets you matched up with a new batch of players with similar higher performance ratings. The heart of the issue for me is that those PRs could have been generated by a piss-poor player with equipment that's simply better than mine. You get a few of these kind of idiots on Red team, and suddenly it's a slam dunk win, and your PR goes up, making things appear to be worse for you with a new batch of stronger idiots. You get a few of those on Blue, and suddenly it's an obvious loss, and if you're stubborn and fight it out, you'll get a higher relative damage compared to the idiots, and your PR goes up but not as much, but still... it goes up.
And then there's the bipolar switching. Eventually your PR is high enough to create really badly mismatched equipment levels, even if everyone's PR may be similar. My android account is at ~ M10/10 & H9/8.5, but my iOS account is at H6/7. I can anecdotally confirm from my iOS account on others' reports that if your PR gets up there and you don't have 9/9 [or better] equipment, you get hit with piss-poor players with maxed 12/12 hangers. They don't use strats, they use the big red "win" button. I haven't noticed this effect [as much] on Android, and it wasn't until reading some of the recent posts on this thread that I could even postulate a theory. As much as I hate blame games, it seems this could be an intended effect of Pixo's renewed drive to increase their revenue streams.
But, I don't think this spells doom for the game. While the ratio of P2W vs. F2P features has been shifted to P2W, this is still one of the better ratios out there in mobile gaming. As a bigger bonus, skill really does matter in this game, and thus F2P is still a viable option. There are sooooooo many other mobile games I could list where that ratio is so stupid that you may as well just buy a premium game for a console and enjoy that instead. I cannot fathom how peeps be willing to spend hundreds of dollars on a F2P mobile game though. $300 and more? That's a used console system right there. Some folks sound like they need to adjust their priorities, in both life and gaming.
When you've realized "the game" has been stacked against you, and there is no way to "win" by conventional means, change what it means to be a winner in your own eyes. This is part of my Life philosophy, but it works very well for gaming too. My new personal "Win condition" is getting the most beacon captures on my team, regardless of winning or losing. By this measure I can buttress my ego during the MM's depressed phases, because I at least know that I'm not one of the idiots on the team that's contributing to a loss.
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Post by ł⸰§ĦȺĐ◎ŴƧŦḀɌ on Feb 1, 2017 12:58:02 GMT -5
I found this awesome older article that sums up a lot of my feelings about the recent conflicts the community is expressing about the new MM, especially in regards to equipment versus skills. Fighting games... precision skills with any "equipment" (fighter selection) vs. the dreaded button mashers using "better equipment" (fighters designed to be easy to use). I'm getting "deja vu" all over again. It's a great read. Maybe no answers for our current issues in War Robots, but yanno, the struggle is real, and it's been around for a long, long time. kotaku.com/in-defense-of-button-mashing-1648604756Addendum: I use to be a master player on Mortal Kombat Trilogy for the N64 back in the day. My 2 fav characters were Sub-Zero and Scorpion. I discovered an un-intended air-juggle combo with Sub-Zero that was 99% un-breakable without exquisite timing. I also mastered Scorpion's teleport jump abilities (in MK3 they buffed him by allowing forward teleportation as well as away) which allowed me to bounce all over the screen and defeat my opponents with hundreds of light hits that they couldn't predict. I got so good at this, my friends would refuse to play me unless I promised to avoid using those 2 characters, because I was too damned good with them and my friends didn't want to waste their time on a match they knew was lost from the beginning. As I mastered more characters, my friends started hating me more, and eventually, they asked me to always use a randomized character selection. That lasted about a month, until my general fighting skills with any character was enough to piss off my friends. So I used a special 'cheat code' to force a random character selection on every round and every death. Years later, my kids found the ol' N64 and got it working again. I played some rounds MK3 with my sons using my self-imposed handcaps, and guess what happened? I got button-mashed to death by my clue-less offspring So, I picked Sub-Zero... My older boy's response was priceless, "Dad, I love you, but you're an 「bum-bum hole」."
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Post by Muhlakai on Feb 1, 2017 14:25:18 GMT -5
See, it recognizes that we're better than the average pilot, so it's giving our opponents a handicap just so they can survive our face-wrecking skills. It does this because they CAN'T get a fair match against us otherwise! You are so powerful that they need better weapons just to keep up! Muhlakai, I agree with a lot of your points - just maybe you can clarify these statements that I highlighted as I keep tripping up on them. The MM is handicapping you, right? Not your opponents because it is seeking balance. Skills vs bot/wep level - you see opponents who are heavier as a trade off vs your skill in fighting them. Am I getting something backwards on handicapping? And because you are not as powerful but more skillful that is translating into more powerful/heavier vs comparable level opponents. Said another way, if you were a H6/6 player, you would decimate other H6/6 players so that is why MM is giving you matches against pilots 4 levels above you. Ha! Yeah, you've gotta love English. You are handicapped because you're better. They're given the handicap to help them. (I often use the mental visual of standing on boxes. If I'm taller then I'm handicapped by having boxes removed. They get given those handicapped boxes to make our heights equal.)
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Post by frunobulax on Feb 2, 2017 4:11:42 GMT -5
The fun in the game is if you have close matches, and win them about half the time or better. I still have a win rate over 50%, but it feels like most games are pushovers, one way or the other, and most of the close ones are lost due to stupidity of some blue players. If I play for 3 hours and have maybe 3 games where I say in the end "good one, this was close", that's not enough. It would be nice if the matchmaker preferentially grouped by player rating, only resorting to hangar strength as an equalizer when forced to "rubber band" to get matches going. That way more sophisticated players would be satisfied with the quality of their gameplay while less-experienced players wouldn't feel like they were usually irrelevant to the outcome. And place a player with a 6/6 hangar in the same match as a 12/12 guy because they have the same rating? It's the other way around, hangar score must be the basis and experience the modifier that gives you players with somewhat higher/lower hangars depending on your rating.
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Post by boomsplat on Feb 2, 2017 11:42:23 GMT -5
As promised, here is a match that is fairly representative of games I win or lose fighting with a H6.2/9.8 line vs others and doing okay. I usually do well enough to be top 3 win or lose unless I really screw the pooch with my bot drop sequence or miss a lot of shots. Red team had 2 max players and blue team had 1. Sorry about not crunching all the numbers but from rough estimation the red team was a bit more powerful in total (they had 30 bots vs our 28 and higher level bot and weps on avg). Now I realize this does not represent some of the situations you find yourself in because weps were much closer in line that bot level...but I was at the low end of both for either team. And we won on beacons while aggressively pushing our lower level bots working together to kill off their more powerful bots (they killed 21; we killed 14 bot). They could have also suffered disconnects so that is the other unknown factors. My success has been for some of the reasons Muhlakai points out on situational awareness and taking smart risks. I gained a lot of those skills by fighting spiders, rhinos, lances, galas, griffs, unicorns, and purple dragons as a gep driver using mags, aphids, spirals, and crvs. Here is my hanger - it is okay. And the blue team Red team
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