Post by frunobulax on Feb 9, 2017 5:02:01 GMT -5
Hi,
some random thoughts...
Assuming the dust settles, so that we 7/7ish hangars won't see 12/12 hangars anymore. Then I still see 3 major weaknesses in matchmaking, none of which will be fixed by the league system (according to everything we know).
I would also like to see an option for matchmaking: Allow the system to wait longer in order to find better opponents. For a random battle you are usually matched within 10-12 seconds, and it appears that the system will almost always wait that long in order to have a better player distribution over matches (compared to greedy filling of matches whenever one suitable squad is available). Why not allow the user to increase this voluntarily to 30 seconds (or 60 seconds for squads), to allow the matchmaking more time to find equal opponents?
Another thought: The complaints about "pay to win". (Sometimes you observe correctly, but sometimes you percieve something that just isn't there.) Many players complain about the lack of gold. We get 14 gold per match, so the average income should be something like 1.2 gold per match. I wonder if the income of the players that complain about it is really much lower than that, or if they just complain because they used to get much more in the past? I would love to see some additional stats in the player page, like average gold earned and average beacons capped, and also a record of the last 10 (and maybe last 200) games and not only the last 50. That would give us a good idea about players that tank (40% winrate in last 200 games but 90% in last 50), and it would also settle the question of gold income. It would also show if hangars running mostly beacon cappers have a gold advantage over heavy hangars or not.
Of course that shows the important of daily tasks. To get 60 gold you need to play 50 battles. Guess there are pros and cons (ability to earn gold even for casual players), but I guess I would prefer just a bit more gold from battles.
.f
some random thoughts...
Assuming the dust settles, so that we 7/7ish hangars won't see 12/12 hangars anymore. Then I still see 3 major weaknesses in matchmaking, none of which will be fixed by the league system (according to everything we know).
- Frustration levels will still be high. Two reasons:
If I run a 7/7 hangar then I don't mind getting beat by another player with a 7/7 hangar that plays well, or even a player with an 8/8 hangar. But it absolutely sucks to get beat by a bad 10/10 player that wins only because he has better weapons.
Even more important is that my teammates in random games are now those stupid 10/10 players. If you play with guys who open with a Natasha with a KWK, a Thunder, a Gekko and a Pinata and have never heard about beacon capping, then you're in for a world of frustration.
The problem is probably that the matchmaking makes no difference between a good 7/7 player and a bad 10/10 player, but it really should try to put those good 7/7 players in one battle and the bad 10/10 players in another battle, if the player pool allows for that. Pixo already uses a hangar score, so this should be easily doable. - 60% of all robots are now useless. (You can argue all you want that AG mediums still have value, I don't see any of them on the battlefield anymore.) I don't like it, because (a) I really miss the fast paced low silver battles of the past, using no heavies, WSP bots or Britbots, and (b) it reduces the variety of the game. If 80% of the robots are Griffins, Leos and Natashas (on lower leves) or DB Griffs, Galahads and Trident Furys (on higher levels) then it makes for less interesting games.
One possible fix here is to introduce "robot classes", like the old tiers, but officially. Say class 1 would be AG light bots, class 2 are AG medium bots and Gepard, class 3 are Stalker/Gareth/Carnage/Fujin/Rogatka, class 4 are Galahad and AG heavies, class 5 are the remaining robots. (Subject to discussion of course, and I might have missed a robot.)
Highest robot in hangar determines the class, within a class the usual matchmaking applies. Rubberbanding might occur over classes occasionally, though. A decent hangar score should respect these classes (like the old MM did), so if you mix a class 1 robot (say Cossack) with class 3 robots, then the class 1 robot should be allowed to have higher levels, maybe 1 level per class to keep it easy. (Is it fair to match a 7/7 Cossack with a 5/5 Fujin or Gareth? Maybe we need even more than 1 level per class. Maybe not.) - We absolutely need the ability to squad with teammates at a lower or higher levels. That could be fixed by the robot class system, or matchmaking adjustments, or whatever, but the fundamental ability to "strip down" to a common level of clanmates must be restored.
I would also like to see an option for matchmaking: Allow the system to wait longer in order to find better opponents. For a random battle you are usually matched within 10-12 seconds, and it appears that the system will almost always wait that long in order to have a better player distribution over matches (compared to greedy filling of matches whenever one suitable squad is available). Why not allow the user to increase this voluntarily to 30 seconds (or 60 seconds for squads), to allow the matchmaking more time to find equal opponents?
Another thought: The complaints about "pay to win". (Sometimes you observe correctly, but sometimes you percieve something that just isn't there.) Many players complain about the lack of gold. We get 14 gold per match, so the average income should be something like 1.2 gold per match. I wonder if the income of the players that complain about it is really much lower than that, or if they just complain because they used to get much more in the past? I would love to see some additional stats in the player page, like average gold earned and average beacons capped, and also a record of the last 10 (and maybe last 200) games and not only the last 50. That would give us a good idea about players that tank (40% winrate in last 200 games but 90% in last 50), and it would also settle the question of gold income. It would also show if hangars running mostly beacon cappers have a gold advantage over heavy hangars or not.
Of course that shows the important of daily tasks. To get 60 gold you need to play 50 battles. Guess there are pros and cons (ability to earn gold even for casual players), but I guess I would prefer just a bit more gold from battles.
.f
