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Solo/Duo Que Vs. 5 Man Team Que - Ultimate Discussion Rant


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I know there are a lot of people out there who want to be able to casual solo play in a competitive environment in this game and I am one of them. But the unfortunate truth is that dream isn't real. Guild Wars 2 Conquest is the wrong game to be playing if a player is looking for a fair & competitive solo play environment. This game is riddled with so much match manipulation in so many forms, most of it not even against the TOS which is why no action is taken against it. The amount of bunk dirty unclean matches in solo/duo que nowadays is astonishing. If you don't have someone getting mad and throwing the game because someone said something to them, then you have someone AFKing to answer their door to pay for a pizza, or an ALT account who is throwing because he has some personal rivalry with the Necro on your team, or there is a Plat 3+ player on the other team who is smurfing on an ALT that is currently ranked and placed as Gold 2, and if it isn't some chintzy non TOS breaking bullshit like that, it's actual $%^&ing blatant win trading, or the classic guy who has terrible ping who keeps DCing who should just STOP trying to que but for some reason he keeps doing it. And now with lower population, these problems have become much worse.

5 or 6 years ago or hell even 3 or 4 years ago, when you'd que solo the games were still primarily full of players who owned only 1 account, who were actually trying hard in legitimate fashion, who were playing by the rules. Running into win trading was far in between because not many people knew about it, and even running into general match manipulations didn't happen too often because people actually feared Arenanet administration back then. There was such a large player base that 9/10 of the players in your game were actually within about 50 rating of each other. But now... everyone has heard or read or watched youtube videos or streamers discuss win trading and how it works. Players no longer fear Arenanet administration because 7 years have gone by and they've seen the examples set by popular streamers and old pro players who have been caught breaking the TOS, who only received slaps on the wrist. And the population is so low at this point, that even with the complete absence of match manipulation, the algorithm can't do its job correctly. Simply put my friend... wanting to find any form of quality match making within solo or solo/duo only queues, is a pipe dream at this point. I hate saying that because I rather enjoy playing solo off discord, when I want to relax.

There are many reasons why all of this has grown into such a plague, but the two primary reasons are these: 1 - F2p accounts were implemented with absolutely no restriction on how many f2p accounts a single person could create and actually use in ranked seasons, which lead to heavy exploitation of leaderboard position blocking. 2 - Solo/Duo only opened the gates to mass match manipulation exploitation through synch queuing and alt throwing. No matter what we do as players within a solo/duo only que, we have no way to block ourselves from throwing, other than participating in match manipulations ourselves. <- When players began to notice THAT, this is when things got bad. And you mark my words right now reading this, it's only going to get worse as time goes on. This pattern of decay in match quality over 7 years and within the solo/duo queue system will continue to worsen as it has been doing since the day it was released.

The only thing that Arenanet could have done to save solo/duo or solo que modes, if acted upon about 2 or 3 years ago, would have been doing an intimidating mass ban phase where players were not allowed to come back. This would have saved us so much player base in the long run, if Arenanet would have shown that they cared about their game mode. We'd still be seeing a lot of veteran players sticking around to this day if that would have been the case, and match manipulation would be much thinner if players actually feared Arenanet's hand. 2 or 3 years ago, the population could have survived that and recovered from it. But now, the population is so low that it's like a stage 3 cancer patient who's too deep in the sickness to survive chemo. If they tried to ban phase now, the player base required to run the game mode wouldn't survive it.

Since that is no longer an option, we are looking at accepting what this game mode is. Solo/Duo ranked is a game mode where you roll the dice each and every time you que. We are long past the days where matches look like: 1575 1560 1555 1550 1545 on a team together, who were queued like this through solo joins, all players with 1 account who are actually trying hard. No, now we are looking at situations like this almost every game: 1650 1525 1500 1480 1420 where the risk is high that one if not two of the players on that team will throw for whatever reason that is, whether it is win trading alt throwing, or simply because some guy gets mad and he knows Arenanet won't do anything about it. The fact of the matter is... solo/duo only is producing absolutely shit quality match making man...

Look, I used to love the randomization behind solo que. I really enjoyed joining matches and playing with different people on different builds with different team comps against some other different random team comp every game. That is a good form of a gambit, variation, it keeps things interesting. This was still healthy 2 or 3 years ago even. But nowadays, it just doesn't work anymore due to every reason I've already mentioned.

At this point 7 years in, things are different. If we want to experience healthy matches again in Guild Wars 2 Conquest, we need to be able to know & trust who is in the teams that we que with. We need 5 man ques back for the main competitive seasonal mode for several reasons. I know this is hard for the solo que promoters to wrap their minds around, but it's true and it's the only hope we have of cleaning up the poor match quality monkey shit that solo/duo only and lower population has brought us:

  1. Sure, win trading can still happen with several methods. (A) A 5 man team synch ques with another 5 man team who is all on ALTs. they could easily land in the same match together and simply allow the team with the mains in it to win. (B) If it were 1-5 man que system in ranked, the 5 man team of mains could synch que with their 5 ALT friends, who could potentially land in many different ques, funking up the games of many other people. But is (A) & (B) really any different than what is happening now already? Think about this now. With Solo/Duo only, you DO NOT have the choice of forming a 5 man team for yourself. This means you DO NOT have the choice of blocking yourself and your team mates from being effected by match manipulations of all forms. You must eat those 3 random joins every single match that you que during the season. It's one big roll of the dice each and every time you que. But with a 1-5 man que system or 5 man only w/e, you HAVE THE CHOICE if you are wise and care, to pick up 4 guys that you've known over the years from your contacts list, and block yourselves from all throw activity in every game that you que that day. If the people who are win trading want to beat your team, they're gonna have to do fairly. This is ultimately the perk that comes with 5 man ques, and not enough people quite understand why this is important.
  2. INB4 "It isn't fair to those who want to play solo only" because that is an ignorant statement that too many people make, when they have no idea of the full ante of what is going on here between these two choices of solo or 5 man teams. I notice that the very very large majority of people who vouch and advocate solo or solo/duo only, are mostly all people who still believe they are getting fair matches while queueing solo or solo/duo. These tend to be people who were not around 3 or 4 or more years ago, and they didn't get to see what the match maker looked like when it was actually working. They also tend to fear the 5 man team because they are generally more of the loner type of player, who if they had a choice, would just always play solo. So in their perceptions that "solo/duo or solo only is still rendering me fair matches" they idealize going against a 5 man team as the ultimate unfairness. If I were a player who had only been around for a year or two, or who had never looked so deep into what was going on as I have, I'm sure I would think the same thing. But this solo que point of view advocation is coming from a lack of information. There are truths going on here, that these people aren't recognizing. The 1st is everything I have already mentioned. The 2nd is that a system was freshly implemented right before they deactivated 5 man ques, which substantially increased the que rating of a 5 man, which made their matches much harder than normal, to compensate for the organization & communication offered through 5 man teams. When people are fearing the 5 man team, they are remembering the days before that system was implemented, when being in a 5 man on discord really did make a huge difference vs. a bunch of solos of the same rating as the 5 man team. The 3rd is that, solo/duo or solo advocates are not realizing that they are not actually queuing in a solo world at all. It looks like it's a solo que, it may feel like it's a solo que, but it often isn't at all. Just as often as a solo would have to go against a 5 man in a 1-5 que system, he is being made to go against synch qued players in his supposed solo only que, who are working as a team in a voice chat, exactly like the 5 man team. The only difference between these two situations is that the 5 man team is at least going by the rules of the game, whereas the synch qued players who are gaming the system of the solo only que, are cheating and throwing on you to grant the win for their team on the other side who are currently on mains. Ether way, you're still going up against a team and losing to a team, just as often in solo que as you would be in a 1-5 man team que. It's important for everyone who reads this, to decide how they'd rather lose their games. Would you rather lose to a group of 5 good players who took their time to organize a real team who went by the rules, or would you rather lose because some butt sits in the spawn and chooses to throw the game on you? Really think about this one here, because this is the very essence of the difference in resolve between solo que or team que. Remember that with 5 man que, you actually have the choice TO BE that 5 man team and block the butt from throwing on you. With solo or solo/duo, there is no choice but to deal with the butt as often as he lands in your game.
  3. And INB4 INB4 "But it's still unfair to those who want to play solo." As I've already stated, that stance comes from either an uninformed perspective or a desire to be some kind of a loner who fears the social strengths behind teams. In my opinion it is not fair that Arenanet has catered to this demographic of ill informed solo advocates, who have the wool pulled so far over their eyes that they still believe they are getting some kind of fair & clean & quality match making out of solo solo/duo only. It isn't fair to the rest of us who do see what's going on, who would like to be able to protect ourselves from the effects of throwing and general assery. And for those still reading who are still thinking: "Well.. I don't care and I still want solo or solo/duo only." I think you've been playing solo in this game for so long, that you don't know what you're missing out on socially and all the perks of fun that comes with it. And you know what? If 1-5 man que was reenabled and a person chose NOT to participate with 5 man teams, at least HE GETS THE CHOICE TO DO THAT. Right now, there is no choice other than to let the monkey shit reign. That's not fair and it's not competitive.
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Out of the thousands of games I have played, I've only had 3-ish matches where I've felt match manipulation had possibly occurred.

Asides from those few, every other match was winnable. Losses were caused by poor gameplay from myself or my teammates (usually teammates lol).

My point is, there's no way I've been quing solo ranked consistently in high plat for years yet haven't ran into the "wintrading epidemic" I see so many of you talking about. Unless something balance-related is completely overtuned, blame yourself and not the game. If you learn from both wins and losses, you'll get better. I would probably be a terrible player if I believed that even a tenth of my losses were due to wintrading.

Anyways, I find it pretty funny how much time and effort all of these conspiracy theorists put into figuring out how players "match manipulate." I can guarantee that it almost always goes something like this:

  • "Hey, wanna que?" - Player One
  • "Sure." - Player Two
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I don't get it. By statistics alone, if you are put with 10 players of equal skill level, you will win 50% of matches. The higher up the elo ladder you go the more relevant it gets since it gets harder to farm.

Second you seem to only feel it's wintrading if you are on the losing team - that's not how it works. By statistics alone you win the same amount of games because you have wintraders on the other team instead, rendering your argument that it affects your rating moot. Sure the games won't be as enjoyable, which is a problem, but such is life.

The only reason for people to take ranked seriously, is for the leaderboard positions. This is relevant for 250 players of the population, and therefore you won't be affected by wintrading unless you a) get sniped by someone dedicated to end up in your games or b) put yourself at a disadvantage not using the tools given to you.

Both of these can be dealt with by creating an alt or just improving your soft reset rating allowing you a higher starting point and subsequent less amount of games needing to be played if it's that important. Sure I agree it's unfortunate, but all you can do is report the harassing wintrader to anet by email with proof if alts aren't your thing - it's a game after all, and there will always be players that feed on bothering others.

Trust me if you win every game that is not a wintrade, you will climb regardless. Everyone loses at some point, it's inevitable and out of your hands, but if you win the ones where you have a choice you are competing on equal footing with everyone else. Report and move on. Let people get their pizza as long as they help you win the game. Watch some youtube if you have a wintrader from the start. Even the #1 has to go through the same hoops as you to get there, whether they be wintrading or not.

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I definitely agree that the lack of adequate action taken against wintraders/griefers/idlers is a huge restrictive hurdle when agreeing on any sort of queue system. There really is little to no other competitive games that have so many people consistently trying to juke the system into giving them the easiest time possible, and so few who just want to play without dealing with the headache of it all.

It's to the extent, in my opinion; where, people like to blame the death(whether that's ongoing or already happened) on neglect and bad balance, and while those are some major contributing factors, I think ego played and equally large role in killing this game.

The lack of punishment from Arenanet is kind of a bummer, not going to lie. If someone bots, they get banned. If someone sells an account, that account is usually banned, but if someone invests real or virtual money into manipulating the outcome of ranked games, tournaments or just straight up boosting accounts that aren't theirs; they all get a free pass. Similarly so, people giving up and sitting in spawn; forcing their team to lose rank because they just decided they didn't want to play anymore should be taken a lot more seriously than just a little dishonor. Repeat offenders should have the chance to be banned for entire seasons, or ranked entirely.

Although, all that being said; classic wintrading hardly exists anymore, and that's only because it's unneeded. Why bother paying someone to take a dive for a match or two, when merged queues have completely wrecked competent matchmaking? A team consisting of the very two top players versus whatever the matchmaker was able to muster in 8-10 minutes will almost always result in the DuoQing winning.

I'm not just pulling that out my rear either. The Leaderboard has looked hideous for the past 4 seasons. In Season 13 there was an exploit that allowed a Duo partner to leave a match and incur no penalty to their partner, and from there; they've only found more ways to abuse it like queuing up with someone leagues below them to snipe lower ranks, free to boost those winrates 70, 80, 90% across multiple accounts too, like an illegal gambler celebrating beating charges by buying an all new Rolls-Royce.

That's about the full extent to which I agree with your post, because of a lot of the negative you mention comes from merged queues. I can't condone mixing SoloQ players with TeamQ, nor would I call for SoloQ to be removed entirely either.

When it comes to merging Solo/TeamQ, I think that's a bad idea because, even changing the effective rating of the TeamQ won't do much when the matchmaker values quantity over quality when choosing the SoloQ opposition. The same people you said deserve to be banned would have an actual field day with that, because now they can boost 5 people at once, acquire an even lower average rating to better snipe low ranks, and if they're worried and decide to mail someone on the other team a few gold to take a dive, they've paid for five players to boosted rather than just two. It's like giving a Pyromaniac a flamethrower, bad things are just bound to happen.

@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:It's important for everyone who reads this, to decide how they'd rather lose their games. Would you rather lose to a group of 5 good players who took their time to organize a real team who went by the rules, or would you rather lose because some butt sits in the spawn and chooses to throw the game on you? Really think about this one here, because this is the very essence of the difference in resolve between solo que or team que. Remember that with 5 man que, you actually have the choice TO BE that 5 man team and block the butt from throwing on you. With solo or solo/duo, there is no choice but to deal with the butt as often as he lands in your game.

To answer this question, obviously i'd want to lose to a more skilled 5-man that actually tried. When it comes to TeamQ only, eliminating SoloQ completely; I wonder why the option has to SoloQ OR TeamQ and not SoloQ AND TeamQ(Or any team-based competitive queue really) split, and that's my answer to this question. Like if I were to queue as a 5-man into TeamQ, i'd know for sure what i'd be losing to, just like if I queued separately to Solo, I know the risks in doing so.

I want to have the option to go from a team-based competitive mode when my friends are available, and back to SoloQ when they aren't. You can dismiss that as a misinformed bias if you want to, because that's exactly what it is; considering SoloQ and TeamQ have never coexisted separately in the game's history. I prefer that idea though, and I think we should try it; though I suppose i'm not totally opposed to TeamQ being the only option, or maybe something similar to that idea you had of making Ranked more like ATs. I would be forced to quit ranked in that scenario, but I can at least leave knowing the ego-fueled manipulation of the gamemode would be at an end. Now that would be how I lose with a smile.

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Alright, you guys are coming in hot with the "win trading" thing. Let us distinctly separate the definitions of "win trading" and "general match manipulations". I had just gone over all of this in a thread with Sindrener. When I say match manipulations, I am referring to: Random AFKs, Random DCs, People Ragequitting, People grief throwing to punish someone, General Smurfing where some Plat 3 worthy competitor plays an alt in the Gold 2 division with his cousin who just bought the game, ect ect. General match manipulations that don't even break the TOS, happen constantly all through the day. If you're not noticing this, I don't know what you say other than pay attention. When I say win trading, is when I am actually talking about win trading. In the thread with Sindrener, I had clearly stated multiple times that my good estimate on this topic, from my own subjective experience, is that roughly 1/4 games or sometimes 1/3 are some form of a match manipulation, and that only about 10% of those encountered match manipulations are actually organized win trading & alt throw phases to knock threatening players out of leaderboard positions. So let's lay off turning this thread into a win trade discussion, because this thread was about discussing the shitty match quality received through solo/duo only. <- And that is true, and it is mainly because of low population and people no longer fearing Arenanet's hand when they commit some form a match manipulation, regardless of if it's a purposeful throw or some guy answering his door to pay for a pizza.

@"shadowpass.4236" Look, I don't want to argue with you man, I respect you and your opinions. But some of the things you're saying here makes me wonder if you're playing the same game that I am, or if you are possibly playing on some kind of a separate secured server route que or something, where only certain people are allowed a pass. I mean seriously, most people definitely as of S17, even top 100 or even top 25 players, would tell you that there is definitely something wrong with about 1/4 or 1/3 matches they play. Something very visible, like a DC or a guy who AFKs at 100 to 50 because he throws a fit, or sometimes stranger things like a team who is winning at 350 to 20 points, then miraculously the opponents who previously were displaying absolutely no mechanical skill value in any way, all turn into final around AT material, and come back to win the match 350 to 500 with a sudden dominating triple cap and unbreakable spawn camp. <- I actually featured two videos in that discussion with Sindrener, both of which were the very first matches of the day that I logged in to play for two days in a row in ranked S17, as indicated by the dailies still present in the corner of my screen. One of the videos featured that exact situation happening. So when you say you've only ever seen a few matches over the course of thousands of games where you thought match manipulation was happening and that all the games you've ever been in were winnable, I don't even know how to respond to that. I often get incarriable matches where I am quite seriously, really, 1v2ing the entire game and not just holding but actually killing players and winning and not dying, but no matter where I am, the other two nodes are always the enemy color. I get matches where I'm against 1800 duos who are with faces that I frequently have seen for YEARS in this game, who I know are solid Plat 2 players who at worst drop to mid Plat 1 from time to time, yet my team is compromised of me hovering at 1600 with a bunch of random accounts I have never seen once, who perform like garbage and we lose 500 to 50 or less. I get plenty of matches that are certainly not winnable, and most people know exactly what I mean by that. So when you say that everything is fine on your end of match making, it makes me question a few things. We are somewhat similar in the way of how we look at things in this game, how we view it, how we explain it, and how we bring those details to the next level. This strikes me as odd that if we were experiencing the same que system and match qualities, that I would take such a hard left stance, but you would take such a hard right. That makes me wonder if we are experiencing two very different types of que qualities. I don't know how or why that would be happening and we don't need to go into that here in this thread, but it does make me wonder. I know you're no fool, and I know that you aren't simply "overlooking" obvious manipulations that are happening right in front of you, so I believe you when you say your match quality is decent. I would hope that by now, even if you don't agree with everything I say, that you wouldn't see me as a fool either. I hope you would trust my logic a little bit more than to assume I believe that every lose I have is a match manipulation and that is why I am in hear writing all of this. I'll tell you that, I base these ballpark statistics that I toss out, not only on my losses, but also my wins. One of the videos I had posted for Sindrener, showed my team actually winning, as I pointed out why I believed that someone or two on the other team was throwing for us. I base my opinions on this topic from my wins & my losses, as well as some very interesting discord conversations that I've had with some very interesting people.. and of course some logical reasoning as to why what happened in the match, didn't make sense at all vs. the flow of real matches where everyone is trying their hardest even if they suck. I can sternly make the statement that over the years, match manipulations of all forms have become much much more prevalent, which boomed and picked up the most pace during the implementation of solo/duo only.

I guess we can agree to disagree.

@rng.1024 said:I don't get it. By statistics alone, if you are put with 10 players of equal skill level, you will win 50% of matches.

Agreed, but that rarely ever happens anymore. Most matches nowadays due to low population are super lopsided. You're either winning 500 to 100 or less or you're getting smashed 100 to 500. I get maybe 1 or 2 out of 10 games nowadays that are within point values of 450 or even 400 to 500. So there is rarely ever "equal skill against equal skill" but rather the 50% win rate does remain somewhat real due to how it flip flops your super blowout wins and then gives you a super blowout loss.

@rng.1024 said:Second you seem to only feel it's wintrading if you are on the losing team - that's not how it works. By statistics alone you win the same amount of games because youhave wintraders on the other team instead, rendering your argument that it affects your rating moot. Sure the games won't be as enjoyable, which is a problem, but such > is life.

Ok so first of all, you're targeting the win trade topic only, and that's not what I'm talking about. I mentioned this already in the opening paragraph of this response.

"Me only feeling it's manipulation or win trading when I lose" is an assumption that you picked up due to your mental associations from other people complaining about this topic, who really do only ever complain rather than discuss, when they receive a bad loss. I don't blame you for assuming that I am the same way. However, it would change your opinion if you had seen the 3x youtube videos that I posted, featuring me winning matches, and then pointing out that how we won due to some form of match manipulation. Sindrener watched them, ask him about it. I also recently wrote in another thread, a story I had, where a particular person wanted to que with me. I was bored and it was early season so I qued with him. We got into the discord and he seemed like a cool guy. We proceeded to win like 10 games in a row, all blowouts looking like 500 to 100 or less. It as about 3 or 4 matches in when I became suspicious as to why in the hell were all of these games so ridiculous easy with little to no resistance at all on the opponent's side? I never get games like that man. I always have to work over time 1v2ing and shit, always winning and never dying to be able to win my matches. It was like on the 6th game or something, I happened to have my B screen up while viewing the enemy's roster. Then the guy who was in discord with me, messed up. He was running multiple voicechats and he somehow fumbled and activated his voicechat to me, at the same time I hear him discussing with 2 people in a different voicechat, what classes they should log in as. I heard him say "no no no no, log in as the DE, and come back as Necro" then the voicechat cut out. Immediately on my B screen, I see one of our team mates rejoin the game as a DE, and one of our opponents log out and come back as a Necro. The entire game, the Necro on the other team walked over to where the DE was, and let the DE farm him with 1HKOs. It was then that I knew, I had been anonymously invited to a session of win trading. Not gonna tell you who this person was, as of recently I've found out who it was. I appreciate the gesture, but nevertheless I'd rather see the game clean of this stuff ^^ Think what you want of me, but know that what I'm stating here, is coming from a long history and wide variety of first hand experiences with this stuff, not just getting pissed off at losing a match.

As for winning as many games as you lose to match manipulations, that definitely used to be true in previous seasons with higher population. but nowadays if you're edging over 1600, you're the only plat 2+ in que with that 1800 duo creeping around. It often results in getting messed up match making that looks like: 1800 1800 1500 1500 1500 vs. (You 1600) 1500 1500 1500 1500. And of course we know that even if you were winning due to win trades or match manipulations as often as you lose, you still lose A LOT more rating from a single loss at Plat 2+ levels, than you gain from a win, which is a bummer. On top of that, let's say that what you said is true. Well.. that still doesn't justify any of it. I mean people want real matches, not rigged matches.

@rng.1024 said:The only reason for people to take ranked seriously, is for the leaderboard positions. This is relevant for 250 players of the population, and therefore you won't be affected > by wintrading unless you a) get sniped by someone dedicated to end up in your games or b) put yourself at a disadvantage not using the tools given to you.
Sure I agree it's unfortunate, but all you can do is report the harassing wintrader to anet by email with proof if alts aren't your thing - it's a game after all, and there will > always be players that feed on bothering others.

Gotcha, but ironically enough, reporting players is exactly how you get targeted for que sniping, tons of social stigma, and near semi-permanent blacklisting from the teams & cliques of certain other players who are their friends. I've already learned my lesson on that one back in S6. This is why I will never again go any further than pointing out general ballpark statistics on what is happening and how it is being done. It's up to Arenanet to care.

@rng.1024 said:Trust me if you win every game that is not a wintrade, you will climb regardless. Everyone loses at some point, it's inevitable and out of your hands, but if you win theones where you have a choice you are competing on equal footing with everyone else. Report and move on. Let people get their pizza as long as they help you win thegame. Watch some youtube if you have a wintrader from the start. Even the #1 has to go through the same hoops as you to get there, whether they be wintrading or not.

For sure, 100% agree. But you know what? I'd climb a lot faster, avoid a lot of hassle & stress, and place a lot higher at the end of a season if there was less match manipulations win trade or general, and if there weren't a regime of alt accounts blocking top leaderboard positions.

That's just how it feel about it.

@Multicolorhipster.9751 They did actually have Solo Que & Team Que separate years and years ago. Then they turned it into Unranked and Ranked where Unranked and Ranked were originally both 1-5 man ques. It was what, as of S3 or S4 I believe, when they turned off the old guild league 5 man leaderboards and enabled solo/duo only. This happened roughly around the same time that ESL participation died. At first they weren't even letting people duo past 1600. You had to go solo as soon as you hit 1600.

I guess what I'm saying, we'll call it my opinion, is that solo only or solo/duo only or being able to duo into 1800+ or being gimped from duo at 1600 and then having to go solo, none of that matters. None of those alterations or tweaks would hit nearly hard enough to put a dent in the match quality as of the way it is right now. Disagree with me, I can respect it, but I'm telling you that the only thing that can change things around now is being able to entirely eliminate gambits in your teams. 5 man ques is the only way to make sure you can block yourself and your friends from random person who joins into your match, that could be a terrible player, someone throwing to make you lose rating, or some guy with terrible ping who's gonna DC at the start of the match.

Not sure exactly what people want out of the game mode at this point, but if they are in search of premium match quality, this is how to achieve it ^

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@"Trevor Boyer.6524" said:

  1. Look, I don't want to argue with you man, I respect you and your opinions. But some of the things you're saying here makes me wonder if you're playing the same game that I am.
  2. I mean seriously, most people definitely as of S17, even top 100 or even top 25 players, would tell you that there is definitely something wrong with about 1/4 or 1/3 matches they play. Something very visible, like a DC or a guy who AFKs at 100 to 50 because he throws a fit, or sometimes stranger things like a team who is winning at 350 to 20 points, then miraculously the opponents who previously were displaying absolutely no mechanical skill value in any way, all turn into final around AT material, and come back to win the match 350 to 500 with a sudden dominating triple cap and unbreakable spawn camp.
  3. So when you say you've only ever seen a few matches over the course of thousands of games where you thought match manipulation was happening and that all the games you've ever been in were winnable, I don't even know how to respond to that. I often get incarriable matches where I am quite seriously, really, 1v2ing the entire game and not just holding but actually killing players and winning and not dying, but no matter where I am, the other two nodes are always the enemy color.
  4. I get matches where I'm against 1800 duos who are with faces that I frequently have seen for YEARS in this game, who I know are solid Plat 2 players who at worst drop to mid Plat 1 from time to time, yet my team is compromised of me hovering at 1600 with a bunch of random accounts I have never seen once, who perform like garbage and we lose 500 to 50 or less. I get plenty of matches that are certainly not winnable, and most people know exactly what I mean by that. So when you say that everything is fine on your end of match making, it makes me question a few things. We are somewhat similar in the way of how we look at things in this game, how we view it, how we explain it, and how we bring those details to the next level. This strikes me as odd that if we were experiencing the same que system and match qualities, that I would take such a hard left stance, but you would take such a hard right. That makes me wonder if we are experiencing two very different types of que qualities. I don't know how or why that would be happening and we don't need to go into that here in this thread, but it does make me wonder. I know you're no fool, and I know that you aren't simply "overlooking" obvious manipulations that are happening right in front of you, so I believe you when you say your match quality is decent.
  5. I would hope that by now, even if you don't agree with everything I say, that you wouldn't see me as a fool either. I hope you would trust my logic a little bit more than to assume I believe that every lose I have is a match manipulation and that is why I am in hear writing all of this. I base my opinions on this topic from my wins & my losses, as well as some very interesting discord conversations that I've had with some very interesting people.. and of course some logical reasoning as to why what happened in the match, didn't make sense at all vs. the flow of real matches where everyone is trying their hardest even if they suck. I can sternly make the statement that over the years, match manipulations of all forms have become much much more prevalent, which boomed and picked up the most pace during the implementation of solo/duo only.

I guess we can agree to disagree.

  1. Likewise, for both sentences haha
  2. People on my teams rarely AFK or DC. The former occurs slightly more frequently. However, if I see people arguing in team chat, I just say, "Stop talking and focus. We're fine lol." 90% of the time my team buckles down and keeps playing. As for DCs, you can't really do much about them. If they come back, they come back. If they don't, they don't. From my personal experience, DCs are very rare. As for comebacks like those, those are just reverse snowballs. Getting a kill or two could mean the difference between whether or not you win the game from a 300 point deficit. Generally, PUGs don't know how to recover. So, it's not too hard for a good player to start and continue a snowball through good rotations.
  3. Don't get me wrong, I have a TON of uncarriable matches. However, I see what's happening. For example, I'm holding a 1v4 for 30 seconds on far. We don't have the other two points. Why?

    • My team wiped in the 3v3 mid fight and lost the 1v1 home.
    • One enemy capped both points while the other 3 came to outnumber me at my 1v1 at far.
    • My team starts trickling out of spawn, recapture the 2 nodes, and by the time they finish capping them and killing the solo player, 3 out of the 4 people I'm fighting give up and rotate back into my team.
    • The process repeats.

    In conclusion, my team is very bad and cannot win the teamfights nor 1v1s.So, what do I do? My choices are: make sure I'm in the team fights so my team has a better chance at winning them OR kill people in the 1v4 and hope my team rotates in to help me clean up. Either way, I wouldn't consider these relatively common scenarios, "match manipulation" or "wintrading." I could've played better, as well as my team.

  4. When I say I've only experienced 3-ish POSSIBLE match manipulations, here's what I mean. When I was going for rank 1 during one of the solo-only seasons, I ended up quing into a match with one of the french wintraders the day before season ended. We were losing exceptionally hard because condi mirage was completely busted at this time and he was farming my PUGs. Now, here's the thing. Did this player plan to snipe me and had a friend play very poorly on my team in order to make me lose rating and drop from a top spot? Or, did my team just not understand how to handle his build? The former could be considered match manipulation, the latter couldn't. However, there's no way for me to tell. Now, the only reason I specifically singled out this match where I lost is because I also fought against this player earlier in the day. We happened to be winning. Then, someone on his team DC'd. Okay, great, free win. But now he doesn't lose rating. That same DC'd player ended up on my team during that massive loss towards the end of the day. Even then, it's important to note that this player was a well-known match manipulator at the time and ended up getting removed from the leaderboards by Anet after the season ended.
  5. I don't see you as a fool. Also, I know you don't believe that every loss you have is a match manipulation. Look, I've played with the majority of the players that get singled out for foul play. Honestly, I really don't believe they do anything other than que at off-hours. Most of us simply don't care enough about the game to put in a ridiculous amount of effort into somehow gaming the matches when we can easily just find another good duo and be on comms (or not) to achieve high win rates. Believe me when I say, the people who try the hardest just dodge EVERYONE at 3 am est. There's really nothing else. I'd be able to get top 3 too if I decided to bork my sleep schedule just so I could play some GW2 lol.
  6. Look, if it makes a difference, we can que together a bit next season on comms. You'll see what I mean.
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We need a 5vs5 Guild vs Guild game mode with a completely separate ladder from solo que Ranked PvP ladder to be added.

This is the best solution as no new content will need to be developed by ANET as current PvP maps will be used.

It would give teams and friends the ability to compete again in a format that people care about. Just like the original Guild Wars 1 Guild vs Guild ladder.

The only development effort would come from creating the Guild ladder and perhaps reworking how the match maker system is configured.

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I don't care if it's only a few teams in guild, and I have to play them over and over.

I did that playing basketball in the neighborhood growing up and it was never a problem.

Funny thing was, even when a tougher team showed up from time to time, me and the boys would still try hard.

We lost, but we learned some things because no one gave up.

Yes.....

and we still had a ton of fun.

There is literally zero argument that you can make against a separate team that actually makes sense.

If you are afraid it will drive players out of the han solo / dynamic duo que hot mess...you right.

But, then again they are already leaving it anyways.

I love how players believe if teams was the only option, no one would do it.

Tell that to HA and AB players, and formerly team arena players.(and by the way all of these game modes were full at the same time during the prime of GW1 life)

If players will seek out teams for RAIDS, Fractals, and squads for farming and wvw zergs....they will probably seek out teams in ranked.

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@Trevor Boyer.6524On my phone so can't be bothered responding to paragraphs:

I'm sorry if you perceived my response as biased, however it was simply an honest question after you first mention it in the original post since it's a zero-sum outcome. As for you I haven't really read your previous posts and I don't see how they should change my perception of the topic at hand, but I get the impression this is something you put alot of weight on.

I agree that the adverse effects, for matchmanipulation and wintrading specifically, have their root in low population and following suboptimal matchmaking.

Problem is there isn't really much that can be done as long as these types of players are allowed to do so freely. So yeah the hassle is real, however I don't really see the benefits you list on bringing back 5-man queue, and here's why:

  1. What's stopping people from selling 1/5 spots on the leaderboard? 4 good players tagging along a paying customer, if you think the spots are few now this will only worsen.
  2. The problem with 5-man teams are that it becomes much harder to deal with if you are on the unorganised side. The counterargument here is that it balances out with enough teams, but with already dwindling population this is not the case.
  3. The best thing about solo, duo and the matchmaking is that we now have alot more freedom of who we create matches around and who goes into which game, and as such 5-man queue would in every way constrict the algorithm that already struggles to align mmr as is. This means longer queue times, theoretically (team average mmr) more uneven matches and a lower pool of players available per match.

It just doesn't seem like your suggestion is thought through, because at this point taking the population into account is mandatory and we need to predict the effect of any changes for the casual and the tryhard player, else implementing such suggestions - with good intent - could potentially prove to be the final straw for the gamemode.

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@rng.1024 I guess my ultimate point and opinion is that, I don't care if there are only two teams playing in the season who encompass the top 10 ranks because no one else wants to play in a team. That is everyone else's fault for choosing to not play in a 5 man team. I don't understand this aversion to team play in spvp. In dungeons, people used LFG to form very specific groups as listed. In fractals, people use the LFG with large requirements listed to form very specific groups to run T4CM fractals. In raids, people use the LFG to form extremely specific 10 man team comps to form the strongest teams possible and they even filter heavily for guilds. Even in WvW, people go out of their way to team up and run with other people. I do not understand where this aversion to meeting people and using the LFG to form team comps in spvp comes from.

Also, I never claimed that 5 man ques would abolish match manipulations and things like leaderboard alt play. I claimed that it would allow the players who choose to play in 5 man teams to block themselves from having match manipulations effect them in matches. A person whether doing it on purpose or simply AFKing to pay for a pizza, cannot throw vs. a 5 man team if there is no room for him to wiggle into their que.

So in other words, if we were allowed to play in 5 man teams, even if it was different people that you qued with every day, sort of like what we do with ATs, the people who were smart enough to que with 5 people that they trusted who all played at similar skill levels, would all be playing a lot higher on the leaderboards. And this isn't because the 5 man chemistry and organization is so so so so much stronger than a team of solo ques of the same skill ratings, it's that the 5 man team usually won't ever have to deal with rando AFKs, rando DCs, rando Ragequits, rando alts throwing to drop you out of plat 3. I've rarely seen people who know each other, do things like that on purpose when playing in teams together. When people go out of their way to que as a group, people generally try hard and have manners.

And so as such in a 1-5 que system like this, there is nothing that purposeful or accidental match manipulations or bad rando match making due to low population can do to keep your team from climbing up into exactly where it deserves to be on the leaderboards. If there were people who were gaming the leaderboards and using win trading throw tactics to knock people out of leaderboard positions and win easy matches, they won't be able to stop your team with that. They will have to face your team on equal ground, just like in an AT.

Just my preference.

But really I'd like to see something like this happen, which I am sure plenty of other players would completely disagree with, but hey, it's just my opinion:

  • Keep Unranked Conquest with the optional Stronghold que. But rather than checkmark boxes, just make Stronghold a map selection on the pie chart spinner.
  • Add 5v5 Courtyard to the Unranked que with Conquest & Stronghold, and it a selection just like Conquest & Stronghold, on the pie chart spinner thing. The map selection of Stronghold/Courtyard doesn't need to pop up as often as Conquest. It should be either or, but never both Stronghold and Courtyard popping at the same time. It should always be primarily Conquest map selects, where Stronghold or Courtyard popping up is a semi rare event that provides the option for something different to do every once in awhile.
  • Add 2v2 Arenas as a check mark box choice in the pvp panel for Unranked ques. So players could chose to enter que for the 5 man game modes, or the 2v2 game mode, or even both.
  • Merge Ranked & ATS together, and make them the same thing. So seasons are based on 5 man team participation through ATs, and all seasonal rewards, titles, and badge icon display is all linked to the games played through AT participation.
  • Rotate different types of ATs so we have some damn variation in the game. I certainly wouldn't mind at all, to see weekends where the ATs featured 2v2 Arenas, Stronghold, or even 5v5 Deathmatch Courtyard. And these matches played can still effect the individual rating of the players who play them. Match manipulations wouldn't be as much of a problem here due to the points I had already mentioned.

I believe that if ATs could grant competitive purpose to the game modes that have been forgotten, the community would be tolerable of this, if not happy about it. Speaking for myself, 7 years in I'd just like to see some new things to do. The coding is already there, it just needs a bit of refinement.

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@Trevor Boyer.6524 said:@rng.1024 I guess my ultimate point and opinion is that, I don't care if there are only two teams playing in the season who encompass the top 10 ranks because no one else wants to play in a team. That is everyone else's fault for choosing to not play in a 5 man team. I don't understand this aversion to team play in spvp. In dungeons, people used LFG to form very specific groups as listed. In fractals, people use the LFG with large requirements listed to form very specific groups to run T4CM fractals. In raids, people use the LFG to form extremely specific 10 man team comps to form the strongest teams possible and they even filter heavily for guilds. Even in WvW, people go out of their way to team up and run with other people. I do not understand where this aversion to meeting people and using the LFG to form team comps in spvp comes from.

Also, I never claimed that 5 man ques would abolish match manipulations and things like leaderboard alt play. I claimed that it would allow the players who choose to play in 5 man teams to block themselves from having match manipulations effect them in matches. A person whether doing it on purpose or simply AFKing to pay for a pizza, cannot throw vs. a 5 man team if there is no room for him to wiggle into their que.

So in other words, if we were allowed to play in 5 man teams, even if it was different people that you qued with every day, sort of like what we do with ATs, the people who were smart enough to que with 5 people that they trusted who all played at similar skill levels, would all be playing a lot higher on the leaderboards. And this isn't because the 5 man chemistry and organization is so so so so much stronger than a team of solo ques of the same skill ratings, it's that the 5 man team usually won't ever have to deal with rando AFKs, rando DCs, rando Ragequits, rando alts throwing to drop you out of plat 3. I've rarely seen people who know each other, dostraws like that on purpose when playing in teams together. When people go out of their way to que as a group, people generally try hard and have manners.

And so as such in a 1-5 que system like this, there is nothing that purposeful or accidental match manipulations or bad rando match making due to low population can do to keep your team from climbing up into exactly where it deserves to be on the leaderboards. If there were people who were gaming the leaderboards and using win trading throw tactics to knock people out of leaderboard positions and win easy matches, they won't be able to stop your team with that. They will have to face your team on equal ground, just like in an AT.

Just my preference.

But really I'd like to see something like this happen, which I am sure plenty of other players would completely disagree with, but hey, it's just my opinion:

  • Keep Unranked Conquest with the optional Stronghold que. But rather than checkmark boxes, just make Stronghold a map selection on the pie chart spinner.
  • Add 5v5 Courtyard to the Unranked que with Conquest & Stronghold, and it a selection just like Conquest & Stronghold, on the pie chart spinner thing. The map selection of Stronghold/Courtyard doesn't need to pop up as often as Conquest. It should be either or, but never both Stronghold and Courtyard popping at the same time. It should always be primarily Conquest map selects, where Stronghold or Courtyard popping up is a semi rare event that provides the option for something different to do every once in awhile.
  • Add 2v2 Arenas as a check mark box choice in the pvp panel for Unranked ques. So players could chose to enter que for the 5 man game modes, or the 2v2 game mode, or even both.
  • Merge Ranked & ATS together, and make them the same thing. So seasons are based on 5 man team participation through ATs, and all seasonal rewards, titles, and badge icon display is all linked to the games played through AT participation.
  • Rotate different types of ATs so we have some kitten variation in the game. I certainly wouldn't mind at all, to see weekends where the ATs featured 2v2 Arenas, Stronghold, or even 5v5 Deathmatch Courtyard. And these matches played can still effect the individual rating of the players who play them. Match manipulations wouldn't be as much of a problem here due to the points I had already mentioned.

I believe that if ATs could grant competitive purpose to the game modes that have been forgotten, the community would be tolerable of this, if not happy about it. Speaking for myself, 7 years in I'd just like to see some new things to do. The coding is already there, it just needs a bit of refinement.

Because in Fractals, Raids, PvE in general you only have to worry about your own setup - unlike sPvP. WvW is simply a numbers game, which is why you want quantity over quality most of the time.

Reading through your points I can't help but notice how a separate team queue would be better in every way. And on this I do agree we should have team leaderboards, mode shuffle throughout the season (except 2v2) and leaderboard worthy rewards. If it's good matches you want this is unprecedented since it's an actual 5v5. This way we could keep ranked as is, affect the matchmaking as little as possible and ensure fairer play.

In fact I would take it one step further to relegate unranked to hotjoins and use the unranked queue for 2v2's. We'd now have team (not it's own queue really, but a 2 team tournament held on demand once 2 teams sign up - the ladder should prioritize those closer to you in rating purely based on a w/l factor), ranked remaining as is and s2v2 there to add standardized personal rating on wins and subtract on losses - which could be used to supplement regular ranked games since wintrading/match manipulation is way harder in a 2v2 where most communicate.

This is also in a measure to not spread the playerbase too thin, because:a) Unranked players will fill hotjoinsb) They will use team or 2v2 queue instead(even seeing hotjoins filled would warm my heart at this point)

Having 2v2 be a supplement to regular ranked ensure coverage and since both ranked and team queue give double rewards together most people would dip into both. This would revitalize the competitive aspect and make the season extremely busy, while allowing you to play as you like whether it be same as now, in a team or 2v2 with a bunch of the unranked population joining in on the fun for a boost in matchmaking precision and sheer number of participants.

Couple this with unrelated AT's throughout that give extra rewards and you have a fiercly encouraging scene to behold - and the more competitive it becomes, the harder it gets to manipulate or trade matches which is the problem as of right now.

Edit: This would also allow removal of duo from ranked as you now have distinct options of playing solo, with a friend or with a group - further limiting the option of those who want to artificially alter their rating.

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