PvP Discussion: Matchmaking and Leagues

[Meteor.3720]

Being matched with people far below your skill level is frustrating, yes.But what is more frustrating for me (and I think a lot of others) is being punished for not being able to carry those weaker teammates with massive rating losses (yes the classic argument about losing way more for a loss than gaining for a win).

Is there any way to factor in your teammates rating into win/loss rating, as opposed to just the enemy team?

Also I'm sure it will be covered, but very much in favour of seeing rating at the end of a match (to put it before will I think be demoralising or lead to flaming of the lower players). Something like this was in season 1 where you could see the badges of players at the end of the match? Can it be brought back but this time with a specific numerical value?

It's good to see Anet engaging with the community here, but I would like to add that as a veteran player this is coming at a very late stage in the quality and life of the community. I really hope this isn't a one off and engagement will continue or I fear this won't do much for the game in the long term.

[Natto.5819]

Matchmaking needs to take into account classes that are way stronger than others. Necro, Thief, and Warrior classes should have a stealth bonus rating to account for the fact that they're too strong. For example, if a player has a 1600 Rating, and plays his Necro, his effective Rating is 2000. That will help the matchmaking put together a more balanced opponent team.

[Ario.8964]

@Natto.5819 said:Matchmaking needs to take into account classes that are way stronger than others. Necro, Thief, and Warrior classes should have a stealth bonus rating to account for the fact that they're too strong. For example, if a player has a 1600 Rating, and plays his Necro, his effective Rating is 2000. That will help the matchmaking put together a more balanced opponent team.

No? That would skew matchmaking to an absurd level... Also you're entire comment is grounded on the fact that you think those classes are imbalanced. What happens when they get nerfed? Do people just have to quit those classes or does anet have to remake the entire system to cater to an imbalance?

[Ranael.6423]

Not sure if this belongs to matchmaking but do you have intentions to increase the visibility of teammates? Right now, when you see a class in your team you can only guess they use the meta builds but you can have surprises (especially in low tiers). Have you consider the ability to see either the build or at list the amulets of your teammates? Another thing I could imagine is tagging with a build orientation... this could even be used to match teams...

[Sultane.9150]

@StarDroid.1038 said:I have a question on locking duo queuing at 1600 rating.

This chance has affected me and my teammate negatively, because we are less inclined to try harder to reach top tiers because of the lock, this chance even incentivizes us to remain below that rating so we can continue to play together.

1. So is there a chance to raise the cap in future so we wouldn't feel limited in our growth or removed?
2. Are there any plans for giving another queuing options for duos/teams, because currently rank is unfriendly to anything team/duo based, unraked is waste of time due to a lot lower game quality and ATs happen only at specific times and at worse offer only 1 game with added time consumption of getting 5 people together?

Would also like to add putting restrictions on rank only damages community, because team/duo based parties are turned away from ranked and community has less reason to work together in a team based game.

This question needs an answer.

I feel like the PvP community -- at least at the top tier-- has taken a massive hit since you removed duo queue from 1600+ rating. I, for one, am way less motivated to play now-- it almost feels like a chore. More importantly, this season I keep seeing the same players over and over. This was a common occurrence in most seasons but the amount of times I get queued against the same people within a single session is way higher than in previous seasons. I think this just shows how badly the community has taken a hit. The matchmaker just isn't finding enough players to mix it up.

[Rennie.6750]

@Meteor.3720 said:Being matched with people far below your skill level is frustrating, yes.But what is more frustrating for me (and I think a lot of others) is being punished for not being able to carry those weaker teammates with massive rating losses (yes the classic argument about losing way more for a loss than gaining for a win).

Is there any way to factor in your teammates rating into win/loss rating, as opposed to just the enemy team?

Also I'm sure it will be covered, but very much in favour of seeing rating at the end of a match (to put it before will I think be demoralising or lead to flaming of the lower players). Something like this was in season 1 where you could see the badges of players at the end of the match? Can it be brought back but this time with a specific numerical value?

It's good to see Anet engaging with the community here, but I would like to add that as a veteran player this is coming at a very late stage in the quality and life of the community. I really hope this isn't a one off and engagement will continue or I fear this won't do much for the game in the long term.

I can confirm that the average skill level in silver is abysmal. I used to be high gold then I did somehting stupid and tried ~10 games on a class I don't know (mesmer, no elite spec) and lost all 10. Now no matter what I do nobody ever understands how to use my support guardian. They all seem to run away from heals and buffs, go on solo adventures only to discover that it's not that the enemy does no damage, it's because i was mitigating everything, not using reflects and other sad stuff. This goes way beyond the matchmaking discussion though, even if i'd love a per class MMR to learn and enjoy new classes, because right now I feel locked on my guard and it's frustrating as hell.

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

I don't post often, but i feel that now is the perfect opportunity to present the issues i see with Matchmaking.

According to your statistics, you say that 95% of your matches, the difference in skill rating was between 50 points, thus the matchmaker is therefor "doing it's job." I don't believe you are taking into account whether those folks that are in those rating ranges even belong there in the first place.

There was a thread on here recently, of a video, where someone who clearly didn't belong in a certain high level tier was playing in a high level tier, and did absolutely nothing other than hinder their team. They still won the match but it was against the grain, the grain being this particular team-mate that didn't belong there. The player was clearly "carried," so to speak.

This isn't a needle in the haystack case. This is almost every single game. Myself and others SEE it when we play...A ) People who waste their dodges , or don't know what they are dodging against me.B ) People keyboard turning.C ) People having absolute zero map awareness.D ) Countless deaths, over and over again.

And others constantly complain about it. It's because you have high skilled players carrying low skill players in the same skill rating. The theory is that it's supposed to "eventually equalize them out" But i have never witnessed this to really be the case, because its a constant cycle. I know many high skill players stuck in a rank they don't belong in simply because they can't carry the dead-weight in their team hard enough.

This issue needs to be addressed because people don't really know why this is happening, that you're statistics don't show what's actually happening in the game. i believe it to be one of the biggest reasons i see in most matches what feels like having 1 - 2 top players, versing people who just reached gold league.

[Vancho.8750]

Can i ask about the common occurrence of lose/win streaks and blow outs ( because they go hand to hand) and why do they happen?Is it because of the matchmaking or it is population problem?Also i have noticed that playing allot of matches per day starts dropping me into lost games while playing 1 or 2 per day keeps me on the winning side. Is that normal?

[Ben Phongluangtham.1065]

@Meteor.3720 said:Also I'm sure it will be covered, but very much in favour of seeing rating at the end of a match (to put it before will I think be demoralising or lead to flaming of the lower players). Something like this was in season 1 where you could see the badges of players at the end of the match? Can it be brought back but this time with a specific numerical value?

Showing skill rating of your team members at the end of the match is something we already plan to do in the future.

It's good to see Anet engaging with the community here, but I would like to add that as a veteran player this is coming at a very late stage in the quality and life of the community. I really hope this isn't a one off and engagement will continue or I fear this won't do much for the game in the long term.

I actually feel the competitive team does a decent job in general of trying to engage on the forums. We definitely read them daily and I personally try to respond to post at least a couple times a week.

Speaking for myself, some of the things I look for when trying to determine whether to respond to a thread.

• Don't be toxic. Once a thread starts becoming toxic, it usually discourages me not to respond. Not because I have a thin skin, but because I either don't want to bring attention to a toxic thread or encourage additional toxicity.
• Don't post something like "Anet respond or else!" This pretty much guarantees I won't respond.
• Don't make a new post for something that has been discussed over and over.

[Ben Phongluangtham.1065]

@Natto.5819 said:Matchmaking needs to take into account classes that are way stronger than others. Necro, Thief, and Warrior classes should have a stealth bonus rating to account for the fact that they're too strong. For example, if a player has a 1600 Rating, and plays his Necro, his effective Rating is 2000. That will help the matchmaking put together a more balanced opponent team.

Balance changes on a regular basis. Making a system that would have be tweaked that often is not sustainable.

[Vaeo.4097]

@Ario.8964 said:is there a possibility of a class lock upon entering a match and removal of class stacking from all pvp modes?

I like this idea very much. At least for ranked.It will prevent too powerful compositions like 2 scourges on tight maps (Skyhammer mid and hammer points, Forest mid point) or 2 coordinated thieves on Khylo. I understand that powerful cross-class composition exists too (for instance, Firebrand + Scourge) but still I think this should provide significantly better matches.

@"Ben Phongluangtham.1065" said:in approximately 95% of matches, the difference between the average skill rating of each team was less than 50 points.

Are there any restriction on difference between highest and lowest MMR among all 10 players selected for match?I mean teams like "Plat2 + Silv2 + 3xGold2" and "5xGold2" are not equal though team MMR difference is below 50 points.I think there should be say max 300 MMR points difference between all 10 players in match. And if such restriction will cause longer match making I think it will be acceptable until time is under 5 min.

[Ben Phongluangtham.1065]

@Sultane.9150 said:

@StarDroid.1038 said:I have a question on locking duo queuing at 1600 rating.

This chance has affected me and my teammate negatively, because we are less inclined to try harder to reach top tiers because of the lock, this chance even incentivizes us to remain below that rating so we can continue to play together.

1. So is there a chance to raise the cap in future so we wouldn't feel limited in our growth or removed?
2. Are there any plans for giving another queuing options for duos/teams, because currently rank is unfriendly to anything team/duo based, unraked is waste of time due to a lot lower game quality and ATs happen only at specific times and at worse offer only 1 game with added time consumption of getting 5 people together?

Would also like to add putting restrictions on rank only damages community, because team/duo based parties are turned away from ranked and community has less reason to work together in a team based game.

This question needs an answer.

I feel like the PvP community -- at least at the top tier-- has taken a massive hit since you removed duo queue from 1600+ rating. I, for one, am way less motivated to play now-- it almost feels like a chore. More importantly, this season I keep seeing the same players over and over. This was a common occurrence in most seasons but the amount of times I get queued against the same people within a single session is way higher than in previous seasons. I think this just shows how badly the community has taken a hit. The matchmaker just isn't finding enough players to mix it up.

It's something we will continue to evaluate. The way we implemented it, the rating cut off is easily adjustable. However, before we change it further, we will want to see the affects of our other upcoming matchmaker changes.

[Ledavi.1803]

I would support any improvements to the matchmaking that kept ranked queues under 5 minutes (during regular times - although I know that is hard to control but just use existing data and monitor)

[Cal Cohen.3527]

@Ario.8964 said:

@Cal Cohen.3527 said:

@Ario.8964 said:I guess my first question would be: Is there a way to tweak the current matchmaker to balance teams so that each individual player in a match is within 50 rating of the others? Cause the current one does some weird things to average out the mmr (Iasked a group I was playing with for ratings in one match just to check behavior and we had at the highest 1758 and at the lowest 1400 which I thought was incredibly bizarre).

We've talked internally about reducing the maximum rating range of the matchmaker, but the tradeoff is that queue times will increase. We will likely do some testing in unranked to see how much of an impact certain ranges have, and look to make some adjustment for ranked in the future. 50 rating might be an unrealistic goal, but I do think there's some adjustment that can be made here without blowing out queue times.

Now as far as matchmaking goes on alt classes, is it a possible idea to try and create a system with class specific mmr (or at least a grace period of 10-15 matches where you are matched at lower and slowly increasing mmr until you are back where your actual mmr is) to encourage players to try out new classes? (this can go in unranked if needed but at least from my experience, trying new classes is incredibly frustrating because you get placed in matched where you'd want to play your main and end up getting farmed pretty hard by a good deal of people in the match.)

And not to be "that guy" and bring this up but is there a possibility of a class lock upon entering a match and removal of class stacking from all pvp modes? I just know myself and many others are curious as far as if there was any discussion around the implementation of such a system or if other things were a priority thus leading to this not really being considered yet as matchmaking would be seriously impacted by a change like this.

These two ideas are tied together. We do actually track profession specific mmr, but it isn't currently used

because

we don't lock professions in queue. Without the character lock, players could queue on a profession with lower mmr, then swap to their main profession after the queue pops for easier wins. Some time ago we held a poll asking players if they would prefer using profession mmr and locking characters on queue, but it did not pass.

Yeah my first number was kind of a spitball/hopeful number but If population can't support it that could be widened to a certain degree if it works with the matchmaker.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the original poll was only asking players about class locks in matches. The main reason many said no to it (myself included) would've been fear of having stacked classes such as thieves making it harder for your team or stacked scourges on the other team making your life harder. If the entirety of the idea were pitched it may have seen at the time, or likely would now see, different results.

This is likely the reason why the poll didn't pass. Players would rather have the option of improving their team composition during the warmup period. The matchmaker already makes some considerations to distribute professions evenly between teams, but it won't make a "bad" match for the sake of balancing out the professions. When these situations occur, I think it's a good thing for players who can to be able to swap professions, and this wouldn't be possible with profession locking. These same cases could still happen, but players wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

[StarDroid.1038]

@Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

@Sultane.9150 said:

@StarDroid.1038 said:I have a question on locking duo queuing at 1600 rating.

This chance has affected me and my teammate negatively, because we are less inclined to try harder to reach top tiers because of the lock, this chance even incentivizes us to remain below that rating so we can continue to play together.

1. So is there a chance to raise the cap in future so we wouldn't feel limited in our growth or removed?
2. Are there any plans for giving another queuing options for duos/teams, because currently rank is unfriendly to anything team/duo based, unraked is waste of time due to a lot lower game quality and ATs happen only at specific times and at worse offer only 1 game with added time consumption of getting 5 people together?

Would also like to add putting restrictions on rank only damages community, because team/duo based parties are turned away from ranked and community has less reason to work together in a team based game.

This question needs an answer.

I feel like the PvP community -- at least at the top tier-- has taken a massive hit since you removed duo queue from 1600+ rating. I, for one, am way less motivated to play now-- it almost feels like a chore. More importantly, this season I keep seeing the same players over and over. This was a common occurrence in most seasons but the amount of times I get queued against the same people within a single session is way higher than in previous seasons. I think this just shows how badly the community has taken a hit. The matchmaker just isn't finding enough players to mix it up.

It's something we will continue to evaluate. The way we implemented it, the rating cut off is easily adjustable. However, before we change it further, we will want to see the affects of our other upcoming matchmaker changes.

This is really disheartening to hear, guess we have to hope for the best and prepare for worse when it comes to duo queuing in future.But I can't stress enough this will create a scenario when games will be played "badly" and will continue to discourage team play among PvP players.

Can there be given a hint on what you are working that could help to this issue to be less damaging when it comes to playing duo in ranked?

[huehuehueh.5106]

If I understand the match making algorithm, you can get matche with players 300+/- your rating, can we get this number tighter to say 150? 300 is a whole division. Can player amulets be a factor in team building decisions?

[Anodic.6712]

If Unranked takes skill level into account, why is it that low gold players can get/have gotten matched up against the Rank 1 player? Shouldn't that be not possible?

[Morwath.9817]

@huehuehueh.5106 said:If I understand the match making algorithm, you can get matche with players 300+/- your rating, can we get this number tighter to say 150? 300 is a whole division. Can player amulets be a factor in team building decisions?

Quaggan doesn't think it's a good idea, after all we can change our amulets and professions.

[Sinid.7460]

What about the huge rating gain/loss disparity? Most people I talk to complain about having to win 3 games to make up for a loss, for example. It just doesn't feel right for whatever reason. There are good players who got demotivated from playing the game due to having an unfair ratio of rating gain/loss.

[EgyptRaider.3946]

I was doubting whether to post this here or in rewards, but it's clearly related to leagues (but not matchmaking):

-could we have a bigger tab of our league history? I notice myself that I'm slowly progressing over the seasons, but it's sad to only see my last season :( (even just a tabel that tells: season X, Rank Y, and MMR Z, would be amazing!)

[Crinn.7864]

Currently the matchmaker will never put more than two of the same profession on the same team, and at least as far as I can tell will generally avoid duplicates when possible.

Can this be changed to limiting by elite spec rather than by profession? Elite specs on the same class often fill very different roles, which makes the current matchmaker behavior detrimental. For example DH and core guardians are generally offensive builds, but firebrands are almost always supports. This means that a guardian queuing as a DH or core will be less likely to get a team with a support than if that player was queuing on another class. (since Firebrands are the only class that commonly queues as support atm)

[Smarazzinger.1403]

1) Whats the reason for not make people start in bronze or silver divisions? I have the feeling that the majority of players are stuck in gold/plat and i think that silver/gold should be where the most of the population stay, plat is for great players and legend only for like the top 50 or so.2) Does the matchmaking take note of your teammates rating when it calculate the pips gain/loss? if no could it be so?

Sry for my grammar and keep up the good work!

[Smarazzinger.1403]

1) Whats the reason for not make people start in bronze or silver divisions? I have the feeling that the majority of players are stuck in gold/plat and i think that silver/gold should be where the most of the population stay, plat is for great players and legend only for like the top 50 or so.2) Does the matchmaking take note of your teammates rating when it calculate the pips gain/loss? if no could it be so?

[OriOri.8724]

@Cal Cohen.3527 said:

@Ario.8964 said:I guess my first question would be: Is there a way to tweak the current matchmaker to balance teams so that each individual player in a match is within 50 rating of the others? Cause the current one does some weird things to average out the mmr (Iasked a group I was playing with for ratings in one match just to check behavior and we had at the highest 1758 and at the lowest 1400 which I thought was incredibly bizarre).

We've talked internally about reducing the maximum rating range of the matchmaker, but the tradeoff is that queue times will increase. We will likely do some testing in unranked to see how much of an impact certain ranges have, and look to make some adjustment for ranked in the future. 50 rating might be an unrealistic goal, but I do think there's some adjustment that can be made here without blowing out queue times.

Now as far as matchmaking goes on alt classes, is it a possible idea to try and create a system with class specific mmr (or at least a grace period of 10-15 matches where you are matched at lower and slowly increasing mmr until you are back where your actual mmr is) to encourage players to try out new classes? (this can go in unranked if needed but at least from my experience, trying new classes is incredibly frustrating because you get placed in matched where you'd want to play your main and end up getting farmed pretty hard by a good deal of people in the match.)

And not to be "that guy" and bring this up but is there a possibility of a class lock upon entering a match and removal of class stacking from all pvp modes? I just know myself and many others are curious as far as if there was any discussion around the implementation of such a system or if other things were a priority thus leading to this not really being considered yet as matchmaking would be seriously impacted by a change like this.

These two ideas are tied together. We do actually track profession specific mmr, but it isn't currently used

because

we don't lock professions in queue. Without the character lock, players could queue on a profession with lower mmr, then swap to their main profession after the queue pops for easier wins. Some time ago we held a poll asking players if they would prefer using profession mmr and locking characters on queue, but it did not pass.

Could you not change it to be a two variable algorithm? It would queue people up for teams the same way now based on their overall MMR, but before it finalizes the teams, it checks again, but by using everyone's class based MMR. If the teams are rebalanced it tries to shuffle them around to get the team MMRs closer, relative to the classes everyone is queueing up on? > @Ben Phongluangtham.1065 said:

@Natto.5819 said:Matchmaking needs to take into account classes that are way stronger than others. Necro, Thief, and Warrior classes should have a stealth bonus rating to account for the fact that they're too strong. For example, if a player has a 1600 Rating, and plays his Necro, his effective Rating is 2000. That will help the matchmaking put together a more balanced opponent team.

Balance changes on a regular basis. Making a system that would have be tweaked that often is not sustainable.

It really doesn't change that often though.... That's the major complaint that the playerbase has with it.

[Ben Phongluangtham.1065]

@EgyptRaider.3946 said:I was doubting whether to post this here or in rewards, but it's clearly related to leagues (but not matchmaking):

-could we have a bigger tab of our league history? I notice myself that I'm slowly progressing over the seasons, but it's sad to only see my last season :( (even just a tabel that tells: season X, Rank Y, and MMR Z, would be amazing!)

It would be cool, but currently would be a low priority item and I'm not sure how far back the data is kept. I can investigate.