I believe time played is a bad variable for MM to use for the entire player base. Even if we totally exclude smurfs and new cheater accounts into the argument, the correlation between skills and time played is probably only somewhat strong in low ranges like 0-500 hours or something like that but after that, the correlation becomes so weak it will make the matchmaking even worse than it is now. There are causal players with 1000+ hours in this game who cant get out of gold (and probably come to this forum and complain about cheaters and smurfs hahah) and there are gamer kids who gets to diamond their first split.
Ive said it many times before: I think most people who complain about the MM first need to accept the logic that in a PERFECTLY matched MM, you would end up with more or less 1 KD and 5% win rate after "many" games. Thats how "sweaty" this theoretically "perfect" SBMM would look like. So before complaining about the SBMM, then at least use this as a reference to assess the current SBMM. Most SBMM complainers are mad because they regularly cant drop 5-10 + kills games even though they are utterly mediocre at this game.
My biggest complain about the SBMM, or rather the ranked system design, is that Respawn focus too much on player retention and to little on competitive integrity. Their MAIN GOAL with the design should be to ASAP put every player at the rank where they belong and this goes for both promotion and demotion, i.e faster demotion if you generally underperform at your current rank and faster promotion if you overperform at your current rank.
@Balladalidila wrote:I believe time played is a bad variable for MM to use for the entire player base. Even if we totally exclude smurfs and new cheater accounts into the argument, the correlation between skills and time played is probably only somewhat strong in low ranges like 0-500 hours or something like that but after that, the correlation becomes so weak it will make the matchmaking even worse than it is now. There are causal players with 1000+ hours in this game who cant get out of gold (and probably come to this forum and complain about cheaters and smurfs hahah) and there are gamer kids who gets to diamond their first split.
Ive said it many times before: I think most people who complain about the MM first need to accept the logic that in a PERFECTLY matched MM, you would end up with more or less 1 KD and 5% win rate after "many" games. Thats how "sweaty" this theoretically "perfect" SBMM would look like. So before complaining about the SBMM, then at least use this as a reference to assess the current SBMM. Most SBMM complainers are mad because they regularly cant drop 5-10 + kills games even though they are utterly mediocre at this game.
My biggest complain about the SBMM, or rather the ranked system design, is that Respawn focus too much on player retention and to little on competitive integrity. Their MAIN GOAL with the design should be to ASAP put every player at the rank where they belong and this goes for both promotion and demotion, i.e faster demotion if you generally underperform at your current rank and faster promotion if you overperform at your current rank.
I would like to add that a "perfect" matchmaking also ensures that you don't necessarily notice its effects. It would ensure consistent games against players of (nearly) equal skill.
At the moment Apex sortoff does try to ensure a 1KD, 5% winrate. But it does that by essentially giving you 19 matches filled with smurfs, cheaters, and high skilled players; and then 1 match where you get matched with 2 masters that carry you to a win, or a lobby filled with players that can't aim to save their life...
But I could forgive a less optimal MM for casual BR, if ranked wasn't just sanctioned smurfing. You should never play against former diamonds in bronze and silver. Or former masters and preds in gold and plat.
The fundamental design of the ranked system is flawed, and that itself causes a lot of problems.
EDIT:
Fair game, no cheaters here... /s
@Anjunakrokus wrote:At the moment Apex sortoff does try to ensure a 1KD, 5% winrate. But it does that by essentially giving you 19 matches filled with smurfs, cheaters, and high skilled players; and then 1 match where you get matched with 2 masters that carry you to a win, or a lobby filled with players that can't aim to save their life...
I dont agree with this. I am ex-master and if I substract my kills, deaths and wins from my ranked games, I now have 3+ KD and 15% win rate, i.e my stats from pubs. My "hardstuck platinum" IRL friend on the other hand, has about 1.3 KD and like 5% win rate. So obviously, the matchmaking, however it may currently work, allows players to get quite significantly different KD and win rates depending on their individual skills.
I think that the reason why the majority of players may experience that the MM is rigged to "ensure a 1 KD, 5% win rate" as you put it, is because the majority of players, by definition, are average and this is the average KD and win rate you get in a non-rigged and random system. Its just statistics.
Yes you are right. I dont know EXACTLY what the average KD and win rate is in an unrigged and random matchmaking. What I meant was that if we assume a totally random and unrigged system, most matches will lobbies looking somewhat close to the total player skill distribution, i.e normal distributed --> the majority of players will be close to the mean of this distribution i.e the majority of players will have players close to their own skill which should end up them with a KD and win rate somewhat close to 1 KD and 5% win rate which is the theoretical KD and win rate in a lobby of 60 exactly equally skilled players.
But my point is that the system definitely allow players to get significantly different KD and win rate, regardless of what "average" might be. This indicates that the system isnt hard rigged towards a fixed KD and win rate. And if you think about it logically; such rigged matchmaking system would also significantly increase the matchmaking time. Imagine what a huge puzzle it would be to make ALL players, from the noobiest bot, to the number 1 Pred, have a matchmaking that pushed them towards a certain fixed KD and win rate. On the verge on impossible unless we assume an infinitely large player base playing at all times.
The exact same logic can be applied to debunk the idea that the matchmaking system is rigged to punish you with "bad" teammates in x games to guarantee you to lose just to reward you with "good" teammates y games to almost guarantee you to win etc etc. Once again; imagine the puzzle to apply this to EVERYONE pressing "play" at all times. Impossible. Everyone who make such claims are just tunnel visioning on their own situation but forget that your two teammates and your 57 enemy players also must be a part of the same system.
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