A Proposed Rework to Skill Based Matchmaking
NOTE: It's only lengthy because I tried to answer as many questions as possible It NEEDS to be much more dynamic, adjusting your skill rating after every game, either raising it slightly or lowerin...
Forum Discussion
@ErectRainbow Why have you created another thread when you covered most of the points mentioned here only yesterday?
I think your suggestion is a bad idea as you're trying to build a skill profile that's overly complicated which will be very very difficult, if not impossible to account for all factors that are either completely random or don't do justice to the player.
Who engages first for example.. I could be dealing 1000+ damage to a team only to be shot as i try popping a bat round a corner. Random guy engaged me first and won so he's gets 20 odd damage but i'll have a negative rating even though i was pinched amongst 3 teams, surviving in the chaos for nearly 5 mins and dealing the most damage against the ones we were engaged with initially and potentially getting several knocks but they were revived due to the unforeseen circumstances. That doesn't equate to skill.
Different legends, roles and RNG. This isn't a team death match where everyone starts on equal terms, same size hitbox or engages combat in the same way. Some might play area denial and supportive roles compared to a more offensive character/player but the success (increased skill rating from your suggestion) on one can be almost totally dependant on the other being a team game. Someone on my team could be getting a rez off when the the enemy are peaking round the corner and if i have sufficient ammo then i'll beam that corner to secure the rez and if the enemy poke they'll be shredded. I most likely wasted an entire mag or potentially several effecting my accuracy but secured getting my team member back in the fight.
Just the fact that when your stats increase they'll inevitably drop back when being put in harder lobbies will give a constant fluctuation and similar result to what we have now anyway but with a lot of time and effort wasted when other more critical things could and should be prioritised.
I could go on but honestly there are so many holes with this...
@apostolateofDOOM you're dealing 1000+ damage which implies you're hitting shots. That indicates something about your skill rating. You could have always positioned yourself better or heard the guy. That indicates something about your skill. But this guy walked up behind you while you were healing. He hit you so that indicates he's good enough to hit a person which gives him a very tiny boost to his skill rating based on accuracy and engagement rules. You lose a tiny bit because of your poor positioning. But I want to stress how little you would lose in such a circumstance. You could not lose any at all. This is an open forum. Hitboxes factor into accuracy and while Respawn suggests certain characters are used certain ways, you don't HAVE to use them that way. I got an aggressive 19 Kill 4600 damage game with Rampart and used her walls 4 times that game. I didn't even use Sheila. The aim assist system in this game is how they track accuracy. You really think that if you shoot 30 bullets into a wall Respawn decreases your overall accuracy? You'd be put into skill brackets very similar to ranked with with RP. Except RP becomes your skill rating. There'd be a range to allow for plays having better or worse games still in the same bracket. Keep having good games, keep moving up the ladder.
And you're absolutely wrong. There is NO FLUACTUATION WHATSOEVER in the lobbies now. That's the whole point. That's the key point to all of this. Fluactuation. Dynamic. Always changing. Real time. That's exactly my problem with SBMM now. You're hardstuck in pred lobbies with nothing to do about it. There is NOTHING YOU CAN DO.
@ErectRainbow There's to many random elements to it.
You can do your best to avoid getting pinched in bad positions or 3rd partied but it's bound to happen at times no matter how good you are. Audio and such might not be heard in part because it doesn't always work as intended (ie completely broken at times) or intense fights where it's over saturated and footsteps just won't be heard. You can also have 2 very good players who just don't mould well together because of different playstyles.
Let's say hypothetically that 19 kill game was only because you had a Caustic to secure an area to fall back to. Your stats can be dependant on others in your team and should they then get an increased rating because of teams success or just the person that secured the most damage and kills? That Caustic might not be able to shoot to save his life but without him giving you that safe space to heal up you wouldn't have such a high rating... team synergy in a team game. I used to troll about in low ranked games doing 720 grapple spins round the enemy team, they used to focus fire me as i was up close while my teammates took them out. They get the rating but i don't even though my i played my role in the teams success.
1000 damage can be from playing risky aggressive or camping safe taking pot shots and as @DoYaSeeMe said, i see this being easily exploited.
The hard stuck in pred lobbies is overblown too.
I sympathise because yes it happens often being mentally taxing and frustrating leading to burnout but it's not ALL games like some make out.. My personal grievance with SBMM is why should i learn to improve only to get the same end result or even potentially worse? Less wins for getting better? Makes no sense and no incentive to actually improve unless you want to join ALGS. As the game is catered to casuals (they have made that abundantly clear) then i expect most here play casually, not competitive. I want to play the game casually and even be rewarded for getting better, not punished and have lesser skilled IRL friends in my team not leading to a depressing experience for all as they can't keep up while i'm expected to carry or circumvent those protections negating the point of them in the first place. This has absolutely nothing to do with slaughtering low level lobbies and always having easy game like some defend or even at Respawn make out but that's their counter argument to keep bringing in new players and the cash flow coming in. With so many regular smurfs now and including rank split it's actually counter productive with how harsh it is for new players but engagement is up and money rolling in while burning the candle at both ends.
I don't think this is healthy for the game in the long run...
As i said in your other thread, we've had literally thousands of SBMM threads over the past 2 years and the ONLY amicable solution that most people agreed with was giving players the choice. These lobbies with it turned off are likely to be much harder but you could give incentives for people playing in them, like ranked but with actual rewards you could earn or even crafting materials but they would probably need to remove duos for this now which is highly unlikely.
- @ErectRainbow You need to acknowledge that the lack of fluctuation is your perceived truth, not the general truth. In my case, there are days when the first few matches feel extremely hard and sweaty, but later I get good matches, with top placements (including wins) and decent stats. Then, there's a lot of difference between the lobbies where I solo queue and those where I party with friends, so there's a lot of variation if you mix the two. And even sessions where I consistently get high level players in the lobby (pred, master and diamond trails), matches feel very differently. I actually got almost 3 consecutive wins in a day like this. In another I had an extremely boring win with 0 kills and 0 damage for the whole team, as everyone else kept fighting outside the ring for too long. That match was followed by a couple of sweat fests and then another few rather boring matches.
I think the fear of "preds" is getting a bit unhealthy. They can be killed by players far worse, they don't have extra shield or health and their bravery often makes them vulnerable. I've seen many die without kills and with low damage, picked up downed ones, had boring matches with them, killed a few surprisingly easy. Fear makes us panic or paralyses us, so we often end up losing the duels because we actually perform way below our skill.
