Looting Gear ! you doing it wrong !

I have to agree with OP for the most part.

I noticed that the more you play and the better you get, the more you notice people wasting time looting, making poor decisions and them not being able to keep up with you. I have found good randoms that I queue with, and I have real friends in discord that I play with regularly, and even they fall behind. If you watch high-level players on twitch, you'll notice they're always in front and looking for action.

Now is that more important, or is the win more important? It depends what you want to get out of the game. If it was competitive mode, you'd look at how ELO points are calculated and whether high impact games will contribute towards your ranking. Since there isn't one, I play only to have fun with my friends and it turns out that the most fun I can have is by killing other squads. So a 1-kill win for me is a loss compared to a 14-kill ownage and domination where you get 7th partied and killed from behind.

In fact, a 1-kill win is a disgrace and I would probably prefer to leave and forfeit the victory. The only exception is if you're a support player who's not particularly great at aiming, but you make decisions and strats in-game, still fight and deal damage, just don't end up finishing many enemies.