Re: Change my mind: All players should win and lose at the same ratios

I believe he wants us to convince him of the merit of the latter paragraph's argument because he would like to consider changing his mind.

@Axs5626Sxa5001  I think that there are plenty of reasons for SBMM besides win rate, although that does seem to be the metric they use to measure its success.  What mediocre players like myself want is to have a reasonable chance to ever come out on top in a fight.  When I play against players with the sort of skill level you would appear to possess, that is not a possibility.  When I queue with my friend and we bump up to lobbies where the champion squad is inevitably a stack with all the badges, I am almost without fail down to the first player I engage with.  I can easily go an hour without a kill.  Not fun at all and I actually stopped playing this game for almost an entire season from being so discourged by having those games over and over again.

Winning games is cool and all, I won't pretend I don't enjoy it.  But it's not my impetus to play.  I just want what feels like a decent quality match where if I play at my best I can succeed.

I am a fairly average player I tend to think and because I play with one friend only I tend to stick to public games and Duo's mainly.  My lifetime overall KD ratio is something like 0.8, however this season so far its more like 1.2 . . . so average at best.  If I play a solid evening session of maybe three hours in public games with my friend ( who is of a similar skill, maybe slightly better ) we might win 2 or 3, we might only win 1.  That's ok though, I wouldn't want the game to feed me easy games, I am happy going against whoever and if i come out on top then great and if I get soundly thrashed by a higher skilled team then so be it.

Now, if I actually felt that I was so far outclassed by everyone around me then it might not be so fun, but would it stop me playing or make me try and get better?  I don't know, probably the second option. That said, I do play a bit on my own and pick trios and honestly, the number of times I feel like the weak link compared to carrying the team is probably 50/50 even at my level.

This is all down to you personally and how much it bothers you to not be the best you can be.  It's a fun game for me even though I know I can never compete with the real hardcore guys.

@Piabetic The problem comes when it feels like you are not making any progress whatsoever despite making great efforts. "Why do I even bother?" During much of that time I took off the game, I was still in the firing range for at least a half hour daily. My stats this season are still not tremendously improved, but I feel much more confident in my shot and movement which is giving me better chances in each individual fight I take. And that makes a lot of difference in enjoyment level.  I can come out of a failed game now seeing what I did RIGHT, even after getting outplayed by a highly skilled player.

I have to accept that my perspective is biased and probably not indicative of what’s best for the largest player base in the community: casuals/lower skilled players.

My experience is entirely molded by the early days of non-ranked matchmaking, where everyone played everyone and natural hierarchies emerged by virtue of the player’s ability.

SBMM works in opposition to that idea. Awesome for ranked modes but not for non-ranked modes.

But the important thing is that I am in the MINORITY. I want skill to determine who wins more. I get upset when my Gold-level friends win more than me— not because they are more competent than me, but because they are in the democratic that the publisher wants winning as much as possible.

So in that regard, by virtue of being above average, I have to accept that I actually deserve to win at the same rate (or lower), because that benefits the company and the community as a whole. Of course, this realization prompts me to question whether I would even want to be part of a community that under-compensates competence— but that’s another discussion...

@hayhorYes we have, and as always I value your reasonable responses.

Heck, I don’t even want ZERO SBMM— I just want it to where players can feel their improvement by virtue of them out performing average players.

It is what it is. The industry isn’t going to change. I need to change.

@Tad844You’re clearly much better than me. You should look into ALGS. Thanks.