Q&A: Sandbagging Response

@TheRHOMBUS we lost but it was very close. They full cleared us, we came up six teams short (or 7, I can't exactly remember).

We are 77-17 after that loss, so it was impressive. Whether it was impressive strategy or impressive sandbagging, we'll never know.

Whatever, make jokes. It gets irritating to play.

"StoemKnight;c-2023831" wrote:
Whatever, make jokes. It gets irritating to play.

Who made jokes?

"TVF;c-2023832" wrote:

"StoemKnight;c-2023831" wrote:
Whatever, make jokes. It gets irritating to play.

Who made jokes?

who did make jokes? last TW for us was great! went to the wire! had full participation from guild, our plan held and we won? and we had 182 active gp against 197gp? i realy dont see sandbaging as such as a term a problem, if you have a guild that participates, and dosnt ecpect easy ride just because it has 50 drevans, and 50 7 star maleks etc, its like chess, and the only thing that gets our guild up and interested in the game!

if you purly look at active gp in a TW we also struggled against far less active gp in a TW, for all the faults if can call them faults in game, how would anyone like an AI to match make a TW? look at every player, every guild, and try and make a choice, while also trying to stop potential cheating, think you looking past the issue that your plan, is not up to doing much :)

"Nikoms565;c-2023789" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023763" wrote:

"Nikoms565;c-2023739" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023695" wrote:

"Kyno;c-2023687" wrote:
Sandbagging is not losing to a stronger opponent. Sandbagging is an intentional act to try and force a favorable match.

What you are talking about is an issue with matchmaking that should be addressed.

What he was asking for is information to look at a guild to see if they did this intentionally.

These are 2 different things.

Disagree here. His response clearly indicates he doesn't think intentionally sandbagging is possible. We know that it is. And we know that it's not always intentional.

Just to be clear - by definition, there is no such thing as "unintentional sandbagging". If it's unintentional (i.e. players are busy IRL so choose not to sign up, people forgot to sign up, people have left the guild, etc.) that's not sandbagging.

I only make that differentiation because I think guilds are shorthanded unintentionally much more often than they are sandbagging. Think about it. If you were in a 200+ million GP guild and you were asked/forced to sit out of TW and not got any rewards, how long would you stay in that guild?

The end result is the same, so I use the term regardless. I understand not everyone does.

"Kyno;c-2023734" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023695" wrote:

"Kyno;c-2023687" wrote:
Sandbagging is not losing to a stronger opponent. Sandbagging is an intentional act to try and force a favorable match.

What you are talking about is an issue with matchmaking that should be addressed.

What he was asking for is information to look at a guild to see if they did this intentionally.

These are 2 different things.

Disagree here. His response clearly indicates he doesn't think intentionally sandbagging is possible. We know that it is. And we know that it's not always intentional.

I understand that his response does say that, but to the OPs point there is a difference between having an opponent who doesnt have a guild full of players who want to play TW, and guilds that try to force a situation. They are not one in the same, as many seem to think, regardless of relics,zetas or GP, and other factors.

They are functionally the same. If you force the issue by telling 2-4 people to sit out a TW you get the same match as you would if 2-4 people just didn't sign up for any other reason. Making a distinction between doing it on purpose or not is 100% meaningless, especially in this context, where CG doesn't think it's even possible to get a favorable matchup with fewer than 50 members.

The distinction is not meaningless, as guilds have been reported as "cheaters" when an opponent thinks they're sandbagging, when it's possible that players simply sat out due to RL commitments, left the guild, etc. Distinguishing between intentional manipulation of the matchups and real-life obstacles to participation is necessary because integrity matters. Both in the play and in the way matchmaking deals with guilds of 50 that only have 42-46 participants in a TW.

Yes, matchmaking needs to account for player number differences better - but not in a way that "punishes" guilds with less than 50 players participating. That wouldn't be fair to smaller guilds, casual guilds, guilds that have players that travel for work or are on vacation, etc.

Why does being accused of cheating matter? Even sandbagging on purpose is not against the rules or the TOS.

And I agree, matchmaking should be fixed so it properly accounts for this situation.

"Obi1_son;c-2023802" wrote:

"StoemKnight;c-2023719" wrote:

"trevyclause;c-2023712" wrote:
sorry for my lack of knowledge, but can someone briefly explain how sandbagging works? It seems likes it’s not possible for it to give you an advantage, but I would assume I just don’t know how it works.

To me it just seems that the matchmaking system just does a not-so-great job at taking into account the varying rosters across the board.

A group of 40 players, with 5.5M GP (mostly relic'd) takes on a guild of 50 players, mostly 4.4M (barely relic'd), both are 220M guilds...
Who do you think wins easily?

My money would be on the guild with 50 players

Chances are they will have more meta toons/teams

Well, then you would be wrong. Because the guild with 40 players has 40 of each meta team with all the appropriate zetas and most at g13. The guild with 50 will have maybe 30-35 of most of the meta teams, without all the zetas, and with worse gear levels.

"StarSon;c-2023844" wrote:

"Nikoms565;c-2023789" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023763" wrote:

"Nikoms565;c-2023739" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023695" wrote:

"Kyno;c-2023687" wrote:
Sandbagging is not losing to a stronger opponent. Sandbagging is an intentional act to try and force a favorable match.

What you are talking about is an issue with matchmaking that should be addressed.

What he was asking for is information to look at a guild to see if they did this intentionally.

These are 2 different things.

Disagree here. His response clearly indicates he doesn't think intentionally sandbagging is possible. We know that it is. And we know that it's not always intentional.

Just to be clear - by definition, there is no such thing as "unintentional sandbagging". If it's unintentional (i.e. players are busy IRL so choose not to sign up, people forgot to sign up, people have left the guild, etc.) that's not sandbagging.

I only make that differentiation because I think guilds are shorthanded unintentionally much more often than they are sandbagging. Think about it. If you were in a 200+ million GP guild and you were asked/forced to sit out of TW and not got any rewards, how long would you stay in that guild?

The end result is the same, so I use the term regardless. I understand not everyone does.

"Kyno;c-2023734" wrote:

"StarSon;c-2023695" wrote:

"Kyno;c-2023687" wrote:
Sandbagging is not losing to a stronger opponent. Sandbagging is an intentional act to try and force a favorable match.

What you are talking about is an issue with matchmaking that should be addressed.

What he was asking for is information to look at a guild to see if they did this intentionally.

These are 2 different things.

Disagree here. His response clearly indicates he doesn't think intentionally sandbagging is possible. We know that it is. And we know that it's not always intentional.

I understand that his response does say that, but to the OPs point there is a difference between having an opponent who doesnt have a guild full of players who want to play TW, and guilds that try to force a situation. They are not one in the same, as many seem to think, regardless of relics,zetas or GP, and other factors.

They are functionally the same. If you force the issue by telling 2-4 people to sit out a TW you get the same match as you would if 2-4 people just didn't sign up for any other reason. Making a distinction between doing it on purpose or not is 100% meaningless, especially in this context, where CG doesn't think it's even possible to get a favorable matchup with fewer than 50 members.

The distinction is not meaningless, as guilds have been reported as "cheaters" when an opponent thinks they're sandbagging, when it's possible that players simply sat out due to RL commitments, left the guild, etc. Distinguishing between intentional manipulation of the matchups and real-life obstacles to participation is necessary because integrity matters. Both in the play and in the way matchmaking deals with guilds of 50 that only have 42-46 participants in a TW.

Yes, matchmaking needs to account for player number differences better - but not in a way that "punishes" guilds with less than 50 players participating. That wouldn't be fair to smaller guilds, casual guilds, guilds that have players that travel for work or are on vacation, etc.

Why does being accused of cheating matter? Even sandbagging on purpose is not against the rules or the TOS.

And I agree, matchmaking should be fixed so it properly accounts for this situation.

we dont have 100% people on every TW, we actually allow people to join if they on holiday or away, as they part of guild and active, and just becuause they having a few hours/days of dosnt mean they should miss out, on rewards, and again maybe we just lucky, and dont keep count, but we are about 26 wins to 2 lose, and the 2 lose were over a year ago, need a strong plan, inline with current meta, and a guild who react when asked too, its a part of game realy enjoy, and no sandbag, or alliance beat us yet :)

"StarSon;c-2023846" wrote:

"Obi1_son;c-2023802" wrote:

"StoemKnight;c-2023719" wrote:

"trevyclause;c-2023712" wrote:
sorry for my lack of knowledge, but can someone briefly explain how sandbagging works? It seems likes it’s not possible for it to give you an advantage, but I would assume I just don’t know how it works.

To me it just seems that the matchmaking system just does a not-so-great job at taking into account the varying rosters across the board.

A group of 40 players, with 5.5M GP (mostly relic'd) takes on a guild of 50 players, mostly 4.4M (barely relic'd), both are 220M guilds...
Who do you think wins easily?

My money would be on the guild with 50 players

Chances are they will have more meta toons/teams

Well, then you would be wrong. Because the guild with 40 players has 40 of each meta team with all the appropriate zetas and most at g13. The guild with 50 will have maybe 30-35 of most of the meta teams, without all the zetas, and with worse gear levels.

Why doesn’t the guild with 50 have 40+?

"Dropper;c-2023827" wrote:
...stop blaming something you cant control, as it will happen, no AI matchmaking can ever fix it!

This thread is more about the Devs not being aware of “sandbagging” and it’s viability.