[Matchmaking] Introducing a new "PVP Level" for better matchmaking. [SUGGESTION]

ayroux

Its no secret that matchmaking doesnt work, ELO doesnt work and the leaderboard doesnt work. I have a suggestion that I have been chewing on for a while and I think it would work VERY well for Neverwinter. Here it is.

Create a PVP level - much like your character level. Everyone starts at "level 1" and you gain EXP from winning domination matches. If you LOSE, you will LOSE. Or heck, an even simpler version could just be. WIn = +1 level Lose = -1 Level. To keep it very "simple"...

So every person starts at "level 1" and it will feel like no match making. After a short time all the premades and BIS players will be a high level, where as the average person will not and new players will start at level 1. The matchmaking system will PURELY base matches off this PVP level/bracket. Nothing else, NO ELO!

The leaderboard should be based on this EXP number/ PVP level. I would envision Levels 1-50 working just fine.

For matchmaking purposes, you already have "tiers" or "ranks" that could be used and based on PVP Level. These would be used for matchmaking and it would ONLY pit players against others in their "tier", so 1 example:
- Unranked (1-7)
- Dominator (8-14)
- Tyrant (15-21)
- Supreme Tyrant (22-28)
- Ultimate Tyrant 29-35)
- Overlord, (36-42)
- Invincible Overlord (43+)

So if you are an "Ultimate Tyrant" you would only be matched against other "ultimate tyrants" it would NOT try and balance teams by putting 2 "Ultimate Tyrants" on each team and two Dominators on each to make them "balanced". It would only seek to match based on your current "tier" and if after X time (call it 10 minutes) it could then expand to go 1 tier higher or lower. (or better yet is if it were based on the actual PVP level ranges, which then could slowly broaden the range every X minutes by 1 level).

Since the leaderboard is based on this PVP level, leveling up and moving into this better "rank" is a double edge sword. You level and you are moving up the leaderboard, but! it increases the toughness of your competition. If you lose, you lose EXP/Levels and it can make it harder to progress to the next Tier as now it requires more wins and thus harder to move up the boards/tiers. I would also make sure that once you progress to a NEW "tier" say from Tyrant to Supreme Tyrant, you cannot go below the lowest level in that "tier". So if you went from PVP LVL 14 -> 15 you move up a tier. but if you were PVP Level 15, you could not go back down to Dominator or go DOWN to LVL 14... Level 15 in this example would be the lowest you could go (to lock in your highest tier)...Why this is important is you need players to feel like they can "lock in" at a certain point so losing matches can only hurt so much, with limited downside. This is what prevents players from quitting after 2-3 losses feeling like they need to get a premade or something in order to make up for it. With this limited downside, it encourages people to keep playing more.

The beauty of this system is it creates your own matchmaking, gives players something VISIBLE to "work for" in PVP as if they are feeling progress after winning EVERY match. Players will care more about PVP games and actually TRY even if at negative odds - since noone likes losing EXP.

Also, this sets up " PVP Seasons" easily! Every 2-3 months, you reset everyone's PVP level, reset the leaderboards after giving rewards to Top X players.

This all would be akin to the NCL - which was a BIG success. But introduces another layer(PVP Level) that I think would breathe a ton of fresh air into PVP and give players something to work for and it would be fun too!

ayroux

In response to a thread created by @matthiasthehun76

He posed a great thread that this solution ALSO solves see his points below:

matthiasthehun76 said:

I was today in a Domination match, lost 3 in a row btw, when i kind of exploded and had to log off. All my matches featured nearly the same conversation on my team, from PUGs, take a look for yourselves:



I am personally fed up to be paired with intentionally trolling persons, who don't give a damn about team, just come and leech for easy AD. I would like to play with like minded people, who are there to enjoy PVP and contribute to the success of their team.

So with this "PVP Level" solution, this would fix the problem! The "PVE PUGs" as he calls them who only do 1-2 PVP games a day, mainly for the free AD, would be stuck at virtually level 1 the entire time. Losing and never gaining EXP.

A player like Matthias, since he seems to play more competative and sounds like a rational human being, id wager would be a pretty solid "PVP Level". Just for the sake of example. Lets assume "PVP Level" ranges from 1-50. Lets assume Matthias is a "Level 36". He would NEVER get matched with a level 1 PVP level player. The only players those low level guys who get matched against are OTHER players who are < Level 10 in PVP.

So all these "AD Trolls" would basically only see THEMSELVES or brand new players looking to get their feet in the door in PVP to earn some glory/AD themselves too. It would actually make these "trolls" WORK for their AD since they would face opponants on the other side who are just like them - wanting to AFK to get the AD LOL!

Where as Matthias would only see other players in a 31-40 "tier" of PVP meaning its likely going to always be competitive matching.

matthiasthehun76

Thank you mate for the kind words, much appreciated , as far as your idea i like it, simple as that. Thumbs up!

Something really needs to happen regarding PVP, sadly i am not so optimistic to say this game can wait another year with PVP reworks, no no, it needs to happen now, if only steps by steps, but if Devs wait another year after they sorted out all class balances in PVE, then i see red.

loboguild

I'm not as optimistic with all these alternatives to ELO. I think @panderus reiterated that the ELO currently performs badly because it's missing players. At the same time it's coded to produce short queue times. This essentially means it pairs players that shouldn't ever meet on the battlefield, but happen to be in the queue at the same time.

I fail to see how any other system (item level tiers, PVP level) can overcome the lack of players. In your system, the matchmaking would pair a lvl 70 PVP player vs. a lvl1 PVP player, because it still can't find equal competition. How is that better than the current ELO?

When we're talking "tighter searches" or item level brackets, it means you want players to be matched with equal competition. This can already be done with the current system, but would produce queue times of 30+ minutes, a price the devs aren't willing to pay.

So if you're searching for reasons why the PVP queue isn't working: It's population, population and population. Did I mention population? We should also not forget population and add that population is kind of an issue. It's really that easy. So you either try to get more people into PVP, which the solo queue imho could achieve. Or you give the few remaining PVP players a chance to create their own matches in a room / lobby system or a full premade queue.​​

rayrdan

I give up, just call me back when solo q will become a stable feature. Tv series my old friends

ayroux

loboguild said:

I fail to see how any other system (item level tiers, PVP level) can overcome the lack of players. In your system, the matchmaking would pair a lvl 70 PVP player vs. a lvl1 PVP player, because it still can't find equal competition. How is that better than the current ELO?

Sure! I can tell you how it would be better.

First, ELO is a "skill" based metric. Or an attempt at one. Its been proven its failed in how it has been implimented with Neverwinter and one of the large reasons it fails is it assumes an "unknown" factor in its calculations. This is normal for most ELO systems however in Neverwinter its the reason for why people were LOSING leaderboard spots after winning a match, because this "unknown" factor shurnk causing a loss in ELO - its all technical BS for basically "not ideal".

Anyways, so besides ELO not being optimal in NW for that reason, ANOTHER reason why it doesnt work is because skill < gear. In most competitive games that utilize ELO they also have a very low, if not non existent "gear" component. In Neverwinter, the opposite is true. It relies VERY heavily on gear so much so, you could take the most skilled person in the game and put them on a fresh level 70, and literally a band new player who has never played NW before and but him on a BIS character and the BIS character would win.

So there are TWO reasons why ELO has failed Neverwinter.

Want a third?

ELO doesnt segregate the population. It merely seeks to balance teams with even ELO. This is why you will have a team of BIS 4k Players get matched against a team of 3k players and everyone is wondering WTF man... Its because of ELO. Or to paint an even better picture. You get a team of all 2.5k players + 1 BIS 4.3k Player on 1 side. Matched with a team of all 3k Ilevel players on the other side. In THEORY and using ELO this system seems fair. But going back to point #2, why it fails is that 4.3k+ Ilevel player can likely 3v1 or 4v1 them because the gear gap is SO HIGH, which allows for those 4x 2.5k Ilevel players to easily pick off the 1-2 surviving 3k players because that 500 point gap is small. ELO doesnt segregate the player base. It could actually be IMPROVED if they adjusted or created "brackets" that would stop high ELO players being put on low ELO players teams but in the current system it seeks to "average" the ELO and WILL put those players on the same team.


So how my system would be better, lets address the same areas

It is NOT a skill based metric, its what you "earned". If you are a BIS player, or you believe what I have claimed in that gear > skill by a massive amount. It will be no secret that your "PVP Level" should be relatively high. Just through volume of games. Its likely you will win. Taking my previous 4.3k Ilevel player + 2.5k allies, in this match his ELO wont go up very much, and thus that scenario is likely to repeat. In my PVP Level, his PVP Level goes up and it is likely he could move into a new "bracket" or now will get paird with people closer to his new level... and because players cant LOSE levels (just exp earned in any single level) he will eventually move onto higher tiers against higher Ilevel players who also have leveled up. The system wouldnt seek to match a PVP level 1 player to a PVP Level 50 player, it would create "tiers" or restrictions. Players cant "twink" themselves very easily since it would entail purposefully losing matches and I would HOPE this PVP Level would be visible - meaning people will want to brag about theirs, and not keep themselves low, for easy PVP wins.

Another thing this also will do is (as I wrote above) separate out the daily PVPers from the casual PVPers. Sheer volume of games will have a correlation to PVP Level. You could in theory have a BIS PVP player only play 1-2 games at a time and not move up fast, and therefore would create imbalanced matches, this is true. This is also true with any matchmaking system or the current ELO system. But what you WONT have are the AFK ADers or casual PVE ers or NEW players facing any seasoned PVP er, since matchmaking would be based on "PVP LEVEL".


To address your other point about population and "tightening searches" this is true that the population is low. But its NOT as if there arent enough players for a domination. It takes 10 players... your telling me there are not 10 players qued for PVP that are not BIS? I find that hard to believe and wager at any time there are... but the issue is it isnt trying to match based on gear... its looking through ALL the player base and trying to build TEAMS that ave a similar ELO rating. Not similar on the individual front but similar as in "total" or "average". My system would seek to divide the player base based on a VISIBLE level that the player accrues via winning PVP games.

In theory you COULD do what I propose for ELO:
1) Make it visible (FYI it actually USED to be visible until they got flack for people losing ELO from winning games)
2) Make Matchmaking based on "ranges" which you could do.

Ultimately this will fail unless they remove this "unknown" variable from ELO as well as realize that SKILL < Gear. Also, you need to have people "lock in" at certain thresholds otherwise you get some player who shoots way up after a few wins, then tanks his ELO a few games to drop back down...

ELO is just not a very good metric to use in an RPG PVP game. It needs to be just a sheer level, earned through EXP - which then provides meaning and a sense of accomplishment from every single win in PVP and players will feel the desire to "level up" and this also sets the stage to do seasonal resets as well as dividing the community between casual PVPers and die hard PVPers. It also would not differentiate based on guild or friends list but sheer PVP Level (unlike ELO which does this).

ayroux

@loboguild
I will also add to this. My suggestion is to ALSO make any TEAMS that are compiled based off the HIGHEST PVP Level on that team.

So lets say you did get a premade put together, and their PVP Levels are:
44, 36, 27, 18, 43

This "team" would be ALL considered PVP Level 44 and match against that.

So it will actually be a "handicap" if you want to see it that way to Premades since it will match people up with a ton of solo Qers who are all in the lvl 40+ range which would likely make for a fun match! Where as right NOW it looks at that (and assume this is their ELO since it does range from 1-57ish if I recall right) it will seek to have an "average" of "33" or so for each player.

So again... its highly likely that most of this premade are BIS or many BIS but an ELO 33 player might be a 3k Ilevel player so this is EXACTLY how you end up with a team of 4k+ players against 3k Ilevel players... Its elo and how its being used.

forumnamesuxs

Interesting concept, assuming it's not account gained xp, but per character.
This could possibly work, and add new players to the arena.
Just one thing though, to increase chances of success with this, some of the "naked pvp" ideas would probably have to be implemented. No boons, insignias, mount combat powers etc.
Sorry if I'm doubling someone. On my phone, sleepy AND high on caffeine = didn't read much past OP.

ayroux

forumnamesuxs said:

Interesting concept, assuming it's not account gained xp, but per character.

This could possibly work, and add new players to the arena.

Just one thing though, to increase chances of success with this, some of the "naked pvp" ideas would probably have to be implemented. No boons, insignias, mount combat powers etc.

Sorry if I'm doubling someone. On my phone, sleepy AND high on caffeine = didn't read much past OP.

@forumnamesuxs I completely agree. Doing what I call "Vanilla" PVP - which corresponds to my other post about removing boons/mounts/etc. from PVP so its basically just your character and gear and thats it to balance out the power creep and gear gap in PVP.

Do that, and then this suggestion of a PvP Level for each character as described above and you will have a GREAT PVP game!

forumnamesuxs

@ayroux. I just made a separate post about it. I probably took it a bit further than a lot of people care for though

ayroux

forumnamesuxs said:

@ayroux. I just made a separate post about it. I probably took it a bit further than a lot of people care for though

EDIT: Found it:
http://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/neverwinter/#/discussion/1223752/idea-for-a-pvp-event

pepe

Although I support the idea, I don't think average sealclubber will like it. And him exactly is the main source of income for average game producer. They usually say their hard work to get better should not be punished by giving them harder matches. Average player trains (and invests) simply to club more seals. So, statistics will not help your struggle I'm afraid.

I was reading about similar ideas on other forums too. Many creative people like you were hanged, burned and buried in unmarked grave for being fair.

I guess I better not encourage you further on

ayroux

pepe#7131 said:

Although I support the idea, I don't think average sealclubber will like it.

Appreciate the post and I hope you are wrong. Just for kicks, I thought I would quote here some OTHER popular games and how they approach this issue:

Overwatch said:

Once you've completed your initial ten placement matches, you'll be assigned a basic bracket. From here you can climb up into a higher bracket based on performance, but you'll never drop entirely out of your best tier if you end up having a terrible time of things.

So this would be similar to my proposal, minus placement matches, however you can view the low "levels" AS placement, since my guess would be they take very few wins to get out of those low levels meaning a competent PVPer should win a majority of his initial 10 first games and easily put him at a higher PVP Level rather quickly.

Halo 5 said:

When you first hop into any of the Arena playlists, you will play a series of placement matches before being earning your CSR. After you complete 10 games, you will be placed into one of 7 CSR ranks based on your performance....As you win, you will progress through the 6 tiers of your rank. If you are skilled enough to continue winning at tier 6, you will advance to the next rank (yay!). Losing games will cause your progress within a rank to decrease, but you will never drop down a whole rank from losing. For example, if you spend all month working your way into Silver, losing won’t drop you back to Bronze.

Again a similar system. Minus "placement" players rank up with wins, players lose "Rank/Level" with losses, with some type of "catch" to prevent players from falling TOO far (Just like Overwatch and "you'll never drop entirely out of your best tier")

RocketLeague said:

Competitive is one of the two core Online Gameplay modes. The Competitive mode is based purely on skill tiers which will loosely determine the skill of a player... All players are required to play 10 placement matches... Every time you get promoted or demoted... Etc.

SAME type of system. You work on a visible "Level" or "Rank" that when you win, it goes up, when you lose, it goes down and you ONLY get matched against other players in your same "division or tier".

A new game I just became aware of:

Dragon Nest said:

Players obtain PvP EXP after killing other players, or receive assist EXP after helping kill other players. Players are able to level up their PvP level and acheive a higher PvP Rank displayed by their rank icon... In most modes player stats are normalized to level the playing field, so poorly equipped players will find their stats vastly improved while those with cutting edge gear will be weakened (this is why many players strip for PvP).... A player gains Ranking Points (thereby moving up the Ladder) by winning a match and loses points by losing matches (which moves him or her down the ladder).

Same type of system.


ALL of these games have a VISUAL rank that matches players against people ONLY within the confines of their ranks.

Incorporating a PVP can do the SAME thing. You associate these PVP Levels with The "Ranks".
Dominator, Tyrant, Supreme Tyrant, Ultimate Tyrant, Overlord, Invincible Overlord.

You can use these SIX classes to segment players and then ONLY allow players to get matched against others in their own class of the six listed above.

The PVP Level system would then be used to show VISIBLE gain or progress in each segment. Heck you could even throw out the PVP Level Idea and just show some other formula. You must win X games in each "tier" to move on, and if you LOSE a match, it removes a win.

To illustrate, call it "Stars" You get a "Star" for each win and lose a "star" for a loss... You need 10 stars to move up to the next tier. You are at 6 Stars as an Ultimate Tyrant. You lose a match, you lose a star. You can never move out of Ultimate Tyrant though... Even if at 0 stars and you lose. Once you get 10 stars you move up to Overlord.

That would work JUST AS WELL.

Note though, 6 "classes" at 10 stars each = 60 "PVP LEVELS" Same type of idea.


It just needs to be VISIBLE and players need to SEE progress and then you also need to matchmaking based on the "Tiers" or "PVP Levels" etc.

yubit

I didn't check out this post b4... Looks cool! Like the tiers from LoL, HotS, DOTA, but why not make it like that? Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, and allowing people to drop levels will make a loss much more meaningful, let's say that if you have 0 exp in the lowest tier of Gold, if you lose 3 games in a row you drop to Silver, why not?

Gears of War 4 had this on Beta (I don't have the full game yet :( ) and it let you queue with any number of people you wanted, was the usual, play 5-10 qualifiers and you ended up in a tier according to your performance.

I started playing NW's PvP not long ago tbh, but I'm getting discouraged because of the random Leaderboard and the "awesome" level 60 rewards, maybe the campaign needs an update too!

ayroux

yubit#2497 said:

I didn't check out this post b4... Looks cool! Like the tiers from LoL, HotS, DOTA, but why not make it like that? Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond, and allowing people to drop levels will make a loss much more meaningful, let's say that if you have 0 exp in the lowest tier of Gold, if you lose 3 games in a row you drop to Silver, why not?



Gears of War 4 had this on Beta (I don't have the full game yet ) and it let you queue with any number of people you wanted, was the usual, play 5-10 qualifiers and you ended up in a tier according to your performance.



I started playing NW's PvP not long ago tbh, but I'm getting discouraged because of the random Leaderboard and the "awesome" level 60 rewards, maybe the campaign needs an update too!

The only thing I dislike is allowing people to lose their "spot" There is a comfort in knowing that once you hit a certain point you cant de-rank further. I really believe its to give incentive to play and not worry that "oh man i lost 3 in a row im on a bad streak and better stop" so they build fail-safe methods by allowing you to drop a little, so that its a meaningful loss, but not feel like a week or weeks of work is thrown out over night with a few bad matches.

I think allowing you to fall to just the bottom of the current "tier" is far enough. For many players they will find themselves "capping out" at various tiers, which is what you want... Then a seasonal "reset" gets players back into wanting to "try again" to beat their best.

pepe

ayroux said:

I would quote here some OTHER popular games and how they approach this issue:

Yupp, mate.

In Warthunder matchmaking was all about the gear. Many were QQ-ing about 1-2 aces devastating all enemy team in a minute. No fun and no credits for others, not to mention slaughtered enemy.

So they tested experimental matchmaker for 2 weeks: every player would receive a battle rating according to his experience (defined mostly by total kills and kill/die ratio) and gear. Every player had a chance to fight against similar ones, aces vs. aces and newbies vs. newbies. But, it happened some good players went to low tier battles and noticed they had worse gear than newbies. River of forum tears was amazing. Aces got killed by average players. Game was no fun any more.

No one asked why were aces fighting at low tiers so much. Did they really search for fair fight there?

So... Game designers simply reversed matchmaker to good old sealclubber2014 version.

ayroux

pepe#7131 said:

ayroux said:

I would quote here some OTHER popular games and how they approach this issue:

Yupp, mate.

In Warthunder matchmaking was all about the gear. Many were QQ-ing about 1-2 aces devastating all enemy team in a minute. No fun and no credits for others, not to mention slaughtered enemy.

So they tested experimental matchmaker for 2 weeks: every player would receive a battle rating according to his experience (defined mostly by total kills and kill/die ratio) and gear. Every player had a chance to fight against similar ones, aces vs. aces and newbies vs. newbies. But, it happened some good players went to low tier battles and noticed they had worse gear than newbies. River of forum tears was amazing. Aces got killed by average players. Game was no fun any more.

No one asked why were aces fighting at low tiers so much. Did they really search for fair fight there?

So... Game designers simply reversed matchmaker to good old sealclubber2014 version.

How sad. This is a joke to me and matchmaking NEEDS to be about making the most "fair" games possible. In PVP it SHOULD come down to skill as the deciding factor. The problem with NW is skill has nothing to do with who wins anymore than what race/gender your character is... its that bad now. I could take my GWF and put a monkey at the keyboard and he would likely win over a brand new lvl 70 player - just from sheer GEAR alone.

Thats when you know its gone too far.

I think gear SHOULD play a role - thats part of the appeal to an RPG MMO in PVP. YOUR character and how you choose to build him and what gear you have farmed all makes him unique in PVP. It goes too far when the average player doesnt even stand a CHANCE in killing the better geared players.

I cant think of ANY game that is successful with that large of a gear gap. The only thing that comes remotely close would be WoW back in its Vanilla days but even then it was LARGELY about skill... But I do recall certain videos like the "Pat HighWarlord" video in which he gets buffed by a team, in BIS gear, and just SHREDS everyone. But he was literally 1 of a kinda and it required a TEAM of players to farm on his account for weeks to get that rank and that gear. Here in NW you bust out a credit card and you are there... Or if you were smart enough to do professions on gateway for several years, you are there, etc etc. Ill get off my soap box but its VERY clear to me that the gear gap allowed in NW has definitely gone FAR past its threshold in making PVP competitive. PVP is anything BUT competitive today which is exactly why people who want competition DONT play anymore - because it doesnt exist in this game.

pando83

Population is indeed low. You said it. Your system wouldn't find a fitting enemy team for the premade and eventually feed it a pug team. Period.

Or you FORCE matchmaking to WAIT for a proper enemy team, which means premades would wait ages before getting a match.

Solo queue--->faster. No premades, no ganging up, just matchmaking working with no extra element (premades) bypassing it.
We've already seen that when premades are not involved, in solo queue, the quality of the matchups is raised drastically. Players still lose, often without a head-to-head match, but they 9/10 can fight back.
In current mixed queue 9/10 you CAN'T fight back. You must beg the premade/ half premade for points.

Your system would however solve some flaws of the current matchmaking. But if you don't want a solo queue you must force 5 men premades to wait for another 5-men premade, and so on with any other premade formation. Anything else would break the matchmaking. Matchmaking= system that arrange teams for a fair match. Premade= you create your own system bypassing the matchmaking.

The only way to have the 2 concepts "coexist" is to force what i explained above. Which would result in premades a lot to get a match against another premade of the same level.

silver11

The system you described has been implemented in alot of games already and works well for them. it wouldnt for nw because of the heavy gear dependence. in other games you level up and get a better gun or perk, skill is what separates good or bad. not saying there is no skill in nw pvp, but gear is the biggest factor involved in being great at pvp here (r12s, trans enchants, mythic arts, legend weapons etc. make a night and day difference). i believe alot pvpers would stay at an easier tier even if it meant losing which would countermine the entire reason behind the system. think im wrong? check how populated 60s pvp is. id bet there are more bis 60s than there are 70s (i play on xbox). all nw needs is a solo queue, regular queue (both truly randomized) and the ability to make private matches. the villany of "premades" and "bis" should stop also. premades = a group of friends playing together, no different from pve tackling a dungeon. bis = a veteran player (some cases a rich player) but all i can say is in my own personal i grinded over a year to be 4k. i like nw and hope it returns to its former glory.

yubit

It would need a whole revamp to be at least comparable to any decent PvP game out there; a not random easy-to-follow leaderboard, Custom Queues, worthy campaign rewards, more maps, more modes would be nice (right now there's only one mode: Dom 5v5, Dom 10v10, "Open world" Dom) and get rid of Siege, that thing is broken beyond repair!! D:

ayroux

pando83 said:

Population is indeed low. You said it. Your system wouldn't find a fitting enemy team for the premade and eventually feed it a pug team. Period.

Or you FORCE matchmaking to WAIT for a proper enemy team, which means premades would wait ages before getting a match.

I dont think this is true. I dont know why you think its true. There ARE other equally geared players out there for the BIS players. I mean how many times have two premade teams tried to sync que and it never matches them.

There arent just 5 BIS players on at a time. There ARE a small number sure but there are enough for a solid match.

Solo Q is a horrible idea. It detracts from the intent of MMO RPGs (play with friends)... It doesnt fix the gear gap issue. Its a short term fix with devastating long term impact.

If everyone works at a "PVP" level it will make the guys at the top wait longer, and likely end up playing the same people more often - which is what they want (with the proposal of lobby system)

Like I said, if you have a team of players, it puts that entire team as a 5 man group with the HIGHEST PVP Tier player. So this team will either get matched against very high ranking PUGs (who would likely outgear the premade) or another team who has another high ranking player on their team.

It literally solves all the issues....

silver11#9318 said:

The system you described has been implemented in alot of games already and works well for them. it wouldnt for nw because of the heavy gear dependence. in other games you level up and get a better gun or perk, skill is what separates good or bad. not saying there is no skill in nw pvp, but gear is the biggest factor involved in being great at pvp here (r12s, trans enchants, mythic arts, legend weapons etc. make a night and day difference). i believe alot pvpers would stay at an easier tier even if it meant losing which would countermine the entire reason behind the system. think im wrong? check how populated 60s pvp is. id bet there are more bis 60s than there are 70s (i play on xbox). all nw needs is a solo queue, regular queue (both truly randomized) and the ability to make private matches. the villany of "premades" and "bis" should stop also. premades = a group of friends playing together, no different from pve tackling a dungeon. bis = a veteran player (some cases a rich player) but all i can say is in my own personal i grinded over a year to be 4k. i like nw and hope it returns to its former glory.

This is exactly my point and why the CURRENT system fails... The CURRENT system is based on "ELO" which is a try at a "skill rating"

What you are missing about this system, is that no under geared player will be able to make it to the top tiers. This is exactly why LOSING a game makes you LOSE rank.

Why solo Q wont work is now you have multiple Ques that FURTHER divide population and (again) defeats the entire purpose of playing this game with friends.

More QUes = Bad. We dont have the population to support that and I dont think you want to divide the player base up and force you to NOT play with friends. This will only discourage playing with friends which leads to the game being less social which for many players is the only reason they still play.

I have already written in detail about all this stuff and its a little frustrating that you guys didnt seem to read my responses to some of these things in this thread, such as my reply to loboguild.

pepe

Dudes, let's face it... NW can't go on without gear weight. More equipped char must be slower and/or getting tired faster. It's natural. Fighting with heavier gear should cost speed and/or stamina.

That's all matchmaking we need, imho. That way even PvP world would be possible.

ayroux

pepe#7131 said:

Dudes, let's face it... NW can't go on without gear weight. More equipped char must be slower and/or getting tired faster. It's natural. Fighting with heavier gear should cost speed and/or stamina.

That's all matchmaking we need, imho. That way even PvP world would be possible.

Thats just silly. If this were true the tank classes would be very slow and the classes like TR would just be faster. That doesnt make a ton of sense.

What they need is a better matchmaking system (This proposal gives us that) and they need to normalize gear without completely trivializing gear (the boon/mount bonus removal suggestion does that) and then PVP will work well again.

Without that, any other solution is only a temporary fix. The lobby idea isnt bad, but it splits the community and all the premades will love it for 2 months and the game's PVP will die.

The solo Q option is bad because it doesnt address the fundamental core issues with MMO RPG games - people come online to be social and play wit friends, this is a step back from that. Not just that but you STILL end up with a 4.3k+ Ilevel monster, going in and getting matched against 3k Ilevel average players and just STOMPS their faces in with no contest. It isnt fun for either team to have this.


The issue of gear gap HAS to be addressed in any solution.
The issue of matchmaking HAS to be addressed in any solution.

There is only 1 clear path, and I have outlined it. Anything else is destined to fail and continue down the current path until NW PVP is 100% dead. Just look at STO and that games history... If NW follows in its footsteps, there ya go. A lobby or Solo Q system WONT fix any of that and will just be a temporary relief for players without lasting effects. It will be MUCH akin to SH SIEGE PVP. It was "OK" or "FUN" at first, but now noone does it because its boring and many other reasons. Thats the SAME thing that will happen with Lobby or Solo Q.

loboguild

ayroux said:

it assumes an "unknown" factor in its calculations. This is normal for most ELO systems however in Neverwinter its the reason for why people were LOSING leaderboard spots after winning a match, because this "unknown" factor shurnk causing a loss in ELO - its all technical BS for basically "not ideal".

I have to say that I can't really judge this. If true another system makes obviously sense, but other than that I still don't really see the need for a complete overhaul. What you want to achieve (balanced matches, gear gap, etc.) can largely be done by the current system.

And please stop to fight the solo queue because "social". That's just a bad excuse. There has to be a system for premades to determine the best team, but in the Leaderboard environment a solo queue does not only make sense, it's mandatory. It shouldn't be the only queue available, but the only one that contributes to any meaningful single player ranking. If you want to play with friends, you can still enter the custom queue that doesn't have a ranking attached to it.

pepe

ayroux said:

Thats just silly. If this were true the tank classes would be very slow and the classes like TR would just be faster. That doesnt make a ton of sense.

Ah, I wasn't clear, mate. Heavily armed TR would be as slow as any other heavily armed class. My model offers fair battles, between equally armed players, no matter of class.

Classes MUST remain equal, or it really would be silly, I agree. Just for records. I will not push my idea further more in your fair thread. *wink*

silver11

true there is a huge social aspect to mmos but there is a large solo community too. there are times i dont want to play with friends. having a solo queue will work. theres really no way it can fail imo besides i guess killing regular queue a bit. ill leave your idea alone, but i think you should find ways to enhance the current system instead of completely remodel it. im not opposed to it, but this company wont do it. look at their track record.

ayroux

pando83 said:

Just tried a match on one of my alts. Enemy team got double 4k players (most likely teaming up). They stomped 1000-7 while one guy from their team asked them to let us cap....

Now, ayroux: your system, in a mixed queue, would still give plenty of chances to players like the 2 mentioned above to stomp players.

You guys must understand that what you experience in PvP is not how things go. Even 1 match ending like the one explained above is enough to convince a new player to QUIT PvP.

@pando83 I snipped some of your post since it got moved to the lower depths, but you bring up some good points that I think are relevant to this conversation.

I 100% agree with your last point. We cannot get matches like this or it causes new players or casuals to quit. As you put it "normal player that can waste 1 hour trying to complete a daily to get PvP gear, for example."

I 100% agree.

Here is why I DONT think the solution is solo -Q. It doesnt solve your problem. You will get that NEW player who goes into PVP and gets hit 2x with an at-will from a BIS player and dies. There is no "skill" involved and while his TEAM might have a better chance and the match might not end 1000-7. It doesnt do anything to help that new player.

Now, what my system here offers is that it will avoid MOST of these matchups. Maybe you dont quite understand how it works.

The "4k players" as you describe them would NEVER be matched against new players or even casual players. The 4k+ players would be a HIGH PVP Level. The players you describe (alts, new players, casuals) will be a LOW PVP Level and therefore NOT get matched with 4k+ premades etc.

You dont need to force a SOLO-Q to make this happen. You create a PVP Level that does your matchmaking for you, that gives players something to work towards ( PVP LEVEL) and then ALSO separates out the daily PVPers/die hard PVPers from the rest of the population.

Anyone who is 4k+ in item level isnt going to be in a low PVP tier bracket for very long. Itll take 1-2 days of a few pvp matches and they will SHOOT up in level from several wins. The casual player (who doesnt often do PVP) will be very low.

This perfectly segregates the population by both playing time AND "gear" by making it all about wins. We all know power > skill, so the high PVP Level players will be those with GEAR and if they are all lvl 40+ they will never see an "average" PVP Level 20 player...

This solves your issue and that new player will never have a 1000-7 match. Creating different Ques is NOT the option.

pando83

ayroux said:

pando83 said:

Just tried a match on one of my alts. Enemy team got double 4k players (most likely teaming up). They stomped 1000-7 while one guy from their team asked them to let us cap....

Now, ayroux: your system, in a mixed queue, would still give plenty of chances to players like the 2 mentioned above to stomp players.

You guys must understand that what you experience in PvP is not how things go. Even 1 match ending like the one explained above is enough to convince a new player to QUIT PvP.

@pando83 I snipped some of your post since it got moved to the lower depths, but you bring up some good points that I think are relevant to this conversation.

I 100% agree with your last point. We cannot get matches like this or it causes new players or casuals to quit. As you put it "normal player that can waste 1 hour trying to complete a daily to get PvP gear, for example."

I 100% agree.

Here is why I DONT think the solution is solo -Q. It doesnt solve your problem. You will get that NEW player who goes into PVP and gets hit 2x with an at-will from a BIS player and dies. There is no "skill" involved and while his TEAM might have a better chance and the match might not end 1000-7. It doesnt do anything to help that new player.

Now, what my system here offers is that it will avoid MOST of these matchups. Maybe you dont quite understand how it works.

The "4k players" as you describe them would NEVER be matched against new players or even casual players. The 4k+ players would be a HIGH PVP Level. The players you describe (alts, new players, casuals) will be a LOW PVP Level and therefore NOT get matched with 4k+ premades etc.

You dont need to force a SOLO-Q to make this happen. You create a PVP Level that does your matchmaking for you, that gives players something to work towards ( PVP LEVEL) and then ALSO separates out the daily PVPers/die hard PVPers from the rest of the population.

Anyone who is 4k+ in item level isnt going to be in a low PVP tier bracket for very long. Itll take 1-2 days of a few pvp matches and they will SHOOT up in level from several wins. The casual player (who doesnt often do PVP) will be very low.

This perfectly segregates the population by both playing time AND "gear" by making it all about wins. We all know power > skill, so the high PVP Level players will be those with GEAR and if they are all lvl 40+ they will never see an "average" PVP Level 20 player...

This solves your issue and that new player will never have a 1000-7 match. Creating different Ques is NOT the option.

Yeah it got moved but i don't really care because those guys eventually damage the game, so the same company that protects those guys on forums is the one getting the most damage from them. Lol.

In those 2 days people would just quit PvP already. Cause those 2 days would be 2 more days of stomping. Also, you said in another post that solo-Q destroys the purpose of MMOs (play with friends). Wrong.

MMOs are created to play with OTHER PEOPLE. Now, you can either play with friends OR play with random people.
What solo-Q does is to divide those who want to play with friends or competitively organize with other players, and those who want to just play with random people.

You try to achieve balance through a system similar to ELO rating.
I want to start with team balance instead. Which means: you allow matchmaking to fully form the teams, in solo-Q. We've seen that in that way the balance of each match increases dramatically compared to mixed queue. And you still have people playing with other people (MMO).

It's not MFO (massively friendly online).
It's MMO (massively multiplayer online).
The idea that you must play with FRIENDS is a misconception. You must play with other people.
And a matchmaking must...make the match. While now it's like "ok matchmaking, you form the other team following your rules, while we form the other with our own rules".

deterrant

Use the Rank, Random Ques and Lobby system.

Party compositions

2vs2 up to 5vs5, rainbow
10vs10, 2 party rainbow, max 2 of same class, per team
20vs20, 4 party rainbow, min 2 of same class, max 3 of same class, per team

Lobby For Fun party compositions are Free.

Lobby Matches party compositions are Free only when its accepted by both teams.

Implement Arena fights for 1vs1 up to 5vs5

-Solo only random ques, for Arena/Dom/GG - 1vs1 up to 10vs10 - competitive PVP

-Premade only random que, for Arena/Dom/GG - 2vs2 up to 10vs10 - competitive PVP

-Mixed Solo and Premade random que, for Arena/Dom/GG - 2vs2 up to 10vs10 - competitive PVP

-Lobby, For Fun and Matches, for Arena/Dom/GG/Siege 2vs2 up to 20vs20 - non-competitive and competitive PVP

-Challenge, available in Solo only random que's 1vs1 up to 5vs5,
Requires a certain amount of played Solo only Random Que matches to be unlocked.
Try to win 3 or up to 5 matches in a row for Extra rewards.
You can claim the 3/3 win prize or go for more rewards with more wins.
Challenge wins wont reduce over time.
Challenge wins will reset to 0 after a Challenge loss or claiming a prize.

Challenge Queue Search ignores your Guild and friends. Available only for the last week of the ongoing leaderboard.

You can fight against anyone in Matches.

Matches win reward is scaled by difference of rank.