Guild Wars 2

darres.8203:

Justin ODell.9517:

Trevor Boyer.6524:

After hundreds and thousands of matches, it is very visible that your MMR system functions as this:

• Ten players que at the same time
• High MMRs are 10, low MMRs are 1
• The ten players qued look like this: 10, 6, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1
• System tries to balance two teams from these MMRs
• Result looks like this -> RED: 10, 4, 3, 2, 1 --- BLUE: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2

This is not how the system works. The old solo queue worked like this, sort of.

You can find more details on matchmaking here:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/PvP_Matchmaking_Algorithm

The current system is more likely to produce a result like this…
Red: 10, 5, 4, 3, 2
Blue: 6, 4, 3, 2, 1

Which could be argued is less fair, but really because MMR isn’t the only factor this is an oversimplification.

honestly it does not feel like that at all

u can check out my past 20 games from last 2 days

My last 2 days vs your last 2 days might be the most balanced fight we’ll see. I’m getting shredded by the MMR.

Aidenwolf.5964:

My last 2 days vs your last 2 days might be the most balanced fight we’ll see. I’m getting shredded by the MMR.

i had 2 games in which people would triple cap a single point after i had cleared it

I don’t want to rage but sometimes it just comes out…

Another night where no guildies log in so I decided to solo que
Another night of complete joke matches while being placed on team B repeatedly

So I figured I’d bump this one last time before ladder season 3 begins

Suggestion:

• Bring back solo que, make it ranked only
• Bring back team que, make it ranked only
• Make hotjoin/practice function exactly like unranked does now
• Remove the MMR algorithm entirely and allow spvp to function like the old RA and TA from GW1. This would render better results than any of the previous MMR systems and it would have no wait times for ques.

Give us solo q back, I’m sick of playing alone vs buildboy and his team.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

• Remove the MMR algorithm entirely and allow spvp to function like the old RA and TA from GW1. This would render better results than any of the previous MMR systems and it would have no wait times for ques.

I believe the leaderboard we have right now is good, but you have to consider that it might have come too late.. People who already played 5k games before aren’t really going to dedicate x games/day to be put on their true rank.. Consider also people who did 1000 games on 1st season. It is quite frustrating to hear that there would be a reset

The only thing that is needed is motivation for all these players, and i’m pretty sure in game tournaments( giving big skyrocketings in leaderboard) and unique rewards would do very good

I totally agree with OP.

Today I had a match with
- players double capping close early,
- afking when in downstate so when I stomp an enemy, they don’t get up.
- trying to really stomp that mesmers downstate clone and still not realizing that even after being interupted, not knowing about the little mark on top of a mesmer. (which r80 should know.)

So why do I r80 get queued with r1? Also, 2 matches in a row I am the random in a 4 man premade which I have to carry, because they are playing like r20, dropping points like there is no tomorrow.
I hate that when there is this PvP buff that there are these really “luck dependent queues”. I don’t like playing until the buff is over.
I want to play with competent professional players , so please do something about the algorithm of yours, anet.

“Luck dependant ques”
Great way to state it actually

I will say that I don’t care about playing with “professional players” necessarily but I don’t want to land in teams with 4x rabbits/deers that are completely incapable of keeping up with the team of phoenix/dragons that we are against. It gets old, sour and eventually feels like arena-net has flagged you for rigged matches. I mean seriously, after awhile it’s like: “this can’t be serious… I thought there was an MMR algorithm that helped create balance matches?”

Trevor Boyer.6524:

After hundreds and thousands of matches, it is very visible that your MMR system functions as this:

• Ten players que at the same time
• High MMRs are 10, low MMRs are 1
• The ten players qued look like this: 10, 6, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1
• System tries to balance two teams from these MMRs
• Result looks like this -> RED: 10, 4, 3, 2, 1 --- BLUE: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2

Looks good in theory but it’s bad in conquest application. Even if the elite 10 MMR on RED holds a point the entire match and farms opponents back to back without ever dying, it still won’t be enough point value to make up for the other two points where BLUE is slaughtering RED’s lower MMRs. Why are high MMRs punished for solo queing?

I normally run 5 man pre-mades within our guild “which kind of avoids the above problem” but when you are a team captain and run 5 man premades, sometimes you need a break to run solo or maybe duo while listening to mp3s for some casual play. But this is no longer a realistic option for those who have relatively higher MMR due to the visible MMR algorithm.

As priority you need to eliminate impractical and unreasonable match ups
It is one thing to lose 500 to 400 or 500 to even 250 but losing 500 to 100 or lower means that your team never had a chance in hell of winning to begin with and these sort of matches need to be eliminated from ever happening within ques.

Your MMR system is propagating all of the problems that players complain about:

• 4v5s ~ People leave when they realize a match is impossible to win
• 5 solos placed against 5 man pre-mades ~ No one has fun and people stop playing
• r80s being placed with or against r1s ~ Why is this even allowed to happen?
• ect.. ect.. the list goes on

The above problems are directly responsible for diminished player basis.
I am sure that you do all that you can already.
But please fix this calamity so that high MMR solos can enjoy the competitive scene.

At least you have a 5-man premade team to slaughter all the soloer..
I think the real issue is not MMR, but rather merging premade with all the soloers…

There are always going to be players who want to run solo, even in MMORPGs. By merging them with team ques, it just creates a situation where they are playing together but they are not playing together and it’s similar to mixing oil with water.

Here is a separate thread that well discusses this topic and suggests the return of solo que → https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Two-different-types-of-competitive-gamers/first#post5103961

Trevor Boyer.6524:

After hundreds and thousands of matches, it is very visible that your MMR system functions as this:

• Ten players que at the same time
• High MMRs are 10, low MMRs are 1
• The ten players qued look like this: 10, 6, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1
• System tries to balance two teams from these MMRs
• Result looks like this -> RED: 10, 4, 3, 2, 1 --- BLUE: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2

Looks good in theory but it’s bad in conquest application. Even if the elite 10 MMR on RED holds a point the entire match and farms opponents back to back without ever dying, it still won’t be enough point value to make up for the other two points where BLUE is slaughtering RED’s lower MMRs. Why are high MMRs punished for solo queing?

I normally run 5 man pre-mades within our guild “which kind of avoids the above problem” but when you are a team captain and run 5 man premades, sometimes you need a break to run solo or maybe duo while listening to mp3s for some casual play. But this is no longer a realistic option for those who have relatively higher MMR due to the visible MMR algorithm.

As priority you need to eliminate impractical and unreasonable match ups
It is one thing to lose 500 to 400 or 500 to even 250 but losing 500 to 100 or lower means that your team never had a chance in hell of winning to begin with and these sort of matches need to be eliminated from ever happening within ques.

Your MMR system is propagating all of the problems that players complain about:

• 4v5s ~ People leave when they realize a match is impossible to win
• 5 solos placed against 5 man pre-mades ~ No one has fun and people stop playing
• r80s being placed with or against r1s ~ Why is this even allowed to happen?
• ect.. ect.. the list goes on

The above problems are directly responsible for diminished player basis.
I am sure that you do all that you can already.
But please fix this calamity so that high MMR solos can enjoy the competitive scene.

Yeah, the matchmaking punishes you for being…GOOD! Of course, I think the matchmaking system is a reaction to the separation of Solo & Team Arenas which should’ve never been split. THIS is the cause of the imbalances, not necessarily the matchmaking.

I’ve played pvp since launch, from hotjoin to arenas and there never were imbalances like today.

Honestly everything in the game is fine and fairly well balanced with exception for how the MMR algorithm is working. Maybe there are things that I just don’t understand about “why” the MMR algorithm is designed the way it is. I’m just doing my part by giving feedback.

I’ve had terrible matchmaking today.

I’m really just…lost for words. How can it perform so badly?

Is the population just non-existent at the moment? That is the only explanation I can think of…

Emm, i kno this is a little bit out for topic.
But any news about observer mode? Cuz i feel like (for like past 2 years) new players have no actual source to learn how 2 PvP(in-game&created by developers). I mean nowadays people rarely stream team based games.
I know that there was a mechanics, that allowed Anet approved casters to cast top tier ranked matches (some window pop’ed up & casters were able to join & commentate).
So why did u remove such system?
Is there any way to make some delays for such matches? ( I think i heard, that u cant make recordings of matches, but still these matches with some delays will be fun to watch)

Ok, i think i ve remembered why u couldnt make recordings, due to some server issuses, i.e. how ppl connect to the game & how their movement/skills are reflected to the server. Which means, that u can record at least one player of the team.
Can u make like 10 recordings (of each player in a match) & sync em?

I seriously think I’m gonna give up on this game. I’ve been patiently wading through the cesspool of unbalance and incompetence that is solo q’ing in guild wars for a while now. I was chasing a dream that one day I wouldn’t q into radioactive or apex or whatever the hell this week’s top-tier-player-pug is called, but the muck sucked my waders off and I ain’t getting that kitten between my toes.

I get so sick of seeing so many dedicated players who care about the game take the time to come to these forums and leave their opinions to no avail. Every answer is the same generic Anet copy-pasta. The dev swoops in to get their “2 red posts a day on the forums!” quota and bounce, kitten the community and their concerns.

This game has been riddled with gamebreaking bugs (immob bug, I’m looking at you) for as long as I can remember, yet I can’t a single red post regarding the matter.

Insta procs, bugs, bad matchmaking, pairing premades vs solo queued players, being trapped in the mists with nothing to do. Honestly, it’s no wonder why all of my guilds, family members, and real life friends left the game.

glhf anet, somebody open a kittening freeshard already.

inb4 “can I have your stuff”: I got like 3 gold bro, be my guest.

brannigan.9831:

Its all levels of players that are being penalized not just high MMR players. They are probably prone to being a little more screwed then other levels when solo but its there for everyone. All it takes is one really bad player in the match (compared to everyone else) to ruin it. They need to tighten up the allowable range of MMRs in a match and if it hurts queue times so be it. You could have a match like this (assume 5 is average) 6,5,5,4,1 verus 5,4,4,4,4. Nobody high MMR but imo the second group is going to win because they don’t have the 1.

I was reading back through this thread and noticed this post by Brannigan.9831. He makes a very good point and I wanted to repost this because this single aspect of “bad match making” actually counts for a large margin of the bad matches that we all have happen from time to time.

In a mode like WvW, having a 5/5/4/4/1 group mashed in somewhere with a zerg isn’t that big of a deal. That 1 has cover and can splash his AoE while following a pin and stay in the back. Now in conquest, the dynamic is entirely different and that 1 has a great chance of being singled out whether it’s an on-point battle at mid or when he goes to try and back cap home, someone shows up on him. The problem with having a 1 on your team of 5/5/4/4/1 vs. let’s say a 4/4/4/4/4 is that “due to the dynamic of conquest” the enemy team figures out that guy is a 1 pretty quick during the first engaged combat. Then you have a situation where they purposely focus that 1 every time they see him, he goes down in a matter of seconds and your team is staggered the entire match. It is essentially like being in a 4v5. No, sometimes it’s worse than a 4v5 because the 1 MMR is literally doing nothing but feeding the other team points.

Again, I cannot stress enough that this is no good or fun for anyone. I’m not sure if the problem is lack of population for the MMR algorithm to do it’s job correctly or if the system is actually built to not only allow matches like this but also form matches like this on purpose. Either way, the point being is that impractical & unreasonable matches need to be eliminated. These kind of experiences are discouraging and drive players away from the game. Not because they are mad that they lost but rather they do not want to play matches that are impossible to win right out of the gate. Brannigan’s suggestion is good.

Furthermore, I wanted to post this as example of why so many people don’t stick around long enough to learn & play in the spvp scene. As the guild leader of an spvp guild, here is what I have experienced with member joins:

• Member joins, excited to learn and play
• Member is a 1-2 range MMR, we teach him everything we know
• Member quickly rises to the capability of 3-4 range MMR with proper teachers
• Learning Curve between taught tactics and actual experience hits
• Member is unable to keep up in performance with older veteran members
• They win some, they lose some but more often than not, the new member is blamed
• Member learns what MMR is and begins to understand why the matches are difficult when he is playing with the older veteran members
• Member begins seeking lower MMR groups to play with so he has time to adapt and learn a bit before being ball busted in the world of high MMRs, alongside veterans
• Member learns that there are very very few low MMR teams running, anywhere in any guild for him to merge with
• Member figures he will run some solos or duos with another low MMR from the guild to get his practice in
• Member discovers that solo/duo que is broken and matches are even more difficult at times than while running with veterans
• Member becomes discouraged to the point of feeling like a bad player that no one wants around. He is either being blamed in solos while getting kicked around by r80 dragons or he is trying to play with veteran teams who have very little patience for the new guy, unless he is learning at some accelerated obsessive rate, which is unreasonable to expect from anyone
• Member begins to understand that Guild Wars 2 has an enormous learning curve and if he wants to keep up with players who have played for 3 years before him, he needs to be overly dedicated to catching up and be willing to take grief from all of these players because there is no middle ground for him to learn in at his own pace. He must play in the world of veterans
• Member recognizes that this is not the casual & fun pvp scene that he was looking to get out of Guild Wars 2
• Member leaves the spvp scene

What is the problem with the above situation? Why is this becoming MOST players cliché story of their experience with Guild Wars 2 spvp? Because the system is designed to both metaphorically and literally mix rabbits and dragons in to the same category of competition. Go figure why new players are not sticking around long enough to become interested in the competitive scene.

Thread needed a bump because the problem is still not fixed and it’s been happening again worse than ever.

The last few days while running solo or duo, the match ups have been so badly imbalanced that I have actually been asking myself: “am I being punked by the arena-net dev team or some other entity?” These matches are so bad that it feels theatrical. As if I am being placed with a team of fake players who are not trying to win the match at all but rather cooperate in a stoogish manner to create the worst calamity of a match possible. As if for the entertainment of watching one guy’s reaction who isn’t in on the joke. As if they are frapsing it or twitching it for hits.

In the last few days I have experienced:

• 0 – 500 match result, where my teammates strategically avoided ever fighting on point. When telling them that they needed to fight on-point, the only responses were that of “lulz and lols”.
• Matches where before the match even starts, people begin arguing in a manner that does not feel real and then continue to argue the entire match about irrelevant topics. They act distracted and stand still holding conversation while enemies attack them and kill them. Even if our team is winning, there is always one guy who acts mad about something and then stands in the spawn point, doing nothing as the enemy team catches up. “I have seen this happen twice in the last few days”.
• My team was initially losing 275 to 120ish so I gave rotation/placement advice in the /t chat. Someone on my team whispers me and says: “It’s fine, just watch” and within seconds of the whisper, the enemy team turned from an organized team of r80 dragons in to a seemingly random PUG team that suddenly couldn’t win a single combat and our team caught up and ended up winning 500 to 300ish. When whispering the guy later to ask him “was that match throwing?” I was blocked and never responded to.
• Initial split on Legacy ~ Our team caps home, their team caps home and we all meet in a 5v5 at mid. The enemy team sends a single player to peel from mid and rush our lord. Four of my teammates chase the single player back in to our spawn point and it takes them over 2 minutes to kill the single player. During this 2 minutes I am chokepointing on the steps between our home and mid. I actually manage to down but not kill 3 players on the enemy team as they each try to individually walk up the steps towards me. By the time the 4th player came up the steps the others were reviving and I get snowballed. When telling my team in /t chat “It does not take 4 people to kill 1 person, please get on points” I receive no response other than blame that I am a bad player for not being able to hold the home point. After they kill the person at our lord, they scatter like ants and proceed to fight off point while the enemy has us triple capped, ignoring any & all good /t chat communication. At this point the score was something like 300 – 70ish. It was the first time that I have ever been so kittened off about recent match making, that I went to the options screen and clicked exit game.

Never before in any game have I experienced such bad matchmaking, not even close. Between the bad matchmaking and the recent apathy towards serious pvp imbalances after the June 23rd 2015 patch, I have seen more players leave and not come back than ever before. I took initiative to exit game during one of the worst match ups I have ever seen and it felt good. The next step will be finding a new game to play.

~ You ought to listen to fanboys like me when they say things like this.

Cheers for bumping. I’ve been looking for this thread.

Trevor Boyer, is this stuff happening to you mostly on Saturday and Sunday mornings? For me, Saturday and Sunday mornings are the worst time for matchmaking, and some of the things you’re describing sound eerily familiar. Especially the weird team chat and the teams that race to an early lead and then vanish as soon as they score 250 points.

I didn’t see it on your list, but players who run to a spot, fight haphazardly until they die, then run back to the same spot to do it again, and again , and again, seems to be a Weekend AM specialty too.

Your mileage may vary, but you may find better luck in the evenings. I know I do. You still get some frustrating matches, but they are much better than the ones you find on Saturday and Sunday mornings.

How is having no MMR and matchmaking system any better than a an imperfect matchmaking system? Become some people prefer to just roll on randoms and newcomers in PvP instead of having competition from time to time?
Some of you speak as if GW1’s no-match-making monk arena was good! A team who won faced more and more randomly formed teams! Perfect system!

Funny how my 2 month old Pseudo questions haven’t gotten any replies. I gave that question its own thread, posted code from the Wiki so a dev could reply but haven’t received an answer.

It’s as simple as why the pseudo takes score points of 100 increments instead of 5 incremets, considering almost every factor is in “5” and not “100”.
105, 110, 115 all the way to 495
instead of 100, 200, 300, 400, 500

If you have 1000 players each with an end team score of 400 points… they all shouldn’t get the same +3 rank point score. Should it not be in increments of 5 so they each have a more defining rank point score?

Ah I see what you mean now….

Yeah not sure why they are arranging it like that.
It seems quite obvious that basing it on 5 would better distribute player base MMRs.

signahead.7281:

Trevor Boyer, is this stuff happening to you mostly on Saturday and Sunday mornings? For me, Saturday and Sunday mornings are the worst time for matchmaking, and some of the things you’re describing sound eerily familiar. Especially the weird team chat and the teams that race to an early lead and then vanish as soon as they score 250 points.

I didn’t see it on your list, but players who run to a spot, fight haphazardly until they die, then run back to the same spot to do it again, and again , and again, seems to be a Weekend AM specialty too.

Your mileage may vary, but you may find better luck in the evenings. I know I do. You still get some frustrating matches, but they are much better than the ones you find on Saturday and Sunday mornings.

Yeah, lately there are things happening that just don’t make any sense at all. In 3 years of play I haven’t seen anything like it. I haven’t paid attention to what weekdays it seems to be the most prevalent but I’ll start taking note of it.

Justin are there any plans to make MMR visible so we know how we stack up against other players? right now, we don’t really know what we’re playing for. hope you guys have something good in store for us by the time HoT launches.

also would you be kind enough to tell me how I’m doing in terms of my MMR?

this is the usual situation when you win close 1v2 and your team already wiped 4v3…you cap point, look at your dead team, look at other team snowballing at you and the only realistic option is to alt f4, not even afk…just straight out

Too bad you usually waste 8+ minutes qtimes for crap like that too

Want proof anet? Just look at my last 2 solo matches on main acc (Archaon.6245)

Last match before totally giving up started on temple…i was capping close, 2 guys went killbuff and just sat there (Yeah right, they were sitting there doing nothing ffs), 1 guy went far 1v2 and got rekt and other guy jumped mid 1v3 and exploded (While those 2 wvsw guys still at killbuff). Match before was pretty much at same level of reterdness like downing 2 people and leaving them to a full hp ele….and ele just goes away letting both of them rez up

Now please, go look into matchmaking on those 2 last matches and tell me…are you even serious?

I made so many threads (on main account) about the bad matchmaking and the fact MMR’s are too broad in a team most of the times.. I had 0 response either.

Bumping this thread again because matchmaking seems worse than ever. I’m either stomping the team being up by 200+ points, or its the opposite and I’m on the losing side. I’m seeing more and more players who rage quit the match within the first few minutes, or I’m being put up against full pre-mades. Adding in the usual 6+ minutes of queue time, PvP feels unbalanced and unfun unless you have a dedicated PvP group going into it.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

Why are high MMRs punished for solo queing?

Because the PvP population is virtually non-existent. If they fixed matchmaking the wait times would skyrocket.

@ Kelayda
This is why they need to re-add solo queing
Here is a fine thread explaining further reasons why it is important:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Two-different-types-of-competitive-gamers/first#post5103961

As of this morning I’ve decided to take a good long break from Guild Wars 2. I won’t be purchasing HoT and I won’t be returning until I hear better reviews about this game.

For anyone who supports the idea of “fixing a game so that it is balanced”, I suggest you do the same. Boycotting not only a single company but poor products from an industry as a whole is important. It shows that the consumer does indeed have a standard of quality before they will use a product or service.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

As of this morning I’ve decided to take a good long break from Guild Wars 2. I won’t be purchasing HoT and I won’t be returning until I hear better reviews about this game.

For anyone who supports the idea of “fixing a game so that it is balanced”, I suggest you do the same. Boycotting not only a single company but poor products from an industry as a whole is important. It shows that the consumer does indeed have a standard of quality before they will use a product or service.

Wish I could man but PvP Community literally too small to make a difference.
All they need is their weekly ESL players on Stream and all is fine :<

Terrorsquad.4802:

PvP Community literally too small to make a difference.

True that. I think the game servers would explode if more than two dozen ranked/unranked matches were going on at the same time. Too many resources are probably allocated to custom arenas and instant, Practice, matches. That’s why queue times are ~2 minutes or more.

sunnypsyop.3025:

Trevor Boyer.6524:

Why are high MMRs punished for solo queing?

Because the PvP population is virtually non-existent. If they fixed matchmaking the wait times would skyrocket.

Do you expect the population to fix itself if the MMR sucks? Ofc people gonna leave! It works like :

Player A is 20, the MMR will pit him against a team of players of value 5, while the rest of the team of player A will all be 0…guess what will happen?! so ofc people gonna leave -_-

This is possibly the worst pvp system I ever seen implemented in a videogame…

I’m surprised the OP hasn’t been infracted for repeatedly bumping a dead thread. There’s so much negativity in here that it beggars belief! Even a cursory glance at the matchmaking page in the wiki would tell you that party size is accounted for not just in one but in TWO ways: not only does the game try to match you up with parties of similar size, but also your MMR is inflated when you’re in a party!

Why does everyone attribute their losses solely to the enemy team being a premade? There are an AWFUL lot of terrible premades around! So many pve-only guilds running their once-a-week pvp event, so many WvW players jumping in for a couple games because the queue to their borderland was too long to bother with. There’s even premades that form up right in HotM, as you’d know if you read map chat, from people who don’t know each other, rarely if ever played together before, and don’t have their own voice comms server. The majority of casuals prefer to team up because they don’t really enjoy pvp enough to do it on their own, or because they find it terrifying on their own. They’re not great players, and their MMR is low, but it gets inflated when they queue up together and they routinely get paired against much better players. If your MMR is as high as you seem to think it is, you really should have no trouble beating these people, team or no team.

Voice comms are a legit and real advantage that premades have. However, not all premades necesarilly have them, and the game can’t detect it so they can’t overcompensate by inflate their MMR even more! Moreover, an experienced pvper will have much better map awareness than a casual and would be able to rotate well without voice comms. Plus, casuals can’t really be trusted to use their voice comms effectively. Who here hasn’t been frustrated by a teammate who dies on a point even though they told you they were fine 2" ago? A casual won’t always know they’re in a bad matchup, or they’ll get tunnel vision and won’t notice the thief coming to +1 their fight, or they might not communicate accurately and know how early they need to ask for help for you to get there in time.

My tl;dr is: don’t assume you lost cause they were a premade. You might have lost just because they’re better. Considering the OP never made it onto the old pre-Dec16 solo queue leaderboards according to gw2score.com, I’m assuming he’s not a former solo queue pro whose MMR suffered when solo queue was removed. Maybe his MMR simply was never as high as he assumed?

@ manveruppd.7601

Three things for you:

• Literally nothing that you’ve said is anywhere even near relevant to what the discussion in this thread is actually about.
• I was never on the solo que leaderboards because back then I only ever played in a team while queing for team arena. Go figure.
• It would do you good to read a thread before posting a wall of text.

@ everyone else:
I said I was going to take a break from Guild Wars 2 but after only 3 days it just ended up not really happening. I do believe in this game’s engine and that is what is so frustrating with how long we have to wait before something gets fixed. It’s also very confusing that Guild Wars 2’s pvp engine is somehow the worst engine I have ever seen while simultaneously being the best engine that I have ever seen. If Arena-Net would just devote the time needed to flatten out the problems, it would be another classic that would live for decades to come but at this rate, players are going to jump boat if something new and fresh arrives within the genre of MMORGPs, unfortunately.

At any rate, this will more than likely be my final post in this thread as I have said everything that I’ve needed to say on the subject multiple times over. We have new features to look forward to in HoT and hopefully some of them fix these current problems with the MMR algorithm.

If anyone else has feedback however, feel free to share.
That was of course the purpose of this thread.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

After hundreds and thousands of matches, it is very visible that your MMR system functions as this:

• Ten players que at the same time
• High MMRs are 10, low MMRs are 1
• The ten players qued look like this: 10, 6, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3, 2, 2, 1
• System tries to balance two teams from these MMRs
• Result looks like this -> RED: 10, 4, 3, 2, 1 --- BLUE: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2

Looks good in theory but it’s bad in conquest application. Even if the elite 10 MMR on RED holds a point the entire match and farms opponents back to back without ever dying, it still won’t be enough point value to make up for the other two points where BLUE is slaughtering RED’s lower MMRs. Why are high MMRs punished for solo queing?

I normally run 5 man pre-mades within our guild “which kind of avoids the above problem” but when you are a team captain and run 5 man premades, sometimes you need a break to run solo or maybe duo while listening to mp3s for some casual play. But this is no longer a realistic option for those who have relatively higher MMR due to the visible MMR algorithm.

As priority you need to eliminate impractical and unreasonable match ups
It is one thing to lose 500 to 400 or 500 to even 250 but losing 500 to 100 or lower means that your team never had a chance in hell of winning to begin with and these sort of matches need to be eliminated from ever happening within ques.

Your MMR system is propagating all of the problems that players complain about:

• 4v5s ~ People leave when they realize a match is impossible to win
• 5 solos placed against 5 man pre-mades ~ No one has fun and people stop playing
• r80s being placed with or against r1s ~ Why is this even allowed to happen?
• ect.. ect.. the list goes on

The above problems are directly responsible for diminished player basis.
I am sure that you do all that you can already.
But please fix this calamity so that high MMR solos can enjoy the competitive scene.

yup

happens to me all the time. i’m a fairly agressive player so i go for opponents home point and either cap it in 1v1 or hold up 2-3 of them, often 4 for a really really long time. meanwhile, my 4 team mates are unable to defeat and recap nodes from the 1 thats left on the rest of the map.

what i end up doing then is unfortunate, but, i tank a few matches, intentionally. this goes usually together with the courtyard map which i hate cause its so small and has no strategic / tactical points. so unless i still need my daily win, i simply AFK through courtyards, as it goes well together with the rest of the system.

I heard all time players complain about the machmaking does anyone though that they are the problem, every time the others are the noobs and they are just the unlucky .
Before sometime i have 4 wins in a row in the 5th game a player complaining about the machmaking and he loose 10 games in a row of course we loose the game, now tell me he was so unlucky or he was the problem;

How would you know if you have a high or low MMR? Is it based on game win ratio and/or personal match scores?

Vague Memory.2817:

How would you know if you have a high or low MMR? Is it based on game win ratio and/or personal match scores?

If ques take 5+ minutes just to throw you together with people who never played PvP before in order to balance out your MMR against a team of the same composition then you have a high MMR.

aggelos r.5387:

I heard all time players complain about the machmaking does anyone though that they are the problem, every time the others are the noobs and they are just the unlucky .
Before sometime i have 4 wins in a row in the 5th game a player complaining about the machmaking and he loose 10 games in a row of course we loose the game, now tell me he was so unlucky or he was the problem;

So…I manage to win majority of team fights I cap/decap with a staff build, I ress people, stop stomps, end up with 3x more pts than the rest of my team where 1-2 people have 0 pts 4-5m into the match…and I am the kittening problem?

My queue wait is 6m+ and on average as solo player I will lose 9 matches out of 10, the players I get…are impossibly bad, no word to describe how bad they are; most of them will literally die the sec an enemy looks in their direction, dunno how many times I get the combat medic title….

Not even if you try , you can make a worst system than this…

Supreme.3164:

aggelos r.5387:

I heard all time players complain about the machmaking does anyone though that they are the problem, every time the others are the noobs and they are just the unlucky .
Before sometime i have 4 wins in a row in the 5th game a player complaining about the machmaking and he loose 10 games in a row of course we loose the game, now tell me he was so unlucky or he was the problem;

So…I manage to win majority of team fights I cap/decap with a staff build, I ress people, stop stomps, end up with 3x more pts than the rest of my team where 1-2 people have 0 pts 4-5m into the match…and I am the kittening problem?

My queue wait is 6m+ and on average as solo player I will lose 9 matches out of 10, the players I get…are impossibly bad, no word to describe how bad they are; most of them will literally die the sec an enemy looks in their direction, dunno how many times I get the combat medic title….

Not even if you try , you can make a worst system than this…

I feel ya mate. Every weekend casuals go ranked(i dont even know why they cant just go unrank) and im placed with them to balance them off… Problem is no matter how good i play there is almost to way to solo carry game in pvp. Before i had godlike hambow on warrior or my S/D thief. Now unless i swap to godmode ele i wont have “close game” i had teams that can lose 4v2 scenarios for some reason. I had seen 3x man premades that run together hand in hand to cap close kill svanir and die on mid. Thats why i tought hmm “mby this whole league system will fix it” but i know this is bs, Even if i get legend i will still be used as counterbalance for noobies that will ruin my experience in pvp, wont do kitten to my “nooby” teammates cuz they dont even understand why they lose. There is NO benefit for pve player to learn pvp. They just queue and ruin games till they win. Thats not rly thier fault. Pvp in gw2 is pretty hard and unless you are in guild/team that will teach u basics you wont get kitten from just soloq.
Other problem is whole “mettabattle”. If every build/trait would be seperatly balanced around pvp then there would be no forcing someone to copycat build from mb. Right now only like 2/3 classes have more than 1 viable build in pvp(cuz rest had to be balanced for pve. like s/p thief dmg on whip, this whole lets buff burning so there will be more conibuilds in pve, that is destroying pvp right now). Even Blizzard with thier WoW used brain and now with new expansion they are making separate “traits” for pvp and pve. ITS EASIER to balance and gives player more options…

Let me tell you a story about Bob The Bunker. This story will help explain why personal score isn’t always important and how one can tell when their high MMR is being used as a balancing integer amongst low MMR players:

One day Bob decided to solo que. He was placed in a team of random PUGs that did not know each other. During the initial split, 1 went home, 3 went mid and Bob went far. Bob arrived at far point quickly enough to keep the point neutral and stop the enemy from capping it. Bob was engaged in a 1v1 at far point then noticed that an enemy from mid had peeled back to far to try and +1 Bob. He was now engaged in a 1v2 at the far point. Bob could not down either of the 2 opponents but they could not down Bob either. Bob’s team was now in a 4v3 “in their favor” on home and mid, due to Bob’s 1v2 at far.

Bob’s teammates were sloppy. Even in a 4v3 “in their favor” on home and mid, they were allowing back-caps on the home and mid points. When they would notice a back-cap, they would all zerg up and stand on the point together while killing the opponents in a 4v3 “all gaining neutralization points, all gaining points for kills”.

It was 10 minutes in to the match and Bob was still holding the far point neutral in a 1v2. He had killed no players and he had capped no points. It was then that a 3rd player came to the far point to +2 Bob. Bob was now in a 1v3 at the far point and his resources were dwindling. The score was 400 to 420, Bob’s team was somehow losing the match, despite being in a now 4v2 “in their favor” at home and mid. This was ridiculous and Bob wondered one thing: “Where the hell is my team?”
The 3 opponents were close to killing Bob but Bob knew well how to mitigate damage and he knew that his 1v3 was allowing a 4v2 “in his team’s favor” on home and mid point. Bob could not kill the 3 opponents at far but they could not kill Bob either.
Bob survived like a radioactive kittenroach until the score hit 500 to 490. Due to Bob’s last game play of holding out at far in a 1v3, his bad team was able to barely catch up and win the match.

When the personal scoreboard popped up at the end of the match, Bob had 0 personal score. His team mates ridiculed him and called him bad but the truth is that Bob carried his team like Atlas from the start of the match all the way to the end of the match.

Bob’s MMR was high and it was being used to balance a team of low MMRs against a team of average MMRs. Half way through that match, Bob knew that even if his team lost, it sure as hell wasn’t his fault.

I just feel i need to point at that, if you are able to stand your ground 1v2 somewhere doesn’t mean your team will necessarily gain an advantage 4v3.
Because chances are, the enemy team also has at least one person who is able to endure a 1v2.
Then it should all come down to who is able to outsmart the other team’s rotation. Which is a term that eludes most players.

Bob the bunker had to tank 3 ppl for his team to win by 10points, proves point that noobies should be queued with noobies vs noobies, not noobies + bob the bunker that can TANK 3 PPL vs team of average players (who would force fight on bob seeing that hes bunker, bunkers are slow and can be easily ignored). Bob got flamed for his heroism by casual/noobies/guys who dont know kitten about pvp cuz he had no score. If Bob had a team on his lvl with him they would help him with rotation, if Bob had team on his lvl in enemy team he would die the moment fight went 1v2.
I still think ANet should encourage ppl to play pvp but also teach them right way to play it, BASICS. Starting(tutorial) location in mists is a JOKE and whats even funnier is that someone who just bought game can just start rank right after compleating it. There is no point in pactice(cancer mode) unranked has maps like skyhammer so most players with brain wont risk getting this dumb map. Problem is when noobies / casual/ ppl that know kitten about pvp arent lectured how to play and arent rly balanced in thier own “skill lvl”. We cant have Bob in team each game to balance out 2 ppl in his team that play on nobrain lvl. I know ANet want to make pvp easier by promoting idiot builds for dummies like trap ranger burnguard, they nerf skill lvl for other classes like engi(turrets/bomb yolo) or ele that right now is all about making same rotation till enemy is dead. I dont think it’s the right way but they know better…

The problem with matchmaking is that it is only as accurate as the pool of players it can draw from.

I’m sure in a perfect world, with the current matchmaking system we have, 10s will never be queued with or against 1s, or even 5s, but Guild Wars 2 just doesn’t have a sizable enough PvP population to have that kind of accuracy. And while you can complain about getting paired up against premades, bringing back solo queue wouldn’t resolve the primary issue of matchmaking accuracy and, if anything, only exacerbate it (and other problems solo queue created).

The other problem is that the Heart of Thorns hype train has pulled in a lot of new players to the point where they greatly outnumber experienced players. Guild Wars 2 as a non-subscription game has always been a pick-up and put-down kind of game, and most people that picked up this game at launch aren’t around anymore. I would say in a guild like mine with nearly 500 active players, maybe 10 or 15 of us are launch players; there are more people in my guild actively playing that picked up this game when HoT was announced than there are people that have been around since the game’s inception.

This is why, if you’re a player that has been around since launch, the matchmaking system has seemed to only get worse for you; the system strains making accurate match-ups for experienced players with thousands of matches under their belt when there is this constant influx of new players that haven’t even hit rank 80 yet. And for every experienced since-launch player there’s 10 newbies that take their place.

So if you want better PvP match-ups you have, realistically, three choices:

1. Accept that solo queuing is a mixed bag and queue with friends.

2. Accept that solo queuing is a mixed bag and get your “fair” PvP fix through attending scheduled PvP tournaments.

3. Accept that solo queuing is a mixed bag and just play the game. None of these wins or losses will matter after leagues are implemented, as everyone will be reset to division one and start over, so stop flipping tables about it.

Leagues will more visibly represent the level of players you’re are matched up with and against, but I have no doubt that unless there is a huge surge of new players that actively PvP with this expansion it’ll be no more accurate than what we already have.

Trevor Boyer.6524:

Let me tell you a story about Bob The Bunker. This story will help explain why personal score isn’t always important and how one can tell when their high MMR is being used as a balancing integer amongst low MMR players:

One day Bob decided to solo que. He was placed in a team of random PUGs that did not know each other. During the initial split, 1 went home, 3 went mid and Bob went far. Bob arrived at far point quickly enough to keep the point neutral and stop the enemy from capping it. Bob was engaged in a 1v1 at far point then noticed that an enemy from mid had peeled back to far to try and +1 Bob. He was now engaged in a 1v2 at the far point. Bob could not down either of the 2 opponents but they could not down Bob either. Bob’s team was now in a 4v3 “in their favor” on home and mid, due to Bob’s 1v2 at far.

Bob’s teammates were sloppy. Even in a 4v3 “in their favor” on home and mid, they were allowing back-caps on the home and mid points. When they would notice a back-cap, they would all zerg up and stand on the point together while killing the opponents in a 4v3 “all gaining neutralization points, all gaining points for kills”.

It was 10 minutes in to the match and Bob was still holding the far point neutral in a 1v2. He had killed no players and he had capped no points. It was then that a 3rd player came to the far point to +2 Bob. Bob was now in a 1v3 at the far point and his resources were dwindling. The score was 400 to 420, Bob’s team was somehow losing the match, despite being in a now 4v2 “in their favor” at home and mid. This was ridiculous and Bob wondered one thing: “Where the hell is my team?”
The 3 opponents were close to killing Bob but Bob knew well how to mitigate damage and he knew that his 1v3 was allowing a 4v2 “in his team’s favor” on home and mid point. Bob could not kill the 3 opponents at far but they could not kill Bob either.
Bob survived like a radioactive kittenroach until the score hit 500 to 490. Due to Bob’s last game play of holding out at far in a 1v3, his bad team was able to barely catch up and win the match.

When the personal scoreboard popped up at the end of the match, Bob had 0 personal score. His team mates ridiculed him and called him bad but the truth is that Bob carried his team like Atlas from the start of the match all the way to the end of the match.

Bob’s MMR was high and it was being used to balance a team of low MMRs against a team of average MMRs. Half way through that match, Bob knew that even if his team lost, it sure as hell wasn’t his fault.

That is probably.. the saddest story I’ve ever read on this forum ..

Dem feels and dem truths …

Trevor Boyer.6524:

@ manveruppd.7601

Three things for you:

• Literally nothing that you’ve said is anywhere even near relevant to what the discussion in this thread is actually about.
• I was never on the solo que leaderboards because back then I only ever played in a team while queing for team arena. Go figure.
• It would do you good to read a thread before posting a wall of text.

TBH I found your response a little condescending, but I’ll try to be helpful and constructive in return:
1. I did read THE WHOLE thread, and though you didn’t complain about premades in your OP, many other people did. I wasn’t just replying to you.
2. You have less than 500 games on team arena so I don’t know what you’re talking about?
3. Frankly I didn’t even feel the need to engage with the argument in your OP, because a dev came in and told you outright that the way you think the matchmaking system works isn’t the way it actually works. That’s why my response was more directed at other posters in here. Yet you ignored that and continued moaning about the same thing, so I’m wondering whether there’s any point to me typing this.
Nope.

@ manveruppd

I already told you once:
I did not play solo arena back then, I only played team arena.

But since you are trying to hit me in the credentials, here is a screen shot of my match records as of 8/22/2015:

Trevor Boyer.6524:

@ manveruppd

I already told you once:
I did not play solo arena back then, I only played team arena.

But since you are trying to hit me in the credentials, here is a screen shot of my match records as of 8/22/2015:

OK, apologies, seems gw2score.com doesn’t have a record of all games, probably because there were a couple of resets and it only registers the latest incarnation of the pre-Dec 16 ladder.

Still, my other points stand: you have actual developer confirmation that the matchmaking doesn’t work the way you think it does. Whatever your perception of your experiences is, it can be put down to confirmation bias.