Guild Wars 2

The term “Solo Queue” suggests that this is a leaderboard that ranks your individual ability, without a team.

In reality, it primarily ranks the performance of the teams you are randomly assigned to. It ranks the strength of the assigned team’s win.

Your performance is only 1/5th of that, and maybe even less if your class and build is hard countered in a particular match..

Maybe a better name would be: Random Team Tournament. No sarcasm intended. I think that name is more accurate. It would set a more accurate expectation, too.

It’s been really hard for me to accept that there is only so much I can do when the team I am randomly assigned to, is failing.

When I look at the ongoing score and see the enemy in the 400s, and my team in the 100 level, I feel this huge sense that I have personally failed.

I need to keep working on the more accurate realization that there is only so much I can affect.

IMO, the solo Q leaderboards should be removed, and the MMR rating system should stay only to attempt fair matchups. Some people dislike the stress of being rated and some actually take it seriously, so it might allow more people into solo Q, then they could attempt finding teams to play with for an actual rating.

The name should also be changed to something more like Random Arena. So it just looks simple and then both the browser and the tournament NPC should be fused into one.

Phantom,

I like your suggestion, Random Arena.

The first time i joined i was disappointed, i thought it was a 1v1 matchXD

Then i realized how stupid i was:P

I would love for a quick join format that demonstrates your skill/progression as an individual. I know Team Arena is the best place to gauge and monitor your skilled pvp play, but I have a strange schedule and enjoy the convenience of soloQ. This is why I loved rated Hero Battles in GW1 – I knew for every win it was because of my playing and every loss was equally because of my playing. For all the negative feedback/flaws of the Hero Battles system and ladder, it certainly was an awesome outlet for solo play. And I agree, if we’re talking about a comparison to GW1, soloQ is simply Random Arena and it is strange to have a ladder for it.

Yea, Random Arena sounds way better.

RaynStargaze.6510:

Can u read?

Actually the right terms are Team arena and Solo arena. So yea, it can be confusing.

Sure you could construe it as misleading. But never has it been directly implied that you are being rated on your sole performance. It’s a 5v5 game type in GW2. Since this is up front with the player, it’s more implied that you will have to share the performance rating with your chosen teammates. Cooperating / carrying with your teammates is a big part of what your abilities are being rated on.

I wonder though, are you more let down that you aren’t getting rated solely on your good plays? Or is it actually the name of the Solo Arena really the thing misleading you?

So let’s be honest here, unless you were the only person on your team, how could you possibly be surprised that yes, your teammates affect your performance? Do you think that this is any different in the Solo Queues in League of Legends, SMITE, or any other PvP game? Yes, indeed, you can be in ‘rating hell’ if you keep getting matched with teammates you can’t carry, despite you perceiving yourself as being above that rating.

Not to worry, other players will come to the same realization as you have, which is that there is only a proportion of the outcome you can affect in 5v5 modes. And when players quickly/instantly realize this, there won’t be a huge reason to change the name to ‘random arena’ – I think that’s even more ambiguous. Is the map Random? Does this feature use MMR or are is the matchmaking random?

No point in nit-picking the name, imo.

Chaith.8256:

I wonder though, are you more let down that you aren’t getting rated solely on your good plays? Or is it actually the name of the Solo Arena really the thing misleading you?

Like many people, I get frustrated when I see the team I am assigned to not playing a reasonable strategy, and getting their tail kicked. Because I take a hit for something completely outside my control.

As I said, I need to learn the limits of what one person can do to help win.

Silentshoes.1805:

Chaith.8256:

I wonder though, are you more let down that you aren’t getting rated solely on your good plays? Or is it actually the name of the Solo Arena really the thing misleading you?

Like many people, I get frustrated when I see the team I am assigned to not playing a reasonable strategy, and getting their tail kicked. Because I take a hit for something completely outside my control.

As I said, I need to learn the limits of what one person can do to help win.

Indeed, it is an age old problem with rated MMO game types that dates back to the very first pick-up rated game.

Unfortunately, I feel it’s too much a component of MOBAs & MMOs to ever get rid of – unless a next generation game decides they want to design around it. Kind of like what GW2 did with the Holy Trinity.

Noc.2459:

RaynStargaze.6510:

Can u read?

Actually the right terms are Team arena and Solo arena. So yea, it can be confusing.

It literally says

Solo Arena
“Automatically find a team to play with”

Team Arena
“Form a team before playing”

not too hard to figure out yes?

Rayn,

What’s your point? And how does it relate to the idea that this thread is about?

Chaith.8256:

Silentshoes.1805:

Chaith.8256:

I wonder though, are you more let down that you aren’t getting rated solely on your good plays? Or is it actually the name of the Solo Arena really the thing misleading you?

Like many people, I get frustrated when I see the team I am assigned to not playing a reasonable strategy, and getting their tail kicked. Because I take a hit for something completely outside my control.

As I said, I need to learn the limits of what one person can do to help win.

Indeed, it is an age old problem with rated MMO game types that dates back to the very first pick-up rated game.

Unfortunately, I feel it’s too much a component of MOBAs & MMOs to ever get rid of – unless a next generation game decides they want to design around it. Kind of like what GW2 did with the Holy Trinity.

Ideally though, when ladders are finally introduced, I think the most optimal thing would be to have Unrated Solo Q, Rated Solo Q, and Team Q.

-Unrated would match you up, still using some sort of match making algorithm that gives you the best match in the best time frame, with lesser rewards and no leaderboard penalty.

-Solo would utilize the new ladder system with an MMR and try to find you the best match possible. Not as rewarding as team, but more rewarding than Unrated. Leaderboard loss penalties for a loss in this tier should be lessened compared to Team Q based on the random team element being a factor, and unfair matchups (aka 4v5s) shouldn’t penalize the losing team (but should penalize the person who leaves).

-Team Q. Basically the same implementation as it is currently.

With this system, hotjoin should be removed and replaced with just a custom server browser (so no unowned servers are available). That way, Custom Arenas feel more special and have more of a purpose, like for community tournaments and teams practicing.

Not the most ideal, but it at least takes a portion of the “hotjoin hero” community and pushes them towards more competitive practices, like having theme queue up for 5 man only game types, but not let it affect their ranking. That way it has more of a competitive practice feel and less of what it currently is (lolpubstomp and build trial).

I don’t know, maybe it’s just me that thinks this would be good. Honestly there’s probably a million ways to start to go about doing it.

A good first step would to not penalize players for unfair matchups though (4v5s).

I agree. Remove leaderboard’s. How an individual is ranked according to how well their team of randomly put together players did just seems counter intuitive.

Whenenver i talk one of my friends into trying pvp… The first thing they click is solo arena >_<

“I dont have a team. So this seems like the best choice.”. Thats how rank 1s get into it >_<.

I also know plenty of people who thought solo arena just meant 1vs1 battles. “OMG they finally added duelling? Finally something fun to do in pvp :D”. And then they get dissapointed :P. thats how rank 1s go afk in solo Q.

Matchmaking systems are basically sorting algorithms. The one in GW2 may or may not be perfect. It’s too new to tell, and we don’t have the precise details, but the argument of “It ranks your random team, blah blah” doesn’t hold water, because that’s the issue that the system is focused on from the start.

Consider the following analogy:

Say you have have a bunch of rocks of various weights and a balance. You want to ascertain the weight of Rock A relative to the rest of the rocks, but you are only allowed to compare 4 rocks at a time, 2 on each side of the balance. If you compare Rock A+ Rock (Random 1) to Rock (Random 2) + Rock (Random 3) you may find that Rock A + Rock (Random 1) is heavier, or you may not. Either way, that one comparison doesn’t tell you much, because Rock (Random 1) may be very heavy, or it may be very light. However, if you do 50 comparisons and you realize that 80% of the time, Rock A + Rock (Random 1) is heavier than Rock (Random 2) + Rock (Random 3), you can conclude that Rock A is heavier than most of the other rocks.

In the same way, while any one individual match concerning you and 4 random players vs 5 random players is not very telling of how well (or how poorly) you played, the cumulative results of many matches certainly is.

Well Random Arena…that has nothing to do with arena style gameplay, so it is misleading for newbies.

I think it is also bad, that solo/team arena are in the second tab and hj is in the third tab.. the first thing new players see is solo/team arena… BAD DESIGN!

I’ve just gone back to hotjoin, and my goal is to have interesting skirmishes where I am not outnumbered, and I see how well I can play my character.