DUST Search - Matchmaking- The Solution

Rogatien Merc wrote:

Kasote Denzara wrote:

Edited the original post. For those that have already read it, only the lines outlining what is allowed in each tier has changed. I gave it some thought and believe this is for the better.

I won't quote the two that have responded already. Not enough players? Is that seriously the only argument that has ever been brought up against tier based matchmaking? Seems a little worn out, if you ask me.

I have successfully gotten into full lobbies of Ambush, Skirmish, and Domination since 1.4. Either A) I'm somehow lucky, despite me being on the American servers deep in the night or B) You kids are just bullshitting to bullshit.

The only people that my suggestion does not cater to is the group of people that use prototype gear against the fresh bloods. Pathetic. It's time to get out of the wheelchairs, to stop leaning on crutches, and harden the **** up because this is sad.

Added note: Even if no one stands with me, even if I do this alone, I can say that I stood up and spoke while everyone else sat in silence as darkness came. This community is poison, but there is still some hope. For freedom. Instead of complaining about weapons, suits, and vehicles, I wish to treat the true problem.

Your high horse is epic. Nerf it.

The more you split players up into different categories for matchmaking, the harder it is for the game to successfully matchmake. Take it to the extreme - you have 100 tiers. You need 1600 people queueing AT THE SAME TIME to make that successful. Say you want 3x tiers, 3x game modes = 9 different queues, plus 2x FW fronts. That is 11x queues. That is 396 people that need to be queueing AT THE SAME TIME to make sure all the battles for that "cycle" are filled.

So you still want people to be able to start a game of their choice somewhat immediately... Meaning "Search for battle" to "boots on ground "is somewhere in the <3min range. Let's assume each battle lasts 12 minutes and people queue immediately after each battle. That is a 15 minute cycle between "search for battle" and return to merc quarters. A player can log in at any time and you want him to be able to join a battle with other players within 3 minutes, so for math purposes, call that a necessity for 5x cycles to be running before the same players start queueing up again because you need battles to start every 3 minutes. So 5x cycles of players. So 5 * 396 = 1980 online players to make this work in a perfect world.

In a perfect ******* world.

Now account for players AFK. Squads waiting for members. Squads that need 6x slots in their chosen game mode. Needing to restock between matches. Average match time going longer than 12 minutes. Factor in PC matches and just completely subtract those from players contributing to queues for a full 45-60min per PC match. And factor in the fact that the type of matches that people select is not a uniform distribution, but even if someone picks an unpopular match type (ambush) you still need enough players for to form a 32-man match every 3 minutes... you can easily triple the number of players that need to be online at any given time, and we are not pushing 6000 at this point.

L2Math.

I'll say again: Playerbase. Is. Too. Small. For. Gear-tiered. Matches.

[Edit: Oh... and I didn't even include REGIONAL servers...]


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Kasote Denzara A Vulture 318	Posted - 2013.09.24 05:40:00 - [1] - Quote When I was first cloned, things were new and exciting. "What was this?", "What's that?", "Can I do this or this?" My common questions. I was never one for groups, so I often lone wolfed and answered myself. Things were not like they are now. Old faces went, new faces came. Names faded into a memory. Secrets learned, weapons mastered. Over time, the number of mercenaries started to drop. R&D has tweaked and adjusted our weapons, suits, and vehicles quite a bit over time. Eventually, the transport ships will bring our missing gear that was lost in the initial bringing of the gear. Though this pleases me, this is not the point of this broadcast. Though Scotty has been making an attempt to properly deploy us into battle for the various investors, there is a small problem. War is not fair, though this war is controlled. Our new bloods biomass shortly after leaving the training grounds. This is a problem. A major problem. They require a... level fighting ground after leaving training. Even those that have long left the Academy have not gained proper footing. I cannot directly speak to Scotty, but I hope to gain enough supporters of this cause so that it may, one day, happen. We require some sort of restricted matchmaking based off the gear we regularly use. Below is my suggestion. It'll be seperated into three tiers. Tier 1: Militia and Standard only, no vehicles allowed. Low ISK payout. Tier 2: Standard and Advanced only, vehicles allowed (even militia grade) but restricted to the standard and advanced modules. Medium ISK payout. Tier 3: Advanced and Prototype only, all vehicles allowed (with no restriction). High ISK payout. Tier 1 allows a transition between Academy and the "real" battles, sparing them from the prototype users and tanks. Tier 2 allows vehicles to be used but spares them from the prototype AV. Tier 3 allows mercenaries to "show their stuff" without the troubles of lesser equipped opponents. Each tier allows a means of building money, skill, and experience, ultimately leading to higher tiers. What about Planetary Conquest and Faction Warfare, you may ask? PC will be pure tier 3, with FW being tier 2 and 3. With PC being tier 3, only the best will be used. With FW being tier 2 and 3, it eliminates the lesser experienced from entering into it, thusly allowing more intense battles. I believe this is what is needed, more so than the tools of war that we hope to one day use. Who will stand with me?
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 318	Posted - 2013.09.24 06:56:00 - [2] - Quote Rogatien Merc wrote: Low playerbase nerfs current matchmaking. Matchmaking is unlikely to be gear-tiered as such would discourage adv/pro AUR gear purchases. Recruit a friend FTW and save us all Nothing about this stops people from buying AURUM gear. In a way, it promotes it. Most of the playerbase is currently infantry with either standard or advanced.
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 331	Posted - 2013.09.25 05:26:00 - [3] - Quote Edited the original post. For those that have already read it, only the lines outlining what is allowed in each tier has changed. I gave it some thought and believe this is for the better. I won't quote the two that have responded already. Not enough players? Is that seriously the only argument that has ever been brought up against tier based matchmaking? Seems a little worn out, if you ask me. I have successfully gotten into full lobbies of Ambush, Skirmish, and Domination since 1.4. Either A) I'm somehow lucky, despite me being on the American servers deep in the night or B) You kids are just bullshitting to bullshit. The only people that my suggestion does not cater to is the group of people that use prototype gear against the fresh bloods. Pathetic. It's time to get out of the wheelchairs, to stop leaning on crutches, and harden the up because this is sad.
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 331	Posted - 2013.09.25 14:20:00 - [4] - Quote It's time to weed out the weak that cower.
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 331	Posted - 2013.09.25 14:47:00 - [5] - Quote Monkey MAC wrote: Segregating suit tiers is not the way to go. You just end up with Tier 1 standard Stompers Tier 2 Advanced Stompers Tier 3 Proto Stompers So now noobs are getting stomped at 3 tiers instead of just 1. It also near defeats the point of suot tiers in the first place. If everyone is using the same gear as you, you might as well only ever play tier 1. And stomp noobs fresh out of the academy What is required to eliminate PROTO Stomping is 1) Longer more in depth NPE 2) A squad Finder 3) Adopt a Noob Scheme 4) PvE 5) More squad and tactical based rewards There will always be some form of "stomping", as age is king in this game, not skill. One that has been around for a year will always stomp out someone who has been here a week. Always. It's what ultimately separates Dust 514 from other shooters, as this is also shared in EVE. What both makes it unique... and garbage. All depends on the point of view you'll take. 1) No tutorial will prepare someone to be stomped out within half a second by an AR, simply because that person more than likely has at least proficiency three, if not topped with damage mods. 2) This is a welcomed addition, but fundamentally does not help those that a) lone wolf or b) get repeatedly paired with people that do not understand how some things work. 3) Isn't that the AA...? 4) A welcomed addition and ultimately an alternative to PvP. This is more than likely where a good number of new players will be. 5) We'll be getting WP for scanning. That's about as "tactical" as we're going to get in terms of rewards for a while. I don't see much else we can add to that. After all, a coordinated squad will triumph where a squad that is not will not succeed. Most times.
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 344	Posted - 2013.09.26 05:51:00 - [6] - Quote Rogatien Merc wrote: Kasote Denzara wrote: Edited the original post. For those that have already read it, only the lines outlining what is allowed in each tier has changed. I gave it some thought and believe this is for the better. I won't quote the two that have responded already. Not enough players? Is that seriously the only argument that has ever been brought up against tier based matchmaking? Seems a little worn out, if you ask me. I have successfully gotten into full lobbies of Ambush, Skirmish, and Domination since 1.4. Either A) I'm somehow lucky, despite me being on the American servers deep in the night or B) You kids are just bullshitting to bullshit. The only people that my suggestion does not cater to is the group of people that use prototype gear against the fresh bloods. Pathetic. It's time to get out of the wheelchairs, to stop leaning on crutches, and harden the up because this is sad. Added note: Even if no one stands with me, even if I do this alone, I can say that I stood up and spoke while everyone else sat in silence as darkness came. This community is poison, but there is still some hope. For freedom. Instead of complaining about weapons, suits, and vehicles, I wish to treat the true problem. Your high horse is epic. Nerf it. The more you split players up into different categories for matchmaking, the harder it is for the game to successfully matchmake. Take it to the extreme - you have 100 tiers. You need 1600 people queueing AT THE SAME TIME to make that successful. Say you want 3x tiers, 3x game modes = 9 different queues, plus 2x FW fronts. That is 11x queues. That is 396 people that need to be queueing AT THE SAME TIME to make sure all the battles for that "cycle" are filled. So you still want people to be able to start a game of their choice somewhat immediately... Meaning "Search for battle" to "boots on ground "is somewhere in the <3min range. Let's assume each battle lasts 12 minutes and people queue immediately after each battle. That is a 15 minute cycle between "search for battle" and return to merc quarters. A player can log in at any time and you want him to be able to join a battle with other players within 3 minutes, so for math purposes, call that a necessity for 5x cycles to be running before the same players start queueing up again because you need battles to start every 3 minutes. So 5x cycles of players. So 5 * 396 = 1980 online players to make this work in a perfect world. In a perfect ***** world. Now account for players AFK. Squads waiting for members. Squads that need 6x slots in their chosen game mode. Needing to restock between matches. Average match time going longer than 12 minutes. Factor in PC matches and just completely subtract those from players contributing to queues for a full 45-60min per PC match. And factor in the fact that the type of matches that people select is not a uniform distribution, but even if someone picks an unpopular match type (ambush) you still need enough players for to form a 32-man match every 3 minutes... you can easily triple the number of players that need to be online at any given time, and we are not pushing 6000 at this point. L2Math. I'll say again: Playerbase. Is. Too. Small. For. Gear-tiered. Matches. [Edit: Oh... and I didn't even include REGIONAL servers...] For my region (America), I will always find a match. Always. I spend a good amount of time in public games. For starters, guy, the majority of the people I run across run either standard or advanced, which would fall under tier 2. I do roll around and find the people that use protogear, but I find that it's one of three corps that do it, even then it's more than likely because of their footholds in PC. They know who they are. With the current system in place, I'm also finding more non-squads. So far, I just threw away two things of your side of argument; population of tiers and squading. Not everyone in the entire population wants to squad. I think at least a sixth is sick of squading with randoms. This isn't even during the peak hours. I can't honestly say which mode has the most players, but I can tell you which ones are more likely to have proto-squads, with greater chances of high-end tanks. Domination and Skirmish. This is natural. For vehicles, I mean. FW, as I said, is its own category, along with PC. With the separation I've suggested, it will free FW from what a good number of people are currently complaining about- games filled with people that have no idea what is going on. Let me explain that this suggestion of mine is not aimed towards the current community, but for a growing one. We need people. I will agree, and you are right, about the population division between three sets of tiers with three queues each. I didn't quite expect someone to bring this up, but I'm glad you did. (Honestly.) What if tier 1 consisted purely of 8v8, with a grab-bag mode selection? That'll cut down the number of queues by two, along side freeing people up for simultaneous battles. Also, I'll disagree that Ambush is unpopular. It's been buzzing with people for some reason. Keep in mind that I am using the American servers, as they are apparently always matches going on. I cannot speak for the others, though I hear Oceanic is picking up the ruins that was Uprising prior to 1.4. Rynoceros wrote:** Instead of basing it on suit tiers, why not a suit's total Meta level? Suits with a collective Meta of 10 or less would be Tier 1, and so on. (Actual useful numbers not necessary, as it is just theory.) This would allow somebody with a Duvolle on a Standard fit to possibly go up against somebody in all Advanced gear, as an example. This is also an alternative. Mine is strict compared to this (as mine demands everything to be x or it isn't allowed), and is vastly a better idea. [ran out of post length. See next.]
Kasote Denzara A Vulture 344	Posted - 2013.09.26 05:52:00 - [7] - Quote Sleepy Shadow wrote: Gear based matchmaking is not a good idea. You can verify this in three easy steps. 1. Create an alt 2. Slaughter some new players in battle academy 3. Come back and admit gear based matchmaking is not a good idea Your experience alone is enough to make you top the killboard. Like MAC said above, new players will be stomped even with gear restrictions. MLT/STD queue would be painted red with the blood of new players. I would think NPE would be even worse when people in seemingly same gear rip you apart time and time again. And I hate the idea of restricting modules. It defeats the whole purpose of fitting your suits just the way you want. We need more players and better matchmaking (not based in gear restriction), better tutorial would go a long way too. I would also recommend raising the starter SP/ISK, give more starter fits (different MLT suits with different weapons) and raise the WP requirement of battle academy drastically. I don't think tiered matches for those still in the academy is a bad idea though. But again, I don't think we have enough new players for that. I've said this a few times before, though not in this thread. I did make an alt, even made a few posts about it, named Needle Addict. Brand new character, did Academy, came in. Protogear being spammed around for the first three games I was in. I went postive the first two games, purely out of my knowledge of Dust. This character has ZERO SP in weapons. Everything is in the Logistic suit for Minmitar and logibro gear. Do you know why people get slaughtered leaving the Academy? People that like to spam high-end gear against militia, if not standard. Don't be a problem, be part of a solution. Gallente Mercenary 08551380 wrote: I don't actually think there is a matchmaking system in place I made a new character last night and once I got out of the war acad, my very first battle was filled with people from Hellstorm Inc.! The same thing happened to my brother, he was like "what happened?". Long story short he doesn't play anymore! New players come out of the academy with little experience, and skill points most likely improperly spent. They get into pubs and get stomped like ants. I don't know how to fix this, but something needs to be done. This is why I'm suggesting these tiers. Though, the other guy I quoted on the post I ran out of space has a better idea by far. Tier 1 (in my idea) will allow people to learn what to invest into and not to. Late P.S. My horse is well fed.