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

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

I have a post with almost the same idea in feedback.

And I convinced you there it isn't the best idea.

Age based stomping happens in every game, you don't know what your doing etc etc. NPE will ease this.

Someone will be prepared for dying to someone in less than 3 secs if he understands how and why! NPE will ease this.

Squad Finder will allow you to choose your squad, think your squad is a load of noobs, find another one!

Lone Wolfing is not meant to be a lifestyle choice, you have squaded and squadless roles, squadless roles involve sniping, tanking, piloting that kind of thing. If the NPE hammers the point that Lone Wolfing will get you killed a lot, it will be less common

Adopt a Noob Scheme is taking a noob with you in a squad, experienced players take 1 noob a match with them, hammers in squad play benifits, reduces stomping, noobs feel useful.

4,5 yeah pretty much!

But segregating by suits is a poor choice, trust me on that!

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.

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.

The threat of your enemy having proto gear is an incentive for new players to buy adv and pro AUR weapons and modules to compete. Removal of said thread reduces said incentive.

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.

So what's the bottom line then ? That there's no hope for the game as the player base slowly drops lower and lower.

CCP needs to do somethng quick to get players to come to the game or come back and stay for longer then 2 or 3 weeks.

At one point in this game there was over 100k+ players on then they all left.

The player base is out there CCP just needs to get them to come look at the game and some look at it again.

Just don't want to see the game die be for it even starts.

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...]

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.

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 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.

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, militia vehicles only allowed. Low ISK payout.
Tier 2: Standard and Advanced only, vehicles allowed 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. Militia grade vehicles will allow new players to "try" vehicles without being gangbanged by proto AV.
Tier 2 allows an upgrade of both gear and vehicles without savagely being stomped out by proto 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?

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.

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.



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.

The best solution to matchmaking is no matchmaking.

Yeah cause game where you get
Super Awsome Player, Proto gear
Awsome Player, Proto gear
Average Player, mlt gear
Poor Player, mlt gear

Sounds fun!

So it-¦s fun for you to play against average players 24/7? How will you improve your skills if you don-¦t shoot against better players?

It is tragic to see how many of you are born afraid. Man up and get better at shooting instead of crying over a matchmaking system. Pathetic.

I never get redlined. I-¦m 2 good. Use a Drop Uplink, start running and work for your squad. Do this right and you will win games by yourself.

Blaming the matchmaking system for your lack of skills is ridiculous.

Tiercide: remove tiers and at the same time, tears.

There will be minor despair and doomsaying about loss of progression, but to be honest tiercide is the best-looking alternative to this gear system which many seem to disagree with.

Matchmaking won't be necessary since everyone has the same gear (more or less). Differences will be much less pronounced than today, with customisation and specialisation leading to players having MORE OBVIOUS WEAKNESSES in addition to strengths.

Weaknesses AND strengths. This is the key to tiercide. Progression must lead to penalties as well as bonuses.

There are many threads on tiercide and to be honest, I haven't explained it so well here, but it's worth considering.