PVP matchmaking question

pepitedechocolat

I play on an account with a 320 roster (a dozen 5* at 320, and many 4* between 295 and 315).

In PvP most of the team I can hit are around my level (285 to 405 unbuffed 4* and 5* mixed). However sometimes I get hit a huge amount of time in a row by a full 550 roster with a lot more event point than me (so the point gain/loss is very tiny).

I'm a bit curious of these guys. is that the way pvp is intended by the devs? is it an exploit ? is it a byproduct of the low amount of unshielded accounts? something else?

DAZ0273

When they reach a certain point threshold players "break" MMR and when this happens they start to see all sorts of strange teams they couldn't before as they have stretched the ELO calculator past where it can find normal matches, mostly teams that are at the lower end of the ELO points scale in the bracket, that is the 550 attacks.

I have however noticed that there are some off season events where MMR is getting screwed up and 550's seem able to hit for much higher points much sooner on teams they normally could only hit for very low points, not sure if Supports are affecting this - Claws for Alarm and House of X being the examples I have noted (think that is what they are called).

BriMan2222

I'm a 550 player and when I climb high enough that there are too few players at my level that are worth points the game will open up and show me teams that are way below my level that are only worth like 5 points. Sometimes it's easier to hit super easy 5 point teams until you reach 50 wins than it is to hit 1200 points.

This will also happen more in slices with less points. I play in slice 2 where there are less points, so if all the players in the 550 range are way lower than me or shielded I will start getting the lower level teams. In slice 1 or slice 4 where there are many more players and the scores there get much higher, this doesn't happen as much when I have played those slices.

entrailbucket

@pepitedechocolat said:
I play on an account with a 320 roster (a dozen 5* at 320, and many 4* between 295 and 315).

In PvP most of the team I can hit are around my level (285 to 405 unbuffed 4* and 5* mixed). However sometimes I get hit a huge amount of time in a row by a full 550 roster with a lot more event point than me (so the point gain/loss is very tiny).

I'm a bit curious of these guys. is that the way pvp is intended by the devs? is it an exploit ? is it a byproduct of the low amount of unshielded accounts? something else?

As a player who does this sort of thing nearly every event, it's definitely not an exploit. Most of us would prefer to climb 40-70 points at a time, rather than spending half an hour climbing 5 points at a time. Spending that much time leaves us open to taking big hits from others like us, as well as taking retaliations from folks like you (this happens!).

The game has to give us matches to play. So if there's nobody like us unshielded, it'll throw up its hands and go "eh, here's whatever." "Whatever" is folks like you that give us 5 points per match. Sometimes I end up doing this from 1000 points all the way to 1200. I do try to avoid hitting the same player 100 times in a row, but...well...I don't try that hard. I figure you're not really losing substantial points, so it's probably ok.

pepitedechocolat

Thanks for the feedback all it is enlightening to see the other side of the coin

@entrailbucket said:
The game has to give us matches to play. So if there's nobody like us unshielded, it'll throw up its hands and go "eh, here's whatever." "Whatever" is folks like you that give us 5 points per match. Sometimes I end up doing this from 1000 points all the way to 1200. I do try to avoid hitting the same player 100 times in a row, but...well...I don't try that hard. I figure you're not really losing substantial points, so it's probably ok.

I agree it is not a big deal, mainly annoying when you play and you get popup at every other screen with the same guy name. Maybe its a dev strategy to encourage players to buy shields. I'm wondering though if making shielded players partially visible would not be a better solution.

entrailbucket

@pepitedechocolat said:

@entrailbucket said:
The game has to give us matches to play. So if there's nobody like us unshielded, it'll throw up its hands and go "eh, here's whatever." "Whatever" is folks like you that give us 5 points per match. Sometimes I end up doing this from 1000 points all the way to 1200. I do try to avoid hitting the same player 100 times in a row, but...well...I don't try that hard. I figure you're not really losing substantial points, so it's probably ok.

I'm wondering though if making shielded players partially visible would not be a better solution.

Well...one event years ago (it was 4* Deadpool's launch event) there was a bug that caused unshielded players to be visible under certain circumstances.

My alliance used it to break the all-time scoring record -- each of us went over 5000 points, and some well past that.

The record's been broken many times since, of course, without using that bug. But if they ever made that change on purpose, permanently, you'd see scores at the top increase massively.

DAZ0273

@pepitedechocolat said:
Thanks for the feedback all it is enlightening to see the other side of the coin

@entrailbucket said:
The game has to give us matches to play. So if there's nobody like us unshielded, it'll throw up its hands and go "eh, here's whatever." "Whatever" is folks like you that give us 5 points per match. Sometimes I end up doing this from 1000 points all the way to 1200. I do try to avoid hitting the same player 100 times in a row, but...well...I don't try that hard. I figure you're not really losing substantial points, so it's probably ok.

I agree it is not a big deal, mainly annoying when you play and you get popup at every other screen with the same guy name. Maybe its a dev strategy to encourage players to buy shields. I'm wondering though if making shielded players partially visible would not be a better solution.

I don't think there is any strategy to it beyond pure maths. The algorithm exists for one purpose only - find any player a match under standard game circumstances and that is what it does pretty much without fail every time we play Versus.It ticks through it's requirements until it can generate that match for you, if it has to go to the very end of the "rules" it follows it will do so, anything to give a player a match at any time in an event.

Not everything has an alternative motive and pretty much nothing on Versus is completely random from who you get matched with. the points you gain, the points you lose - all explainable with maths (for example there is a formula that calculates how many points a player gains and a player loses, if you win a match for say 50 points that doesn't actually mean the player you beat loses 50 points).

JoeHandle

OP, every win is a possible cover drop, some players spend time grinding matches to collect those drops, not worried about their score. Honestly if you can collect enough covers, it more than compensates for any 'loss' in placement rewards. And, thanks to the win-count progression, playing this way makes progression 'moot'. Players are racking up 50 ... 100 ... 150 ... 300 wins per event.

Is any of this intentional design? Doubt it. It's where the game mode is, after many many band aids and many side effects from various other game changes.

As weird as it looks, PvP is the best it's ever been, IMO, as there are many ways to play it and reap rewards for the effeort, for players at various stages of roster development.