Season XIII Matchmaking - Discussion

orionpeace
orionpeace Posts: 343 Mover and Shaker
edited April 2015 in MPQ General Discussion
Here are the PvP Matchmaking Changes that went into effect for Season XIII
Matchmaking Changes
We’re shifting matchmaking calculations to achieve the following aims:
  • We used to use a persistent, hidden Versus rating to help with matchmaking. There were a number of ways where that could cause some quirkiness where people’s hidden rating gets far off from what we expect, and their matches are much harder or easier than they should be. That hidden rating no longer figures into matchmaking, fixing these issues.
  • The removal of hidden rating makes it so that purposely losing to get easier fights stops being effective.
  • Newcomers to PvP stop getting pounded on quite so badly, and retaliation fights are more likely to be within reach.
  • The flipside to that is that higher-level players see less super-easy targets. You’ll generally see opponents with a minimum difficulty of roughly one star level below you. (Players with maxed 3-star teams will see maxed 2-star teams and stronger, for example.) If there's a shortage of opponents worth a meaningful number of points in this band, you can be matched with easier teams than that. And if you climb high enough in the event, anyone can see you as an opponent, even if they’re much higher level.
  • The experience of suddenly hitting a wall and seeing much harder teams is reduced. The upper bound on how difficult a team we match you with gradually increases as it becomes harder to find good matches for you, so you can still expect matches to get harder as you climb higher in an event.

I thought it would be a good idea to separate out the discussion specific to the PvP matchmaking so the Devs could review our feedback more readily.

Once we are at least one day into the PvP event Heavy Metal, I will put up a poll to clarify that feedback.
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Comments

  • orionpeace
    orionpeace Posts: 343 Mover and Shaker
    Name: orionpeace
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 4
    Roster: Many max covered 3* but none max level
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 50
    Experience: I entered a relatively fresh bracket in the slice, joining 15 minutes after opening. I fought 8 seed team battles and uncovered an opponent with max covered and leveled 3* roster. Skipping the remaining 2 seed teams, the opponents on the other nodes had maxed covered but not max leveled characters.

    Normally I would not see any 3* teams immediately upon completion of the seed teams.
  • Druss
    Druss Posts: 368 Mover and Shaker
    Entered middle slice

    Defeated 3 seed teams - matchmaking is now solid 270 wall

    After 5 skips easiest battle found: Lv 228 IM40, Lv 270 XF (what a surprise!) Lv 166 Hulk

    That was the easiest - others were maxed IM & usually another 270 (Starlord a number of times which is new)

    Position is outside top 200 with 70 points - no real way to climb without boosts/healthpacks - even if this is acceptable pretty much isolating 90% of my roster as uncompetitive. Cant even easy climb Patch'Daken etc - straight to X-Boring.

    My Roster: Lv 220 XF (optimally covered) + 15 maxed 3* + 10 or so Lv 130+

    Forcing me to play EVERY SINGLE match with XF is not going to see me hanging around too long - it was bad enough before where you needed to use him from 600 points onwards but 70 onwards? please!
  • WilsonFisk
    WilsonFisk Posts: 365 Mover and Shaker
    edited April 2015
    Name: WilsonFisk
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 3
    Roster: 2 maxed 4*s, 16 maxed 3*s, almost all 3* Max covered
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 5 to top 10
    Experience: seeing all maxed 3-4* rosters at 200 points. This tweak is going to make pvp an even more time consuming slog, and likely will make high scores more difficult


    UPDATE: A guy with just a 2* roster was dominating my bracket early on with a score around 650. I could not queue him took I managed to get around 600 myself. At that point I could queue him, and hit him 5x in a row. Sorry to the 2* guy I pummelled, nothing personal, but after the frustration and effort it took me to get to that lowly score, I felt no shame taking out my frustration on a loaner/94/94 after facing almost nothing but 249/270/166 before.
  • tanis3303
    tanis3303 Posts: 855 Critical Contributor
    From what I'm reading here and in Will's original post, this sounds EXACTLY like the experiment they did in an off-season event a few months back (Category 5 I believe it was), where everyone hit the dreaded "wall" immediately after clearing the seed teams. If I remember correctly, that experiment was met with almost unanimous scorn and hatred...so, obviously, installing that system at the start of a new season couldn't possibly have any negative consequences, right? icon_e_confused.gif

    I haven't started Heavy Metal yet, and from what I'm reading, I really don't want to. I didn't want to start Thick as Thieves either if I'm being honest, but I did for the sake of my alliance when the change to the alliance reward structure was announced. So, I don't want to play PvP, I don't want to play PvE..........I guess its DDQ for a few minutes a day until I start forgetting to open the app altogether? The morale and will to play around here is so low lately...are we seeing the beginning of the end?
  • PuceMoose
    PuceMoose Posts: 1,445 Chairperson of the Boards
    Seems like a good idea to consolidate feedback in one location.

    Name: Puce Moose
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 1
    Roster: no usable 4*, two maxed 3*, most 3* fully covered. Four maxed 2*
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 100
    Experience: I did what I generally do; first slice, but I wait until there's less than two days in the event. After taking down the seed teams, I noticed opponents that I would normally not see until crossing the 550 point barrier. At 150 points, my node options are:
    70/155 Lazy Thor/204 X-Force (21 points)
    70/153 Lazy Daken, 166 Patch (24 points)
    247/114 MoHawk / 141 GSBW (21 points)

    I'm hoping the system just has a few kinks to work out, because it has not been fun so far. I don't mind fighting teams like this around 500 or so, but it's discouraging to see them right out of the gates.
  • killerkoala
    killerkoala Posts: 1,185 Chairperson of the Boards
    they should have run a couple test pvps parallel with black vortex/BoP to see how things would work out. but i guess test servers is good enough for their practical results.

    "p.s. also for money"
  • ynglink
    ynglink Posts: 195
    edited April 2015
    Figured I'd go ahead and put my info to help out with the PvP data collecting.

    Username: ynglink
    Roster: 1 Fully covered 3*, several half covered 3*'s, couple of full covered and leveled 2*'s, Fully covered Juggs
    Slice: 1
    Usual Placement: Top 150-200 (Not a PvP player most of the time, I find it easier to place in PvE but still participate in PvP during downtimes)
    Experience so Far: After beating the seeded teams (Using 140 Fully covered Blade, 140 mostly covered Hood, loaner) been getting maxed 2* teams, roughly worth 30-35 points. Have not aggressively done the PvP yet due to PvE refresh and work. Will update this post later with more experience with the new Matchmaking.

    Note: I normally have to skip a lot to find people worth more than 25 points after the seeded.

    UPDATE:
    Current Placing: 25 with 301 points.
    So I've done several clears, broke 300. Haven't hit a wall yet, but I've seen a couple of 166-200 teams, and have skipped past them. Still hitting either Maxed 94's or mid covered 3*'s and 4*'s. So it appears to be people around my cover range, which is nice. Current leader is shielded at 547 with 2nd place at 489. Most of the top 8 is around 400, which appears might be the wall for me. Will update when I get more testing.
  • Deadpool369
    Deadpool369 Posts: 53 Match Maker
    The biggest difference I'm seeing as of now is the amount I've been attacked..I'm only sitting at 300 and I've been hit about 15 times already where before it was at about 650 where I'd see heavy attacks
  • May as well add my thoughts to this as this is the first time I've been unhappy with the game in a long time. If it stays like this, I'll find something else to occupy my free time.

    I cleared my first seed and now see nothing but maxed ironmen and xforces which makes me use my own xforce every single match which I don't normally do. I liked playing with my new characters I got but now I can't. I already wiped a few times and got attacked and I'm only at 400.

    This is not fun in the slightest and I'm actually gobsmacked you would do this again after what happened the last time. I don't know who will find it fun and exciting forcing their way past 300 points and using health packs after almost every fight.

    I've said it before and I said it again, players should at least start off fighting easier teams and the higher they go, THEN the game and levels they see should get higher, not straight of the bat. NOT COOL D3
  • Unknown
    edited April 2015
    Name: Lerysh
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 3
    Roster: Many max level 3* XF 270 TGT 250
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 25
    Experience: Entered and looked at the leaderboards. One guy shielded at 650 and then #2 has 370 points. Climbed to 300 points relatively quickly and was top 10 for a bit. Checked in an hour later and 0 attacks, still top 10 with 313 points. Didn't see any max 94 teams, but that's not unusual in the lowest scores for some reason, maybe because more targets? Did see a few with a 120 3* and a 94 2*, so it's possibly even more important to not level your guys beyond 100 until you can hit 166 with them. Before I would start seeing and hitting 94 teams in the 300-500 range.

    It doesn't bother me that I can't see/hit 94 teams anymore. I shouldn't have been able to anyway with my roster. Overall I think the change is positive, but then again, I haven't scored above 400 points in an event yet so we will see.

    Editing in new experiences as the event progresses: I am seeing more partially leveled 4*s than I ever have in the past. 170 XFs for example. Maybe I just didn't register them since I wasn't looking, but before I seemed to go straight form beating up on 94s for 18ish points to the 270 wall at 700. Now I have a kind of steady climb through 166 teams to partially leveled 4*s to 270s (although I have seen 270s already in Heavy Metal too).

    Climbed to 500, and now waiting 3h for health packs (and a PvE clear). After a night of hits and fighting through retaliations I am at 575 now. So 75 points for a 3h climb. Not great. Top 8 people are all shielded at 580ish right now, and I seriously considered an 8h shield for my 580 points. Also not good.
  • One season ago the game was the best it had been in a long time, DDQ, meaningful and what's more important, achievable 4* progression, if you ignore competitive PVE reward structure for new 4*, the game was pretty damn fun to play.

    I believe it takes rare to talent to lose goodwill so quickly, assuming this is more bumbling from the devs and not a deliberate attempt to purge vets to lower the difficulty curve for new players, who after all, buy 10 packs for some reason.

    What makes this especially hilariously misguided, is this mmr change was attempted and insta-scrapped months ago, after a strong negative reaction from players, and that was in an off-season event.

    To attempt it again, at the start of a new season, no less is, let's say - adventurous?

    I plan to play this game until it becomes unplayable and that milestone seems to be within reach, curious to see how this plays out, I'm guessing the mmr change will be scrapped, but we'll probably get multiple buffed characters again, because "it tested well" or some garbage.
  • simonsez
    simonsez Posts: 4,663 Chairperson of the Boards
    I just realized that after playing for 400ish days, and building a roster of 20ish maxed 3s and 4s, I'm right back to where I was in the first couple of months or so... a player whose PvP score will settle somewhere in the 500s.
  • Seems like they dropped a turd on us and then all went off on holiday. I've said most of what I think in other threads, I'll just add that it makes the game joyless.
  • Name: Ben Grimm
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 3
    Roster: 4 4*s at 180, 1 at 168, 30 3*s at 166, everyone else at soft cap (3*s & 4*s) or hard cap (one of each 1* and 2*)
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 25 or top 50
    Experience: Seeing teams that range from non-maxed 3*s to non-maxed 4*s. Mostly 3*s around 150-166. Have only climbed to 191 so far, since the bracket is pretty new and I want to take this easily if I'm going to get attacked more often.

    This may make everything a major slog. I had planned on trying to push to 1000 this time - I need a few blue covers for Thoress (she's the 168), and the placement for Kamala - but this may majorly suppress scores, and 1000 may be ludicrous, regardless how much I shield hop, unless I'm wrong.

    If mmr is 100% roster now, I'm wondering if that's going to make scoring even more stratified. I can beat 270s, but it's a pain, and I don't know how much I'm willing to do it if I have to start hopping at 500 points. And I'm not willing to spend 1200 on shields when I can just buy a Kamala cover for that if it's not going to get me the Thoress too. I kind of hate that the testbed is the first PVP I've needed a cover in in ages.

    Also, SHIELD Simulator has similar enemies to the ones in PVP. I'm hoping that changes, and soon, because there's no way I'm climbing to 1500 points fighting 166s 26 points at a time.
  • slaxer723
    slaxer723 Posts: 40 Just Dropped In
    tanis3303 wrote:
    From what I'm reading here and in Will's original post, this sounds EXACTLY like the experiment they did in an off-season event a few months back (Category 5 I believe it was), where everyone hit the dreaded "wall" immediately after clearing the seed teams. If I remember correctly, that experiment was met with almost unanimous scorn and hatred

    Wasn't it Nefarious Foes? I remember seeing nothing but 332 laken/sentry/hood teams from the start. It was so bad they changed it BEFORE that pvp ended.
  • SnowcaTT
    SnowcaTT Posts: 3,486 Chairperson of the Boards
    Name: SnowcaTT
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 4
    Roster: 250 X-force, four 166's, 13x 140 (including IM), 12x 127 (almost all the 2*'s maxed)
    Usual PvP Placement: Top 50. Never, ever have I T10'd. Never, ever have I cracked 900 points. Never, ever have I shield hopped.
    Experience: Three seeds, skipped a bunch to find a non-166 team to beat. Four matches, 102 points, 113th: have to skip many times to find around level 150 teams rather than all 166, seeing occasionally 270's and often 220+.

    That was a lovely surprise. Sounds fantastic just like BoP - any single person I attack can easily beat me back. No way to push deep at the end without paying $$$ for health packs.

    D3: you want this type of system, you need to completely remove loss point-losses. I have no idea how I'll get anywhere near 600 in this unless I pay $$$ for shields over and over.

    So that is the plan I guess - pay money to play PVP or don't play. Like Lerysh mentioned - playing X-force/IM/166 EVERY SINGLE TIME through the event is going to get massively boring. They had already chased me out of PVE with scaling and constant grind, my guess is this will chase me out of the game for good at long last.
  • dider152
    dider152 Posts: 263
    edited April 2015
    Thank you, OP. I was about to make a post screaming about this change, but I see this thread is way more constructive, so I'll do it here. It seems I'm not the only one who has encountered something like this. I think that this proves without a doubt that the devs make and implement changes without testing it themselves, because anybody with sense that saw this would have rolled back the changes immediately.

    Name: jarkem
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 5
    Roster: Have every 3* so far, but none completely maxed out. Strongest is XForce at lvl 143 with 2/3/3, have 15 3* at lvl 100-130, rest at 94 or below. Got all the other 4*, but none viable
    Usual placement: Primarily PvE player, but usually place from T150 - T200
    Experience: I had an interview, so I wasn't able to enter the event immediately, like I usually do. I played the first node, and, as usual, it was a seed team with the leveled up default level 1 characters. So I did that and got some points. Then I clicked on the node again, and I was met with level 166 characters. So I clicked on other nodes and played the seed teams on those nodes. But same thing afterward: teams were leveled highly, like teams I don't usually see until after 350-400 pts. So now I've reached a wall much earlier, at the 70 point level instead of the 350 point level. Such an obvious mistake. I'll be lucky enough if I can abuse an OBW, IM40, and Xforce or OBW, IM40, and LTorch team for each and every node that I play, but they aren't even high enough level. What an unnecessary change. Please roll it back. If it doesn't get changed back, I don't see myself even getting enough points to reach the 10 pack milestone.
    Recommendation: 1. Roll back the change. It doesn't work. 2. If you decide to keep the change, make it so that others can still get points off you, but you don't lose any. It's hard enough slogging through 166 teams. It'll hurt to lose your progress if you get hit.
  • esoxnepa
    esoxnepa Posts: 291
    Name: Esoxnepa
    Event: Heavy Metal
    Slice: 3
    Roster: 10 166s, no max cover 4*.
    Usual PvP Placement: 650-750 points. I don't enjoy hopping, so unless there is something I really want higher, I just don't bother.

    D3 has decided to honor Christ by crucifying all of us.

    I am seeing max 166 and 270 teams right out from the seed teams. There were a few 3* transitioners around 200 points, but by 300 they are gone.

    I wouldn't mind facing these teams, if there was no losing points in PvP. Right now, at around 350, I was getting hit for -40 points from people with only 50 points.
  • tanis3303
    tanis3303 Posts: 855 Critical Contributor
    dider152 wrote:
    Recommendation: 1. Roll back the change. It doesn't work. 2. If you decide to keep the change, make it so that others can still get points off you, but you don't lose any. It's hard enough slogging through 166 teams. It'll hurt to lose your progress if you get hit.

    At the very least, roll back the amount of points lost. Starting to lose 25+ points as early as people are in their climbs is not "fun", which is a word that these folks like to throw around a lot here...I do not think they know what it means.

    I have a very deep roster (3 lvl 270s, like 20 or so 166s) so I really can't complain about seeing higher level opponents early in the event, that's fair. I don't even mind slogging thru them to get my score up, but having that score subtracted from throughout my whole climb? Yea, no thanks. I guess I'd need to know the aim of this new system before I can comment on its success - if you were looking to foster a more enjoyable PvP experience for all players, the feedback will tell you it was an abysmal failure. If you were looking to drive players of all levels away from the PvP experience, then kudos, great success!
  • DubbaHuss
    DubbaHuss Posts: 110 Tile Toppler
    Not paitient enough to neatly type out all my stats. I'm with TheEnlightened and I've got roster of 4 4stars @ 250 and 19 maxed 3's. Hit 120 points in slice 1 and hit a wall of maxed 4's. Then got hit (yes my maxed im40, 250 xf and 4hor were a tempting target for some other poor soul) This is how you accomplish making the game less fun. Thanks for dropping this as the first event if a new season with meanigful rewards. Very thoughtful.