GAC matchmaking (again)
Hi,
I'm here to ask the community for their opinion about GAC matchmaking. Correct me if I'm talking nonsense at some point: I think I'm less knowledgeable about the game than many here.
Do you think it would be a good idea to implement a system that prevents older players from dropping below a certain rank?
I say this because, as a player with a relatively young account compared to some of you... I am literally blocked in bronzium by accounts that are much more advanced than me (+3; +4M) and that should not, in my opinion, be in my group. For some, the concern is obvious: the account is badly optimized, sometimes without GL while they have more than 6M. For others, they have obviously dropped in the ranking voluntarily, or by simply stopping playing for a while.
Which is... Perfectly understandable, since no one is required to stay glued to the game every day. But for those who find themselves in front of these accounts, the day the player finally decides to play again... Well, it's a bit frustrating. Because there's no way to win, no matter what strategy you adopt. And this is a situation that happens very, very regularly. So much so that half of my games, or a third (I honestly haven't done the stats) are affected by these impossible "walls".
Having browsed the forum a bit, I saw that a classic response to this type of post was that you simply overperform when you find yourself in this type of situation. That's a valid response... But it doesn't rule out the fact that a 6M account doesn't really belong in bronzium.
Hence the idea of "blocking" the descent of some: after a certain point, they could not go below it. In my opinion it would be beneficial for everyone: the "small" ones like me, who would avoid getting Kyber accounts on the corner of their face, and the "big" ones, who would have a guaranteed profitability in terms of crystals. And this, in a sustainable way, without having to play to keep their place.
Sorry for the very long post. Finally, two small side questions:
- I have been having slowdown problems very frequently IG, for some time. 10 seconds of downloading between some screens. My connection is not the cause apparently; are others in the same situation? An update that went wrong?
- Another frequent bug: the sith marauder's lightsabers glitch in every fight against him. I end up with little sabers that stay on the screen permanently, until I close the application. Even in fleet battles. Others in the same case?
Good day to you.
I'm here to ask the community for their opinion about GAC matchmaking. Correct me if I'm talking nonsense at some point: I think I'm less knowledgeable about the game than many here.
Do you think it would be a good idea to implement a system that prevents older players from dropping below a certain rank?
I say this because, as a player with a relatively young account compared to some of you... I am literally blocked in bronzium by accounts that are much more advanced than me (+3; +4M) and that should not, in my opinion, be in my group. For some, the concern is obvious: the account is badly optimized, sometimes without GL while they have more than 6M. For others, they have obviously dropped in the ranking voluntarily, or by simply stopping playing for a while.
Which is... Perfectly understandable, since no one is required to stay glued to the game every day. But for those who find themselves in front of these accounts, the day the player finally decides to play again... Well, it's a bit frustrating. Because there's no way to win, no matter what strategy you adopt. And this is a situation that happens very, very regularly. So much so that half of my games, or a third (I honestly haven't done the stats) are affected by these impossible "walls".
Having browsed the forum a bit, I saw that a classic response to this type of post was that you simply overperform when you find yourself in this type of situation. That's a valid response... But it doesn't rule out the fact that a 6M account doesn't really belong in bronzium.
Hence the idea of "blocking" the descent of some: after a certain point, they could not go below it. In my opinion it would be beneficial for everyone: the "small" ones like me, who would avoid getting Kyber accounts on the corner of their face, and the "big" ones, who would have a guaranteed profitability in terms of crystals. And this, in a sustainable way, without having to play to keep their place.
Sorry for the very long post. Finally, two small side questions:
- I have been having slowdown problems very frequently IG, for some time. 10 seconds of downloading between some screens. My connection is not the cause apparently; are others in the same situation? An update that went wrong?
- Another frequent bug: the sith marauder's lightsabers glitch in every fight against him. I end up with little sabers that stay on the screen permanently, until I close the application. Even in fleet battles. Others in the same case?
Good day to you.
2
Replies
But that's not the biggest issue. The "how" is the hard part once anybody proposing it actually tries to think it through. "Old roster", "heavy roster", "drop too low", or "belong" are all subjective concepts. How do you quantify "belong"? Why does a 6M roster not belong in Bronzium? Are we going to start drawing lines by GP, when we know perfectly GP is a poor indicator for roster strength?
Players drop, and they deserve their wins. There's no problem with players dropping 'naturally'. I.e. participating, but losing. Even if their GP is significantly more, they're generally a lot fairer match ups than they look.
The issue is with players that are signing up, but not participating, or hardly participating. It of course is not affecting win rates, but it is affecting the 'spirit' and 'enjoyment' of the game. If the match up is decided on whether one of the players decides to play or not, isn't right.
So 'no' to a drop cap, but 'yes' on something to combat sandbagging.
I think OP meant +3/+4M more than they have.
Yes, I guess that's my bad, looking at the paragraph as a whole. Sorry OP.
There are 2 situations:
1) good players that punh up and get frustrated because they start facing rosters they can't beat. Hence your 'classic response".
2) fairly young accounts that faced big rosters who went very deep, either by inactivity or because they want to be big fishes in small ponds. That's your case, and the classic response is: "no real solution for you kiddo, hopefully you will get past this sea of monsters at some point. Good news is, it doesn't affect your win rate, because statistically, half of the time they don't engage".
No good solution seem to emerge, unfortunately for you and other players who can find it frustrating, with reasons. If we do what you suggest, you will create a huge wall at the bottom of the division where you want to stop them, moving the problem away from you but creating a new problem elsewhere, on top of what others said before in the thread.
I see one good thing in your post: you have more than half interesting games, which isn't so bad.
Its not fair to compete with other players that has the same skill rating and 2m GP more.
So you’ll be back to ‘i’m very careful on how I spend my resources because it will affect my matchmaking’.
Actually it is fair. There's a reason that 2M + GP account is at the same skill rating as you.
And that is called sandbagging.... I'm tired of facing unwinnable matches in GAC because my opponent has 1, 2, 3M more GP than I. It's outrageous... It's unfair!!
I think one approach could be to constrain GP for each league to restrict large rosters using all their GP as an advantage. Each league can have ‘ideal’ GP say 4.5M for chromium which sets the cap for the challenge of that league. If you exceed this you can only use up to 4.5M of you roster and must select def and attack carefully. This would mean you can develop your roster for everything in game but you do not overwhelm smaller rosters in lower leagues. As you progress you need more GP for more squads on def and attack so it makes sense to expect more GP and the ‘ideal’ GP raises in a balanced manner.
This would also help you realise realistically if you are punching up. At the moment the relative difficulty in leagues shifts massively. I have been in chromium for months I was average when I broke through from bronzium and have grown at a fast rate. I checked through rosters of my skill rating in three brackets today as I thought I had some bad MM turns out the demographic is completely different shaped by the win/loses and my bracket was best of the bunch. But the average has increased from approx 3-4M up to 6-7MGP in that time. That means the challenge is much more for the same rewards and leave you feeling like you are not progressing. Even though you are by holding your position.
I mean you ditch your chances anyway if you toss your resources across the board blindly dont you?
i could be best to worst ~1 million GP difference. Has no predertermined boarders and everyone can be best/worst in GP at any time
If player is at a point where they have risen pretty much as high as their power will take them. If you then match by GP, you'll have several players like this. However, as you've now matched them all together, several will go up even further and compound their perceived problems.
GP definitely isn't a true measure of a players power, several players have proven this. However, the same player with more GP would do better than the same player with less GP. So there is a factor, but not a reliable factor.
Do something about high GP sandbaggers, yes please. Start messing with the match making by adding GP back into it. That's just asking for trouble.
If you'll look, 4M GP was Chromium 3, 5M was Aurodium 4. And yet Carbonite and Bronzium are clogged with these bloated accounts, leaving nowhere for newer accounts to compete and suggesting that something is grossly wrong with how the game handles matchmaking an demotion.
Many content creators really push GAC since it's a prime source of crystals. But if the only way for a 2M GP player to win is for their opponent to no-show, then why even bother building teams for GAC at all? Overall, the state of GAC is not healthy for the game.
Right now we appear to have random match making amongst the people with the same skill rating. I don't think anyone has detected any pattern or justification for how each group of 8 people with the same skill rating is put together. There may be some method behind it, but no one has explained what is actually going on. Just how is that list of people with the same skill rating ordered on the leaderboard?
At least if that order of people with the same skill rating was in order by GP there would be some logic behind it - faulty or not.
So the guys in Chromium 3 were 4M, what would they be now? I believe I was 5.6 when the new GAC started. I'm now 6.4.
Well played lower GP accounts are beating bloated accounts. GP simply isn't a good method of measuring GAC power.
I think a lot of this is hyperbole due to players wanting to win more than 50/50.
If.....inactive accounts do/are becoming such a problem in the lower leagues, I'm sure CG will step in. They have and are keeping an eye on the data.
However, for those that are playing and falling, they deserve their wins too.
Personally I think the state of GAC is pretty good. It could be tweaked though.
I'm sorry but I have to disagree with you here. This is a problem that many people face, it's not once in a blue moon but on a regular basis.
It doesn't even matter why those higher accounts drop. Be it inactivity, sandbagging or 3v3 that they don't like that much so they participate less... it all comes down to one thing: More and more higher accounts are in lower leagues and because of that, smaller accounts are being pushed down further and further.
Everyone faces regularly much higher accounts starting in Aurodium all the way down. Until not long ago allegedly CG didn't know about it eventhough the forum, Reddit and Discord are full of people pointing it out... and they mostly get the same old answer of how good they are and that's why they're punching up. Nevermind that the accounts they face don't belong there and that they are the ones punching down.
I said many times, the theory of the system is what people tell those players whom face bigger accounts but the reality is so much different.
Something really needs to change because as it is, it kills all the fun.
Inactivity/sandbagging is an issue. I'm not going to disagree there.
I debate 'how much' of an issue though. Especially for accounts that have progressed. I really do feel that some players cannot handle the 50/50 win rate and/or expect to steadily progress though the leagues/divisions.
Take Dianora for example. His match ups look competitive and he's moved up a bit. He's now the lowest GP in his bracket. 2 are probably sandbaggers, one of which is put together pretty badly and crackable..
I also think that a lot of lower end players don't have the experience or knowledge of the environment as a whole, to make blanket statements about what needs to change to make it better as a whole.
Don't get me wrong; I honestly do think that sandbagging/inactivity is a legitimate issue and needs to be addressed. I think I mention it often, something does need to be done for the enjoyment factor. Making GP part of the match making, is definitely not the answer though.
1m
2m
3m
4m
Who should get matched with who?
Should 1m be matched with 4m leaving 2m and 3m to face off?
What if the four are
1m
1m
4m
4m
Should we have two 1m vs 4m GP matches or a 1m vs 1m and a 4m vs 4m?
Thanks so much for this post @Lumiya , this is exactly what's happening to me over and over again. It's not about that I can't handle 50/50, it's about fun matches.
Now it's been like 5 or 6 matches that I attack once with a single toon just to get my 10 points and move on. Where's the fun in that??
It's all just hearsay though. 'My match vs somebody with much higher GP is unwinnable.' A lot of these matches are winnable.
Nobody is coming forward with categoric figures from the last 6 months and showing a trend. It's all more emotional. 'I can't win, I'm frustrated!'
I can't agree more, that sandbagging needs to be addressed. However, I'm extremely dubious about your last 6 matches have been against sandbaggers. And are won by whether your opponent decided to play or not.
Chromium 1 was seeded with 4.5M initially. I looked into the brackets (n=3) around my skill rating and they are on average 5.8M. The demographic is changing resulting in higher GP players on average. So we are not experiencing poor MM but an evolution of demographic in each league.
These rosters are not just falling because of inactivity though, I have battled and won against them. They were seeded high based on GP but the skill rating is working by moving them down when they lose. They may lose because they are poorly modded, have poor strategy, do not know counters or refuse to use datacrons. Today I am more worried by someone with a lower GP than me as they will use it effectively.
This is working as intended but remains problematic as it becomes harder to achieve the same rewards. The challenge for each league is evolving but the rewards stay the same. And the lower leagues need something to help new players ease into the game mode.
The statistic win rate seems untrue to me, anecdotally but based on my experience, not theoretics. I've got a total of 5 wins from 15 rounds, with the GAC going on now, I'm 0 for 2. I'm in Carbonite 3 and relatively new, 1.35mil gp. Sure people can go on and on about how gp doesn't matter, but at what point is a roster, no matter how "bloated", incapable of being defeated by someone around my GP? 3 mil? 4 mil? Pushing 5 mil is the highest I've faced. It seems that what these accounts do is either fall to the bottom and then actually play, or only play 5v5. Because most of my 5 wins have been in 3v3.
I always found the statistic win rate to be nonsense. It depends where you sit, if you go on a win streak expect to reach a plateau and lose some. Players do often get stuck in the same division for a while until a mega unlock so it may sometimes even out but not exactly 50:50.
The issue is there is not a buffer where these rosters win more than lose before they fall to your level. Maybe 2-3M rosters still win against them and they continue to fall.