The Problem:
Ok, here’s the deal.
I’ve made posts about this before, and I’m sure I’ll do it again, but there is seriously something wrong with how PBSR functions.
Currently, your SR gain/loss is adjusted per game due to how you’re performing.
“But wait”, you say, “what do they compare your performance to so they can accurately measure your needed SR gain/loss?”
Well, a lot of people are led to believe that it’s every player who fills the role you’re playing in your rank. But I’ve been paying attention to my stats and gain/loss from them, and noticed that it’s not functioning that way.
What is actually happening is that you’re being compared to your teammates that game.
What does this mean?
Here’s an example:
Say I had four golds. The slots I had golds in were:
- Eliminations: 25
- Eliminations on Objective: 15
- Objective Time: 2:00
- Damage: 10,000
At the end of my game, I would get, say, 27 SR.
However, next game, if I were to get these exact stats but get all silvers, while the player who had gold had stats like these:
- Eliminations: 45
- Objective Kills: 40
- Objective Time: 3:30
- Damage: 25,000
I would only get around 20 to 23 SR.
The problem here, especially with DPS players, is that there is a constant competition between the teammates to do better than each other.
You can see this a lot. People will over-extend, knowing that they will probably pay for it, just to secure an extra kill for those beautiful gold medals.
“Ok”, you then say. “Well, just do really well and you’ll always get a lot of SR!”
Well, not performing as well as your teammate is not the only problem that makes you drop more SR.
Say you’re playing a game and you’re doing pretty average as DPS. Your other teammate(s) are doing better than you, but not by way too much.
At this point, someone leaves…
It’s a 5 v 6. A much harder fight. The chances are, your team is going to be too tilted or just completely give up. You no longer have any chance of surpassing your teammates in stats, and when you lose, you’re going to lose much more than you should’ve.
And that’s not all.
Say you’re playing McCree, and doing much better than the other DPS on your team, but you notice that there’s not enough healing happening, so you switch to Ana.
Your DPS stats will almost completely stop, but your healing stats will rise. However! The other DPS will eventually rise above your DPS stats, and you will most likely be unable to get higher healing stats than the other healer(s) that had already been healing. When the game ends, your stats will be lower than everyone else, and your gained SR will be much lower.
( Or lost SR will be much higher )
So not only does PBSR promote selfish play, it also promotes not switching or filling, effectively one tricking for a game as to not lose more SR than should be lost. And on top of that, leavers almost completely tank your SR as well.
So how do we fix this?
How to Fix the Problem
Well, instead of comparing your stats to your teammates, you could compare it to all the players in your rank, and not just those in your game.
What would this fix?
If this was how PBSR was calculated, teammates would not compete with each other for better stats. They would constantly be trying to beat their own stats, and always do better than last time.
But this isn’t the only way it could be fixed. Here’s the big one:
Instead of measuring performance on a game-to-game basis, your performance could be measured over a constant average of games.
If you do well, say, 8 out of 10 games, you’re doing well over an average of games, and most likely deserve to be higher, and the PBSR should slowly apply in your favor. If you don’t do well 8 out of 10 games, you’re doing badly over an average of games, and most likely deserve to be lower, and the PBSR should slowly apply against you.
Once your average approached a one-to-one ratio, the matchmaker would understand you’re where you belong, and your SR would even out to a constant SR, until it notices a change in your average.
If you started doing better, not only would the matchmaker notice a difference in stats between everyone in your rank, but it would also notice that you’re doing better rather than worse on average, and that would make it much easier for the matchmaker to notice that you deserve to rise. ( Or fall )
So what would this fix?
Think about it. There are some games where you just do very well, and some where you just can’t kill anyone.
When you do extremely well, does that mean you deserve to be much higher? Not necessarily. When you don’t do well at all, does that mean you deserve to be much lower? Not necessarily.
The matchmaker could get a feel for where you belong as an average, rather than a jumpy game-to-game basis.
And not only this! But it would also fix the leaver problem! ( Somewhat )
If the matchmaker was able to see past those not very well fought games, it would also see past games where there were leavers, and not rapidly shoot you down.
This would also advocate for switching and filling for your team, so you’re able to support your team in every way you can.
Tl;dr:
PBSR is too rapid, needs to be over an average of games and compare you to people in your rank rather than teammates.
Thank you for any replies to this thread. Let’s please get Blizzard to at least notice this. I’d rather much have a PBSR system like I explain here or no PBSR system at all rather than the one that is in place.