there are plenty of people who do.
Lhun is completely right.
imgur /sWgM1lD how am I supposed to interpret this then?
please tell me.
or this:
media.discordapp DOT NET/ attachments/409773099290984471/433706305967095829/unknown.png?width=417&height=634
or this?
media.discordapp DOT NET /attachments/311862369485586432/433036416365232161/Screenshot_20180409-185015_Oversumo.jpg?width=308&height=634
or this
media.discordapp DOT NET attachments/311862369485586432/433033535733891092/Screenshot_20180409-092801_Oversumo.jpg?width=308&height=634
or this
media.discordapp DOT NET /attachments/311862369485586432/433033125652856833/Screenshot_20180409-093010_Oversumo.jpg?width=308&height=634
or this
media.discordapp DOT NET attachments/311862369485586432/433032606192369674/Screenshot_20180409-092945_Oversumo.jpg?width=308&height=634
or this
media.discordapp DOT NET attachments/311862369485586432/433032182005497856/Screenshot_20180409-183357_Oversumo.jpg?width=308&height=634
That last one is verses all sombras at all ranks.
The zen shot from overbuff is across TWELVE GAMES.
Of course my stats are smoothed due to early swaps, I play way, way more than you.
Perhaps it is you who is interpreting stats wrong?
First of all, for pete’s sake don’t you know how to create links?
Use the ` symbol on both sides, or click the </> button when the text is highlighted.
https://imgur.com/sWgM1lD = `https://imgur.com/sWgM1lD``
This isn’t Oversumo. This is Overbuff. Which also has a nice little comparison tool. Since we both main Zen it actually works. I’m slightly above you in rank and have none of the issues you seem to have, plus I believe that I am a bit over ranked, if anything.
Our stats are comparable. You do some things better than me, I do some things better than you.
See first photo in album:
https://imgur.com/a/1Jkkr
You’re about where WE BOTH belong.
Your other photos don’t really show anything interesting, but like I said you can look up your OverSumo stats so there’s no need to lie, which I now believe you are doing not to be malicious but to protect your ego.
You don’t need lots of stats, there’s only one OverSumo sheet you need, the second photo in above album:
You are average for silver overall. That’s fine, so am I, but I am not deluding myself into thinking I’m better than I am.
The third photo in the album is specifically Zen stats, which state that you are slightly better than average for a silver player. About where I am and where your stats show you to be.
Blizzard’s MM system and your teammates aren’t holding you back, brother. Your skills are.
As for the rest of the photos, sometimes people have great games. Overall, though, your stats show that you are average for our rank.
While I agree it matches you with other players playing the same hero at your level rather well, the main problem I have is when it thinks it’s perfectly fine to match up 5 healers and one tank against a balanced comp on the other side. That’s what really needs to be addressed and why a double select role queue would help alleviate this problem. It wouldn’t solve it persay 100%, but it’d drastically reduce this from happening.
2 Likes
No one has yet shown how “Matchmaker attempting to create fair 50/50 matches actually prevents players from being accurately placed either higher or lower”
Please explain how an average winrate of 50% would allow anyone to change ranks significantly without the completely random and magical “you are playing better then others” sr bonuses that are, in my opinion, entirely RNG and based on your team’s ability to support and enable you in whatever role you’re in? We have seen this before with the “boosted mercy” that blizzard admitted was gaining SR bonuses faster than other heros.
We know the metric behind bonus SR is completely skewed based on the difficulty and expected “jobs” of the hero itself, compared to other people who play them. If a character’s role is somewhat one dimensional, (mcree and genji does damage and sometimes stuns people-) performing at the same level everyone else in your SR range is isn’t entirely all that difficult, but performing ABOVE everyone else requires good team play.
If you’re playing a zen that is getting protected from being dove, your stats are going to look far better than one who is getting dove and forcing a reset every team fight.
What about when the enemy team has a leaver, or two? Your stats are going to look awful and your SR gain will be lowered. This may adjust your MMR, but we don’t have any evidence or hard data on that.
What about when YOU have a leaver? If you’re playing a hero that is dependant on LastHits, or K/D for bonus SR, EVEN IF YOU WIN THE MATCH, you’re boned for that bonus SR and escaping the innaproprate rank.
Plus again, the matchmaker matches based on MMR, not SR. So that means that if the game can find someone as good as you are at the rank you’re at, you’re going to face off against that person in comp. This is a problem because it gives good players -nobody to beat- and they will be playing at a higher level in a lower rank then people with lower MMR in a higher rank.
This is unintuitive and weird. I understand it was designed to prevent “smurfing” and make sure the game is fair to everyone: but the better way to prevent smurfing is to give smurfs a rank appropriate to their mmr after seasonal placements and swing the banhammer harder on people who are intentionally deranking.
People who are legitimately attempting to leave the inappropriate rank are lumped with and against smurfs, especially when grouped, and are forced to play a completely different game then someone “legitimately” in silver. I should know, as someone who’s ranked through literally every rank on two seperate accounts, the games overwatch gave me on my alt at first were an absolute joke.
I ran roadhog and by the time I Was ready for placements everyone I met in QP was high platnum and above or a smurf too.
First, if your win-rate hovers around 50% you shouldn’t expect to change ranks, right? Even if you just put 2 random people together, in any game, if they both won about half the time you would say that they were evenly matched. One is not better than the other. If you are not better than your competition, you should not expect to increase in rank.
That’s not what you’re asking though. What you’re really asking is “If the MM can produce a 50/50 match, then how can it expect anyone to advance even if their skill is higher than their current rating would indicate.”
This is actually a really simple problem to solve.
The MM, as good as it is, assumes in ALL instances that it is wrong. Even if you were perfectly placed, if you win you gain SR. Why is that? Why would you gain if you are perfectly placed even 1 SR?
It’s because the win result shows that it is, in fact, wrong.
When the MM makes the match all it has as information is the MMR value. We tend to think that that MMR value is what the MM thinks we belong, but that’s not the right way to look at it.
That MMR value is a guess. Educated guess, but a guess nonetheless.
That guess needs to be validated. How do you validate this guess? You pit players against each other to find an actual result. So the MM makes a guess. Puts you in a match (it really doesn’t matter against who, I’ll get to that) and takes the result to see if the guess is valid…not CORRECT, VALID.
So, if you (or me) were to be put in a game against NYXL that game would indicate that we were not as good as NYXL. If we kept repeating that match we would be even more confident that we were not as good as NYXL. Each and every drumming by NYXL would validate that, yes, we are not as good as NYXL.
Of course, in that example it would be pitting a team where you estimated had a skill of around 1600 with a team where you estimated had a skill around 4500. The 4500 winning against the 1600 does validate your guess, that 4500 is better than 1600, but that’s not really saying much.
What you want to do is pit two players that you think are the same skill against each other to show who is better. That way, you find out where you are wrong and in which direction.
If you “think” two teams have an equal chance of winning but the final result is that Team A is better than Team B, then your next guess will be that Team A will win again. You no longer think that the result is 50%. You think that it’s 60%, or 51%, or 80%, depending on how you set up the system.
If that same set plays again you can gain information, but that’s not how OW is set up.
OW is set up so that when you VALIDATE that result, when you WIN that estimated 50% match, it updates what it thinks of you. Now, it thinks you’re better than 1600. Maybe it now thinks you’re 1650, maybe 1700, but in our system for most people it appears that it guesses next around 1625.
So instead of getting put against a 1600 team, you are now put against a 1625…STILL A 50% CHANCE TO WIN, JUST AGAINST A BETTER OPPONENT THIS TIME. If you lose, you go back to 1600. If you win you go up to 1650. The cycle continues, giving you 50% matches, until you can’t win anymore. Of course, your win-rate will be above 50% while you’re climbing, but if it weren’t why would you expect to climb. Each validation shows more and more that it’s about right.
Now, say you lost a game that you were correctly ranked at. It happens, in fact it would happen about half the time. You lose again, against a (slightly) worse opponent…you lose again, worse opponent. It happens, because now maybe you have a 60% chance to win. Lose, lose, lose, lose, lose…ASSUMING NO BAD ACTORS this is perfectly plausible…down to the point where you basically have 100% chance to win. Like, 1 v 6 for your entire team. IF YOU TRULY BELONG AT THE RANK YOU WERE…your chances of winning will be increased and you will see a higher win rate up to the point that you are correctly ranked and you are at 50% again. THE MM THINKS IT’S MAKING 50% MATCHES, but you know better, these games are easy and these poor souls don’t stand a chance. Remember, that’s fine, the MMR always assumes that it is wrong.
Now, you’re probably thinking 2 things. 1) This is not what I experience. According to this, I should win all the way up to my rank, then WLWLWLWLWL around my true rank. 2) This is not what they are saying, they are saying that they are happy that people have a 50% win percentage, not simply that they put equal skill sets together.
1_ If you truly are only 25 SR below your skill, you won’t win that game 100% of the time, of course. Your EXPECTED result is 50%, but if we simulated that game over and over indefinitely your ACTUAL result would be, say, 51% BECAUSE THE GUESS IS INCORRECT. You can’t win 51% of a game, but you sure can lose 49 out of every 100 games played. The actual order of wins and losses in that scenario won’t necessarily be WLWLWLWLWL, either. You will get some streaks in there because streaks happen, just flip a coin 100 times to prove it to yourself.
2_ Say you wanted to study some natural phenomenon to see how it worked. One way you could test your idea of how it worked is to create a model. We (humans) do this all the time. In fact, any “theory” in the scientific sense is a model. E=mc^2 is a model. The algorithm that determines who will win a game of Overwatch is a model. You can study the phenomenon, think about how it probably works, build a model that expresses what you believe is true.
How would you validate that model? How would you know it’s correct? You put data into the model and see if the model matches the actual result.
So when we initiate nuclear fission, we take the known mass and take the released energy and see if E does in fact equal mass times the speed of light squared.
It’s the same with the OW MM algorithm. They take the players, guess their skill, and need SOME WAY to validate if their guess was correct.
If they guessed two people were the same skill and they tested it to see if their guess was correct what do you think the result would be?
50%. If their model of how good players are were correct, they would expect a 50% win-rate. They find a 50% win rate, indicating that their model is correct.
That’s part of the reason this “forced 50%” stuff is annoying.
They want a 50% win-rate to validate if their system works, not for some nefarious purpose. Testing mathematical models isn’t something the average person does everyday, so I get the confusion, but this is a process of guess, collect data, adjust, guess, collect data, adjust…not “Lhun is getting a bit above his rate, lets put a leaver on his team.”
This is how the MM can be good (overall 50% win-rate) and also allow people to climb (games are individual validations of SR).
If you want to discuss PBSR, that’s fine. I won’t participate because I really have no strong feelings either way on the issue. I can understand both sides, I don’t believe it’s a significant effect, but I’m not very certain of that belief at all.
Yep. The way they handle groups sucks. It’s really an impossible problem to solve. First, the above system works best when everyone is of the exact same skill. That’s not really realistic but as long as it’s close it’s fine. But you get 1000 SR differences in there? No. It’s that scenario where we were playing against the NYXL, you’re just proving what you already know.
Second, there is a bonus (apparently) for grouping to account for the “synergistic” effects of being in a group. Synergistic effects that don’t apply in the same quantities over all groups.
In short, they know groups are screwey. It’s one of the hotter topics out of their own mouths. Unless you have a good idea on how to stop groups from screwing with the MM there isn’t much else to be said.
Maybe I don’t understand what you’re saying, because the only people that will have “nobody to beat” would be the top 1…not 1%, not 100…top 1. Even they have to constantly be beating their competitors.
6 Likes
What Lhun is very clearly saying is that if you are an above average player at your current rank and the matchmaker would deliberately set you up against other above average players at your rank it would use a strange handicapping mechanism. What should happen instead is that you are placed in games with average material of your current rank and if you play better than them you should naturally climb the ladder until the average material is better than you.
By the way, SR is used in matchmaking (in addition to MMR) and has been since last November:
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20759648155
Some people will still claim that it is not used even though a blue post very, very clearly says it is.
The matchmaker tries to find teams of equal skill. Not teams consisting of individuals all having equal skill. Similar MMR, yes, inside the boundries it uses. They admit that it doesn’t always find a 50-50 win probability and they say that the teams have varying MMR (because MMR calculations actually looks at the MMRs of the other teams and if there were higher MMR players than you and you won it will affect how much MMR you gain).
When both MMR and SR are used a player playing above average is not anymore as often placed in games with higher ranking people playing below average at their rank. This leads to the above average players more often being the best player of their team and for balancing purposes a weaker player is placed in their team.
Actually this kind of balancing will give you a better experience of fighting with and against the average skill of your current rank.
I notice this Matchmaking behavior on a Gold account I recently got from a friend. I am currently ranking this up and teams are often heavily stacked against me.
I assume the matchmaker knows Im not a gold player and tries to create 50/50 ( within boundries ) so I don’t completely murder the enemy.
^I am however pretty sure this is not what OP is experiencing. If you constantly get these stacked teams against you PSBR will try to get you out ASAP - the system REALLY does not want you there and it will try to correct your rank fast.
1 Like
The current SR system is insanely stupid because it’s not mostly based on individual performance. It’s not a rating of your direct skill, it’s a rating of how many games you win. Placement matches are the only real skill rating out there because it’s based almost entirely on your own performance and wins/losses don’t count. You can win every game and get bronze, or lose ever game and get diamond. A skill rating based based on wins/losses just magnifies toxicity and creates a blame game.
Nah, the system isn’t good at all. It gives the most lopsided matches I’ve had in competitive video game environment, not mention it lacks consistency.
I played about 3 seasons in a row in mid to high masters, now I have been tanked to mid to low diamond. The matches keep getting worse and worse, more and more unbalanced.
If I consistently placed in Masters for three seasons and all of a sudden next season I drop 700 SR without massive tilts, then something is wrong. Three seasons at certain bracket while playing hundreds of matches, isn’t sign of getting lucky and as a purely solo player, I wasn’t carried by duo/trio partner(s).
It took me a quite bit of frustration and determination to reach the ratings I reached, I’ve basically lost all the SR I’ve gained in past 4 seasons in half a season. I even had my career high this season I believe and now I am way down.
Competitive matchmaking is just awful, if it wasn’t for the good will I’ve felt for Blizzard as someone who’s played their games for about 20 years, I’d just quit permanently and not think much of it. Sadly they just cannot seem to fix the issue and they refuse to put in place role queues, which may alleviate the problems.
3 Likes
The system is bad. It rewards solo , not teamwork. So the higher rank you get, the more toxic it gets. The player are afraid of dying because they worry about mess static.
Can I come up with better system? No. For example, any better system that I can think of will require longer wait time. The balance between good matchmaking system and toxic environment is hard but I will say current system is toxic more.
2 Likes
It be nice if they could give out stats on how many people stop playing comp. That would be my guess why things like that happen to you, occur.
There would be more problems with having a role queue than not. Unless you like the meta never changing.
If everyone on my team is a tank/support main as well, I just warn them I’m poop at DPS, and play my best.
lol about to flag this for spam.
good try though
the matchmaker in this is rigged always puts cold players up with players that are playing well
always costs me sr every time
now I just quit after 2 losses and get annoyed
If this is the case, then shouldn’t they be on the other team all the time as well?
Yes. So games are ruined for people on both sides.
1 Like
How is it ruined? If you have equal number of hot and cold players on both sides, then that seems like an even match.
Do you not want an even match?
You might be playing a different game.
The example you give leads to the steamroll games everyone hates. A player who should be losing wins and a better player loses. This creates an artificial cycle for players SR where higher SR games can be easier than lower SR games.
This isn’t “fair games.”
1 Like