MMR change suggestion

PVP Arenas
1

I’m cutting straight to the point:

Yesterday I played in 3 games of solo shuffle starting at around 2050mmr.

  1. In the first match I was approximately 15 mmr below the enemy healer. I went 5 - 1 and gained 50ish cr.
  2. In the second match I was approximately 10 mmr above the enemy healer. I went 3 - 3 and gained 0 cr.
  3. In the third match I was approximately 12 mmr above the enemy healer. I went 4 - 2 and gained 12 cr.

Herein lies the problem:
The mmr algorithm sees that I am either slightly above or slightly below my opponent, and rewarded me with drastically different cr gains as result. The inherent issue with this is that there is not a substantial difference in skill separating player a with 2000mmr and player b with 2012mmr. There simply aren’t enough players for a gap of 12mmr to make any meaningful declarations of skill.

My issue with this is I put in a heckuva lotta work in order to go even 3 - 3 at 2050ishmmr, and unless I overwhelmingly dominate that ss match I don’t feel I’m being properly rewarded for it. Why should my cr gains be determined by something as arbitary as being either 12 mmr below or above my opponent? Such a small mmr gap is irrelevant in terms of skill measurement.

When I enter a ss match, I first check if I’m above or below the mmr of my opponent, and it’s quite deflating mentally and emotionally if I’m 10 mmr higher than my opponent for reasons mentioned above. It just doesn’t feel right.

Recommendation:
Expand the mmr range used for determining CR gains and losses. Adjust the mmr algorithm, even if it’s just for healers, so that players within 50 - 75mmr of each other are considered ‘of equal skill’, so that if I, with 2010mmr, go 3 - 3 against another with an mmr of 2000, it is not implied that I should win because I have 10mmr more than my opponent, but that we are equally matched, and a record of 3 - 3 is grounds for an increase in MMR and CR for both healers, rather than just the one who had slightly lower mmr.

Consequences:
Yes, I understand this will inflate the ratings of healers in SS. However this is a good thing! Many of us agree that it’s easier to climb as a dps relative to a healer for a variety of reasons, and this minor adjustment to the mmr algo balances the equation a bit. What’s more, this change will certainly entice more healers to que up for ss (and hopefully pvp in general) as consequence of the cr inflation. I haven’t qued a single game on the healer I used in the above example since the last 3 games, because it just feels like a game of Russian roulette pertaining to cr gains. “I hope my opponent has a higher mmr than me, because then I have a chance of acquiring juicy cr gains; if not, this is probably going to be a waste of time. If I play pretty well and go 4 - 2, I’ll barely be compensated; however if I go 2 - 4, the hit to my CR will be severe; and if I go 3 - 3, it was mostly pointless.”

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Hide MMR entirely
Set up a battlepass-esque reward structure using Honor as a metacurrency
Introduce metal ranking system
Victories count towards +++ ranking
Losses take away nothing
Track player performance per match
Make performance stats readable
(x% kicks landed, x% CC applied, x% defensives popped against incoming offensives etc)
Gear templates
Spec templates (with room for choice)
Battlepass rewards to encourage longevity
Ranking rewards to let the bangers show off

People who win a lot will rise in rank quickly
People who do not win a lot will still be encouraged to participate

Templates onboard enthusiasts much quicker
Easier to tweak balance for

With MMR hidden and performance visible
The player’s goal becomes improving instead of trying to divine an obfuscated, irritating system

Lends a shift to player goals, and player understanding, and rewards everyone while still letting the bangers preen

A rising tide lifts all ships. New players are only ever a good thing.

idk what these people are doing but hey they’ve got their 90$ mounts so

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the MMR system is over 20+ years old . yeah its time for a revamp

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You’re a cooker Vishnu, yet another good take.

I think there’s definitely room to improve how CR gains are distributed in solo queue modes.

Blizzard could probably do a +50/-50 and consider healers to be the “same”.

Out of scope of this thread and a crack pipe dream for sure, but I think that if solo queue acknowledged lobbies you’re unfavored in and adjusted your CR/MMR gain according on statistics that’d be cool af.

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Literally not reading the post and just saying it again. The system works fine, if anything blizz just needs to be quicker to update the formula for when participation drops off (shuffle after blitz came in).

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The system doesn’t work fine, I clearly laid out why this isn’t the case.

Since you’re lazy and others likely are too I’ll summarize:In short, a spread of 10mmr between two players doesn’t describe a difference of skill level, and so the cr gains and losses should be adjusted to account for this. It is suggested this should happen by changing the mmr algo so that players within a 50 - 75 mmr range of eachother are considered ‘of equal skill’, rather than 'player b has 2010mmr, and thus should beat player a with 2000mmr. I also suggested this change could increase healer participation if it was only implemented for the healing role.

Why even participate on the forums if you aren’t here to actively engage threads?

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I think this is valid and a reasonable change that could be explored.

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Ok this is not what I expected, apologies for assuming this was another one of the hundreds of “mmr is broken” threads when it isn’t. This idea actually is a good thought.

Because a massive majority of the forums now are complaints done by players who want hand outs and refuse to look into the mirror and see what the problem is, it’s why I have spent much less time on here recently.

1 Like