Shorter queues require able participants queuing at the same time, and in the system I’ve proposed, basically equally geared players. Not a lot to ask for from a MMO. But maybe for an MMORG that is a lot to ask for.
10 levels of Item level doesn’t have to be the set barrier, this could be adjusted so matches actually take place, but it’s a starting point. If say after 10 minutes a game hasn’t started, the system will start pooling the closest candidate to that item level into the queue with them. Additionally, if this layer had to be used, gear could just be normalized in the instance to the highest available IL for that instance.
This logic should also apply to low level which if I’m hearing people correctly, they have high queues because people don’t want matches against twinks, so people just don’t queue period. This could alleviate that concern. You will get paired up against equally geared players if it’s by Item level.