I lost every competitive game i played today?

[Cherry (CATGIRL)]

I have a feeling it has something to do with ONE of my TEAMMATES i played with ROUND after ROUND tanking LOSS after LOSS.... I won't be naming any names but.... YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE! YOU BETTER WATCH OUT BUSTER!!!

[᲼᲼᲼᲼᲼᲼᲼᲼᲼]

ow > rivals

[Jace Eureka | E7]

You must play Tracer.

[emmietiie]

This is why the Avoid As Teammate function exists.

[Supersniper98]

Very well then. I shall share my knowledge on how the matchmaking works after careful observation for >100 hours so you can know too. There are 5 different kinds of match-ups that the matchmaking aims to offer you (which not always go to plan but still generally work):
- Very favorable scenario: Your teammates are on a winning trend and the opponents are on a losing trend (those types of games you can find rarely, they are usually so unfair that the enemy team can't exit from spawn properly, those match-ups occur with the highest probability on Clash, but can be seen in all of the modes). These matches are always wide (5 or more divisions apart), but the per team rank distribution may still be "equal".
- Favorable scenario: Your teammates are on a winning trend OR your opponents are on a losing trend (not both at the same time, those types of games generally also end quickly but not by completely crushing the opponents). These matches are generally wide, but there are situations where narrow ones occur also (4 or less divisions apart), but again the per team rank distribution may still be considered "equal".
- Normal match-up: The expected match-up when queuing competitive. Both sides are very similar on paper, result is unpredictable and matches are usually sweaty until the last moment. Almost always these are narrow (most often in the same division).

To save some time, the last 2 are unfavorable and very unfavorable, which are the same as the first 2 but you are on the losing side.
I don't know what is your region, but the games in the European region are hosted on 2 different server locations (and it should be similar in other regions too): ams1 and gen1. I can tell the switch by the change in ping but you can still tell by checking Ctrl+Shift+N if you don't notice it. Normal match-ups are hosted on both server locations, however the other categories severely vary in rarity on both. ams1 has primarily normal match-ups and match-ups from the favorable group. In this region it's easy to get a win streak. This is the primary server for me as it has the lower ping, but it's very common that some time later or even immediately I will get switched to gen1. This may happen due to queue times or due to the algorithm detecting your win streak. The gen1 server has primarily unfavorable and normal match-ups. It has also nothing to do with the +20 increase on the ping, you can immediately tell the difference between a well performing coordinated team and whatever those other guys you destroy are, whether they are on your side or not.
So why does the game do this instead of always providing normal competitive match-ups where the outcome is uncertain and the game doesn't feel rigged?
Reason 1: Queue times. Finding a match in the same division might be easier at a certain rank range and at a certain time of day, but other times it would mean that an average gold support would have to wait more than 10 minutes stable to get into a game, let alone higher ranks, which is often longer than the game itself, and that is simply unacceptable.
Reason 2: Emotional roller coaster. Even though the system still results in the "rigged 50% winrate" aka - the realization that someone plays at their expected rank, it is delivered in a very different way. The player does not win and lose in quick successions, or just win and lose immediately when reaching the higher rank and repeat indefinitely. They move through a lot more ranks this way and form an unhealthy relationship/addiction where they are happy by winning a lot and then mad when losing a lot. The important part is that it never leads to real boredom. Ultimately, some people might be so mad that they will lose even their favored match-ups, or they have no chance in the normal match-ups due to a calibration error or a carry and so they will ultimately derank to where the system can work better, if they are still sticking around with the game, of course.
In a system with a ton of narrow groups, smurfs, hackers, toxic throwers and so much more this system can work in a sorting manner as well. In the end you can still rank up but it takes a bit more time and it challenges your patience. You need to focus on winning your normal match-ups and always try your best in the unfavorable ones because you never know when those throwers or deranking people finally break the lose streak (it cannot be predicted by the system), but don't be too mad when you lose them or get crushed.

I have also tried to manipulate the system; upon seeing that I get a game on the unfavorable gen1 server, I stop queuing and change my connection a bit through various means (I do not change my region entirely, it is kept exactly the same, just a brief disconnect and a slight change in the IP address, so it is perfectly legal to do). This tricks the game into thinking I face connection issues with the gen1 server and switches me back to ams1. However, this is not always long lasted and the system eventually switches back to gen1 or even worse; upon repeatedly doing this I managed to enter, as you mentioned, a losing streak for an entire day on DPS - where I entered in platinum with a colossal win streak and then every single match-up was deliberately unfavorable: It gave "consolation" every time I lost because the enemy team has a PHYSICALLY higher rank or "uphill battle" when I somehow still managed to win some of them. Eventually it stopped but this probably triggered an anti-smurf system which gives only the WORST of the worse scenarios, my poor teammates in all those games were asking in each match... "there is no way that's my rank", and it wasn't, yeah. Smurfs also probably don't play alone because of this. There are a lot of videos about "unranked to GM" out there but none of them are GOLD to GM or BRONZE to GM exactly because of this. It would take a decent amount of days for even the greatest players to brute-force 100% the algorithm, so they skip them altogether in the calibration process, as it is more educational and faster that way anyway. There is nothing to learn in the lower ranks. In narrow groups it's much easier to control the situation with a teammate on another role. However playing in narrow groups is not always guaranteed to be cool either since you can get a match against a full team, either smurfs or just regular people coordinated through voice chat, it's enough to make a difference. Playing in full teams isn't too fun as well because their queue times are just horrible, they mostly stick to open queue too in the lower ranks but it is by far the best way to be immune to the algorithm. I would advise against tampering with it like me if you don't want a lot of unnecessary frustration.

Whether you like it or not, whether it drives you mad or not, it's still a decent system in my opinion and I am impressed by how it seamlessly works, but I couldn't help but notice and document the pattern. Quick Play on the other hand is much more loose, it is probably engagement based and maybe it has some sort of MMR system, but it generally feels much more random. However, it can still offer a more quality experience than low competitive ranks, since even though people play for fun, they are just better at the game and you can get to that point easily by just playing well, much easier than you would in competitive. Good luck hope this helps

Edit: Yes also avoid poor teammates that really helps, but with the limited slots it's not too significant.

[WhiteKnight]

It happens. Sometime loss streaks are just unbearable.