Loss Streaks Explained (and how to solve them)

[Terotrous]

There's been a ton of discussion here about loss streaks and a ton of honestly very confused people about many concepts that relate to competitive gaming.

For starters, obviously, if a system is creating fair matches, you should win about 50% of the time. That's not to say that beating the matchmaker is impossible, but for most players it should be around there.

Secondly, you will sometimes get stomped even if the match is fair. This is just how the game works. Momentum matters a lot in this game due to how ult charge works, losing early teamfights can snowball. This even happens to the pros, it is not uncommon to see a pro set where they trade stomps.

You will also sometimes lose several games in a row even with fair matches. This is sort of obvious if you know anything about probability, flip a coin a few times and you're going to see instances of 3-4 heads / tails in a row with some frequency. However, higher numbers than this become increasingly uncommon. Yet, some people do lose long streaks of games.

So what causes people to go on big loss streaks? It's their mental state. These sorts of games are highly volatile, a single good or bad play can determine whether you win or lose. If you're feeling defeated and thus you make a bad play with your ultimate that could cost you the game and make you feel even worse. Maybe you're really tilted so you're playing some other character you're not as good with and that's making you lose, or you're not communicating well with your team because you're in a bad mood. All of these things can sink your team and contribute to losses.

Talk to any pro player and they'll tell you that maintaining your mental state is essential. When you take a loss, even if it was a tough one, like a nailbiter that you lost at the last minute or a stomp, you just have to shake it off. Maybe review that footage later and see what you can learn from it. If you can't shake it off and it's starting to affect you, take a break. This is why it seems like if you're losing a lot, you can just stop playing and then the next time you'll start to win again, this is not "rigged", you're just managing your mental state well. As you get better at doing this, your win rate will go up and these loss streaks will disappear.

[snowball]

Just all this man, for real, all this

[Scorpio]

EOMM influenced loss streak, if you get two losses then stop playing because algorythm tags you for being hard headed and set on playing untill you get a win. You will get longer loss streaks that way. Or just stop playing entirely, because this artificially engineered and curated multiplayer experience feels soulless. Unless you play with a team I guess.

[Axx]

How to solve loss streaks? Simple. Play in a pre-made group with non clueless players. EZ fix, you're welcome. If you solo, it doesn't matter how well you control your tilt and all that. You will always be gambling. You can't control if you get clueless low skill teammates as solo.

[﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽]

Originally posted by Terotrous:

There's been a ton of discussion here about loss streaks and a ton of honestly very confused people about many concepts that relate to competitive gaming.

For starters, obviously, if a system is creating fair matches, you should win about 50% of the time. That's not to say that beating the matchmaker is impossible, but for most players it should be around there.

Secondly, you will sometimes get stomped even if the match is fair. This is just how the game works. Momentum matters a lot in this game due to how ult charge works, losing early teamfights can snowball. This even happens to the pros, it is not uncommon to see a pro set where they trade stomps.

You will also sometimes lose several games in a row even with fair matches. This is sort of obvious if you know anything about probability, flip a coin a few times and you're going to see instances of 3-4 heads / tails in a row with some frequency. However, higher numbers than this become increasingly uncommon. Yet, some people do lose long streaks of games.

So what causes people to go on big loss streaks? It's their mental state. These sorts of games are highly volatile, a single good or bad play can determine whether you win or lose. If you're feeling defeated and thus you make a bad play with your ultimate that could cost you the game and make you feel even worse. Maybe you're really tilted so you're playing some other character you're not as good with and that's making you lose, or you're not communicating well with your team because you're in a bad mood. All of these things can sink your team and contribute to losses.

Talk to any pro player and they'll tell you that maintaining your mental state is essential. When you take a loss, even if it was a tough one, like a nailbiter that you lost at the last minute or a stomp, you just have to shake it off. Maybe review that footage later and see what you can learn from it. If you can't shake it off and it's starting to affect you, take a break. This is why it seems like if you're losing a lot, you can just stop playing and then the next time you'll start to win again, this is not "rigged", you're just managing your mental state well. As you get better at doing this, your win rate will go up and these loss streaks will disappear.

Players want the 50% but hate how matchmaking enforces 50% its the how and not the what OP
I had to explain many times this to matchmaking defenders

2nd point is wrong because momentum rarely matters when matchmaking pre determines the base skill and game ceiling to begin with unless the matchmaking was balanced which rarely it ever is

This is like arguing that bot enemy team can win because they had better momentum as compared to being bot vs human players insanity
There's no way you're going to tell that bot players don't exist OP
This is simply an gas lighting technique

Imagine using the classical coin toss gamblers fallacy for conditions that doesn't apply god that's just disingenuous and bad
The gambler's fallacy does not apply when the probability of different events is not independent aka dependent
Matchmaking probabilities are not based on independent variables its based on dependent variables

You simply can't use that example because matchmaking is incredibly complex and dependent on other variables such as skill, player, time zones, pings, player time etc etc whatever matchmaking algorithm is
You don't seem to understand that dependent variable when I mentioned how the Player2Vec was dependent on Hero2Vec in other thread which you outright ignored from the paper

OP tries to insinuate or convince that its you the player with bad mental state that lead to loss spree and not the loss spree that lead to bad mental state
The chicken or the egg problem
I assure you go ahead and check your team and enemy team rank, winrates etc during your loss/win spree games
Your team rank, winrate aka stats will be alot better than enemy team during your win spre games
Your team rank, winrate aka stats will be alot worse than enemy team during your loss spree games
Rarely it is ever balanced if you were able to find balanced games congrats you're an rarity but not common

Yea no the original OptMatch Matchmaking paper which Marvel Rivals uses
https://linxiagong.github.io/OptMatch/
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a1Gf-DXz0w2q4avFtI1g9eKEN4CYQpIk/view
11:02 video has extra graph on how certain configurations of W/L influences the churn rate of the player

What the matchmaking in the end wants is high player retention and low churn rate through increased play time that's the truth

I'm tired to bad posts of matchmaking defence its so bad and disingenuous

Solution

Anticipate loss/win games based on your experience of team skill vs enemy skill

I've been doing analysis of mine and friends games so far I've figured out that player accounts have different rates of L/W spree
Refer to the video please
Cross reference and check your spree with the video permutation aka combinations and game that combinations for peak experience
Unlike OP I provided good solution based from real technical paper and my experience its the truth don't be gaslight away from truth

[Activison]

Originally posted by Axx:

How to solve loss streaks? Simple. Play in a pre-made group with non clueless players. EZ fix, you're welcome. If you solo, it doesn't matter how well you control your tilt and all that. You will always be gambling. You can't control if you get clueless low skill teammates as solo.

it's not that easy and really needed, why?
1)ranked in this game have no actual meaning, it's not attached to ur skills but rather the play time in ranked i had 650 matches and 45% winrate and i went to diamond 3 if i keep playing i would be in gm in ~50 matches
2)i once played with a guy who have good understanding at game mechanics in plat 2 i was 42 level he was 50 and LITERALLY each game was with noobs against good skilled players we were getting destroyed after EACH match together and it stopped once we broke up and i went solo q

Matchmaking system is NOT stupid if u q with another good skilled player it's most likely that ur team will be weak and enemy team at average

[Tiziel]

Originally posted by ﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽﷽:

Originally posted by Terotrous:

There's been a ton of discussion here about loss streaks and a ton of honestly very confused people about many concepts that relate to competitive gaming.

For starters, obviously, if a system is creating fair matches, you should win about 50% of the time. That's not to say that beating the matchmaker is impossible, but for most players it should be around there.

Secondly, you will sometimes get stomped even if the match is fair. This is just how the game works. Momentum matters a lot in this game due to how ult charge works, losing early teamfights can snowball. This even happens to the pros, it is not uncommon to see a pro set where they trade stomps.

You will also sometimes lose several games in a row even with fair matches. This is sort of obvious if you know anything about probability, flip a coin a few times and you're going to see instances of 3-4 heads / tails in a row with some frequency. However, higher numbers than this become increasingly uncommon. Yet, some people do lose long streaks of games.

So what causes people to go on big loss streaks? It's their mental state. These sorts of games are highly volatile, a single good or bad play can determine whether you win or lose. If you're feeling defeated and thus you make a bad play with your ultimate that could cost you the game and make you feel even worse. Maybe you're really tilted so you're playing some other character you're not as good with and that's making you lose, or you're not communicating well with your team because you're in a bad mood. All of these things can sink your team and contribute to losses.

Talk to any pro player and they'll tell you that maintaining your mental state is essential. When you take a loss, even if it was a tough one, like a nailbiter that you lost at the last minute or a stomp, you just have to shake it off. Maybe review that footage later and see what you can learn from it. If you can't shake it off and it's starting to affect you, take a break. This is why it seems like if you're losing a lot, you can just stop playing and then the next time you'll start to win again, this is not "rigged", you're just managing your mental state well. As you get better at doing this, your win rate will go up and these loss streaks will disappear.

Players want the 50% but hate how matchmaking enforces 50% its the how and not the what OP many times I had to explain this to matchmaking defenders

2nd point is wrong because momentum rarely matters when matchmaking pre determines the base skill and game to begin with unless the matchmaking was balanced which rarely it ever is

This is like arguing that bot enemy team can win because they had better momentum as compared to being bot vs human players insanity
There's no way you're going to tell that bot players don't exist OP
This is simply an gas lighting technique

Imagine using the classical coin toss gamblers fallacy for conditions that doesn't apply god that's just disingenuous and bad
The gambler's fallacy does not apply when the probability of different events is not independent aka dependent
Matchmaking probabilities are not based on independent variables its based on dependent variables

You simply can't use that example because matchmaking is incredibly complex and dependent on other variables such as skill, player, time zones, pings, player time etc etc whatever matchmaking algorithm is
You don't seem to understand that dependent variable when I mentioned how the Player2Vec was dependent on Hero2Vec in other thread which you outright ignored from the paper

OP tries to insinuate or convince that its you the player with bad mental state that lead to loss spree and not the loss spree that lead to bad mental state
The chicken or the egg problem
I assure you go ahead and check your team and enemy team rank,winrate etc during your loss/win spree games
Your team rank, winrate aka stats will be alot better than enemy team during your win spre games
Your team rank, winrate aka stats will be alot worse than enemy team during your loss spree games
Rarely it is ever balanced if you were able to find balanced games congrats you're an rarity but not common

Yea no the original OptMatch Matchmaking paper which Marvel Rivals uses
https://linxiagong.github.io/OptMatch/
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1a1Gf-DXz0w2q4avFtI1g9eKEN4CYQpIk/view
11:02 video has extra graph on how certain configurations of W/L influences the churn rate of the player

What the matchmaking in the end wants is high player retention and low churn rate through increased play time that's the truth

I'm tired to bad posts of matchmaking defence its so bad and disingenuous
Solution
Anticipate loss/win games based on your experience of team skill vs enemy skill
I've been doing analysis of mine and friends games so far I've figured out that player accounts have different rate of L/W spree refer to the video please cross reference and check your spree with the video permutation aka combinations and game that combinations for peak experience
Unlike OP I provided good solution based from real technical paper and my experience

I wonder why good players has several accounts with celestial or above and bad players are usually between bronze and gold. I guess EOMM rigged it for them? EOMM conspiracists are so dumb lmao

[😎Astran😾]

I just switch between random matchmaking, ranked and AI. And if everything is bad I just Alt+F4 and play Diablo 4 and The First Descendant until penalties are gone

The devs only shooting themselves in the foot with the penalties: with the matchmaking like this I have no intention to spend anything on the game while spending couple hundred bucks monthly in other games (also Marvels have awful cosmetics)

[Tiziel]

Originally posted by 😎𝔸𝕤𝕥𝕣𝕒𝕟😾:

I just switch between random matchmaking, ranked and AI. And if everything is bad I just Alt+F4 and play Diablo 4 and The First Descendant until penalties are gone :lunar2019piginablanket:

The devs only shooting themselves in the foot with the penalties: with the matchmaking like this I have no intention to spend anything on the game while spending couple hundred bucks monthly in other games (also Marvels have awful cosmetics) :lunar2019scowlingpig:

Diablo 4 and first decendant. LMAO.

[Campers wear Pampers]

Nothing in this game is "coin flip" they have an entire team behind their match making algorithm. This post is nonsense.

[Terotrous]

By the way, this video is a good extension of what I was talking about. It took me a while to find this because I thought it was a tournament match, it turns out it was a scrim, but this is one of the top Splatoon 3 Pro Teams (I'm a former Splatoon player)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx2szFPx-qE

This got talked about quite a bit in the Splatoon scene at the time, essentially this team was getting beat bad and they were kinda getting tilted, so one of the players basically just makes the team laugh for the next couple games and in the end they win. It's a great example of how having a positive mental state can help you win (of course it doesn't hurt if your DPS gets a quad at the end of the match either).

[Terotrous]

Originally posted by Campers wear Pampers:

Nothing in this game is "coin flip" they have an entire team behind their match making algorithm. This post is nonsense.

It takes a lot of work to create a game that's balanced enough to be a coin flip. If you just pair people randomly usually one team will be drastically better than the other. The ultimate goal of the matchmaking algorithm is to create a fair match where the chance to win for both sides is as close to 50% as possible.

[Chaosolous]

No 50/50 means I should win every other match.

This post is brought to you by "sarcasm", available everywhere people are present. ...but it's also why you have bots in quickplay.

[Shubni]

Hard disagree. When the match is set up by the game and you have a range from silver 1 to bronze 3 in one match, that is bad matchmaking, end of discussion. There is no way that you can balance teams against each other if you allow this match skill difference between players. The teams a often not fairly balanced and thats just a fact. Teamgames means everyone has to carry their own weight. 11 average players and 1 complete noob is a decided game before it starts. The team with the noob will loose. As much as controling your emotions and not tilting as a statement is all true, the tilt comes after the frustration not causes it. I wished they would take more time for the machtmaking. I'm bronze 1 right now and i would love to wait 2-3 min for a match just to have it guaranteed that everyone I play with and against ist bronze 1, should'nt be that hard to do with 20 mil registered players...

[Terotrous]

Originally posted by Shubni:

Hard disagree. When the match is set up by the game and you have a range from silver 1 to bronze 3 in one match

Is this QP or ranked? If it's QP, that's totally normal. A lot of things can cause someone's rank to be off, especially at low ranks. If someone has never touched ranked, they will always be Bronze 3, regardless of how good they are. That's why QP uses hidden MMR and not ranked rating.

If this was in ranked, that is indeed a big disparity. I've never seen a match that was this far off, but maybe it was a stack. I'd hope there's some limit to how far away they'll allow players in a stack to be, because obviously pairing something like a GM player with a Silver is basically impossible balance. Most games restrict this.

Originally posted by Shubni:

11 average players and 1 complete noob is a decided game before it starts.

I mean, it's definitely not. All it takes is one player on the enemy team to play bad and the match is even, and as anyone can tell you, there's no shortage of bad players who aren't noobs and should know better.

Also, don't you have to be at least level 10 to play ranked? So no one can literally go there on their first game. If you're talking about QP, sure, but at least you don't lose anything here. Maybe their team also has a noob.

Actually, a couple weeks ago or so I was in a game with someone where their friend was like "hey, be nice to X, it's his first game" and we won. He actually played tolerably on Venom.

[Chaosolous]

The other day I was in a match where there was Bronze III and Gold II on my team.

I'm Silver I for the point of reference.