skill based matchmaking killed the update

[purp]

if you are wondering why you cant find games, its coz they made the matchmker super agressive to only match you with "high skill" players and it refuses to match you with new players, its basically trust factor but in tf2

everyone has maxed out casual rank medal in my game and it takes 20 mins to find a match lol

[Dunhill]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by solar controller:

it does work. i explained to you why it has its flaws and why you can expect match deviation when pooling together players of different skill levels and experience.

if a tier 2 has the same combined rating as a tier 8, the game might think they're of equal skill but from our standpoint, the latter most certainly has an experience gap over them. You can argue that the game could take casual exp into account, but that's a flawed approach as you're essentially advocating for a way for players to always artifically increase their elo rating regardless of their own individual skill.
you can't create experience-based matchmaking unless you want to play competitive. I say this because that is literally exactly how VALVe competitive seeds for lobbies.

if players are pooled together and they are all consistent and not actively throwing, you will get balanced matches; this is not a very big ask for anybody but casual tf2 players.

So it doesn't work for casual, AKA exactly what I said. I didn't argue about whether or not it's technically done well, bottom line is that it does not work.

Nah man, let him just contradict everyone's experience since the game was released and then contradict the contradiction with his explanation.

[malignant]

Originally posted by Astyl:

So it doesn't work for casual, AKA exactly what I said. I didn't argue about whether or not it's technically done well, bottom line is that it does not work.

edited my post. it does work for casual. It works when players are playing the game. one player isn't going to be the reason the matchmaker gets confused, it'll be multiple players with botched rankings for a variety of reasons. as they play more--and this is assuming they actually play the game--it should average out and their projected elo should average out lobbies even with the typical two or three bottom feeders you get in a round.

if casual players don't want to play the game, oh well, but I don't really know what you want me to say at that point. Do you want matchmaking but also want to pootispenser here for 5 hours while the enemy team relentleessly farms your team? Do you just want no matchmaking and then you can cope about how even more unbalanced the teams are like they were pre-blue moon?

there's no elo rating system that can compensate for people who are simply unwilling to play the game. Glicko is genuinely the best we have because at least if there's a consistent troll player, you'll get a troll player on the other team that is just as bad to compensate. To say it doesn't work in any capacity is an outright lie, as it does work and it's probably the only reason you're able to have consistently playable pubs. Disqualifying it because ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ will be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is illogical no matter how much you want to move your goalposts and redefine the definition of what "works."

[Astyl]

Originally posted by solar controller:

edited my post. it does work for casual. It works when players are playing the game. one player isn't going to be the reason the matchmaker gets confused, it'll be multiple players with botched rankings for a variety of reasons. as they play more--and this is assuming they actually play the game--it should average out and their projected elo should average out lobbies even with the typical two or three bottom feeders you get in a round.

if casual players don't want to play the game, oh well, but I don't really know what you want me to say at that point. Do you want matchmaking but also want to pootispenser here for 5 hours while the enemy team relentleessly farms your team?
there's no elo rating system that can compensate for people who are simply unwilling to play the game. Glicko is genuinely the best we have because at least if there's a consistent troll player, you'll get a troll player on the other team that is just as bad to compensate.

I don't want you to give any specific alternative or explanation. The reality is, matches are regularely unbalanced skill-wise, the way that is handled is not sufficient regardless of whether or not it has a better alternative. That's my entire point. And no, the balance in matchmaking is not any better since blue moon.

[Dunhill]

Originally posted by Astyl:

Originally posted by solar controller:

edited my post. it does work for casual. It works when players are playing the game. one player isn't going to be the reason the matchmaker gets confused, it'll be multiple players with botched rankings for a variety of reasons. as they play more--and this is assuming they actually play the game--it should average out and their projected elo should average out lobbies even with the typical two or three bottom feeders you get in a round.

if casual players don't want to play the game, oh well, but I don't really know what you want me to say at that point. Do you want matchmaking but also want to pootispenser here for 5 hours while the enemy team relentleessly farms your team?
there's no elo rating system that can compensate for people who are simply unwilling to play the game. Glicko is genuinely the best we have because at least if there's a consistent troll player, you'll get a troll player on the other team that is just as bad to compensate.

I don't want you to give any specific alternative or edplanation. The reality is, matches are regularely unbalanced skill wise, the way that is handled is not sufficient regardless of whether or not it has a better alternative. That's my entire point. And no the balance in matchmaking is not any better since blue moon.

It's why everyone always has a 1/1 k/d and roughly the same score

[malignant]

what is the point of even speaking here then?

you came and tried to argue that it doesn't exist even though it exists in "valve's bible," then stepped back and said even if it does exist it doesn't work, and now you're saying that even if it does work it isn't handling it good enough? If you're just going to keep backtracking from your initial stance what's even the point besides to whine that every single game isn't 50:50? You've come here obviously with a vendetta against glicko but do not have anything meaningful to say.

The matchmaker will almost inevitably always sacrifice match quality for queue times--that is a given. the vast majority of pubbers care more about playing their own solo adventure than playing the game so what else do you want? do you want class-based elo or elo-specific lobbies to make queuing even longer and more convoluted?
I'm genuinely lost as to why we need to have this discussion if you acknowledge that sbmm exists and it works. Otherwise brilliant deduction you've made that glicko has it's flaws, I'm sure that was a very hot take to have.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by solar controller:

what is the point of even speaking here then?

you came and tried to argue that it doesn't exist even though it exists in "valve's bible," then stepped back and said even if it does exist it doesn't work, and now you're saying that even if it does work it isn't handling it good enough? If you're just going to keep backtracking from your initial stance what's even the point besides to whine that every single game isn't 50:50? You've come here obviously with a vendetta against glicko but do not have any solutions.

The matchmaker will almost inevitably always sacrifice match quality for queue times--that is a given. the vast majority of pubbers care more about playing their own solo adventure than playing the game so what else do you want? do you want class-based elo or elo-specific lobbies to make queuing even longer and more convoluted? I'm genuinely lost as to why we need to have this discussion if you acknowledge that sbmm exists and it works, just not as intended (as this is an impossibility that even games like CS struggle with).

The skill based matchmaking doesn't exist because it doesn't work. If things with the sole purpose of working not working qualify as existing to you in the context of their outcome, then be my guest.

I never backtracked, you may have not tracked back far enough to see that.

Yes, because it doesn't even create approximately balanced matches a lot of the time. That's well under good enough.

I have nothing against glicko, given that it works, which here it doesn't.

What I want is irrelevant for what I said about the non-existence of skill-based matchmaking, I want skill-based matchmaking, but as you said, it can't be achieved without increasing queue times. I think that trying to balance between those two by also removing a lot of bad maps from the game to promote queue times would be optimal, but that is not relevant to our discussion.

And please stop adding paragraphs to your comments after you've published them, it makes it hard to read.

[Lurnaezel]

There's skill-based matchmaking?

[Bad Medic Buddy]

Originally posted by solar controller:

Originally posted by Astyl:

So it doesn't work for casual, AKA exactly what I said. I didn't argue about whether or not it's technically done well, bottom line is that it does not work.

Do you just want no matchmaking and then you can cope about how even more unbalanced the teams are like they were pre-blue moon?

I want no match making and blue moon wasn't the update that added skill based match making.

Community servers tend to have more balanced matches than casual and all they typically do is allow team switching, scramble and autobalance. And they don't give large groups of players the option to all join a match on the same team.

I'm willing to bet if you got rid of matchmaking entirely and assigned players to spectator on connection instead of placing them on a team and confusing autobalance, matches would be significantly more balanced than they are right now. We don't need skill based match making, we just need a system that doesn't actively facilitate team stacking while neutering autobalance.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by Amantiel:

There's skill-based matchmaking?

You haven't been filled in yet.

[malignant]

Originally posted by Astyl:

The skill based matchmaking doesn't exist because it doesn't work. If things with the sole purpose of working not working qualify as existing to you in the context of their outcome, then be my guest.

>it doesn't exist because it doesn't work well enough to meet my expectations

ridiculous reasoning. you are just going to keep redefining what it means to work or keep denying that it works regardless of whether I explain to you why it does work exactly as intended, but still has its limits (LIKE LITERALLY EVERY SINGLE ELO SYSTEM).

impossible to argue with such subjectivity when you seemingly hold all of the control over establishing whether something works or not. next matchmaking update ask valve to let you handpick teams.

Originally posted by Astyl:

I never backtracked, you may have not tracked back far enough to see that.

>it doesn't exist just because it's in valve's bible
>posts message that calls puffy incompetent for stating how glicko works
>ok so maybe it does exist but it doesn't work
>so what if it's actually working exactly as well as it can within tf2's restrictions, it's not good enough

please correct me if you think i'm oversimplifying anything. this is how it looks from my perspective.

Originally posted by Astyl:

I want skill-based matchmaking, but as you said, it can't be achieved without increasing queue times. I think that trying to balance between those two by also removing a lot of bad maps from the game to promote queue times would be optimal, but that is not relevant to our discussion.

if you want skill-based matchmaking but refuse to elaborate beyond stating that it is not sufficient you are essentially complaining just to complain. in which case, you had no real reason to respond to my post or any of the subsequent ones that were solely concerned with trying to explain that sbmm exists. you've turned this into a debate as to whether the existence of sbmm is satisfactory to you. that was never the argument, that was your own arbitrary argument that you introduced halfway into this discussion.

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

I want no match making and blue moon wasn't the update that added skill based match making.

ur right, it added glicko matchmaking which is what is currently being used today
https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/March_28,_2018_Patch#Matchmaking_Changes

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

Community servers tend to have more balanced matches than casual and all they typically do is allow team switching, scramble and autobalance.

community servers are balanced because in spite of not having any real matchmaker, the players who constitute the teams are usually good enough to where the average skill present in the lobby is leveled out between both sides.

obviously this doesn't stop these servers from being unbalanced sometimes (Chudtopia is notorious for that), but scramble, while completely random, essentially breaks apart clumps of imbalance that might have formed on either side and gives the lobby another shot at leveling out any mismatches that might have occured.

[Astyl]

Originally posted by solar controller:

Originally posted by Astyl:

The skill based matchmaking doesn't exist because it doesn't work. If things with the sole purpose of working not working qualify as existing to you in the context of their outcome, then be my guest.

>it doesn't exist because it doesn't work well enough to meet my expectations
ridiculous reasoning. you are just going to keep redefining what it means to work or keep denying that it works regardless of whether I explain to you why it does work exactly as intended, but still has its limits (LIKE LITERALLY EVERY SINGLE ELO SYSTEM).

impossible to argue with such subjectivity when you seemingly hold all of the control over establishing whether something works or not. next matchmaking update ask valve to let you handpick teams.

Originally posted by Astyl:

I never backtracked, you may have not tracked back far enough to see that.

>it doesn't exist just because it's in valve's bible
>posts message that calls puffy incompetent for stating how glicko works
>ok so maybe it does work but it doesn't work
>so what if it's actually working exactly as intended, it's not good enough
please correct me if you think i'm oversimplifying anything. this is how it looks from my perspective.

Originally posted by Astyl:

I want skill-based matchmaking, but as you said, it can't be achieved without increasing queue times. I think that trying to balance between those two by also removing a lot of bad maps from the game to promote queue times would be optimal, but that is not relevant to our discussion.

if you want skill-based matchmaking but refuse to elaborate beyond stating that it is not sufficient you are essentially complaining just to complain. in which case, you had no real reason to respond to my post or any of the subsequent ones that were solely concerned with trying to explain that sbmm exists. you've turned this into a debate as to whether the existence of sbmm is satisfactory to you.

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

I want no match making and blue moon wasn't the update that added skill based match making.

ur right, it added glicko matchmaking which is what is currently being used today
https://wiki.teamfortress.com/wiki/March_28,_2018_Patch#Matchmaking_Changes

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

Community servers tend to have more balanced matches than casual and all they typically do is allow team switching, scramble and autobalance.

community servers are balanced because in spite of not having any real matchmaker, the players who constitute the teams are usually good enough to where the average skill present in the lobby is leveled out between both sides.

obviously this doesn't stop these servers from being unbalanced sometimes (Chudtopia is notorious for that), but scramble, while completely random, essentially breaks apart clumps of imbalance that might have formed on either side and gives the lobby another shot at leveling out any mismatches that might have occured.

My bloody expectations are that it works. You are being either ignorant or completely dishonest if you'd call what you see on casual as anything but a failure of balance. This entire thread and every other of its kind is filled with people not knowing that what you claim exists in a working capacity exists. This is not my opinion or my prerogative. Stop putting mud in your eye sockets.

You are not oversimplifying, you're just outright being dishonest. I explained to anyone nearly reaching for the crayons that the skill-based matchmaking doesn't exist because the systems put in place don't do their only job in making it happen, this is what I mean by not existing.

I am not complaining. Nowhere in this thread have I complained about anything at all.

[Bad Medic Buddy]

Originally posted by solar controller:

community servers are balanced because in spite of not having any real matchmaker, the players who constitute the teams are usually good enough to where the average skill present in the lobby is leveled out between both sides.

obviously this doesn't stop these servers from being unbalanced sometimes (Chudtopia is notorious for that), but scramble, while completely random, essentially breaks apart clumps of imbalance that might have formed on either side and gives the lobby another shot at leveling out any mismatches that might have occured.

Even at it's worst, uncletopia is generally more balanced than casual.

And honestly uncletopia probably has more extreme differences in player ability than casual. You run into far more try hards or psychopaths with literally 100s of thousands of headshots on their strange sniper rifles in uncletopia than you do in casual, while still having people who are essentially dead weight and don't even know how to push the cart when their team has momentum.

Also scramble usually uses current points to re-balance the teams, which is still a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ metric but much better than what casual uses. But even if it was essentially random it, (along with autobalance, good players being allowed to join the losing team, and large groups being broken up every match) would be a much better system for casual than what we have now.

[malignant]

Originally posted by Astyl:

I am not complaining. Nowhere in this thread have I complained about anything at all.

It does work idk what else to say. If you’re going to plug your ears and keep saying it doesn’t just because matchmaking, like how it is in literally every other game, is imperfect, then that is entirely on you.
Your subjectivity means absolutely nothing. by definition, it is working. It is creating balanced matches (balanced relative to the absence of sbmm); by its own design, it is working. It is doing its job and exactly what it was formulated to do, which is to assess players’ skill through numerical ratings and create teams that have similar averaged ratings. That is working.
In every sense of the word it is working except for your own.

Yes you can argue that it is not good at working, even if I don’t particularly agree (in my experience, the overwhelming majority of my matches are balanced). With that understanding, glicko doesn’t work at providing you a balanced experience.
However, you cannot also hold the position that it doesn’t exist, because those views are contradictory from one another. By acknowledging its existence you cannot also deny its existence. The two ideas are not synonymous with each-other.
Your insistence to me that it does not exist simply because you do not like the results—despite me explaining to you how exactly it works—leads me to believe you are being disingenuous. If you are not outright denying the existence of sbmm then you are complaining about it.

However much you want to exaggerate how bad sbmm is, the crux of this entire discussion surrounds the existence of sbmm alone. that’s what void (self-proclaimed sbmm denier) and puffy were discussing. I’m not sure what your position was when you disregarded the update logs as valve’s Bible, but any feelings have towards glicko has nothing to do with the original topic.

l

[malignant]

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

And honestly uncletopia probably has more extreme differences in player ability than casual.

For every ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ you generally have 2 players who can pull their weight.
Also worth noting that even with all the terribles in chudtopia, they usually have the gamesense required to work as a team to fix bad lobbies themselves: if there is no medic they will switch medic. If the enemy team’s heavy is rolling they will play sniper.

While there is a large variance in skill, they usually cross the bare minimum threshold that allows them create balanced matches just by playing to win. The best solution to matchmaking is having enough players who have a general understanding of what to do.

Originally posted by Bad Medic Buddy:

Also scramble usually uses current points to re-balance the teams, which is still a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ metric but much better than what casual uses. [snip] would be a much better system for casual than what we have now.

wiki says it’s random. I don’t have access to the code and I don’t doubt that but I’ve been apart of enough scrimblos to attest to the opposite. I digress. Scramble would be nice in casual but it still doesn’t compensate for all the clueless players + trolls who pad out lobbies. Scrambling teams into much worse teams would not be uncommon just because of how large the skill gaps are in casual. Community servers have a good player pool to pull from. Casual has players who only know >30fps default settings YouTuber gameplay. Very different talents.

[Jaxanine The Gnome Queen]

idk seems to work fine for me, sometimes your enemy is just better than you. Also where are you finding these maxed out casual ranks? I play TF2 almost every day and rarely see anyone higher level than me and I'm only tier 3