Opinions on Rank?

[LIMP BISQUICK]

So I'm curious, especially for players with low elo what they think about it. Do your wins feel sort of like "freebies?" Meaning, the battle wasn't challenging or interesting? While new and it's still placing me, I'm fighting people who've had games in the triple digits. Out of like 20 games I've only had one where iI wasn't just getting completely rolled. That person was new to the game as well.

[Puason]

the amount of games dont really matter, as long as both player are stable in their elo then the game is even

[Quintem]

Majority of my games tend to be evenly matched. I'd say 10-20% are not. Either get matched vs somebody a decent bit lower than my own ELO and as such I have edge or they're a decent bit higher and they have the edge. A good 60% are pretty even. Remaining percentage is between that.

At around 1100 ELO mark, I'm on the higher side of the average ELO range, so not low ELO. I rarely get a total free win unless it's a mixture of stars aligning. I've been on a losing streak, they've been on a winning streak, match making at off peak hours and getting a longer queue so the ELO range is widened.

I will note however very big misconception. Number of games played does not equal skill. There are people with thousands of games and they are completely hopeless at the game. Those that don't care to improve much beyond their level and stagnate or those that have reached the limits of their skill.

You will in time find your correct ELO range and unless you are truly awful at this game you'll even out to 50% win rate or close to. If you're on the low side you'll probably edge towards 45% and if you're a really good player you start going towards 55%. Only pros go over 60%.

So there you go, my input. No doubt though if you're losing a lot, your basic play has gaping holes in it. I'd recommend watching some guides and using practice tools to sharpen things up.

[LIMP BISQUICK]

The amount of games does matter to some degree. It's not going to determine skill sure, but it does show experience. I guess what sparked the whole thing is that I've seen such players have less than 50% win rate. That win that they got from me was most likely not satisfying to them, at least I wouldn't be satisfied in that situation. So when it comes to lower elo I wasn't sure if the game would try to throw like free wins or something or force matches where the probability to lose is high.

Definitely could improve strategy and holes in my gameplay. I won't deny any of that. Don't feel like learning metas and stuff tho so I'm trying to stay away from all that.

Idk if devs read comments here. My feedback on rank placement is that it has been a terrible experience. I definitely expected to lose and stuff but it has been a very slow process and clearly not where I should be at yet.

[Kasbfaäfad]

Originally posted by Player69:

The amount of games does matter to some degree. It's not going to determine skill sure, but it does show experience. I guess what sparked the whole thing is that I've seen such players have less than 50% win rate. That win that they got from me was most likely not satisfying to them, at least I wouldn't be satisfied in that situation. So when it comes to lower elo I wasn't sure if the game would try to throw like free wins or something or force matches where the probability to lose is high.

Definitely could improve strategy and holes in my gameplay. I won't deny any of that. Don't feel like learning metas and stuff tho so I'm trying to stay away from all that.

Idk if devs read comments here. My feedback on rank placement is that it has been a terrible experience. I definitely expected to lose and stuff but it has been a very slow process and clearly not where I should be at yet.

It is a known problem that newbies will lose probably their first 20 games since many ppl are in the 700-800 elo range that are bad but experienced.
You can search this forum about this topic. Yet, the current system is probably still the best variant.

ATM you will have to lose the first 20 games to start playing against other newbies. Is this frustrating? Yes. Don't be frustrated.

You could also organize lobbies and check the stats of other ppl that want to join with aoe2insights.com

[Moist Butt]

Originally posted by Player69:

Idk if devs read comments here. My feedback on rank placement is that it has been a terrible experience. I definitely expected to lose and stuff but it has been a very slow process and clearly not where I should be at yet.

This has been discussed multiple time and long story short its not a simple fix.

Video below does a good job of explaining the situation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kx2Z7pnk17M&t=661s

[FloosWorld]

Originally posted by Player69:

Idk if devs read comments here. My feedback on rank placement is that it has been a terrible experience. I definitely expected to lose and stuff but it has been a very slow process and clearly not where I should be at yet.

Ranked being a bad experience for completely new players is a commonly shared sentiment. And to be fair - that's mainly due to RTS being a difficult genre to get into. I played this game casually since first grabbing the demo in 2004 and dipped my toes into ranked back in 2021 and it was a real shocker at first.

Originally posted by Player69:

Definitely could improve strategy and holes in my gameplay. I won't deny any of that. Don't feel like learning metas and stuff tho so I'm trying to stay away from all that.

I want to mention, you can be decent in ranked even without learning meta (well, for the most part) if you just follow a couple of things:
- Let your Town Center always work, whether it's producing villagers or researching one of its technologies.
- Get familiar with the hotkeys. The default hotkeys in the game use a grid system which means the first button in the first row on the UI is Q on the keyboard etc. You can rebind almost all hotkeys, so feel free to bind the game's actions to something that suits you more
- Watch the replays of your games and try to identify mistakes. You can do so by clicking on Single Player → Load Game and go to the replay tab. You can also watch the perspective of your opponent to get an idea what they did and adapt a thing or two

[Kampfschwein Fjonda]

Originally posted by Player69:

I've seen such players have less than 50% win rate. That win that they got from me was most likely not satisfying to them, at least I wouldn't be satisfied in that situation.

Rest assured, such an easy win for them is more on the satisfying side. You gave the key argument yourself: less than 50% wins, those guys are not accustomed to winning.
And beating up a lower level player without breaking into a sweat can be quite relaxing compared to the average experience in an AoE2 match. Speaking from 3,000 ranked games experience.

Change what is in your realm - don't ask for Devs. And that is learning from your mistakes. Failing less is also a step forward.

[LIMP BISQUICK]

Maybe meta was wrong term, but You do need build order even at low elo. People clearly use them. I checked up on the tutorial and it promotes build orders.

You say don't ask for devs. It's pitting me against players where there is no chance and it's taking time. That's the reality of it. I'm also not asking for free wins, I'm actually afraid of that and this whole thing would be a waste of my time if half my wins were freebies.

I'll keep trying but I know many have quit and I can't blame them. It's fine losing for a few games but here's the reality. Just about all of them rush with cavalry and I get locked out of production and eco. It is what it is and still learning. But the problem is that they don't finish the job and it drags on. They want to build up an entire army to roll up some basic base. because it's low elo that to will take more time than your higher ranks. Some may be backing off and going easy? Which just makes it frustrating cause of time. I am also not sure if it's inappropriate to resign in those situations.

[Moist Butt]

Originally posted by Player69:

You say don't ask for devs. It's pitting me against players where there is no chance and it's taking time. That's the reality of it. I'm also not asking for free wins, I'm actually afraid of that and this whole thing would be a waste of my time if half my wins were freebies.

Can you link some of the games where u think u have no chance? Have you even watch the games where u think u have no chance?

And what exactly do you want the devs to do here? As explained this isn't a simple solution and these type of problems exist in other competitive games as well although usually in a team environment.

[LIMP BISQUICK]

That whole process is not necessary right now. I'm starting to learn. I'm aware there are things to improve. It's just in that moment in time, with current knowledge and abilities, no, there's not much I can do about it. It's mostly that tho, I get rushed by cavalry or archery's and if I lose that fight they pretty much hang around and I can't bounce from that. Not to mention other opponents production eclipse mine.

It starts off at 1,000 elo right? Weird choice but I'll roll with it. My beef with it is that doesn't seem to matter if player is 1000 elo or lower, the game doesn't dock off many points. by the 6th loss it should analyze things like score comparisons. Try matching much lower elo and see how you do there for a game or two. Who knows, maybe point distribution is fine but having static starting elo isn't. The placement is wack and it's slow process. That's the drawback.

Having an AI match and analyze from that might be a decent way to gauge in newbies like myself.

[Kampfschwein Fjonda]

Crucial tip for QoL in Ranked: Play ranked only after ability to safely beat extreme AI. I did it like this.
It kills you quite mercilessly, so there is little time wasted on that learning curve.

[Quintem]

There are guides and practices tools. You can play against the AI to improve your basics. Throwing yourself in to ranked is bound it a nightmare.

You also state you refuse to learn the meta. It's not even about playing meta builds yourself, but knowing what your opponents are doing you can't counter it otherwise.

Also if you're in a position where you've taken a lot of damage, generally it's best to resign. It's the polite thing to do.

I'll have a look at your most recent game out of interest.

Originally posted by Kampfschwein Fjonda:

Crucial tip for QoL in Ranked: Play ranked only after ability to safely beat extreme AI. I did it like this.
It kills you quite mercilessly, so there is little time wasted on that learning curve.

Very much this. I did the same even though I'm competent at RTS games. I was like if I can't beat the hardest of the AI difficulties I'm probably going to get slapped about by real humans.

[LIMP BISQUICK]

Originally posted by Quintem:

There are guides and practices tools. You can play against the AI to improve your basics. Throwing yourself in to ranked is bound it a nightmare.

You also state you refuse to learn the meta. It's not even about playing meta builds yourself, but knowing what your opponents are doing you can't counter it otherwise.

Originally posted by Kampfschwein Fjonda:

Crucial tip for QoL in Ranked: Play ranked only after ability to safely beat extreme AI. I did it like this.
It kills you quite mercilessly, so there is little time wasted on that learning curve.

Very much this. I did the same even though I'm competent at RTS games. I was like if I can't beat the hardest of the AI difficulties I'm probably going to get slapped about by real humans.

That's terrible. I'm sure most would not agree to implement such prerequisites to play. It's only good advice if my complaint was about being low elo and wanting to be in a higher rank. That's not the case. My complaint is simply how bad the placement is and how it's asking too much time for a new player to get a footing in their placement. I acknowledged that I was going to lose some matches. Not only that, If I were to stick around and worked my way up to 1,000 elo, I would not want to face people like me in the game.

There are people willing to boot up into such matches without much experience, without spoiling through online material or following formulas. This rank will push away such players tho, it really doesn't have to be this bad.

[Moist Butt]

Originally posted by Player69:

That whole process is not necessary right now. I'm starting to learn. I'm aware there are things to improve. It's just in that moment in time, with current knowledge and abilities, no, there's not much I can do about it. It's mostly that tho, I get rushed by cavalry or archery's and if I lose that fight they pretty much hang around and I can't bounce from that. Not to mention other opponents production eclipse mine.

It starts off at 1,000 elo right? Weird choice but I'll roll with it. My beef with it is that doesn't seem to matter if player is 1000 elo or lower, the game doesn't dock off many points. by the 6th loss it should analyze things like score comparisons. Try matching much lower elo and see how you do there for a game or two. Who knows, maybe point distribution is fine but having static starting elo isn't. The placement is wack and it's slow process. That's the drawback.

Having an AI match and analyze from that might be a decent way to gauge in newbies like myself.

I have played a variety of competitive games. Static starting elo isnt strange, but to each their own. Do you know the concept of placement games? A lot of games have this where the objective of placement games is to place players to their respective level. Age has 10 placement games I believe.

From my experience 5-10 placement games is pretty normal. Age also dont have a requirement for ranked MP like other competitive games. For example, you need to grind levels to be able to play ranked in games like league, csgo, and valorant. In age you can jump right into MP at min 1. That is to say the process for balancing is easier for other games since everyone is forced to play the game quite a bit before jumping into ranked.

You can expect the balancing to be worse from the get go for games that dont have these restriction. With that in mind, I dont think u can really say the process is slow since for some games u cant even start this process till u played like over 100 games. U need to play for months casually to get to lv30 in league for example from what I recall. I feel like a lot frustration from new players getting stomp in ranked is because they dont prep themselves. In other games, everyone is forced to prep to a certain degree.

[Kampfschwein Fjonda]

Originally posted by Player69:

My complaint is simply how bad the placement is and how it's asking too much time for a new player to get a footing in their placement.

AoE is a 25y old game, so millions have played it before you. Its placement is quite elaborate and fair.
If you decide on your first day of playing chess or football to rush into a competitive / tournament / ranked situation you will get slapped a lot without learning much.
Is it the referee's fault, yes?