Spiral Knights - pvp: random teams not random / bad matching

pvp: random teams not random / bad matching

8 replies [Last post]

Fri, 09/23/2011 - 04:21

Ufana

So... looking at my random pvp experience like at a "field study", I came to the conclusion, that it's really improbable that they are actually random. There seem to be mostly 2 sorts of teams:
1) "going to loose 100:600 and there's nothing I can do about it"
2) "going to win 600:100 no matter how bad I play"

I see 2 possible explanations:
a) There's some build in "optimization" in how teams are put together. And it sucks. Something like: "players that have less weapon slots are put together with high score players which should me neat in theory but actually most of those 'weak' players are really just 'bored PROs' that don't want to spend the ce". Just an example. Something like that.
b) There's some sort of unintended self-organizing system in how teams are being put together. Like p.E.: "players that stay get put together with a higher likelihood because they are first in the list... bad players quit, random players join, super-teams and suck-teams are slowly born". Or something ;)

Thats how it looks to me. "Random" teams feel really broken, it doesn't give you "random PvP", more like a "random chance for being slaughtered or slaughtering a team that's no match for yours". Can someone confirm this bug or do you see it differently?

Fri, 09/23/2011 - 22:22

Starlinvf

Lock down has the capability

Lock down has the capability of keeping a team together into the next match if the players choose to play again, and fills the empty slots with random players. Other then that, it doesn't look to do any type of matching making based on rank or performance of players.

The only reason it looks so one sided is because the team make up on either side needs at least 3 people who understand how lockdown works to have a chance at winning. You'll notice that the winning teams often has a group of 2 or 3 circling the map, doing nothing but trying to keep points capped. The losing team will usually have its players spread around, and are never concentrated enough on a point to successfully take it back. And since the winning team has a chance to stick together, it betters their odds in the next round.

In games were one side dominates, you'll also notice players know how to work the classes to support each other, and tend to be more aggressive. Once all the points are capped, its hard to break out of the situation since both sides will cluster at the gates. It would take a well timed rush attack of losing side to wipe out the guys camping the gate or a slippery recon to cap a point to pull the campers away.

Fri, 09/23/2011 - 23:50

Ufana

I can see, how skill

oh god, teh new forums, it hates me.... wait...:

Fri, 09/23/2011 - 23:53

Ufana

The losing team will usually

Lock down has the capability of keeping a team together into the next match if the players choose to play again, and fills the empty slots with random players.
That's what I meant, I guess. And the effect looks pretty extreme to me. Is it possible that the (winning) players don't just have a better chance to be in the same group-of-12 BUT also in the same team-of-6, too?

Sat, 09/24/2011 - 00:26

Rage-Knight

It seems to me that winning

It seems to me that winning teams are just kept together as a team, resulting in agressively overpowered teams.
And then there's issue with players leaving before the match resulting in 2 vs 4 games...

Sat, 09/24/2011 - 08:47

Skankingrove

Players that hit play again

Players that hit play again aren't always on the same team the next time around. I've played countless games with the same groups of people before, some groups which had EVERYONE in the group click "play again." It still randomizes the teams in the next game even if the teams all click "play again." In some groups that I've played with I've seen me be paired and against the same individual over and over after matches even though we are both clicking "play again."

Other than the teams being randomized it doesn't seem like OOO has implemented a team balancing system at all. There definitely should be some sort of addition that can help how unbalanced teams are. A new "rank points" system should be implemented that gives an idea of ACTUAL player skill. Of course this would be hard to do because how do you rate together the captures, defends, damage, and possibly heals to give a label to a player's skill. I wish there were some kind of system like the xbox true skill system for matching so that everybody can better enjoy their lockdown games.

Wed, 09/28/2011 - 01:17

Ufana

I don't get it, that really

I don't get it, that really doesn't look like coincidence. 4 out of 5 games I'm on the loosing side and the 5th game usually is the one where the opponents were one player short of a full team. Even if I was one of the weakest players around, that was sort of improbable... I know the "scores" don't correlate too well with actual "skill", but being well above average in all stats for my team if not at the top has to mean at least that I'm not just "dead weight"?

Thu, 09/29/2011 - 01:18

Ufana

I tried around some more,

I tried around some more, taking a closer look at how I join / quit lockdown:

I used to quit after winning games where a ridiculously weak opponent team has been put together, taking a break (I don't really enjoy games where the other team is unable to get out of their base & reach a control point :/)... but yesterday I kept playing instead. And kept getting put on the winning team. That means, so far I now had about (over the last weeks):

20 times playing multiple rounds of lockdown, loosing 4 out of 5 games. Almost all of those loosing streaks started with my team loosing.
5 times playing multiple rounds of lockdown, winning 4 out of 5 games. Almost all of those winning streaks started with my team winning.
Guess total amount of matches lies somewhere around 100 when I look at the coins I made (since we can't find GvG opponents any more...)

So: I'm going to assume, that "My memory plays a trick on me here" for now. And start writing that stuff down. Would be great of someone who has still more motivation for playing lockdown left than me could take a look of one of his "samples", too!

Wed, 10/05/2011 - 04:14

Ufana

I have now played 36 times in

I have now played 36 times in 9 groups. This means: 27 games where I pressed the "continue" button.

In 20 of those 27 games, the result was the same as in the preceding game.
In 4 of the 7 games that had a different outcome for me than the preceding game, the loosing team was one player short.
In 19 of those 27 games, the two players that had the two highest (dmg) scores landed in the same team.
In 5 of the 8 games where this did not happen, one of the "top two" players chose not to play again.

For 13 of the 16 games I lost, the first game played in the row was a loss (the other three started with a match where the other team was one player short and we won).
For 10 of the 11 games I won, the first game played in the row was a victory.

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pvp: random teams not random / bad matching