101 replies to this topic

[virella]

i've seen many games where it starts as a 4v4 one leaves making it a 4v3 then the 3 get it together or the one that left was terrible, then it gets to be 3v3 then 2v3 with the 3 that were down from after the first leaver winning the whole time since their 4th member left. Ive seen the team down winning far to often as long as its only 1 down with 4 on the larger side and 2 down on a 6 with the larger side anything bigger than that makes some major issues.
and those three level 0 that you saw get stomped by the 5 lvl 15 most likely had a higher level mech that they didnt pull out. Its not that uncommon for people to use lower level mechs to test them out.

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

yes i have seen that too. its chaotic. Bring a touch of order to the chaos. a gyroscopic feature.

Its a little bit of pain for one....and for the masses to be spared a brutal clusterbunny filled with rage-quits

Edited by rdKNIGHTMAREZ, November 29 2012 - 08:44 PM.

[Beemann]

rdKNIGHTMAREZ, on November 29 2012 - 08:44 PM, said:

yes i have seen that too. its chaotic. Bring a touch of order to the chaos. a gyroscopic feature.

Its a little bit of pain for one....and for the masses to be spared a brutal clusterbunny filled with rage-quits

Wow... hyperbole much_
Just about every match I've seen has been won or lost based on a skill discrepancy. Very rarely does 1 person make that much of a difference

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

Quote

very rarely does 1 person make that much of a difference

i just don't think that is true.

And also, skilled players arn't more likely to be on the bigger team. They are spread randomly too. So that means more often than not, even team numbers = even fighting chance mostly


if the server doesn't do something to compensate, more often than not, the game will skewed very heavily in one favor.

One mustn't forget how MERCILESS players are with xp driving them.

[Gagzila]

Who really cares if both teams are exactly balanced against each other...you play a game to have fun, if you're competitive then get in a clan.

End of the day, you lose some, you win some...get over it and just go play some Hawken FFS!

Cheers,

Gagzila

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

does 5v4, then 5v3 , then 5v2 and then 0....sound like fun_ Surely not.

its not like you are sacrificing fun here.

right now...chaos on team balance is not as fun as more balanced teams.
Regular consistent games, with few-er rage / xp farming quits is what we need
What i've suggested is a simple change, and it, or something like it may help soften the combined chaos.

the chaos is comming from two factors leading to a 3rd.

player chosen (mostly random) placement of skill level in teams
+
D/c's (or rage quits whatever) from one team / odd one out joining games.
=
Chaotic unstable fights in team games.

Your attitude gagzila, seems a little off key here.
i say so not as a personal thing, im just saying....3/4 of the modes are team based.
team placement is something that really matters, and small changes can have big positive effects

Edited by rdKNIGHTMAREZ, November 29 2012 - 09:00 PM.

[Beemann]

rdKNIGHTMAREZ, on November 29 2012 - 08:50 PM, said:

Quote

very rarely does 1 person make that much of a difference

i just don't think that is true.

And also, skilled players arn't more likely to be on the bigger team. They are spread randomly too. So that means more often than not, even team numbers = even fighting chance mostly


if the server doesn't do something to compensate, more often than not, the game will skewed very heavily in one favor.

One mustn't forget how MERCILESS players are with xp driving them.

I quite often see an uneven number of players of a particular skill level
To rate them 1-5, I often see 3 5's in a match, or 1 4 and 2 5's, or something similar
The matchmaker has to take these uneven numbers and try to make the piles as equal as possible
However many players are brand new and don't understand how Hawken works, so you've got a lot of 1's and 2's and one team may have more than another
In the end, more often than not, the teams are borked no matter what you do, and it's generally just enough of an imbalance to make the match unfair no matter where that 4th person is, but also imbalanced enough that their removal turns it from a slight steamroll to a total spawncamp-fest

Even in cases where that doesn't happen, wouldn't it be better to just force the matchmaker to only queue even numbers of people into a match_ If people ragequit after the match starts there's not a whole lot you can do that isn't just fuzzy bunny someone over, but you can do your best to even things out at the beginning anyway
It's definitely less exploitable anyway

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

I have experienced everything above as well

Quote

In the end, more often than not, the teams are borked no matter what you do,

now i don't think thats true. Too many games out there have developed clever systems of coping with this exact same problem. subtle changes can have very big effects. but such changes have to be built early on in the games development. programming reasons why.

[Beemann]

Those games often lock you into teams, sort any and all new players evenly and have a much larger population (remember that ours is split like... 4-6 ways) with a much wider skill distribution (beta is not kind to the skill gap)'
I've seen games with great matchmakers fuzzy bunny out when the population drops

Edited by Beemann, November 29 2012 - 09:08 PM.

[Titzilla]

rdKNIGHTMAREZ, on November 29 2012 - 08:56 PM, said:

its not like you are sacrificing fun here.

The only problem with this statement is that someone must be sacrificing fun if they are being locked out of a game due to there being uneven teams.

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

by fun you meen gaming time perhaps_

cause with this system everyone as a whole get's more gaming time. yes sometimes you wait. but most of the time you don't
if you don't want to wait...
you LEAVE and find ANOTHER SERVER
where you probably find other players.

the game IT'SELF dies when people rage/xp quit , which right now they do at the slightest wiff of an uneven match.

fundamentally players are abusive in this xp arena.
Taking away the option of ganging and abusing the other team is healthy for the game.

its not WWF here, we don't want bystanders jumping in from the side lines with a chair.

Edited by rdKNIGHTMAREZ, November 29 2012 - 09:13 PM.

[Gagzila]

To be honest, people that rage quit all the time or just leave when they realise their side are loosing are free to go find another match or even a different game than Hawken...I'd rather play with mature, team oriented people that don't run at the first sign of trouble or adversary.

If there's an issue with matching making, then just let AG / ME know. You don't have to debate how the game should actually be and go into the N'th degree with all these extremely situational examples. If people choose to leave a match, you really can't do much about it...it's a reality of online gaming, build a bridge already...

Cheers,

Gagzila

Edited by Gagzila, November 29 2012 - 09:19 PM.

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

Quote

.I'd rather play with mature, team oriented people that don't run at the first sign of trouble or adversary.

i know, but thats just not the reality of the servers. Im sorry if being systematic comes across like extremely situational examples, but each example is one of the possible outcomes.

if you write down all the ways a match can go in terms of numbers, its quite a logic tree.

chears, knightmarez.

[Gagzila]

rdKNIGHTMAREZ, on November 29 2012 - 09:22 PM, said:

Quote

.I'd rather play with mature, team oriented people that don't run at the first sign of trouble or adversary.

i know, but thats just not the reality of the servers. Im sorry if being systematic comes across like extremely situational examples, but each example is one of the possible outcomes.

if you write down all the ways a match can go in terms of numbers, its quite a logic tree.

chears, knightmarez.

I'd "rather" but am still happy to play against whoever...but then if someone rage / losing quits, good riddance to them..someone else will surely fill their gap or the server will re-balance at the start of next match.

If you write down all the ways a match can go and incorporate all the real world factors from individual skill level, play style, gaming equipment (affecting game performance for example), even general alertness and local gaming environment, you would not get to 0.1% of finishing that list before you died of old age. All the devs can do is create a match making algorithm based on what they can knowingly account for which is the number of players on both teams and the levels of the mechs they each have in their garages.

A mod for ARMA2, DayZ, incorporates a "combat mode" mechanic where if you fire or throw anything or a bullet lands within 50m of you, your combat mode starts from 30, counting down to 0, after which you can exit the game either via the menu or ALT-F4. During combat mode, you cannot exit and ALT-F4 redirects you to a status window and alerts everyone on the server to your actions. This works in such a game as DayZ, Hawken sees you almost constantly in combat so if you legitimately have to go for some reason, you need to be able to exit the game and not wait an hour for your siege game to finish.

You could possibly incur some XP penalty for leaving before the game finishes to discourage rage / losing quits, if it's a random one off then you barely notice the loss but successive quits from 3-4 matches starts to add up to a decent loss in XP which is counter productive to levelling your mech up...it could also add to a games "completed vs played games" or "team player" account statistic, where quitting before a match finishes incurs a negative value which highlights to other players someone of such a nature.

You need to look at what is causing the imbalance, not bandaiding a game mechanic that won't actually solve the core issue...people leaving post match balancing.

Cheers,

Gagzila

PS...you spelt cheers wrong

Edited by Gagzila, November 29 2012 - 09:53 PM.

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

a match making algorithm would help soften the blow of the chaos. But i just came from a 3v2 deathmatch. I would be happy to wait 'offside' if it ment i could enjoy my 2v2 without some 3rd guy coming in and hitting me with a chair.


When it comes down to it, having the odd one out wait in line takes away the chance for that player to play unfairly and press forward the 3v2.

the odd one out system is a simple algorithm.

Players really wouldn't mind waiting if its for a good cause. and if they arn't prepared to wait, they quit and join another game.

either way with my system its win win.

fun for the team not getting beaten into a bloody pulp.
fun for the team not beating the 2 players into a bloody pulp without skill.

win for the guy who chooses to stay, and win for the guy who chooses to find another server.

win for eveyone,  including the battleship launching in siege mode....because now people don't all rage/xp quit and he gets to ram the enemy base.

[Gagzila]

I would not be happy to wait and miss out on half the match or even the beginning. It definitely doesn't work if your wanting to play with specific people.

You could have two pro, organised and communicating players with lvl 0 mechs against four noob, disorganised players with lvl 20 mechs and the pros are more likely to win in Hawken. If you make two of the noobs sit it out to even team numbers, they are in an even worse predicament. All you can really do is discourage people from leaving post match making when the initial balancing takes place (but doesn't stop people switching teams anyway pre-spawn if there are spots open on the other side). Why penalise the player wanting to play, the emphasis should be on getting in and staying there till match end.

Also Hawken is mech "war". Generally one side is always bigger than the other (take US vs Vietcong for instance) and the smaller side has to use skill and tactics to outwit their opponent's brute force in numbers / weapon power and come out on top. War is not fair or "balanced", life itself often times is not fair.

I had something else to say but my mobile ran out of battery and turned off near the end so I had to try and rewrite this again and lost my train of thought

Cheers,

Gagzila

[G4M5T3R]

This would be waaay to complicated of a fix to a problem that wont exist in 7 days...

[Sicarius_X]

Urvanis, on November 29 2012 - 06:56 PM, said:

I think you're on to something. Instead of an out right lock out till even, I would propose a spawn que system. if teams are uneven the last person to ready or join the match has to wait till a teammate dies, then they spawn in while the teammate that died waits. So on and so forth till teams are even.

I imagine this could get quite annoying when people rage quit and teams are something like 5v2 but they've still got the option to switch teams.

I wanna give this man an award, why have we not put this in_ While I agree a skill base is more so the issue than an extra body; it still takes a few extra shots in another direction. If the players are of equal skill (I understand this will never happen, but it might average out to close) the extra person would matter a lot. Plus I don't think that this would hurt a better player (if he was on the 4 team instead of the 3 team) in that he would die less often anyhow. I am for this

[rdKNIGHTMAREZ]

Quote

have two pro, organised and communicating players with lvl 0 mechs against four noob,

i feel this kind of reasoning misses the point. For every time 2 pro organized players face off against 4 newbies....there is 2 newbies vs 4 pros..

why_ because it's almost entirely random.

Making the odd-one-out results in better games for everyone, and not victim/abuser dynamics.

[Subdivision]

rdKNIGHTMAREZ, on November 29 2012 - 08:11 PM, said:

4v3 is a problem.

No, its the skill gap between players. You're talking as if all players are of the same ability and level and thus the influence of one more player is significant when in reality one team will often feature a player or two of greater skill and so h0B0's suggestion of a dream world where people balance a game out themselves would pitch teams of equal skill against each other and uneven numbers wouldn't happen as people would wait for them or leave. Sure an extra player will always give a tactical advantage but that doesn't matter is the team doesn't work together or aren't as capable as the smaller team.

Your solution actively stops one single player playing, completely. Regardless of how long that occurs for, it is unfair on the one person and isn't justified. That's saying, your team has an advantage so you personally will take a penalty. If anything, it should affect the whole team so everyone takes a 25% reduction in some manner so they equal 3 players. By removing one person from play, newer players will have a harder time, people will enjoy the game less (that is a fact and not an opinion fyi) thus spoiling the game and driving people away from it much more that any team balance discrepancy that will disappear when open beta comes and the servers are more full and working more efficiently. Most of this issue is currently being worked on by the Hawken team to be resolved before open beta, thus the reason why closed beta is running, to find these problems so they can be sorted. Your solution isn't necessary or sensible and can not be taken serious in relation to the manner in which you reply to the threads you make. Sorry.

Edited by Subdivision, November 30 2012 - 08:20 AM.