Lack of matchmaking is a significant problem

sliktsslikts Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174759Members
in Ideas and Suggestions
The NS2 gameplay shines the most in organized matches, but there's a complete lack of support for matchmaking by UWE. Pub games stop being engaging once you reach a certain level of skill and want to go further. This is supposed to be a hardcore team game, but you could hardly tell that from seeing the pub system. After having played many pub matches and many gathers, I feel that pub matches too often are just parodies of good games, and that playing in pubs doesn't even allow people to really evaluate their skills, since there are too many newbies to stomp on. Gathers/PUGs have their own problems, and matchmaking doesn't work perfectly even in games where it's central like in Dota 2, but currently there are just too many hoops to jump through if you want to play an organized NS2 match. ENSL.org gathers, for instance, can fill up only to empy again just because 1 player is missing. It can take literally an hour to set up a game there just because of problems with finding and joining servers. The Reddit Steam group PUGs only happen at certain times, and it's somewhat of a hassle to play there as well. UWE should take note of the existence of things like rddt.eu and answer the demand for organized games with better support, so servers wouldn't need to have third party tools to support gathers, and so that players wouldn't need to go through some third party sites to find matches. Proper matchmaking should be in NS2 by default, and UWE should reward people who have been dedicated enough to keep wasting their time trying to work around the lack of matchmaking. Currently it looks like UWE is just satisfied trying to emulate the NS1 or CS model of being primarily about pub games, but this is suboptimal for a hardcore team game like NS2. NS1 was popular despite lacking proper matchmaking, and CS got popular because its gameplay isn't so dependent on having balanced teams, since the rounds are shorter etc.

tl;dr Pub games get stale fast, and there is almost no support from UWE for the players who want to go beyond pubs.
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Comments

  • bERt0rbERt0r Join Date: 2005-03-23 Member: 46181Members
    I dont think UWE should invest time into makeing a matchmaking system. There are not enough players to assure good ping for everyone and a lot of changes to the server architecture would have to be made.

    What I would like to see is recording statistics for players (what we already have in ns2-stats) and using those statistics to balance the teams before a round starts. This could limit the pubstacking and allow for some mure enjoyable games.
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  • sliktsslikts Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174759Members
    There won't be more players unless there is a way to get good games. Adding the half-assed matchmaking you propose on top of pubs solves nothing, and it introduces more problems. People normally trickle into the server because their loading times differ, so how long would you delay the start of round to balance the teams? How would you deal with friends who will only play together, or with people who will leave, rejoin, or just join in the middle of a match? Proper matchmaking solves these problems, and it also doesn't matter if it would be hard to implement, because the alternative for the NS2 community is what, just rolling over and dying? I don't see many good players anymore because they're sick of wasting time trying to find a good match. Pub players will derp like they always have and many will be neurotic enough to keep playing for some time, but it's hardly a long-term solution to do nothing about higher quality games. Everyone knows about the lack of competitive NS2 teams, but where are good players supposed to come from if organized play is so poorly supported?

    As for pings, many US and euro players routinely play with around 150 ping, and it's tolerable.
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  • bERt0rbERt0r Join Date: 2005-03-23 Member: 46181Members
    edited February 2013
    As for pings above 100, I have heard different oppinions on these forums.

    People already have to wait until both teams have a commander, your argument about players trickling in is invalid.

    There is no problem with friends playing together, but if they have no equally skilled opponents, this just ends in a pubstomp. Would there be a problem if, before the round starts, players see the skill ratings of each player so they can balance the teams on their own accord?

    Games with matchmaking usually use A) an experience system which allows for rising in levels/ranks that measures how long one has played and B) a hidden number that measures the acutal player skill. Encouraging people to make fair teams is achieved by only rewarding maximum xp for winning equal matches.
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  • sliktsslikts Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174759Members
    So both teams would get a commander and then suddenly the players would get shuffled? The problem with player groups is also addressed in proper matchmaking systems, even though it's harder and requires more players. No one would also be forced to play in high ping servers with machmaking, so the people who think ping is so important could stick to their own regional servers. The problem of people like you is that you apparently just haven't seen how it can work in practice, so you're prone to reinvent the wheel with gimmicky, crappy solutions, or be overly incredulous. You reject a proven solution because of your lack of experience, and meanwhile the community continues to shrink: http://steamgraph.net/index.php?action=graph&appid=4920&from=0
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  • bERt0rbERt0r Join Date: 2005-03-23 Member: 46181Members
    Hmm, where did I say I want players to be shuffled? I thought i was being pretty clear that I wanted the players to make fair teams, by changing teams manually. I have seen this work in NS1, with XP and Ranks collected and a skill meter to show how long one has played and how good he is.

    You on the other hand talk of proven solutions, what comparable system do you have in mind? ELO of games like chess or go? The matchmaking of Dota2, the one of Starcraft 2, the one of CS:GO?

    All these systems have in common that they work only with relativly small teamsizes. And I have experienced them fail horribly a couple of times: Players nukeing an allied's base, Russian dota players unable/unwilling to communicate with their team... Matchmaking is not the solution to everything.
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  • sliktsslikts Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174759Members
    Shuffling isn't necessarily random, I was using the word "shuffle" in a more general way. Nothing is "the solution to everything", solutions just need to be good enough. Matchmaking based on Elo works fine in other games with team sizes close to the 6v6 of competitive NS2. Your solution of autobalancing once at the start of the round, on the other hand, would do next to nothing to make games better, since players could just switch again after being autobalanced, players could leave, or new players could join. Not to mention that it would be jarring to join one team and immediately get thrown to the opposing one, and it would break groups of people trying to play together etc. No other games are dealing with balance like you suggest because it's just not a good idea. Anyway, unless there is some major fixing from UWE, this community is going nowhere, like the trend in the Steam graph shows. There are better things to do than to waste time hopping servers from one low level game to another, or to try and organize better games without proper support. I see no light at the end of the tunnel now, only more good players getting burned out.
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  • FrankerZFrankerZ Join Date: 2012-05-06 Member: 151627Members
    I would suck dicks for a matchmaking system
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  • SquishyOneSquishyOne Join Date: 2005-01-11 Member: 34963Members
    The ENSL website has a pug system ie. matchmaking you may like. I do agree that for many people this is a lot more fun than pubbing. I wonder though how they would police a UWE matchmaking system as 1 troll can ruin more serious matches.
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  • sliktsslikts Join Date: 2012-12-11 Member: 174759Members
    edited February 2013
    Just like there should be player ranking to balance the matches, there should be a reputation system, so leavers and griefers would get punished.

    These days ENSL gathers take forever to fill up, and even after getting 12 players it can take a long time before the match starts (30m to an hour is not uncommon if someone has problems with their game or is AFK and a merc needs to be found), and it's also not uncommon that captains can't pick balanced teams because it's impossible to know all the players. It wouldn't need to be like that if UWE implemented proper official support for matchmaking, and proper matchmaking could save tons of time and energy for people trying to play better games and maybe revitalize the community and lead to more competitive teams.

    There was a short period of time when you could even get several ENSL gathers happening in parallel, but now it seems it can go a day without a match. reddit PUGs (e.g. http://rddt.eu/) seem to be more popular, but it's a bit lower level and is only happening because of the activity of the organizers, and it probably isn't going to grow much. The overall trend is for people to leave.
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