Matchmaking and Threat

[Ketog 1031]

On 10/20/2018 at 2:59 AM, Hexerin said:

Even if you hide threat level and remove district instance choice, it's still possible (and easy) to dethreat because it's an automated system.

This is true , but why would you need or want to dethreat if you get a fair opposition , would you really want to intentinally loose for hours (due to how the system would work) and not have fun only to later win a lot then have to redo that all the time ? meanwhile a normal player would be there having fun playing against equally skilled players .

 

 

People dethreat because the matchmaking is bad , if the matchmaking works great you won't even feel the need to do so .

Edited December 16, 2018 by Ketog

[pyru 4]

On 10/20/2018 at 7:41 PM, BIank said:

While eliminating visible threat levels, I would hate the removal of rank icons.

 

The current solutions you have implemented have either made the icon the same for the faction (as was in open conflict) , or have removed it entirely (ps4 and xbox one builds)

 

I think it would be a good idea to combine the idea of Open Conflict icon colors with the current ranks so they would now be red or blue instead of the current bronze, silver or gold.

(very quick mockup)

 

 

A good idea but then we'd have too many colors.

Red names might be paired, for instance, with blue rank icons from enforcers. 

[Haganu 104]

10 hours ago, Void said:

A good idea but then we'd have too many colors.

Red names might be paired, for instance, with blue rank icons from enforcers. 

That wasn't an issue for open conflict.

[Darkzero3802 609]

On 12/16/2018 at 4:30 AM, Ketog said:

This is true , but why would you need or want to dethreat if you get a fair opposition , would you really want to intentinally loose for hours (due to how the system would work) and not have fun only to later win a lot then have to redo that all the time ? meanwhile a normal player would be there having fun playing against equally skilled players .

 

 

People dethreat because the matchmaking is bad , if the matchmaking works great you won't even feel the need to do so .

Ppl also dethreat cause they want to stomp on ppl who arent as good as them so they have ez matches. As long as ppl dethreat both matchmaking and threat will be horrid (they are still bad without it). There needs to be a threat system that accurately shows your rank while making it impossible to dethreat, losing threat is still possible via finding ur tier but throwing just to drop wont be. Maby a lifetime acc wide points per match average or KDR would solve this issue as the longer uve been around the harder it will be to change threat,

20 hours ago, Haganu said:

That wasn't an issue for open conflict.

Your right cause open conflict wasnt a waste of space and was constantly populated while it was alive... Oh wait it was constantly dead and wasted space my bad. Everybody wanted to see ranks and threat (mainly to threat shame) and because of that it wasnt accepted. As I said above there needs to be a good system for lifetime instead of what we currently have now and once threat is fixed matchmaking should fix itself.

[Haganu 104]

13 hours ago, Darkzero3802 said:

Your right cause open conflict wasnt a waste of space and was constantly populated while it was alive... Oh wait it was constantly dead and wasted space my bad. Everybody wanted to see ranks and threat (mainly to threat shame) and because of that it wasnt accepted. As I said above there needs to be a good system for lifetime instead of what we currently have now and once threat is fixed matchmaking should fix itself.

You missed the point by a couple miles. Try again.

[TheMessiah 430]

On 12/16/2018 at 10:42 AM, Void said:

A good idea but then we'd have too many colors.

Red names might be paired, for instance, with blue rank icons from enforcers

what u mean by that?no colors for districts must be visible this is just the rank for each player

[safdfsgkjhdgsjkhs 140]

he means just have servers without threat lock and then have red (crim) blue (enforcer)... no more green-gold threat separating everyone. how can you not understand what hes saying?

[TitoRukas 25]

In my opinion apb matchmakining/threat system have more problems:

• There is no incentive to be the highest threat that you can, that leads into dethreating issues and less people playing, if some incentive was added to the matchmaking/threat system more people will play missions trying to get to the higher threat that they can. It can be made in seasons with rewards at the end of each season depending on the threat you end, the kills that you made and the missions you win during the season period. With this system more people will be forced to play missions to get special rewards! The only incentive in APB matchmaking is dethreating to get more kills and win more.
• Matchmaking algorithm doesnt take care of premades: thats something obvious, because if the game only have a pool of 40 players in the best moment it would take so long to find another premade that could fight in same condicion with other one. That will be easier with phasing, because there would be a larger pool of players and the system would be able to choose matches depending on group (2vs2 premades, 3vs3 premades and 4vs4 premades). We all know that playing with friends and comunicating with them is a good adventage.
• Add more threats: there are 4 threats, and is very easy to get gold fast, so it will be awesome to make more threats where the best players will play, because I can feel that there are a big difference inside silver players and the same inside gold players, that threats could easily be divided into 2 different, that will help players to play more to reach the highest threat and get better rewards.

This are the problems and solutions that I think are the best for apb.

 

I think that making threat invisible wont be a good idea because people will have less motivation to play and improve!

 

LO will also need to invest money on advertising to make the game big when they fix the matchmaking completly, it would be awesome that they do a big advertise when they upgrade to UE4 and everything is fixed!

 

Oh, and sorry for my english, it isn't my native language .

Edited December 19, 2018 by TitoRukas

[Haganu 104]

3 hours ago, TitoRukas said:

• Add more threats: there are 4 threats, and is very easy to get gold fast, so it will be awesome to make more threats where the best players will play, because I can feel that there are a big difference inside silver players and the same inside gold players, that threats could easily be divided into 2 different, that will help players to play more to reach the highest threat and get better rewards.

There are about 10 threat levels underlying each threat color. It is however way too easy to fluctuate in threat level. Threat volatility is supposed to make you slowly more or less lock into a threat level when playing consistently, but that's what dethreaters don't do so it's not nearly effective enough.

[TitoRukas 25]

57 minutes ago, Haganu said:

There are about 10 threat levels underlying each threat color. It is however way too easy to fluctuate in threat level. Threat volatility is supposed to make you slowly more or less lock into a threat level when playing consistently, but that's what dethreaters don't do so it's not nearly effective enough.

I know that, but thats not something visible for the players, It will be better to make more threats visible to create a big incentive to threat up and prevent dethreating

[Stunny 42]

not sure if i like the sound of this phasing thing. so we all won't be in a district together, we'll just be lumped in a fake district with only the enemy and one or two other teams? no more 40/40? apb is a sociable game too if you go that way it takes the biggest part of apb away.. a bunch of boring 2v2 deathmatches on big empty maps.. what

 

unless i'm misunderstanding

 

i think the way districts are setup are fine. it's just matching based on skill that's a bit borked atm. 

 

though increasing from 40/40 to 80/80 would help a lot, because instead of having 2 fins of 40/40 you can have 1 fin of 80/80, bigger pool for matchmaking.

Edited December 19, 2018 by Stunny

[MattScott 15242]

Hi there,

 

The plan is to still let you choose any server you want to hang out with friends while you’re waiting for missions.

 

Then the system will aggregate the players in the same mission to the ‘best fit’ server alongside other players in other missions. Opponents can be matched on any server (so best population matching possible). Each action district can still feel populated, but we get to control the load balancing.

 

Thanks,

Matt

[Kewlin 692]

9 minutes ago, MattScott said:

Hi there,

 

The plan is to still let you choose any server you want to hang out with friends while you’re waiting for missions.

 

Then the system will aggregate the players in the same mission to the ‘best fit’ server alongside other players in other missions. Opponents can be matched on any server (so best population matching possible). Each action district can still feel populated, but we get to control the load balancing.

 

Thanks,

Matt

 

 

To be clear, is there going to be an issue where you can, say, be talking with some strangers in /d, and then you change instances and aren't in the same district at all, seeming as APB is a social game for a lot of people I could see this being annoying.

 

Do you have any plans to try to address this potential issue? (I may have asked this before, but IDR.)

[vsb 6170]

29 minutes ago, Kewlin said:

 

 

To be clear, is there going to be an issue where you can, say, be talking with some strangers in /d, and then you change instances and aren't in the same district at all, seeming as APB is a social game for a lot of people I could see this being annoying.

 

Do you have any plans to try to address this potential issue? (I may have asked this before, but IDR.)

i dont think there's any way around that unless they make /d a server-wide chat

[Kewlin 692]

4 minutes ago, BXNNXD said:

i dont think there's any way around that unless they make /d a server-wide chat

 

I'm not sure there's really one either, but I figured it's worth asking. You might be able to make migration cancel-able or something, but I don't think that's necessarily a good idea.

[Glubbable 41]

I personally would like to see changes to the current matchmaking rather than hanging everything over the promise of Cross-Server Matchmaking. Introducing new tech does not inherently solve problems that are currently plaguing an existing system, especially when these are problems that are caused by basic mistakes in logic or incorrect values.

 

Currently as it stands, it is far too easy to obtain Gold Threat as having any ability to play games at an above average level, gets you Gold. On top of that, players in the Gold Threat will flood into the Silver Districts simply because they could which is often unfair to actual Silvers in the districts due to the vast skill gap between legit Golds & Silvers. Resulting in those Silvers that are aware of district switching, to bump down into Bronze and cause skill gaps to appear there.

 

The first problem can be solved by adjusting the current settings for the threat system. At this point with how dead the game is, it wouldn't hurt trying to make a change.

The second problem can be tackled by introducing a new system that I would like to call the Dynamic District Threat System that would dynamically change the districts threat based on controlling factors.

 

Dynamic District Threat System

Desc: Dynamically changes the threat level based on certain factors and takes actions accordingly when applying the newly assigned threat level.

Factor 1: Dynamic Threat will enable upon the districts population passing beyond two thirds capacity.

Factor 2: Dynamic Threat will be changed based on the largest portion of players belonging to a certain threat. But only if that threat is at least twice the size of the second largest threat.

Action 1: In the event of a districts threat increasing (ie Silver > Gold), all players below the new threat level will be prompted over this change and should be advised to switch district.

Action 2: Players that are in a threat level that is no longer valid for the district (ie if a District drops in Threat) will no longer be allowed to ready up and will be prompted to self-select for another district.

 

Just a basic brain storm on something to address the problem with players stacking into lower threat districts by basically discouraging the behavior with a reactionary system rather than hard locking them.

Edited December 21, 2018 by Glubbable

[Kewlin 692]

31 minutes ago, Glubbable said:

Currently as it stands, it is far too easy to obtain Gold Threat as having any ability to play games at an above average level, gets you Gold. On top of that, players in the Gold Threat will flood into the Silver Districts simply because they could which is often unfair to actual Silvers in the districts due to the vast skill gap between legit Golds & Silvers. Resulting in those Silvers that are aware of district switching, to bump down into Bronze and cause skill gaps to appear there.

 

I'm not sure you understand the concept of how this works. The idea is that it basically doesn't matter what district instance you're in, as it will look at people across ALL of the similar instances (E.G. all Financial mission districts.) As such, there's not an issue with Golds being in "Silver district" (if there even still will be a Silver district) since the Gold's teammates and opposition are being chosen from every similar district. The only time this could be an issue really is with P/N5, but P/N5 is considered to be a fundamentally flawed system by many players to begin with anyways.

[Thaumaturge 83]

what i would do would be to readd the g10 threat system. it was very iconic for APB and unique.

 

1. seeing your threat increase/decrease serves as both a reward for winning and a punishment for losing. Right now, for many players, there is no reward for winning because they are already gold. There is no punishment for losing because for many its LITERALLY NEAR IMPOSSIBLE to go down a threat level. old g10 threat system wasn't like that

2. bring back ladders to encourage competition, especially against high threat players

 

both of these gave veterans a reason to play, and one was hidden, and the other was removed for "toxicity", and really, it didn't make anything that toxic, it just made the game a little bit more bland. i really don't understand why people are against it. just to prove a point though, look at the population graphs after those were removed. I know a significant portion of those who were really good at the game stopped playing around those times.

 

the old g10 system also shows what kinda player you are going up against. the difference between a high/peak gold and a mid level gold is the difference between that mid level gold and a bronze. it's not fair, nor is it fun for either party, but it would be helpful to know when you are about to get molliwhopped or just face an alright player. would seriously decrease the amount of noobs that get put against high tier gold back to back and think all golds are cheaters when in reality theyve just been slammed with the best of the best.

 

as for the dethreater issue, it exists (at least on NA) simply because in the bronze district they 100% do not have to worry about high tier golds. in the other district, due to low population, they will get matched against them, its a matter of when not if.

 

i really don't like the limiting of districts I can play because as a high tier gold its already near impossible for me to play the game. I wait on average 20ish minutes between opposed missions, when I get one, many times my whole enemy team leaves, or a good portion of them do before I even see anyone, many times some of them just AFK the whole mission after 1 or 2 deaths, further wasting my time. we've been doing in houses to mitigate this issue, but, it gets ridiculously boring playing the same set of 6 people day in day out.

Edited December 21, 2018 by Thaumaturge

[Glubbable 41]

13 hours ago, Kewlin said:

 

I'm not sure you understand the concept of how this works. The idea is that it basically doesn't matter what district instance you're in, as it will look at people across ALL of the similar instances (E.G. all Financial mission districts.) As such, there's not an issue with Golds being in "Silver district" (if there even still will be a Silver district) since the Gold's teammates and opposition are being chosen from every similar district. The only time this could be an issue really is with P/N5, but P/N5 is considered to be a fundamentally flawed system by many players to begin with anyways.

I do understand, I think you misunderstood that I am talking about the current matchmaking system as we are still, so far away from an engine upgrade.

[Kewlin 692]

31 minutes ago, Glubbable said:

I do understand, I think you misunderstood that I am talking about the current matchmaking system as we are still, so far away from an engine upgrade.

 

You specifically said that the new tech of cross-instance matchmaking wouldn't solve the current issues with matchmaking, and then went on to describe the current issues, so unless you misspoke I understood perfectly:

 

14 hours ago, Glubbable said:

I personally would like to see changes to the current matchmaking rather than hanging everything over the promise of Cross-Server Matchmaking. Introducing new tech does not inherently solve problems that are currently plaguing an existing system, especially when these are problems that are caused by basic mistakes in logic or incorrect values.

 

The new system pretty much inherently solves the problem of people being in the wrong district.

[Nymphi--DoubleDee 83]

On 10/19/2018 at 4:03 PM, BXNNXD said:

i honestly don’t think there’s any way to make dethreating impossible without it also affecting regular players 

Late to the party, but there is a quite easy way  to stop dethreating.

 

Lock Threat. And I don't mean by District. See, a regular player doesn't fluctuate in threat that often. Even I would  maybe float up to Gold once a month. To stop dethreating, simply make it so you can only drop in threat twice a week, then reset the lockout during maintenance. This makes the people that are on daily, and habitual dethreaters locked into Gold for a majority of their playtime, or makes them only log in twice a week. Either way, that's a win/win for people in Bronze.

 

If you want to take it further, threat lock the Districts. Give Silver players a real place to play, as well as keeping dethreaters away from new players.

[Kewlin 692]

10 minutes ago, Nymphi--DoubleDee said:

Late to the party, but there is a quite easy way  to stop dethreating.

 

Lock Threat. And I don't mean by District. See, a regular player doesn't fluctuate in threat that often. Even I would  maybe float up to Gold once a month. To stop dethreating, simply make it so you can only drop in threat twice a week, then reset the lockout during maintenance. This makes the people that are on daily, and habitual dethreaters locked into Gold for a majority of their playtime, or makes them only log in twice a week. Either way, that's a win/win for people in Bronze.

 

If you want to take it further, threat lock the Districts. Give Silver players a real place to play, as well as keeping dethreaters away from new players.

 

I'm against hard threat locking districts, but your first suggestion would be worth trying.

[vsb 6170]

14 minutes ago, Nymphi--DoubleDee said:

Late to the party, but there is a quite easy way  to stop dethreating.

 

Lock Threat. And I don't mean by District. See, a regular player doesn't fluctuate in threat that often. Even I would  maybe float up to Gold once a month. To stop dethreating, simply make it so you can only drop in threat twice a week, then reset the lockout during maintenance. This makes the people that are on daily, and habitual dethreaters locked into Gold for a majority of their playtime, or makes them only log in twice a week. Either way, that's a win/win for people in Bronze.

2 minutes ago, Kewlin said:

 

I'm against hard threat locking districts, but your first suggestion would be worth trying.

this would just actively punish anyone who is on the border of two threats, as well as cause some pretty intense threat inflation 

 

[Haganu 104]

44 minutes ago, Nymphi--DoubleDee said:

Late to the party, but there is a quite easy way  to stop dethreating.

 

Lock Threat. And I don't mean by District. See, a regular player doesn't fluctuate in threat that often. Even I would  maybe float up to Gold once a month. To stop dethreating, simply make it so you can only drop in threat twice a week, then reset the lockout during maintenance. This makes the people that are on daily, and habitual dethreaters locked into Gold for a majority of their playtime, or makes them only log in twice a week. Either way, that's a win/win for people in Bronze.

 

If you want to take it further, threat lock the Districts. Give Silver players a real place to play, as well as keeping dethreaters away from new players.

There's already a system in place like this. It just doesn't work because people tamper with threat levels too much. 

That's not the problem though, the problem is that gold threat is way too easily attained.

 

Poor threat level distribution is constantly distributing threats too high for a lot of players. This causes people that get threat too high for the skill level they feel they should be getting to tamper with it deliberately. In result all the systems together, including the system that is supposed slowly lock you into a threat level the more you play is only causing lopsided matchups and distribution of threat levels, which in turn cause even more disturbance. APB's reputation also really doesn't help in this issue since a lot of dethreating players often accuse silver district to be full of cheaters (I wanted to call this a thing for new players, but since old G1 consistently did nothing for 5 years in a row I won't, not at this point).

 

In all honesty, it's been at least 4 years with this mess that people like to call matchmaking. It feels like something incredible has to happen if LO wants to keep people from constantly tampering with threat levels and threat volatility.

I also think the overly extensive competitive mindset people have in the game plays part in why this game is such a mess, especially in this field.

Edited December 22, 2018 by Haganu

[Kewlin 692]

29 minutes ago, BXNNXD said:

this would just actively punish anyone who is on the border of two threats, as well as cause some pretty intense threat inflation

 

Once a week isn't that bad, plus matchmaking doesn't treat high silver and low gold that differently TBH, except not allowing golds into bronze but. . . high silvers really shouldn't be in bronze TBH.