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Re: Scenarios....

Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2021 6:35 pm
by Grock
Since this discusssion is still going and there are some important points missing i thought i'd chime in with a serious and long answer. Turned out longer than i expected. :roll:

First off there seems to be a confusion about what is what. The one-sided stomps everyone is complaining about aren't caused by people simply grouping up. They are caused by massive power and experience advantage that older or more invested players have. This advantage remains no matter if it is a PUG or a premade group, and the one-sided stomp situations will happen in soloQ as well.

Second - what players want is to play the game, not sit in queue.
Majority of people, "premades" included, will always just que the fastest option.

If you separate two queues and move all solo players into its own queue it will drastically increase matchmaking times for groups. As a result many of the so-called "premade players" - most of whom are completely average players just casually grouping with friends/guildies - will choose to split up and que "solo" concurrently, hoping to get into one match. Waiting for longer queue with a chance of being matched against an actual premade group isn't particularly attractive for casual groups.

After casual groups leave the queue, the matchmaking times for it will increase even more, now raising the question for "real premades" whether they want to sit an hour or two waiting for another 6man to fight, or if they should just split up and que solo for a chance of being matched into the same game anyway. (which is inevitable with our current player numbers)

This snowballing effect will eventually lead to group queue mostly dying off and majority of players moving to solo queue. But this does not mean that people will stop playing together and coordinating their actions.

Thinking that separated soloQ will consist of true solo players only just says that you don't understand player behaviour and haven't learned anything from what has been happening in Ranked 6v6 mode since its release.

In addition to that, and on top of the gear advantage, the veteran players are simply acquainted with more fellow players. Even queuing solo they would form groups and work together in an SC - without any prior coordination.
Even when i que solo casually, i still often end up in games where i know many of the players present and we can just all jump to the same group and make a more-or-less balanced setup, and maybe even hop to voice in one of dozens of guild Discords that we share.

Killing an option to que as group would simply create worse experience for everyone involved.
People willing to group up will either have to sit in very long queues, or will have to sacrifice the ability to play together and control your group setup.
People who want soloQ for better experience will still keep being stomped by veteran players - because there'd still be massive gear, skill and experience advantage, stronger social circles and easily available shared voice comms.


Is there a perfect solution to this issue? No. Is there an easy solution to this problem? Also no.
It is a multi-level problem that comes both from the way the game is built and from the limitations of the tech and community the server has.
The game is designed from the ground up to be played in a 6man format, many class mechanics and things like CC immunities play directly into that. But with our current population and the inherent class popularity disbalance(thanks Mythic...) it is very hard to create balanced and fair matchups with just random solo players, even if you "move" "premaders" into the solo queue.

But some things can still be done. In no specified order:
- Encourage and incentiveize grouping up on casual levels - something like a buff effect that boosts exp/rr/etc gain while being in a group.
- Create easier pick-up tools and UI - such as improvements to existing Parties & Warbands window and the "open parties in your area" pop-up (which freezes my game btw).
- Make our social environment friendlier to newcomers and beginner players - as a community effort. Veterans need to open up their circles and welcome and teach newbies.
- Teach the basics of group play and how important the archetype interactions are, how different classes complement and enable each other. (Do it both as community effort, and through game systems like quests, tips, events)
- Crucially: teach people about how to switch groups in SCs and how to use /assist macros. It is embarrasing how many people are confused by group switching.
- Expanding number of pug Scenarios from 1 to 2 should be a good middle ground. Most people would still usually prefer to Queue All because its faster.
- A bit of a stat squeeze to reduce gear disparity in T4 could go a long way for improving everyone's experience. (The gap between Sov and Invader is as big as between Invader and Annihilator, isn't that ridiculous?)

p.s. and do address a couple other points:
- T4 scenarios are "less popular"(proof?), because you can't do RvR and Scenarios in the same moment, and RvR content is crucial for a T4 character and it is the core gameplay of the game. Scenarios are secondary in nature.
- It "works" in T1 and Mid Tier because those are leveling tiers and the gear disparity is less of an issue there. There's constant flow of new characters and the RvR gameplay is not important at those levels(as well as PvE straight up not existing), so SC play has much less competition from other play types. There's also no BiS geared veterans in lower tiers, so that helps a bit as well.
- Attempts to force matchmaker to make matches with balanced healers/tanks/etc have already been made and led to considerable increase in queue times which no one liked. Do we really need to try this for like the 3rd time?

Re: Scenarios....

Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2021 7:47 pm
by Vri
How has this one not been locked ?