Problems with matchmaking

[Schwalbe]

@Mr. Disaster, also, if you don't find the match maker to be working, give custom game and the match list a shot.   

We gave it a shot, and we shot our feet.
I mean, we tried to set up the custom game, and 20 minutes after we started nobody even passed by. Not a SINGLE person. That was annoying.

After that we were told, that there is some magical button that allows people to get in from the matchmaker, but honestly, I find GUI so not transparent now, we haven't noticed that one for TWENTY minutes...

And by inviting friends... Really? No offence, but this looks much like you gave us first solution coming to your head, it doesn't cool thing you know... and in fact - I find that one a litlle offensive, because I invite people I like / I respect - and those who know me personally know, how fucking tough it is to earn my friendship, not to mention my respect.

But suddenly I have to go against my own life rules to play comfortably this game? No bloody way.

[shaelyn]

On the point about not allowing custom game to pull from match maker, yeah we can do that.  We had it designed like that initially, and changed it because we took feedback from player testers that they would like help filling matches.  If the vet custom game creates and fine with recruiting players not from match maker, we could easily revert back to not allowing custom games to pull from match maker.  But I don't want to keep changing back and forth though, so if this is the majority will, we can do that.

the custom matches definitely need a way to fill, and with half the player base using matchmaking and half using match list, I don't know if match list is going to be enough.  it may be.  it may be fine.  I don't think any of us are going to know the answer to that until it gets released with some data, though, and I cannot say one way or another until that happens.

so Howard, if you're really thinking this is a good way to go and you don't want to keep swapping how custom games fill, my suggestion would be leave the matchmaker filling as it does now, pull some data after the match list gets implemented, then make a decision (and put out a call for some feedback from us then if you'd like, before you do.)  see if the custom games do need filled by more than the match list or if the matchmaker games aren't filling enough since the custom games are hogging the players.

I still think the best bet would be to make it optional to everyone involved - both the creator of the custom game to open it to match maker, and the player, whether they prefer to be placed quickly or have balanced matches, but if there's not enough people using matchmaker for it to fill the balanced lobbies, obviously it's a bad idea.

[Imagine]

Well you're right. You're doing all you can and we're also doing all we can. And with some good will we'll meet somewhere in the middle.

This is nice in theory, but so far like 90% of the complaints seem to be "I hate it get rid of it bring back previous patch!"

We gave it a shot, and we shot our feet.
I mean, we tried to set up the custom game, and 20 minutes after we started nobody even passed by. Not a SINGLE person. That was annoying.

After that we were told, that there is some magical button that allows people to get in from the matchmaker, but honestly, I find GUI so not transparent now, we haven't noticed that one for TWENTY minutes...

It's a very large button at the bottom of the screen.

If you're not able to find that for 20 minutes... I dunno man, I dunno what to say.

[GeoRmr]

Well you're right. You're doing all you can and we're also doing all we can. And with some good will we'll meet somewhere in the middle.

This is nice in theory, but so far like 90% of the complaints seem to be "I hate it get rid of it bring back previous patch!"

We gave it a shot, and we shot our feet.
I mean, we tried to set up the custom game, and 20 minutes after we started nobody even passed by. Not a SINGLE person. That was annoying.

After that we were told, that there is some magical button that allows people to get in from the matchmaker, but honestly, I find GUI so not transparent now, we haven't noticed that one for TWENTY minutes...

It's a very large button at the bottom of the screen.

If you're not able to find that for 20 minutes... I dunno man, I dunno what to say.

I couldn't find it at first either - because i wasn't expecting it. Its not like muse gave a manual for the UI and matchmaking.

Food for thought:

If 90% of the comments are passionatley saying: I hate it, its bad, bring it back to how it was before!

Maybe its because: People hate it, its bad, and muse should bring it back to how it was before.

[macmacnick]

...I have been pushing for the idea that there should be two systems: Matchmaking (MM) and Match List (ML) for a long time. The community pushed to have quick join removed for a long time, and the idea of matchmaking was supported mainly as an alternative to quick join. Why should we, the veteran players, those who are part of the reason why this game has such a good community overall, have to suffer? Why are we, the veterans, having to deal with a system that degrades the community experience, strategy, general craziness, and overall fun and entertainment value of the game, why all of this just so that the shorter-term, pick-up, play the game, all of two or some-odd times, not giving half a damn about the community get a system designed with just them in mind, stripped down to provide just a glimpse at the depth of the game? Is it not us, the veterans, those who continually help, by giving assistance, feedback, sending in well-informed reports, self-policing and discouraging toxicity amongst the community. Is it not the veterans who are the ones teaching the newbies, pushing the limits on the depth of the game, and helping nurture the community who hold up the community standards, actually care, growing and sustaining the community with a passion, one that dwarfs any found in most of the largest, most popular games in existence? Why should we, the community as a whole, get off with the short end of the stick, with the social aspects of the games, such as the possibility of meeting someone in a random lobby, someone who could eventually become a new friend, a new acquaintance, or even a person who could become in the future a new clan member, reduced or removed entirely? What exactly was Muse's point when they removed one of the most integral portions of the community the match list, the social hub of the game, by basically ripping out its heart, and trying to replace it with a lesser alternative?

[GeoRmr]

You know why there aren't two systems macmac?

Because 80% of the community wouldn't use matchmaking at all, and then the matchmaking wouldn't work because there would only be about 40 people online at any one time who actually want to use it.

[shaelyn]

if that were the case, wouldn't Muse have its answer as to which is the better option for the player base for now?

and note, I'm not saying after the fact get rid of the system, I'm saying hide it until the player base is big enough to handle it.
all hypothetically.  I think there's more people screaming for balance directly to the devs than we realize.  I suspect the split's closer to 50/50.  and I'm not sure we have the numbers to carry more than one system either way.

[macmacnick]

Then, shall we ask for the number of unique users who sent muse e-mails to them with a pro-matchmaking message and those who sent e-mails with a pro-match list message? Therefore we can tally it up, with only some difficulty.

[shaelyn]

lol.  you can if you want to.  that's not for me to know.

so I should probably stop speculating..........

[Hoja Lateralus]

Well you're right. You're doing all you can and we're also doing all we can. And with some good will we'll meet somewhere in the middle.

This is nice in theory, but so far like 90% of the complaints seem to be "I hate it get rid of it bring back previous patch!"

I could say that 90% of the responses to complaints seem to be "You stupid. This system good. Simple good."

But what you're saying is not true. Although at the beginning it was more emotional, after time everyone gave it some thought and we had some good posts and some good arguments. We write what we, as players, don't like and why.

[Squidslinger Gilder]

...I have been pushing for the idea that there should be two systems: Matchmaking (MM) and Match List (ML) for a long time. The community pushed to have quick join removed for a long time, and the idea of matchmaking was supported mainly as an alternative to quick join. Why should we, the veteran players, those who are part of the reason why this game has such a good community overall, have to suffer? Why are we, the veterans, having to deal with a system that degrades the community experience, strategy, general craziness, and overall fun and entertainment value of the game, why all of this just so that the shorter-term, pick-up, play the game, all of two or some-odd times, not giving half a damn about the community get a system designed with just them in mind, stripped down to provide just a glimpse at the depth of the game? Is it not us, the veterans, those who continually help, by giving assistance, feedback, sending in well-informed reports, self-policing and discouraging toxicity amongst the community. Is it not the veterans who are the ones teaching the newbies, pushing the limits on the depth of the game, and helping nurture the community who hold up the community standards, actually care, growing and sustaining the community with a passion, one that dwarfs any found in most of the largest, most popular games in existence? Why should we, the community as a whole, get off with the short end of the stick, with the social aspects of the games, such as the possibility of meeting someone in a random lobby, someone who could eventually become a new friend, a new acquaintance, or even a person who could become in the future a new clan member, reduced or removed entirely? What exactly was Muse's point when they removed one of the most integral portions of the community the match list, the social hub of the game, by basically ripping out its heart, and trying to replace it with a lesser alternative?

+5000 Gilder rep points to Macmac

Yeah we needed 2 systems. Big reason we fought Quick Join so hard was because it was extremely detrimental to gameplay. Everyone would quick join gunner and you'd have ships with 3 gunners all the time. I remember addressing this specifically about MM because in the tests I saw multiple gunners happening. Said outright, what the point of MM was if it was just quick join with extra menus? Unless there was intelligent funneling of players, MM was going to flop hard.

Now here we are...lemmie get my Mr. Floppy out...



Ok...thats better.

[HamsterIV]

The attached picture is indicative of my match making experience:

This is was not a balanced game, this was a 5-0 stomping that I managed to make last a few minutes longer than it should have. The captain decided he didn't want to fly after his first death, and the other engineer was set for buffing. This is why I join on friends and stack lobbies. After a match or two of this I care nothing for balanced matches, I just want to watch the world burn.

[Mezhu]

If 90% of comments say 'it's bad change it', it's not necesserily bad. It's just people are very vocal when it comes to the game not meeting their expectations, be them logical or not.
On the other hand, even proponents of the matchmaking system like me tend to focus on the perceived negatives of the system rather than praise and congratulate muse on their efforts.

Realistically, so far all the complaints of the game becoming 'antisocial' and statements of the sort 'imma delete it' (nothing new, same exaggeration and tears every patch) have mostly been without basis. Your friends are still there, the means of joining them as well. Stop whining already about how special you are and how you want the game to remain the exact same for the next 3 years. Could we turn the focus back on the actual issues of matchmaking and ways of improving it?

[Squidslinger Gilder]

That has kinda been the point in many of these posts. There have been notes on improving it and a desire to see it functional along with preserving some of the original game. To reach a "compromise" as has been attempted. Many of them are ones that were made back during the big tests before it went live and are being mentioned again because obviously the message didn't get across. The fact that you can have multiple gunners on any boat just says enough of how broken this is and how it is not really much better than the quick join system it replaced.

Thx for paying attention Mez.

[GreenBreeze]

...I have been pushing for the idea that there should be two systems: Matchmaking (MM) and Match List (ML) for a long time. The community pushed to have quick join removed for a long time, and the idea of matchmaking was supported mainly as an alternative to quick join. Why should we, the veteran players, those who are part of the reason why this game has such a good community overall, have to suffer? Why are we, the veterans, having to deal with a system that degrades the community experience, strategy, general craziness, and overall fun and entertainment value of the game, why all of this just so that the shorter-term, pick-up, play the game, all of two or some-odd times, not giving half a damn about the community get a system designed with just them in mind, stripped down to provide just a glimpse at the depth of the game? Is it not us, the veterans, those who continually help, by giving assistance, feedback, sending in well-informed reports, self-policing and discouraging toxicity amongst the community. Is it not the veterans who are the ones teaching the newbies, pushing the limits on the depth of the game, and helping nurture the community who hold up the community standards, actually care, growing and sustaining the community with a passion, one that dwarfs any found in most of the largest, most popular games in existence? Why should we, the community as a whole, get off with the short end of the stick, with the social aspects of the games, such as the possibility of meeting someone in a random lobby, someone who could eventually become a new friend, a new acquaintance, or even a person who could become in the future a new clan member, reduced or removed entirely? What exactly was Muse's point when they removed one of the most integral portions of the community the match list, the social hub of the game, by basically ripping out its heart, and trying to replace it with a lesser alternative?

Amen. If you introduce such a drastically different system, there are bound to be issues people have with it, no matter how polished it is before you release it. Especially when you remove so much functionality that people are used to having. That is the purpose of testing. However, testing has a finite member base and you'll never be able to get all the feedback you need from a small test bed.

If you split it up into two separate systems and then took some analytics on what people are choosing to use I think you'll find that the new MM has a spike initially as people try it out and give it a chance and then the old 1.3.7 system will be preferred by the bulk of the community. At least that's the feel I get from most people I talk to in the game about it, but I could be wrong. I stand by my assertion that the number of people waiting for a match at a given time is not large enough to make a matchmaking system work properly. I feel that no matter how much tweaking you do to MM it just can't work in a community this size.

The bottom line is, we had to made concessions to make the match system flexible for you guys to foster, expand on, or retain the social, community, and custom features.  These unfortunately impact the match maker's ability to balance matches individually and in totality. 

We can't take complaints about lacking social features and lacking perfect balance at the same time, and be expected to achieve both.  We are trying, and will continue to try.  But being totally honest, to have all the social features you guys want, and to achieve perfect balance for every match is impossible, as these are opposing forces tugging at each other. 

I feel that Muse is listening more to a bulk of emails from people who buy the game on steam sale and then complain because it's too hard than to those who have stuck around and learned the game and got good at it and have found compatible people to play with. Teamwork is key to this game and I feel that this MM system is punishing groups who have achieved what this game is about, finding a group of people who you can cooperate with to achieve a common goal. If you remove the function to allow people to choose who they are crewing with, you completely butcher the game. If we are weighing the merits of balance vs. social features, aka control, then on my scale you'd need a ladder to reach balance because control weighs so much. I already felt as if captains should have had more control in 1.3.7 than they did, not less.

fuck it. just add everyone to your watch-list, and have all the costume matches.
then let's just request a separate (consensual) friends-list and have them be a different colour.

that's the only way to cheat yourself match lists back.

just give us a separate friend-list and i will get off your back. promise.

Another point is, B'Elanna is right.  The more friends you add, the more the friend match list becomes the old match list.  The way of tech is headed towards friend curation and filtering, and so are we.  I think it's the right way to go.

Really? Can't you tell that she's being facetious here? Friend curation and filtering are the way that tech is heading eh? Some of us don't have facebook accounts because we loathe this sort of friend curation behavior and boycott social media. The moment I see the button to link to my facebook account to populate my friends list I'm out. Ugh.
 

@Mr. Disaster, also, if you don't find the match maker to be working, give custom game and the match list a shot.  Personally I found that once I have 50-100 friends added, the match list worked well for me.  I'm likely biased I know, but I don't think I'm talking BS here.

@Bubbles

If you want to in the new system, you can without too much effort recreate the old system.  For example, if you want the old match list back, you can literally just add a bunch of people as friends.

This is unfair, I don't like this. I'm an introvert in real life therefore I have introvertic way of being also in GOIO which means I pick my friends with care. To add someone as friend I need to fly with him/her a few times, having him/her doing a good job and fun together. I think I have like ~50 people on my friend list and I will not accept this "solution" of my problem. This is no argument to me and stop repeating that because it's just....unpleasant. If you truly believe this is some "back door" from matchmaking then bring back the regular server list or do the suggestion below.

I agree completely. The idea you propose that we just add more friends certainly sounds like a work-around and not a solution. Custom games is not the answer to all of our problems by any means because custom games are not browsable by the community at large. If custom games behaved like the old lobby system in 1.3.7 then the answer of "just use custom games" would be acceptable to me.

As for some sort of penalty invoked for leaving a lobby that I don't like the looks of. I wouldn't care in the least bit. Levels mean nothing to me. There is no difference between anybody in this game, which is great and not something I would want to change. It is good that the only difference between a level 1 and a level 45 is experience and personal skill garnered from that experience. Levels are strictly cosmetic and mean nothing at all. Match count gives you much more indication on somebody's ability than level. Ding my level all you want. Add a counter in hot pink in an attempt to publicly shame me. Do whatever you think appropriate. It will still not prevent me from bailing on a lobby where MM sticks me on a ship with all brand new players.

I just tried playing a few matches with a friend me as a high level engi, him as a high level pilot, and we were paired with two people with less than 20 games to make up the rest of our boat each time. While I don't mind teaching people the mechanics of the game and repeating myself 30 times every once in a while, I certainly don't want to do that every match. It gets old arguing with new players about the reasons we don't want a gunner on our boat (but the uselessness of the gunner class is not the topic here). Usually when I want to play a game I just want to relax and have fun. That was easily accomplished by taking a look at the few lobbies that are going and figuring out which match had the veterans congregating in it and joining up, or spectating for a little bit while I waited for a spot. Now all the veterans are spread out across various lobbies serving in indentured slavery as tutors. MM is causing this game to become significantly less fun than it used to be because as it is right now it's just too damned frustrating to play more than a few matches.