Lane · @Surefour
13th Jul 2017 from TwitLonger
Matchmaking/Ranked in OW
As well all know one of the main reason competitive players keep playing a game is for ranked in any game they play. They like proving their skills, climbing the ladder, being able to say "hey i'm among the best". But right now for S5 Overwatch's rank is actually pretty terrible. There's dare I say it, people that don't deserve to be at the rank they're at, somewhat "boosted".
This creates a huge problem for people that are actually at the rank they deserve to be at. It creates huge balance deficits because the matchmaker isn't actually determining their ability to play the game at the highest level, it's determining the most balanced "SR" match. Now i'm not saying some people havn't improved, people do, but the amount of people that actually go from 2k - gm/top500 is actually crazy, and when you have a 2k ABILITY player in a GM/top500 SR match, it leaves the team with that player that didn't improve with a big crutch.
But why are they a crutch? It's because overwatch is a team game, and not only a team game, but a game where hero composition matters ALOT (In high tier games atleast). So if anyone isn't pulling their weight in a match that's considered to be a "TOP 500 OF THE REGION" match, you're going to have a very hard time because you're essentially playing a 5v6.
I won't go on to talk about one tricks and ranked and how they effect it but rather how the ranked system promotes it and how it's unhealthy. Everyone knows the mercy problem at the moment, mercy mains that are gaining ALOT of SR because of the buff to her res because they are "outperforming" the stats of other mercys. So what changed? Did all the of the mercy mains that got to GM this season all of a sudden reach a HUGE improvement of skill in this season? Perhaps, but most likely because alot of those mercys would die after they res, which means they wouldn't necessarily win every fight they res. But as a result of the invuln buff, at the lower ranks, they would probably ALWAYS survive after resing, resulting in more fights won or them having less deaths. So in the past the system had all these "bad" stats for mercys, but now alot of mercys are staying alive and getting "good" stats. In return, the MMR system rewards them for their "performance".
You never really saw mercy before the buff, why is that? Well in masters - top 500 it's because players generally have an idea on how to play around mercy and will focus her down ALOT especially if she comes in for a res. When she didn't have invuln she would 95% of the time die after resing because she'd already be below 50% unless she was with a pharah. So we have a very low amount of mercy play in the masters - top 500 range for alot of seasons.
So if the stats comparison are being determined by what SR you're at, then when the invlun buff happened, as I said, mercys were surviving more. In low ranks, res most likely = win. So the mercys were climbing and once they got to masters/GM, there wasn't alot of stats to compare them too because those mercys at that level before either stopped playing her at all or fell off, which results in the matchmaking "performance" sr gains/loss to become lopsided.
Now I know i'm kind of just rambling and don't understand 100% of how the matchmaking works, but the main thing I wanted to talk about is I want a matchmaking system similar to dota 2's. Solid SR wins/losses, not "performance" based, you win more then you lose, you go up, you lose more, you go down. I want a SOLO QUEUE ONLY matchmaking.
Some people might have a problem with this, specifically supports and tanks. I hear stuff like, well you can only do so much to win, you can't exactly "carry" with those roles. Well, you're not meant to. Supports are there to enable the dps, they're there to sustain the tanks. You supports help the dps DO the carrying, you help the tanks SUSTAIN long enough to create space for the dps. What's the tanks job? They create space, they give the dps positional advantage to have more options to carry, they give the supports more space to help the dps and also protect them. That means that dps's job is to "CARRY", it's their jobs, they're the ones that kill the most things, to do all the damage. Yes, there will be times where you will enable and create so much space for the dps on your team and they won't be able to use it correctly, it happens. Your goal in ranked is to do the best of your abilities ON YOUR ROLE and hope everyone else does there's.
In the end, my point is, the SR gains/loss based on performance has only worked for so long, and we're starting to see the flaws of it. I think it's time we change to a more static mmr system with an mmr reset most likely. In the end, if you do your job better then the other team, if the matches are balanced, you will win. If you're slacking, you will lose. That's how I think it should be.
I just felt like typing this out, feel free to call me stupid or whatever be it.