Exactly (Destiny)

by Earendil, Wednesday, June 10, 2015, 13:12 (3694 days ago) @ Kahzgul

Skill based matchmaking is bogus. It leads to bizarre forfeit-farming games where the other team doesn't even try for 50 games so that they can then have a cakewalk to undefeated land, as well as to an eventual 50% win scenario for players who always try their best. Some players (like me) who like to screw around from time to time will find that (a) screwing around isn't as fun because you're basically guaranteed a loss if you're not going 100% and (b) since you screw around sometimes, when you really put your gameface on you realize there's no need and you're not getting the challenge you want.

Skill based match making is a good thing. The other way to look at it is as a filter that won't let you play with people you are guaranteed to crush, and those that are guaranteed to crush you. Play Highscool sports? You won't play against Professional athletes or the elementary school recess team. That doesn't mean there isn't a highschool team that'll kick your ass, or that if the other team shows up drunk that you won't beat them with one joystick taped sideways.

Most of us that aren't super good and treat the game like a career will also *rightfully* not take it seriously, showing up with our A-Game every single match. Besides our inability to perform consistently (even when trying) this aspect throws in an even greater variance to our "rating", and how we get matched, and gets sort of averaged by the fact that there are 12 players in a game.

I *DO* think that Bungie's algorithm for determining the combined skill of a team is a bit off. I played with an entire crew of DBOs in Iron Banner the other day, and we had a handful of close games, a couple last-1000-point comebacks, and some utter stomping. It was obvious that our team had individuals that were all over the rating map, and Bungie didn't know how to add that up.

But still, if it were Random, I'd probably get crushed more often than not, which wouldn't be very fun :(