OVERVIEW This is quite a long post, however, not all of it is necassary for a reply. Basically, throughout this thread, I will be suggesting updates for the matchmaking system and providing some facts/evidence of why they should be put in place. Bungie Optimatch Forum Thread THE THREE UPDATES Three updates I believe need to be incorparated into matchmaking are: 1. If the majority of players are from a particular country / same connection area, eg. 5 from country A and 3 from country B, country A should get host. This would result in a fairer gameplay across the board. 2. A search my country/area function needs to be added. Good connection only makes finding games longer and even then we are wacked with bad connection. 3. Take connection speed into account when deciding your rank outcomes after the game. I'm am entirely sick of winning 5 or so games in a row, then losing because of lag and then deranking back to where I started. Lag needs to be taken into account from the very start of the game when it matches you with other players. However, this should only midly effect the outcome of your rank at the end of the game. A loss is a loss nevertheless. WHY WOULD WE WANT THESE UPDATES Coming from Australia, I experience a lot of laggy and one sided-hosted games. Mainly because Australia is further away from the other countries, we suffer the consequences. This host/lag advantage often changes the reults/outcome of the game. This is why I put forward a My Location / Area search. This would search for people from your country / area. Even if it is a laggy connection from your area, the lag usually effects both teams rather than just one area. Searching connection barely works. It usually just takes longer to find a game and even then you get matched up with players from far away lands (look in facts for more evidence about this). After playing many games and winning, you may feel close to that next rank. Then all of a sudden a seriously laggy game results in loss you should have won. This is the most annoying of them all. This is why I believe lag should be taken into account when deicding your rank after a loss/win. THE FACTS Evidence rarely lies. Why would I put forward these proposals with out any evidence to back me up? Well here it is. Tonight, May 27th 2008, I played 9 matches online. Below is a list of the games with information of connection speed / host / nationality-country / rank results / outcomes I believe should have happened. The first team is our oponents, second team is the team I participated in. NOTE: Every game I searched Good Connection. With the exception of the doubles games, they took on average 2-5 min to find the game. BRs on Standoff 3 Japanese vs 3 Australians Full green / host vs Red bars / about 1:30 black screen. I definately believe we would have won with host/even connection. No rank change. MLG Multi Flag on Narrows 3 USA vs 2 Aus and 1 UK Full green / host vs yellow bars The UK player quit or was disconnected at the start of the match so it was 3 USA with host vs 2 AUS. I don not believe we would have won with host/even connection as we were a man down. De-ranked. Team BRs on High Ground 3 UK vs 2 AUS and 1 UK Full green / host vs AUS yellow/red, UK green (he was part of the UK party) I got disconnected along with my AUS friend during the game due to lag. I definately believe we would have won with host/even connection. It was social. MLG Team Slayer on Onslaught 3 USA vs 2 AUS and 1 US Green / host vs 2 AUS yellow, US green Even with a even connection/host, I doubt we would have won. We would've got atleast another 5 or so kills but they had a good set up throughtout the game. De-ranked. Team Doubles on Pit 2 ? vs 2 AUS Green bars / host vs AUS yellow Even without host, we dominated until 8 - 0 when they quit as they were outplayed, even with host. No rank change. Team Doubles on Snowbound 2 French VS 2 AUS Green bars / host vs AUS yellow We outplayed them even down on connection. No rank change. Team Doubles on Snowbound 2 AUS? vs 2 AUS Green bars vs Green bars / host We pulled host! Wasn't very definitive however as we were both Aussies I believe. We were leading 16 to 3 when they quit. No rank change. Team Doubles/Snipers on Isolation 2 AUS vs 2 AUS Green bars / host vs Green bars Their host was not definitive at all. I believe we lost fair and square, by 3 kills. Was actually a fun game. No rank change. Team Doubles on Isolation 2 AUS (same players as last game) vs 2 AUS Green / host vs Green Their host was again no advantage to them. We won by 1 kill. Another fun game. No rank change. RESULTS Out of 9 games we got: 1x Host. No rank change. 2x Non-host but both basically same connection anyway. No rank change. 6x Non-host with advantage to hosts. I de-ranked twice in 2 of these. NOTES I will admit, this was a bad night across the board with host results. They usually aren't this bad. However, they usually aren't that great neither. Please port your comments and constructive feedback on the topic. I do not want to see posts where people are flaming other countries because of their hosts/connections. If I see any 'Country X are jerks because they bragged about winning even thought we had $%^& connection' I will report the posts. If anyone was in these games and would want the statistic removed, please post a comment here saying so or send me a message. Thanks for reading. Again, please post your comments and constructive feedback on the topic. Also too, please post on the bungie thread to keep it alive; Cheers.
I like some of these ideas, although I also want to add that when you lag out of a game, you shouldn't lose EXP. It wasn't your fault, you know.
true, but i'm pretty sure the system bungie has going doesn't judge it by lagging out. They take it as quitting. Example, someone drops out of a game. Maybe they had a power outage, something they couldn't control.
Definitely have to add this to an update, lag is 99% of the reason I don't play MatchMaking. It's just not fun because I can't get a legitimate kill most the time. If our connection was as good as if we were in America I honestly believe my rank would be much higher. Playing customs I rarely lag, seeing how I usually play with other Aussies, and those games feel very different to MM games. They feel fair and when I loose in a fair game I am still entertained, unlike loosing a game I honestly believe I should have won.
You want some proof? One of my friends in Halo (lives is Queensland, Australia) recently went over to America for schooling (a university course) and is still currently there. I played with him a lot before he went. I wouldn't grade him any higher than a 40. After about a month of living in America, he is now rank 48. It would be nice not to lose XP, however, XP is a lot easy to regain than rank. That is why I didn't include it in my post as an update. It's more of a secondary concern.
This is probably the most times I've been quoted in a thread. Anyways, they should also make it to where if your searching for a game, then you find one, Matchmaking should have a prediction system that tries to predict if the game is going to be laggy. If it is predicted to be laggy, then the search should restart. I don't know if Bungie already has this, but it should be used if it isn't already.
Here's another quote: I think it actually does sometimes. I think it restarts sometimes is peoples NATs are very different and would cause a 'hellish' game.