STEEMMONSTER THEORY: You should face ANYONE in your league
Please bring back the ability to face anyone in your league.
WHAT HAPPENED?
@steemmonsters changed the ranking algorithm to put you up against someone your exact same rank and if none then keep looking outward... while this seems nice on the face of it I'll try to make a case for why this is DUMB and why i think @steemmonsters was pressured into doing something this silly because people just didn't understand the game and ranking systems.
WHY?
The leagues were designed to put everyone on the same footing... right now i'm in the Gold and everyone should have the same limitations of the max level of our cards as I do... why should it matter that someone at the top of the league goes against someone at the bottom... has anyone ever watched sports? You do well and you win the privilege of having that exact thing happen and if the underdog wins then it's BIG news and well rewarded at least in publicity.
Right now this system does not allow for people to easily move into groups of competency by facilitating movement this is the opposite and i think it was because people just needed to be educated... just because you're facing someone at a higher rank doesn't necessarily mean they have higher privilege than you and you should be coddled and protected to not face someone potentially more skilled than you.
THE CASE FOR LOWER IN THE LEAGUE
In fact a lower level player (same league) should be BEGGING to play someone higher ranked than them. Because it's a win / win for them. If they loose they barely loose any points... they win they go up TONS in points.
THE CASE FOR DIVERSITY
Right now it's the same people fighting eachother beating eachother down and perhaps no one going anywhere... I'm playing the same people over and over ... it makes me want to stop for a couple hours and come back when new people are playing otherwise I know exactly what will happen I'll play the same 2-3 people who have the same scores and maybe I'll have a decent winning percentage but it won't matter I'll stay stagnant in my score.
And now everyone ahead of me is stuck with their people which i guess is cool for the people that made it to diamond and champion before the switch... i was moving right ahead in that direction actually incredibly fast (as is the presumption of the champions and diamonds) and now there's a wall.
The case of @jarwow
And this is evidenced not just by me but look at @jarwow
He's playing the same people as me... we're all just beating eachother down and keeping ourselves locked in the same grouping there is no fluid mobility up or down... it's a slow growth or slow fall. Those on top will just stay on top based on the virtue of being there... not because they're the most skilled. I want to see champions or diamonds fall hard and rise fast based on skill compared to their WHOLE LEAGUE not just because they happen to be better than the 4-5 people they get paired against.
The case of @avel692
Look at this guy who plays 16 games and wins 10 of them while playing me 4 times and even beating me 3 of them... and yet goes up 40?
RECAP
This needs to stop and go back to the old system...
please feel free to describe your complaints with the old system because I just don't understand them I feel like @yabapmatt and @aggroed were pressured into adapting to this really really bad system because of complaints so I wanna know what they are (were).
I'm open to hearing them... they better be dang good because the problems the new system brought I can't think can be beaten.
While I have no real preference on how we are matched in league play, I would have to say I agree with @holoz0r. There is no disadvantage to facing someone in the same league as you. If the points spread apart is 1 point or 1000 it doesn't matter as long as the level cards we both are allowed to use are the same.
If you enter a league without the max cards allowed to be used and lose to someone with more powerful cards in that league then that is not a match making issue, its a you better level up your cards issue.
Agreed!
Same league = same cards = same footing = should be playing matches with each other, even if there's a 500 rating difference in that league, because guess what ... there's no difference in the tools someone has the ability to deploy to the battlefield in that league, even with a large (500) rating disparity.
k early evidence is that perhaps I was too committed to my proposition because my first data was looking at just a really unfortunate set of circumstances... data is still showing the overall principle I'm talking about is likely proving true but it's not as widespread an issue as i had thought. More people playing will make it worse... but it's not as bad as i expected. I'll admit that.
this is taking a bit too much time to analyse and i have my actual real life job to do. haha
But here's what the data says.
If you want upward mobility in elo then you want
Basically we have an incentive now for less people to play ... specially in our own league and specially when we're at the top of the league.
Here are some data sets I was gonna go through @tufkat game me this one
Anyway the gold player had a bigger winning percentage and actually did have 3 big elo divergent scores against the same exact player which kinda throws off the stats in this case. But even still the elo divergent average was about 25% higher for tufkat even with those 3 anomalies. About two times greater difference without those 3 anomalies aka 50% 100v200. Take out the top 3 differences on tufkat and it barely moves the dial so they're not really anomalies.
Again willing to listen and see different data. I'm just thinking out loud.
The matchmaking system is now way better than before. But still I experienced some unfair matches against players from higher League.
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My only issue is that several changes have been implemented in a short timespan, and the result is that it feels it takes ages to find a game. Especially during midday European hours.
I'm always trying to see the game through the lens of a skeptical newcomer, and as it is now, it's just too fragmented. It doesn't have a good flow. I hope they implement more interactive elements asap. Before Season 3, at least you had it straight-on that the game is just a passive Find Match spamfest. Now it just feels that it has its legs in two boats.
Went a bit off-topic, but as far as your concern goes, I indeed don't see much scope for restraining rating range when the summoner levels are capped per league. If they want they can just add it in the Diamond/Champion leagues or just add a cap in Diamond.
As soon as I get in a new league, I get trampled regardless of rating, just because my cards are underleveled. Give it 2-3 days and other similar leveled ppl catch up and I'm starting to go up again.
Bottom line, I do agree with you in the sense that it feels this change has been implemented at the pressure of the high-rank players, who were tired of barely getting in Diamond and facing Top5 opponents. For lesser leagues, it didn't help with anything, it just made it:
In the old system I was only playing a few players too and some were the highest ranked players in the game with maxed out cards that there was no way I was ever going to beat with my cards. That was really frustrating. I have been enjoying the games this time and feel like I am playing some real fun games where I am not sure the winner. Last season it was more unevenly matched and I felt like I always new the outcome before the game started.