Suggestion for Better Ranked Matchmaking

[BartonFink]

I don't have my 10 posts yet, so I can't post this in whatever the appropriate forum is. If a moderator moves this, can they send me the link to where they move it to?

My suggestion:

Ranked matches should result in competitive bouts between two evenly matched opponents but more often than not they don't. That's because you may come across someone who has access to better cards than you or they have just gambled and won by paying a lot of money for a small chance of getting a lot of cards that they don't currently have.

As an alternative, why not match opponents based on their starting decks, not their ranking? Playing Seasonal matches sometimes, some opponents bail on me, perhaps because they think that I won't be competitive or maybe it's because that they have powerful decks which work against other powerful decks but might struggle against starter decks, for all I know.

It might be an idea to be able to have screening parameters for match-ups, like only being able to use a standardised starter deck.

One thing which annoys me are OP decks against my pretty low level deck. The past seasonal challenge had that Nilfgaardian card which just kept multiplying. I would have loved to have been able to screen out such opponents.

Playing MTG online some years ago, I had some slow decks which I liked but since I couldn't screen out some fast decks, it just wasn't worth playing them. So, if there are factions that tend to be OP for your deck, it would be good to be able to screen out such match-ups.

 

[BoYoDes]

I think it will be way fair for new players to be matched against familiar Prestige level players. Not sure how (or where) it can be implemented, but maybe try this for the Casual Mode, at least. New players have the perception that playing in Casual they will find more players like them, while in fact, it's the exact opposite and it is disgusting (therefore I'm not touching it anymore).

 

[BartonFink]

One weakness of my suggestion is that people new to the game would struggle with a standard deck compared to veterans of the game with a standard deck. So my suggestion would no doubt need a parameter that you could get a match up with a more experienced player once you had played a certain number of games and demonstrated some basic knowledge of how the game works. Some new players might be faster learners than others, so I wouldn't suggest some hard and fast rule.

I haven't paid a cent to buy cards and I probably won't now, but it is really tiring to play along with the daily quests and get long losing streaks in Classic or Seasonal mode. It took me ages to go from level 19 to 18 or whatever the jargon here is. It really makes the game boring and I'm not sure how long I'll stick at it, but I should probably spend less time on this game anyway, as I wasn't intending to start playing it. I just tried it for a bit to see how it worked and haven't stopped so far.

I have played against what I assume are much higher ranked players than me in Seasonal mode and beaten them at times, which makes me think that my suggestion in this thread is worth considering.

 

[Pacifixer]

I never had any problems with ranked matchmaking. There might be sone problems at lower ranks, but it works just fine at high ranks.

Casual matchmaking is a diferent story - it doesn't work, at all. I'm often matched against Prestige 0 players (levels 1 to 60), who clearly have no idea what to do and often can't even count to 10. Also i see lot of new players with the most broken meta decks.

You are a new player, right? What do you think about the tutorial, is it good enough?

 

[BartonFink]

Firstly, why I am now having to 'prove' "I am not a robot" again? I've already mentioned that that 'feature' kills this site for me and I'm likely to take up the advice of the user here who commented that it's better to use Reddit. If this site keeps asking me to prove that I am not a robot, I will use another site, as no human wants to go into a never ending loop of RECAPTCHA tests to prove that you are not a human. It is an absolute troll by sites that use this. As is doing this whole "10 posts before you can post like anyone else". I belileve that Reddit doesn't do that and you can still talk to the game's devs there, right? So what is the point of this forum?

As for the tutorial, I can't remember it but probably didn't find it that useful or informative. I think this link is for my first post here and I mentioned some issues about that there.

GWENT: Community Q&A Thread - Ask Your Questions Here

How can I get arena tickets? Are they awards, shoppe items? Can I mill something to get them? You can buy them with real money or with ore. Just enter the arena and select your choice.

forums.cdprojektred.com

Currently I'm level 18, rank 38 or something like that. Every now and again I make mistakes but sometimes I can cover for them, if I make a mistake playing cards.

On MTG, one good thing about that was being able to play the AI with either side having any deck that you wanted. That would be really useful for GWENT. This game seems to be stuck on one AI deck.

It would be useful having a board with cards on it that demonstrates how cards play against each other, which would help in becoming a better player.

Anyway, as far as ranked matched goes, I often play the daily quests and it's not that common to have a good game. My cards can't deal with OP decks as my cards can be too picky as to what situations they work effectively. I.e. you can't clear a OP row unless circumstances are just right.

It's just plain boring playing those decks and I would like to exclude those from match making...having similar or identical decks would make for more good games, I think.

 

[BartonFink]

I've had computer problems for a few days now and have just played a few games in Classic mode. I was one or two wins away from going to Level 16. My first 3 games have been against Nor, I've gone first all three times. I've been smashed all three times. Is Nor the new super-buffed deck? What happened to having evenly matched decks (Sco has been the most recent OP deck as has Mon)? It shouldn't matter what deck you play but it does, especially if you don't want to pay to have a very slim chance of getting new cards, which I don't. I wouldn't have put myself down for being a long-term player of this game but FFS gameplay like this is really something which makes quitting sooner more attractive. I've previously posted here about my suggestions to make the match-making better, here:

Suggestion for Better Ranked Matchmaking

I don't have my 10 posts yet, so I can't post this in whatever the appropriate forum is. If a moderator moves this, can they send me the link to where they move it to? My suggestion: Ranked matches should result in competitive bouts between two evenly matched opponents but more often than not...

forums.cdprojektred.com

I'd paraphrase or add the following:

1) Allow me to choose what decks I can play against or what cards I don't want to play against. I'm bored playing the same super-buffed decks match after match, getting smashed match after match. These are not Good Games.

2) Allow people to play only the standard, starter decks against each other.

3) Don't add new cards to a deck until you've allowed other decks to be competitive. Swerving from one OP deck to another isn't fun. I'm really not interested in being a script kiddie following whatever the latest hot new OP deck is and copying it.

As I said, I don't think that you get good games based on people with a similar level being matched against each other. You get good games through having evenly matched decks.

Post automatically merged: Jan 29, 2020

First game today, against Nor. I'm playing Nil. I lost the 1st round but had a 2 card advantage going into the 2nd round. Really, I had great cards and great synergies. It was close in the third round but in the end they ended up winning comfortably. It's ridiculous. With such a 'strong' hand, card advantage, to lose by about 20 or whatever it was, just shows how OP Nor is right now. I can't blame the cards that I was dealt. I didn't make any obvious mistakes playing them. My faction is just uncompetitive and it's not like I could say that I would have won this match from this position if I had better cards available to me. I had great cards. Just up against an OP deck.

 

[MaxisZ]

BartonFink
very bad idea. best matchmaking is based on elo.
modern CCG matchmaking is already a bad surrogate

 

[shepherdmoon]

I think the way match-making is done in ranked ("classic") is fine, but it could use improvement in the other modes (e.g., not non-existent). Northern Realms (abbreviated NR by the community) is currently a contender for the strongest faction in the game: they have very strong bronzes and golds, while other factions struggle a bit with one or the other. Nilfgaard (NG) can be very powerful, though, and is currently the most popular faction, at least partially because it counters a lot of strategies other factions try to use.

If you are having so much trouble even at low ranks I recommend looking up some resources for new players and getting some inspiration for your decks from meta reports published by Team Aretuza and Team Leviathan. Watching streamers on twitch or guides on youtube can also be helpful in learning how to play at a more competitive level.

I will also add my voice to suggesting you check out Gwent on Reddit: it is much more active than these forums and there are a lot of people there that are happy to help out new players.

PS: @BartonFink I love your username!!

 

[Allistre]

I will also add my voice to suggesting you check out Gwent on Reddit: it is much more active than these forums and there are a lot of people there that are happy to help out new players.

Theres more people on reddit, but you cant actually talk about the game there without being downvoted. Offering suggestions/critisism is like forbidden. The only things that get upvoted are appreciation posts and memes. It's really more like for advertising Gwent. I think sticking to the forums for real conversation about gameplay is better.

 

[shepherdmoon]

Theres more people on reddit, but you cant actually talk about the game there without being downvoted. Offering suggestions/critisism is like forbidden. The only things that get upvoted are appreciation posts and memes. It's really more like for advertising Gwent. I think sticking to the forums for real conversation about gameplay is better.

Yeah, a downside to posting on Reddit is that the down-vote button exists, and some people are too liberal with it. But I think you are exaggerating a little bit. Some suggestions/criticisms and real discussions get a good reception there. Also, it's only virtual, meaningless "karma points" just ignore them and speak your mind. (Also... your post is less likely to be deleted there by mods if it is controversial...)

 

[BartonFink]

PS: @BartonFink I love your username!!

I think the way match-making is done in ranked ("classic") is fine, but it could use improvement in the other modes (e.g., not non-existent).

If you are having so much trouble even at low ranks I recommend looking up some resources for new players and getting some inspiration for your decks from meta reports published by Team Aretuza and Team Leviathan. Watching streamers on twitch or guides on youtube can also be helpful in learning how to play at a more competitive level.

PS: @BartonFink I love your username!!

Sorry for the late reply. I thought that users were talking amongst themselves. Today I had a completely different experience in Classic mode. Won most of my matches. Ranked up to 15 from 16 and I didn't even need an extra win to lock in my Mosaic completion bonus. The decks I faced today weren't the same as when I wrote this thread. Initially, I kept getting the Nor decks to play against when I was getting hammered (first 3 logging in). Today there was a bit more variety.

There are multiple ranking systems for this game, right? I.e. Rank, Level. MMR or whatever you call it. fMMR or whatever you call it. It's just plain confusing and there isn't much to find when you search for Level, as far as explaining what it is. If Rank makes for poor matches, then surely just use another filter.

Even when I played MTG (badly), I wasn't interested in becoming a script kiddie just copying and pasting powerful decks to play for myself. The computing power available to the game should be sufficient to find me matches with people who play like that. That could mean me playing players ranked a lot lower than me.

re liking my user name, here's the kicker, I use the label "Cult classic" next to it! I was chuffed to see that option available. It seems such an odd phrase for the game to list as an option, but it works perfectly in my case!

I should probably add to my thread here about suggestions to improve the game the observation that some decks and units and cards are so unintuitive to understand. E.g. Harmony in Sco. It'd be my preference to not be scratching my head as to what a card's ability means or how it will play out...or wonder how the Hell it does what it does and why...I'm back to talking about Harmony. Have seen some comments online about that ability been extended more widely by the devs later, as in now pretty much any Sco unit will activate this ability. It's an OP ability. To counter it, you really need to have 2 or 3 cards to nuke the other side's board or row. Just to be competitive with them.

Post automatically merged: Feb 4, 2020

Theres more people on reddit, but you cant actually talk about the game there without being downvoted. Offering suggestions/critisism is like forbidden. The only things that get upvoted are appreciation posts and memes. It's really more like for advertising Gwent. I think sticking to the forums for real conversation about gameplay is better.

I noticed a while back that I acquired some Red Points. I can't say that I even knew what that was and probably still don't. Since I acquired them for threads where everybody disagreed with my comment, I just assumed that they were a negative feature of this site. I.e. a way to show displeasure with a poster's comments.

With Reddit, does it matter if you get downvoted or not? Does it make your comment or thread harder to find on the forum? Even on forums like this, with people posting threads all the time, people's threads can get buried too, without it being due to people reacting negatively to their posts. With forums like this, I just try and keep a tab on my profile for my posting history and notifications about replies to my posts.

Sorry for the delay in replying. Sometimes I miss them or it can just sometimes take me revisiting a thread to think of something relevant to say in reply to people.

 

[Allistre]

With Reddit, does it matter if you get downvoted or not? Does it make your comment or thread harder to find on the forum?

It really does matter. If you get -4 votes there, then your comment collapses and gets hidden. I've seen people post really reasonable things and end up with like -20 points and a bunch of hateful insults. Red points here are purely positive though.

 

[BartonFink]

It really does matter. If you get -4 votes there, then your comment collapses and gets hidden. I've seen people post really reasonable things and end up with like -20 points and a bunch of hateful insults. Red points here are purely positive though.

I suppose that downvotes wouldn't be too bad so long as you could easily read those threads or posts (so it wasn't a pain to uncover those hidden posts or threads). That Reddit system seems pretty common on the web. Posters don't get judged on their argument, they get (down)voted for having an opinion different to the voter. It's similar to how people rate music or TV/flim nowadays...everything is either 5/5 or 0/5...it's the greatest thing ever or the worst thing ever. A lot of times I'm a 2.5/5 kind of person. I.e. the thing is myeah...not great, not the worst thing ever.

Generally I can't be bothered voting or interacting with these kinds of opinions in a Reddit kind of way. I.e. I wouldn't downvote someone just because I disagreed with them. I can barely be bothered voting at the best of times.

If social media has a Like function I might only use to bookmark something, if there's no other way of keeping tabs on it.

 

[Draconifors]

Back on topic, please.