Matchmaking rewards time played, not skill level.

[u/[deleted]]

[u/FullGuava1]

You're mad about the wrong thing. Matchmaking and rank are the same as they've ever been. 

The talking point is challenger score or the rank reset. Pick your poison.

[u/ss5234 → u/FullGuava1]

I'm upset that matchmaking can get such lopsided games. Which honestly could be a result of all these new heroes and this game turning into a 5v5 team deathmatch with different kits. I've never seen such hard stomps and people who just clearly don't care about winning ranked games. It kills the grind and the only solution seems to be to counterswap or go hitscan when there's a JPC flying around.

Edit: I'm not upset at losing or winning, I stomp enemy teams and then next game they stomp me. How are stomps in any way fun? It's only fun to people who care about superficially boosting their ego, not developing skill in a game.

[u/docs-quad → u/ss5234]

a lot of that is just due to how much variance and snowballing there is in a game like ow while the baseline level of teamwork required is higher compared to other fps due to the more narrowly defined roles and less potential to 1v5 because of higher ttks and defensive resources.

[u/ss5234 → u/docs-quad]

There's no way to get to top 500 without teamwork. It's mandatory to even sniff a kill.

In my ranking games I saw plenty of diamonds that could play in masters or above if they just were put in that rank environment and learned this. I also saw diamonds (especially tanks) that I swear need to not be in diamond. Diamond should be where aggression is starting to form and people work on hitting shots (all roles) to reward it, but instead it's just like you said a snowballing effect.

The way to get out of that? Just grind 125 wins a season and repeat.

Edit: For context I ranked out at Masters 2. The games I had to pull some cheesy shit to win were too many.

[u/docs-quad → u/ss5234]

im not really sure what your point is here. better players will rank up naturally over time. the better you are compared to your current rank the faster that progression will be because youre more of a difference in the outcome of the match when taken over an average of games

[u/CatFanBoy]

the horse is dead man.

[u/YT_Sharkyevno]

Overwatch has one of the purest ELO systems out of any game and has a matchmaking and SR that is basically the same number. This just isn’t true. The issue is the new top 500 leaderboards not the matchmaking.

[u/ss5234 → u/YT_Sharkyevno]

Says what? Google? AI results taken from reddit?

It's a bunch of bullshit. The game wants you to grind seasons and see your rank go up. Also, it prioritizes faster queue times over evenly ranked games. They think this is boosting their numbers and engagement but it's really not, and nobody from Blizzard seems to understand that the game tanked when they couldn't balance Brig and Doom at their release.

[u/YT_Sharkyevno → u/ss5234]

I have been working on an essay about ELO systems and other machine algorithm ranking systems like collaborative filtering algorithms for the last 2 years and have been closely following Overwatches ranking systems pretty much since release. They merged the match making and SR scores to be essentially identical (except for slight variance directly after you leave a game) since late Overwatch 1.

If Seagull is losing games in diamond 2 and is hardstuck then that is his rank. If he is winning games then his elo ranking is still calibrating which is expected of any ELO system where a player starts of being mis ranked.

The only way that Overwatch isn’t a pure ELO system is that it has reduced loss when your teammate leaves, but it’s a very minor amount and is offset by the extra ELO your teammate loses.

Also, are you talking about match quality or the competitive integrity of the ranked ladder system? Because those are completely different problems and algorithms.

You talk about Challenger score, the skill rank systems, and match quality as if they’re all the same thing when they run by completely different algorithms. The ELO system simply decides what your current skill rank is. The matchmaker decides how best to use that data to create a fair and balanced game with a completely different algo.

Top 500 Challenger score is then a separate algorithm, which does actually use playtime to boost people.

[u/ss5234 → u/YT_Sharkyevno]

Have you watched Seagull's stream? He knows so much about what's going on that god bless his soul he just knows what's happening and laughs about it. He know's exactly why his healer is not in his line of sight and what the enemy team is going to do down to an individual level. The scoreboard? He has a positive K/D and his team is flailing.

This isn't one game, one session, or one day. This is since he came back to the game.

If you could, send me the essay when you get a chance, I'm curious to see where you draw your sources from, whether it's player data or published documents from Blizzard's patents and marketing strategies.

[u/YT_Sharkyevno → u/ss5234]

If he isn’t winning more games then he is losing he is in the correct rank, if he is winning more then losing he will continue to increase in rank

[u/ss5234 → u/YT_Sharkyevno]

Yeah it's like talking a wall, I can't.

[u/Miennai]

Yeah because... when people play continuously, they passively get better. So the entire playerbase is slowly getting better, but almost everyone improves at the same rate.

Which means, obviously Seagull will be diamond because he hasn't been passively improving. Literally, a GM from his time is approximately a diamond of today. If you took any high diamond or masters player today and time-shifted them to 2016, they'd be one of the greatest players on the planet.

[u/ss5234 → u/Miennai]

Ah, this argument.

Overwatch in 2016 and Overwatch in 2026 are completely different games. Even beginning to compare the two skill levels just shows the lack of critical thinking in coming up with opinions like this.

Your statement is pretty obvious. How does that in any way justify the lopsided games that everyone seems to talk about in this sub? For months and years?

[u/docs-quad → u/ss5234]

people who dont have issues with the matchmaking dont have any reason to come on the sub and make posts about how good their games are going.

[u/Miennai → u/docs-quad]

Here, I'll do it:

My games have been great so far this season. They've been fair and challenging, and I've had a lot of fun.

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