Matchmaking-Rating
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Rating issues for Arena and RBG wins
There is a strange issue taking place at the moment with rating. Rating itself is a tricky thing to wrap your head around, especially as it's recently gone thorough something of a shift. Right now, your character has two ratings for every bracket of arena, and for RBGs. One is the MMR, the matchmaking rating. This is the rating the system uses to match you up against similar level players. It's shown at the bottom right of the scoreboard after every match, as an average of your group's character MMRs. The other type of rating is CR, Current Rating. This is the rating that your character earns by winning and losing matches, the one that's shown in green and red letters in the main part of the scoreboard. It's also the rating that gets you titles and mounts. Every season CR is reset to 0, while MMR remains what it was last season. So, if you ended season 14 on an MMR of 1800 and a CR of 1880, you'd have begun season 15 with an MMR of 1800 and a CR of 0. What happens next is that as you win games, your CR increases towards your MMR. You should expect it to stabilize as you reach a CR that's near your MMR. As you win and lose games, your MMR will also shift. Your MMR aims to give you a 50/50 win-loss rate, as when that's achieved you're being pretty evenly matched.
Dissecting the Dev Watercooler on PvP
A few days ago, Blizzard Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street released a very lengthy Dev Watercooler on Mists of Pandaria PvP. Now that the dust has had a chance to settle, we're going to take a look at the blog and its implications for PvP right now. Next time we might look at some of their zany ideas for future PvP! MMR MMR, or Match-Making Rating is how teams are matched in rated PvP. MMR is separate from rating, but both are altered when you win or lose against other rated teams. Explaining the difference between the two is a little tricky, but essentially, MMR is how your matches are found. MMR is linked to players and teams, so a player forming a new team will carry some of their MMR with them from previous PvP escapades, in order for them not to face far lower-rated players. Rating is also linked to both players and teams, but doesn't dictate who you face. Rating is won and lost via winning and losing against teams with better and worse MMRs. Say you're at 1500 MMR and 1500 rating, and you face a team at 1600 MMR and 1600 rating, and you lose. You will only lose a small amount of rating, let's say 5, and they will only gain a small amount, again let's say 5. Both your MMRs will adjust similarly. Now say you beat them. They will lose a big chunk of rating, but likely not such a big chunk of MMR. You, equally, will gain a big chunk of rating, and depending on how many matches you've played, likely gain a reasonable amount of MMR. The MMR is saying "hey these guys beat a 1600 team. They're better than a 1500 MMR".
2v2 team hits 3206 team rating, 3585 personal rating
A 2v2 team on US-Ruin has somehow achieved an unheard-of 3206 team rating. Paper Cut Your Eyelids' team leader is Cäke, a Blood Elf Priest in three-piece Deadly, one-piece Furious Gladiator gear. His Orc partner, Kwamo, a nearly full Furious Assassination Rogue, has somehow amassed a 3585 personal rating on the curiously successful team. This is pretty amazing when you consider the highest 2v2 team last season was rated below 3000. Red flags are going up over this one, folks. The team has a strangely unimpressive win ratio of 82-71. If each of their losses brought the team down 0 points, (which we know is untrue from their match history), each of their wins would average out to slightly greater than ~39 points per win. As they are nearly 400 team rating above the next highest team on the battlegroup, one would assume their gains would decrease dramatically the higher they ascend.
Arena teams hit 3k
A pair of 3v3 teams from the US Bloodlust Battlegroup -- aka BG9 and reputed to be the best US Battlegroup -- recently hit the 3000 rating, the hard cap for Arena ratings. A few other teams following closely behind at 2953 and 2949, making it likely that they, too, will hit 3000 before Season 6 is over. This has caused a bit of a stir in the Arena community, although it's not entirely unexpected considering all the changes that had been made to the Arena system since the launch of Wrath of the Lich King. In fact, some had predicted that this season would see teams hit 3k legitimately (unscrupulous win-traders have hit the ceiling before).The two teams, big furious joke and sup fresh our turn baby, an RLS (Rogue, Warlock, Shaman) and a RetPR (Retribution Paladin, Priest, Rogue) respectively, are composed of members who have performed consistently well through different Arena seasons. The Rogue of big furious joke, Nutzz, is rumored to be the legendary Neilyo, who grew to infamy with his popular series of PvP videos. Its Shaman, Douja, formerly played pro for Team Pandemic. The other team's Paladin, Euneek, topped his Battlegroup last season using the Holyplay (Ret Pally, Priest, Shaman) comp. None of these guys are slouches and aren't likely to have win traded the way teams in the past have in order to reach the hard cap.Their recent achievement has brought the current Arena system under scrutiny, as Blizzard has stated before that they never intended for players to reach the rating ceiling. Considering the system has undergone numerous changes in the past few seasons, it's not unreasonable to think that it's due for another overhaul. Regardless of the system, a 3k rating is an incredible achievement. Congratulations on jobs well done.[Thanks to cigarillo for the heads up!]
The Art of War(craft): Arena Season 6, rise of the Casual Gladiator
I know, I know, most of you hate Arenas. I've been writing for WoW Insider -- ahem, I mean WoW.com -- long enough to know that you guys probably aren't the most avid of PvP players. But the fun thing about it is that at least I'm not preaching to the choir, right? Anyway, I have to admit that I've gotten pretty tired of Arenas myself. Aside from two to three weeks worth of games in Season 5, I skipped the season altogether, unhappy with the balance then and the constantly changing rating and matchmaking system.That wasn't even the heart of it, really. In the past seasons where I'd had the most success, I played with particular classes and specs that were viable in that season's environment. More importantly, I teamed up with players who were focused on PvP and were expectedly competent at it. The downside was that our success as a team was proportional to my loathing of the players on my team, particularly our team leader who was prone to excessive nerd rage and finger pointing. It sometimes happens that the best PvP players aren't necessarily your friends, and working together towards high ratings is sometimes a marriage of convenience. At a certain point when the stakes were extremely high, where wins would net us measly gains and losses would tank us badly enough for us to lose titles, Arenas became more stressful than fun.
Season 6 weapons as good as Ulduar drops
As an addendum to the recent Arena system FAQ posted on the forums, Kalgan addresses several concerns about the gear, the system, and questions of skill vs. gear. In a very forthcoming and transparent post, Kalgan admits that Blizzard "botched the ilvls" of the current Deadly Gladiator weapons by making them a full tier below the items from Kel'thuzad in heroic Naxxramas. At the time they designed them, Blizzard didn't account for how easily accessible Kel'thuzad would be. He promises they won't make the same mistake in Season 6, and that the new Furious Gladiator weapons would be equivalent to the items in Ulduar. Kalgan explains that the aim is to balance the accessibility of the items so that the number of raiders who have access to the best raid weapons is roughly the same as the number of Arena players with access to the best PvP weapons. He even goes so far as to say that Blizzard will make two tiers of PvP weapons if necessary. This might have been in the original plan as Hateful Gladiator weapons are in the game files but not available in the game.
New Arena matchmaking system FAQ
This will be like beating on a dead horse or something since Blizzard keeps making posts about it, but Aratil put up a comprehensive FAQ about the new and mysterious Arena matchmaking system. This is probably the most enlightening post of all, and should clear up many questions players have about their ratings versus their performance. It explains why some teams are experiencing drops in personal and team ratings even when they sport winning records.In a nutshell, the system is continuously trying to place players and teams in the bracket. This means a 50% win ratio, where teams are fighting other teams of equal skill (and thus have an even chance to win or lose). If players get winning records but still drop in ratings, it means that they are beating far inferior teams and the system will adjust their Matchmaking Ratings or MMR to the appropriate level. It is by far the best post about the subject, answering important concerns clearly and without any smoke and mirrors. The way Aratil explains it shows how the new system is superior to the old one. If you're going to read just one post about the new system (and there's a lot), this should be it.
New Arena system: you suck more than you know
Well, the changes to the Arena system haven't made the game any more fun for people. Players are still reporting losses on winning records, and Slorkuz hops over to the official forums to explain things. The short version is: if you're winning games and dropping in ratings, it's because you suck. You do. The system has been tracking your level of suck and adjusting your wins to bring your team rating down to the appropriate level of fail. Of course, Slorkuz puts it more diplomatically than that.He mentions that the new 'hidden rating' which determines the matchmaking process remembers your original ratings. Players who routinely dropped to 1200, for example, and reformed teams at 1500 are recognized by the system and are promptly put in their place -- even if they win. This is because the new system is correctly matching those players with others who suck equally. So, let me get this straight... because you're beating other players who don't have much skill to begin with, they're worth less points?
