Third PTS in a row without any serious changes to Battlegrounds, CAN WE PLEASE HAVE THEM FIXED NOW?!

jcm2606

Cyrodiil is about ready to crumble, and Battlegrounds aren't doing so well, either. Between MMR, garbage match making, broken queues, broken metas, Battlegrounds are just as depressing to play as Cyrodiil, despite not having the crippling lag of Cyrodiil. How have they not received any serious attention, in 3 PTS periods, despite us practically screaming at you to fix them? How?

I'm about at the end of my rope with Battlegrounds, so as a last ditch effort to have this potentially great form of PVP receive the fixes it truly deserves, no, needs, I'm just going to compile every problem in the one thread. Hope you guys actually read this and take everything in, because at this point, it's getting to be an actual joke. @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_RichLambert @ZOS_RobGarrett @ZOS_BrianWheeler

Broken Queues
Quickest and easiest to address, so it's up first. If you're not familiar with this problem, the Battlegrounds queue can occasionally get stuck trying to find players, leaving one team a man short for potentially hours at a time, which renders the match unable to start, since one team is a man short. The only way to fix this is to either wait for the queue to fix itself (can take hours, and potentially draws more players into the match, making the problem worse), or to simply leave the match, giving you the deserter penalty and leaving you unable to queue again for another 20 minutes.

Not that bad if you have other things to do while you wait for the penalty to end, but if you've logged in specifically to do Battlegrounds -- which many of us who are vocal about this problem do log in specifically to do Battlegrounds -- it leaves you unable to do the very thing you logged in to do, in which case, why keep playing. The fix for this is dead simple, and literally just involves checking if the match is still in the "Waiting for players" stage before applying the penalty to somebody who leaves. Maybe 5-10 minutes of someone's time to fix an issue that has plagued Battlegrounds for years.

MMR
Behind broken queues, this is IMO the next most destructive thing for Battlegrounds. The idea behind MMR is great, separating players into distinct brackets based on their individual performance keeps matches interesting since matches are more well balanced, and it also keeps matches enjoyable. But the execution honestly sucks. Before I start, I want to say that everything I'm talking about is speculation based on observations from everybody in the community. Zenimax has kept MMR and its inner workings hidden, so we can only take educated guesses as to how it works. Anyways, execution.

Firstly, MMR seems to be somewhat based off of medal score, or the total points you've individually scored at the end of the match. There are so many things wrong with this, but the biggest is that this effectively makes MMR scale based on time played, alongside individual performance. A good player may earn 6k points at the end of a match, compared to a newer player who only earned 1.5k points, but because MMR is based on your points, that newer player can simply play 4 matches and earn the same 1.5k points, to match the good player's 6k. MMR should really be based off a combination of things, such as overall win/loss ratio (MMR increases when you win a match, MMR decreases when you lose a match), kill/death ratio (MMR increases as you do better at PVP, MMR decreases as you do worse at PVP), etc.

Secondly, MMR seems to never go down. This means that you'll only ever face increasingly harder and harder opponents, eventually getting to a point where every match is filled with players who easily outrank you, purely because you've played a ton of Battlegrounds. It's not like there's weekly or monthly MMR resets, so this is a huge problem for those who don't enjoy getting steamrolled, like myself. If MMR were changed to what I suggested above (being based on a number of factors), it would naturally balance itself out based on how you do. However, if MMR were to remain based on your medal score, it could balance itself out based on how many points you have compared to some median, say 3k -- if you earn more than 3k points, your MMR goes up, if you earn less than 3k points, your MMR goes down.

Thirdly, premades seem to be separated from everybody else solely through MMR inflation. This is the one that really confuses me. Basically, when you queue for a Battleground as a premade group, the individual MMR values of each player in the group seem to be averaged together to form the MMR for the group itself, and then that MMR is increased based on the size of the group. Think about it for a second, and consider how that would work with the first two points -- MMR is based on time played, and MMR never goes down. A premade has their MMR inflated to enormous heights, but your own MMR is also inflated to enormous heights, because you've played a ton of matches. How on Earth is this meant to separate premades from solo queues? It can't. It just can't. Premade matching should be done on their own variable alongside MMR, which would properly separate them from solo queues.

Match Making
Just general match making woes. A few of these are caused by MMR, but they're still a problem with match making, IMO.

Firstly, extremely long queue times caused by obscenely high MMR brackets. Those who do Battlegrounds regularly often hit a certain point where their queue times get significantly longer, sometimes taking longer than the match itself. From what I can tell, this is caused by the MMR brackets being so wide and MMR itself being so high, that there just isn't enough players in rotation. They either need to shrink the gap between the MMR brackets so players are closer to each other, or they need to loosen up the MMR requirements for the queue to find other players.

Secondly, lack of match diversity caused by obscenely high MMR brackets. Similar to long queue times, the lack of players in rotation due to MMR also causes a lack of match diversity, where every match is always against the same dozen or so players. Like long queue times, shrinking the gap would introduce more diversity, as there are more players in rotation.

Thirdly, groups missing a 4th player for an extended period of time, sometimes even the whole match. A 3v3v4 or a 3v4v4 just isn't fun. What more can I say about it? I'd imagine that this is also caused by a lack of players in rotation due to MMR, causing the queue to take ages to find a 4th, so same fixes.

Fourth, role imbalance in matches. Healers are extremely strong in Battlegrounds, and having one can mean the difference between being basically immortal, or dropping dead at the drop of a pin. The queue doesn't seem to take role into account when forming a match, so sometimes one team can have a healer, while the other two are full DPS, often leading to an easy win for the healer's team. The queue should take role into account when forming a match, and it should attempt to balance healers between the teams, to make the match as balanced and fair as possible.

jcm2606

This really needs to be addressed ASAP. Everybody is sick of the current Battlegrounds experience, you've already left them wayyy too long, enough for people to be turned off from them. For the sake of Battlegrounds and everybody who enjoys them, give them the changes they need and deserve.

Olupajmibanan

I agree with all the points.

I will add one more pain point. Battlegrounds lack long-term progression. Ranked mode hasn't been implemented and BG leaderboards can't even be considered leaderboards. Leaderboards should reflect player performance and not time played in a given week, like it is now. I would really like to see BG leaderboards working like vMA or trial ones, which actually measure player performance.

TimeDazzler

#RankedSoloQueue

OlumoGarbag

Well bg healing was fixed. There are no more good bg healer builds if you dont wanna climb the magblade healer Meta.
Buff necro, sorc, dk, warden healers.

Strider__Roshin

IC > BGs

jcm2606

One last bump before this next patch, hope to god I see at least some actual changes to Battlegrounds.

Carbonised

I completely agree with all the points mentioned in OP. I've grinded through most os the BG achievements, and have gotten all 3 faction armors, and am currently trying to get the 3 faction weapons too, so I have done a lot of BGs.

They're atrocious, simply atrocious and horrible. The amount of time you waste in a queue that never ends, wait for teammates that never come, then get stuck on a team of 3 vs other teams of 4, get steamrolled by all the disgusting meta proc builds since there is no CP and everything is a bleed and proc hell, get no rewards whatsoever for your efforts, other than a few K of AP which you could have gotten 10x the amount of in Cyrodiil.

Rinse and repeat for the hundreth time, in the vain hope you might get one of the stupid motif pages you're after.

Just stop putting more collectibles into BGs already, it's sadistic to force people into your broken queues and unfinished teams, just to get the style pages they might like for their characters.

akray21

I want games with only 2 teams, and/or some larger numbers like 6v6 or 10v10.

jediodyn_ESO

Premade v pug separate que has been #1 topic on BG forums with hundreds of posts and an overwhelming (2/3) vote requesting that they separate the queues for over a year and a half.

Topic never even gets addressed in the patch notes. Could we please get a dev comment as to why they keep “tweaking the matchmaking system” but never make the one change we actually want and need.

Here’s a quote from my old Kenpo instructor:
“Baseball bat - instant black belt, gun - instant third degree black belt.” Being in a partial premade is like bringing a baseball bat to a fist fight, being in a full and coordinated premade against pugs is like bringing a gun to a fistfight.

You can “tweak” the matchmaking all you like but BGs are going to be terrible and frustrating until the queues get separated.

Cortimi

Finally, a post a I completely agree with.

The MMR problem needs addressed the most IMO. I am to the point now, that for some reason, I will get matched against ridiculously high ranked, very well geared, and very coordinated premades every time I solo queue. Bit of course, my team will consist of obviously new players, because apparently my MMR is so high I am expected to carry them through all odds.

I am not saying I am that good, nowhere near, but the MMR "thinks" I am, and it's always a bad experience, especially for those new guys that get absolutely blasted. Worst part is, if I have ANY modicum of success against that premade, make ANY decent plays to get a few medals, or Azura forbid I somehow get more kills than deaths, the MMR system says "see! I knew you could do it!"

Yeah, me going 7-6 and the rest of my team going 0-10 while the enemy premade goes like 20-2 STILL penalizes me. It's ridiculous.

NBrookus

Cortimi wrote: »

The MMR problem needs addressed the most IMO. I am to the point now, that for some reason, I will get matched against ridiculously high ranked, very well geared, and very coordinated premades every time I solo queue.

You don't even have to do many matches to be in this situation. MMR ramps up very fast.

Carbonised

The MMR system is a joke, and has been since the inception. Often I get stuck with complete noobs on my team who get walked all over by elite pvp'ers on the other side. Other times I get complete walkovers on the other teams, and the result looks like this:



At this point, they are better off just scrapping MMR system and premade groups altogether, and have your team and opponents be completely random. At least then the noobs and elitists are divided randomly and spread out over all teams.

Hyperion616

jediodyn_ESO wrote: »

Premade v pug separate que has been #1 topic on BG forums with hundreds of posts and an overwhelming (2/3) vote requesting that they separate the queues for over a year and a half.

Topic never even gets addressed in the patch notes. Could we please get a dev comment as to why they keep “tweaking the matchmaking system” but never make the one change we actually want and need.

Here’s a quote from my old Kenpo instructor:
“Baseball bat - instant black belt, gun - instant third degree black belt.” Being in a partial premade is like bringing a baseball bat to a fist fight, being in a full and coordinated premade against pugs is like bringing a gun to a fistfight.

You can “tweak” the matchmaking all you like but BGs are going to be terrible and frustrating until the queues get separated.

It is being addressed, by being ignored in favor of what the Developers feel is more important. I for one would love to have a separate queue for premade groups, but I doubt that is something that will never happen.

Also, someone that was new to the game like myself who went from 10 to 27 in battle grounds, I was blown away at how damn quick you just fall over and die with out even so much as being able to put up a decent fight. I would look at the recap and would see numbers in the 3 to 4k with some numbers being as high as 7k.

This outcome continued through out my battle grounds travels until I finally unlocked caltrops and vigor, I found myself praising a god I don't warship for never having to bother with battle grounds again.

Battle Grounds in this game seem like such a cluster F of stuff going on all around you, at least in the low level brackets. You seem to have so very little time to really think up a strategy before you fall over dead. I always try to stick with my team, figured there would be more safety in numbers, but hell, that doesn't seem to be the case either.

Not sure how pvp is at level 50, kind of feel like not even trying to be honest. Especially since I'm sure now that I'm at cp level 372 that I'll face cp level 810 players who will just look at me and I'll die.

jediodyn_ESO

Hyperion616 wrote: »

jediodyn_ESO wrote: »

Premade v pug separate que has been #1 topic on BG forums with hundreds of posts and an overwhelming (2/3) vote requesting that they separate the queues for over a year and a half.

Topic never even gets addressed in the patch notes. Could we please get a dev comment as to why they keep “tweaking the matchmaking system” but never make the one change we actually want and need.

Here’s a quote from my old Kenpo instructor:
“Baseball bat - instant black belt, gun - instant third degree black belt.” Being in a partial premade is like bringing a baseball bat to a fist fight, being in a full and coordinated premade against pugs is like bringing a gun to a fistfight.

You can “tweak” the matchmaking all you like but BGs are going to be terrible and frustrating until the queues get separated.

It is being addressed, by being ignored in favor of what the Developers feel is more important. I for one would love to have a separate queue for premade groups, but I doubt that is something that will never happen.

Also, someone that was new to the game like myself who went from 10 to 27 in battle grounds, I was blown away at how damn quick you just fall over and die with out even so much as being able to put up a decent fight. I would look at the recap and would see numbers in the 3 to 4k with some numbers being as high as 7k.

This outcome continued through out my battle grounds travels until I finally unlocked caltrops and vigor, I found myself praising a god I don't warship for never having to bother with battle grounds again.

Battle Grounds in this game seem like such a cluster F of stuff going on all around you, at least in the low level brackets. You seem to have so very little time to really think up a strategy before you fall over dead. I always try to stick with my team, figured there would be more safety in numbers, but hell, that doesn't seem to be the case either.

Not sure how pvp is at level 50, kind of feel like not even trying to be honest. Especially since I'm sure now that I'm at cp level 372 that I'll face cp level 810 players who will just look at me and I'll die.

Oh, if you think pre 50 BGs are bad now, just wait till people can buy skill lines!

You’ll see entire groups of pathetic bullies strapping gold twink gear on super low level toons with max skills infesting these sub 50 BGs with even more OP new player stomping joy.

Maybe if the 50+ BGs weren’t so full of broken matches and pug v premade imbalances at least a few of these players would go back to having fun with better competition instead of taking their frustration out on the new player population.

ecru

Nearly all of the issues in this thread stem from there being three teams instead of two like in every other game that has ever existed, on top of very small teams, on top of premades being able to make up an entire team. All of these issues combined consistently create the worst balanced and least fun matches I've experienced in any MMO, and I've played pretty much everything.

Three teams creates a gigantic black hole in every BG that siphons up every last bit of fun you could hope to have (unless the teams are extremely imbalanced) by ensuring that nearly every fight leaves you outnumbered and/or actively engaging the enemy team(s) instead of standing around waiting means that you will be rear-ended over and over and over again. It never feels fair, so even when you're winning, it never feels fun or enjoyable. Wins are because you rear-ended the enemy teams, and losses are because you got rear ended. This isn't fun (I realize I'm repeating myself, but there' a lot of emphasis on this part in particular), not interesting, not enjoyable, not anything that would make someone feel good about the overall instanced pvp experience and incentivize them to hit the queue button again.

Small teams with poor matchmaking and/or full premades lead to much easier imbalanced matches, which every other developer besides ZOS has learned. The reason for this is that the smaller teams are, the easier one or two high skilled outliers or healers can turn the tide of a match. This means that matchmaking must be that much more accurate, or you end up with extremely lopsided matches, and we know how "good" the matchmaking is.

A full team consisting of a premade being put up against pugs only exacerbates all of these issues. The more organized, better communicating premade can more easily choose when to engage and disengage, giving themselves a near permanent numbers advantage against their enemies as they rear-end the other two pug teams during just about every fight. This leads to the worst outcomes imaginable, and often leads to people like myself just not queueing anymore if I'm being put up against the same premade over and over again.

The entire 4v4v4 system has failed to create fun, balanced matches, and should be scrapped. Why does no other game have three teams? Probably because of everything I mentioned above. No one likes unfair fights or having every fair fight interrupted over and over and over again. A more traditional 8v8 system like in pretty much every other game in existence would fix most or all of these issues, including the premade issue, as it could limit the premade queue to a group of 4. This would mean that at no point could more than half of a team be made up of a full premade, fights would be (mostly) fair and uninterrupted, and matches wouldn't be so easily imbalanced by a few exceptional players on either side.

Every other MMO's instanced pvp does not have the issues that BGs in ESO has, and every other game has only two teams. Different isn't always good or better, and in this case, it's clearly a lot worse.

HEBREWHAMMERRR

Bump. Something needs to be done. BG ques are extremely inconsistent and haven’t been touched aside from the horrible map additions here and there. Show some love please. This was a main feature of morrowind and it’s fallen to the back burner. At the very least incentivize it more. It will help free up cyrodill space and maybe prevent some of the horrible lag in there since that can’t seem to be fixed either.

jcm2606

Two weeks in a row, and nothing was done for Battlegrounds? Can we please have something done about them?!

MaxJrFTW

Remove MMR, and remove premades. That would immediately fix my two biggest bg problems.

Carbonised

MaxJrFTW wrote: »

Remove MMR, and remove premades. That would immediately fix my two biggest bg problems.

Removing those 2 things would ficx the BG problems for mostly everyone.

Not to mention the fact that premade grouping is being exploited heavily for people to obtain certain BG achievements, especially in Chaosball and Relic matches.

luen79rwb17_ESO

About MMR all I can say is that I have potential better teams on my main characters whereas my less geared characters get way worse teams.

This is all personal experience but I think the MMR system seems to be working as intended.

SeaUnicorn

Yes plox, so we can have midyear mayhem