The current BRs/queus policy is not honest with players and my suggestion related to it

Suggestions
1

To begin with, let me set the record straight. This game doesn’t have five different BRs, in fact it only has three BRs.

Why, you ask? Because of the queues policy enforced by the devs.
The way it works now is that our five BRs are only split between two queues. First queue (BR1, BR2, BR3) and second queue (BR3, BR4, BR5).
Which in effect means that BR3 is the only one that can get into both queues. This means that BR1 and BR2 share the same queue, just as BR4 and BR5 share the same queue. Thus, effectively, these BRs could be combined into a single one. And we end up with only three BRs.

BR1 (current BR1 and BR2), BR2 (current BR3) and BR3 (current BR4 and BR5)
Whereby BR1 will always be low BR in match and at a disadvantage to BR2. And BR3 will always be top BR in match and at an advantage over BR2.
I would like to add that BR1 (current BR1 and BR2) contains Pz II and Pz IV F1. And BR3 (current BR4 and BR5) contains Pz IV H and Tiger II H
Quite a power level difference in equipment for a single BR.
That’s why I think it’s absolutely necessary to expand the number of queues.
To what number? Five - 5 queues for 5 BRs. And ideally, the matchmaking BR stream should be ±0.
Meaning, only BR1 will face BR1, BR2 will face BR2 and so…

You ask why not match making, which would allow BR spread in match ±1?
The answer is simple. Much easier to balance equipment.
No longer will things happen that a vehicle is intentionally put at a higher BR just because it would have the opportunity to meet a lower BR.
This is now the case with, say, Dicker max. The only reason that vehicle isn’t on the current BR3 is because it can meet BR1 and BR2 vehicles that it would clearly dominate against.
Fun fact, prior to the merge Dicker max had not fought a single BR4 or higher vehicle.

And won’t it have negative consequences on the quality and balance of players in each team? Won’t there be faction bias again, where good players will deliberately play only one faction?

In my opinion this problem already exists, and even merge hasn’t solved it. In my opinion, it can’t be gotten rid of. And I personally don’t really see the difference if I have to carry a team full of bots or casual players.
That’s why I think it shouldn’t limit the number of queues in any way. After all, it would only ever be 5 queues anymore. Even if more campaigns were added, the number of queues wouldn’t increase.
And that was the main problem with pre-merge campaigns.

PS.
This suggestion was made with the knowledge that the BR system was implemented for balance reasons.
Therefore, I don’t think arguments like “sometimes it’s nice to play against other equipment with different power level” is compelling.

For such a case, I would rather create (somewhere in the future a.k.a soonTM) a completely different game mode, maybe just for customs like lone fighter. Where instead of BR, the year of deployment would be decisive factor in matchmaking.

10 Likes
3

Yeah there’s no gameplay diversity there. Here I’ll quote myself on an idea I brainstormed a week back.

4

Yeah, because making queues where 90% of all equipment will be useless and everyone will just pick meta stuff is definition of gameplay variety. XD Good joke.

With my suggestion, if equipment on specific BR would be properly balanced/tweaked. Potentially everything could be usable. And meta wouldn’t be so significant.

3 Likes
5

Bruh most of the tier 5 matches I play against I won against almost all of them with bolt actions. Trust me, most of these tier BR 5 teams have BR 1 brains. So I don’t think meta weapons are as relevant of an issue and It’s pretty hilarious

6

That’s completely unrelated to what I have said.

If you want to take BR1 BAs to BR5 match, that’s up to you. And I think it should be always allowed to take stuff from lower BR to higher BR line up.

But people who only have low BR BAs shouldn’t be forced to play against higher BR if they do not want to.
This game isn’t just about you. It’s about all players. And there’s quite a bunch of players who aren’t so good.
And since BR system was created with intention of balance, that’s why I have created my suggestion.

2 Likes
7

The post I quoted myself on doesn’t force lower BR’s to go up against high br equipment. Matter fact does the opposite. It gives you the choice to be uptiered. If you have mostly bolt actions and don’t want to fight people with BR 3 weapons, just don’t equip br 3 things. If you want to see that type of challenge against 3 and 4, then just equip at least one BR 3 gun/vehicle. And if you don’t want to fight BR 5 matches then don’t equip anything with BR 5.

8

And I’d be on board with that.

1 Like
9

It works like that even in current Enlisted. And my suggestion would not change anything about that.

You have BR1 BAs and you seek challenge? You can add a single weapon BR 2-5 weapon to your line up and MM will put you there.

You can always choose to be uptiered if that’s what you want.

10

You also have to remember that ORIGINALLY, when they were talking about implementing the merge, they were intending to have like 10 BRs, which is where the rule of +/- 1 BR would have worked out perfectly fine. The only reason they changed that was because people complained that it would divide the player base too much.

Personally, I think there NEEDS to be a bit more division in this way, so that players actually play in more equal scenarios, as you are saying @Adamnpee !

As far as meta equipment goes, there needs to be better balancing in core mechanics that then create viability for other tactics.
You hear me say all the time that an overhaul to engineer fortifications would significantly help the game. This is because the meta is to take as many run-and-gun spam weapons as you can and just keep flooding the objective.

Now stop and seriously think about what would happen if fortifications made a definitive difference. To where other equipment such as extra grenades or such would have to be given up in favor of something to actually get past fortifications. Then you would have a lot more equipment with a lot more diversity, breaking the meta and changing up gameplay to be a lot more interesting and dynamic.

2 Likes
11

Well put,

But I still much prefer br +/-1 suggestion, because:

  • Would satisfy (in part) the obvious desire the devs have, to create as few queues as possible due to population, as it requires only 3 queues to work well, compared to 5.
  • Would still be balanced easily, no lineup that is maximum one br rating over is overpowered compared to the previous br.
  • Would keep a bit of diversified stuff which IS IMPORTANT because of the following reason: newcomers that start dabbling with one single piece of weaponry superior in br to their current lineup, wouldn’t feel crushed by the sudden upgrade. It would be transitional thanks to a less strict br +/-1.

Since br +/-1 only requires 3 queues total to work with the current system, it would also be easier to implement the next future br, duch as 6, 7, 8… a br +/-0 would mske that extremely difficult as it would require a new queue per br, which as I’ve stated earlier, is not something devs are very keen to do.

My opinion: I’m against br +/-0. I’m for br +/-1.

3 Likes
12

As @guardianreaper0 said, in theory ±1 BR MM is actually just a cosmetic/psychological thing.
If my suggestion was implemented, there would still be vehicles in the same BR that have a BR difference in WT.

If you remake my 5 BRs into even more BRs, and left the same number of queues. Nothing would change, you would just have end up with a ±1 BR MM

That’s why I think ±0 MM is better. It is more obvious at first glance and easier to balance.

I don’t think 3 queues significantly differs from 2 queus. And thus I don’t think the balance would be good enough.
Number of queues is main factor of balancing, not BRs.

13

in paper, we might have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 BRs, but the sad truth is it isnt even 3 queues. its only 2 queues that overlap.

1 Like
14

go reread those topics. they never complained about playerbase division, but about endless grind with 10 tiers. they made it perfectly clear that those 10 tiers were never about BR, but just about grind.

for me it was funny how people complained about 10 tiers but didnt complain about same number of weapons on 5 tiers.

15

Whoever is going around on a censoring crusade can you knock it off and you’re not even censoring the right things

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16

Yeah I felt like that message never even needed to be censored to begin with.

2 Likes
17

Somewhat true. However, this next one is irrelevant but i barely see any purpose in using anything but tier 2 and 5 weapons and vehicles. Tier 4 there’s no other purpose in using tier 3 or 4 weapons I feel when 3 is just a gamble of being down and uptiered and 4 will always get stomped by 5’s of not used correctly. I’d like to see a “1-2,3-4 and 5” system so there’s purpose for for all the tiers and they have at least a respective queue. But that’s just me.

18

The big reason for the merge was to reduce the amount of bot matches, especially in certain campaigns. The BR system originally (if you look at the first test) was to have historical accuracy on maps to a limited extent more than the balance but due to player response was changed to the current system to focus more on weapon balance. To ignore that the big reason is to reduce the number of queues that players had to make for more full matches than we had is a poor one in my eyes.

The main thing is that the playerbase is smaller than it needs to be to support the most optimal system for balancing without having a ton of bot matches. Bot matches were killing the game in the long term. So … it would heavily depend on the playerbase growing in size. This is likely the reasoning for having BR 1 and 2 and BR 4 and 5 effectively the same … expandability once the playerbase grows in numbers.

This means that we need more players … this means the most pressing concern is not the BR system in of itself, though it is important … but the NPE of the game. I have come to this realization after trying on a fresh alt account. So any expanded queues need to (IMO) take into account 2 main factors:

1: New Player Experience / Retention
2: Playerbase Size to Support Without Bot Filled Matches

Any suggestion that does not take into account these 2 factors are just wishful thinking in my eyes.

So lets think about this clearly. The end goal here is absolutely good. having well balanced matches. but we need players to support it first. We need to take steps to the end goal rather than another club that we did with the BR change … granted I do think the new system was great for the betterment of the game, regardless of the issues we have with it.

My suggestion is as follows, focus on NPE … Introduce an expanded New Player queue that allows them to grow within BR I without being seal clubbed unless they are partied with non-new players. Next we need them to stay once they hit low BR matchmaking. This is where many blame BR III armor (armor is the where I see the complaints … not the small arms or planes). But the way I see it … BRII does have answers that can front pen all of the BRIII tanks including the KV-1 and IV J…moving around these to unlock earlier could be an option.

Once the playerbase is ready (IE we have enough to support it) we introduce a new queue to the mix, but have an option in settings to allow for uptiering for those that wish it without them needing to change their loadouts.

Alternatively, there is the curveball option. Get away for matchmaking and go to server browser of old. Make a system that you just join with a certain BR / BR range based ont he server allotted (think the custom game browser but have standing servers for people to join, and allow joining as a group). This would also be appreciated for the other older gamers here :stuck_out_tongue:

19

I do understand you. But I don’t think bots are bigger issue than low number of queues.
Especially since even now, lot of people can’t tell difference between bots and casual players.

And in fact, there’s no real big difference between them. If this game attracted a lot of new players now, it wouldn’t improve the quality of the team.
That’s why I think it is less relevant issue than fair equipment balance.

This game has extreme number of casual players. It is literally f2p and on console, so that’s no surprise. And it has no ambition to have any kinf of skill based MM.
Meaning, quality of teams will always be unbalanced. And it doesn’t matter if your team is made of bots or casuals.
Faction bias will prevail.

I think the argument “game needs more players and everything will be better” is false.
Only significant number of good players would solve quality of team balance issue.
But that will not happen any time soon. Since this game has no competitive ambition with such a poor equipment balance.

20

Well the game went from 12 sides queue’ing to 8 sides queue’ing per server + console lock.

If we split to 5 BR’s (one for each) it would be 20 sides queue’ing. So that leads to the question. Have your games felt better than pre-merge, the same, or worse. For me, they’ve felt better. Which logically, would mean that the game would be worse if we expanded without the playerbase to support it.

Its not just game needs more players and everything will be better. Its that the solutions need more player input for them to work, otherwise why play a multiplayer game when (and im being hyperbolic a bit here) its just 4 players in a lobby and the 16 bots.

Casual players can get better, and especially in lower tiers, it has much to do with not having a firm grasp on mechanics and not having well equipped squads yet. But if you curb stomp them constantly, they will just leave.

Both issues are important, and need to be worked in conjunction with one another rather than just one over the other. That is my point.

21

It felt same in the matter of team quality. Most matches aren’t fair and one team will just complety dominate the other. It depends only on one thing, which faction is more popular atm.
Literally nothing has changed in this manner.

But I am speaking from PC player playing on EU server only perspective.

And I have waited even 2min+ in queues when I wanted to play popular faction.

That’s complete disillusion. Majority of them will not.
This was beautifully displayed on WoT. There were a lot of players who had ovwe 40k battles (one battle takes ±7 min, max time is 15 min)
And they averaged dmg such that they could do 1-2 hits in a whole battle.
That was their average result.

Yet another completely false argument. Most of casuals do not even care if they are losing or not. They can be absolutely excited that they managed to kill one moving character in an entire match.
Most of them do not have competive mindset. And I believe they’re not evwn registering loss/win. They simply do not care. It is not the reason why they choose to play games like this.

People are consistently yelling about how they have full teams of bots. But when you check the replays, you find that most were just not very skilled players. And they had 1-2 bots on the team max.
People literally can’t tell difference.
All they see is that their team sucks and the opposing team is absolutely crushing them.
So they just think “uh, just a team full of bots again” and go rant on forum.