poss
Member
This is an interesting case study in player frustration. These two teams actually see mostly fairly equal, and yet the experience is frustrating.
The total soul disparity is only about 10% with none of the usual telltale disparity of having 15+ kills or deaths. The top stats are distributed between the teams, and 11 of the 12 players are in a 30-36k range of souls. The top line numbers seem like the game should feel close and winnable.
So why does it feel bad? Where are the disparities and what can they tell us?
its tempting to look at the Warden vs Infernus matchup and note how many souls were fed to Infernus as deaths. However that isn't the biggest difference between the teams. 30 vs 45 kills probably didn't feel great, but its recoverable. 37 vs 76 assists is huge. That suggests the Sapphire Flame grouped up more
Of course obj damage is what ultimately wins the game, and this is where the biggest difference lies within each team. Overall its roughly 40k to 65k, but half of the Amber Hand's objective damage was done by Warden alone. Paradox and Abrams barely looked at an objective the whole game.
This data paints a picture of a game where Sapphire flame grouped up and pushed objectives together, while the Amber hand split up with most of the team chasing individual kills in small groups, while warden pushed objectives alone. If there is a skill issue here, its not mechanical or tactical, but strategic. Amber failed to communicate and coordinate.
How does a match making system account for this? Its hard to think of a metric that could capture how well a player contributed to their team. "time on mic" or "number of pings" both go up when people are flaming. Is it reasonable to expect any random group of six people will naturally vibe together or come up with a shared leadership and coordination? Is "matchmaking" really a form of speed dating? Do we need psychological profiles to create good teams?
It seems that deadlock was specifically designed to reward teams who group up and coordinate. Players failing to do this isn't experienced as their own lack of communications skill though, its at best internalised as a lack of mechanical skill, or more often externalised and blamed on team mates and the game failing to matchmake. So if the problem with matchmaking isn't the matchmaking, how do we solve a lack of coordination?
Currently there are very few in-game tools to learn or encourage coordination. Playing vs bots is the only current form of game practice, but training only covers basic laning, and late game coordination is what the bots are worst at. So, how do we help players progress from intermediate skill level to advanced? How do we gently remind players to do the things that win games and make their team mates happy?
Yet again my conclusion is that in-game diagetic prompting, training, and contextual queues are the solution to align player behaviour with intended play patterns.
