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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 20, 2023

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My point is, if you prefer that level of challenge, but will pull out all the stops if challenged more, you're explicitly saying that you'd prefer to not be matched against yourself, but someone worse.

Lets say, for arguments sake, that I can expend my full, sweaty, maximum try-hard effort for about one (1) match before I'm exhausted and return to baseline performance, then I have to rest up before I can expect to pull out that kind of performance again.

In that case, if I go full, all-out aggressive to try and win at all costs, I may pull out a victory, at which point I'm exhausted and I either stop playing for the night, or I go ahead despite knowing my performance will degrade, and guess what, I'm matched to a person with a higher skill level and I can expect to lose pretty handily unless I dig deep for that serious effort again.

It's not clear to me why a ranking algorithm should assume that I play full-tilt at all times, or that I would want to play at full-tilt at all times.

I think this is where my assumptions about competition sort of diverge from the usual. I'm generally not playing to 'win' and improve my ranking. If there's no money or prestige on the line, what would be the point? So I'm playing to have fun and not end up more stressed and angry than when I started.

Which means I want to match with people who will challenge me at the level I'm most comfortable at, in most cases, and not be 'forced' to go all out. Because my goal is having fun and not 'winning,' I don't have to nor want to switch into full on effort-mode if I start losing. I just want it to be fair.

So I don't WANT a ranking algo that expects me to be trying as hard as I can at all times.

I'd like to be able to say, for instance "computer, match me with someone who is a about equal to my my baseline skill level," or "computer, match me with someone who will push me to my limits" or "computer, I don't really care who I match with today."

Again, so I can optimize for having a fun and enjoyable experience, even if I don't win.

it doesn't matter if your rank jumps around +-100 due to random factors

It matters from the player experience side, is my point. If my ELO can jump up or down +/- 100 due to random factors, then I can end up matched with players who can, respectively, stomp me easily or are a relative cakewalk, in quick succession, and neither of those experiences is particularly enjoyable.

The yo-yo effect is my issue, and based on my experience with most online competitive multiplayer games (looking at you, COD) the algos tend to yo-yo you around mercilessly. Although that is quite possibly due to the algos they employ being designed to keep you addicted and push microtransactions on you, and thus are not optimized for a smooth experience.

At that point, just let me have a server browser so I can CHOOSE who I play with.

I'd like to be able to say, for instance "computer, match me with someone who is a about equal to my my baseline skill level," or "computer, match me with someone who will push me to my limits" or "computer, I don't really care who I match with today."

This can achieved by having multiple accounts and switching based on your level of intensity. It is often frowned upon because it can be easily abused, of course. The computer can't really tell whether you're honest or just asking for the first one but actually planning to go all out and stomp people worse than you.

This can achieved by having multiple accounts and switching based on your level of intensity.

Sure, there's plenty I can do 'manually' to try to fix the issues I'm speaking of. The big one is I just play games with people I already know.

Genuinely, I think I'd be satisfied if all games just included a 'casual' and 'ranked' mode by default, so I can hop into ranked if I ever feel like going all out and seeing how good I can REALLY be.

But I'm still going to point out my issue with the current state of game design.

And if I'm being fully open, my core problem with multiplayer online games these days is rampant cheating, since I can't even feel like the hard-fought matches were fair.