Today I played my 11 PVPs in Elite.
My gear score is 4287 at the moment, and I did more than 27K points already, so I can only advance if I get roughly 2700 points from a battle.
9 times from 11 every opponent was with 2400-2600 gear score, giving 1500-1800 points (with fast and unwounded wins I could get 2100-2300 point), which is very little.
The remaining two times I got two easy ones similar to me, and one opponent with a prospective 2200 points. I won one, and could advance a meagre 300 points forward. The other opponent was better, so I lost that battle.
It is very frustrating. If I cannot advance, where is the competitivness in this?
Summing-up: giving opponent who are only a little bit better than a player will not giving enough points for advancement, so this mechanic should be changed!
Taking into account all the experience with new PvPs until now, I believe there is a really easy way of making it work better than it is right now.
Opponent pairing uses level + max gearscore + tourney points, but the number of points given by a player depends on stats (gearscore weared + attributes + citadel). That means that people with similar pairing standings will give vastly different number of points. Therefore, the strongest players gets paired against weaker ones and get placed lower than those weaker players that get paired against the strong.
The solution would be using the same criteria for opponent matching and to calculate how many points each opponent gives, preferably not dependent on gear weared to avoid players being able to change it.
I suggest using the following criteria to calculate how many points a player gives:
-Level
-Citadel level
-Tourney points
-Max gearscore possible for gear usable in that tourney.
Then, pair a player with an opponent that gives less points than themselves, an opponent that gives similar and an opponent that gives more. You can use % ranges to add a bit of luck to the system. For example: one opponent that gives 5-15% less points, one opponent that gives between 5% less and 5% more points and an opponent that gives 5-15% more points.
I think maybe as the best and easiest temporary solution (until the best one gets figured out and implemented), the highest used gear setup should be locked in as an opponent preset (so you are still able to adjust things, but won’t cheat), together with the option to be matched against yourself (for the concern of the highest players).
Credit for the gear setup lock-in goes to TRJoker - I saw him writing this in global ingame chat.
Also obviously, although it seems necessary, getting matched against opponents out of your current tourney around the reset time is really unfair, because of temporary higher scoring oportunities (especially for those, that don’t have the chance to play at that time - in EU it’s like 2 AM?).
As a solution, maybe ask the player to click register with the (valid) preset they plan on using, which then is saved as an opponent for matchmaking. (might cause some wait time in the beginning, but you could just play the matches a little bit later, if you want), or use and keep some opponents from same past tourneys.
(I’m sorry if I say something that was already mentioned or is counterproductive, but trying to remember everything about this complex topic is difficult for me, so I just write and hope it contributes positively )
WHAT A JOKE
)