Punish bad lobbies

-1

A 6v6 queue is just unviable

@melanol removing the 4v4 no share queue was a good idea I think, since having multiple very similar queues will split up people between the queues which is bad. Even if you can technically queue for both at the same time, there are a number of scenarios where people wouldn't do so since they clearly prefer one over the other.

But adding queues for the most popular (even if most contributing members don't like them) maps should be done, since anything that brings people from the matchmaking tab to the custom games tab is especially bad for new players, because "just host yourself" is not an option for them, so they have to put up with all the shit going on, plus you can only be in one lobby at a time, so you are forced to play what fills fastest, instead of trying to get a game in the mode you want to play.

@blackyps why is it unviable to have a 6v6 dual gap queue?

There are too many connection problems when trying to connect 12 people at once

@zlo I'd rather make it one queue button and some checkboxes for which slots you'd like.
In the background it might be a good idea to later have some priority system and sometimes "force" people into roles that nobody wants, so they at least get to play. (Like other online games also do)
But that's for after people actually use the queue
maybe dualgap folks will just stick to hosting customs to kick people they don't like or something🤷 who knows

@blackyps how are people playing dual gap custom games then?
they work the same as the matchmaker

In a custom lobby people that can't connect to everybody will leave again. In a matchmaker you only have one shot to connect everyone. We already see that a certain percentage of 4v4 games don't launch because of connection problems. A 4v4 game needs to establish 28 connections. A 6v6 game needs 66 connections.

@blackyps said in Punish bad lobbies:

A 6v6 game needs 66 connections.

Ah, one of the things that threatens the forever part of FAF: Modern games are run on the server and not on each player's computer. That 6v6 would only need 12 connections, and there wouldn't be any desyncs, and here comes the source code / engine wall again...

@blackyps but people not being able to connect to some players should be a rare issue.
It's currently quite common because of issues with the ice adapter, but assuming those get fixed, the amount of connections that fail should be relatively low.
Also I'd believe GAF is doing this since it's the obvious way if you only play that map to have a queue for it. (is that shot from zlo from the GAF client?)

@melanol said in Punish bad lobbies:

Ah, one of the things that threatens the forever part of FAF: Modern games are run on the server and not on each player's computer. That 6v6 would only need 12 connections, and there wouldn't be any desyncs, and here comes the source code / engine wall again...

You'd also either need to compute the whole game on the server, skyrocketing running costs or live with increased latencies across the board making it impossible for people from multiple countries to play together.

It's also unneeded, cause assuming a working ice adapter and coturns, you only need 12 connections in the worst case scenario, as everyone could connect to a coturn and from there to the other players. (sure they'd each have 6 connections to a coturn, but loosing one of them is unlikely, since they all connect to the same server)

well, it should be rare as you correctly said. At the moment it clearly isn't. And even if it is rare, let's say a connection failure occurs 1% of the time, the chance that a 6v6 game launches successfully is still 0.99^66=0.51, so just over half of the time.
Do you know if it even works well in GAF? It could also be that they generally have an easier time to connect as most of them are in russia, so pretty close together.

@nex said in Punish bad lobbies:

(is that shot from zlo from the GAF client?)

lol, no i just used paint.
Here is actual GAF screenshot:98b24a45-54a8-4325-b26b-29f574076d88-image.png

TA4Life: "At the very least we are not slaves to the UI" | http://www.youtube.com/user/dimatularus | http://www.twitch.tv/zlo_rd

@blackyps said in Punish bad lobbies:

And even if it is rare, let's say a connection failure occurs 1% of the time, the chance that a 6v6 game launches successfully is still 0.99^66=0.51

I don't think assuming the connection failures to be independent is a good approximation, so we won't know how well this works until someone tries it out.
But in the current situation it's very likely a bad idea to add, since frequent disconnections and the high chance of the match not starting would give the queue a bad reputation that'll be hard to loose later on.
But once the game becomes more stable again a DG queue might be a good way to get the DG players on the same page and quicken match starts.

Meanwhile an astro queue could be added since that's only 4v4 (potentially 3v3), since that map is also played very frequently.
while astro is an especially deformed map, it's played a lot for it's simplicity and the quick launch. So even people that want to play 3v3 mapgen are driven to astro, just because it's faster.
And since astro only exists in custom games you have to commit to the astro lobby or the 3v3 matchmaker, if you had an astro queue you could just queue both and it'll be "safer" for you to get a game, sicne you don't need to chase down one of the 3 astro lobbys to secure your spot, when you can just chill in 3v3 queue when there are still 10+ people in the astro queue.
Generally pushing people to the matchmaker from custom games will benefit all matchmaker queues and might also open the minds of some "one-map-only players", since the effort needed to get a game will be more similar between game modes.

@zlo said in Punish bad lobbies:

lol, no i just used paint.

huh, quality checked out though.😁

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

@thomashiatt , @ftxcommando , explain me please how can I play ladder at desired position without full share on dual gap map.

Sounds like you’re part of the problem then. Can’t moan about wanting a specific slot and then moan that host wants to play with a specific player.

Likewise can’t have these 80 prerequisites for you to play and then be flabbergasted host takes a while to balance games.

Consider there should be interface like this:

  • Select map: random, small pool, medium pool, huge pool, <check manually>.
  • Select size: random, 1v1, 2v2, 4v4, 6v6.
  • Select role: random, mid, air, navy, eco, non-mid.
  • Toggle ranked: on, off.
  • Button: Enqueue
  • Hint: Most wanted roles (faster search): mid.
  • Hint: Most wanted sizes (faster search): 4v4, 6v6.

Algorithm of matchmaking:

  1. Search for available players for a while.
  2. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map (without loosing priority).
  3. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map(without loosing priority).
  4. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map(without loosing priority).

@ftxcommando said in Punish bad lobbies:

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

@thomashiatt , @ftxcommando , explain me please how can I play ladder at desired position without full share on dual gap map.

Sounds like you’re part of the problem then. Can’t moan about wanting a specific slot and then moan that host wants to play with a specific player.

Likewise can’t have these 80 prerequisites for you to play and then be flabbergasted host takes a while to balance games.

If host really wants balance then he should use opti. Otherwise he should respect the role. At least, he should react somehow in chat about this.
Also when the highest rank writes something like "move me to 5" host moves but when the same is written by low skill players host kicks them.

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

Consider there should be interface like this:

  • Select map: random, small pool, medium pool, huge pool, <check manually>.
  • Select size: random, 1v1, 2v2, 4v4, 6v6.
  • Select role: random, mid, air, navy, eco, non-mid.
  • Toggle ranked: on, off.
  • Button: Enqueue
  • Hint: Most wanted roles (faster search): mid.
  • Hint: Most wanted sizes (faster search): 4v4, 6v6.

Algorithm of matchmaking:

  1. Search for available players for a while.
  2. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map (without loosing priority).
  3. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map(without loosing priority).
  4. If not enough players prompt to extend role/size/map(without loosing priority).

Too many similar options.
allowing so many choices will cause players to fragment and not be able to match until enough time passes. (If you aren't allowing hard vetos)
but to go into the specific options:
@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

Select map: random, small pool, medium pool, huge pool, <check manually>.

A map veto system has been talked about and might come if someone finds the time to implement it. allowing such big choices here will make it hard for people to match up and their ratings will deform to that type of map requiring seperate ratings to accurately match players.

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

Select size: random, 1v1, 2v2, 4v4, 6v6.

This is already there (except 6v6 for stated reason)

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

Select role: random, mid, air, navy, eco, non-mid.

This only makes sense for dual gap. Other maps have different slots and most maps that aren't DG or Setons aren't played enough to have such hard roles. (most maps have an air slot and maybe navy if there's water)
also hard to define for mapgen maps.

@cocucka said in Punish bad lobbies:

Toggle ranked: on, off.

This option makes no sense. Unlike most online games FAF has no hidden rating that it uses to match you vs others. The rating you see is the rating you are matched at. unrating a match makes sense if you play a severly unbalanced match or try something which could otherwise fall under rating manipulation. If you play mostly unrated against random opponents none of the players involved players will have fun.

You overestimated the amount of players FAF has or underestimate the amount of players needed to allow for such options without deteriorating queue times massively.

Nothing like this would ever exist for the matchmaker. The whole purpose is making it easy to play not spending 45 minutes going through a hospital entry form in order to just launch your weekend game.

Singular map queues are disliked conceptually because it isn’t what is viewed as the sort of game experience FAF should be endorsing. Why not just have a wonder queue (6 variants of it), dual gap queue (3 variants of it), astro queue (7 variants of it), senton queue, map gen queue for every size of game, so on.

If you ONLY want to play one map, that’s the whole point of custom lobbies. You choose it when it is literally a precondition for you to want to play. Same reason you have this whole “I only want to play air slot” or whatever.

If you dislike other people having the right to do as they please in the lobby they host, then host your own. There is no prerogative on the host and he can do whatever he wants so long as he is willing to spend forever waiting for people to play the game he wants.

All welcome host with 7 0s and 1 1500? He can

(1) launch
(2) kick a 0
(3) kick the 1500

all have drawbacks, up to host to choose which tradeoffs he prefers.

@ftxcommando said in Punish bad lobbies:

If you ONLY want to play one map, that’s the whole point of custom lobbies

No.
The point of custom lobbies is to fill whatever gap the matchmaking system can't fill.
This is almost always playing with specific people and then everything your matchmaker can't do.
But you want the matchmaker to be able to handle as many scenarios as possible, because that makes it easier for new players to join in on the fun.

@ftxcommando said in Punish bad lobbies:

Singular map queues are disliked conceptually because it isn’t what is viewed as the sort of game experience FAF should be endorsing.

But that's conceptually bad, because the matchmaker mustn't be an iron hard competitive environment. It can be casual as well, so there is no need to exclude modes because they are not deemed competitive enough. If lots of people want to play it, there should be a queue.

@ftxcommando said in Punish bad lobbies:

Why not just have a wonder queue (6 variants of it), dual gap queue (3 variants of it), astro queue (7 variants of it), senton queue, map gen queue for every size of game, so on.

That's why I also mentioned you don't want mutliple queues that are too similar, so you just pick one version of each important map etc.
That way you also reduce the same fragmentation in custom games, where now people host 5 different versions of the same map, but by selecting one for the matchmaking queue you lower the entry barrier to play that specific version, reducing the incentive to host a different version and compete for players.

@nex said in Punish bad lobbies:

The point of custom lobbies is to fill whatever gap the matchmaking system can't fill.

Correct. And rather than having 50,000 matchmaker queues for the 50,000 individual maps, we can delegate it out for the free market of players to handle and instead maintain the queues for the ways FAF softly encourages itself to be played. This is already seen with how balance decisions operate and maps are just as large a role in deciding the utility of units as statlines.

This is almost always playing with specific people and then everything your matchmaker can't do.

You can party queue in the matchmaker.

But you want the matchmaker to be able to handle as many scenarios as possible,

No.

because that makes it easier for new players to join in on the fun.

Then we would remove all the matchmakers as they currently stand and simply have a pve queue that leads to astro and culminates in dg.

But that's conceptually bad, because the matchmaker mustn't be an iron hard competitive environment.

Nobody said you need to try your ass off, but the game is ultimately balanced around some overton window of acceptably deemed situations. These are the matchmakers.

That's why I also mentioned you don't want mutliple queues that are too similar, so you just pick one version of each important map etc.

These are all big, simple teamgames. They are all too similar.

That way you also reduce the same fragmentation in custom games, where now people host 5 different versions of the same map, but by selecting one for the matchmaking queue you lower the entry barrier to play that specific version, reducing the incentive to host a different version and compete for players.

This already happens organically.