Why the system sucks

Thats 4k at least. When playing with 3k friends, they literally just stand in lane ...not doing a single thing but leech exp. This is especially frustrating if you are up against a good solo offlaner, who will jsut make your life misserable, once he outlevels you.

But srsly ....for whatever reason i also have come to almost solely play support in my solo ranked matches and it really is paying off most of the time. You pull constantly, so that your safelane farmer gets a nice item and level advantage over the other offlaner(s), try to maybe go for a kill inbetween pulls and go piss off the enemy midlaner....im not even talking about good warding or spellusage or whatever. Just these basic things won me so many matches already...

Me again, prepare for a long one :P

There seems to be a great deal of bitterness among players who feel that they deserve a higher number next to the "MMR:"-tags on their profile... As in all activities and actions, it is easier to see others mistakes than one's own. This "discussion", and the million just like it, is such an amazing example of how easy it is to perceive our failures as "unfair" and blame something outside of ourselves.

But back on topic. Why the system isn't stupid:

• First of all: it's the same for everyone. You're not treated any differently than any others.
• Dota is a team-based game, and your "performance" in the game relates to how well you contribute to your team. You might think you did well buying those wards or killing that enemy, but what counts is how much it contributes to your team's probability of winning the match.
• The system does exactly what it should: it rewards the better team. One team wins because they played the game better, and the system rewards them for it - simple as that.
• Rewarding the team as a whole promotes teamwork, which I hope everyone agrees is desirable.

Try looking at it the other way: Imagine a system that rewards the best players in the game, which is what you all seem to want. Ignoring the obviously huge issue of balancing such a system, rewarding players individually would create competition within the team. You think Dota has a mean community now? How do you imagine players acting when they compete with their own team-mates as well as the enemies, for ranking points? Last hits, denies, kills, towers, XP, farm, items, wards, EVERYTHING would fuel the flames. Would that make a better, more enjoyable game? In my mind, no; that is not the solution.

Try to accept that the system is actually fair, it does what it's supposed to and it works as well as it could. The system is the same for everyone, so if you want to climb the ranks you have to improve relative to other players.
(Although, if you played the game for the entertainment rather than for the numbers on your profile, you'd probably enjoy it more)


Allright, on to some answers:





The system is fair, people! Stop blaming everyone else. You are not as great as you imagine yourself to be, get over it. Being frustrated after a bad game is very understandable, and many players are douchbags who only say "**** you" or pick a bad hero. It happens, for everyone. Complaining about the system being "broken and stupid" because you don't have the "ranking number" you think you deserve however, that is just childish.

That's enough for now. Back to what I should be doing....

There is an unfair part about the system, which cannot be denied. Yes, IF YOU PLAY AN INFINITE NUMBER OF GAMES, your MMR will eventually end up converging to your actual skill level.

But the criticism of the MMR system is that this number of games needed is just way too damn high.

I have my fair share of friends who have a constant 55-60% winrate, but still are stuck in the scrub brackets.

Is that because they are bad? No, it's because if you do the math, a 55% winrate amounts to an average of 10% of 25 MMR gained per game, which is an average of 2.5 MMR gained per game.

So to gain 1000 MMR, they'd need to play 400 games.

So if you're actually 5K MMR but you're stuck at 1K MMR, you'd need 1600 games to get out of the scrub bracket.

I'm finding that this figure of 1600 games way way too high and discouraging.

MMR *does* go up, it just does so at a slow-as-hell discouraging pace that makes you say **** this game.

If you are at <= 50% winrate, then you are playing at the right level and you should blame only yourself. BUT if you are constantly at a >55% winrate I'm all for allowing recalibrations and I recommend smurfing to those people.

"MMR *does* go up, it just does so at a slow-as-hell discouraging pace that makes you say **** this game."

But why does your MMR being high or low makes you wanna stop playing the game, if you know "the system is unfair bla bla"? Shouldn't you enjoy it for what it is, playing not for MMR but for fun, with your team if strangers annoy you, and understanding that being good at the game is something you have to feel for yourself and from the perspectives of others, instead of some random mechanic calculation from the game?

Swixcap:

I agree with your fundamental point but you're overstating it a little. It's natural to be pissed off when you've had a series of bad games, you could be a little gentler without losing your point.

I do totally agree with your sentiments on changing the MMR system though. It is massively flawed in various ways, but I think it's probably also the least-bad option when you actually start thinking about it. If you start trying to measure performance in terms of kills, net worth, wards placed, building damage or whatever...all you're doing is asking people to focus on gaming them as much as possible, at the expense of everything else. It would be horrific.

Hamster:

I do take your point...but would flip it round. If you were "worth" a 5k MMR, I'd expect to see an 80-90% win rate at lower levels, not 55%. People who's done account boosting, smurfing etc have easily recorded this, and it fits with that 10-15% of your games being almost unwinnable due to DCs/Feeders/etc. Average 25 points per win @ 85% wr = 46 games per 1k.

If accounts did win/lose say 50 or 100 points per game, you'd end up with bigger swings and probably less accuracy in the system...and how annoying would it be to lose 100 points cos of that idiotic 1v5 decision your carry made that lost the match you should have won? I'd not saying it maybe shouldn't be adjusted though.

I think the main thing that would placate a lot of players is the option to "recalibrate" every 3/6/12 months or something. There would need to be a hard limit of some kind on it, but would alleviate a lot of frustrations I think.

^THIS. SO MUCH!!

The genuine frustration here seems to be, that the current system reflects very badly on player improvement. Where it might be accurate for when you initially let yourself be rated, playing a lot of games will undeniably make you improve... which is something the system fails to acknowledge.

So what if - and i really would like some feedback on this - valve would instead implement something like "seasoned MMR". This would mean that, after a certain amount of time (like 6 months or something), the MMR of every single player would be hard reset and everybody basically had to redo his whole calibration. I dont know how this would be affected by the hidden-rating-system that already is in the game, but hey, maybe we could get achievements and sh*t :D

Edit: before anybody says it: I know that this isnt an original idea and that similar games like *cough* LoL *cough* already have something like this. I just really am interested, if you guys would consider this to be more "fair".

I think it would probably end being the same thing, since the smurfing somehow functions as a recalibration for those who are not satisfied with their initial level (and at the moment smurfs are so spread they have to be considered as a part of the game). If what people say about MMR is true (that it slowly inscreases at a steady pace if you are indeed improving), the recalibration would feel the same, and the problems would still be there (the games with factors that you can't control, the loss when you played well, etc).

But it would be funny to see those big egos coming down from their 5k's to 0k every six months :D

As funny as it would be to see some players knocked down to size, this would be a disaster for everyone. Can you imagine the ragey, chaotic game that happen after a reset? When there's no skill balancing whatsoever and your formerly 1k mmr mid is getting kicked into touch by their former 4.5k mmr mid? When you have no idea what the relative skill level of your team or opposition is every game? Uhh, horrible.

I worked hard for my MMR, I don't have the time to commit anymore to building it up from scratch again every 6 months. So that means I probably wouldn't even bother playing as the games would be routinely imba and therefore no fun.



This seems a very fair point, in is why I'd favour some kind of recalibration system every so often, or maybe if people's visible and invisible MMRs are highly divergent (e.g. you played ranked 20 times when you were 1.5k and didn't bother for a year). The alternative is purely to played ranked games all the time so that your "true" MMR is always reflected there.

This is a great thread and people are making some very good points! It's nice to hear some different ideas and perspectives on the matter. After a few ridiculously bad games ending in losses, teamed up with people who are supposed to be "equal" or "close enough" in skill level to yourself, it's understandable that you may feel discouraged and feel like it is unfair. Don't give up! d;p

When people mention that it is possible to raise MMR as support, it gives me Hope. TY!
I also think it's a good idea to make yourself a more well-rounded player too, something that I definitely lack (I hardly ever play Carry or Mid Heroes anymore...)

Quick question; I noticed that occasionally I'll be against people who have 300-400 higher MMR than the highest person on my team. Does this occur often???

The system matches you with the enemy based on average mmr, so it is possible to have mmr flunctuations where your enemy team has a player who has a much better mmr than you. However, when you take everyone's mmr and average it out, it should be roughly the same. There is a second piority to match people as close to the mmr you are at, so such situations might be rare, but they do occur.