So I haven't been playing very long, but I've noticed that all of my games have been severely unbalanced. It seems that 1 team or the other is at about 150-200 points by the time the other teams wins in attrition. I've been on both sides of this, and it really ruins the game for me. 1 sided matches are never fun imo. Is this just bad luck on my part or has anyone else had this same problem?
It's not your bad luck. This is becoming more and more common. There is a reason for it. 1) They changed almost everything in this game to make it more like a traditional FPS game. 2) They added Networks, which also encourages FPS clans. 3) They removed burn cards and replaced them with Boosts that only get activated by good play. 4) They made it take longer to get your titan and you can only reduce the time by good play. 5) So, because of #1 and #2, many times there is an FPS clan on one side. 6) Since they play coordinated, they get their Boosts earlier for "good play". 7) Because they have Boosts, they get their titans faster for even more "good play". 8) Some on the other team realize what is going on, get frustrated and leave. 9) That makes what was uneven in "skill" also be uneven in numbers now as well. Here's a good example. These guys are the worst. If I notice it's them, I leave the game immediately, because it's not worth wasting my time. In my opinion, coordinated play only belongs in tournaments. In the general population, where it is largely strangers against strangers, there is no place for this. Especially, when you have NEVER EVER implemented a matchmaking algorithm to make sure the teams were evenly matched. If you did that, then you could allow this. You would put these guys in a que and let them sit there waiting forever like they deserve to until it can find an even match for their team on the other side. By allowing this though, it drives your user base away and makes everyone suffer in the long run, because then there is never enough players to get in most of the lobbies that you like. FPS clans should be discouraged, not encouraged, and everything they did in TF2 was like a magnet for them, which is why you end up "unbalanced" as you described. Just to be clear, I'm not saying you shouldn't play with friends. I'm just saying you shouldn't play coordinated, because in my opinion it is an unfair advantage if the other team is not. TF1 did not have a matchmaking algorithm at all so you always had a mismatch in skill and numbers. Plus TF1 had no anti-cheat system. Both of those things drove the user base really low. Who wants to sit there in a lopsided game against you or with cheaters making the games fake? Even as a veteran, I get sick of it, but for new players, I can't even imagine what they feel, which is why they would never stay. No matter what they say, it is absolutely obvious by the results that they did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to make matchmaking better or to prevent cheaters. To make things worse, they added an FPS clan magnet, so now you have the perfect trifecta (poor matchmaking, cheaters, FPS clans) to drive users away and end up with empty lobbies. Even if you had the best game in the world, that is going to kill it.
They should do like Blizzard does in overwatch/WoW in that group queued teams matchmake against other groups of similar size. This lets the clans be clans and enjoy more tactical play and keeps them from boatracing a group of randoms.
WOW!!! I haven't played those games, but the more I hear about Blizzard, the more obvious it becomes that Respawn owes it to us to take some of the $millions they have made from us and pay Blizzard whatever the hell it takes to either buy the rights to their matchmaking and anti-cheat systems or get them to install them in TF1 and TF2 for Respawn. It sounds like Blizzard does these things the way they are supposed to be done and it especially sounds like Overwatch is the model for how these things should be done.
That works for Overwatch @Dexterryu because half the planet is playing it, limited player numbers reduce the efficacy of matchmaking overall. But I do agree with your original point.
There have been much closer matches as of late. And I don't feel every game needs to be close . That is what skilled based matchmaking does which can be a horror show. Some games your on the winning side of things then it flips and your on the losing side , that basically is balance lol. But I really think there's just not enough people playing which has created more balance issues than there really should be. But this past week I have noticed the games being much better and tighter . I think there have been more additions to the online community which has helped the game lobbies work better.