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In the equilibrium those playing the meta poorly will be matched with players who use suboptimal strategies with good execution.

by im3w1l 4mo ago

estearum 4mo ago
Yes, correct. Which think about what that feels like: getting semi-consistently beaten by worse players who just all "happen to have" the exact same loadout and exact same strategies and exact same everything. That's exactly what I'm describing. It's incredibly boring.
- fc417fc802 4mo ago
  If matchmaking is working correctly you should win some fraction of your matches, probably ~half. Losses against someone with better logistical choices is normal and expected. You should quickly pick up on what they were doing and learn to counter it. If you can't then how can you claim to be better than they are? I recognize the adjacent commenter's point about the small population though. It might be difficult to be appropriately matched up unlike a AAA title at launch.
  - estearum 4mo ago
    Correct, and if 100% of the people who beat you are using all the same "meta" then that suggests it's not a skill variation that explains it. That makes the game extremely boring. > You should quickly pick up on what they were doing and learn to counter it. If you can't then how can you claim to be better than they are? You must not be familiar with what "meta" means. Modern video games seem to all have an across-the-board superior configuration. And yes, the way to "counter it" is to copy it, which is why this strategy spreads like a virus through the game until 100% of the people who beat you are all doing the exact same thing. If the desired outcome of the game design was for everyone to use the same configurations (the meta) in order to "counter" the meta, then why have configuration options at all? Give everyone the same exact thing all the time. The reason they don't do that is because it's extremely boring. But unfortunately the "meta-finding" capability of the streaming community yields the same functional outcome anyway. Ergo: the games are made boring by the community, as stated at the very top.
    - fc417fc802 4mo ago
      I'm familiar with the term, thanks. I'm suggesting that if you're consistently losing to it that's a skill issue. Sure, you might find the gameplay boring but then that's a complaint about a perceived failure in the game design (notably only from your perspective, not necessarily other's). I appreciate that you're more interested in casually playing off the wall builds for fun rather than competitively playing to win but casting that as others being less skilled or the community being in the wrong is just petulant.
      - estearum 4mo ago
        Yes, it is a game design failure (obviously) insofar as it seems not possible to make a perfectly balanced game. But games weren't previously perfectly balanced either, presumably. But they didn't have this same "herding" dynamic because there wasn't an entire industry (literally!) of people trying to discover and disseminate knowledge about the imbalances. And no, the issue isn't "I like to casually play with off-the-wall builds." The issue is "video games were a lot more fun when you encountered different types of opponents." This is, of course, why game designers put so much work into supporting variations in builds, so obviously they agree too. I didn't criticize anyone for being less skilled or anyone for being "in the wrong." I'm observing a game dynamic that makes games less variable than their designers clearly intend.
        fc417fc802 4mo ago
        I think you aren't appreciating how varied other's views are here. I'm not a fan of starcraft because I don't enjoy how important micro is to it but that's clearly an integral part of that particular game. As far as meta goes there are clearly lots of people that greatly enjoy trying to win by optimizing every last detail out of a build, fully playing into the current meta or alternatively going against it in an attempt to score a win by surprising the opponent. If you don't like it that's fine - I'm actually mostly in agreement with you. But I don't think it's necessarily a flaw in the game any more than chess openers are necessarily a flaw with chess (although chess960 does exist so clearly not everyone appreciates the typical openers).

In the equilibrium those playing the meta poorly will be matched with players who use suboptimal strategies with good execution.

by im3w1l 4mo ago

In the equilibrium those playing the meta poorly will be matched with players who use suboptimal strategies with good execution.

estearum 4mo ago

Yes, correct. Which think about what that feels like: getting semi-consistently beaten by worse players who just all "happen to have" the exact same loadout and exact same strategies and exact same everything. That's exactly what I'm describing. It's incredibly boring.

fc417fc802 4mo ago
If matchmaking is working correctly you should win some fraction of your matches, probably ~half. Losses against someone with better logistical choices is normal and expected. You should quickly pick up on what they were doing and learn to counter it. If you can't then how can you claim to be better than they are? I recognize the adjacent commenter's point about the small population though. It might be difficult to be appropriately matched up unlike a AAA title at launch.
- estearum 4mo ago
  Correct, and if 100% of the people who beat you are using all the same "meta" then that suggests it's not a skill variation that explains it. That makes the game extremely boring. > You should quickly pick up on what they were doing and learn to counter it. If you can't then how can you claim to be better than they are? You must not be familiar with what "meta" means. Modern video games seem to all have an across-the-board superior configuration. And yes, the way to "counter it" is to copy it, which is why this strategy spreads like a virus through the game until 100% of the people who beat you are all doing the exact same thing. If the desired outcome of the game design was for everyone to use the same configurations (the meta) in order to "counter" the meta, then why have configuration options at all? Give everyone the same exact thing all the time. The reason they don't do that is because it's extremely boring. But unfortunately the "meta-finding" capability of the streaming community yields the same functional outcome anyway. Ergo: the games are made boring by the community, as stated at the very top.
  - fc417fc802 4mo ago
    I'm familiar with the term, thanks. I'm suggesting that if you're consistently losing to it that's a skill issue. Sure, you might find the gameplay boring but then that's a complaint about a perceived failure in the game design (notably only from your perspective, not necessarily other's). I appreciate that you're more interested in casually playing off the wall builds for fun rather than competitively playing to win but casting that as others being less skilled or the community being in the wrong is just petulant.
    - estearum 4mo ago
      Yes, it is a game design failure (obviously) insofar as it seems not possible to make a perfectly balanced game. But games weren't previously perfectly balanced either, presumably. But they didn't have this same "herding" dynamic because there wasn't an entire industry (literally!) of people trying to discover and disseminate knowledge about the imbalances. And no, the issue isn't "I like to casually play with off-the-wall builds." The issue is "video games were a lot more fun when you encountered different types of opponents." This is, of course, why game designers put so much work into supporting variations in builds, so obviously they agree too. I didn't criticize anyone for being less skilled or anyone for being "in the wrong." I'm observing a game dynamic that makes games less variable than their designers clearly intend.
      - fc417fc802 4mo ago
        I think you aren't appreciating how varied other's views are here. I'm not a fan of starcraft because I don't enjoy how important micro is to it but that's clearly an integral part of that particular game. As far as meta goes there are clearly lots of people that greatly enjoy trying to win by optimizing every last detail out of a build, fully playing into the current meta or alternatively going against it in an attempt to score a win by surprising the opponent. If you don't like it that's fine - I'm actually mostly in agreement with you. But I don't think it's necessarily a flaw in the game any more than chess openers are necessarily a flaw with chess (although chess960 does exist so clearly not everyone appreciates the typical openers).