Lack of SBMM leads to the desire to cheat

[HyperXMousepad]

IMO there's a reason why this game has so many cheaters, and it's not all that hard to understand.  Sure you have the cheaters who are just 'trolls who wanna mess with people', but I suspect those aren't necessarily the majority. 

I'll ask a simple question here:  "How do you think it feels to really love a game, but due to reasons such as lack of time to play/other commitments/bad hardware or simply a lack of natural talent, you're doomed to forever be mediocre at best at the game?"  You might try your best, but you're just never gonna be better than average at the game, and then game after game you get crushed in seconds by people who have like 3000+ kills.  Then you watch the pro players all stacking together and sometimes getting a total squad kill count of 30+, literally crushing half of the lobby like ants.  As time goes on you long more and more to experience the feeling of having power and control over the outcome of the game, the feeling of actually being capable and confident in your ability to get something done.

This leads to the point of this post.  In games with SBMM, even bad/average players will still get their moments to shine because they'll be playing against other bad/average players.  I'm no pro at Dota 2, but I've still had plenty of games where I've gone "Beyond Godlike" and racked up a 10+ killing spree.  It feels good.  In a game like Apex, unless you're above average at minimum you will almost NEVER get to experience the thrill and validation you get from carrying a game.  You'll basically just need to sweat your butt off every game just to barely stay alive at best.  Also the worst part is you'll feel like you're not even really getting better at the game, and this is because you're getting crushed by people who are so much better than you that your minor improvements in skill are meaningless.  People learn better and have more fun when playing against enemies who are slightly better, or slightly worse than they are.  Not by getting massacred by some pro or twitch streamer who players 8+ hours per day and then wondering what the heck they even did wrong.

They say that "Life isn't fair", but if that's the case then why do YOU have an obligation to be fair?  Sure, some people will just quit or continue to play in an unfair system despite their lack of success, but other players of a more rebellious mindset WILL turn to third party programs to forcibly take what they see as 'their share of fun and enjoyment' from the game.    Perhaps if we want to remove some of the mentality behind cheating, we should try to ensure more fair playing field FOR ALL players by adding in some form of skill based matchmaking.

[PWA-Miyo · Accepted solution]

I thought this was going to be another crying post about unbalancing, hackers or something along those lines.

But, it wasn't.

I actually and genuinely agree with you, on the point of some form of skill matchmaking should be implemented. 

And this is coming from a player who is one of those "pro" players you are talking about (1500+ kills, 120+ wins, best killstreak in a single game: 17 kills. I also play with friends with 4k+ kills, 300+ wins and killstreaks of 20+ (thats 20 kills from a single player).

Some lobbies are ridiculously easy.. we will win like 5+ matches in a row... then other lobbies we actually face difficult teams etc..

So it would make it more interesting with matchmaking based on specific stats. 

+1

[PWA-Miyo · Accepted solution]

I thought this was going to be another crying post about unbalancing, hackers or something along those lines.

But, it wasn't.

I actually and genuinely agree with you, on the point of some form of skill matchmaking should be implemented. 

And this is coming from a player who is one of those "pro" players you are talking about (1500+ kills, 120+ wins, best killstreak in a single game: 17 kills. I also play with friends with 4k+ kills, 300+ wins and killstreaks of 20+ (thats 20 kills from a single player).

Some lobbies are ridiculously easy.. we will win like 5+ matches in a row... then other lobbies we actually face difficult teams etc..

So it would make it more interesting with matchmaking based on specific stats. 

+1

[HenxFTW]

good post.

i enjoyed reading it and it makes sense from several points of views

[fifaoynamakzor]

Good post, good definition.
i hope EA admins won't lock it, just because it is related to cheating issue ( They tend to do that).
They should actually pin this post, must be there on the top of the list forever.

[HyperXMousepad]

Thanks for the thoughtful responses guys, glad to see others can understand this viewpoint.

[Xare555]

Ok but how would you determine skill in a game that’s mainly about luck

and yes I acknowledge there is skill in the use of abilities and gun play but you could be the best team on earth but if all your rocking is p2020 and Mozambique’s with no shields you’ll be rocked by ok players who got blue shields and better guns

[HyperXMousepad]

Simple, things average out over time. Just take some combination of average KDA, average damage, and average win % to determine a matchmaking rating. Obviously players with a <1% winrate and an average of 100-200 damage a game with a .3 KDA shouldn't be going up against players with KDA over 3, 500+ average damage per game, and hundreds of wins. You can never have a perfect MM system, and smurfing will still be a problem, but you can at least stop knowingly matching noobs and casuals against the really good players.

[Jungle-Beard]

As much as I want to agree with the thread simply because of it being well posted, history disagrees with the overall concept. 

Even if SBMM is implemented, it won't change the minds of players using cheats.  One of the biggest issues, is that EA tries covering up the issue, and protects them with the no name and shame ruling.   

If they know it's going to take weeks to get a ban, and can just use any freely available freeware to bypass the bans, they aren't going to care ether way.  

Most people who record and upload to youtube or similar sites, don't bother trying to send in a report. The system is a pain to navigate, you don't get any feedback regarding the report, and in most cases, your report is seemingly ignored, as people have far to many repeat encounters. 

When all signs are pointing towards EA taking their sweet time, ignoring the issue, and protecting them on the forums, there is little deterrence to not use them. 

500K + banned free accounts may as well read 1 Banned user 500K times.   And when you see the Youtube videos of players getting unbanned, it really sends out the opposite message. 

[HyperXMousepad]

It would actually make it a lot easier to identify cheaters for one thing.  Right now whenever a single player wipes your squad out like nothing, you have no idea if they're just really freakin good or cheating unless you wanna take the time to spectate them.  With match making it becomes easier to notice the players who dramatically stand out from the crowd.

Aside from that, most people do feel a bit bad about cheating unless they're an actual sociopath.  They need to justify it to themselves and others with reasons such as "There's no SBMM and I'm always getting owned by gods, and there's no way I can ever get that good because I can only play an hour or two a day tops", or "Man, I just wanna play casually after work and not get completely destroyed over and over again".

With SBMM these types will be stuck vs other casual/mediocre players, and they lose their internal justification for cheating.  It won't stop all( some people do just enjoy cheating), but it will probably prevent a good amount.

[Cipax]

Maybe it's just me but I've never felt the need to want to cheat because of the lack of SBMM, I'm an average player and when I get killed I think to myself what could I have done to prevent that and I learn/adapt from it.

How will matchmaking make it easier to identify cheaters? I can identify cheaters now without it.

You could also say SBMM would allow high ranked players to make smurf accounts over and over again just to crap on the lower players.

I'm not saying I'm for or against SBMM but saying it leads to the desire to cheat is a BOLD statement.