Skill-Based Matchmaking is Good for Games, Why is this an Argument?

[@SupermanSajam]

I see a lot of comments saying, "I think SBMM is fine, but CoD's version is bad." I mentioned this in the video, that has to do with how it's implemented and now whether it's good. If you love Apple Pie, but the local bakery has the worst Apple Pie every, it's not Apple Pie's fault that the bakery sucks. Also the bakery needs an Apple Pie sweatlord who can make the goods tbh

[@dylanh.3793]

Not everything has to be a competition. Unlike FG’s, games like CoD/Fortnite have a primarily casual community who just wanna talk trash and have fun. People don’t play those games with the intention of improving or going pro, and if they are, then there’s ranked mode for that. SBMM is awful for the casual community and it makes smurfing much worse. CoD has already seen a fair share of content creators who will spend a bunch of time throwing games and killing themselves over and over again so they will get paired against total scrubs and get easy Nukes or “40-0” type games. It ruins the game for the people dealing with a throwing teammate and it ruins the game for the scrubs who have to tangle with a godlike player and get destroyed. If people want a better SBMM experience then the focus needs to be on improving competitive game modes, not altering the casual experience.

[@Copperhell144]

@@dylanh.3793 SBMM is also good for those people, as it prevents casuals from being matched with elites that dominate them with their eyes closed

[@TigBiddeus]

Cod just needs a ranked mode that of course has sbmm and public games should be just random people

[@dylanh.3793]

sozcan please read the second paragraph of my comment.

[@MaulusRS]

It kinda just depends on the intended experience, which is gonna be not only subjective to the game, but also to the people playing it. It might be just "stomping noobs" at the end of the day, which has its downsides (especially for new player retention if you're the devs), but it's undeniable that one of the core appeals of certain fps games like CoD, battle royales like Apex Legends, and even going back as far as Halo, is having those high-accolade high-kill games where you're better than your competition and showing it. Just look at the popular content uploaded over the years for these sorts of games - kill world records, high kill games, tactical nuke games, perfect games. It's a power fantasy that feels good to watch and to achieve yourself after working hard for them. The games themselves have rewards and incentives built around this appeal, too. From Nukes (25 killstreaks) in CoD, to perfections in Halo (15+ kills no deaths), to the 20 kill badges in Apex (especially brutal as you have to kill 1/3rd of the ENTIRE lobby of 60 players by yourself), these games all have those big hype accolades to work towards and achieve that people can only really get if they're at least substantially better than most of the other people they're playing with. You're never gonna see these sorts of things happen in a ranked ladder match or a game where everyone is equally skilled - they are outright not going to happen and never will happen, and they're not supposed to. People wanna work towards the huge euphoric dopamine flood of grinding their butts off for that amazing gameplay and getting that badge or nuke or whatever. It's what keeps people playing these games and it feels incredible to finally achieve - it's the personal growth people are looking for in these kinds of games that are designed around them. Now obviously, none of this appeal applies to fighting games - in fighting games, and really most other competitive games, most of the appeal is completely centralized in having an even, hard-fought match with someone who challenges you. That's why it's such a hard conversation to approach from literally any angle other than from these specific games who are designed around that sort of frag-out sense of accomplishment that just isn't there with SBMM, and why so many communities outside of this small segment of fps players are so incredulous and don't really get why people really dislike SBMM even conceptually on a near universal level. Sure, hard fought, evenly matched ranked games in these games have their appeal too, but a lot of what people enjoy about these games is lost with any sort of universal and substantial skill based matchmaking in public/casual lobbies, which used to be where people just queued up with their IRL friends and had fun in casual games with wide skill distributions. This problem is more or less solved by having a dedicated SBMM/ranked mode imo so people can have the experience they want. Used to be easier when community servers in stuff like CS were the norm.

[@donk5058]

Broke: Skill Based Matchmaking Woke: Smash Brothers Melee Melee

[@espurrseyes42]

Guess I'm woke, because something Smash Bros. Melee related is the first thing that came to my mind.

[@CylonDorado]

The world isn’t ready for Double Melee.

[@BBGirlSamus]

@@CylonDorado but is it ready for Melee doubles ?

[@CylonDorado]

Parker Knight Maybe on certain stages.

[@deliightulinwa8534]

Won’t lie legitimately thought it was super smash bros melee melee till I clicked on the vid

[@Alice-jp1kl]

One of the best things I've seen come out of this is "You fighting game players just don't get it, how would you feel if you tried to learn a new character but got matched with people at your same rank and lost a bunch because you were still figuring things out?" as if that's not already how we learn new characters.

[@MallowJam]

my character learning experience is going into training mode to get a feel for the character, find exactly 1(one) easy combo then go get my ass kicked online

[@anotherinternetperson8495]

@@MallowJam someone who gets it!!!

[@rum5878]

@@MallowJam I'm in this comment and I don't like it

[@patrioticshitstain]

I can't say how many ranks I've lost trying to figure out a new character. Stomping new players just gives you bad habits that take forever to unlearn. Better to get your shit pushed in every time you do something stupid so you learn to stop.

[@MallowJam]

@@patrioticshitstain oh yeah, that also reminds me that by losing ranks you play worse players and start getting wins again. Honestly, it's a steady progression of getting bodied, close matches, winning a lot and finally getting back to your rank

[@CGoody564]

"The Leffen Offensive" will forever be noted and professed by great historians going forward.

[@eliastew9636]

Also known as Leffen's "Shmovement"

[@Scientist93]

I hope they actually call it "The Leffensive", though...

[@SoysauceML]

This thread cracks me up so much 😂

[@CGoody564]

@@Scientist93 too hip for the history books, but those whose brethren were on the front lines will surely call it such

[@mikereed4594]

"One implementation of badly made french fries" got an instant thumbs up from me.

[@bennymountain1]

Typical commie

[@JPVersus_]

This video was worth it just for the Rocket League story lol

[@SnuggsMcDuff]

i freakin' lost it after the "Where is she?!" interaction. Great joke after all the Batman metaphors

[@justblake6975]

Possibly the best 30 seconds of youtube

[@Bladieblah]

But the example doesn't make any sense though. It's a story about how being terribly missmatched in rating was one of the most fun experiences he's had with the game. If being missmatched is so much fun, which I actually agree with, there is little point in skill based matchmaking to begin with. Because it isn't a bad thing to occasionally have your ass kicked ridiculously by people who are much better at the game than you

[@The268170]

@@Bladieblah seems you missed the part where he WAS playing a game with sbmm. So it very much SUPPORTS his point..

[@Bladieblah]

@@The268170He was talking about the situation where you play with a friend that is rated much higher than you. His friend was rated much higher and because of that the team they got matched against were way better than Sajam. The algorithm can't handle the situation where two players with a large skill gap between them insist on playing together. He got destroyed but he could laugh about it. Apparently it can be a blast when you are matched against exclusively top tier players. That is not even what a no SBMM situation is like (which would, on average, represent all skill levels based on the size of the player base they make up, so in a 100 player room you would find at most one player who is in the top 1%). If that is an okay situation then having no SBMM shouldn't be a problem. So no, it completely contradicts the entire point

[@r15835]

Ngl, when I first saw "SBMM" (on scrubquotes), I thought it was about Smash.

[@sleepinbelle9627]

Every time it's "Super Bash Mothers Melee"

[@qedsoku849]

Super Bros Melee Melee

[@kevinrivera9917]

@@qedsoku849 beat me to it lol

[@Matt-dp7ze]

Smash Bros Melee Melee

[@myboy_]

@@Matt-dp7ze very clever

[@mainpika]

"I shouldn't have to sweat it up, so let me play weak players." Weaker players: "I shouldn't have to sweat it up, so let me play weaker players." Even weaker players: I shouldn't have to sweat it up, so let me play weaker players.

[@MrOzzification]

Ranked ladder but its in reverse

[@Bladieblah]

And what if I told you that at the very bottom there are people that really don't care whether they get trashed or not? In games that did not have SBMM there was never a shortage of those players, maybe the bottom of the barrel simply doesn't care. Changing it would be similar to dumbing down fighting game mechanics to make it more accessible. Many games have done this and it's never stopped better players from destroying lesser players because the nature of FG's remains that it has a relatively high skill ceiling and making that less high still doesn't let bad players have a chance against good players

[@somedudethatdoesthings8057]

This. THIS. HOLY SHIT-

[@Azmodeus87]

Korega scrubquote... da!

[@Sakaki98]

Azmodeus87 BAKA NA

[@r15835]

The real joke here is that all these people claiming they will get trashed by sweatlords not only think they are as good as those sweatlords, but somehow aren't as sweaty to be that good...

[@ashjudd]

Definition of scrub right?

[@DXYS95]

And of course they're the only ones who don't sweat, but everyone else at their skill level does lmao

[@jessiejones7141]

Bro you sir are the truth! I remember playing the older cods cod4 to be exact. And i was always getting destroyed. Id respawn, go out to look for kills and immediately get killed again. How is that possible unless the enemy players are being massive sweats! The only thing is back then they were called tryhards 😂

[@r15835]

@@jessiejones7141 ... Either I'm reading this wrong or you missed the point entirely, but either's fine.

[@jessiejones7141]

@@r15835 na i understood what you were saying. These guys call everybody sweatlords but they are also sweatlords. They're just sweatlords who get smacked then cry about sbmm lmao. Little babies honestly.

[@astashasta1]

Imagine an NBA player complaining about having to play NBA players all the time

[@nerdstrangler4804]

But they don't have to? I am pretty sure they also play basketball with their friends and family. And a lot of times they visit schools and play with the kids. Granted they are obviously only doing this to smash noobs and boost their ego.

[@emperormegaman3856]

@Nerestrangler and in the same way, if a good player (or a scrub) want to play against his friend/ family or anyone else, nothing stop them from doing so. (though if they're being a jerk about it, don't expect their friends to play with them for a long time). And there have been one or two "celebrities/ casual plays against pro players" events. But if a scrub is complaining that they can't be allowed to beat beginners, at a game they've been playing for 15 years, in a online ranking environment, then they are full of it.

[@astashasta1]

@@emperormegaman3856 I didn't think it was worth responding to lol. He just throws his whole point out in the last sentence

[@Rinin.]

Except an NBA player is employed to compete. Video games are a hobby got fun. I agree with SBMM but this is the wrong argument to make.

[@astashasta1]

@@Rinin. They still play against nba comparative talent even when they're not getting paid for real games. They don't play with any random at their local gym lol. You're overthinking the analogy people get the point

[@garethmagis]

The last time i saw this being complained about was during destiny 1 when the added skill based matchmaking and all the youtubers who made a living off of "30-0 LOOK AT HOW BROKEN THIS NEW PISTOL IS!!!!!!!" started complaining that now the game wasn't fun anymore.

[@jessiejones7141]

Lol yea bro like they think they're so good until they play someone of equal skill level. Then they find out that they werent as good as they thought they were 😂. But i mean everybody is good playing against noobs and scrubby players so the real question is.....Where they even good to begin with? 👀

[@justfitz08]

But didn't they remove it in d2? Cause I tried that game for the first time a few months ago and the experience was god awful. The gap between players was insane.

[@shgalagalaa]

@@jessiejones7141 Your argument is so braindead. Thats like watching pro csgo players not pub stomp in professional games. Your conclusion to that is "Then they find out that they werent as good as they thought they were 😂" . Your argument is that "good players arent good when they play aginast other players of the top .5% of the playerbase. When the only reason SBMM is a thing is to protect the trashcans from realizing theyre trashcans so the company can milk more money out of them before they move over to the next new and cool game.

[@oliveoil2549]

@@justfitz08 Yeah, sadly. The game has become mercy or be mercied. :\

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

@@shgalagalaa yup, people who have very little skill will never understand that unfortunately.

[@shrikelet]

"I want to beat up people who are weaker than me to feel better about myself." How are we even entertaining this argument?

[@water-111]

Because thats not really the argument

[@Copperhell144]

@@water-111 But that's 100% the argument

[@skylrxoxo]

@@water-111 how so

[@TurboNemesis]

@@water-111 what is the argument then? I've not seen a single person in this comment section decrying sbmm that doesnt eventually include them wanting to be able to get matched into games with low skill players. I'm genuinely trying to understand and so far I dobt follow what's so bad about being made to play with people of equal of comparable skill level.

[@mikemoggerson6651]

You guys are corporate shills and too foolish to even see WHY sbmm or as EA calls it “engagement optimization” is in the game. That’s why they’re so secretive about it, because it’s ALL about money. It has NOTHING to do with making the game better. Do you seriously think the developers are doing what most people DON’T want them to do out of some altruistic goal to make the game better? Lmao.

[@horplesmoff]

Cod's community always has the worst mindset when it comes to competition

[@xCriZzZ]

Because CoD is not competitive game

[@pepinillomagico1645]

​@@xCriZzZtwo teams figthing eachother for a objective, definitely not a competitive game

[@NJP695]

All of these arguments kinda fascinate me when you put them in the context of a different game. Like, imagine if we were having this conversation about skill based matchmaking in *chess*. “Of course I can’t win - this guy is the same skill level as me, playing the same Caro Kann variations, while I’m just out here trying to learn my Sicilian game without having to sweat lord it up.”

[@OldManShoutsAtClouds]

What you're describing is ranked play. Public matches are not ranked play.

[@noneofyourbusiness9428]

"I don't want to sweat all the time" says the to ranked player as he queues up for an unranked match with no SBMM, forcing all the casuals in the lobby to now sweat out of their minds to even compete. And I say this as that casual. I don't want to sweat all the time. And so the cycle continues

[@joedatius]

how about just don't be so sweaty? if you were actually a casual then you wouldn't care if you could compete or not, that's what casual means, not "i dont wanna earn my win"

[@indestructible247]

​@@joedatius casual players play games to have fun and getting killed 20 times within the course of just 1-2 minutes is not fun

[@mysterypie]

When sbmm came out on fortnite, I was asking why people who wanted it gone wanted to crush new players. I can actually win now!!!

[@Roteberht35]

I've been saying if playing the game optimally isn't fun and you want to win that badly than why are you even playing that game

[@Arlo5.13]

Exactly. “I want to win, but I don’t want to work and try like pits McGee, he’s a sweat lord” If you don’t want to do what it takes to improve your game, you either have to accept your current level and that you will lose to better players, or change your mind and get better. That goes for anything, music, sports, video games, writing, whatever 🤷‍♂️

[@EarthLordCJ]

Yep, this is something I've had to learn for myself, especially when trying to improve at competitive games other than fighting games (platform fighters included). I just avoid trying to 'get good' at the games where the process of playing optimally is 'unfun' for me, or try and see if I can reframe how I'm playing/thinking of the game to find more enjoyment out of playing optimally. It's a point of introspection that I can understand not many players really consider, *especially* if it's something that you've already made part of your identity (for good or ill), or have otherwise spent a ton of time playing.

[@malcovich_games]

These players could just go play slot machines. There's no way to optimize playing on slot machines ever and it's really all up to chance. They should not even play things like Mahjong, Blackjack or Texas because while there's an large element of chance, there's ways to optimize the shit out of those.

[@Lanzetsu]

Yup, I do as Sajam says, I often don't care about optimal and want to play with stuff I have fun, so I get rekt until I am on a lower rank where I can get fun and if they get me mad I start being serious and go to rank up again lol

[@xaviercopeland2789]

To have fun?

[@like17badgers]

the "if you like SBMM you have no drive..." stuff is what really got me you are gonna sit there and tell me that *I'M BAD* because I want a fair fight instead of bullying kids who just got their game for their birthday? homie WHAT!? people are throwing temper tantrums over CoD Cold War and killing themselves as they spawn over and over but they dont realize *this it what it's like when there IS NO SBMM!* you're gettin your ass beat by people who are strictly better than you cause they dont have the existing ELO to put them in the 4k bracket while you are in the 200s

[@gaddeath]

these people that wanna stomp on noobs but bitch when better players beat them. its annoying. edit: grammar

[@kinginthenorth1437]

I think the truly insane part is that wanting easy kills on noobs sounds a lot like having no fucking drive. Good players with drive want to play good players.

[@TurboNemesis]

I think he meant it from the new player perspective, that being low skill and not having the perseverance to play with the big sweaty boys makes you weak. Its a stupid fucking argument that only exposes his desire to bully noobs, of course

[@nerdstrangler4804]

@@TurboNemesis No its because the META in cod is both boring to play and boring to play against. So with SBMM as you improve at the game, the game becomes increasingly less fun. So the only people who like SBMM are the people who never improve at the game. And it is extremely frustrating for experienced COD players because people who are completely unqualified to have an opinion on the matter, keep chiming in telling them they are wrong and just want to bully noobs.

[@TurboNemesis]

@@nerdstrangler4804 then dont play meta if you dont like it. It's okay to not be 100% optimal if it's not fun for you. You might lose some matches but that's fine. If that's not acceptable to you then maybe the problem is you just dont like high level cod play. And I used to play the shit out of cod, halo, tf2, destiny crucible, etc. I know what it's like and sbmm is better imo. It's very telling that you assume anyone who doesnt agree that sbmm stunts skill growth doesnt play fps games.

[@EarthLordCJ]

"How are good players being punished by playing people of the same skill level?" That might be because they never really had a drive to actually improve themselves, they only want to be good enough to pubstomp casuals online. I know that might be an 'uncharitable' interpretation of these CoD folks, but I really can't read it any other way.

[@cinemapigeon4898]

I think the issue is sbmm in theory is great, and many games do it well and are open about how their systems work. A modern COD player is criticizing a completely different form of sbmm (there's no ranks, no rewards,everything is hidden, etc..), And all data suggests modern cods ' sbmm is more so about player engagement than fair balanced lobbies. As the game will determine beforehand which games you will lose /win, going from easy lobbies to difficult ones, almost like gambling. Saying people are mad because they can't pub stomp anymore is largely missing the mark and is attacking a strawman.

[@coldbacon4869]

@@cinemapigeon4898 if the game “determines” what games you’ll win and lose before hand, why are people who are genuinely good at the game able to go positive 200-300 games? How would anyone gain skill if everyone has to go through this? How do the top players get to the top? How are there many many top players who don’t use meta weapons?

[@cinemapigeon4898]

@@coldbacon4869 Ok it's a slight exaggeration, but if you play the game enough and have been a veteran of the series, you'll definitely find some matches way harder than others. You'll get crushed a few games in a row then get a strangely easy match. Data supports this as well. Uses recent match performance.

[@BalkanManic]

Yeah pretty much. Theyre just mad that they cant stromp new players and act like they have any type of skill. Thats why they sit in corners instead of playing the objective in COD too. Because they think KDA means something. These people are some of the lowest IQs of the gaming world.

[@joplin4434]

@@cinemapigeon4898 but that's how everything works? Of course if you do better you will get matched against people who are also doing better, one will go up and one will go down. That's how any ranked system works. Your skill is between those two levels, you are not good enough to maintain level 3 but you are good enough to get there after some good games. Like in all games where you can rank down this happens lol

[@DragonHalo3D]

Yeah the main argument I hear is that they “don’t want to try every game.” Besides the obvious things wrong with this sentence, it doesn’t even make sense in the first place cause you know damn well they’re gonna still be trying their ass off against bad players in order to get the most kills possible and hit clips.

[@Fatlord27]

The argument presented to me was "I'd like to be able to play off meta without virtually forfeiting the match." Which is fair, I think, but surely the solution to this problem isn't "hey treyarch, let me play worse players," it's "oh shit, if I wanna use this gun, i gotta learn how to work around the meta," or "hey treyarch, please alter game balance," right?

[@6packproductions710]

Yeah, if off meta gets you pulverized, then you may just need better fundamentals.

[@justfitz08]

@@6packproductions710 And in the mean time you simply derank yourself so that you can rework your fundamentals in a more balanced environment. SBMM always works itself out. I'm pretty sure destiny 2 removed it in most modes, and the experience was TERRIBLE as a newcomer.

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

@@glizzytoucher2301 yeah... Being a Top 1% Skill level then having my friends who are only in the top 70% skill level join me and the Game Matching us with people who are in the top 10% skilled players is painful as my friends all get decimated.. In games Like For Honor this is a huge issue.

[@notmyfullname598]

I disagree with that point as plenty of strategies in games are designed to not be top tier but instead be fun, these strategies are designed to be used in a casual environment where people are not sweating it up

[@erurice1797]

@@notmyfullname598 I’m pretty sure most things in games are meant to be fun. Some things just happen to be better than others, and that’s fine. You also have to accept the fact that other people find different things fun. Your off meta stuff might be fun for you, but that doesn’t means it’s fun for everyone either. Some things won’t be fun on the receiving end, but that’s how it works when you play against other people. They get enjoyment out of doing good, and, unfortunately, you might not get that enjoyment at that moment.

[@kaleidoslug7777]

"Why is it not fun just because you're not winning?" That's just the thing tho! These people need to learn to lose. It just happens, you gotta get used to it. On a 1v1 game, every game, someone's gonna lose. Being salty because sometimes that's gonna be you is just so self-centered

[@Permafrost1]

Ive been trying to figure it out why is not fun for me to lose It's probably expectations. It felt bad for me to do my best and get no result in the form of losing I keep forgetting that its about getting good. If i get better, Ws will come by themselves. I should keep telling myself that its not about winning, its about doing my best Sorry for the late response lul

[@kaleidoslug7777]

@@Permafrost1 Nah no worries, you got the attitude! The smaller victories are what counts

[@TurboNemesis]

I would give anything for people to go back to saying "tryhard" instead of "sweatlord" Christ what a disgusting phrase

[@cloude8496]

Let them drown in their own salt

[@hiroprotagonest]

But you see, tryhard almost sounds like praise, can't have that!

[@tbotalpha8133]

I dunno, "tryhard" feels a bit less negative than "sweatlord". Like, in the Team Fortress 2 community, there's a player called B4nny. He's one of the best players in the game. And in every match he plays, he plays to win. He has no time for friendly shenanigans or memery (unless he's being paid by his stream audience to do it). B4nny lives to destroy the enemy. Every match he plays, he gives 100% of his focus. B4nny is the Platonic ideal of a tryhard. And I respect him immensely for it. He very clearly gets a huge amount of enjoyment out of challenging himself, and always trying his best. And in always pushing himself, B4nny has become a ferociously strong player.

[@Wiki1184]

@@tbotalpha8133 B4nny is a machine. My man has two goals: To win and to make it fat.

[@IoNicD3]

@@tbotalpha8133 He goes deep and shreds the guitar. B4nny is simply too powerful.

[@lukusridley]

What's so funny about this whole argument is that the reason CoD players are so mad about SBMM is that their game is unfun and degenerate at high levels - the problem isn't matchmaking, it's that *call of duty is a terrible competitive game*. Blaming matchmaking is hilariously confused

[@SuperTurboCrash]

The case against SBMM seems to just be "I want to win without putting effort in. I want to smurf and crush crappy players with meme strats to make myself feel good.".

[@codenameuniccorn2412]

Exactly

[@Error-dq9wf]

@@codenameuniccorn2412 well pro players put the effort into being good at the game, and you noobs dont want to put in the effort in improving and instead get sheltered.

[@MrAjking808]

@@Error-dq9wf your not pro lol 😂

[@Error-dq9wf]

@@MrAjking808 but I know you are trash since you want to be sheltered by SBMM :)

[@MrAjking808]

@@Error-dq9wf nah I’m pretty good at the good , I get beat at times but I’m not crying like y’all are because someone else is better than me

[@rowyourboat4331]

I will never understand the argument that SBMM doesn't make u improve as a player. That is the entire of purpose of SBMM when you rank up you fight better players and realize "wow im pretty shit" then you learn and get better and rank up again to repeat the process

[@HarbingerOfTruth1]

I think that is integrally something that can be argued against SBMM. SBMM is an eternal cycle of trying to make you as a player better and better, but therein lies the problem. If you now work a lot and only have time for a couple of games you are essentially forced to tryhard unless you want to be flamed. The game simply stops being fun unless you tryhard, but at this point you would have to invest hundreds of hours to get to the next level which you don't have time for. I don't think most people don't want to play against complete noobs, but instead wishes to play against people on their skill level that aren't tryharding although really this wouldn't be a problem if casual game modes weren't taken so seriously.

[@Crota23]

@@HarbingerOfTruth1 But that's just to be expected tho. If you have to work now and you don't have enough time to invest in a game, it is to be expected that you no longer have those skills because you don't train yourself anymore to maintain that skill. You lose a game to someone who has the same skill level as the old you (who once used to play the game so much). And then the results said you have a bad skill now. And now because there's SBMM the matchmaking are just gonna match you up with weaker players. Now you don't have to sweat it up anymore against these people who have the same skill levels as the old you. Now you can just learn at your own pace, fighting against these people who are just as bad as you. You don't have to be a tryhard all the time, you can just get flammed and lose a couple of games and then you're just gonna match up against people who have the same low level (non-tryhard) skill as you. And then when the game decides you have a higher skill level than the people fight against last time, they're gonna match you up against the people who are as good as you and better than the previous people you fought. And then turns out you lose because you don't have the same amount of skill as these new people you fight. So what? You can just queue up again and fight against weaker players again. If you don't want to tryhard and just want a CASUAL game. Why does losing matters so much?

[@mrcuddles2199]

The biggest difference for me about the FGC from other game communities is the accountability you take since it's all on you. You can't hide your excuses behind bad teammates or an opposing team that has more skilled players. I see that as the reason we can take the L and try and learn and adapt better than the average player from other groups that may need an ego boost with dominating matches against low-skilled players.

[@jakesimpson3373]

You can always bitch about your opponent’s character, but that usually gets shot down anyways

[@joedatius]

this is basically the entire reason why so many of them are so against SBMM in the first place. it takes away another excuse they could use. alot of these anti-SBMM people refuse the idea that they aren't as good as they think and will find any excuse possible to justify an L. if you think being against SBMM was bad just wait until you see the people who make unhinged conspiracy theories that Activision has unseen technology that is able to pinpoint and find out how well you are doing and on the spot nerf you mid match and manipulate the game to ensure you don't do better while doing the opposite to the sitty "noob" who just killed you. and just as a reminder this is the NORM for COD content creators who will actively smurf in lobbies so they can "dominate" players and get easier trickshot videos. Imagine if literally any other community tried pulling this shit off. This is like Sajam using smurf accounts to get easier wins and BEING OPEN ABOUT IT

[@nerdstrangler4804]

The biggest difference is the FGC is based around being sweaty. You don't hop on street fighter to find a lobby full of funny drunk/high dudes you can spend all night cracking jokes with on the weekend. So the concept that some people enjoy online games simply to relax and be social is a completely foreign concept to them. You assume everything is about winning and losing, because thats the only thing that matters in fighting games. Whereas with team-based games socializing is a big aspect. But when you remove persistent lobbies to try to make games as sweaty and competitive as possible. It kills the social aspect.

[@wanderingwobb6300]

​@@joedatiusI'd think you were making the stuff about the conspiracy theories up if I hadn't seen people say that myself. 😭 CoD community is so pathetic that people actively cheer on smurfing. At the very least it's looked down upon pretty much everywhere else.

[@vudgnudg2214]

​@@nerdstrangler4804you act like winning and losing is the only thing that matters in fighting games and not shooters. The entire argument against sbmm is that they want to win more games by stomping weaker opponents. Is it a team game? Yeah, but "socializing" is not the problem that theyre complaining about. If you want to make a conspiracy theory, this is not where you do it

[@absoul112]

If it's a casual game, then why does losing matter?

[@thedragonsden2774]

I think it's a matter of how they lose cuz some ppl who beats players in casual tend to be very disrespectful like their playing rank

[@strathmore5267]

It was a causal game until they re-enforced sbmm, when you create a competitive system you create a competitive environment. In cod like bo2 and mw2 it was fun because yes it was casual, it wasn't all about winning.

[@Zakaru99]

@@strathmore5267 Both of those games had SBMM.

[@strathmore5267]

@@Zakaru99 Yes but the degree of sbmm was different. You didn't have to reverse boost in mw2 to drop back-to-nukes unlike mw

[@WaluTime]

@@strathmore5267 "it wasnt all about winning" "TAKE SBMM OUT SO I CAN PUBSTOMP NEW PLAYERS AND WINNNNNN, I WANNA WINNN" it is genuinely surprising how all the anti sbmm folk dont see the fallacy in this. The fact that yall wanna go ham and stomp new players makes yall the sweatlords.

[@whs1pmjazz]

I've never even got how sweatlord is even an insult in the first place. I spent years of my life afraid of failure, and unable to take forward steps in my life as a result of that. The people trying to put others down because they are trying hard and making an effort at something are like how I used to be (although I never blamed others, I just took it all out on myself). Making a concerted effort on things in life is a good thing, and you should never feel ashamed for doing so. If you try to avoid the pain of failure through blame on others or claiming you could have won if you tried, you rob yourself of most happiness through unfair standards of yourself when good things happen (something along the lines of "Yeah, but I bet I could have done even better if I put in more work"), and actually bring about an even greater pain than the one you were trying to avoid when things inevitably don't work out. If you are too afraid to fail, there are certain points you will never be able to get past in hobbies, activities, and life, and that stagnancy and fear in which you sit in is far worse than skinning your knee a couple of times.

[@misterkeebler]

Very true, and great comment

[@doolioart3314]

"sweatlord" is a nonsensical thing even wtihout that context, because you can't really know someone's approach. Perhaps they're ten times better than you and they're playing drunk and relaxed this match, so they're only five times better than you. On the other hand, such description can work, depending on an environment. Your assessment is very generalized. But, here's a real example (funnily enough, it's very much about scraping a knee, which you mentioned lol). I played a lot of basketball when I was younger. We mostly played in the neighborhood or some money matches in "foreign" neighborhoods, that kind of stuff. So, nothing serious, but kinda solid street basketball. You would never see people dive for the ball, even in those money matches or "pride" matches. Because we played on concrete courts. You never saw people trying to mess up your spine by trying to spin you while you're in the air. Things like that. Yet, there was one guy who did all that all the time. Because he wanted to win all the time and he couldn't stand losing. So, there's a ball going out of bounds, everyone stopped playing because no one is going to do a horizontal jumping dive for it, but there he is, diving for it, failing and scraping half of skin from his legs and arms. He couldn't continue with the game, he had to go to emergency because he was sliding on that floor for, like, four meters. Now, if I used the term "sweatlord", which I don't, I'd call that guy a sweatlord. Which is, a commitment completely out of line when compared to the situation/environment. There is such a thing and it's not even some vague assessment, it's pretty tangible when you see it. Pretty much all of us would do try that dive if it was some professional game or who knows what on the line etc, but only that guy would time himself out from not only basketball, but everyday life, for weeks (because that scraping was a good one lol) in that particular game in that particular situation. Of course, everyone's an individual and we all gauge things differently, but there's a certain thresholds where pretty much everyone else except that guy is like "dude, chill". If you want another example, which I won't go into detail with, you have me and my profession, where I "sweatlorded" myself out of it due to lifelong injury I suffered (which I wouldn't suffer if I wasn't a sweatlord). So, the categorization isn't completely void. As I said, your description is very generalized and indeed, what you say is true. But, I think something like "sweatlord" demands a context in order to be fairly analyzed. I agree that in most situations it's used incorrectly or in an exaggerated manner. But, for example, that guy with the dive, he didn't gain anything from that, he messed himself up for nothing and he objectively acted in discrepancy with the gravity of the situation - I'd say that fits the description pretty well. I mean, "sweatlord" isn't someone who is making an effort, sweatlord is someone making "too much of an effort" compared to the situation they are in. You're not going to call an NBA player a sweatlord, for example.

[@like17badgers]

I've always seen it as a term of endearment, I play Siege mostly these days, and when our team is down 1v5 and our last guy takes out 3 people that's when we go "oh he's gettin' sweaty" he aint holdin back right now, Rock Lee just dropped the weights from on top of the statue. shit's about to get REAL

[@doms7568]

It’s called playing a game

[@basicsyphilis8]

@DoolioArt great story & I’m not joking it’s legit 👍

[@ryujijitei]

This has been a serious issue in Destiny, where whenever SBMM is reintroduced, EVERY content creator goes on a furious rampage bitching until Bungie change it back to CBMM. All of the same arguments discussed in this video are used there. It's fucking INFURIATING. I had the best experience I've ever had with Crucible while SBMM was enabled, actively feeling myself improving and with video evidence to prove it, and have had no desire to touch it again after it was reverted back to CBMM.

[@tyblair8116]

lmao when shadowkeep dropped and everything except quickplay was sbmm i went to legend ranked survival to fucking AVOID sweaties because every other mode was just loaded to the brim with people desperate to pubstomp. that said honestly the skill ceiling in d2 is so low that sbmm may as well just be checking your loadout because that's what matters 99.99% of the time

[@GoldenChainsaw]

Destiny PvP is just fuckin horrible in general...SBMM or CBMM

[@goddamnarshia]

Destiny is a game notorious for having droughts and making the game shit with one update. Many players who are good at the game would leave when the game becomes shit and come back like a whole year later , and when they do come back the game treats them like they never left , still matching this player who hasn't played for an entire year against sweat lords. There needs to be a system to decrease skill when time passes and a player doesn't play , and for there to be 2 separate match making ques. Control and the like being cbmm and survival and trials being sbmm. There is indeed times you DONT want to try your hardest and this concept seems to be lost to players who do want to try their hardest every second of playing a video game

[@supremespanker]

Destiny pvp was fun, what really killed it for me is grind/pay to win. It is disgusting that you cannot on equal footing in pvp, without grinding boring ass dungeons.

[@mysterypie]

​@@tyblair8116i avoid this because I am too competitive against real people and just play easy bots I decimate or just play a type of rs6s through cod bots or pve. I aint competitive against bots for some reason. Then again the last competitive game I played was cod in 2013.

[@Zapatote]

"Everyone that kills me is a sweatlord"

[@yearslate9349]

Imagine being so mad at the prospect of losing in a competitive game that you take to Twitter to vent your frustration about these people (who are ostensibly of a similar skill level) putting more effort into the game than you want to. I know that's an oversimplification, but it's pretty whack. Losing? In a competitive game? No sir, not me; I'm too good to lose.

[@gerardorivas2811]

What's wack about this is you writing 'wack' with an H

[@yearslate9349]

@@gerardorivas2811 Haha, I never noticed that. Thanks for pointing that out for me.

[@oBCHANo]

Imagine thinking public matches in COD are competitive.

[@Sakaki98]

Seal Any kind of versus game mode is competitive by definition, genius. You’d look a whole lot less like a douche right now if you derived your confidence from intellect rather than ignorance, you know.

[@doolioart3314]

@@oBCHANo You might want to reassess whatever meaning you thought "competitive" has. Are, perhaps, CoD public matches about people sitting around, roleplaying aligators or something? Or, they're about shooting other guys in a pvp environment and as far as I know, there's even a scoreboard and a winner is declared at the end of every match. Things can be more seriously competitive than others, but there's a pretty basic and fundamental meaning behind what competitive means in general. Hell, if you go afk in some attempt at pacifism to protest others killing each other in a CoD match, I am sure you'll get kicked from that match because you're interfering with the COMPETITIVE aspect. But really, this complete idiocy about shifting goalposts when it comes to what "competitive" means is one of the dumbest things I've seen in the last several years. It's objectively untrue. Quake might be "more competitive" because there's a different approach to the game, more elements to worry about and the player base is thinner, so the general level of it is highly elevated. But, CoD NOT BEING COMPETITIVE? That's objectively bullshit, because its literally fundamentally designed as such (its multiplayer is pvp, for starters, which ends every further discussion). You know what's the funny thing? The first example I wrote, about roleplaying as alligators. If there's a scoring system that determines who was role playing the best, that's a competitive activity as well. An alligator role playing competition. But, hey, let me give you an opportunity, to explain how CoD public matches aren't competitive. But, using proper language, proper definitions and proper reasoning. Not some moronic "imagine blahblah ecks dee let's fucking go" type of speak and some moronic figurative butchered definitions of the term "competitive" that your favorite 25 year old "esports streamer" came up with.

[@JusRed48]

People that don't want skill-based matchmaking are the same people that make smurf accounts on League of Legends. This is the video game equivalent of going to play grade schoolers in their driveway because you can't dunk on anyone at the real basketball court. The same people complaining about the participation trophy generation want false self-confidence by preying on inexperienced or less-skilled players lmao

[@RandomFandomOfficial]

Exactly!

[@Geheimnis-c2e]

To be fair, League matchmaking isn't ENTIRELY skill-based lmao People could be put in smurf queue and suffer miserable double digit loss streaks until they drop to their actual rank. But come on man, you really have to have a full match history tainted with red just to with match people with "equal skill" just for the system to throw you back to smurf queue for winning three times in a row after that?

[@RandomFandomOfficial]

The modern equivalent is men joining women’s sports.

[@brandonzamora5470]

Hey sajam, just wanted to say i just got an ethernet cable to play dbfz, thank you for illuminating my life. I feel that videogames should tell you to use ethernet cables, i didnt even know there was a difference until you said it.

[@Chris-xl6pd]

you didnt know that electrical signal through air is worse than through a solid copper cable. Bruh i got news for ya

[@Joltman11]

Most the complaints about SBMM come from Cod players and I feel like it's for a couple reasons: Firstly, Cod as a game is really only super fun when you're doing really well and are able to get killstreaks. If you're in a close and even match then that means that you're probably not getting your killstreaks. So being in competitive games is not fun for a lot of people. (I think this is in large part due to game design though) Building off of that, anyone who's actually doing well on the opposing team is undesirable because that means they're probably going to kill you either directly or with a largely unavoidable killstreak. As such, people actually trying to do well are attacked to a degree that I don't see in many other games. How many other communities have a derogatory term for people who actually try in their games? I can't name that many. And thirdly, the implementation in the newer Cods seem questionable at best. Like its main goal is to make sure people take turns having lobbies where they're stomping or getting stomped by people rather than having actual even and fun matches. I guess my original comment wasn't too clear on this so I'll say that I think that every game that's attempting to be remotely serious about its gameplay (IE it's not an RNG clownfiesta) should have some form of skill-based matchmaking. Some games or modes might be able to put less of an emphasis on it (League of Legends' ARAM and LTM modes both put less emphasis on skill in their matchmaking than games on the main map) but it should be there to some degree. If you want skill to be a major part of your online games, you also want skill-based matchmaking. Games where brand new players can end up in the same match as professionals are practically a non-starter these days. The only way they can get away with that these days is to lower the skill ceiling so much that unskilled players can still be able to beat out significantly better players than them. (And old Cods like MW2 actually did this, the guns were very lethal and easy to use in addition to explosives being extremely overpowered and brainless. And even then MW2 had some form of skill-based matchmaking, it was just very loose) Like Sajam says, just because the system they have in the new games might be poorly implemented doesn't mean that skill-based matchmaking as a concept is bad. People saying that unranked shouldn't have matchmaking are tripping, unranked it's almost more important to have good matchmaking because that's the mode that most the beginner players are likely going to gravitate towards, it's counter-intuitive if you have to go into ranked just to find people remotely your skill level.

[@iamacharliest]

I don't play cod anymore but this was an issue. It made the new modern warfare get boring real fast. I think to fix the problem there should be level based matchmaking up to a certain amount and then you're unleashed into the world. Jumping into a random online game and just losing to teams of 3-5 people on the enemy team on Comms, running strats in public lobbies just because you have a decent K/D or win/loss isn't very fun at all. There should be ranked lobbies for that shit, like rainbow six. I always run into great players in casual games and get smoked but I also run into people worse than me too. It's clearly a problem which is why you see people going afk in games to lose and drop stats so they can get matched with less sweaty people because it gets boring after a while. Obviously games like fighting games don't really come into this in my opinion it's mostly for games like cod as you said.

[@ragnarokhead19000]

Thanks for your thorough break down! I think from afar it’s really easy to poke fun at CoD players crying about wanting to just pub stomp (in particular from the fighting game crowd). While that’s certainly true to a degree & has been deeply rooted in the game design, the recent complaints about SBMM need to be more nuanced & directed towards it’s current implementation. If it didn’t fluctuate so much & was maybe based on overall performance, it’d be smoother. Sadly, the current discussion is an all-or-nothing perspective, but removing SBMM really only benefits top players.

[@SakuyaFM4]

The thing is, SBMM is fine IN A RANKED SCENARIO. With CODMW lacking real ranked lobbies like BO2, the casual player is forced to take SBMM, and it makes majority of their time miserable.

[@onlyicedgarrett7791]

@@SakuyaFM4 But the thing is CoD is a casual af game. People hop on to mess around or grind XP and challenges, not to actually compete. People will just play Casual. Look at Apex, that game has had Ranked for a long ass time and people complain it has no rewards, as if Ranked is supposed to be a grind for rewards instead of competing for victory itself. People don't play Ranked, and when Ranked is depopulated it makes Ranked worse because the whole point of Ranked goes out the window cause the game has to throw people from different Rank brackets together to just get games started.

[@weiwu1442]

The real problem with call of duty + sbmm is they got rid of scorestreaks so everyone just goes for kills and thus you have a toxic campy environment where people just wait for kills all match instead of playing the objective

[@PerpetuallyTiredMillennial]

It took me so long to understand what the anti-sbmm argument was because it's so stupid. It's an argument so stupid it made me agree with Leffen on something. Sacrilege.

[@olivegardenchef4114]

The non sbmm playlist solution works exactly like you thought. In Destiny 2 they had only 1 playlist as connection based mm and that playlist was the “sweatiest” becuz it was filled with good players lookin for easy matches in the non-sbmm playlist.

[@TurboNemesis]

It also doesnt help that Destiny's meta is fucked and shifts to The One Exotic with the busted perk interaction that season that let's you just steamroll anyone not using it

[@goddamnarshia]

Thats really weird hearing from another destiny player . I no longer play destiny , but sometimes jump in for a week to play with whatever i have laying around and when skill based match making was set up at the beginning of shadowkeep (which i didn't even buy) i had to try my damn hardest and kamikaze to get a kill , the game still treated me like someone who played the game all day with his best friends trying hard, but that was years ago and i was running with a friend who was new to the game and i could barely aim and he was getting clapped. Then a couple months pass , sbmm is removed , i come back for a shader (yes im one of those people) and the game suddenly feels much better. I can actually play the game and have some fun with it as long as i don't take it seriously, win some and lose some others. Yes , i do run into try hards , but i Don't get annoyed with them since i know i wont be seeing the likes of then next match.

[@nerdstrangler4804]

Sweaty doesn't mean good. Sweaty means you are playing some boring cheesy playstyle because you care more about winning than having fun. I would rather lose a match where everyone is running around having fun than win a boring camp fest. I don't play destiny, but I HIGHLY doubt those good players are sweating nearly as hard in CBMM lobbies.

[@Gabriel64468]

The crazy thing about the discourse was that the people complaining that "only sweatlords want SBMM" ARE the sweatlords within their game. The vast majority of players has to be the fooder for them to get their egotrip. By definition what they are asking for is catering to a small minority.

[@klaytonshell5654]

Spoken like a true bad player

[@falsie5741]

I have a stroke every time I try and read sbmm my brain really tries to cram smash bros in there with all of its strength

[@mallow2902]

Late to the discussion, but if you want to see a case of why you need SBMM, look at Destiny 2's crucible. Crucible was always bad, but it got even worse when they removed SBMM. The reason it was removed? Streamers and KZbinrs whining about having to "sweat every match", when the rest of us all know they just wanna club seals so they can make more entertaining content for their channels, and Bungie listened to them. Now most people will tell you that if you're getting into Destiny you should just avoid PvP entirely, and they're honestly right.

[@whiskey4breakfast520]

A lot of these complaints come from qualities inherent in the power fantasy style of game design. The most obvious difference is what constitutes a "good" game. In FGs, a good game is one where one player wins by a hair, and it feels like there's a give and take the whole time. In power fantasies, (like cod) a good game is when you dumpster everyone. It's a 0 sum game. Which is not a bad thing if it's the intended experience the designers are trying to create. But you gotta have the resilience to realize that you aren't gonna be the guy destroying everyone else every game, and either accept that, or stop playing. Sometimes you're the hammer, and sometimes you're the nail.

[@MaulusRS]

This. As someone who's been on both sides of this and has kind of that bridged perspective between FPS and Fighting Games, this cross-over discussion has been kinda frustrating since the two communities are coming at it from two completely different perspectives. In FPS, ESPECIALLY in something like a battle royale, the best feeling sometimes is to really have a great game where you get a bunch of kills. You can call it stomping noobs if you want, but its undeniable that this is the experience players want in these sorts of games. It's the gameplays and content people watch on youtube (kill world records and such, perfect games, high kill games, etc.), and the games themselves are often outright designed around it. You had the tactical nuke in call of duty that rewarded unbroken 25 killstreaks, the 20 kill badge in Apex Legends where you gotta kill 1/3rd of the entire lobby by yourself. That sort of stuff that's never gonna happen if you're in a ranked lobby with people equally skilled. That sort of play has its appeal too, but the reward of skill growth in FPS for a lot of people, especially in public lobbies, is having those dominant games. In Fighting Games, I'm never gonna have fun stomping literally anyone. An even, hard-fought match is the only thing I want. So naturally, anyone coming at this discussion of "SBMM" with that FGC perspective is gonna be baffled by anyone disliking it, its a universal good for literally everyone in that genre. But it's not 1:1 with how that sort of thing manifests in every game. Most of the time, yeah, matchmaking with equally skilled opponents is ideal, but sometimes I just wanna vibe and frag out a whole lobby in a very specific subset of games partially designed around that experience.

[@awxangel6781]

"But you gotta have the resilience to realize that you aren't gonna be the guy destroying everyone else every game" and the self-awareness to realise that the power fantasy is what you're after The idea that wanting SBMM means you have "no confidence, no drive, no resilience, no work ethic" is a ludicrous projection from people who need to crush weaker players to feel good.

[@SquallTheBlade]

How is beating up people who give no challenge a "power fantasy"? Wouldn't the feeling of power come when you beat someone who is actually good or even better than you?

[@daclister]

@@SquallTheBlade no that's not how that works due to not always being able to beat or rack up kills against opponents of equal skill someone eventually will be hit pretty hard in the face. When it comes to power fantasy the control is all on that person and they exert dominance on those who can't fight back not those who can. This is a generally applied not really attached to games.

[@whiskey4breakfast520]

@@SquallTheBlade Power fantasy is a game design term. To give a bit of comparison, who sounds more "powerful", someone who has to work, learn, and adapt to beat a single person, or someone who can beat 10+ people over and over with little to no effort? The power fantasy term refers to game design with the purpose of making the player feel "special" near invincible versus large groups of opponents. Think of the difference in feeling you get from a 1v1 fighting game, versus a beat-em-up. Same basic mechanics of frame data and hit/blockstun, but with drastically different implementations to evoke different feelings during gameplay.

[@CylonDorado]

I can’t even wrap my head around this being something to complain about.

[@liambenjamin2827]

so the 'try hards' are complaining because they're being matched to other 'try hards', so they want to matched with newbs so they good feel good about themselves winning.. come on wtf is that logic.

[@HS_Gomikubi]

"Find some sense of self-worth from the game besides just murdering people who are much worse than you" This right the fuck here. Granted, my personal take is that this isn't necessarily such a foreign concept amongst non-FGC gamers specifically, as it is something we FGC folk take for granted due to the combination of our games placing greater emphasis on it and the general fact that we're in such a niche genre compared to the overwhelmingly larger crowds that amass in shooters and other games. There are probably plenty of CoD players who are able to function exactly as Sajam recommends here and enjoy playing in whatever manner suits them without ever writing a single tweet worthy of scrubquotes, let alone do it constantly and abuse social media as a means to push an agenda that supports their bias. But there are more CoD players alone than probably the entire FGC combined, so naturally when you go to twitter and look for people shouting into the void you're gonna find more of the normie gamer rotten apples than respectable people who happen to play such games.

[@ln8496]

We are talking about a community that flames any feminine voice coming through voice chat. They don't want what's good for them

[@krasmazov009]

If you don't want the challenge to be imposed by someone else's will, single player games exist. And their unique challenges are also fun.

[@AliceLoverdrive]

I know I'm two years late, but _all_ matchmaking is bad. We've had a better system for ages, it's called a fucking server browser.

[@kingroosta]

I'm replacing the name "call of duty" with "dead by daylight" in my head, and this video still makes perfect sense.

[@mysterypie]

I stopped playing because of IAADWAT I AM ABSOLUTE DOG WATER AT THIS

[@mysterypie]

YAADWAT for you are.

[@myboy_]

Only sweatlords complain about sweatlords

[@myboy_]

@ESomber sound pretty sweaty to me

[@WutTheDeuceGaming]

if you complain about sweats, you yourself are also a sweat. Why is it ok for everyone else to take your sweat, but not ok when they have to take it? Most of these arguments are so entitled, it's insane. I think it's funny how they think older CODs just never had SBMM, which is in fact incorrect. It's been in all of those shooters. 14:35 LMFAO

[@Tman450]

except the older CODS like 1, United Offensive, 2, 4, etc. had dedicated servers, so there literally wasn't SBMM this way, because you could pick and choose which server/community to join. Same with Battlefield games. And a ton of other older shooters with dedicated servers.

[@iceshadows911]

You can be shit and sweat and be good and sweat, what are you even saying? Different people have different sweat. The critique of this SBMM is that you have to push yourself every game to improve over time, in a stark contrast to certain prior titles. Which, is not a bad thing, but is a very different system to prior years. With CoD forcing you to play near a 1.0 K/D however, if you want to not get buttsmashed in games you do either A: have to sweat or B: play meta. Previously you could just be reasonably good, or a little better than the average player and the natural lobby filling would be sure you could just smash out some good shots for fun. Now it's no different than the over-regulated, over-managed NBA/NFL/F1, etc. There's a reason why people still prefer college to pro, and even street.

[@doolioart3314]

@@iceshadows911 "The critique of this SBMM is that you have to push yourself every game to improve over time, in a stark contrast to certain prior titles. " So, if we imagine a bottom 10% player, I'd like for you to explain to me how the lack of sbmm makes him experience more relaxed matches? You can't approach the subject with only one type of participant. (just to preemptively argue a potential answer like "he should get better" or something: that's up to him. And no, that doesn't mean he should have a 0.08 K/D because of it. That's why sbmm is there, not to remove the ability for someone to be better than someone else, but to allow for everyone to participate in their skill/ability bracket. So, maybe our 0.08 K/D guy won't be 2.0 K/D guy in his bracket, maybe he'll be 0.7. Also, there's literally no point in having Shaq dunking over ten year old kids - no one benefits from that, neither Shaq nor those ten year olds. Put them with other ten year olds. Put Shaq with other NBA players. He'll "sweat" against Yao Ming, but he'll destroy Greg Ostertag and that's fine. But Greg is still in that skill bracket)

[@crashhappy7296]

If you're playing off meta, you shouldn't complain about losing in the first place. I just imagine these people showing up to a drag race in a Toyota Prius and calling the guy driving a Top Fuel Dragster a sweatlord.

[@spookyspook5347]

There are some games, like TF2, where part of the fun is that 24 players are of varying skill, and that everyone just goes together and has a grand old time in a chaos of insanity. Skill based matchmaking wouldn't make as much sense in that game, since it really wouldn't be the same if the enemy combo with unusuals didn't stomp your team, but also wouldn't be funny if you couldn't dunk on Pablo.Gonzales2010 after he tried to shoot you through bulletproof glass. It feels like a genuine achievement when you kill the unusual wearing hyper testesterone soldier and his girlfriend, and it's also really funny to watch Pablo take on 4 people with an SMG and die horribly.

[@jwm1444]

The argument against skill based MM is always hilarious and full of projection. They don't want to play against others of similar skill because they're afraid they'll lose most of the time.

[@strathmore5267]

Well old cods were fun because you could go 30-0 running around with scav on and high score killsreaks like vsats. That was fun. Shitting on kids. Yes I was also that kid that got shit on. But games like bo2 were fun in that aspect because it wasn't all about winning.

[@melt3215]

Speaking from a COD standpoint.. That was ignorant. “Afraid they’ll lose”.. there literally isn’t any incentive for winning.. No rank to show your skill level. We hate SBMM in casual modes. Like the Public playlist. If they implemented Ranked play like they’ve had in the past, and used SBMM there instead of the public playlist.. Everything would be fine.

[@strathmore5267]

@@melt3215 So I just want to clarify there is no incentive to win because you will just get into a harder game and you don't feel like your skills are developing as a player?

[@melt3215]

@@strathmore5267 There isn’t an incentive to win because there is no rank to show for it, very little extra XP. And yes you will get into harder games. That gets old really quick.

[@manta312]

Isn’t the CoD SBMM based on K/D. If it is playing a game where you snipe and have almost no interactions will net you a very high “skill” which isn’t actually your skill because I could kill 6 people then hide all match then my “skill” would be up there with Pro players. I don’t think SBMM is bad I just think CoD has always had a hard time implementing it and with games with a newcomer mode would be dope. A quick and easy mode meant for lower level players like Siege does. Some people are really out of place in there but it isn’t terrible. CoD makes challenges a huge part of their game but sometimes it can be near impossible to complete. I think there are a lot of components to it but it is also never clearly communicated to the players. Fighting games make it easier by adding “# in the World/Region” . I played hearthstone and I loved the unranked system because I could experiment but CoD doesn’t have that luxury. It makes some guns nearly impossible to get gold and others could be done in an hour of play. I do think a better balance of weapons could fix the issue. A fighting game example of this would be like if you were to play a mediocre character but you always had to fight a character who had really safe moves and a 0 to death. You would be infuriated because it had nothing to do with skill and everything to do with the weapon/character and the problem MW2019 had was that if you managed to beat the bad players you would just go against really good players doing the same thing. I don’t think it’s just SBMM but I think that’s usually what gets blamed for all of it. Not all SBMM is bad it just varies from genre to genre.

[@Arlo5.13]

I feel like calling someone a sweat lord is more akin to calling someone a masher in fighting games, but if it is actually people putting down others for trying and working...that is hilariously dumb. Like imagine someone going up to Stevie wonder and saying, “geez Stevie, why are you sweatin it up so much, you’re blind you don’t have to try this hard lmao 😂”

[@cjskater2006]

FPS games had a solution to this a long time ago: dedicated servers ran by communities and a server browser. A lot of the times they even labeled themselves as either sweatbased or fun servers.

[@xxProjectJxx]

That would have worked back then. Nowadays content creators would just crash the casual servers so that they could dominate low level players and make more $$$.

[@quonevi9250]

And what stops a pubstomper who seeks an ego boost to join a noob-server?

[@cjskater2006]

@@quonevi9250 Dedicated servers run by communities have their own admins and rules that they enforce. If a server didn't have an admin nobody would play on it, usually, thus the owner would be wasting their money. There's a monetary incentive for the server owner to run a good server. If the server is called "24/7 Map [Newbs Only]" then you'd expect that single map to be played and for admins to make sure that it's a newb friendly environment. That's the community they want to build after all. Sometimes that includes telling a player who is just too good for the playerbase of that server to find another one. I used to be an admin for a server and probably 18hrs/day there was an admin online able to ban/kick/mute, sometimes 24hrs depending on who was losing sleep that day. On the opposite end of the spectrum there was even "pro" servers that would kick people that weren't good enough, because it would ruin the other player's experience.

[@elmonke6154]

Honestly, matchmaking for fps games is just completely inferior to dedicated servers.

[@Ragingspoon]

People just dont like losing and will find any excuse possible to try and implement something that they think will help prevent it happening as much or one that deflects the blame from themselves as much as possible. If you cannot have fun when you lose in a game then you do not like the game as much as perhaps you think you do and it may be best to try something else.

[@no_nameyouknow]

I don't really agree with that last sentence. I hate losing in fighting games, but I love playing them. It's a sort of paradox, I know, but don't tell me I don't like the genre or the game because I don't like losing. I don't like losing in anything, even a casual game of horseshoes I get hyper competitive. It's just my nature. I am not toxic about it, I am always polite and respectful, but inside I am seething when I lose. I know some people will judge me for this an think I am just a bad person because I don't like to lose, idk what to say to that but I am not a bad person, I am quite kind and generous and good natured, I just hate losing. I can't help it, I am old, I've always been this way and I don't see it changing. Also, it's not that I don't have fun in a game I lose, I am having a ton of fun, right up until I lose, then I am mad until I start another game and I am having fun again. This is pretty common for the FGC honestly. I see plenty of pros, streamers and people who breath fighting games act the same way. Some people are just very competitive.

[@Splitcyclewastaken]

I mean. I hate losing, and I get salty. I don't think "not wanting to lose all the time" equates to "not actually liking the game" However, wanting to shift blame onto something else bc u lost is dumb. I do it sometimes when playing, but I also acknowledge it's just salt, not actually my opinion on the game, lmao.

[@joedatius]

@@Splitcyclewastaken exactly, no one is telling anyone that you have to enjoy losing. nobody likes losing but its about how you handle a loss

[@indestructible247]

i dont mind losing as long as it feels fair but i do mind a level 3059868 player killing me 15 times in 1 minute

[@BTPhoenix1244]

4:32 "Why is it not fun just because you're not winning?" Bruh, you're about to tear hell wide open with that one, chief.

[@HappyRatKaiser]

Back when I played a lot of CCGs (MtG, UFS, L5R), I'd play at my local brick & mortar game store, and I found SBMM was something that just about everyone intuitively wanted. Very quickly the tournament crowd would find each other and pair off, the eight year olds from the elementary school up the street who were playing the pre-mades their moms bought them would stick together, as would the weekend warrior types like myself. This felt pretty natural, and while sometimes folks would go out of their way to request a game from a stronger player, you almost never saw a shark pick a fight with the minnows, and on the rare occasions it happened, nobody (outside of, perhaps, the shark) had a good time, and everyone watching just felt kinda shitty. My point is, in face-to-face situations, I think we tend to realize that playing against vastly inferior competition isn't much of a win for anyone. Online and off-site, however? Seems to be a different story.

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

As someone who has been on both sides if this... Playing against a Stronger player teaches me about the Areas of skill that I need to improve upon and just how far I have to go to reach that point of skill... Playing against someone worse than me teaches me about how much I've improved. If I'm getting destroyed in a Game all I'm thinking about is How I could improve and different ways where I could get the upper hand... Playing against people my own Skill level doesn't any of that for me, it makes me just get bored.

[@soulcutterx13]

@@xLionsxxSmithyx if playing the game against an even opponent isn't fun, doesn't that suggest that what you're playing isn't fun? Rather, you're suggesting that the fun comes from getting stomped or doing stompings, and the medium could just be whatever, it's not important.

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

@@soulcutterx13 I can't improve if I'm fighting against what is essentially myself... if I'm presented with a stronger opponent then I'm driven to change my style of play to overcome to skill difference.

[@soulcutterx13]

@@xLionsxxSmithyx That's just not correct. Only when good and bad decisions make a difference in outcome can you practice making good decisions instead of bad. When the opponent is better than you, they're going to see through your strategy and beat you without your plans and methods making a difference until you're at their level. If your opponent is worse, you can make poor decisions and outplay them on execution alone. Again, ONLY in the case where the ending is not decided from the very beginning can your decisions make a meaningful change in the outcome of the game.

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

@@soulcutterx13 well... from where I'm standing what your saying is incorrect.

[@HighLanderPonyYT]

ITTV: Saj talks about how a lot of people are complete idiots, lacking basic argumentation skills and the slightest idea of logic.

[@dylanh.3793]

Ok Leffen

[@HighLanderPonyYT]

@@dylanh.3793 Wut. I'm on Sajam's side. lol

[@dylanh.3793]

HighLanderPony Sajam is on leffen’s side 🤨

[@HighLanderPonyYT]

@@dylanh.3793 Weird, but I get it. I think. Okay.

[@dianauwu1312]

Idk what's more satisfying, hearing Sajam dunk on CoD players or hearing Sajam dunk on Chick-Fil-A

[@misterkeebler]

Your story telling always has me laughing...that Rocket League example really painted a hilarious picture for me.

[@Lazycandle]

If someone’s stomping you with the meta it’s time to pull out the cheese and hit them with the strays they don’t know about

[@pocketjoe]

Absolutely lost it at "I haven't even seen the ball in 5 minutes (and I have ball-cam on)"

[@Washicles]

I mean if they don't wanna sweat, why don't they just queue up for a game and not sweat? Because they'd lose I presume and to them that's probably no fun. But they want to do the same thing to newbies which just makes them seem like they lack any sense of self awareness at all.

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

Lol, we were all Noobs at one point in time and our Skill levels shot up because we actually Sweated that one time and got stuck in an Endless loop of having to improve at a game to have a chance of Enjoying the game... then we improved too much and are Stuck Fighting Cheaters and other Sweatlords, Eventually. More and more players will end up in the same position and then games Die because people get tired of sweating every match to have a chance of that Victory euphoria... It's dangerous for the Health of the Players. And the only people who don't understand this are people who suck at games but think they are good because SBMM has them fooled.

[@nerdstrangler4804]

Because it is a team game and I am not a sociopath, so I can't intentionally ruin the game for other players without feeling bad. I couldn't care less about losing in a video game. But it is not just me that loses when I refuse to sweat, it is everyone else on my team.

[@Phosphophyllite524]

Legit thought this video was from like last week until I saw the twitter timestamps. Some things never change.

[@Kanelel]

Watching Sajam videos has really opened my mind to the magnitude and variety of scrubs out there. So many dudes just cannot accept losing for any reason. How do these people get through life? Do they really just say "that's unfair" every time they fail? It's such a non-growth mindset.

[@Swattii]

It's unfair when you put into a team where all your teammates are straight garbage but the other team is full of diamonds. It's one of the reasons why I enjoy fighting games more than FPS games now because at least I can accept that it is MY fault. In team-based games however, there will always be the anchor that can NOT carry their weight, dragging the whole entire team down.

[@skcans]

@@Swattii That's a poor example of SBMM because most of the time games don't put a full team of golds against a full team of diamonds. SBMM gets a bit weird when you're queued as a stack because the end goal is to still get you games, even if it's at the cost of imbalanced teams.

[@Swattii]

@@skcans That's the point of any matchmaking system, to get you into games. How CoD does it is just horrible. They also manipulate you into wanting to play more by giving you highs and a lot of lows. The highs are meant to make you stay longer. It's like a casino. They want you to stay longer because it increases the chances of you buying something from their in-game store. I don't expect many fighting game players to understand. Most FGC folks I've met don't play anything else than fighting games so.

[@skcans]

@@Swattii My point was you can't use your example of facing against a premade stack to claim sbmm is bad because the game needs to find a game for them, even at the cost of balance. Plus any premade stack is gonna be at an inherent advantage. The second thing you said about manipulating players into playing more, I've seen lots of content creators say that and people echoing it but have never seen any proof of it being real. Statistically speaking, if you play enough games, you'll get anomalies from both ends of strong lobbies and bot lobbies.

[@Bones0]

The best argument against SBMM in CoD is that the game is actually designed to disproportionately reward the best player in the lobby. You earn kill streaks which beget more kill streaks, but if you are only put into competitive lobbies then building a kill streak becomes much harder and less fun. Lobbies should therefore be left with unfair skill matching so that one person can enjoy kill streaks as opposed to zero people. There's only really 1-2 good players in your average lobby, so if you want to get kill streaks and enjoy the game, you should have to work your way up to that level. Ultimately, I think this is dumb and highlights the fundamental flaw with how kill streaks work in CoD. I liked the Specialist Class in MW3 which gave you extra perks for a smaller number of kills as opposed to ridiculously OP air support for double digit kill streaks. Getting a few kills in a row made you feel powered up and rewarded, but players without kill streaks were still able to fight back. Unfortunately, I think most CoD players are little kids who don't realize how much more abuse they are taking per game than an above average player. I loved playing CoD but always got bored fairly quickly because stomping noobs becomes so routine that there was very little excitement, and on the rare instances I was on the receiving end of a beatdown, it's usually in the form of a Chopper Gunner repeatedly spawn killing me.

[@JusticeSoulTuna]

Like I said in the stream chat, the frustrating thing about the SBMM narrative is that it is peddled HARD by the top streamers and influencers who openly denounce it and blame it for all their problems. And that trickles down to their impressionable audience who parrot the same thing. And those of us who either don't agree or don't care, are treated in toxic ways. It's the same way how tactics like 'camping' are treated with such vitriol, when it's just a way to play the game and no rule says you can't do it. It's literally unwritten social rules that people hold a strict standard to, and they just make it up as they go along. 'Don't camp. SBMM is bad. These guns are cheap' etc. Dealt with this shit in the COD Community for over a decade now, it's so annoying.

[@yensi-main]

The problem with some SBMM implementation is that, in several Call of Duty games for example, some top players will find themselves on a whole team of LOW skilled players, fighting against a seemingly balanced team. It's like a "9 and a lot of 2s" fighting "5s and 6s", and it can be really frustrating for that 9 who hates being in the position of either carrying the entire team or losing, ranked and unranked. That scenario is more related to team-based games, of course, so that perspective is different than fighting games or other competitive 1v1 games, but otherwise I agree that SBMM is not some unholy mark on a game. However, I believe, similar to netcode, it can be implemented poorly in a way that can be frustrating for casual and competitive players alike.

[@oliviawallace3636]

true it can be done shite sbmm doesn't just fix matchmaking, you need GOOD sbmm

[@NoxinPistol]

This is the same problem with Destiny's matchmaking. The community had a fucking uproar about SBMM because it's implemented similarly to make sure players never always win or that they never always lose, by putting them in uneven games where they're the carry or the one being carried. They only do this so that matchmaking is quicker, but it sacrifices a balanced game where everyone has the same skill level. The issue here is that Bungie did listen. They turned SBMM off. And that ACTUALLY MADE IT WORSE. I had 2 IRL friends whom I got into playing Destiny with me, but as soon as they opted to try out the PvP game mode, I left them to their own devices. I watched their game instead, and they got paired up against a full stack of veteran players. They got pub stomped so hard they don't want to play it ever again. This is why they want SBMM gone so bad. It's only fun for them when you're in a full party against low level newbies.

[@lylemcdermott2566]

Heard the cod pros and streamers "reset" their connection so they can always beat down on low level players and never encounter other pros.

[@HyperMoon]

Yep, and everybody who defends SBMM ignores this fact constantly. I've played thousands of games of Apex Legends, and I can say like 99% of my matches I have borderline useless teammates and I get thrown into lobbies full of full stacking preds and diamonds. It's just completely fucked and horribly unfun, which is why I quit playing.

[@Sakaki98]

Yensi While I see what you mean, I think your thinking has already been addressed by Sajam’s pinned comment. Roughly paraphrased: If one bakery makes shit French fries, the problem is that the bakery is shit rather than French fries being inherently bad. We’ve also seen this type of phenomenon with Rollback. Just because SF anniversary edition and SFV had shit implementation of rollback doesn’t mean that we should go delay all the way instead of striving for shining examples like KI and Fightcade. All that in mind, I really don’t see the point of saying “it’s a possibility that the devs fuck up the most tried and true solution to our matchmaking problem” when the debate is centered around whether or not SBMM is worth having in general.

[@shaddykack]

FGC: we’re not so different...you and I. You secretly love SBMM. FPS community: No, that’s not true. That’s impossible!

[@phabiorules]

"I don't want to be a try hard in order to win." That's what a try hard is though,, someone who values winning more than having fun.

[@gatocochino5594]

I wish playing only against people of my skill level was a problem I had, I'm lucky if I find someone to play with who has a decent connection. I'm way too good for my friends and everyone on discord is way better than me.

[@malcovich_games]

If you play someone better and they're on discord you can always chat and pick their mind for tips post-match, though!

[@MallowJam]

when i play people better than me my goal is never to win. if i make them work for those wins that's already an achievement. also playing agaist better players helps you find gaps in your play you didn't even know existed

[@Naota753]

What game?

[@robind506]

There is some bizarre sect of people who think fun = winning, which is like ego feeding more than actually having a good time

[@yearslate9349]

The people who best know the satisfaction of winning are equally familiar with the pain of losing. Only through knowing what doesn't work, can you come to understand what *does*.

[@Sharkofspace]

The point of a game is to win. If you lose, you wasted your time.

[@robind506]

@@yearslate9349 that's tru, that's how people get good, weeding out bad options from what works. But at some level you gotta enjoy the game, regardless of winning or losing, otherwise you'll be chasing the high of winning while being discouraged to improve and appreciate the game from the salt of losing. Like for me I get my ass handed to me in melee but I enjoy it for the schmovement, win or lose, but I'm getting better slowly and havin fun

[@robind506]

@@Sharkofspace serious McGee has entered

[@Regdren]

I think game design and presentation might have something to do with this. They do tend to emphasize winning while not talking about having fun even if you lose.

[@pervognsen_bitwise]

A solution to wanting to play "off-meta" stuff is to offer (possibly rotating) formats with those sorts of restrictions. It doesn't seem like a matchmaking issue.

[@Gatrax]

the only time I hate SBMM is when it pairs me against people who are so blatantly better than me I dont feel like I'm playing the game anymore but staring at the death screen for 5-30 minutes of however long my game is. if the system thinks I'm THAT good, it's wrong. I'm fucking trash

[@allopic3764]

If you're talking about cod, it's also ebmm coming into play, CoD's matchmaking practices are just scummy: aside from sbmm, ebmm (engagement based matchmaking) is also used; its purpose is to get your dopamine up after an in-game purchase by giving you easier lobbies for a while. This way, you'll unconsciously start associating spending money with having a better experience in pvp, incentivising you to spend more and more.

[@Gatrax]

I'm talking about any game, apex, overwatch, cod, fortnite, etc. @@allopic3764

[@Ryodakun]

People that don't wanna play to win, get angry at people that do, but simultaneously believe that they're just as good despite not trying. Oh and despite not playing to win, they hate to lose and get really salty all the time. None of this shit makes sense. IMHO there's two types of people. One is the type that wants to play to win but lacks confidence and believe they can't do it. And instead of overcoming that lack of confidence, they go full mind gymnastics and make themselves believe that they're in reality just playing for fun. They get incredibly salty when they lose and tend to call others try-hards. They can't have fun while losing despite not playing to win. They're suffering from cognitive dissonance. The other type is the kind of person that is just out for constant easy affirmation. If they're not the center of the game, going 50/0 in 10 minutes, they hate it. They're not looking to improve, they're looking to dominate. They're the types that tend to smurf a lot. Losing is to them like a personal insult and they take it deeply personally. Both have in common that they're incredibly sore losers and both would be solved if they adapted a student mindset instead. People that truly play for fun don't mind losing and therefore won't complain about sweaty try-hards.

[@crownedpleb9747]

Lol the fuck? CODs entire gameplay hook is the killstreaks which necessitates a skill gap between players, simple as. Hell in a match with equally skilled players the quad feeds would dry up, let alone the 13, 15, 17 killstreaks. Good luck on the PsyD tho.

[@Ryodakun]

@@crownedpleb9747 Well, if Cod is only fun when dominating, and that's by design, then it's not a well designed game isn't it.

[@crownedpleb9747]

@@Ryodakun Horrible design, but damn if I'm not sad to see it go. You're right though.

[@vigneshmoorthie922]

It's like they just want real life in their games, your boss gets a kick out of shouting at you and you in turn take that out on your subordinates and the pyramid goes on. Then you climb the pyramid and repeat the cycle.

[@Joshinyu]

“But that’s the reality of what I queued into...and that’s okay”. The defense rests. Case closed. lol

[@killervacuum]

conspiracy theory: activision wants to add skill based matchmaking so that a few years down the road, older versions of cod have EVEN LESS people per lobby, making the game appear dead and forcing people to buy the new one

[@WaluTime]

"I'm upset the sweatlords come out and win against me" " I wanan fight new players and win, i wanna stomp them i wanna go 30-0 i wanna win i wanna win i wanna winnnn" how the hell do anti sbmm folk not see they're being the sweaty try hard then. If they really wanted the casual goof off experience they wouldnt be going 30-0 and beating new players into the ground, theyd be running around trying to knife people, or playing some godawful loadout and bein a cornball and popping off when they snag a kill with the worst weapon in the game. But nah, they only feel fun and joy when theyre being the sweatlord and are kicking the teeth in on little timmy who just convinced his big bro to let him play CoD and not tell mom.

[@TurboNemesis]

"I feel no sense of improvement" Because you're in the unconscious competence stage of learning. It means you've gotten good and all that remains is to hone your skills.

[@stonevicta]

You know, just an idea: devs could work into ways to incentivise good players to teach bad players how to play better. Some kind of reward system. I have no idea how it would be implemented but it could work. I guess it would have to be something very specific, maybe even a dedicated mode (tutoring mode?). I don't know. It could actually be very fun matching players like in duos of one high ranked player and one low ranked and the high ranked player would work in a supportive/indirect way trying to make his low ranked pal beat the opposing low ranked player tutored by an opposing high ranked player.

[@noboty4168]

There were attempts. Team Fortress 2, back in its glory days, had a "coach" feature where you would be paired with another player seeking guidance. I never got to be on either end, but I always liked that feature and am sad that that was the only game to ever have try it out, it seems.

[@stonevicta]

@@noboty4168 hey, that's nice. I didn't know that. It would definitely be nice to see it come back in other games in some form. However, it's also sad that it's kinda unrealistic to expect that especially from fighting games given the present reality in which many of them still lack even the most basic features. feelsbadman.

[@noboty4168]

@@stonevicta On top of that, now, we've entered some strange bizarro-world where now developers think it's cute to release game completely devoid of teaching materials, let alone giving players the ability to teach each other.

[@joedatius]

@@noboty4168 sorry but these aren't complex games. i mean ffs this is COD we're talking. literally point and shoot. there is nothing these games can do to "teach" players to be magically better. that requires time and actual effort. there is only so many ways you can tell someone "aim better" or at best "listen to footsteps"

[@Whit3WolfXArcadia]

Call of duty players hate it because they want easy matches but sometimes skill base match making can put you in a lobby with shitty connections

[@robind506]

It's possible, but I'm not sure the two are related

[@venixilinehasfailed8001]

It’s moreso that SBMM is put into all playlists, making ranked playlists meaningless since casual games are essentially being used on the same metric

[@skipatrolslayer]

Holy shit, I had to pause to wipe the tears from my eyes listening to you describe that Rocket League match. XD

[@josiah9039]

FGC takes on CoD SBMM are already tired. CoD community isn’t voicing their gripes effectively. SBMM has always been around but as of late it has been implemented horribly. You play a decent game and you get shot way up to CDL regionals. They smack you and you fall back down to the kiddie pool. It’s a constant cycle where you’re very rarely playing against people of equal skill, it’s always a stark imbalance where the only way to make up the difference is to buy a scuf controller and wear a headset. CoD games are fundamentally imbalanced when you add in the momentum killers known as killstreaks. Your team feeds and you’re caught in a loop for the rest of the game. And your team is worse because you played well last game so some invisible metric is using you to even it all out. It’s legit anti fun.

[@justincha4973]

lolol

[@GothMoth_exe]

SBMM makes a lot of sense to me. I feel like after a game has been out for a little bit and the skill levels become defined, it sort of becomes a training ground. Typically it you can't rank up without learning one or two key things about the game. Then you get to the next rank and you have another new thing to learn. It's nice to have the structure, rather than just not knowing whether you're going to get a decent match, get washed, or wash your opponent. 2/3 of those options aren't great, and SBMM does a lot to mitigate them. Obviously it isn't perfect, but it's a computer algorithm. There's always going to be room to improve it, and there are always going to be people who game the system, but I don't think that makes the whole system bad.

[@ARandomClown]

when i first played ranked starcraft 2, it was 2v2 with my master league friend. i tanked canon rushes while trying to figure out how to make units as protoss and my friend 1v2'ed anyway, thats how i became a master league starcraft player

[@quickdrawmcgraw3567]

The only legitimate complaint for SBMM as an idea is the whole "SBMM results in shitty connections/lag". Except its actually not, because any game worth a fuck in a competitive sense should have dedicated servers with a decent tick rate. Any game trying to anything more then a fun, casual game with absolutely zero competitive integrity should have dedicated servers. Then, there is no reason to have anything but decently designed SBMM, which most team-based games other than fuckin CoD seem to have gotten mostly right.

[@HarbingerOfTruth1]

Teaming up with friends is also a huge detractor for SBMM. I am sure you have been carried by or carried one or more of your friends in some game. This is all fine as you should be allowed to play with friends, but if the person that has gotten carried tries playing alone the experience is horrible. Although it is more that SBMM needs to be adjusted heavily in regards to parties.

[@RandomFandomOfficial]

And also a decent amount of players.

[@dkcsi9256]

This doesn't make any sense lmao SBMM has nothing to do with creating lag or bad connection. If the game had a bad connection, its gonna have one regardless of whether or not it uses SBMM.

[@Gonzakoable]

You play worse players to test out new stuff, you play people your level to polish execution and you play better people to sandpaper your bad habits

[@neckal]

Jesus that rocket league story was the funniest thing I've heard in a while

[@anonanon1604]

I didn't realize anyone on the planet thought skill based matchmaking was a bad idea. As usual CoD players are the scum of competitive gaming.

[@dylanh.3793]

says the guy who’s a part of a community full of sexual predators

[@MHScald]

@@dylanh.3793 Damn how do you know that?

[@anonanon1604]

@@MHScald i think he means fgc, which is funny to assume because not only am I not at all associated with even a single sexual predator, I'm a fan of a ton of game genres but not very involved with any single genre's community, so his nonexistent argument is entirely baseless, probably a mad cod player who can't make an actual argument because playing call of duty dropped his IQ into the single digits, sad really because I was really hoping to read a good reason to dislike SBMM, I don't think there is one that isn't selfish or pathetic, which is why I'm insulting CoD players in the first place.

[@Roge9]

Ranked mode for people around your skill level and casual mode for all kinds of different skill levels. Why can't this be implemented in cod?

[@xLionsxxSmithyx]

It should be like that for every game...

[@Slybandito7]

Damn the more things change the more they stay the same

[@Blkvox]

My problem with SBMM in team based shooters is that it isn't consistent. You'll have 2 to 4 good players in a lobby on average and the other 6/8 players are mediocre or under performing, leaving it up to chance whether or not your underwhelming teammates will run their routes into the good opponents on the other squad, feeding into them. If SBMM was consistent, all players in a lobby should hover around the same ELO. But then comes the issue with publishers not allocating funds to devs for a full suite of dedicated servers and most games are still on antiquated P2P. So devs try a lobby balancing system by using total ELO ranking across both sides to balance the match, leading to disparities and chaos regardless. I think in titles with 1v1 or 2v2 multiplayer, SBMM is a no brainer but the problem gets more and more complex the more players you have thrown into the mix. Due to SBMM, half my lobbies on shooters my teammates are from PR, Cuba, and other countries with bad isp infrastructure. Yet the devs say things like "connection is king". Topic has more layers than SBMM is bad/good and needs legitimate discussion going forward for all team based games.

[@ZefulStarson]

Part of that is an issue of population and time spent in queue. Most matchmaking systems initially prioritize putting people of similar skill together, but as people get more skilled the population of "similar skill" drops dramatically, to the point that a playerbase of a 100,000,000 people can see the top 30 people spend tens of minutes or even hours never seeing matches if skill is the only thing that's assessed. So what happens is that the longer you spend in queue, the wider all other criteria become to make sure a match fires, this leads to lopsided matches as people who wait 30 minutes to match are put into lobbies with people who never have to wait (and are thusly statistically worse players).

[@airshipkirov3707]

Folks are mad that they play against someone on the same lvl as you.

[@eliasnicolasmiranda4940]

So in conclusion the COD community are all scrubs?

[@akhtar637]

I think it's also worth noting how sbmm affects battle royales in particular. Assuming equal skill, for shooters you usually have a 50% chance of winning due to there only being two teams. In battle royales that chance is significantly decreased since there can be so many people. This means that people can go 20 games or more without winning once

[@chrisludwig4729]

Sajam is such an amazing balance off impeccable logic, chill energy, and freaking awesome sense of humor

[@slugbones]

Next time someone is complaining about not being able to pub stomp just send them a screen shot of the "You win" screen. Same stuff. Enjoy your win.

[@imESAM]

the rocket league story was so funny holy fuck

[@RagnellAvalon]

Since I'm pretty bad at most fighting games in unranked when I get someone far better than me, I always try and take it as an opportunity to learn. They're better than me for a reason, and it's *probably* not something that my disability prevents me from learning and replicating if I can recognise it and learn it myself.

[@PURENT]

You don't exactly get that opportunity to learn when you're against a higher skilled player in an FPS game. Most of the skill is just in reaction time + aiming which is innate and can't be learned from watching somebody else let alone playing against somebody else. Typically in such circumstances, the worse player just resorts to the most effective, least skill intensive tactic available to them. In fighting games, it's usually spamming.