Matchmaking issues
So, after a few days playing I get enough cards to put together a not very good, but at least functional deck other than the one you start with. No EXes, mostly filler cards, but the important part, the core of Lapras and Misty is there so I decide to give some PVP a try. I go to the PVP section and see that I can choose between a "Beginner" and "Experienced TCG player" mode. Sine I'm all too aware that my deck is objectively terrible I obviously choose beginner. But as I do so I can't help but notice that if the game allowed me to just choose my experience level, that it wasn't doing anything on its end to match me with similarly-beginner level players… and that I was going to find a bunch of high level players who are just SAYING they're beginner level…
…yeah, that's exactly what happened. I played seven matches, and of those seven opponents, six of them were fully decked out with all the rarest and strongest cards in the game. One of them even had the infamous golden Charizard! It's transparently obvious that these are "expert" level players who choose "beginner" mode to score easy wins against ACTUAL beginners. This is why you shouldn't just "honor system" matchmaking. If there is some level of matchmaking based on player level, then that doesn't work either. Most of these guys were actually at or below my level, and yet they have all these insane cards while my rarest card is a Dragonite that I can't even use because I don't have any Dragonairs. Not sure how that's even possible, since you get xp from opening packs, and these guys have clearly opened way more packs than me, but the results don't lie.
So what to do about it? Well, funny you ask, because it just so happens that a ranked mode is the single most requested thing in the playerbase right now. So yeah, you should do that. But also you should have a "random mode" where literally any player can be matched against any other player too. Not as fun if EVERYONE you fight is on the same level. Probably would lead to you seeing a lot of the same decks.
Comments
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It's a P2W game... if it releases like expected even a beginer that spends money will have a significant advantage. They may actually be beginers but just "bought" a top deck.
If the money was just for the looks (card rarity and cosmetics) the game would be fair, but since it will be possible to buy stuff that directly gives you advantage, the free players will always have a less satisfying experience.
Not sure how often they will release new cards, but if it's similar to the regular PTCG set releases it will give P2W players a large advantage that will only increase with time... sadly
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Bit of an update to my findings: Earlier today I found a Cloyster so my deck's a little better now, and I tried some more PVP All of this is still on """Beginner mode""", mind you. I've now done a total of 20 duels, and 16 of those opponents were decked out with all the rarest and strongest cards. One opponent I couldn't tell what his deck was at all because he conceded first turn, and only 3 other players had actual beginner-level decks. The highest player level I saw was a whopping 19, indicating that there is in fact no level-based matchmaking after all. The game literally just assumes that high-level players would not play on the beginner-level gamemode. SUPRISE! THEY DO! A LOT!
Shoutout to those 3 guys with beginner-level decks, they were worthy opponents and our duels were legendary.
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There's two separate queues for PVP that you can choose from, one labeled "beginner" and another labeled "experienced". However as far as anyone can tell, there is no functional difference between the two, nothing stopping a high level player with all the rarest and strongest cards from playing in the "beginner" queue. In fact, the majority of people in the "beginner" queue are doing exactly that. I've played 100 matches now, all in "beginner mode", and 66 of those opponents had at least 2 of the super rare "meta" cards like the golden Pikachu or the infamous Mewtwo-Gardevoir deck. Exactly two thirds. Actually, that number might be higher, because 12 of those opponents either conceded first turn or the battle otherwise ended too fast for me to actually see what was in their deck.
I saw a suggestion posted elsewhere that I thought would be a good idea to remedy this problem: Make the reward for winning a match in the "experienced" mode be higher than winning in the "beginner" mode. This would make the higher level players naturally gravitate to where they're supposed to be.
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that makes since and I actually think that would be better because I’m not that good at the card game and I probably don’t want extremely tough players facing me and beating me and a way to encourage them to not face easy players is like you said make the expert rewards higher
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From what I was able to get from good sources, the goal is to have a "Ranked Mode" (in some months after the final release) that will replace that "Experienced Mode". It wasn't implemented yet to let players gather a decent amout of cards in their collection so the paying player don't have a giant advantage by then.
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I’ve had this exact issue. It’s so annoying that clearly highly experienced players just spam 2 EX Articunos or a team of Pikachus running circle circuit on the 2nd or 3rd turn. Makes one almost not even care to play until changes.
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