Rookie/Intermediate and Intermediate/Veteran Servers

Deck_

I think the rookie only servers are a great idea and not allowing veteran players play there finally stops someone from getting owned by a div 1 player when they first load up the game. My suggestion is to consider an additional step. I know the player base isn't huge at the moment, and people will worry that this is too restrictive. So I'm trying to propose an idea that is somewhat restrictive, but allows for some movement. What if NS2 allows for 2 different types of pub servers. One is rookie/intermediate and the other is intermediate/veteran:

1) This stops a rookie from playing with a veteran player - rookie friendly servers could be misleading. If you are a rookie joining that type of server, you could have no chance against veteran players. Or stopping veteran players from having to play with multiple rookies on their team (when there is only 1 on the other team) in an unbalanced scenario.
2) 2 thresholds would exist: a) When 1st threshold skill level is reached, a person would be allowed to play on an intermediate/veteran server if they wanted. I would have a pop up window choice for intermediate players that click the play now button so they can choose what type of server they want. b) 2nd threshold skill level would not allow you to play on rookie/intermediate servers any longer.
3) I also think certain veteran members of the community should be allowed to command in rookie/intermediate servers to help people play the game. Not sure how you would decide who would have this access, but I think it should be considered.
4) I think the play now feature should put rookies into rookie/intermediate servers they can find available, and if they are all full to put them in a bot server that would remove bots when people are added. (might already do this)
5) The server browser could have a pop up for rookies when they try to join intermediate/veteran servers that says they need to reach this skill level to play here - please choose a rookie/intermediate server or click this play now button - make it also available from server browser (not sure how it works currently)

I wouldn't be surprised if people don't like the idea of not allowing a rookie to play on every server, or there might not be a player base to support this. I do think this is a compromise since we don't have matchmaking and it alleviates some issues with different skill levels, but also allows for movement between the servers if you are in intermediate status. Having intermediate players in rookie servers also might help rookies. Instead of having a server full of people that barely know the game, you could have some players helping them through the process. Just a suggestion to try it for a build possibly, and you could always change it later.

NousWanderer

The small playerbase does make an idea like this challenging to implement, I'd imagine. It could backfire. But I agree that a smoother curve would be useful as players transition from learning the basics to learning the meta. As it stands, rookie-only servers do very little to train new players effectively in any way that matters once they encounter remotely skilled players. This is frustrating for both the rookies and for the more competent players who are tasked with the job of being perpetual teachers.

This discussion I found on Reddit emphasizes a few areas where the current system is less than stellar.

I guess a good comparison is that NS2 now functions the way Chivalry does (or did-- perhaps they've changed this since I last played about a year ago): you have a training environment for rookies up to an arbitrary level (level 10 in Chivalry), and within that environment they learn how to play the game the "wrong way" (re: efficacy). After reaching the cut-off, they're banished from rookie servers and are exposed to players who understand the game's mechanics more intricately. This is perhaps more exaggerated in Chivalry, since that game requires awkward positioning and crouch-mechanics to play at maximum effectiveness, so you have good players unintuitively folding in half and swinging swords backwards as if the game was The Matrix: Medieval Edition. NS2 has the advantage of more familiar mechanics on the engagement level, at least on the marine side, so the gap between "I get this!" and "What the fuck is happening on my screen right now?" is somewhat narrower than in the case of Chivalry. But the overall comparison remains apt, because once the gates open up, new players get screwed by NS2's complexity.

I'm not sure that additional restrictive server brackets would be the ideal solution. I don't know that there really is a single solution (much less an ideal one). But UWE should do whatever they can do to make the 'guided curve' as useful as is possible.

Nordic

There have been similar ideas suggested before. Even just recently. http://forums.unknownworlds.com/discussion/140308/3-types-of-servers-to-help-with-rookies-stomping-smurfs-and-player-retention-need-suggestions/p1

The biggest problem with these skill brackets is the playerbase is too small. In theory restricting the playerbase to certain brackets would results in more balanced, and arguably more balanced games.

One of the larger reasons why shuffle often does not produce results that are quality is because teams skill deviation is really high. I have seen it range from about 400 to 800 standard deviation of skill on a given team. Even a deviation of 400 is ridiculously high.

A team with 5000 2000 1000 500 250 125 is going to have higher standard deviation than a team with 2000 1800 1600 1400 1200 1000.

The middle 50% of the playbase is between 998 and 1560 hive skill. So I ran an experiment where I had 100 fake servers with 18 fake players with a random skill between 998 and 1560. The average standard deviation for a server in that skill range was 160. That 160 is far less than what you typically see in a pub server with 400 to 800 deviation.

Ghoul, as a server operator, found this intriguing. So he decided to experiment with it. He limited one of his servers to 883-1560 hive skill. That skill range, given the same experiment explained above gave an average standard deviation of 170. Basically the teams should be mostly balanced assuming hive skill values truly represent a players skill.

I tried seeding that server for a whole weekend. It had people join, but it never seeded. Roughly 50% of the playerbase could not play on that server, and of the remaining who could, some complained they could not play with their friend who fell just outside of the skill range.

The smaller the skill range, the more balanced the games are likely to be if you have the population to segregate. Given the above range of 998-1560, that leaves 50% of the playerbase in less than ideal scenarios. The bottom 25% below 998 probably won't have much of a problem. It would just be filled with low skilled players and rookies. The top 25% would have a huge issue. A 1600 hive skill player is so easily stomped by even a 2000 hive skilled player. A 2000 hive skilled player is easily stomped by a 2400 hive skilled player. The top 25% basically gets shafted in segregated servers.

The point is, segregating servers by skill may be a decent idea but ns2 has no where near the population to do it.