I've been discussing a few ideas to improve annoying aspects of BO2 with Friends I play with on Steam, and we've come up with a few very simple ways to make the majority of the players happier.
Cheaters: First we've observed a very high probability of current cheaters with shady past records on Steam, namely Ban(s) on Record. Now while a few have indeed learned their lesson, well, many clearly have not an continue to cheat in one of many forms including but not limited to AimBots, Wall Hacks, Glitches, etc. Next, unfortunately not all hacks are blatant like Snap-on AimBots, Auto-Fire, etc but are still clearly present i.e. Wall Hacks, Macros, Recoil, etc so players tend to Report those folks rather frequently and no doubt sometimes erroneously; frequency still remains high and typically valid. An easy mechanism to track is RPD Reports Per Day. The Report Cheater button needs teeth, as it is right now and everyone knows it that it's a pacifier so make it a tool. Programming should be able to 'Heuristically Detect' hacks, and though the binary fingerprints aren't confirmed, hence no Ban, the probability is very high.
Parties: Parties and Clans are a fun and enjoyable way to play the game, pubstomp, however against an enemy team of unsuspecting Random's it's the opposite. The problem is in most cases Parties/Clans have an open mic and communicate positions, scorestreaks, etc to a clear unfairadvantage to Random Players.
(new) Ping Rates: A persistent complaint is 'lag comp' and laggy lobbies. In theory this can be adjusted to a point, but in practice a [highest ping] - [lowest ping] > 75 ms is where Lag Comps starts breaking-down. In addition, folks with widely swinging ping rates > 50~75 ms from their basis ping mid-game can also drastically effect Lag Comp making the game unplayable for the majority. Some folks deliberately 'adjust' the bandwidths in an attempt to gain an advantage.
Now if you've read above nowhere am I mentioning KDR or SPM and normal Matchmaking should balance the teams.
Solutions:
- Cheaters: Past, present (suspected): RPD & Heuristic Detection are placed via Matchmaking into their own 'special' groups, and Prior Ban(s) Players are prohibited to create a Party, and most legitimate Clans already prohibit memberships of players with Prior Ban(s). Segregate those cheaters. For folks with prior Ban(s) well you should have thought about that beforehand and understand consequences. I/We are tired of looking-up Steam records in-lobby and/or quitting a game mid-game. Non-Banned but suspicious players have a choice to redeem themselves and uninstall Hacks, Macros, quit Glitching, etc thereby their RPD, Heuristic Detection would go down and their accounts moved back to the main group after a period of time.
- Parties/Clans: In Open Lobbies all Players in a 'Party' are color coded and Matchmaking first priority is to place Parties vs Parties and if needed Random's on both sides. This alerts Random Players to the presence of a Party and provides them the option beforehand to either leave the lobby or stay.
- Rage Quitting & Lobby Spamming/Slamming: After a game is > 25% over the lobby needs to be 'locked,' no one likes being Spammed/Slammed into a game that's unwinnable and often in a Spawn Trapped game in mid-to-end game. I understand this can leave 6 v 2 and often results in a forfeited game but in the long run again the vast majority of players slammed mid-to-end game on the '2' side hate it. Hopefully, the above solutions will greatly reduce its likelihood anyway.
- (new) If the (S)earch function is failing to properly place folks in e.g. <100 ms lobbies per their preferences then in the pre-game lobby display the Player's Ping rates, Countries of origin. Most folks would have no problems to mix foreign and domestic players if there wasn't a lag problem, but simple physics dictates otherwise. Further, often domestic players Friend foreign players and the Search preference option fails for the other players in the lobby. Nobody wants their 50-80 ms pings matched-up with 300 ms players or visa-versa. Players with persistent huge swings > 50 ~ 75 ms should be locked into their highest peaked ping rate throughout the end of the game session. Capped ping rate adjustments is another viable option where folks with low-stuttering frame rates and/or > 150 ms simply are at a disadvantage where (example) 11 of 12 players' ping rates are 50 ms ~ 75 ms vs a single player at 300 ms.
As a note to those that disagree just know that you're in the minority, and what I've stated above is both logical and will ultimately keep more players in CoD, BO2 and future titles. This is something that should have been implemented some time ago. For those that have high KDR's you shouldn't have any problems with most seasoned players, and high KDR are also in the minority of players. For those wondering what Heuristic Detection is well it's the same mechanism to catch suspected viruses that have similar acting binaries which look and act like known viruses and are attempting to interact in areas that they shouldn't and are perceived and blocked as a threat.
Please feel free to comment.