Part of me understands how you feel and shares your sentiment. After all, I’ve been having a world of trouble finding an opponent in IE for the past two weeks, and I’ve also been wondering why.

Another part of me can’t help but understand and support the MDJ’s stance on not revealing how IE matchmaking works. You don’t need 15 years’ experience on VF to guess what flaws a full understanding of how it works might bring to light. VF is full of anecdotes (some funnier than others) about cheating, and this carries weight when decisions are being made.

So, whilst Aymeric’s decisions may not be to everyone’s taste – it only takes a few clicks to see that – That said, I believe we should ‘give it time’ to allow the game’s mechanics and communication strategy to take shape, whilst accepting that, in any case, they won’t be universally popular.

I remain convinced that the game’s teams are working hard every day to find (or rediscover) a balance between tradition and modernity, and I believe it’s best to maintain this approach when sharing our gaming experiences and impressions, as there’s never any benefit in expressing dissatisfaction through abuse and accusations of ulterior motives – other than to render one’s message inaudible and less credible.

I remain patient and am learning to appreciate VF for what it currently has to offer, without dwelling too much on the past and whilst remaining hopeful that the future will be far less dramatic than the prophecies suggest.

Hi Cedric,

Do you really think that the underlying issue here is communication?

You’re raising the issue of potential cheating – perhaps we could ask the admins? Nicularo or Socrate might be able to answer us.
As far as I’m aware, nobody in the CP has been caught for rigged IE matches, and I don’t get the impression that’s the case with the LR or your side either?

I don’t know how things are felt within the LR or on your side, but for over a year now I’ve never had the impression that a title was decided by rigged IE matches or even by lucky draws. Perhaps I’m wrong.

There have surely been shenanigans elsewhere, perhaps in obscure divisions, but honestly, if the numbers are so small, why should we still be punished for two or three blokes?

Besides, when certain areas for improvement were discussed to boost our bid for D1, no one had ever put forward such a nonsensical idea.
Reducing the IE seemed like a good idea on paper. Perhaps we could have waited to see if it would lead to greater competitiveness. Which, incidentally, seemed to be the case.

It seems fairly clear that this isn’t a bug, given that the issue was raised three weeks ago and is still active to this day.

In my view, the real underlying problem is still the same: trying to solve non-existent problems with solutions that add no value and create even more problems.

The system as it stands is unfair, and on top of that, it makes it difficult to find matches.

Hello Sora,

La communication n’est certainement pas le plus gros problème sur ce sujet. Mais actuellement, personne ne sait exactement comment fonctionne ce nouveau système et nous n’avons quasiment aucune information à son sujet. En ce sens, je pense que la communication devient importante pour pouvoir faire avancer les choses et réellement s’attaquer aux problèmes de fond.

Si Aymeric vient nous expliquer que tout le monde peut tomber sur tout le monde, sans qu’aucun autre critère, comme l’indice VF, le classement des ententes de chaque adversaire ou autre, n’entre en jeu, alors il n’y aura plus vraiment de débat sur le fait que le matchmaking ne respecte pas un certain principe d’équité par exemple. En revanche, cela permettrait peu être de comprendre qu’il puisse y avoir des bugs dans le fonctionnement du matchmaking.

Après, comme je l’ai dit dans mon message plus haut, je n’ai personnellement jamais eu l’impression qu’il y ait eu des matchs arrangés et je n’ai jamais pensé qu’une entente était devenue championne grâce à des tirages favorables. Mais le fait qu’Aymeric évoque la possibilité de matchs arrangés pour justifier le fait de ne pas divulguer certaines informations sur les règles du matchmaking m’interpelle forcément. C’est justement pour cette raison que je lui pose directement des questions par rapport à cela.

Les admins peuvent effectivement peut-être nous apporter des réponses mais ce que je me demande surtout, c’est si la mise en place de ce nouveau matchmaking est motivée par la volonté d’éviter les arrangements, ou s’il y a un autre objectif derrière. Si c’est effectivement pour éviter les arrangements, je ne peux que te rejoindre sur le fait qu’une nouvelle fois, tout le monde ne doit pas être puni pour les agissements d’une minorité (si l’on part du principe que les arrangements restent minoritaires). J’ai également du mal à comprendre pourquoi les matchs arrangés sont évoqués avec ce nouveau système alors que cela n’a jamais été un sujet avec l’ancien qui le permettait.

Les problématiques que tu évoques, à savoir l’équité et la difficulté à trouver des matchs, sont effectivement les plus importantes. Mais je pense justement qu’un retour d’Aymeric permettrait d’y voir plus clair et d’avoir enfin un véritable débat sur le sujet.

Après, peut-être que je me voile la face à demander de la communication et une discussion ^^

No, that’s complete nonsense, given that you can select several time slots for a single day…
In fact, it’s exactly the opposite – you actually have more choice that way…
Seeing multiple options means I can select the 10.00, 12.00 and 14.00 slots if I want to, so it’s brilliant; it actually encourages you to play online matches, and therefore to find opponents...

The problem is precisely that with the new settings, even if you select three or four time slots in a day, you don’t necessarily find anyone willing to play...

Yes, Aymeric
I posted two requests, four to five days ago, with no opponent drawn
Then two IE matches were confirmed against the same opponent.

In that case, Aymeric, why revolutionise a system that works – by making it completely unfair – if there’s no evidence of cheating or exploitation?

The system was actually rather good – not perfect, but clearly effective – and since it’s been in place, complaints about a ‘skewed’ ranking have been rare, if not non-existent.

Moreover, simply hiding pending requests should prevent any potential exploitation, as submitting an IE request is now a completely blind process.

And to answer your question, from my perspective it’s taken ages, and clearly it’s been just as long for my opponents. Many of my fellow CP colleagues have had matches not taken up despite requests made a week in advance.

D accord avec toi, en d2 plusieurs jours sans que quelqu'un n accepte ma demande...

C’est vraiment une top proposition et la meilleure si l’idée première de ces modif était d’éviter les matchs arrangés 🙏🏻