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  • Subject: In depth explanation of the Halo 3 skill ranking system.
Subject: In depth explanation of the Halo 3 skill ranking system.
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Um can anyone explain to me why me and my team won well over 20 games in a row by 20+ points and not even our team leader gained a level(he averaged 20-30 kills a game and went anywhere from +18 to +28 per game.

  • 01.21.2009 4:36 PM PDT

Gamertag- PuN iZ SaCrEd

all this -blam- is confusing. sigma, mu, gama, K*, i mean WTF lol. im fine withwhat i got, a Brig

  • 01.21.2009 4:40 PM PDT

Posted by: Fos Tis Krisis
Brutes aren't monkeys, Brutes are gorillas. Humans are monkeys, and Spartans are Orangutans.

Posted by: Ozzie234
Posted by: Legendary Blue

You didn't even read it all?
The system works the way it is supposed to.


Yes the system works the way it's supposed to, but the players aren't.

With all these 2nd accounts flooding in, the system assumes every average player to be completely awful at this game, and subsequently robs him of all his Sigma in NO-TIME.

Also these 2nd accounts regularly beat the 1st accounts (with a higher rank including a more mediocre game history) at most levels with the result of "rank locks" just about everywhere.

To even have a chance to rank up at any higher levels of Halo3, you have to get real (and I mean REAL) skillful at the game before you even start out matchmaking.

That's a FLAWED system.


^^^ That's the only explanation you'll ever need. This is the state of things. The unpolished truth.

  • 01.22.2009 8:45 AM PDT
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Posted by: UselessTrash
Posted by: Ozzie234
Posted by: Legendary Blue

You didn't even read it all?
The system works the way it is supposed to.


Yes the system works the way it's supposed to, but the players aren't.

With all these 2nd accounts flooding in, the system assumes every average player to be completely awful at this game, and subsequently robs him of all his Sigma in NO-TIME.

Also these 2nd accounts regularly beat the 1st accounts (with a higher rank including a more mediocre game history) at most levels with the result of "rank locks" just about everywhere.

To even have a chance to rank up at any higher levels of Halo3, you have to get real (and I mean REAL) skillful at the game before you even start out matchmaking.

That's a FLAWED system.


^^^ That's the only explanation you'll ever need. This is the state of things. The unpolished truth.


Absolutely true. Second accounts artificially lower average player's sigma values much quicker than they should be. Over 2000 games it should not matter to someone's rank, but it definately does two things:
1) Skews the normal distribution of skill levels, likely centering skills somewhere below 25 with some oddly high abnormalities at the 45 and 50 levels
2) Slows the average time for an average player to reach their True Skill

Second accounts are not and never will be illegal. They make money for Microsoft, and would be utterly untrackable for Bungie.

The only obvious counter tool Bungie/Microsoft has is to allow sigma to be slightly more fluid, but they do so at the risk of lower the overall accuracy of ranks.

  • 01.23.2009 8:58 AM PDT

Posted by: UselessTrash
Posted by: Ozzie234
Posted by: Legendary Blue

You didn't even read it all?
The system works the way it is supposed to.


Yes the system works the way it's supposed to, but the players aren't.

With all these 2nd accounts flooding in, the system assumes every average player to be completely awful at this game, and subsequently robs him of all his Sigma in NO-TIME.

Also these 2nd accounts regularly beat the 1st accounts (with a higher rank including a more mediocre game history) at most levels with the result of "rank locks" just about everywhere.

To even have a chance to rank up at any higher levels of Halo3, you have to get real (and I mean REAL) skillful at the game before you even start out matchmaking.

That's a FLAWED system.


^^^ That's the only explanation you'll ever need. This is the state of things. The unpolished truth.
Not necessarily. The system factors sigma and MU updates based on the sigma or your competition. So, a 2nd account with a high sigma doesn't hurt as much as an established account with a low sigma when you lose. Psychologically it sucks for the player to lose badly to a 2nd account, but the reality is the system can tell who is new and who isn't and uses the info accordingly.

  • 01.23.2009 8:59 AM PDT

Posted by: Fos Tis Krisis
Brutes aren't monkeys, Brutes are gorillas. Humans are monkeys, and Spartans are Orangutans.

Posted by: Jay120171
Posted by: UselessTrash
Posted by: Ozzie234
Posted by: Legendary Blue

You didn't even read it all?
The system works the way it is supposed to.


Yes the system works the way it's supposed to, but the players aren't.

With all these 2nd accounts flooding in, the system assumes every average player to be completely awful at this game, and subsequently robs him of all his Sigma in NO-TIME.

Also these 2nd accounts regularly beat the 1st accounts (with a higher rank including a more mediocre game history) at most levels with the result of "rank locks" just about everywhere.

To even have a chance to rank up at any higher levels of Halo3, you have to get real (and I mean REAL) skillful at the game before you even start out matchmaking.

That's a FLAWED system.


^^^ That's the only explanation you'll ever need. This is the state of things. The unpolished truth.
Not necessarily. The system factors sigma and MU updates based on the sigma or your competition. So, a 2nd account with a high sigma doesn't hurt as much as an established account with a low sigma when you lose. Psychologically it sucks for the player to lose badly to a 2nd account, but the reality is the system can tell who is new and who isn't and uses the info accordingly.


So the system can detect a lvl 50 playing a lvl 10 account? Wow, US military should use this code in their defense systems. /irony off

Add to that the fact almost every 2nd account can on a regular basis beat most older accounts of lvls 30-35, and vice versa, making almost all levels of MM a stale mess.

You just need to realize what the true state of this rank system is dude.

[Edited on 01.23.2009 11:24 AM PST]

  • 01.23.2009 11:19 AM PDT
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Posted by: UselessTrash
Posted by: Jay120171
Posted by: UselessTrash
Posted by: Ozzie234
Posted by: Legendary Blue

You didn't even read it all?
The system works the way it is supposed to.


Yes the system works the way it's supposed to, but the players aren't.

With all these 2nd accounts flooding in, the system assumes every average player to be completely awful at this game, and subsequently robs him of all his Sigma in NO-TIME.

Also these 2nd accounts regularly beat the 1st accounts (with a higher rank including a more mediocre game history) at most levels with the result of "rank locks" just about everywhere.

To even have a chance to rank up at any higher levels of Halo3, you have to get real (and I mean REAL) skillful at the game before you even start out matchmaking.

That's a FLAWED system.


^^^ That's the only explanation you'll ever need. This is the state of things. The unpolished truth.
Not necessarily. The system factors sigma and MU updates based on the sigma or your competition. So, a 2nd account with a high sigma doesn't hurt as much as an established account with a low sigma when you lose. Psychologically it sucks for the player to lose badly to a 2nd account, but the reality is the system can tell who is new and who isn't and uses the info accordingly.


So the system can detect a lvl 50 playing a lvl 10 account? Wow, US military should use this code in their defense systems. /irony off

Add to that the fact almost every 2nd account can on a regular basis beat most older accounts of lvls 30-35, and vice versa, making almost all levels of MM a stale mess.

You just need to realize what the true state of this rank system is dude.


Jay is the last person to ever defend the system...everyone agrees its not perfect. He is just pointing out the mechanics. New accounts still cause unduly lowered sigma's for regular accounts, but the effects simply aren't the same as if they lost to a regular account.

  • 01.27.2009 1:51 PM PDT

Posted by: UselessTrash
So the system can detect a lvl 50 playing a lvl 10 account? Wow, US military should use this code in their defense systems. /irony off

Add to that the fact almost every 2nd account can on a regular basis beat most older accounts of lvls 30-35, and vice versa, making almost all levels of MM a stale mess.

You just need to realize what the true state of this rank system is dude.
You really didn't do a very good job comprehending what I wrote. I stated losing to a new account effects your skill level minimally compared to losing to an established account. I wont bother explaining how again so read my earlier post if you are still in disbelief.

By the way, the system can detect a level 50 playing on a level 10 account given enough games. It is designed to detect skill changes in players and the mechanism it uses is not uber secret defense technology, it's called math. How many games varies but usually within 30-60 games, he will have gained a few skill levels and that accounts skill level will become fluid enough to go up after every 5-10 wins.

I believe I know the state of the system but maybe you should explain to me in detail how what I've said is wrong.

  • 01.28.2009 12:56 PM PDT

Posted by: IParagon
I would love an explanation as to why i did not get my 48 in doubles yet....recent events occurred and i believe that i deserve that 48...


I read this thread when it was first posted and I was really impressed by how comprehensive it was. After the first 20 or so pages I believed I understood the purpose of Trueskill. 60 or so pages later I'm reading some things that I thought were thoroughly explained.

I thought that Trueskill was a method used to determine what your skill level currently is so that you could be matched with similarly skilled random players so that everyone on your team (other than friends and/or guests) would be near the same level. This would then result in a fair match against a team you at least have a chance of beating. After the game your level would be reassessed based on how well your team did relative to the playing level of the other team.

What I keep reading is people who think that their Trueskill (rank) should increase every time they win a game, regardless of who they're playing with or against. If they're rank isn't going up as expected, time to start (or buy) another account. So many people believe that their skill level is 50. Period. If they win a lot they are better than eveyone else and, by god, the system should back them up.

Is Trueskill an attempt to facilitate a fair game or a goal to be acheived at any cost?

  • 01.28.2009 1:57 PM PDT
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Posted by: Stardriver 1
Is Trueskill an attempt to facilitate a fair game or a goal to be acheived at any cost?


The former. However, True skill has a purposeful hill climbing experience modifier in it so that it takes time to reach your True Skill, even if the system mathematically recognizes it much earlier.

But like anything else with statistics and general mathematics, its impossible to properly model human behavior. We can't stop new accounts. We can't stop the fact everyone thinks they should be a 50. We can't stop people finding new ways to cheat. We can't fully stop boosting and deranking.

All of these things will skew the system somewhat, but the system is accurate for the most part and does its job for matchmaking quality. People just don't understand normal distributions. If they did, people would stop with their attempts to "trick" the system.

  • 01.28.2009 2:18 PM PDT

Posted by: Baaaaaaaaaaaaah
Posted by: Stardriver 1
Is Trueskill an attempt to facilitate a fair game or a goal to be acheived at any cost?


The former. However, True skill has a purposeful hill climbing experience modifier in it so that it takes time to reach your True Skill, even if the system mathematically recognizes it much earlier.

But like anything else with statistics and general mathematics, its impossible to properly model human behavior. We can't stop new accounts. We can't stop the fact everyone thinks they should be a 50. We can't stop people finding new ways to cheat. We can't fully stop boosting and deranking.

All of these things will skew the system somewhat, but the system is accurate for the most part and does its job for matchmaking quality. People just don't understand normal distributions. If they did, people would stop with their attempts to "trick" the system.



Thank you. That's the best answer on this topic that I've ever heard. I know it won't happen, but I hope all those folks out there that believe they "deserve" a 50 will read it. Maybe some day getting matched up with random players might still result in a fair game and a good time had by all.

  • 01.28.2009 4:12 PM PDT
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Lol, the distributions aren't "normal" at all. A lot of ranked playlists are mostly right-skewed, so I don't believe for a second that it has to do with fighting for your place on a curve. Just look at the MLG playlist distribution. Anyways, I've got a couple 50's, and all you really need to know is if you win against a new account scrub that (for example) has 100 xp and lvl 46 and really isn't going to get any higher, you will rank up much slower than beating a for example 5000 xp lvl 46 guy because his sigma is stable and the system "knows" where his Mu is at.

  • 01.29.2009 12:53 AM PDT
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Posted by: dabomb691
Lol, the distributions aren't "normal" at all. A lot of ranked playlists are mostly right-skewed, so I don't believe for a second that it has to do with fighting for your place on a curve. Just look at the MLG playlist distribution. Anyways, I've got a couple 50's, and all you really need to know is if you win against a new account scrub that (for example) has 100 xp and lvl 46 and really isn't going to get any higher, you will rank up much slower than beating a for example 5000 xp lvl 46 guy because his sigma is stable and the system "knows" where his Mu is at.


No one is claiming the distributions are normal. Only that it is the intent of the True Skill system. The distributions are skewed, if not binomial at times for low population lists, for reasons that True Skill cannot account for a lot of the aformentioned human behavior issues.

  • 01.29.2009 9:32 AM PDT

Posted by: dabomb691
Lol, the distributions aren't "normal" at all. A lot of ranked playlists are mostly right-skewed, so I don't believe for a second that it has to do with fighting for your place on a curve. Just look at the MLG playlist distribution. Anyways, I've got a couple 50's, and all you really need to know is if you win against a new account scrub that (for example) has 100 xp and lvl 46 and really isn't going to get any higher, you will rank up much slower than beating a for example 5000 xp lvl 46 guy because his sigma is stable and the system "knows" where his Mu is at.

The playlist distribution you see in the game is the distribution of people who are currently in the playlist. If there was a way to look at the skill distribution of all people who have ever played in the playlist, I'm sure it would look much more like a bell curve.

Also, it should be pointed out that it's impossible for the skill ranges to have a perfect normal distribution, as the skill range is only 1-50. A normal distribution requires an infinite range of skill values, although almost all people would fall within 3 standard deviations of the mean.

  • 01.29.2009 9:53 AM PDT
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This is very well thought out but i still do not like this system becuase it is too confusing and i like games that are based souly on EXP.

  • 01.29.2009 12:42 PM PDT
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I really really really hate this system here are 2 reasons:

1. It supports 2 accounter (when you get stuck at one rank or something)

2. i dont know why but with my friend i had won 41 team slyer games in a row and hes still skill 8?!?!?!?!?!?! while other people rank up much faster without winning every game!

  • 01.29.2009 1:34 PM PDT
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Posted by: DIESTRONG86
[quote]
The playlist distribution you see in the game is the distribution of people who are [b]currently
in the playlist. If there was a way to look at the skill distribution of all people who have ever played in the playlist, I'm sure it would look much more like a bell curve.

Also, it should be pointed out that it's impossible for the skill ranges to have a perfect normal distribution, as the skill range is only 1-50. A normal distribution requires an infinite range of skill values, although almost all people would fall within 3 standard deviations of the mean.


The distributions will always have some decent skew and even to them due to the EXP system and its award of titles, especially at the 40,45 and 50 ranges. Of course the second accounters and boosting help cause this.

  • 01.29.2009 4:20 PM PDT
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alright, u say alot of stuff about winning X games and not going up isnt true but it is. im already a 50 and so i got it on another account for a friend. i had a really really good record in team slayer and when iwas a 47, we won 12 FREAKIN STR8 GAMES IN A ROW WITH ME GETTING MVP EVERY TIME AND DIDNT GO UP!!!!!!!!!!!! when i got my 1st 50 it onnly took me about 10 games in a row with a really bad record whereas it takes more than 12 games in a row to go up from a 46? do u have a magical answer to that?

  • 02.03.2009 9:56 PM PDT
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Halo 3 is for noobs. Gg NoRe.

All this thread needed to say was this.

Halo 3's ranking system fails. Its a marketing scheme to have little children(Sometimes adults) make them feel good about themselves for getting a high rank so easily.

/end thread

  • 02.03.2009 9:58 PM PDT
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personally, i think ur just saying that cuz u dont have a 50 or high, not to be calling u out or anything. i just hear alot about that from people, especially my friends at school asking me why im so good and claiming they deserve a 50. im not sure though but im not an adult or a child but getting to 50 doesnt make me feel any better or worse about myself

  • 02.03.2009 10:07 PM PDT
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Halo 3 is for noobs. Gg NoRe.

Posted by: SiK uNiT
personally, i think ur just saying that cuz u dont have a 50 or high, not to be calling u out or anything. i just hear alot about that from people, especially my friends at school asking me why im so good and claiming they deserve a 50. im not sure though but im not an adult or a child but getting to 50 doesnt make me feel any better or worse about myself


I'm just saying that because I don't have a rank? I've said this in the Halo 2 matchmaking forums before Halo 3 even came out.

Don't for once second think that a rank makes you "More in Control" of this game, this world, this life.

It is a disease.

  • 02.03.2009 10:10 PM PDT
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not saying u dont have a rank, just saying that u sound a little like your complaining about not having a higher rank which is why you say its for adults and kids to feel better about themselves. not the case since the majority of 50s on my friend list are from 15-17 so im not sure where ur getting your ideas about this game. the ranking system has been stupid to me too, had to win more than 12 games on a 1month with a good record to go to 48 even though i already was on a winning streak. bungie has its reasons, in the long run its fair and everyone has the same control, some people just know how to control it a little better

  • 02.03.2009 10:30 PM PDT

The funniest thing about this particular signature is that by the time you realise it doesn't say anything it's to late to stop reading it.

Posted by: SiKe X
All this thread needed to say was this.

Halo 3's ranking system fails. Its a marketing scheme to have little children(Sometimes adults) make them feel good about themselves for getting a high rank so easily.

/end thread


No,this thread was a great explanation of a system that is hard to understand.

No one cares about your feelings towards some one else or how you think they should or shouldn't feel.

/thread DENIED.

  • 02.03.2009 10:33 PM PDT
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so wait, if i play and win a whole lot of social games then enter a ranked match my level will go up i.e i win 70/100 social slayer and i enter lone wolves i have a better chance of leveling up to 35 from 34 after a couple wins? or am i missing something help!!!

  • 02.07.2009 12:35 PM PDT

Posted by: xsoccerxownz
so wait, if i play and win a whole lot of social games then enter a ranked match my level will go up i.e i win 70/100 social slayer and i enter lone wolves i have a better chance of leveling up to 35 from 34 after a couple wins? or am i missing something help!!!

No, other playlists have no effect whatsoever when it comes to determining your rank.

  • 02.07.2009 12:39 PM PDT