Why SBMM is a bad system and needs to go!

I'm pretty sure the vast majority of the community agrees with this. Almost everyone would rather us go back to the grade system with ranked matchmaking.

The problem is that after how many years of time and money they put into creating the SBMM they are realistically never going to throw it away and revert. Unfortunately.

It’s also fun to play with/against worse and better players instead of only having teammates/ opponents in your skill level. 

am I the only one who goes constantly against opponents not anywhere near my skill level - in both directions?

Rank system was better and at very least it was fun to grind ranks.

It makes killers play unfun and survivors gen rushing, because both sides can‘t mess around anymore.

also something that for me wasn’t possible with rank based matchmaking. I really don’t know if people just wear nostalgia goggles for rank based matchmaking or I was alone on the unfun side of things back than…

I can understand the sentiment with knowing about your current status at least and would be okay with some kind of indication with your MMR

Rank based matchmaking punished you for gen rushing without entering chase, ignoring healing, camping, and tunneling though. If you tunneled, you likely denied yourself Iridescent Malicious and/or Sacrifice by not hooking all Survs, or killing people on first hook, and camping subtracted points from Chaser. If you genrushed or ignored healing, you didn't progress Benevolent or Evader.

The emblems encouraged gameplay that offered the opposition a chance to play the game. If you were so much better than them, it still encouraged going easy on them to make them think they are playing the game at the least.

There were outliers like Plague deleting Benevolent, and Wraith/Onion Ring chases while cloaked not counting as a real chase, but those outliers could have been fixed instead of committing to the bad system we have in place now that only counts raw K/E.

Someone should do a survey on this because I'd be curious to know what percent of the community prefers grades versus sbmm

The instadown got fixed and counted as 2 Malicious points, I play plenty of Ghosty (mostly Exposed downing people) and Malicious isn't a problem. Stealth I listed for chase, unless you meant stealth not progressing Survivor's Evader emblem enough. In which case yeah, they probably would have fixed it if they spent the dev time on Emblems instead of MMR.

Matchmaking consistently gave me 1 rank difference matches (and more only with full range SWFs as you can check their steam to see they are friends). If you were Tier 2, you could reasonably expect Tier 1-3 enemies. That's the same that happens now with MMR, and autofills provide the true rainbow experience (play soloq for 1 hour and you will get a teammate that clearly forget their brain in their other set of pants). If we saw MMR, then you would see the 1200 alongside 1600/1800/2000 and a 2200 in the match. So if we hid Ranks, the same effect would happen with better gameplay being rewarded.

As far as reaching high on emblems, yes it was mostly a playtime measure, but isn't that what people use as a metric for skill anyways in place of MMR? The idea was it goes up as long as you play (not like a jerk), and it drops only a tiny bit each month. It would allow for you to take a 6 month break, and then quickly skill back up the ranks. Having a decent size amount of people at each rank ensured that matches are varied and not stressful boring matches like the majority of mine have most recently been.

Again, just because a color on a (3 primary color) palette is combined with Yellow to create Green, does NOT mean it is Blue. That is how I read your first sentence. It doesn't matter how confidently you say something if it is clearly, visibly, and objectively false. An alternative would be "Nurse moves faster than Survivors without perks, add-ons, blinks, or Bloodlust." My confidence in that statement has no bearing on the factual nature of it.

A number determining your matchmaking is ranked, unless that number is a queue ticket/your number in line/your purchase ID. If it adjusts one way when you win, and the opposite way when you lose, that's ranked. It doesn't matter if it is public or private, if you are still being ranked and matchmade according to the metrics of the game outcomes.

If it needs to be public, then that just shows that normal matches are ranked, as it doesn't hide whether a Survivor escaped or died to other Survivors. That showed everyone else that they won or lost. Plus plenty of games have ranked modes without replays, or ranked modes without match histories. That doesn't make them unranked.

My issue is that if we want such a bland Ranked/matchmaking qualifier as Kill/Escape, then we need significant Ranked QoL to make up for the deficits inherent to that methodology. If we used Emblems again, then those issues would be less noticeable or no longer even existing, and might not need those same QoL features to make up for the no longer visible or existing deficits.

Either gone or overhauled,

Visible numbers, Ranked/Casual Modes, better tracking and variance in matchmaking completely agree with the halo dev

You are being ranked whether the number is visible or not. And many players are treating it like ranked whether the number is visible or not. The biggest failure of SBMM in DbD is pretending that this isn't a half-baked ranked mode while also not giving players an option for more casual games.

Everyone I know who played the game regularly made it to red ranks

I'm not so sure the grade system is something we should revisit, but I agree that the current matchmaking system isn't fun. My theory as to why that is has more to do with BHVR defining what a 'win' is. Prior to SBMM's implementation there wasn't a defined win condition. You could kill all 4 survivors quickly, but not progress your rank since you didn't get many total hooks and the match was too short. You could escape through the exit gate, but not progress your rank since you either avoided being chased, ignored altruism, or didn't spend a lot of time on gens. What was considered a win was up in the air and could vary from player to player. If I earned 20k+ BP I was okay with calling that a win. It's hard to do that now since we know that our MMR is determined solely off of survival and the community has put so much emphasis on kill rates and win streaks. Finding a casual match is significantly more difficult now than it was when I started to get really into this game back in 2019.

If you watched the video OP posted, or read the article, or read the Game Dev's* comments, then you would know that the Dev said MMR is currently being used incorrectly. The casual game modes that use MMR aren't supposed to use MMR to nearly that degree in the first place. "Yes, our engineers utilized the same codebase and kept skill/level as a search criteria, but we substantially de-prioritized it in matchmaking."

*The game dev who was 'responsible for'/'the founder of' modern MMR.

Also the modes that do use MMR are supposed to throw in (far more than currently provided) expected wins and losses on occasion to break up the stress of high-intensity even sweatfests. "Why not always evenly match people though? My reasoning was that these are actually the most stressful matches of the set."

"The failure of modern skill-based matchmaking, imho, is that it's designed to maximize these perfect match scenarios and minimize the others."

Modern MMR implementation goes against what is was designed for. It's like using a Hammer on Screws, or a Screwdriver on Nails, it's simply the wrong tool for the job. Sure you can get the Nails pounded in with the Screwdriver, but that isn't how it should be used.

A good thing it doesn't exist anymore?

You need a loose MMR system in order for it to work as a casual game. Which is what we have.

You can't have a casual game if newbies are paired with pros all the time.

Except that reds were always paired with greens, because they're within 6 ranks. We've been over this.

Ranks were great for reds, giving them easy games, but crap for mid-level players.

You were obviously red, so it's no wonder you want to go back to stomping noobs.

can you imagine soloQ with a competant killer and 3 bambis while you're the only experienced player, without madness like old DS and DH to save you?

I firmly believe that this point right here is why people want this system back so badly. This situation only sucks for the survivors.

A disturbing number of people on this forum put themselves in the killer's shoes in this scenario and see only free wins a 'fair matchmaking system that recognizes their god tier skills'.

Last actual statistics from BHVR put solo q population at about 60% of the survivor player base, with 4-mans at about 10%.

So yeah, making the game suck for anywhere from 60 to 100% of survivors is a big problem. Not every swf is team eternal, despite what others on here might try to make people think that.

The end paragraph seems to be entirely ignored, which is the most important part. My claim is that when the decision for matchmaking is so poor, it needs to be offset by QoL features like found in other games' Ranked modes in order to be made enjoyable. Emblems encouraged an enjoyable experience for all, and K/E encourages the sweatiest gameplay. Even if we want to give credit to the claim 'people don't know their MMR, so that shouldn't matter', that still ignores that we removed the incentive to play fun and fair towards emblems. Emblems can still be considered ranked, but they encouraged such a better experience for all, such that they don't need Ranked QoL features as much to mitigate the all too common bad scenarios MMR-based matchmaking (or the lack of Emblem-based matchmaking) causes. I often have to play against the exact same Killer player playing the exact same Killer multiple times at some points, and if I want variety, fun, I need a Killer ban so I can wait in queue for a different Killer. With emblems, the matchmaking pool size was large enough that I could safely get different Killers far more frequently, so I didn't need Killer bans to have fun. Heck, I don't even need Killer bans if we got Killer repeat prevention instead, but that much needed QoL was only needed after the swap to MMR-matchmaking (IME).

Our main game mode is ranked, because when we look at what the founding MMR Dev said about matchmaking, we don't 'substantially de-prioritize MMR when finding a match' or use different MMR for different playlists. Yes, the casual modes in that Dev's example used MMR also, but the MMR was firstly unique to each playlist (casual and ranked, as well as Capture the Flag, etc.). Lights Out and My Little Oni didn't use a new MMR number as far as I understand, so they weren't casual by that Dev's methodology. They may have been intended to be casual fun, but it kept the diseased ranked/sweatfest mindset by porting over the same MMR (at least was my experience with those game modes, with people playing for $5 Subway cards). The second issue is that MMR needs to be de-prioritized. That means if you find only 5 people (4S 1K) after 2 minutes, they get a match, doesn't matter what their MMR brackets are. Now technically we do that now with the expanding ranges, but it isn't done well enough from my experience with matches.

As far as de-prioritizing also, we mostly only do that when we get autofills, but the problem there is 4/5 people are expecting to play at their level (from hundreds of sweaty matches prior), and then you get 1 person significantly above or below that expectation. The Killer could be autofilled against babies when the Killer is expecting a clock SWF, or a random sweatlord Surv can be brought in with 3 mid-level Survs and a mid-level Killer. If autofill matchmaking was the norm, then we wouldn't go into matches expecting giga-sweatfests every match, we would know it is a total gamble, and can have more fun with the ups and downs. People wanting to sweat can still take their super-sweat into customs by organizing scrims with various communities, and that helps quarantine them away from the rest of the community.

My overall point is the current methodology plays like a Ranked game mode, without the features that make Ranked 'playable'. People weren't sweating every match (when I played at Red Ranks) under Emblems, but they are (when I play at above 75% winrate as Killer, and when getting tomes as Survivor) under MMR. MMR matchmaking, or more accurately the wincon being a blind K/E, is encouraging the sweaty gameplay, and needs the Ranked QoL to make the game 'playable'/enjoyable. Unfortunately, we currently we have to struggle against the system in place for the good matches.

P2 - Tools and processes can be used incorrectly, then we learn and adjust to them. It's fine for a child to do chores and help out around the house, it isn't cool for them to work in coal mines because they can fit in the smaller gaps. This misuse of the tool (MMR) is being used when it shouldn't be, or isn't doing it correctly in the other casual modes just as we have it being misused in DBD.

P3 - We are being pushed to sweaty play, or actions more commonly associated with ranked play (or alternatively the guard rails for less sweaty/casual play were removed), but we don't have the QoL to deal with it. I am saying if we stick with sweatlording/Kills+Escapes/MMR, then we should get those bans/picks to make the game tolerable. Sweat is a symptom of ranked behaviours, including but not limited to all those you listed (visible ranks, etc.). We have the sweat symptom, but we don't have the deodorant to cover up the stench (bans and other ranked QoL). That doesn't mean sweat doesn't happen in the environment of casual matches also, but they are designed around the casual fun with fans to cool people off and limit the stink (limiting the max negative and or sweaty behavior through separate encouragement).

P4 - Emblems are there, but aren't used for matchmaking. That's what I mean by removed Emblems(-based matchmaking). It was them being the driver of behavior, not a side thought at best, is why I so broadly state that. The game is unique enough in being asymmetrical, that it needs something to fix the rules of its matchmaking. If the Survivor team gained and lost MMR together, that would 'fix' a lot of the problems with it, although that goes too far against the Dev's stated goal of the game being a 1v1v1v1v1. If we created our own rules and encouraged behaviors (with Emblems) for matchmaking, then that also would 'fix' a lot more of the problems with it. Essentially you have to bend and break MMR and Emblems in order to perfect matchmaking. There is less bending and breaking involved with the custom ruleset designed with the game in mind, than the tool intended for 1 on 1s, or X sized team against X sized team. Since we have X and Y sized teams, the system must bend, and stops working as well as it should. Emblems were a better matchmaker than MMR even with the edge-cases. The worst part was 20-50hr new players playing with the sweaty Red ranks, but even then, most Killers were actually casual enough back then to ease up off the gas and onto the brakes back then. That isn't the case now.

P5 - That's fine to consider Emblems more ranked than MMR, but I'm saying it provided more casual fun than MMR does. When I was brand new, when I was mildly experienced, and when I basically reached the top bracket and stayed there on into MMR, I always had more fun with Emblems being the factor than MMR. It helped Killers, with Survivors being more casual, bringing less sweaty perks, and cleansing totems, and opening chests. I loved my loot-goblin build (Plunderer's+Ace in the Hole+Appraisal), but I can't have fun with it currently. It helped Survivors, with Killers being more casual, trying to spread the pressure more often than currently, and Slug races being around 1/10 matches (IME) now being 1/100 matches (IME). Even the complaints about gen times are complaints about sweat. The complaints about sweat are both a valid issue and a skill issue at the same time. It is a skill issue when the person is sweating against sweat, but its a valid issue when they never wanted to go in against people trying to sweat.

My issue with ranked and casual is that ranked isn't fun, casual is fun. Emblems(-based matchmaking) were fun, MMR isn't fun. Ranked QoL reduces the 'unfun', and is needed if we want to continue down this path. Alternatively we can use an old-janky system that provided more fun, even if it had major and minor hiccups. That old janky system may have been more 'ranked' than MMR, but it more importantly was less sweaty, and thus, more fun.