The Abandon System Is So Bad That It Needs To Be Emergency Disabled & MMR reverted player-wide.

I'm not kidding. By MMR reverted I mean changing MMR values to the ones that players had before the abandon system was implemented. Right now, the best killers in the world are unintentionally digging themselves down to new-player MMR while survivors just trying to save time are unable to be brought down to opponents their actual skill level. Both of which exacerbate their own problems.

You, as a company, do not want your brand new players playing against the guys who got 200 wins in a row on Chess Merchant when trying to play the new fnaf chapter.

I have not been abandoning matches, as I took a ~2 year break and have been trying to squeeze every BP out of matches that I can to level up all the characters I'm still missing. Because I am one of the few survivors actually losing MMR consistently, I have already consistently been paired up with sub 1k hour survivors and have been left on the hook without reason. If it's already affecting me, then the system is already dangerous.

I'm going to go over each abandon scenario, why I think they're currently like that so I can convey my current understanding of how they work, and then explain the problems & hopefully a solution for them too.

(For the purposes of this post, Incapacitated means "dying, carried, on the hook, being grabbed out of a locker, etc." but not actually dead.)

1: If All Survivors Are Bots - Killer Draw
WHY: This makes sense. You load into a match, someone crashes immediately, and then the survivors see [DISLIKED KILLER HERE] and decide they don't want to deal with a 3.5 v 1 and dip. They didn't play the game, and bots can't really be used to gauge MMR. Functional and expected.

PROBLEMS: This has major overlap with the Abandon When All Survivors Are Incapacitated Or Dead. If they all abandon because they think the game is over, you as the killer can abandon too and then uh. Not Win. This can both be abused to keep MMR low by slugging out newbie survivors and punishes killers just trying to save time.

SOLUTION: Survivor Bots that are created in the Incapacitated State when at least 2 survivors are incapacitated or all other survivors are dead (this would need to check WHEN the bot is created, not when the killer DC's) count as a "LOSS" for the survivor and a "WIN" for the killer. Otherwise, continue with disconnects as normal.

The reason it checks for 2+ is because a lot of survivors just leave if they get downed first, and while that could count as an immediate loss for them, counting that as a win for killer seems disingenuous since they barely played. It also works alongside the current abandon system, waiting for all the other survivors to go down for the match to be un-salvageable. If you leave a bit early though because 2 people are down, you do it because you are conceding. Eating the DC penalty should still count as a loss for the survivor in this situation. If you are by yourself, you only DC when it's over.

2: 10 minutes without a generator being regressed or completed - Killer Loss
WHY: The actual match timer is 60 minutes, which then results in a survivor loss. (at least visually) The killer is deciding to forego looking for people who are hiding, you are literally giving up for convenience. BHVR also does not want to encourage any "Just guard gens for 10 minute" playstyles, which can be kind of boring and unhealthy.

PROBLEMS: On top of being visually confusing, the conditions for the timer are both too lenient and too strict (and our information is conflicting! I'm pretty sure regressing a generator doesn't rest the timer currently) You have to go 10 minutes without any generators popping, which can be longer than the rest of the match sometimes. Also survivors have to complete a whole generator, which can be really difficult sometimes when stuff like killer sidequests (Ex: Headtraps) and totems and missing teammates (dead, etc.) all come together while the survivors are actually trying to complete the generators and win the match. This also literally punishes the killer with a loss for not playing a match against survivors who are NOT trying to win the game, either hiding or spamming vaults in a corner or whatever else.

SOLUTION: Reduce timer to around ~6-7 and have it reset based on "gen charges progressed/regressed." Also reset the timer when a hex totem breaks. Count as "Killer WIN"

I think a ~3 minute timer that resets on a single generator touch or just stopping the regression would be too easily abused by survivors who want to just trap a killer in an unfun hide-and-seek match. But a 6-7 minute timer that resets on a combined X amount of charges would be perfect. If it's say, 90 charges, then survivors don't have to complete a generator to reset the timer. They can spread that out over multiple generators in a 3-gen, and regression builds this number up to. Pain Resonance would instantly add "~18 points" to the progress check for resetting the abandon timer if it cuts a chunk off of a mostly completed generator. We throw in hex totems as that is basically a main objective, and penti-thrill can hold survivor attention for a long time. It counts as a "Killer WIN" because with these extra timer-reset conditions, it only happens when survivors refuse to do any objective. Refusing to play, is a forfeit. A loss. The numbers will have to be tweaked to make sure holding a 3-gen isn't ever encouraged, until then, counting this as a "DRAW" would be fine.

3: All other survivors are bots - Survivor Draw
WHY: It makes sense, if all other survivors are bots, there's no reason for you to be in the match either. This one is almost perfect and the most well thought-out. If you don't play, there's no way this should count for your mmr.

PROBLEMS: Potential overlap with other abandon features, it could encourage waiting for the last second to abandon so you get the "DRAW" when all of your teammates lose.

SOLUTION: I imagine it might already work like this, but making it so the Abandon feature doesn't get "updated" by other abandon conditions becoming true would make it so the problem can't happen. It still needs to update! If someone unbreakable's last second we don't want people to abandon in soloQ.

This one is mostly paranoia on my part. Some might wonder if it should count as a draw in a 2v1 with one bot, but it's a very playable state of the game if you're good enough. But not with a bot. If BHVR ever add nuance to the MMR system for "partial losses" then moving it closer to a "full loss" based on dead teammates would be reasonable.

4: All Living Survivors Are Incapacitated - Survivor Draw
WHY: I'll be honest, this one was confusing. I had trouble thinking of a single reason why it could be like this. I think it's at least 2 things: One, not wanting to incentivize waiting for other survivors to DC for abandon scenario 3, and Two: There's a lot of last-ditch come back mechanics! If a killer doesn't have to play through those, should it count as a win for them?

PROBLEMS: Yeah it should count as a killer win/survivor loss. The survivor team is done. They are giving up, shaking your hand, and saying "yeah I'm going to the next match." You are depriving killer players of a win, when the other team looked them in the eyes and said "yeah you win." If I flip the table at board game night it's because I'm mad that I LOST. It can also be abused by survivor teams to make it impossible to lose by simply healing each other until everyone is Incapacitated.

SOLUTION: Count it as a "LOSS" for survivors and a "WIN" for killers.

I'ma be real I know we don't get the behind the scenes of how you get to these decisions, and I'm sure I could have ended up here too. But I'm genuinely disappointed man. Whoever made this decision for Scenario 4 should like. Be given the ability to learn from their mistake but also a close eye kept on them.

I just want the best for this game man.