[WoTB] Blitz Matchmaker

World of Tanks Blitz uses basically the same matchmaking system from the PC version of the game, only slightly optimized for faster performance and 7vs7 battles.

First, it would be good to watch this video for the PC version.

• There are no particular restrictions on vehicle nation, class, tier, etc. Same as on PC.
• MM-ing spread is 2 tiers for most of the vehicle tiers, apart from tiers 1 and 2. Tier 1 can only play with tiers 1 and 2, tier 2 can play with tiers 1, 2, 3. 
• Platooned players are matched based on highest tier in platoon.
• Balance weights for all classes in Blitz are the same, i.e tier 7 mediums, heavies and tank destroyers all have the same balance weights. 
• Premium tanks may have preferential matchmaking, eg A-32 can only play against tier 3-5 vehicles, Pz IV Hydro, KV-220, M4A2E4 - only against tiers 3-6, Panther M10 - against tiers 5-8, KV-5 - against tiers 6-9.

Ideally, matchmaker tries to create full 7vs7 battles, ensuring that top 3 vehicles in both teams are of the same tier, and balance "weights" of both teams are equal.

The longer the wait time in the queue, the softer matchmaker requirements become. The requirements change twice - after 30+ and 60+ seconds in the queue.

After 60+ seconds for one of the waiting players matchmaker would try to create battles with less players on the team where minimal size is 3, i.e. 3vs3 battles. In such battles, at least 2 top vehicles are to be on the same tier, while matchmaking "weight" difference between the team can go up to 10%.

Unfortunately, there are some rare bugs which carried over from the PC version to Blitz, and in Blitz they are reproduced more frequently:

Such battles, where top 2 equal tier requirement is not enforced, could be created after 60+ seconds of wait time for one of the queued players. We will be monitoring the situation and trying to fix this.

After 5 min wait time, player is kicked out of the queue to garage due to timeout. 

[ALL] Matchmaking

What do you think of the current matchmaking in both World of Tanks and World of Warplanes?
Is there anything about it that you don't really like?

How do you like the idea of economic incentives for "underdogs"?

• individual underdogs (eg tier 8 in tier 10 battle) getting bigger exp bonus for fighting higher tiers, the bigger the tier gap, the bigger the reward. The system is currently in place, however rewards can be bigger. 
• team underdogs (based on comparison of overall balance weights of all tanks in the two teams) getting some exp bonus for being slightly disadvantaged, eg team that has 1% lower overall weight gets 5% bonus exp regardless of the battle outcome

[WoT] On SPGs and MMing

Too many SPGs in battles is one of the persistent issues in WoT. It does affect the gameplay and can change the perception of the entire game.

Additional match-making requirements that are already live on RU servers and pending implementation worldwide are the following:

5 SPGs per team is a so called semi-hard cap which means 5 is maximum number of SPGs per team if the battle is created correctly, ie without any errors. The prerequisites for that are relatively high CCU (that's why might be somewhat hard for NA server) and no particular imbalance or disproportion between vehicle classes in waiting queue.

In addtion to the above the SPG-cap for high tier battles is floating and varies from 2 to 5 arty units per team.

Simplifying things, battles are created by the server in succession with different SPG limits: 2, 3, 4, 5, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc

For lower tiers the limits are a bit different and depend on the average SPG percentage for that particular battle tier.

Such matchmaking adjustment will increase waiting time in queue for all tanks:
- for tanks/TDs the increase is going to be relatively small - up to a few seconds (under normal conditions)
- for SPGs the increase is going to be more noticeable - up to 30-60 seconds in worst cases.

The cap mechanics was chosen taking into account possible increase of waiting time. The harder the cap and the more restrictions, the longer waiting times. Especially for less-populated servers (on single RU cluster there can be 140-200k players)

Matchmaking Improvements for EU

The same improvements that have been applied for US server recently now available for EU (since today's server restart).

This includes smart matchmaking system that takes into account the number of battles played on each particular vehicle. See the chart below:

First N battles (N varies according to vehicle tier, class, premium/non-premium status) on each vehicle are chosen not according to full spread, e.g. 8-12 for tier 7 heavy tanks, but according to decreased combat tier spread, allowing this vehicle to be at the top part of the team list.

Being only the first step of many, this improvement is aimed at helping players adjust to their newly-obtained vehicles.

Updated Match-making Chart

Updated the match-making chart for 6.7 update. Mind new tier spreads for light tanks and some premiums.

Anticipating your questions on match-making improvements, I remind you that overhaul is scheduled for Q1 2012, as it was given here.

New Match-Making Chart

Here goes new chart that will be in use in the upcoming v.0.6.3.8.  

- Changed spread for some vehicles
- Featured new vehicles