The simple answer would be that the matchmaking algorithm keeps track of your winrate and gives you bad RNG when you stray too far above 50 percent. The more complicated question is, how exactly would the algorithm calculate which cards in your deck are suboptimal relative to the deck your opponent is playing and subsequently arrange your deck in such a way that you consistently draw said suboptimal cards?
From a development point of view, it could very likely be possible to draw suboptimal cards when the mechanics of wishing for a perfect card already exists Zephrys the Great. Personally, I have not used that card as I'm a returning player after 2+ years of inactivity so I'm not really sure on its consistency but given the mechanics that HS believes you can get the optimal card then its merely reversing the logic so that you would get suboptimal cards.
P.S. I don't believe the game is rigged just giving my train of thought, I'm a casual player having some fun now and then in HS. :)
HSreplay would catch any rigging. So ones believing in this conspiracy should also believe that HSreplay is involved. As well as smaller tools that track HS games,
So how do the same players consistently get to the top of legend every month? Or how do GM players consistently perform at a high level? They're immune to the rigging or something?
So how do the same players consistently get to the top of legend every month? Or how do GM players consistently perform at a high level? They're immune to the rigging or something?
Because the algorithms utilized probably don't really care about the top players, as far as sales are concerned.
I've talked about Acti-Blizzard in the past, and how they own a patent for utilizing matchmaking to drive microtransaction sales - and it does so specifically by analyzing psyche profiles (every action in game, from random clicks to mulligan choices are tracked) by matching veteran players with less experienced players, in order to incentivize the less experienced players to buy products they may want.
It's not much of a stretch to say that HSreplay might not be able to track such things because of incomplete information pertaining to those psyche profiles, and that individual players might have their matchups tweaked with to drive sales, in such a way that also happens to line up with wins/losses being skewed positively or some people, and negatively for others, and the whole thing comes out as net neutral in aggregate.
Put another way: It's not necessarily rigging for/against a particular person's winrates, but may be putting greater weight on certain matchups to drive sales independently of what the winrate is for that player.
So how does it decide who are top players? How do new players keep qualifying for masters if they have the game rigged against them to stop them ranking up? And how exactly does all of this drive sales?
Activision does own a patent for rigging games to drive sales and some people believe that it is applied to Hearthstone.
Now, as I understand it that patent has two main parts. One is that it tries to match players without a desirable in-game item with players that have it, thus advertising the item.
The second is to match players in games they would enjoy when they're having a bad streak. This is described to be done by analysing the players most effective role and the teammates and game modes he does better with and attempting to put them in that situation.
None of it is about a players win/lose ratio, because none of it needs to be. A simple rating system is enough to achieve a near 50% winrate for everyone after they reach their respective rating, however players that are stuck at low ranks are often unwilling to accept that this is the rank they deserve, so they blame "rigged matchmaking" for it.
Activision does own a patent for rigging games to drive sales and some people believe that it is applied to Hearthstone.
Now, as I understand it that patent has two main parts. One is that it tries to match players without a desirable in-game item with players that have it, thus advertising the item.
The second is to match players in games they would enjoy when they're having a bad streak. This is described to be done by analysing the players most effective role and the teammates and game modes he does better with and attempting to put them in that situation.
None of it is about a players win/lose ratio, because none of it needs to be. A simple rating system is enough to achieve a near 50% winrate for everyone after they reach their respective rating, however players that are stuck at low ranks are often unwilling to accept that this is the rank they deserve, so they blame "rigged matchmaking" for it.
So you think that a multibillion dollar corporation would not use a patent that they own which is designed to generate revenue in hearthstone. Is that correct?
Activision does own a patent for rigging games to drive sales and some people believe that it is applied to Hearthstone.
Now, as I understand it that patent has two main parts. One is that it tries to match players without a desirable in-game item with players that have it, thus advertising the item.
The second is to match players in games they would enjoy when they're having a bad streak. This is described to be done by analysing the players most effective role and the teammates and game modes he does better with and attempting to put them in that situation.
None of it is about a players win/lose ratio, because none of it needs to be. A simple rating system is enough to achieve a near 50% winrate for everyone after they reach their respective rating, however players that are stuck at low ranks are often unwilling to accept that this is the rank they deserve, so they blame "rigged matchmaking" for it.
So you think that a multibillion dollar corporation would not use a patent that they own which is designed to generate revenue in hearthstone. Is that correct?
Acti-Blizzard says they don't use it in any of their games, and that includes Hearthstone.
...
Now if you believe that line or not is up to the individual to determine, especially considering how trustworthy they have been the last decade or so, but I squarely fall on the side of the fence where they're probably using a very mild version of that system to drive sales.
Whether you call that "rigging" is none of my business, but I would say it is, even if it isn't actually impacting the aggregate stats.
It's not much of a stretch to say that HSreplay might not be able to track such things because of incomplete information pertaining to those psyche profiles, and that individual players might have their matchups tweaked with to drive sales, in such a way that also happens to line up with wins/losses being skewed positively or some people, and negatively for others, and the whole thing comes out as net neutral in aggregate.
You don't need to know inner details to spot blatantly non-random things in what should be random.
If Blizzard would match players against a deck with cards they don't own, we would see fewer mirror matches (because if you play a mirror you usually own those legendaries) We would see stuff like "Deck A is 7% of meta" but Deck A plays 6.5% of mirror matches. We don't see patterns like this in reality.
I have literally never seen definitive proof that there is any form of rigging going on in the game beyond people's feelings being hurt by their expectations.
Activision does own a patent for rigging games to drive sales and some people believe that it is applied to Hearthstone.
Now, as I understand it that patent has two main parts. One is that it tries to match players without a desirable in-game item with players that have it, thus advertising the item.
The second is to match players in games they would enjoy when they're having a bad streak. This is described to be done by analysing the players most effective role and the teammates and game modes he does better with and attempting to put them in that situation.
None of it is about a players win/lose ratio, because none of it needs to be. A simple rating system is enough to achieve a near 50% winrate for everyone after they reach their respective rating, however players that are stuck at low ranks are often unwilling to accept that this is the rank they deserve, so they blame "rigged matchmaking" for it.
So you think that a multibillion dollar corporation would not use a patent that they own which is designed to generate revenue in hearthstone. Is that correct?
Acti-Blizzard says they don't use it in any of their games, and that includes Hearthstone.
...
Now if you believe that line or not is up to the individual to determine, especially considering how trustworthy they have been the last decade or so, but I squarely fall on the side of the fence where they're probably using a very mild version of that system to drive sales.
Whether you call that "rigging" is none of my business, but I would say it is, even if it isn't actually impacting the aggregate stats.
I'm not saying it's rigged, but seems pretty easy once the meta is somewhat settled: the game is giving you bad matchups. Every deck has hard counters. You win a few in a row playing the same deck, and you start facing your hard counters. Or it is just the rng. I suppose some ppl will never be convinced.
I'm always shocked that a lot of these posts in threads like this sound like what you would see posted on the insanepeoplefacebook subreddit.
The patent discussed above has nothing to do with making people lose or giving them certain cards in a match. As far as i can tell it only relates to matchmaking as a whole and goes into some detail about it. Much of the described functionality is not even relevant for Hearthstone. But theoretically this mechanism could be used to give players statistically worse match ups. Why tho ? Frustrating players is the opposite of what the company would want. In fact a lot of whats described seems to be related to "rigging" (really more of adjusting a little) matchmaking in a positive sense for player enjoyment. Which seems like a much better way to make them spend money anyways.
I see people always say "yeah yeah i know about confirmation bias and all the other things that make you think its rigged but that's actually not it - it really is rigged". These people obviously have heard about cognitive biases but don't really understand them. There is so much data out there on Hearthstone matches. If there was any weird stuff going on you could find it. Sometimes the absence of any evidence is quite clear in itself. So if you are convinced get some prove. (And I'm not talking about your last 20 games)
I'm still not seeing where money comes into this? Not once in 7 years of Hearthstone have I ever lost a game and thought to myself "oh no I had better buy more packs!"
I'm still not seeing where money comes into this? Not once in 7 years of Hearthstone have I ever lost a game and thought to myself "oh no I had better buy more packs!"
The idea is someone would que into and lose to someone else playing a clearly superior deck, think "I could win if I play that", and then spend money in order to make that deck.
From a development point of view, it could very likely be possible to draw suboptimal cards when the mechanics of wishing for a perfect card already exists Zephrys the Great. Personally, I have not used that card as I'm a returning player after 2+ years of inactivity so I'm not really sure on its consistency but given the mechanics that HS believes you can get the optimal card then its merely reversing the logic so that you would get suboptimal cards. Heck, Zeph against a rattlegore and see if he offers transform removal.
P.S. I don't believe the game is rigged just giving my train of thought, I'm a casual player having some fun now and then in HS. :)
Zeph is very overhyped in his capabilities. That card has a very limited subset of cards to pull from, and struggles a lot of the time. Doesn't handle multiple things to deal with well. Will not give you flare unless you're at 1 or 2 mana remaining regardless of secrets on the board. Will not give transform removal against deathrattles unless they are over something like 6/6. Cannot handle refreshing HPs from ongoing effects. Good at spotting lethal ignoring the ongoing effects. Good at giving overcosted (because he costs 2) boardwipes and the odd threat.
Seeing and playing with Zeph does not give me confidence that the game is rigged based on his code.
There's a very easy way they could rig it. Compare the number of expansion-relevant legendaries each player has, and choose opponents based on that. The more legendaries you have, the higher chances to win, and the higher incentive the loser has to craft them.
They could go even deeper: test for expansion relevant legendaries AND decks/classes, but that might be too much.
Not saying they are doing it, just saying it's not impossible.
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Please enlighten me, oh wise ones. How do they do it?
The simple answer would be that the matchmaking algorithm keeps track of your winrate and gives you bad RNG when you stray too far above 50 percent. The more complicated question is, how exactly would the algorithm calculate which cards in your deck are suboptimal relative to the deck your opponent is playing and subsequently arrange your deck in such a way that you consistently draw said suboptimal cards?
From a development point of view, it could very likely be possible to draw suboptimal cards when the mechanics of wishing for a perfect card already exists Zephrys the Great. Personally, I have not used that card as I'm a returning player after 2+ years of inactivity so I'm not really sure on its consistency but given the mechanics that HS believes you can get the optimal card then its merely reversing the logic so that you would get suboptimal cards.
P.S. I don't believe the game is rigged just giving my train of thought, I'm a casual player having some fun now and then in HS. :)
HSreplay would catch any rigging. So ones believing in this conspiracy should also believe that HSreplay is involved. As well as smaller tools that track HS games,
So how do the same players consistently get to the top of legend every month? Or how do GM players consistently perform at a high level? They're immune to the rigging or something?
Because the algorithms utilized probably don't really care about the top players, as far as sales are concerned.
I've talked about Acti-Blizzard in the past, and how they own a patent for utilizing matchmaking to drive microtransaction sales - and it does so specifically by analyzing psyche profiles (every action in game, from random clicks to mulligan choices are tracked) by matching veteran players with less experienced players, in order to incentivize the less experienced players to buy products they may want.
It's not much of a stretch to say that HSreplay might not be able to track such things because of incomplete information pertaining to those psyche profiles, and that individual players might have their matchups tweaked with to drive sales, in such a way that also happens to line up with wins/losses being skewed positively or some people, and negatively for others, and the whole thing comes out as net neutral in aggregate.
Put another way: It's not necessarily rigging for/against a particular person's winrates, but may be putting greater weight on certain matchups to drive sales independently of what the winrate is for that player.
For reference, the patent in question:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20160005270
So how does it decide who are top players? How do new players keep qualifying for masters if they have the game rigged against them to stop them ranking up? And how exactly does all of this drive sales?
Activision does own a patent for rigging games to drive sales and some people believe that it is applied to Hearthstone.
Now, as I understand it that patent has two main parts. One is that it tries to match players without a desirable in-game item with players that have it, thus advertising the item.
The second is to match players in games they would enjoy when they're having a bad streak. This is described to be done by analysing the players most effective role and the teammates and game modes he does better with and attempting to put them in that situation.
None of it is about a players win/lose ratio, because none of it needs to be. A simple rating system is enough to achieve a near 50% winrate for everyone after they reach their respective rating, however players that are stuck at low ranks are often unwilling to accept that this is the rank they deserve, so they blame "rigged matchmaking" for it.
So you think that a multibillion dollar corporation would not use a patent that they own which is designed to generate revenue in hearthstone. Is that correct?
Acti-Blizzard says they don't use it in any of their games, and that includes Hearthstone.
...
Now if you believe that line or not is up to the individual to determine,
especially considering how trustworthy they have been the last decade or so, but I squarely fall on the side of the fence where they're probably using a very mild version of that system to drive sales.Whether you call that "rigging" is none of my business, but I would say it is, even if it isn't actually impacting the aggregate stats.
You don't need to know inner details to spot blatantly non-random things in what should be random.
If Blizzard would match players against a deck with cards they don't own, we would see fewer mirror matches (because if you play a mirror you usually own those legendaries) We would see stuff like "Deck A is 7% of meta" but Deck A plays 6.5% of mirror matches. We don't see patterns like this in reality.
I have literally never seen definitive proof that there is any form of rigging going on in the game beyond people's feelings being hurt by their expectations.
so you think they engage in 'mild' rigging?
This thread sums up the positions on this argument pretty well.
Does Zephrys the Great prove rigged card draw/discover system? - Card Discussion - Hearthstone General - HearthPwn Forums - HearthPwn
It really comes down to whether you believe that blizzard has such integrity that they would never put money ahead of a principle like fairness.
I'm not saying it's rigged, but seems pretty easy once the meta is somewhat settled: the game is giving you bad matchups. Every deck has hard counters. You win a few in a row playing the same deck, and you start facing your hard counters. Or it is just the rng. I suppose some ppl will never be convinced.
I'm always shocked that a lot of these posts in threads like this sound like what you would see posted on the insanepeoplefacebook subreddit.
The patent discussed above has nothing to do with making people lose or giving them certain cards in a match. As far as i can tell it only relates to matchmaking as a whole and goes into some detail about it. Much of the described functionality is not even relevant for Hearthstone. But theoretically this mechanism could be used to give players statistically worse match ups. Why tho ? Frustrating players is the opposite of what the company would want. In fact a lot of whats described seems to be related to "rigging" (really more of adjusting a little) matchmaking in a positive sense for player enjoyment. Which seems like a much better way to make them spend money anyways.
I see people always say "yeah yeah i know about confirmation bias and all the other things that make you think its rigged but that's actually not it - it really is rigged". These people obviously have heard about cognitive biases but don't really understand them.
There is so much data out there on Hearthstone matches. If there was any weird stuff going on you could find it. Sometimes the absence of any evidence is quite clear in itself. So if you are convinced get some prove. (And I'm not talking about your last 20 games)
I'm still not seeing where money comes into this? Not once in 7 years of Hearthstone have I ever lost a game and thought to myself "oh no I had better buy more packs!"
The idea is someone would que into and lose to someone else playing a clearly superior deck, think "I could win if I play that", and then spend money in order to make that deck.
Zeph is very overhyped in his capabilities. That card has a very limited subset of cards to pull from, and struggles a lot of the time. Doesn't handle multiple things to deal with well. Will not give you flare unless you're at 1 or 2 mana remaining regardless of secrets on the board. Will not give transform removal against deathrattles unless they are over something like 6/6. Cannot handle refreshing HPs from ongoing effects. Good at spotting lethal ignoring the ongoing effects. Good at giving overcosted (because he costs 2) boardwipes and the odd threat.
Seeing and playing with Zeph does not give me confidence that the game is rigged based on his code.
There's a very easy way they could rig it. Compare the number of expansion-relevant legendaries each player has, and choose opponents based on that. The more legendaries you have, the higher chances to win, and the higher incentive the loser has to craft them.
They could go even deeper: test for expansion relevant legendaries AND decks/classes, but that might be too much.
Not saying they are doing it, just saying it's not impossible.