I agree with pretty much everything TC mentioned, especially about OP Lancer & hit detection. Sometimes I can’t frag an opponent in close quarters with Gnasher (may be delivering ~95% of dmg), yet there are constant instances when enemies 1 hit K.O. me mid-range with it, and it doesn’t get better with less ping (and I’m not a scientist, but I feel like in 2019 we can expect at least smth to stop being so ping-dependent. Again, if it’s still there on 60 ms ping it’s more of a hitreg trouble, no matter what).
There’s also a thing about placement matches in Ranked, AFAIK those aren’t affected by rating-based matchmaking since people playing those don’t have any ratings to begin with (yet), thus the need to endure & suffer through 5 torture (I mean placement) sessions to get a rank.
But the thing is, since there’s no ‘tier-based’/rating-based matchmaking applied there, the matches become pretty annoying and not fun when one team completely destroys another. I’m not asking for impossible ‘perfectly balanced teams’, I just want the gap to be as small as possible. And some times the gap is freaking huge, and it’s not ‘fun’ at all.
These constant defeats don’t make me wanna improve my skill, all they do is insult me and make me think of uninstalling the game. If these placement matches are here to help the game ‘read’ my performance, I think devs can gather tons of info on that matter with other means instead. E.g. during the campaign, or bot matches - things like shooting accuracy, movement patterns, pickups timing & weapon preferences, may be smth else, I dunno.
If placement matches are so meta and can’t be avoided, then why not apply some sort of a ‘soft’ matchmaking there as well, to even the chances?
To put it short: I believe there are some people out there who are just like me had enough of humiliating defeats now and then (I mean, even in past Gears titles), who don’t feel like getting through it once again. Personally, I admit that it leaves an impact on my ego (wow, shocking!) and drastically hinders my MP experience. With that said, I’d rather go play PvE matches - but oh boy, ToD medals that are still being earned there are so few. We need more medals for bot matches/PvE because as of now it feels like PvE is treated there like some sorta ‘crippled’ version of ‘teh real Gnashers of War multiplaya’, which is ridiculous. Add either more medals in PvE, or make PvE matches, wins and pretty much every scoring activity there count towards PvP, or to phrase it better - towards the Versus progress.
For now I’d rather go and play a bot match than get humiliated by another MLG PRO Gnashing person. I don’t need to ‘git gud’, no thanks, I’m fine ‘as is’, and if the game can’t put me against peeps of my skill (no matter how low it really is), then I’ll stick to bots then. And there’s nothing shameful 'bout it, just make the bot matches as rewarding as PvPs, that’s all.
Just like others had already mentioned here, let players choose what activity they prefer & want to invest into, and reward it - without those greedy re-rolls, pls. I know that 1st re-roll of a day is free, but I still see the whole ‘challenge re-roll’ thing alienating the game.