Matching the same ship repeatedly, losing to the same ship with 10x superior skills repeatedly = not fun.
Can we limit matching the same ship to 1x per day?
So, we'd have more incentive to continue playing (and potentially matching against other ships with similar skill) instead of leaving game after matching against the same ship 3x consecutively.
*Those who want to rematch can always start a new ship.
I think matching the same people repeatedly is making HG queues more dead.
Matching quickly with the same opponent = incentive to leave stamp/game.
Matching a bit longer with new opponent = incentive to stay.
Better to keep people waiting until a new opponent is found.
But I also understand that
waiting long queues = incentive to leave.
waiting short queues = incentive to stay.
So maybe a toggle - like the cross-region matchmaking thing - might help.
Anecdotally speaking, most of the time, I match with different ships (1-5 minutes queue time in EU) - until I keep matching the same stamp champ ship repeatedly - and then I leave game.
If this match repeat prevention mechanic was active, instead of matching the stamp champ again (in 1-5 minutes), we'd take longer to match at first (3-10 minutes queue time) - as we split queues of the new incoming ships with the stamp champ.
But with better retention (due to new matches each round), the new and old incoming ships get to match with not just the stamp champ, but also the 2nd-rate crew, 3rd-rate crew, etc.
Overall, this enlarges the pool of hg players remaining in the game, which might shorten queue times.
Hourglass uses a stamp system meaning if you keep fighting the same guy you should in theory be able to get away from that guy if you just start a new ship from the main menu and are now in a new stamp. Its not 100% foolproof as if it is taking too long to find a match they will start looking for matches outside of your stamp, which may mean matching you against the same guy, but again the odds are very unlikely.
Capping it to 1 fight against the same crew per day would mean people in very high mmr would find it impossible to get matches as they already consistently fight the same ships over and over.
If anything have it so if you sink back to back to the same ship in hourglass, you have an option to not match against that person for the very next match. Thats all you can realistically do without completely butchering matchmaking.
This system would only work in an ideal world where SoT is as big as Fortnite and HG is full of thousands of different crews on each stamp.
At the end of the day everyone (well, not everyone) is someone else's boogeyman. Assuming you're decent, there are plenty crews that would probably avoid yours. If this were implemented today, it would leave only the closest of fights, people that are actually at exactly your skill level to fight (which would probably be like 1-2 crews depending on the day). Everyone even a little bit below or above would likely be avoided by or avoiding you.
The best solution is to either take the hard fights and learn from them, swap to a different stamp/turn off crosses to try and avoid them, or just take a break from HG until they get off or you're ready for the fight.
I think matching the same people repeatedly is making HG queues more dead.
The game is just dead in general, this isn't a problem specific to HG. Players at the highest levels are talking about how they can revive queues for their boat sizes, but the truth is 90% of the decent fights (along with most of the playerbase) have just gotten bored/given up on SoT for one reason or another.
I think it'll take an engine upgrade and a soft reboot of the game to revive the playerbase.
