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My support MMR calibration story

Blogs > disciple
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disciple
Profile Blog Joined January 2008
9070 Posts
September 28 2015 17:44 GMT
#1
So I've finally decided to man up and calibrate my mmr. I play support exclusively and I feel confidant that with correct play supports can tip the scales of battle to victory. For my calibration games I decided to play WW, she has a high impact ultimate a heal and a flash farm ability. My winrate this month on the hero was about 70% over 50 games. In my unranked I constantly get matched with 4k to 5k players and from 100 odd matches in the past month 80 were in the very high skill bracket and 20 in the high skill bracket. So long story short my calibration matches were all around 3.1k, half of them in the normal skill bracket. A bracket I had no matches in for more than a year. Naturally I went 5-5 and my calibration was about 3100. The games were absolutely terrible, but I think I tried my hardest in all of them, you can see the dotabuff info here:

https://www.dotabuff.com/players/131465760/matches

Now, this ain't gonna be one of the salty blogs 'whys my MMR so low, I don't belong there' cause obviously with my hero picks and play I wasn't able to influence the game positively. Whatever metrics like support play, team healing, KDA or even hero pick didn't really matter. What I'm seriously surprised is why the game decided to throw me in that skill bracket for all my games, considering my unranked matches have been consistently in higher brackets. One of the reasons that came to mind is party MMR which I calibrated pretty much one game a month starting a year ago. Even so all my calibration games were in the high bracket so I dont know. Anyone else had experience with calibrating only playing support? I just feel that nothing I did could've changed the games aside from playing cores and probably raping shit.

So tl;dr: I played support WW, went 5-5, half my games were in a bracket I had no matches in for more than a year. The game didn't really gave me a 'chance' and all players in my matches were in the same bracket.
Administrator"I'm a big deal." - ixmike88
Torte de Lini
Profile Blog Joined September 2010
Germany38463 Posts
September 28 2015 18:42 GMT
#2
You play WW after patch 6.85! You should have done it before!
https://twitter.com/#!/TorteDeLini (@TorteDeLini)
SataNiCKniFe
Profile Joined September 2015
1 Post
September 28 2015 18:49 GMT
#3
Limited hero pool. Bad builds. Why trying carry items on ww? Buy more wards. Stack more camps. Aura items effects has more stats in calibration. I wish you luck..
disciple
Profile Blog Joined January 2008
9070 Posts
September 28 2015 19:37 GMT
#4
On September 29 2015 03:49 SataNiCKniFe wrote:
Limited hero pool. Bad builds. Why trying carry items on ww? Buy more wards. Stack more camps. Aura items effects has more stats in calibration. I wish you luck..

Thanks for the reply. My last limited hero pool match was from april 2014, not sure if that should have any implications now.I always buy all support items for my team, thats why I played ww for calibration, you get a lot of kills gold cause of the ulti and level 7 onwards farming is really fast.
Administrator"I'm a big deal." - ixmike88
Thermia
Profile Joined August 2010
United States866 Posts
September 28 2015 20:23 GMT
#5
I believe he is saying your hero pool is small, not that you play limited hero mode. That said, I'm pretty sure items like bloodstone are not the build for a support (especially after 6.85) when things like glimmer cape and solar crest exist.
Sufficiently advanced stupidity is indistinguishable from trolling. IGN: Mierin
RolleMcKnolle
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
Germany1054 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-09-28 20:47:14
September 28 2015 20:42 GMT
#6
I also play support only and calibrated around your level when I first started ranked games. But tbh I wouldnt expect a better MMR when u still play in high ranked games. I am only playing very high and also am just at 4k. So when still playing high u should naturally be lower. I am not trying to be a prick, I just want to show that you are probably not calibrated too low.
I know your feeling of not being able to influence the game enough. I often had the same feeling. Especially since I hate losing gold in the picking screen and everyone waits till last pick... So i rarely am able to counterpick as a support.
That's why I am trying to play all-around supports like wd, dazzle or even ww.

When playing as support in these ranked pubs I found that the most important change I made was talking, I am not good at dota or dota theory or even at all those little intricacies and hero matchups and whatever. I have simple principles like "try to (smoke)gank their carry with your offlaner", "try to take rosh asap" and "won a fight - get towers". Thats all my dota knowledge. And I am just hammering these into my pubs by using voice. Since I am doing that I got way better games and a way better winrate.
The next thing I had to learn (and I am still doing it badly) was not to get behind in farm/levels too much. As a support in pubs u are usually solo supporting. So it is hard to get up that glimmer or even a shiny aghs. But whenever there is an empty lane I grab it and farm it. It is so easy to be lvl 5 at 13 minutes and just have no impact. Even one or two kills on the offlaner are (in my eperience) less helpful than farming that 1 minute on mid while your mid is ganking offlane or shit.
SInce doing these things I feel a very real impact since I am thinking more about how the game is going and what should be done. I am the one organizing the smoke gangs, the pushes, ad so on. It's amazing how much of difference you can make. I even have the feeling now, that I am the main reason we win the game. Not because of my great KDA or smth, my mechanics are way too bad for that. Just by forcing people to follow my principles. It was a hard step to talk and it felt really strange at first, since people are not answering you most of the time. But it is REALLY rewarding.

And one hero i love in the current pub meta is disruptor. He rapes all these antimages and low hp mids.

ye well that's about it. I hope my experiences are helpful


edit: you really are building strange items. Why would you ever go s&y on ww? I have about 6 items I build on the most support heroes: blink, glimmer, solar, force, aghs and mek/greaves.
Ler
Profile Blog Joined August 2012
Germany543 Posts
September 28 2015 22:52 GMT
#7
Calibration works like Bottom-Up: You start in the so called "elo hell", and go up if you play above the average of the corresponding bracket. This process repeats until you reach the mmr cap or stagnates when you perform on an average level/poorly according to the bracket you were currently matched with.

I believe that good kdas/winrates/gpm/expm in your normal games only influence the starting point by a bit.

hope that helps explaining what happened in your case.
Twitter: @Ler_GG | Facebook: lergg | youtube: lerlolgg | Twitch.tv/gg_nore | #ArtOfSupport
gaijindash
Profile Joined January 2015
Japan376 Posts
September 28 2015 23:40 GMT
#8
I think if I went 5-5 with any hero I would expect to be 3100, and it shouldnt be hard to win at least 7-8 with WW as a support if you play right. Either way in 3k I would recommend playing a core if you want to climb through it fast. Ler will probably disagree with me
Courage does not always roar, sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says 'I will try again tommorow'
synapse
Profile Blog Joined January 2009
China13814 Posts
September 29 2015 00:55 GMT
#9
damn i didnt know disciple played the dotes
:)
TomatoBisque
Profile Joined March 2013
United States6290 Posts
September 29 2015 03:43 GMT
#10
If you want to buy a big money item on a support, Bloodstone and Octarine Core are both terrible ideas most of the time. They don't really do anything to help your team and offer very little benefit to yourself.

Agh's or Refresher are much better (depending on the hero), and frequently some combination of 2 of mek/blink/euls/force/glimmer/solar crest is much better (depending on the hero).
rip
SpiritoftheTunA
Profile Blog Joined August 2006
United States20903 Posts
September 29 2015 03:55 GMT
#11
On September 29 2015 08:40 gaijindash wrote:
I think if I went 5-5 with any hero I would expect to be 3100, and it shouldnt be hard to win at least 7-8 with WW as a support if you play right. Either way in 3k I would recommend playing a core if you want to climb through it fast. Ler will probably disagree with me

that's not how calibration works, it really depends on your unranked mmr before you start calibrating

you can go 10-0 and end up in 2k or go 0-10 and end up in 4k, both have happened
posting on liquid sites in current year
evilfatsh1t
Profile Joined October 2010
Australia8687 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-09-29 05:22:41
September 29 2015 05:22 GMT
#12
i understand how you feel
back when ranked first came out and people had no idea what determined calibration, i played support for 10 games too. (when i played in a team at competitive level i play support)
i went like 3-7 or something, give or take a win, and i calibrated to like low 4k and i never touched ranked again rofl.
unfortunately theres no explanation for this, except that mmr is a disgraceful indication of skill/team input etc etc
Meta
Profile Blog Joined June 2003
United States6225 Posts
September 29 2015 06:14 GMT
#13
During my calibration I played exclusively captain's mode, never got captain, always first picked the support, and went 8-2. Honestly if you're good at support, it doesn't really matter what hero you play. Some are obviously harder than others, but support is all about big picture stuff, calling rotations and setting up ganks, getting map control with wards and sentries. Hero abilities are mostly secondary to this core stuff. WW is a great support, but I would only prefer it against lineups with 3 melee or with a hero like antimage where you need a hard lockdown spell. Playing support should be all about flexibility. Map control, stacking camps, and counter ganking will be 50% of your game no matter what hero you play.

Long story short: different lineups require different things. Some lineups would be over the top with a dazzle that just casts his ult before every team fight. Some lineups require a hard lockdown like from a WW. Some lineups require good team fight from their support early so they can survive till late game, in the form of earthshaker or witch doctor. Diversify your picks based on lineups and you will increase your MMR.
good vibes only
Kraznaya
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
United States3711 Posts
September 29 2015 06:31 GMT
#14
if u bought a dagon 3 with ur bloodstone gold it would literally be more useful
do you have enough resolve, hero of justice?
Yurie
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
11868 Posts
Last Edited: 2015-09-29 06:36:51
September 29 2015 06:36 GMT
#15
High skill is a bit above 3k. Just wanted to insert that into the discussion. At least it is based on the information I have read. Very high is probably around 3.5-4k somewhere. So seems you calibrated around the level you are playing at, system working as expected?
k0pf
Profile Joined January 2011
Germany180 Posts
September 29 2015 09:36 GMT
#16
On September 29 2015 15:36 Yurie wrote:
High skill is a bit above 3k. Just wanted to insert that into the discussion. At least it is based on the information I have read. Very high is probably around 3.5-4k somewhere. So seems you calibrated around the level you are playing at, system working as expected?


He said he played at very high all the time, so i guess he should be at the top end of 3k not the bottom.
Anyways I can only say what I always say: It ALWAYS feels like you couldn't have done more when you lose in DotA. Its the way most of our minds work. You did everything as you think you should have done it. The others didnt. Doesn't mean the others played worse.

On the other hand whenever i play unranked the skill level feels WAY lower than in my ranked games, so maybe it's that people care more about winning in ranked matches than in unranked ones and if you really try to win in unranked matches you get a high win % because the others don't care enoguh for winning / trying new stuff / have fun with funky stuff.
Erasme
Profile Blog Joined February 2011
Bahamas15899 Posts
September 29 2015 10:23 GMT
#17
40wins is 1k mmr, thats fairly easy to grind when you're better than everyone else
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7lxwFEB6FI “‘Drain the swamp’? Stupid saying, means nothing, but you guys loved it so I kept saying it.”
Laserist
Profile Joined September 2011
Turkey4269 Posts
September 29 2015 10:35 GMT
#18
I know by first hand, Very high-high bracket line is about 3500-3600. If you play in both brackets you are expected to be around 3600 at max. You'll not play in high bracket after 3700 or so, all considered solo.
You cannot be matched with 4.5k-5k players if you see a recent high skill game in your history, unless you are in a party.

Playing support, 5-5 with not good stats and I assume valve also tanks it a little bit then you end up with 3.1k. If you are 4k+ material, you can climb very easily with proper picks and execution.
“Are you with the Cartel? Because you’re definitely an Angel.”
disciple
Profile Blog Joined January 2008
9070 Posts
September 29 2015 10:45 GMT
#19
So I played a couple of ranked games today with venge. Prior to that I was 500th in the world, just by winning two games I dropped to 97%. I still don't understand why the rank calibration had to essentially reset my progress. I know its shouldn't be hard to get back up in a couple of months but I dont understand the logic behind my calibration match ups. So if its bottom up and you lose the first 2 games of the calibration you are screwed? Cause it never got better, I couldve stopped right after my second game and my MMR would've still calibrated at 3100. I'm just looking for a reasonable explanation thats all.
Administrator"I'm a big deal." - ixmike88
evilfatsh1t
Profile Joined October 2010
Australia8687 Posts
September 29 2015 10:46 GMT
#20
well no one knows exactly how calibration works besides valve people. i dont think youre going to get a definite answer here
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