How to set a match size of 1 for Matchmaking 2.0?
How can I set the match size to be be 1?
https://i.imgur.com/dYpAowe.png
I make use of a lobby server where my players hang out, party up, chat, etc. before queueing up for a match. This is similar to League of Legends, Dota 2, etc. This lobby server is pretty lightweight so it can support thousands of connected players.
In my current legacy multiplayer implementation, I am able to specify a Min Player Count of 0, which is perfect for my needs. When a client connects to the lobby server, they should just immediately connect to the next free one. They don't need to "wait" for anyone else.
https://i.imgur.com/XW65J4P.png
However, in Multiplayer 2.0 it seems like the matchmaker can only support a match size of at least 2.
How can I implement the needed functionality of connecting a player to a lobby server as soon as possible (match size of 1)?
Best Answer
Greetings,
I'd like to make sure that I understand your flow. Is it that when a single player that wants to play online, they will connect to a lobby server immediately.
There they will wait for other players to join. Then once there are enough players to start a proper match, matchmaking will begin and these matched players will connect to another server, the game server where the match will take place.
Is this your flow? Will there be two distinct servers? One for the lobby and another for the game?
Hi @jital thanks for the reply.
(1) Yes, when any player wants to play, they connect to the lobby server immediately upon starting the app.
(2) Then, they will be presented with a main menu. It looks like this:
https://i.imgur.com/IZ8w0Ah.jpg
(3) Then they press "Play" when they are ready to play a game. This enters them in a matchmaking queue. It looks like this:
https://i.imgur.com/r7qTPca.jpg
(4) Then after the matchmaker does its magic, a match is found (hopefully between players of similar skill):
https://i.imgur.com/SI5Vmbx.jpg
(5) The player then disconnects from the lobby server, then connects to a game server, along with any other players who were matched.
(6) After the game concludes, the player disconnects from the game server, then reconnects to the lobby server. Then we are back at step (2).
Let me know if you need further clarification on the flow.
Greetings,
To answer your question, there is no way to use matchmaker 2.0 with a minimum size of one. Although, based off of the information, I would say that you could bypass using the matchmaker for the lobby server, because clients are just connecting to a server instead of matches.
Clients can connect directly to servers through TCP/UDP sockets. So upon pressing starting the app, clients would connect to the lobby server directly bypassing matchmaking altogether.
However with this new flow there would need to be a way to manage server load.
Are are players separated in your game? When they start the app are all players connected to the same lobby server?
Good Afternoon,
PlayFab will not be pulling the plug on Legacy Matchmaking or Multiplayer because live titles still use it, so your current plan is fine. Additionally since the different matchmakers will not be interacting with each other there will not likely be any development issues with this method.
It is also worth pointing out that you could submit a Feature Request to allow for matchmaking 2.0 to match-make with 1 player or otherwise handle server load while not necessarily making matches.
For anyone coming across this, please continue to upvote my feature request here:
https://community.playfab.com/idea/33285/matchmaking-minimum-size-of-1-player.html
Also IMPORTANT NOTE for anyone seeing this. Jital's comment earlier is no longer true. PlayFab is indeed taking Legacy Multiplayer offline, which is causing live titles like mine to scramble for alternative solutions.
https://blog.playfab.com/blog/playfab-sunsetting-legacy-multiplayer-servers
