[quote][b]Posted by:[/b] Batzter [b]Ok Ive done some further investigations now and everything is pointing at that I cant level up in a party with friends in playlists with more than two players. Im slowely increasing in double team but not half as fast as I am with random people although that the guy im usually playing double team with from my FL is only 1 level away from mine. In team slayer, in a party with friends, I was stuck on lvl 23 for 22 consecutive wins although that I was playing levels way higher than myself. Now I hate playing with random people because that kind of takes away all forms of strategy and teamwork, mostly because 90 % of the teams im ending up with has atleast 1 person whos not using a mic. Anyways, so I tried playing with random people just to see what it did for my level and in 8 games, 7 wins and 1 loss, I gained ten levels all of a sudden. Now this is a major flaw in the skill system if people arent able to progress when playing with friends. I went back to playing with my friends and in 4 straight wins against level 40´s, im only a 32 atm, I didnt gain a single level.[/b][/quote]I totally agree that playing with randoms seems to allow players to level up quicker. The more different people you play obviously allows the system to judge your individual performance faster/better. We know this because of a a team that only plays together and with no one else will get stuck at 15 or so. When you party up, the system cannot determine which one in your party made the difference between win and loss. It is handicapped in a sense that instead of putting you with and against 7 players each game to get data about you, it is only putting you against 4 players each game. It does seem silly to "penalize" players who team up but it does appear to be a limitation of the system. You'll go up when in a party, it will just take longer, that's what is going on and yes it is kind of bunk. Keep in mind that players will not level up at the same rate unless they have played in all of the same games. Even if their win% and/or number of wins and games are equal. This system judges you by the skill and sigma of your opponents. Comparing players won 50 of 75 but only played 25 games together will mean they are different skill levels. Also the amount of games a player has already played will cause them to level up at different speed. If 2 people are 25 and one has played 50 games and one has played 500, the guy with 50 will level up and down quicker because the system is still trying to figure out what his level should be. The more you play, the more info the system has, and the more accurate it becomes. As far as the host not updating the stats, I don't think this is the case. If the data is accurate on B-net, then it is accurate on Live. B-net pulls the data from the Live servers, it doesn't keep track separately. When H3 first dropped, there was a big delay getting game stats from Live to B-net. At that time Bungie stated that Live actually collects and stores the data on each of your games. B-net just gleans that info from them so your in-game skill level, rank and EXP are "more" accurate than the B-net stats. Even if the host box disconnects right at the end of a game, you sit there and wait for the game to be transfered to another box. When the transfer is complete and you get out of the 'New Host' screen, it has accurate post game stats so Live may be keeping track of everything on-the-fly so people can't leave right before the end and not have the game count.