I want to love this game, I really do, but the issues I'm running into are driving me crazy.

Big thanks to Ubi for developing this game and getting it this far, but please do something to make this game a little less maddening before everyone leaves it and the game dies.

Here are the major issues that I see right now that need to be addressed immediately:
1) Matchmaking has multiple major issues that I could probably resolve myself if I had access to the code.
a) I regularly get added to a match that is full and kicked back to the main menu. If a match is full I shouldn't be added to it. If for some reason I do it should kick me back to searching for a match, not back to the main menu to have to go through things again.
b) Combining Elimination mode and Skirmish mode into one match type, and then having orders for one or the other isn't working as things are now. I have orders to complete Skirmish matches, but I've spent hours trying to get into a match and I keep getting Elim. If I try to stay and vote to Skirm after the match that rarely works because most people leave after the match. I think setting my preference to Skirmish is having little effect. The UI says it's still searching for my preferred game mode even though I get placed in Elim matches. If you insist on having orders specific to Skirmish or Elim then you need to have a way to queue for that type of match specifically (maybe something where you set the preference to mark that you are unwilling to participate in a match of the other type).

2) I often get stuck when leaving matches. The window pops up with accept and cancel buttons, and after I accept the screen freezes for about a minute. This eats up a ton of time between matches and is very frustrating and unnecessary.

3) Guard Break Interrupt is awful. I spent hours practicing against a bot and I'm still rarely able to stop a guard break unless I'm attacking. This was functional in the beta when I could repeatedly press the button to break it, but I'm finding it very difficult to find the correct timing when I only get 1 shot. Partially this is a lack of skill on my part, but with missing a guard break often ended up in a 1 hit kill there should at the very least be a bigger window of time in which you can hit the button (perhaps if you hit the button after the icon pops up but before the time that you currently have to hit the button to block it that would be ok).

4) There are obvious defensive/offensive balance issues described in other posts. In general if I am playing against a skilled player I am penalized every time I swing and the only way I can deal damage is to play defensively and counter their attacks. Again, this is partially a skill issue on my part, but still feels way out of balance.



Outside of these major issues there are a few other minor issues that eventually need to be addressed too.
1) When there is a networking issue and the game is resynchronizing when it finishes I always have my guard dropped. It would be nice if I had full block for a second when coming back from resynch to have a chance to get my guard back up and continue.

2) When a match finishes and half of the players leave the lobby we get forced out because there aren't enough players to continue. It would make a lot more sense if this just rolled into matchmaking with the players that remained and fill in the missing spots.

Thanks again for all your help in making this a great game!