I remember in an earlier post I had a long conversation about giving awards to Antagonists, stating that they had a disadvantage against the raiders. This was, of course before I started playing in the high 50%+ (even 40%) MMR matches. The Raiders are at a colossal disadvantage playing against Antagonists in this range.
Why?
The environment are more than capable of dispatching you. In fact, every enemy is an Antagonist.
When you're playing in a game where the weakest grunts can put you into wounded in one weapon burst and kill you in another, there's no need for an Antagonist.
I understand now, just why there are players on this forum, who love playing as Antagonist - it's because it's a walk in the park, against high ranking T1 players, because you know that the environment will most certainly beat them and all you have to do is mop up the remains. It's a very easy chance of attaining a perfect 10 score. There is NO skill needed, as an Antagonist, when you're playing 40%+ MMR matches.
When you're playing under 40% then yes, you do need skill because the environment isn't really doing that much damage to the raiders, leaving them time to stalk the Antagonist when they appear.
I play in a team of very good players, all T1 R1. However, I can't play my dailies with them because, guaranteed, there's a high chance of a loss, on 55% MMR average, against the environment and a definite one with an Antagonist. More so, even if we do win, the time taken to complete the mission, added to that high raider deaths, will most likely give us a score in the mid 7 range, resulting in a large loss to awards.
The only time, as a team it's viable to play against an Antagonist is to purposefully lose lots of matches and drop down to 20% MMR. Even with this low MMR, if the team plays well, you're looking at a high 8, low 9 overall score and a good reward payout. Add in an Antagonist, who's not getting much help from the environment and they'll be quickly dispatched, resulting in an even higher overall score and award.
The only time I would actively reward the Antagonist more is on low MMR matches (sub 40%) due to not having much help from the environment. Anything over, no.
TL:DR - You need to give people the option of playing against an Antagonist or not. It's really the only way to go. Also only give Antagonists a better reward on sub 40% MMR, due to a far harder chance of survival, than in 40%+ matches. I attained a final monthly score of around 330 points. I never ONCE played a high level match, as an Antagonist, against high T1 R1 players. All the points that I acquired, as an Antagonist, were on matches between 30 and 40%. I had to work hard to get those points, managing three 10.4 scores. On a low MMR, this is not easy to get, but incredibly easy on a high one as the environment are effectively all Antagonists themselves.
It's no wonder why there are people on this forum (we know who you are) that are vehemently defending Antagonists and why everyone should be forced to fight PvP. It's simply because these players HAVE no skill and like nothing better than bashing on low level players/doing nothing while the incredibly strong environment enemies bring down the Raiders to wounded status (or kill them) for them to then run in and finish off.
