Curse

Divineshadows · Jan 05, 2007, 04:27 AM // 04:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bloodied Blade

However, they're overlooking the fact that 100% win percentages are easily eclipsed simply by a guild who may be awful but just win more than they lose, and have more time to gvg. Sorry if this doesn't make much sense...just vexes me that they would do this.

This doesn't make any sense. If stated guild is awful and highly ranked, then the paradox is how will they continue to win more than they lose when the majority of their matches will be against other top 50 guilds? Sure they could draw someone ranked 300 or worse and gain a +1, but then turn around and play a top 50 guild and lose -3. For hypothetical guild to maintain a top 50 ranking, they would probably have to win 40% or more of their matches against other top 50 teams and if they are doing that then how are they awful??

The ELO system seems the same as it was before just with a smaller K value. It is the ladder never resetting that will allow guilds to get closer to their true rank.

Patrograd · Jan 05, 2007, 07:40 AM // 07:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

I'm not just talking about teams that enter ATs and lose every match. If an AT has 5 games and a team goes 1-4 or even 2-3, they're probably losing a fairly large amount of rating as a result. Should the bottom half of AT teams be ranked lower than henchway teams on the ladder? Is that representative of their true skill level at all?

Well, I think that there will be a number of tournaments running concurrently, which if they are swiss style and not lasting more than about 2 hours cant consist of more than about 16 teams each (16 team Swiss is 4 matches each, 32 team Swiss is 5 matches). Presumably these teams will be grouped according to rank (ie the top 16 ranked entered teams will go into one tournament, the next 16 into the next and so on - what happens if they get a number of entrants that isnt divisible by 16 I wonder?). So eventually you will be playing ATs against guilds in your ability range, and should be able to pick up rating relevant to your ability.

Until more details come out about how this will work though its all speculation ofc. Maybe they will just run it as one big swiss tournament that lasts 4 or 5 matches, but still I think that pairings would be made based upon rank as well as win/loss in that specific tournament

lord of shadow · Jan 05, 2007, 10:37 AM // 10:37

Did actually manage to get a +3 yesterday against section one, rating difference between us was 40 at the time i believe, anybody know the exact breakpoints required for +3, +4 and +1?

Patrograd · Jan 05, 2007, 11:08 AM // 11:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by lord of shadow

Did actually manage to get a +3 yesterday against section one, rating difference between us was 40 at the time i believe, anybody know the exact breakpoints required for +3, +4 and +1?

hard to say, as they seem to have rounded the points in a weird way. if I have figured it our right then:

+1: rating 165 or more under yours
+2: from 164 less than yours to 13 more than yours
+3: from 13-164 more than you
+4: 165 or more over yours

I know we got a +3 for beating someone 18 points above us the other day

Thomas.knbk · Jan 05, 2007, 11:17 AM // 11:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wasteland Squidget

This is the part of the system that seems really weird to me. In an ELO system, half the teams that play will ultimately lose rating. If ATs are implemented as a series of games with a high K value, that's going to be a lot of people losing a lot of rating. So you'll get this weird situation where the bottom 50% of guilds focused enough to schedule an AT are lower ranked than even the worst pure ladder teams.

That's going to mean a lot less teams playing ATs overall. A guild in the rank 100-200 range isn't going to risk dropping irrevocably off the ladder because they played and lost a series of high-value matches against better opponents. It would be a huge disincentive for them - that's going to mean a lot less teams playing ATs overall.

Of course, it's possible the ATs are structured completely differently and this won't be an issue. However, I don't think the bottom 50% of AT players should drop below most ladder guilds in rank - they should stand to lose something, but if losing an AT means losing 50+ rating I just can't see a lot of mid-level teams trying it.

I'm actually more concerned about the ladder not resetting. While true rating achievement and all is nice, it only happens in a perfect situation. In the real world, guilds will improve, guilds will fall apart, new people will buy guild wars etc.
If someone forms a new guild, he has to play a number of games to achieve his 'true rating'. This number increases with the amount of games played in total, and therefore with time. I'm afraid in time the amount of time you need to spend to achieve your true rating will be too big. Imagine one of the top guilds should disband, leaving 7 guildless players one year from now. (just an example) who are capable of holding the number one spot. Because the ladder doesn't reset, the top guilds have now achieved a rating of 2500+. It would take them ages to form a new guild and get it back to where they belong, leaving them no choise but to join existing guilds with a high rating, which might not at all be what they want. Arenanet already discourages forming new guilds with the 30 day ban from AT's, but this issue makes is worse imo.

Bankai · Jan 05, 2007, 12:19 PM // 12:19

You are forgetting one thing. They will totally annihilate all the players in their current rating until they're about rank 50. With a 90% win percentage your rating will skyrocket.

Thomas.knbk · Jan 05, 2007, 02:26 PM // 14:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bankai

You are forgetting one thing. They will totally annihilate all the players in their current rating until they're about rank 50. With a 90% win percentage your rating will skyrocket.

With 2 points per win? No you won't. The first month they can't participate in AT's, so they'd have to play a huge amount of games to 'skyrocket'.

Greedy Gus · Jan 05, 2007, 04:34 PM // 16:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomas.knbk

I'm actually more concerned about the ladder not resetting. While true rating achievement and all is nice, it only happens in a perfect situation. In the real world, guilds will improve, guilds will fall apart, new people will buy guild wars etc.

I see you pushed a lot of buttons after this, but where did you say why this is a problem? Everything you're mentioning can just cause short-term minor distortions, but those get ironed out fairly quickly and when you look at the big picture they're nearly ignorable. And you finished up with claiming that a non-resetting ladder discourages forming new guilds, but that's only the case if the new guilds matter (ie. have a shot at playing in money tournaments). And why wouldn't they expect to have to spend some time to show the true strength of their new guild?

The only way to protect the rest of the ladder and get rid of the 30-day rule is if the strength of each player on a team is used somehow to judge the strength of that particular team. Then you could allow more lenient rules on guesting as well as determining the strength of newly formed guilds.

Quote:

With 2 points per win? No you won't. The first month they can't participate in AT's, so they'd have to play a huge amount of games to 'skyrocket'.

Clearly, only having 30% of the posts in this very topic explaining that it only seems like 2 pts per win at the moment because the ladder just reset wasn't enough. It only seems like 2 pts per win at the moment because the ladder just reset. Once the rating spread increases, a newly formed top guild will be able to rise much more quickly even with just open ladder play (assuming guilds above them are playing on open ladder).

Thomas.knbk · Jan 05, 2007, 05:50 PM // 17:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Greedy Gus

I see you pushed a lot of buttons after this, but where did you say why this is a problem?

I gave an example. I think it illustrates quite well why I think it could be a problem. I gave the example of a top guild, but ofcourse the same thing applies to every other guild on the top half of the ladder.
I'm saying, it will take longer and longer to achieve your true rating, up to a point where it'll take over a year or something like that. Sure it's fine if a guild needs to take some time to show their strength, but I fear that time will be rediculously long in some time from now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Greedy Gus

Clearly, only having 30% of the posts in this very topic explaining that it only seems like 2 pts per win at the moment because the ladder just reset wasn't enough. It only seems like 2 pts per win at the moment because the ladder just reset. Once the rating spread increases, a newly formed top guild will be able to rise much more quickly even with just open ladder play (assuming guilds above them are playing on open ladder).

The +2's aren't the problem. The same problem would be there with the old K rating. The problem is that the old guilds will have one year of rating gaining on them. Try to bridge that in a reasonable amount of time.

Patrograd · Jan 06, 2007, 12:46 AM // 00:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thomas.knbk

The +2's aren't the problem. The same problem would be there with the old K rating. The problem is that the old guilds will have one year of rating gaining on them. Try to bridge that in a reasonable amount of time.

I think that for the most part, teams will arrive at around or about their correct rating quite quickly - 3 months, maybe less, and no matter how much they play after that, unless they improve or decline markedly as a team, there will be little change to their rating, no matter how many hundreds of GvGs they play, whether open ladder or AT. The very elite few might be an exception to that, but their rate of rating gain will be so slow as to be almost imperceptible after a few months

A guild joining late though, made up of top players, will climb to their correct rating very quickly indeed, much faster than a guild starting on the ladder immediately post reset. They will pick up alot of +4s from open ladder and alot of +24s and more from ATs, whereas the established guilds at the top of the ladder are getting +1s from ladder and +5s and 6s from ATs. one month maybe 6 weeks to catch up?

the teams currently involved in ladder grind thinking it will help them in the long term get a high rank are, imo, deluding themselves. I can see alot of internal edrama coming up for these guilds once they hit their correct rating and fail to climb any further despite playing 100 GvGs a week.

stueyman2099 · Jan 06, 2007, 03:21 AM // 03:21

We can't really say how the new ladder will work out becuase we only have half the picture. Wait 'till the AT's are implimented.

Legendary Shiz · Jan 06, 2007, 06:14 AM // 06:14

I personally don't know if I like the way this system works. It certainly doesn't encourage new guilds.

This seems like it would get really boring, really quickly. People will only enjoy playing for +2 rating for a mid-level gvg for so long.

Elrodien · Jan 16, 2007, 10:48 AM // 10:48

I think it is a good idea simply because it gives a guild more purpose and it gives players more reason for staying in a guild. People won't flippantly rage-quit a guild if they put so much effort getting the guild's rank up through the ladder. The new system also discourages 'smurf' guilds which certainly annoys the guilds on the lower rungs of the ladder.

I think 'stability' is the keyword in the new system, which is no bad thing in my opinion.

Patrograd · Jan 16, 2007, 10:59 AM // 10:59

Is the current poor standard of the top 50 a reflection on

a) These guilds not taking the new system very seriously. waiting for AP mode
b) Many top players having left the game recently
c) Too many broken skills
d) All of the above

I have been very surprised at a number of easy wins this season against top 50 teams either with my guild or while guesting around.

Lowest standard of play ever imo

Xanthar · Jan 16, 2007, 12:12 PM // 12:12

I'd hazard a guess that the reason for the low quality of play is because some of the "good" guilds out there are chilling it, waiting to farm the hard earned ranking points off of the grinders. If I had a truly good guild, that's what we would be doing at any rate

- No use grinding the ladder currently: [cow] has gotta be earning pretty much one point per win at the moment...

Another guess is that strong guilds get so many matches against low-ranked teams at the moment that it's more of an exercise in repetition than a true challenge to harvest ranking points. In a couple of weeks, all guilds in the top 40 will be past 1200 ranking and we'll hopefully see some changes

(This will also allow the "second tier" of medium skilled guilds to start rising above the average in earnest)

romO · Jan 16, 2007, 09:00 PM // 21:00

I just don't know why everyone feels some kind of dire need to farm the current ladder. Sure, playing more games means you will be farther ahead than with the previous system, but what is the eventual goal of this ladder farming? It will give you a pretty 300 wins once ATs come around, and then be overshadowed in a week. QQ has been playing at the rate we always do, but it's nearly impossible for us to keep a spot in the top 50 because so many teams are just blowing past us with 100 games played already. It's not necessarily a matter of top teams not playing or not playing well, but rather of a great number of teams zerging points.

The teams in the top 14 on the ladder at the moment have played an average of 145 games thus far. Over the course of the 15 days that this ladder has been open, that means that they are playing nearly 10 games a day! Sure, we would like to play, and will continue to do so, but at our own rate and with our own builds. It seems like anyone who wants to climb this ladder needs to do it with dedication, boredom, and a lot of time on their hands.

Blame the Monks · Jan 17, 2007, 12:30 AM // 00:30

Or maybe they simply like to play the game.

romO · Jan 17, 2007, 12:47 AM // 00:47

Yes, perhaps. But looking at the competition and the games that most of the ladder farm teams have, it seems like it can't be all that great. With the small discrepancies in rating, almost every guild in the world is a contender with the top guilds, which means a whole lot of matches against unranked or bad teams. Usually on the ladder, you could press 'b' and know who your opponents for the night would be, and now it's very hard to get the matches that you're looking forward to. All of this leads to a whole lot of four minute matches. Even if you like to play the game, as I'm sure we all do, this ladder does not have the ideal conditions to do so, and it's just strange that a lot of teams are playing more than ever.

Blame the Monks · Jan 17, 2007, 12:55 AM // 00:55

<snip>

Doesn't have the ideal conditions YET. I for one am looking forward to when the top guilds have cleared enough rating from the pack that more and more of your matches are against other people very near your skill level.

As for people playing more games than ever, I don't think so. First, the break was long and dull. I was excited to play. Second, games are faster due to weaker teams getting matched against strong ones. Hence, 3 hours of GvG can EASILY get you 20 games. Finally, there have always been high volume guilds at the beginning of the season. Nothing new and frankly, who cares. Skill will win out eventually.

Yabba · Jan 17, 2007, 11:44 AM // 11:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blame the Monks

<snip>
As for people playing more games than ever, I don't think so. First, the break was long and dull. I was excited to play. Second, games are faster due to weaker teams getting matched against strong ones.

I second that.

Even if the number of played games of our guild is now higher than the seasons before we don´t spend more time playing.
Last season nearly every gvg went beyond the vod mark while now most matches last only about 5-10 mins.

And if you get 3 bad teams in a row you keep going hoping to get at least a good matchup in the 4th or 5th gvg.

Still even having to do many dull gvgs is better than not gvging at all or playing ascend - at least for now. I fear only that if the announced gvg changes and skillupdates don`t come soon more and more people will loose interest in gvg/GW. In our guild some people already stopped gvging until the skillupdate comes and it`s becoming difficulter from day to day to get 8 people - and that in our guild where we have 20 active people and used to have on weekends (and often enough during the week) a full team of 8 and about another 6 or 7 people waiting for their turn to gvg.