|
Now that we finally have unranked games (Which we don't have win/loss games shown), do you think it's ok to have win/loss back into the ranked games?
Personally I had quite a strong detest seeing my own win/loss ratio and didn't start grinding games until it was removed.
but right now, it's back and I still feel kinda uneasy looking at it and this is before the game is public (right now it's beta and so it's kinda ok to just win and lose some games- my mindset)
So how do the rest of you feel?
Poll: Win/Loss is BACK!YAY (370) 92% I am not sure how I feel about this.. (19) 5% NAY (15) 4% 404 total votes Your vote: Win/Loss is BACK! (Vote): YAY (Vote): NAY (Vote): I am not sure how I feel about this..
|
I am not sure how I feel about this. I dont want other people to look at my win/lose ratio. If only I can see my own then YAY
|
Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%!
To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse.
EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler +
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Unless you can see individual race matchup statistics, or map winrate statistics, this data is of no value.
You can. There's a new stats page to my knowledge.
|
OP, you are literally the only person on TL who detests seeing W/L, you are a minority in this forum.
|
On November 23 2012 18:15 DemigodcelpH wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Unless you can see individual race matchup statistics, or map winrate statistics, this data is of no value. You can. There's a new stats page to my knowledge.
Yup there is, shows your win % on map, your win % vs a race to. Really glad they added those finally ^_^
|
100-fucking-% YAY.... Finally I don't have to fuck around checking my match history to get an idea of how I'm doing. It's so much better than WoL
|
Might as well, even though there is absolutely no reason to assume that your winrate will be anything but 50% (+-2) unless you're top 100 GM.
The only thing I use it for is to measure progress inbetween seasons.
But it's good to have it back for everyone
|
On November 23 2012 18:19 emc wrote: OP, you are literally the only person on TL who detests seeing W/L, you are a minority in this forum. there were tonnes of people who said the win/loss caused ladder anxiety. And that for sure happens to me when I go on a losing steak that just seems never ending.
|
Silly idea, the vast majority of the playerbase are casual gamers being able to see you win/loss ratio causes ladder anxietly which in return means less players will play Starcraft II -- which is exactly what Blizzard wanted to change with the removal.
Yes competetive players of all leagues wouldn't mind seeing it. But fact is the majority is casuals, which Blizzard obviously will favor in actually staying as active players in return they will cater to balance for the competive players as it'll make them stay too. Win win.
|
United Kingdom14464 Posts
is it an option to show it or remove it? It should be optional, but tbh the arguments about it on both sides are dumb, bar the top and bottom end it trends to 50%.
|
Well the poll says enough ^^ Sure if people want to remove it, it should be an option. I don't get why things arn't more variable. Customizing pleases so many more people.
|
The W/L ratio was brought back because players now have the ability to play unranked. So if you have ladder anxiety, you play unranked instead. No win count, no loss count, only your XP that goes up with every game.
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; It is odd how people keep claiming that win - loss statistics are meaningless. W-L-stats are not meaningless, but cannot directly be used to deduce the player level, but are a progress statistic. In simplest form they provide information how many games have been played, but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games.
After a player reaches his typical MMR range and is stable on his all mu:s, win-loss ratio typically approaches 50% for games played _after_ that moment as Battle.net tries to provide similar level opponents for him. But Win-loss _difference_ (short term) still provides good short term progress information as you can roughly estimate based on it has your MMR dropped or risen lately. For every win your MMR increases and for every loss decreases (E.g. if your W-L difference is -10 for last week and you generalize that you faced always 'similar level' opponents, you deduce that your MMR has roughly dropped about half league MMR range (based on the MMR tool, MMR range for each league other than bronze & master is roughly 18 wins wide (wins against similar MMR level opponents))). Also by looking at other's win-lose differences it quickly tells if the player has risen or dropped (large difference) based on MMR (highlights especially MMR abusers quite nicely).
Win - loss difference is a meaningful progress stat, but you cannot deduce a player level based on it. Even in masters the system aims for 50% matchmaking when you have reached your typical level (it is not more meaningful in masters than the lower leagues). Also people rarely have exact 50 % ratio even if the system aims for it. The thin top of the ladder of course will get better than 50% ratios as the population in their level is too thin to get 'equal level' opponents all the time.
To get more accurate idea where the system ranks you with its hidden skill rating (MMR), it is recommended to try out the MMR tool, which provides quite accurate relative ratings.
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler +
This guy has it right. Seeing overall W/L is nice, and I'm not opposed to it, but in the end it doesn't really matter.
You can go 25-5 in Diamond league and feel like a fucking superstar, but since each win or loss affects your rating differently (beating a gold vs. beating a master), the 25-5 itself is useless as a metric.
Likewise, if you're a masters player who goes 2-10 vs. grandmaster players, your rating still might go up, as each win is worth much more than each loss.
Edit:
On November 24 2012 01:13 korona wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; It is odd how people keep claiming that win - loss statistics are meaningless. W-L-stats are not meaningless, but cannot directly be used to deduce the player level, but are a progress statistic. In simplest form they provide information how many games have been played, but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games.
Then why not simply display it in match history rather than on the ladder board? Maybe add a league icon next to points gained and date played. The problem is that people use W/L as a scoring metric when looking at the ladder ("oh, I'm 5th in my division but I'm down 6 games so I must be doing bad"). Like you said, W/L can be used to track short-term progress, but it's useless for long-term.
|
On November 24 2012 01:13 korona wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; It is odd how people keep claiming that win - loss statistics are meaningless. W-L-stats are not meaningless, but cannot directly be used to deduce the player level, but are a progress statistic. In simplest form they provide information how many games have been played, but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games. After a player reaches his typical MMR range and is stable on his all mu:s, win-loss ratio typically approaches 50% for games played _after_ that moment as Battle.net tries to provide similar level opponents for him. But Win-loss _difference_ (short term) still provides good short term progress information as you can roughly estimate based on it has your MMR dropped or risen lately. For every win your MMR increases and for every loss decreases (E.g. if your W-L difference is -10 for last week and you generalize that you faced always 'similar level' opponents, you deduce that your MMR has roughly dropped about half league MMR range (based on the MMR tool, MMR range for each league other than bronze & master is roughly 18 wins wide (wins against similar MMR level opponents))). Also by looking at other's win-lose differences it quickly tells if the player has risen or dropped (large difference) based on MMR (highlights especially MMR abusers quite nicely). Win - loss difference is a meaningful progress stat, but you cannot deduce a player level based on it. Even in masters the system aims for 50% matchmaking when you have reached your typical level (it is not more meaningful in masters than the lower leagues). Also people rarely have exact 50 % ratio even if the system aims for it. The thin top of the ladder of course will get better than 50% ratios as the population in their level is too thin to get 'equal level' opponents all the time. To get more accurate idea where the system ranks you with its hidden skill rating (MMR), it is recommended to try out the MMR tool, which provides quite accurate relative ratings.
So basically what you want is a graph showing your MMR over time? That I can understand, hell, it would even make sense. However, since W/L is a metric derived from a system that strives to keep the ratio as close to 50% as possible, you only really need to know games played per season. In fact, the more you play, the more accurate this system will be at pinning you on 50%. We dont want to know a single number, we want to know how that number relates to other numbers.
So in response to the OP: I don't care either way.
|
On November 24 2012 01:33 Fenris420 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 01:13 korona wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; It is odd how people keep claiming that win - loss statistics are meaningless. W-L-stats are not meaningless, but cannot directly be used to deduce the player level, but are a progress statistic. In simplest form they provide information how many games have been played, but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games. After a player reaches his typical MMR range and is stable on his all mu:s, win-loss ratio typically approaches 50% for games played _after_ that moment as Battle.net tries to provide similar level opponents for him. But Win-loss _difference_ (short term) still provides good short term progress information as you can roughly estimate based on it has your MMR dropped or risen lately. For every win your MMR increases and for every loss decreases (E.g. if your W-L difference is -10 for last week and you generalize that you faced always 'similar level' opponents, you deduce that your MMR has roughly dropped about half league MMR range (based on the MMR tool, MMR range for each league other than bronze & master is roughly 18 wins wide (wins against similar MMR level opponents))). Also by looking at other's win-lose differences it quickly tells if the player has risen or dropped (large difference) based on MMR (highlights especially MMR abusers quite nicely). Win - loss difference is a meaningful progress stat, but you cannot deduce a player level based on it. Even in masters the system aims for 50% matchmaking when you have reached your typical level (it is not more meaningful in masters than the lower leagues). Also people rarely have exact 50 % ratio even if the system aims for it. The thin top of the ladder of course will get better than 50% ratios as the population in their level is too thin to get 'equal level' opponents all the time. To get more accurate idea where the system ranks you with its hidden skill rating (MMR), it is recommended to try out the MMR tool, which provides quite accurate relative ratings. So basically what you want is a graph showing your MMR over time? That I can understand, hell, it would even make sense. However, since W/L is a metric derived from a system that strives to keep the ratio as close to 50% as possible, you only really need to know games played per season. In fact, the more you play, the more accurate this system will be at pinning you on 50%. We dont want to know a single number, we want to know how that number relates to other numbers. So in response to the OP: I don't care either way. You look at only from one viewpoint like most who claim that win-loss stats are meaningless. Win-loss stats are not for deducing player skill level due to how the ladder system works (for more info check Excalibur_Z's guide). They are progress statistics that tell how many games you have played and distribution of the end results of those games. These numbers can also be used e.g. for the purpose I mentioned. The main problem for these numbers is that most seem to try deducing player skill based on them, which cannot be done only based on the raw numbers. Also many do not understand how the ladder system & matchmaking works. People also look at the percent ratio too much - The short term difference is much more interesting.
|
On November 24 2012 01:29 sevia wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + This guy has it right. Seeing overall W/L is nice, and I'm not opposed to it, but in the end it doesn't really matter. You can go 25-5 in Diamond league and feel like a fucking superstar, but since each win or loss affects your rating differently (beating a gold vs. beating a master), the 25-5 itself is useless as a metric. His W-L difference is +20. We do not know his relative starting MMR level, but we can deduce that his MMR has risen most likely considerably during these games. Based on these numbers we do not know if he for example started in platinum league and was then promoted to diamond. Also if his MMR was already in the diamond range, now his MMR may already be in the master range (diamond MMR range is about 18 wins against similar MMR level opponents according to the MMR tool). Also we do not know if he has reached his 'typical' range & maintains it from where his win ratio usually approaches 50%. To make more accurate deductions you would have to examine other data such as his match history, his opponent's profiles & opponent's opponents. Or he could be e.g. using the MMR tool, from where he gets fairly accurate relative ratings and shares this data with you.
On November 24 2012 01:29 sevia wrote: Likewise, if you're a masters player who goes 2-10 vs. grandmaster players, your rating still might go up, as each win is worth much more than each loss. GM is a subset of master league. It is very hard to get dropped from GM, if somebody reaches it and it has limited amount of spots. Often there are many GM players who actually have lower MMR than many top master players as their MMR may have decreased during their time in GM. The matchmaker usually pairs people quite nicely (not too large MMR difference). Or course at the top of ladder where population is thin, it may have to pair people with large MMR difference much more often than e.g. in lower leagues, where there are lots of similar level people to choose from. Thus if you are at the top of the ladder, deductions based on the win-loss difference are less accurate (master league is huge regarding MMR range).
On November 24 2012 01:29 sevia wrote:Edit: Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 01:13 korona wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; It is odd how people keep claiming that win - loss statistics are meaningless. W-L-stats are not meaningless, but cannot directly be used to deduce the player level, but are a progress statistic. In simplest form they provide information how many games have been played, but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games. Then why not simply display it in match history rather than on the ladder board? Maybe add a league icon next to points gained and date played. The problem is that people use W/L as a scoring metric when looking at the ladder ("oh, I'm 5th in my division but I'm down 6 games so I must be doing bad"). Like you said, W/L can be used to track short-term progress, but it's useless for long-term. The current league does not tell too much about where a person is regarding his MMR (especially after the changes to the promotion system Blizzard made in the beginning of S9. The league icon only tells inside which league his MMR was when he was placed there). And if people try to use W-L numbers for wrong purposes, like directly deducing the skill, it does not make the numbers themselves useless. The numbers are still a progress statistics that can be used for other purposes. E.g. for understanding how many games you have played and how many you won. And by personal opinion these kind of basic statistics should always be available regardless how different people use them. If they are often used for wrong purposes, more advanced statistics should be provided and/or players be educated regarding the possible uses.
|
They are progress statistics that tell how many games you have played and distribution of the end results of those games.
What use would such a statistic be? I am assuming you are talking about the remaining games after you take (wins - losses). If the number is positive, the player has improved faster than the average player, and if negative the opposite. The bigger the number, the bigger the change since last season. However, since it does not show your MMR, you still don't know where the person was last season. They may have improved faster than their "peers" in a league below them, but it doesn't mean that their positive win ratio is of any interest to you.
[...] but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games. and then
Win-loss stats are not for deducing player skill level due to how the ladder system works
Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. The whole reason we have leagues is because we consider them divided by player skill. League placement is based on MMR and MMR is based on how many games you win and against whom you win.
The reason I don't like win rates as a statistic is that it only shows how much you win, but is blind to whom you win against. There is no context in which each win can be valued.
Also by looking at other's win-lose differences it quickly tells if the player has risen or dropped (large difference) based on MMR (highlights especially MMR abusers quite nicely).
Looking at players best league placement also highlights MMR abusers. Someone dropping 10 or even 15 games over a season is not necessarily significant if they played 1500 games. Especially not if 10 of those drops occured because they were playing on tilt last night. 15 negative w/l over an entire season is a lot more significant than recent fluctuations, as those will normalise. Not to mention the overall win/loss ratio for several seasons.
Then again, I never did care about win/loss ratios since I will need to become amuch better player in order to play against someone that I would value keeping statistics of. Either way, my point is that I think a graph and the actual MMR would be a much better tool for evaluating performance than simply adding losses, which is most likely not going to be all that surprising anyway.
|
To be honest, a simple feature like that is KEY to have. With all the new analysis tools as well, SC2 is really starting to turn out more awesome than it already was!
|
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. This is not true. This is, incidentally, why many people are terrible at practicing. People don't focus on trying to get better at the game; they focus on trying to win. It sounds silly to differentiate the two, but it's true. There is no point striving to win more games because you will always win ~50% regardless! Instead, you should focus on trying to improve your skill - even if that means doing something that will lose you games!
I could go and spend 10 games on ladder and focus as hard as I can on injects. I'll not intentionally fail the game, but because injects are what I'm focusing on for those games my overall play, scouting/micro etc, may suffer. Chances are I'll have a greater likelihood of losing those games - but I'll become a better player in the process.
I could get cannon rushed on ladder and die horribly... and that will mean I am now a better player than I was. That experience will help me become a better player, because even the WORST failures serve to give you a clearer insight of what to do (or not do) next time. As a tool for learning and improvement losses are more useful than wins, because it's harder to see a clear path of improvement on a win. Every game is a learning experience - especially the losses, hence Whitera's famous quote of "more gg more skill".
Overall winrates are useless. They're useless for long term analysis (it's 50%), and they're useless for short-term analysis (small sample size means any value is likely to be inaccurate, and, as I said above, winning more recently doesn't even mean you've improved as a player). They give you no useful information whatsoever. Concentrate on playing better (even at the expense of wins!), find some better metrics to judge your play by, and screw the winrate (it's 50%!).
|
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote:Show nested quote +They are progress statistics that tell how many games you have played and distribution of the end results of those games. What use would such a statistic be? I am assuming you are talking about the remaining games after you take (wins - losses). If the number is positive, the player has improved faster than the average player, and if negative the opposite. The bigger the number, the bigger the change since last season. However, since it does not show your MMR, you still don't know where the person was last season. They may have improved faster than their "peers" in a league below them, but it doesn't mean that their positive win ratio is of any interest to you. I find this an odd question. Of course I want to know how many games I have played and what were the results. Number of games played, number of games won & number of games lost are basic progress statistics. Basic statistics don't have to have special uses. But often they have uses especially if other data/statistics is available.
And if you are talking about the win-lose difference (wins minus loses) - Based on it you can _roughly_ deduce your MMR change if you mostly face similar MMR level opponents during that period (each win will increase your MMR, each loss will decrease your MMR). The change itself does not necessary mean you have improved. It means that your MMR has changed. And there are ways to estimate your relative starting level too. But it is often easier just to use the MMR tool for this, as it's fairly accurate.
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote:Show nested quote + [...] but can also e.g. be used to _roughly_ estimate what kind of changes there have been to your MMR in those games. and then Show nested quote +Win-loss stats are not for deducing player skill level due to how the ladder system works Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. The whole reason we have leagues is because we consider them divided by player skill. League placement is based on MMR and MMR is based on how many games you win and against whom you win. For example if you get a win streak of 10 against similar MMR level opponents, you know that the system will start pairing you roughly half a league (size of a typical league, master & bronze are larger) higher opponents than before the streak. If your typical level is less than that you might want to take a break and continue laddering when you are fresh. And by doing so maximize your chances against more difficult opponents. And when you are playing against 'better' opponents, there is more potential for improvement.
And your league only tells that your MMR was inside that league when you were placed. It does not tell what has happened to your MMR since.
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: The reason I don't like win rates as a statistic is that it only shows how much you win, but is blind to whom you win against. There is no context in which each win can be valued. You yourself know whom you play against. You can always check their profiles and who they usually play against. And if you are not at the top of the ladder, the matchmaking system actually does a good job pairing you against similar level opponents (there is rarely a big difference regarding MMR. Of course during some hours of day there are less people playing and matchmaker may have to widen the search). And as the MMR difference is usually quite consistent it is possible to generalize and get surprisingly accurate results. This is of course a _rough_ method. But you can test the method out yourself e.g. by checking your relative starting MMR with the MMR tool, and then playing tens of games and estimating by the W-L difference where your MMR is after the games. And then checking how the estimate relates the result given by the tool. The method works surprisingly well even if it's rough.
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote:Show nested quote +Also by looking at other's win-lose differences it quickly tells if the player has risen or dropped (large difference) based on MMR (highlights especially MMR abusers quite nicely). Looking at players best league placement also highlights MMR abusers. Someone dropping 10 or even 15 games over a season is not necessarily significant if they played 1500 games. Especially not if 10 of those drops occured because they were playing on tilt last night. 15 negative w/l over an entire season is a lot more significant than recent fluctuations, as those will normalise. Not to mention the overall win/loss ratio for several seasons. Many MMR abusers do not just drop 10 or 15 games. They drop much more so their MMR drops several leagues. Thus they often have considerably negative win-lose difference. Also players having extremely high winratio, but mediocre ladder points in some league often tells that that person has risen a lot lately regarding MMR (likely promoted a league or leagues. Has possibly crashed his MMR before the season break or is playing a new account). And services such as sc2ranks offer historic data regarding players' leagues and points.
On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then again, I never did care about win/loss ratios since I will need to become amuch better player in order to play against someone that I would value keeping statistics of. Either way, my point is that I think a graph and the actual MMR would be a much better tool for evaluating performance than simply adding losses, which is most likely not going to be all that surprising anyway.
It would be great if Blizzard would reveal the actual MMR numbers, but it seems they are not going to do so. Thus we have to use other data to estimate our relative positions (ladder points, ranks and even the adjusted points often give inaccurate info). Thankfully at the moment MMR tool provides quite accurate relative numbers, but how long? Its creator Skeldark (who has done a great favor for the community!) plans to retire from the project when HotS is published. It is unknown if somebody else will continue the MMR tool project after that.
On November 24 2012 12:12 Hairy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. This is not true. This is, incidentally, why many people are terrible at practicing. People don't focus on trying to get better at the game; they focus on trying to win. It sounds silly to differentiate the two, but it's true. There is no point striving to win more games because you will always win ~50% regardless! Instead, you should focus on trying to improve your skill - even if that means doing something that will lose you games! No. If your skill level / performance changes (actual improvement, degrading due to inactivity, starting a new account) you will either win or lose more until you reach your typical MMR range. If you maintain that level your winratio will approach 50 % for games played after that point.
For example in an _imaginative_ scenario if I start laddering with an account that has stabilized at the bottom border of silver and if my typical level is at bottom of gold (in reality it is not), I will fairly fast reach my typical level but to reach it, I will roughly need to win 18 games more than I lose. After I have reached my typical level I roughly win 50% of the games. In this scenario my overall winratio was not 50% as while my MMR rose I simply won more than I lost.
On November 24 2012 12:12 Hairy wrote: I could go and spend 10 games on ladder and focus as hard as I can on injects. I'll not intentionally fail the game, but because injects are what I'm focusing on for those games my overall play, scouting/micro etc, may suffer. Chances are I'll have a greater likelihood of losing those games - but I'll become a better player in the process.
I could get cannon rushed on ladder and die horribly... and that will mean I am now a better player than I was. That experience will help me become a better player, because even the WORST failures serve to give you a clearer insight of what to do (or not do) next time. As a tool for learning and improvement losses are more useful than wins, because it's harder to see a clear path of improvement on a win. Every game is a learning experience - especially the losses, hence Whitera's famous quote of "more gg more skill".
Overall winrates are useless. They're useless for long term analysis (it's 50%), and they're useless for short-term analysis (small sample size means any value is likely to be inaccurate, and, as I said above, winning more recently doesn't even mean you've improved as a player). They give you no useful information whatsoever. Concentrate on playing better (even at the expense of wins!), find some better metrics to judge your play by, and screw the winrate (it's 50%!). You are still focusing on "it is not a metric of skill" and not thinking from different viewpoints. Yes I agree - You cannot deduce the skill level by looking at bare win-loss statistics (not ratio!), but W-L stats still have other valid uses. And as the winratio is a percentage, it is not too interesting as it tells less about the progress the more you play. The win-loss difference is much more interesting statistic. And the winratio is rarely exactly 50%, even if it in most cases approaches it after your 'typical MMR level' has been reached. Even you told yours was 51%, that is not exactly 50%.
|
On November 23 2012 19:39 ETisME wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:19 emc wrote: OP, you are literally the only person on TL who detests seeing W/L, you are a minority in this forum. there were tonnes of people who said the win/loss caused ladder anxiety. And that for sure happens to me when I go on a losing steak that just seems never ending.
That is what unranked is for though then best of both worlds honestly.
|
United Kingdom14103 Posts
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Unless you are constantly changing in skill...then your winrate will either be higher or lower than 50%. My winrate has been as high as 60% and as low as 45%. If you are improving at the average rate, your winrate will be 50%. If you're improving much faster you'll win much more and if you are improving slower/getting worse, you will win less.
|
On November 24 2012 12:12 Hairy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. This is not true. This is, incidentally, why many people are terrible at practicing. People don't focus on trying to get better at the game; they focus on trying to win. It sounds silly to differentiate the two, but it's true. There is no point striving to win more games because you will always win ~50% regardless! Instead, you should focus on trying to improve your skill - even if that means doing something that will lose you games! I could go and spend 10 games on ladder and focus as hard as I can on injects. I'll not intentionally fail the game, but because injects are what I'm focusing on for those games my overall play, scouting/micro etc, may suffer. Chances are I'll have a greater likelihood of losing those games - but I'll become a better player in the process. I could get cannon rushed on ladder and die horribly... and that will mean I am now a better player than I was. That experience will help me become a better player, because even the WORST failures serve to give you a clearer insight of what to do (or not do) next time. As a tool for learning and improvement losses are more useful than wins, because it's harder to see a clear path of improvement on a win. Every game is a learning experience - especially the losses, hence Whitera's famous quote of "more gg more skill". Overall winrates are useless. They're useless for long term analysis (it's 50%), and they're useless for short-term analysis (small sample size means any value is likely to be inaccurate, and, as I said above, winning more recently doesn't even mean you've improved as a player). They give you no useful information whatsoever. Concentrate on playing better (even at the expense of wins!), find some better metrics to judge your play by, and screw the winrate (it's 50%!). Classical Blizzard fallacy that win rates were meaningless so they should be removed (when the true reason for the removal was ladder anxiety).
You're wrong. While overall win rates will be 50%, win rates by matchup and maps will not necessarily be 50%. Win rates broken down in this way are useful for revealing how good you are in each matchup or map.
|
On November 24 2012 16:43 Alryk wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 19:39 ETisME wrote:On November 23 2012 18:19 emc wrote: OP, you are literally the only person on TL who detests seeing W/L, you are a minority in this forum. there were tonnes of people who said the win/loss caused ladder anxiety. And that for sure happens to me when I go on a losing steak that just seems never ending. That is what unranked is for though then best of both worlds honestly. To be fair, I think I would very much prefer a matchup, map win/loss rate than an overall win rate.
It gives more data and less stressful for me :p
|
If anyone would have truly bothered with this, there would have been a program where you could write down data, to gain statistics. Overall it was just crying for the sake of being conservative. I had just a small table to get some stats nothing more, took about 5 seconds of my time after each game. It is still great they are adding more stats though, as long as the performance won't suffer to much. There are people that just love playing with numbers.
|
On November 24 2012 22:23 paralleluniverse wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 12:12 Hairy wrote:On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. This is not true. This is, incidentally, why many people are terrible at practicing. People don't focus on trying to get better at the game; they focus on trying to win. It sounds silly to differentiate the two, but it's true. There is no point striving to win more games because you will always win ~50% regardless! Instead, you should focus on trying to improve your skill - even if that means doing something that will lose you games! I could go and spend 10 games on ladder and focus as hard as I can on injects. I'll not intentionally fail the game, but because injects are what I'm focusing on for those games my overall play, scouting/micro etc, may suffer. Chances are I'll have a greater likelihood of losing those games - but I'll become a better player in the process. I could get cannon rushed on ladder and die horribly... and that will mean I am now a better player than I was. That experience will help me become a better player, because even the WORST failures serve to give you a clearer insight of what to do (or not do) next time. As a tool for learning and improvement losses are more useful than wins, because it's harder to see a clear path of improvement on a win. Every game is a learning experience - especially the losses, hence Whitera's famous quote of "more gg more skill". Overall winrates are useless. They're useless for long term analysis (it's 50%), and they're useless for short-term analysis (small sample size means any value is likely to be inaccurate, and, as I said above, winning more recently doesn't even mean you've improved as a player). They give you no useful information whatsoever. Concentrate on playing better (even at the expense of wins!), find some better metrics to judge your play by, and screw the winrate (it's 50%!). Classical Blizzard fallacy that win rates were meaningless so they should be removed (when the true reason for the removal was ladder anxiety). You're wrong. While overall win rates will be 50%, win rates by matchup and maps will not necessarily be 50%. Win rates broken down in this way are useful for revealing how good you are in each matchup or map. "You're wrong"? "Classic Blizzard fallacy"? You're just attacking a strawman.
Firstly I'd like to point out that, as one of the very first things in this thread, I wrote:
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: (snipped) ...Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant.
Secondly, I have NEVER argued that winrate statistics should be removed. If the original removal of the winrate was an attempt to reduce ladder anxiety, I would far prefer that they instead had given the option of having those statistics private. The more statistics we have access to the better. My point has simply been that overall winrate is a very poor and uninteresting statistic compared to many others.
|
I prefer to have W/L ratios related to my matchups like ZvT and ZvP so I know what matchup I should be working on next, how dare people call it a useless feature. I know for a fact that my ZvZ is much lower than my ZvT for example, tending towards 50% is absolutely not true for that.
|
On November 24 2012 23:07 FeyFey wrote: If anyone would have truly bothered with this, there would have been a program where you could write down data, to gain statistics. Overall it was just crying for the sake of being conservative. I had just a small table to get some stats nothing more, took about 5 seconds of my time after each game. It is still great they are adding more stats though, as long as the performance won't suffer to much. There are people that just love playing with numbers. I'm surprised there are people posting on TL that are unaware of SC2Gears: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=124689
Auto-saving of replays, auto-renaming of replays, categorization or replays, analysis of games, analysis of mass games, winrates in each matchup, winrates on each map, winrates in custom-made scenarios (eg what is my winrate when my opponent makes DTs in the first 10 minutes?), APM development over time, spawn larvae development over time....
|
Plus, you can get a plugin for SC2Gears called 'MMR Stats': http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=334561
It provides an estimate your current MMR based upon various factors. Here is a screenshot of my progress over the last 60 games:
The green line is the platinum promotion line, the light blue line is the diamond promotion line, and the dark blue line is the masters promotion line.
|
On November 24 2012 23:40 Hairy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 22:23 paralleluniverse wrote:On November 24 2012 12:12 Hairy wrote:On November 24 2012 09:56 Fenris420 wrote: Then what value is there in knowing you had a sudden win streak or an improving MMR from the last 10 games? If you are winning more, you are doing better. If you are doing better, you are a better player. This is not true. This is, incidentally, why many people are terrible at practicing. People don't focus on trying to get better at the game; they focus on trying to win. It sounds silly to differentiate the two, but it's true. There is no point striving to win more games because you will always win ~50% regardless! Instead, you should focus on trying to improve your skill - even if that means doing something that will lose you games! I could go and spend 10 games on ladder and focus as hard as I can on injects. I'll not intentionally fail the game, but because injects are what I'm focusing on for those games my overall play, scouting/micro etc, may suffer. Chances are I'll have a greater likelihood of losing those games - but I'll become a better player in the process. I could get cannon rushed on ladder and die horribly... and that will mean I am now a better player than I was. That experience will help me become a better player, because even the WORST failures serve to give you a clearer insight of what to do (or not do) next time. As a tool for learning and improvement losses are more useful than wins, because it's harder to see a clear path of improvement on a win. Every game is a learning experience - especially the losses, hence Whitera's famous quote of "more gg more skill". Overall winrates are useless. They're useless for long term analysis (it's 50%), and they're useless for short-term analysis (small sample size means any value is likely to be inaccurate, and, as I said above, winning more recently doesn't even mean you've improved as a player). They give you no useful information whatsoever. Concentrate on playing better (even at the expense of wins!), find some better metrics to judge your play by, and screw the winrate (it's 50%!). Classical Blizzard fallacy that win rates were meaningless so they should be removed (when the true reason for the removal was ladder anxiety). You're wrong. While overall win rates will be 50%, win rates by matchup and maps will not necessarily be 50%. Win rates broken down in this way are useful for revealing how good you are in each matchup or map. "You're wrong"? "Classic Blizzard fallacy"? You're just attacking a strawman. Firstly I'd like to point out that, as one of the very first things in this thread, I wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: (snipped) ...Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. Secondly, I have NEVER argued that winrate statistics should be removed. If the original removal of the winrate was an attempt to reduce ladder anxiety, I would far prefer that they instead had given the option of having those statistics private. The more statistics we have access to the better. My point has simply been that overall winrate is a very poor and uninteresting statistic compared to many others. @Hairy: Many of your claims were indeed plainly wrong and you even ignored common sense. You continued to argue that all win-lose statistics are absolutely useless (meaning that nobody could deduce anything in any viewpoint based on them and thus there would be no use of counting/showing them), claimed that ratios are always ~50% or exact 50% which they often are not for several reasons, fixated on the winratio (percentage) and ignored the individual win count, loss count, tie count & games played count and what these numbers could mean by themselves or in combination with other data. The winratio itself is indeed often uninteresting and does not tell much. The more you play the more the ratio stagnates and as the system tries to pair you with equal level opponents it approaches 50% for most.
And yes, Blizzard used an excuse for removing win-loss statistics. Masses who don't understand how the ladder system functions kept using the numbers for wrong purposes - e.g. tried to deduce skill based on the ratio, fixated only on the percentage ratio and tried to compare different accounts based on it. Blizzard did not try to solve the issue by providing more advanced & meaningful statistics or by educating people regarding the ladder system. They simply hid the numbers from the majority of SC2 population so they would not need to make the effort. They even called it as 'quick fix' in some articles they wrote. Now they finally add them back along with more advanced statistics.
Blizzard often uses so called 'PR or marketing language' where they twist/simplify reality & ignore things for their cause and make it sound better in ears of the masses. Claims made in "marketing speech" are usually true only in idealistic world, but not necessary actualize in practice. For example this was Blizzard's statement regarding removal of win-loss counts: http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/forum/topic/2267580240?page=3#57
In it they concentrate on claims 'not reflection of skill' (this is true), 'matchmaking system plays role' (yes it does try to match people to equal level opponents and thus the ratio approaches 50% for most after they have reached their typical MMR level & maintain it and are not at the very top or bottom of the ladder), 'misleading' (yes, masses used the numbers for wrong purposes such as deducing the skill). These 3 claims are true, but they purposely ignored that there are other uses for these stats especially if you understand how the ladder & matchmaking system functions.
As an example one of the worst recent usages of "marketing speech" was when Blizzard announced that skill tiers would be removed from leagues starting from the beginning of season 9: http://eu.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/5729733/Season_8_Now_Locked_and_Big_Changes_Coming_Next_Season-07_09_2012
Here are couple of sentences from it: "The removal of tiers from all leagues will allow players to better gauge exactly where they're at on the ladder and how far away they are from the next league.", "After this change, climbing to (for example) Rank 2 Diamond will mean that you are in the top 2% of all Diamond players, and you are very close to moving into the Master League. Similarly, Rank 50 Platinum is in the top 50% in the Platinum league, and so forth."
I am sure lots of people scratched their heads in the beginning of Season 10 after they had finished S9 e.g. in top-8 of some division in some league and were demoted when S10 started. Their MMR was inside the boundaries of the lower league and they were not in top 8% of the upper league like they could have thought based on the Blizzard's article.
|
On November 23 2012 18:19 emc wrote: OP, you are literally the only person on TL who detests seeing W/L, you are a minority in this forum.
lol yeah, pretty much my thoughts. idk about literally the only person though. lol
i mean look at this place, its a forum for playing competitive video games. of course were hardcore
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler +
Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle.
|
On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread:
- Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period.
|
I personally hated not being able to see my w/r ratio when I was in Diamond in WoL, I'm glad they added it back since I would have difficultly seeing how well I did for the day. Usually I would have to look at my history to check which games I would lose.
|
For people who want to keep track, it's great; No more calculating it manually or using 3rd part programs. But it should be an option to have it displayed to everyone on your profile.
|
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler +
except is not always going to trend towards 50%. For extremelye awfull players and extremely great players it will be below/above.
|
|
A big YAY! I have no idea why they removed this in the first place. It's just annoying!
|
Now that there are unranked games, I am fine with the win/lose returning for ranked games. I don't think anyone wants to see the 50 losses they get while trying a new build or hotkey set up, but that is no longer an issue.
|
Why not. Anyways i don't care about it. You are going to be around 50% anyways.
Win/Loss on match up and maps are the most important things .
|
On November 28 2012 00:56 monkybone wrote:Show nested quote +On November 27 2012 01:48 korona wrote:On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread: - Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period. If you are improving your W/L will be slightly more than 50%. As time goes on and your MMR gets more stable your W/L will approach 50%. Is this the information that you want to see? The problem was that a large amount of people took the statistic as a measure of their skill. When it doesn't really say anything interesting at all. IMO, Hairy is right and W/L is in principle an entirely useless statistic. He made no false claims. I presume you did not read the thread carefully? If people use certain statistics for wrong purposes, such as for a measure of skill, it does not mean there are no other valid uses. Some uses are explained earlier in this thread. And basic progress statistics don't necessary even need special uses as their main purpose is e.g. to count games played, games won, etc (yes there are other win-loss statistics than just the winratio that often is uninteresting). And that itself is valid information.
Yes Hairy and now you made some false claims. Please read the thread before commenting and don't fixate on winratio (win percentage) too much.
|
Well, the stats don't lie (from this poll :D) I used to be in masters most of the time anyway, so I had them visible, but now with hots random league placements, and the fact that I may not be at master level anymore, I'm happy they put it back.
|
On November 28 2012 02:19 korona wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 00:56 monkybone wrote:On November 27 2012 01:48 korona wrote:On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread: - Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period. If you are improving your W/L will be slightly more than 50%. As time goes on and your MMR gets more stable your W/L will approach 50%. Is this the information that you want to see? The problem was that a large amount of people took the statistic as a measure of their skill. When it doesn't really say anything interesting at all. IMO, Hairy is right and W/L is in principle an entirely useless statistic. He made no false claims. I presume you did not read the thread carefully? If people use certain statistics for wrong purposes, such as for a measure of skill, it does not mean there are no other valid uses. Some uses are explained earlier in this thread. And basic progress statistics don't necessary even need special uses as their main purpose is e.g. to count games played, games won, etc (yes there are other win-loss statistics than just the winratio that often is uninteresting). And that itself is valid information. Yes Hairy and now you made some false claims. Please read the thread before commenting and don't fixate on winratio (win percentage) too much.
I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona; the only thing I can see overall winrate being used for is: "Since my data sample began I have a [win/loss] difference of [X]. This means I have [risen/dropped] [impossible to determine] amount of MMR/points!"
It can't even be assumed that those wins and losses are weighted evenly; your opponents' skill will rarely exactly match your own, so the amount of MMR/points you gain/lose will frequently differ between games. Just yesterday I beat my first masters opponent and won 44 (!) points, where normally against my typical (diamond) opponent I would gain half as much for a win.
|
On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 02:19 korona wrote:On November 28 2012 00:56 monkybone wrote:On November 27 2012 01:48 korona wrote:On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread: - Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period. If you are improving your W/L will be slightly more than 50%. As time goes on and your MMR gets more stable your W/L will approach 50%. Is this the information that you want to see? The problem was that a large amount of people took the statistic as a measure of their skill. When it doesn't really say anything interesting at all. IMO, Hairy is right and W/L is in principle an entirely useless statistic. He made no false claims. I presume you did not read the thread carefully? If people use certain statistics for wrong purposes, such as for a measure of skill, it does not mean there are no other valid uses. Some uses are explained earlier in this thread. And basic progress statistics don't necessary even need special uses as their main purpose is e.g. to count games played, games won, etc (yes there are other win-loss statistics than just the winratio that often is uninteresting). And that itself is valid information. Yes Hairy and now you made some false claims. Please read the thread before commenting and don't fixate on winratio (win percentage) too much. I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona; the only thing I can see overall winrate being used for is: "Since my data sample began I have a [win/loss] difference of [X] . This means I have [risen/dropped] [impossible to determine] amount of MMR/points!"It can't even be assumed that those wins and losses are weighted evenly; your opponents' skill will rarely exactly match your own, so the amount of MMR/points you gain/lose will frequently differ between games. Just yesterday I beat my first masters opponent and won 44 (!) points, where normally against my typical (diamond) opponent I would gain half as much for a win.
The only one is smurf account. Get into bronze league on placement matches, then proceed to destroy and get some kind of awesome W/L stat so your e-peen is happy.
|
Long as there's an unranked ladder, definitely a good thing to add back in.
|
On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 02:19 korona wrote:On November 28 2012 00:56 monkybone wrote:On November 27 2012 01:48 korona wrote:On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread: - Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period. If you are improving your W/L will be slightly more than 50%. As time goes on and your MMR gets more stable your W/L will approach 50%. Is this the information that you want to see? The problem was that a large amount of people took the statistic as a measure of their skill. When it doesn't really say anything interesting at all. IMO, Hairy is right and W/L is in principle an entirely useless statistic. He made no false claims. I presume you did not read the thread carefully? If people use certain statistics for wrong purposes, such as for a measure of skill, it does not mean there are no other valid uses. Some uses are explained earlier in this thread. And basic progress statistics don't necessary even need special uses as their main purpose is e.g. to count games played, games won, etc (yes there are other win-loss statistics than just the winratio that often is uninteresting). And that itself is valid information. Yes Hairy and now you made some false claims. Please read the thread before commenting and don't fixate on winratio (win percentage) too much. I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona; Why are you still fixating on winrate? Didn't we agree that winrate (percentage) is often uninteresting and provides less information the more you play? In many cases when you have reached your typical MMR range + are stable (your MMR is fairly stable without large swings) + your winrate approaches 50%, you cannot deduce much else than that the matchmaking system is doing its job. Thought if the ratio differs much from 50% it is interesting to check why. Actually this is one useful usage itself - to identify deviations (you can spot deviations easier from W-L difference than ratio). Even based on the last sentence claim that 'win-lose statistics are absolutely useless' is false.
Let's see. Basic uses: E.g. if I want to know how many 1v1 ladder games I have played, I can check my games played count. If I want to know how many games I have won, I can check that statistic and so on. These are basic progress statistics that are useful as they provide the information they claim to provide. Even if there were no other uses for these numbers, they still provide progress information such as: 'I have played 70 games, won 38, lost 32 and there were no ties'(btw, these are real numbers for one of my accounts for this season and there are logical explanations why I have won more than lost. And it is not that I have 'improved').
If the numbers are available people can set personal goals based on them, such as 'my goal is to play 100 games during this period of time' (to improve it often requires regular practice. If you do not play, your skill may start to decline). One can simply write the starting numbers down and in the end of that time period count how many games he played. Likewise the other numbers can be used for similar purposes such as 'my goal is to win 100 games during a certain period' (Hmm, actually I should set one of these myself to get 1k wins with every race before HotS with one of my accounts So close now as lowest wins are 921 -> 79 wins needed for that race. So I will need to play roughly 79 * 2 * 3 = 474 games (not taking account my recent results regarding that race) to achieve this as I play random with that account). Of course many goals may not necessary be rational, but if you understand how the ladder & matchmaking system functions you can avoid setting such goals.
By setting goals people can motivate themselves to play more. For example if I in a certain period play worse than usual and thus fall into loss streak that results me a negative win-lose difference of e.g. -15 for that period. I know that my MMR has dropped considerably and that the system tries to match me with 'equal level opponents' based on MMR. This means that my opponents will generally be 'easier' than before the loss streak. If the level from where I dropped was my 'typical MMR range', it should not be too hard for me to climb back. Now I can set a goal to reach '0 win-lose difference' that I will eventually reach (especially due to how the ladder system works - I will win more until I reach my typical level again) and by setting the goal I will be motivated to play more. Different people find different kinds of goals motivational.
On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote: the only thing I can see overall winrate being used for is: "Since my data sample began I have a [win/loss] difference of [X]. This means I have [risen/dropped] [impossible to determine] amount of MMR/points!"
It can't even be assumed that those wins and losses are weighted evenly; your opponents' skill will rarely exactly match your own, so the amount of MMR/points you gain/loss will frequently differ between games. Just yesterday I beat my first masters opponent and won 44 (!) points, where normally against my typical (diamond) opponent I would gain half as much for a win. I am sure you will agree that if you win a match your MMR increases and if you lose a match your MMR decreases? Thus e.g. if your starting W-L was 123-123 and after the match you have 124-123 your MMR has increased. But based on this we do not know how much the MMR increased as we do not know what the MMR difference originally was between you and your opponent. But as the matchmaker tries to pair you with even level opponents, you can _assume_ that the opponent was such and based on this you can get _rough_ results. Of course this method would not usable if the opponents were 'all over the board' regarding MMR. But the matchmaker seems to generally do a good job and most of the time only pair close MMR range opponents. And as it's fairly consistent, generalizations can be made to get _rough_ results (I never claimed this was exact or even near exact method - Only one possible use for win-loss statistics). I will give you an example by data provided by you, but first lets discuss what that master opponent you faced means.
Max ladder points you can get from a match is 24 and rest are bonus points. Thus you got either 22, 23 or 24 ladder points and rest were bonus points. The ladder points you get are affected by opponent's MMR and your adjusted points. Also there are special rules such as the 'minimum division MMR' that 'artificially' increase the ladder points gained and decreases ladder points lost (this boost is visible especially during the start of the season). Difference of yours and your opponent's MMR did not affect how many ladder points you got. The MMR's were used to match you and to determine how much the MMR's changed after the match. Excalibur_Z:s guide quite nicely explains this both textually and graphically: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=195273
It is likely that there was larger than typical MMR difference between you and your opponent, but it cannot be estimated only based on ladder points gained (more data is needed). But just like you did now, you can always check your opponents' profiles and try to spot if there was a large difference (analysis may take time) and take this info into account when doing the estimates. For such matches (case: if opponent's MMR is much larger) your MMR will increase more if you win and decrease less if you lose than in a match against an equal opponent. But matches with large MMR difference are probably quite rare in most leagues at least up to low master MMR range (likely higher. Not sure in which point the population scarcity starts to have noticeable effects and thus the results given by the method become more inaccurate) (on Sea server the population is considerably smaller than on other servers. One could speculate that the matchmaker has to widen its search more often there.)
On November 24 2012 23:59 Hairy wrote:Plus, you can get a plugin for SC2Gears called 'MMR Stats': http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=334561It provides an estimate your current MMR based upon various factors. Here is a screenshot of my progress over the last 60 games: The green line is the platinum promotion line, the light blue line is the diamond promotion line, and the dark blue line is the masters promotion line. Let's take your MMR graph as an example (at the moment the accuracy of the relative ratings given by the MMR tool seems generally good). In the graph white (loss) and blue (win) circles are 'good results' and grey circles are estimates (grey ones basically use the same method that I describe). In MMR tool scale you get/lose 16 MMR points when you win/lose against equal opponent. In the tool (for NA & EU) lower border of platinum is 1050, lower border of diamond is 1350 and lower border of master is 1650. Here is a picture of Hairy's post in case he deletes the picture: http://imgur.com/fZZ44)
Now let's calculate how many wins & losses you have in the picture. I counted 38 wins & 22 losses, but these counts may be little incorrect to either direction. So the W-L difference would be +16. According to tool your starting MMR was ~1270. Now let us add 16 * 16 = 256 to it. We get 1526 as result (my recalculation gave W-L of 37-23, which would result difference of +14 and ending MMR of 1494). Now let's see what your ending MMR in the tool: ~1510. And look, the result was roughly the same even if there might be a slight error in win & loss counts. And the method knew nothing about your opponents. It just generalized that all were equal. This also likely (but not necessary) means that the matchmaker made fairly good job during this period and opponents were quite close and/or variations regarding MMR difference balanced each others out regarding the results.
I find the results accurate enough (in many cases you don't need exact results, which cannot be calculated based on the data Blizzard provides especially as we don't know the exact formulas. But a _rough_ estimate is often enough). If you knew your starting MMR level was high plat, you could have estimated based on the W-L difference that your MMR to be mid diamond in the end. And 'low-mid-high-border' accuracy is good enough also in case where you had analyzed your relative starting MMR level without the tool. At the moment most leagues (except bronze & master) are ~18.75 wins wide (against equal opponents).
In platinum & diamond range there are plenty of players to choose from. Thus the matchmaker usually has plenty of 'equal opponents' to pick from (may need to widen the search during 'silent hours'). But somewhere like in the GM range this method would likely give inaccurate results as population is too thin at that level.
Also win-lose difference method is a fast method as you get results immediately (you can do this all the time). E.g If you deduced your relative MMR level by hand based on your profile (with the info blizzard provides), opponent's profiles & opponent's opponent's profiles it would take much much more time (you don't want to do this between every game). Also regarding W-L method keep in mind the longer the time frame (number of matches) the accuracy decreases. These are _rough_ methods that often provide 'accurate enough' estimates. (Of course Not_That:s method could be used to get more accurate estimates. MMR tool is based on it. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=332391)
On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. In one of your earlier post you suggested that you can any time 'divide your games played by 2 and get accurate results'. Now let's see how your method works for this time period that is shown in your picture. The W-L in the picture is 38-22 (ratio ~63.3 %) or 37-23 (ratio ~61.7 %) or something very close. Your method would count 60/2 => 30 wins. But this was not the case as you have much more wins for that period. Also you are not in the either extremes of the ladder (exception set by you).
On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote: I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona;
So to sum-up some uses for win-lose statistics (Some give exact values. Some give rough estimates. Some just use the values for some other purposes. There may be more than just these): - offer basic statistics - allow setting personal motivational goals (goals themselves may not always be rational, but it is still a valid use) - allow identifying deviations - allow more advanced deductions/estimates in combination of other data
It is often easier to give extreme statements such as 'is absolutely useless' and ignore other possible uses & viewpoints. These 'black and white' views are easier to grasp on and it takes less time to think/write about than considering is there other possibilities or viewpoints (for example this post took some time to write, but probably have not spent long enough for proofreading it --> likelihood of errors due carelessness rises). Also even if something is meaningful for one person, another person might not care about it. People tend to ignore things that do not mean anything for them. Also people tend to agree with statements easier if the statement is short and clear, even if it could be false in some situations/viewpoints or even totally false. For example many viewers of this thread will simply skip what I have written, because my explanations are 'too long' and are not in perfect English.
But if extreme statements such as 'is absolutely useless' are made, it is easy prove them false - You need to find only one situation where they are false. Now Hairy as you asked me to provide often very simple uses that anyone should be able think of, can you provide me explanations why do you still consider win-lose statistics 'absolutely useless' or have you changed your mind (games played count, win count, loss count, tie count and anything you can count based on them. Please don't talk once again only about the win ratio). Why for example win count that provides the number of wins is not meaningful (is it e.g. calculated wrong or has blizzard accidentally switched the numbers again)? Why people can set motivational & reachable goals based on the numbers (even if sometimes irrational) if the values don't mean anything? If the numbers are meaningless why people can spot deviations based on them and e.g. identify MMR abusers or deduce fairly accurately how some have e.g. progressed through leagues just by looking at the numbers & other available data? The answer is you cannot invalidate these uses --> Win-lose statistics have meaningful uses especially if you understand how the ladder & matchmaking system functions.
|
United Kingdom14103 Posts
On November 29 2012 03:43 korona wrote:Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote:On November 28 2012 02:19 korona wrote:On November 28 2012 00:56 monkybone wrote:On November 27 2012 01:48 korona wrote:On November 26 2012 23:43 GDI wrote:On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote:Overall win/loss values are absolutely useless; due to matchmaking, your overall win/loss is always going to trend towards 50/50 unless you are at the very extremes of the top or bottom of the ladder. If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. Individual race matchup statistics or map winrate statistics hold value, but overall winrate is irrelevant. It's 50%! To elaborate on this, it doesn't even matter what league you're in. Silver players will have a 50% win ratio. Gold players will have a 50% win ratio. Diamond players will have a 50% win ratio. Unless you're at the very top or bottom of ladder (or have played very few games), your win ratio is ~50%. If you're looking for a metric by which to measure your skill or progress, you would be hard-pushed to find something worse. EDIT: just glanced at my sc2gears history since my harddrive exploded; Guess what my win ratio is out of 229 games? + Show Spoiler + Pretty much sums it up. I think it is time for people to get over their ladder anxiety and just play the game. Even the idea of people playing unranked in the beta makes me giggle. Except many of Hairy's claims are false. There are better descriptions earlier in this thread: - Win-loss statistics _are not_ absolutely useless. - Due to matchmaking winratio will approach 50% only after you have reached your typical MMR range and maintain it. Exception: At the very bottom & top of the ladder population is too scarce --> matchmaker often has to pair people with large MMR differences - If you want to see how many wins you have _you cannot_ divide your games played by 2 and always get correct results. If your win count is not shown you either have to separately keep a record of your wins or count it with tools such as sc2gears from all of your saved replays (not always exact as in special cases such as base races & ties win detection is not straight forward - results are not saved in the replay files) - Winratios _are not_ always 50%. There are logical reasons behind this. - Winratio (persentage ratio) itself is usually uninteresting, but other win-loss statistics are more interesting especially in combination with other data. - As winratio usually aproaches 50% after typical MMR level is reached, large win-loss difference (wins minus loses) often indicates that player's MMR has changed considerably during that period. If you are improving your W/L will be slightly more than 50%. As time goes on and your MMR gets more stable your W/L will approach 50%. Is this the information that you want to see? The problem was that a large amount of people took the statistic as a measure of their skill. When it doesn't really say anything interesting at all. IMO, Hairy is right and W/L is in principle an entirely useless statistic. He made no false claims. I presume you did not read the thread carefully? If people use certain statistics for wrong purposes, such as for a measure of skill, it does not mean there are no other valid uses. Some uses are explained earlier in this thread. And basic progress statistics don't necessary even need special uses as their main purpose is e.g. to count games played, games won, etc (yes there are other win-loss statistics than just the winratio that often is uninteresting). And that itself is valid information. Yes Hairy and now you made some false claims. Please read the thread before commenting and don't fixate on winratio (win percentage) too much. I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona; Why are you still fixating on winrate? Didn't we agree that winrate (percentage) is often uninteresting and provides less information the more you play? In many cases when you have reached your typical MMR range + are stable (your MMR is fairly stable without large swings) + your winrate approaches 50%, you cannot deduce much else than that the matchmaking system is doing its job. Thought if the ratio differs much from 50% it is interesting to check why. Actually this is one useful usage itself - to identify deviations (you can spot deviations easier from W-L difference than ratio). Even based on the last sentence claim that 'win-lose statistics are absolutely useless' is false. Let's see. Basic uses: E.g. if I want to know how many 1v1 ladder games I have played, I can check my games played count. If I want to know how many games I have won, I can check that statistic and so on. These are basic progress statistics that are useful as they provide the information they claim to provide. Even if there were no other uses for these numbers, they still provide progress information such as: 'I have played 70 games, won 38, lost 32 and there were no ties'(btw, these are real numbers for one of my accounts for this season and there are logical explanations why I have won more than lost. And it is not that I have 'improved'). If the numbers are available people can set personal goals based on them, such as 'my goal is to play 100 games during this period of time' (to improve it often requires regular practice. If you do not play, your skill may start to decline). One can simply write the starting numbers down and in the end of that time period count how many games he played. Likewise the other numbers can be used for similar purposes such as 'my goal is to win 100 games during a certain period' (Hmm, actually I should set one of these myself to get 1k wins with every race before HotS with one of my accounts So close now as lowest wins are 921 -> 79 wins needed for that race. So I will need to play roughly 79 * 2 * 3 = 474 games (not taking account my recent results regarding that race) to achieve this as I play random with that account). Of course many goals may not necessary be rational, but if you understand how the ladder & matchmaking system functions you can avoid setting such goals. By setting goals people can motivate themselves to play more. For example if I in a certain period play worse than usual and thus fall into loss streak that results me a negative win-lose difference of e.g. -15 for that period. I know that my MMR has dropped considerably and that the system tries to match me with 'equal level opponents' based on MMR. This means that my opponents will generally be 'easier' than before the loss streak. If the level from where I dropped was my 'typical MMR range', it should not be too hard for me to climb back. Now I can set a goal to reach '0 win-lose difference' that I will eventually reach (especially due to how the ladder system works - I will win more until I reach my typical level again) and by setting the goal I will be motivated to play more. Different people find different kinds of goals motivational. Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote: the only thing I can see overall winrate being used for is: "Since my data sample began I have a [win/loss] difference of [X]. This means I have [risen/dropped] [impossible to determine] amount of MMR/points!"
It can't even be assumed that those wins and losses are weighted evenly; your opponents' skill will rarely exactly match your own, so the amount of MMR/points you gain/loss will frequently differ between games. Just yesterday I beat my first masters opponent and won 44 (!) points, where normally against my typical (diamond) opponent I would gain half as much for a win. I am sure you will agree that if you win a match your MMR increases and if you lose a match your MMR decreases? Thus e.g. if your starting W-L was 123-123 and after the match you have 124-123 your MMR has increased. But based on this we do not know how much the MMR increased as we do not know what the MMR difference originally was between you and your opponent. But as the matchmaker tries to pair you with even level opponents, you can _assume_ that the opponent was such and based on this you can get _rough_ results. Of course this method would not usable if the opponents were 'all over the board' regarding MMR. But the matchmaker seems to generally do a good job and most of the time only pair close MMR range opponents. And as it's fairly consistent, generalizations can be made to get _rough_ results (I never claimed this was exact or even near exact method - Only one possible use for win-loss statistics). I will give you an example by data provided by you, but first lets discuss what that master opponent you faced means. Max ladder points you can get from a match is 24 and rest are bonus points. Thus you got either 22, 23 or 24 ladder points and rest were bonus points. The ladder points you get are affected by opponent's MMR and your adjusted points. Also there are special rules such as the 'minimum division MMR' that 'artificially' increase the ladder points gained and decreases ladder points lost (this boost is visible especially during the start of the season). Difference of yours and your opponent's MMR did not affect how many ladder points you got. The MMR's were used to match you and to determine how much the MMR's changed after the match. Excalibur_Z:s guide quite nicely explains this both textually and graphically: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=195273It is likely that there was larger than typical MMR difference between you and your opponent, but it cannot be estimated only based on ladder points gained (more data is needed). But just like you did now, you can always check your opponents' profiles and try to spot if there was a large difference (analysis may take time) and take this info into account when doing the estimates. For such matches (case: if opponent's MMR is much larger) your MMR will increase more if you win and decrease less if you lose than in a match against an equal opponent. But matches with large MMR difference are probably quite rare in most leagues at least up to low master MMR range (likely higher. Not sure in which point the population scarcity starts to have noticeable effects and thus the results given by the method become more inaccurate) (on Sea server the population is considerably smaller than on other servers. One could speculate that the matchmaker has to widen its search more often there.) Show nested quote +On November 24 2012 23:59 Hairy wrote:Plus, you can get a plugin for SC2Gears called 'MMR Stats': http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=334561It provides an estimate your current MMR based upon various factors. Here is a screenshot of my progress over the last 60 games: The green line is the platinum promotion line, the light blue line is the diamond promotion line, and the dark blue line is the masters promotion line. Let's take your MMR graph as an example (at the moment the accuracy of the relative ratings given by the MMR tool seems generally good). In the graph white (loss) and blue (win) circles are 'good results' and grey circles are estimates (grey ones basically use the same method that I describe). In MMR tool scale you get/lose 16 MMR points when you win/lose against equal opponent. In the tool (for NA & EU) lower border of platinum is 1050, lower border of diamond is 1350 and lower border of master is 1650. Here is a picture of Hairy's post in case he deletes the picture: http://imgur.com/fZZ44) Now let's calculate how many wins & losses you have in the picture. I counted 38 wins & 22 losses, but these counts may be little incorrect to either direction. So the W-L difference would be +16. According to tool your starting MMR was ~1270. Now let us add 16 * 16 = 256 to it. We get 1526 as result (my recalculation gave W-L of 37-23, which would result difference of +14 and ending MMR of 1494). Now let's see what your ending MMR in the tool: ~1510. And look, the result was roughly the same even if there might be a slight error in win & loss counts. And the method knew nothing about your opponents. It just generalized that all were equal. This also likely (but not necessary) means that the matchmaker made fairly good job during this period and opponents were quite close and/or variations regarding MMR difference balanced each others out regarding the results. I find the results accurate enough (in many cases you don't need exact results, which cannot be calculated based on the data Blizzard provides especially as we don't know the exact formulas. But a _rough_ estimate is often enough). If you knew your starting MMR level was high plat, you could have estimated based on the W-L difference that your MMR to be mid diamond in the end. And 'low-mid-high-border' accuracy is good enough also in case where you had analyzed your relative starting MMR level without the tool. At the moment most leagues (except bronze & master) are ~18.75 wins wide (against equal opponents). In platinum & diamond range there are plenty of players to choose from. Thus the matchmaker usually has plenty of 'equal opponents' to pick from (may need to widen the search during 'silent hours'). But somewhere like in the GM range this method would likely give inaccurate results as population is too thin at that level. Also win-lose difference method is a fast method as you get results immediately (you can do this all the time). E.g If you deduced your relative MMR level by hand based on your profile (with the info blizzard provides), opponent's profiles & opponent's opponent's profiles it would take much much more time (you don't want to do this between every game). Also regarding W-L method keep in mind the longer the time frame (number of matches) the accuracy decreases. These are _rough_ methods that often provide 'accurate enough' estimates. (Of course Not_That:s method could be used to get more accurate estimates. MMR tool is based on it. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=332391) Show nested quote +On November 23 2012 18:13 Hairy wrote: If you want to see how many wins you have right now, just take your total matches played and halve it and you'll be pretty much spot on. In one of your earlier post you suggested that you can any time 'divide your games played by 2 and get accurate results'. Now let's see how your method works for this time period that is shown in your picture. The W-L in the picture is 38-22 (ratio ~63.3 %) or 37-23 (ratio ~61.7 %) or something very close. Your method would count 60/2 => 30 wins. But this was not the case as you have much more wins for that period. Also you are not in the either extremes of the ladder (exception set by you). Show nested quote +On November 28 2012 02:45 Hairy wrote: I'd like to hear some of those "valid uses" for overall winrate, korona;
So to sum-up some uses for win-lose statistics (Some give exact values. Some give rough estimates. Some just use the values for some other purposes. There may be more than just these): - offer basic statistics - allow setting personal motivational goals (goals themselves may not always be rational, but it is still a valid use) - allow identifying deviations - allow more advanced deductions/estimates in combination of other data It is often easier to give extreme statements such as 'is absolutely useless' and ignore other possible uses & viewpoints. These 'black and white' views are easier to grasp on and it takes less time to think/write about than considering is there other possibilities or viewpoints (for example this post took some time to write, but probably have not spent long enough for proofreading it --> likelihood of errors due carelessness rises). Also even if something is meaningful for one person, another person might not care about it. People tend to ignore things that do not mean anything for them. Also people tend to agree with statements easier if the statement is short and clear, even if it could be false in some situations/viewpoints or even totally false. For example many viewers of this thread will simply skip what I have written, because my explanations are 'too long' and are not in perfect English. But if extreme statements such as 'is absolutely useless' are made, it is easy prove them false - You need to find only one situation where they are false. Now Hairy as you asked me to provide often very simple uses that anyone should be able think of, can you provide me explanations why do you still consider win-lose statistics 'absolutely useless' or have you changed your mind (games played count, win count, loss count, tie count and anything you can count based on them. Please don't talk once again only about the win ratio). Why for example win count that provides the number of wins is not meaningful (is it e.g. calculated wrong or has blizzard accidentally switched the numbers again)? Why people can set motivational & reachable goals based on the numbers (even if sometimes irrational) if the values don't mean anything? If the numbers are meaningless why people can spot deviations based on them and e.g. identify MMR abusers or deduce fairly accurately how some have e.g. progressed through leagues just by looking at the numbers & other available data? The answer is you cannot invalidate these uses --> Win-lose statistics have meaningful uses especially if you understand how the ladder & matchmaking system functions.
My god. That's a beautiful post. I actually read through it for sheer curiosity, really good read.
|
On November 23 2012 17:34 KapsyL wrote: I am not sure how I feel about this. I dont want other people to look at my win/lose ratio. If only I can see my own then YAY
Who exactly is going to see your specific W/L?
|
I hope they remove the W/L stat everytime when i will see that, im gonna cry.
|
As a statistician, who is absolutely IN LOVE with data, the more data, the better, and to this I say, "YAaaAAAaaAAY! FINALLY!!!!!!!1!!1!1"
Those who want to be lied to, take the blue pill to go back to sleep in the Matrix world + Show Spoiler +(if I were given the choice like Neo did in the movie, I would not hesitate to take the red pill and wake up to the grim truth which is reality, rather than live a lie, I would be leaping out of my seat and knocking over all the furniture in my way to get to that pill in Morpheus's hand, and you should, too) , or in otherwords, prefer not to get the sad truth, they're ruining it for the rest of us, by pushing their pathetic needs for self-deception on the rest of us who CAN take contructive criticism. Perhaps rather than catering to the n00b crowd and ruining the experience of learning for serious gamers, I say Blizz should either ignore those guys in favor of people like us who don't go crying to mommy when we find out our win/loss ratio isn't spectacular, as is now finally the case again, or perhaps, at worst, give those people an option to turn it off if it truly makes you upset.
Although, all joking and name-calling aside, I think you're doing yourself a disservice by wanting to NOT know your losses. The game gets more exciting as your skills progress, and all new subtle nuances of gameplay open up to you as you play against better and better opponents. AND, in order to improve, you need to know where you're falling short. Personally, I'd like it if Blizzard not only told us our loss ratio, but in addition, win/loss data over the different matchups, over different maps (I also thuroughly enjoy the new addition of the win% on each map, even though I refuse to veto any maps, as this lets me know where to focus for improvement), such that we can even better tailor our practice needs for the goal of getting better.
TL;DR: Don't lie to yourself, embrace criticism, it WILL make you stronger. Wake up, and take control of your life!
More ranting: + Show Spoiler + I teach statistics to college students at a major division 1 university in the U.S., and people come in to college with all varieties of mathematical prowess, from those with beuatiful minds that bring tears of pride to my eyes for the chance to be part of their further development, to those who make you wonder just how they got past the admissions office since they have serious problems understanding basic, fundamental principles in math, such as addition and subtraction of fractions, and even evaluting two constants to determine the direction of their inequality. (No joke, I just finished grading a paper where a student told me that his p-value, .33 < .05 his set alpha level, and thus he should reject the null hypothesis..... *facepalm....)
No, statistics are not your enemy, they just hurt the feeblemindeds' brains. Yes, I'm an arrogant jerk, but you should know if you don't measure up, please, do something about it. I could lie to you and pat you on the back and say, "Sure, go out there, be a brain surgeon, anyone can do it!" :D But I would be commiting involuntary manslaughter on your future patients. Honesty is the best policy, I say, and to heck with the "<3 Everyone's a winner! <3" fallacy which seems to be the trend still in grade school...
|
Russian Federation51 Posts
Win/lose score motivates to play harder. I'm for Yay
|
On December 01 2012 00:19 DuncanIdaho wrote:As a statistician, who is absolutely IN LOVE with data, the more data, the better, and to this I say, "YAaaAAAaaAAY! FINALLY!!!!!!!1!!1!1"Those who want to be lied to, take the blue pill to go back to sleep in the Matrix world + Show Spoiler +(if I were given the choice like Neo did in the movie, I would not hesitate to take the red pill and wake up to the grim truth which is reality, rather than live a lie, I would be leaping out of my seat and knocking over all the furniture in my way to get to that pill in Morpheus's hand, and you should, too) , or in otherwords, prefer not to get the sad truth, they're ruining it for the rest of us, by pushing their pathetic needs for self-deception on the rest of us who CAN take contructive criticism. Perhaps rather than catering to the n00b crowd and ruining the experience of learning for serious gamers, I say Blizz should either ignore those guys in favor of people like us who don't go crying to mommy when we find out our win/loss ratio isn't spectacular, as is now finally the case again, or perhaps, at worst, give those people an option to turn it off if it truly makes you upset. Although, all joking and name-calling aside, I think you're doing yourself a diservice by wanting to NOT know your losses. The game gets more exciting as your skills progress, and all new subtle nuances of gameplay open up to you as you play against better and better opponents. AND, in order to improve, you need to know where you're falling short. Personally, I'd like it if Blizzard not only told us our loss ratio, but in addition, win/loss data over the different matchups, over different maps (I also thuroughly enjoy the new addition of the win% on each map, even though I refuse to veto any maps, as this lets me know where to focus for improvement), such that we can even better tailor our practice needs for the goal of getting better. TL;DR: Don't lie to yourself, embrace criticism, it WILL make you stronger. Wake up, and take control of your life! I would argue that win/loss doesn't really show that whether you are improving or worse because there are difference in maps, matchups, balance patch, opponents, build, luck.
It's just an annoying and pointless (imo) piece of information attached to you for everyone else to judge you and somehow makes you don't feel so good about yourself when you have below 50% and happy when you got over 50%
the truth is only what you preceive to be true what Morpheus offered is letting you to see what he thinks is the truth. :p
|
Can we get wins / losses and an ability in the options menu to hide it? Is it that much to ask? If you get anxious, don't look at it (disable it).
Done.
|
I think overall, people generally agree on a few things. We are arguing semantics at this point and I would like to go back to more fundamental things.
First off, I think we agree that loss statistics doesn't decrease the playing experiece. It is simply a matter of whether we feel it is necessary to include them. The system no doubt knows this value either way.
Secondly, I dont think anyone would argue it is an important statistic either. The impact it has on your profile page is small in either direction. Nobody had to stop playing or saw themselves drop a league because they were unable to properly estimate their win/loss ratio.
Third, we(the people in the thread) are outliers in the bellcurve when it comes to sc2. The interface is designed for the majoirty of the players, and the majority of the players do not argue over interface designs on TL.net. We are most likely(I can't say for sure) more interested in these statistics than the average user, because we are more interested in the game than the average user. This is something we need to keep in mind as well.
I am an interface designer, I want to obscure data that is not important to the user. Not because I need to, but because it helps keep the interface clean and relevant. On the other hand, if people do want access to the data, one way or the other, that could be arranged as well. I just don't think that the actual playing experience on the ladder really depends on loss values at all. You can estimate your win/loss ratio "kinda", and if you want to be more specific you still don't get a lot more value out of it.
Raw values also have less inherent meaning to a lot of people, that is why I would prefer a graph. At least it points up or down and gives a face value because of it.
In the end, some people obviously disagree with me here but thats where I get suspicious. I know from experience that asking users what they want is not a good way to get what those users want. You would likely need to investigate how many users look at their statistics at all and how often it happens. Giving more options is *not* better than fewer options unless you have a really good reason.
|
The more information the better. I'd love to see W/L rates for each matchup and map as well.
|
|
I don't really care about it. I guess it's good that they are bringing it back.
|
On December 02 2012 01:52 Emzeeshady wrote: wait there are people who don't like this? Lol...
I think people that are not sure about it are even funnier^^
|
I like the fact that W/L is back, it gives me a rough guide as to how well im doing. it doesnt matter what people think of your loses if you can beat em
|
|
|
|