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O September 23 2009 05:05 Excalibur_Z wrote:
snip
yea am a sirlinist i guess you could call it that, but thats how it is when it comes to higher level play.
On September 23 2009 05:23 Matrijs wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 01:53 TheYango wrote:On September 22 2009 21:17 TBO wrote:
maybenexttime, a reset in the new system as far as I understand it, is equal to a new season in almost all "real sports" leagues, you either stay in your league/division (copper, bronze, silver, gold etc.) or get relegated/promoted and then you start with 0 points in the new season of your league/division. So instead of starting from total zero each season you start from zero inside your league, like premier league clubs (or all others) do in football. So effectively, if you're in Silver league, but you're working on a new build and can't play it at the Silver-league level, you have to force-lose/dish out free-wins until you get to your appropriate level? No. You play custom games outside the ranked automated matchmaker system until you can play that build at your existing rank. Also, there's a strange symmetry between your argument here and the argument against smurfing generally. You say that you would have to force-lose to get to an appropriate level for this build you don't play well. Why not just use that build at your current level and lose over and over? You can learn that way, right? If you can't, then why should we expect some new player to be able to learn by losing over and over against players who are way better than he is?
But what if i wanted a competitive atmosphere for my current build while still wanting to retain my old account if i wanted to go back and be competitive at that level. Why should we have to choose between having playing our A game and playing for another reason. We want to smurf for the same reason "casuals" don't want us to smurf. We want to be in a more competitive atmosphere for our off race/build/friend/whatever. We want to be able to start a new account to gauge how well our (for the sake of this argument we will say build) build is.
besides if we force lose/ or just regularly lose trying out our new build to be more well rounded we will have to eventually earn our way back up to be competitive with our A game which is simply as good as smurfing to newb bash in the first place.
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On September 23 2009 05:43 _PulSe_ wrote:yea am a sirlinist i guess you could call it that, but thats how it is when it comes to higher level play. Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 05:23 Matrijs wrote:On September 23 2009 01:53 TheYango wrote:On September 22 2009 21:17 TBO wrote:
maybenexttime, a reset in the new system as far as I understand it, is equal to a new season in almost all "real sports" leagues, you either stay in your league/division (copper, bronze, silver, gold etc.) or get relegated/promoted and then you start with 0 points in the new season of your league/division. So instead of starting from total zero each season you start from zero inside your league, like premier league clubs (or all others) do in football. So effectively, if you're in Silver league, but you're working on a new build and can't play it at the Silver-league level, you have to force-lose/dish out free-wins until you get to your appropriate level? No. You play custom games outside the ranked automated matchmaker system until you can play that build at your existing rank. Also, there's a strange symmetry between your argument here and the argument against smurfing generally. You say that you would have to force-lose to get to an appropriate level for this build you don't play well. Why not just use that build at your current level and lose over and over? You can learn that way, right? If you can't, then why should we expect some new player to be able to learn by losing over and over against players who are way better than he is? But what if i wanted a competitive atmosphere for my current build while still wanting to retain my old account if i wanted to go back and be competitive at that level. Why should we have to choose between having playing our A game and playing for another reason. We want to smurf for the same reason "casuals" don't want us to smurf. We want to be in a more competitive atmosphere for our off race/build/friend/whatever. We want to be able to start a new account to gauge how well our (for the sake of this argument we will say build) build is. besides if we force lose/ or just regularly lose trying out our new build to be more well rounded we will have to eventually earn our way back up to be competitive with our A game which is simply as good as smurfing to newb bash in the first place.
The whole point of ladder is to bring your A game and compete with it. That's why it's called a competitive system. If you don't bring your A game, then you'll start to lose more often and get a lower rank. This is working as intended. All Blizzard is doing is lowering the initial barrier that often stops new players from wanting to compete.
If your wish is to practice an off-build, then play on custom games. It's not like you're the only person in the world who wants to practice. Games will be easy to come by for both casual and competitive players alike.
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On September 23 2009 06:35 Spawkuring wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 05:43 _PulSe_ wrote:O September 23 2009 05:05 Excalibur_Z wrote:
snip yea am a sirlinist i guess you could call it that, but thats how it is when it comes to higher level play. On September 23 2009 05:23 Matrijs wrote:On September 23 2009 01:53 TheYango wrote:On September 22 2009 21:17 TBO wrote:
maybenexttime, a reset in the new system as far as I understand it, is equal to a new season in almost all "real sports" leagues, you either stay in your league/division (copper, bronze, silver, gold etc.) or get relegated/promoted and then you start with 0 points in the new season of your league/division. So instead of starting from total zero each season you start from zero inside your league, like premier league clubs (or all others) do in football. So effectively, if you're in Silver league, but you're working on a new build and can't play it at the Silver-league level, you have to force-lose/dish out free-wins until you get to your appropriate level? No. You play custom games outside the ranked automated matchmaker system until you can play that build at your existing rank. Also, there's a strange symmetry between your argument here and the argument against smurfing generally. You say that you would have to force-lose to get to an appropriate level for this build you don't play well. Why not just use that build at your current level and lose over and over? You can learn that way, right? If you can't, then why should we expect some new player to be able to learn by losing over and over against players who are way better than he is? But what if i wanted a competitive atmosphere for my current build while still wanting to retain my old account if i wanted to go back and be competitive at that level. Why should we have to choose between having playing our A game and playing for another reason. We want to smurf for the same reason "casuals" don't want us to smurf. We want to be in a more competitive atmosphere for our off race/build/friend/whatever. We want to be able to start a new account to gauge how well our (for the sake of this argument we will say build) build is. besides if we force lose/ or just regularly lose trying out our new build to be more well rounded we will have to eventually earn our way back up to be competitive with our A game which is simply as good as smurfing to newb bash in the first place. The whole point of ladder is to bring your A game and compete with it. That's why it's called a competitive system. If you don't bring your A game, then you'll start to lose more often and get a lower rank. This is working as intended. All Blizzard is doing is lowering the initial barrier that often stops new players from wanting to compete. If your wish is to practice an off-build, then play on custom games. It's not like you're the only person in the world who wants to practice. Games will be easy to come by for both casual and competitive players alike.
actually while reading your post i was thinking that you wouldn't be able to be matched against someone of equal skill toward your build if you used the custom matches. I would want someone that was just as good as the build i was using. that way like all the so called casual players want you would be able to play someone of equal skill to have good games.
Well what if blizzard implimented a feature to use the AMM system to set up non ranked games also? if i recall correctly the only time you would use the AMM in WC3 was to use the ladder for random opponents. Well what if they implemented the use of the AMM for non ranked play as well. this would help solve it. I would still want mulitple accounts but im trying to think toward the middle.
What i was thinkin was that you would have essentially 2 ladderish accounts. The first was your official account as monitored by blizzard for their official ladder. The second account was the one you used for the non ladder AMM service. You would use this to be matched up with random opponents. But the twist here is that you could either do one of the following or a mixture of the options:
1. you could simply reset the stats of your off account when ever you want to play the non ranked AMM. it would use the same ELL system as the other one to pair you up but you can reset it when you want to try new stuff from the beggining.
2. You could choose what level of opponent you want to play against. Take iccup for example. Maybe you could choose that you want to play an A/b/c/d player for the next match and it would try to pair it up. That way you can try to gauge where your play is without risking your ladder ranking. This obviously has the downside of dragging the other player to play with someone they may not have wanted to be matched against. They could add a dont care option so that they would be used to fill in spots that the AMM system wouldnt be able to find for people.
3. just make your ELL the same as your regular account and just have it not affect the rankings.
i don't know what exactly to say. maybe you other people out there can have some more imput on it. As of now i still believe it is a step backward to limit people to one account to prevent such trivial things like "newb bashing." but im willing to compromise if its done right.
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United States47024 Posts
On September 23 2009 05:23 Matrijs wrote:
No. You play custom games outside the ranked automated matchmaker system until you can play that build at your existing rank.
This is iffy at best. people keep resorting to the argument going on faith that there will actually be reasonable opponents of a measurable level that you can find on unranked games. Maybe there will be maybe their won't, but seeing as player skill fluctuation by change of builds is a common thing, accomodating that is not something I'd want to put solely on faith.
On September 23 2009 05:23 Matrijs wrote:
Also, there's a strange symmetry between your argument here and the argument against smurfing generally. You say that you would have to force-lose to get to an appropriate level for this build you don't play well. Why not just use that build at your current level and lose over and over? You can learn that way, right?
If you can't, then why should we expect some new player to be able to learn by losing over and over against players who are way better than he is?
I don't agree with the first paragraph, and I was not implying what you said in the second paragraph. For one, the matchmaking system places you in an appropriate level based on the first ten games you play. Presumably, if a stats-reset were implemented, it would simply reapply the process. You don't newb-bash your way up--by your 4th or 5th game, if you're playing consistently and legitimately trying to work out your build, you're already at your appropriate level. That's less ladder inaccuracy than the freewins you dish out from naturally falling to that level. Hell, I don't even care if the first 10 stats-reset games start you off by putting you against players at your original skill level and bumps you down, instead of starting you at the bottom and bumping you up. But some way to adjust your level of play when you know you're playing worse (whether it's a new build, or a 2-week hiatus from the game) should be available.
The key purpose of the ladder is to arrange players according to their skill level. If a player has to lose their way down to an appropriate level when they change play-styles or come back from a hiatus from the game (because it's not guaranteed that custom games will be a viable way of finding practice games) that undermines that goal, both by creating a lag-time for placing that player at an appropriate level, and by artificially propping up the rank of anyone he faces along the way.
On September 23 2009 06:35 Spawkuring wrote:
The whole point of ladder is to bring your A game and compete with it. That's why it's called a competitive system. If you don't bring your A game, then you'll start to lose more often and get a lower rank. This is working as intended. All Blizzard is doing is lowering the initial barrier that often stops new players from wanting to compete.
If your wish is to practice an off-build, then play on custom games. It's not like you're the only person in the world who wants to practice. Games will be easy to come by for both casual and competitive players alike.
The problem with practicing on non-ladder games is that the lack of incentive from a game inherently makes players not bring their A-game. No one is going to play standard builds in custom games just for the hell of it (because if that's what they wanted to do, why not just do it on ladder and gain rank from it?), and there's no chance in hell you're going to create a game like "Silver League Player looking for Bronze League Zerg PLAY STANDARD" or something absurd like that. It's silly to think people will join games like that and on good faith play their best game.
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Yeah, BW progamers also practice their new builds against newbies...
Seriously, why do you even think that hardcore practicing build orders will be necessary in SC2? Perhaps, when we get to see the actual game, you'll notice that it is quite easy to off-race and that you don't need to practice too much for your initial build orders?
Besides, is losing a couple games such a drama?
If you fear that there won't be enough practice partners readily available online then join some clan and practice with them, participate in clanwars and a bazillion other non-ranked tournaments which will most likely be available through ESL or something. There are many ways to find a non-ranked match against an opponent of your choosing. Why do you want it all to be automated? Takes out a lot of fun out of it.
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On September 23 2009 07:36 TheYango wrote:
The problem with practicing on non-ladder games is that the lack of incentive from a game inherently makes players not bring their A-game. No one is going to play standard builds in custom games just for the hell of it (because if that's what they wanted to do, why not just do it on ladder and gain rank from it?), and there's no chance in hell you're going to create a game like "Silver League Player looking for Bronze League Zerg PLAY STANDARD" or something absurd like that. It's silly to think people will join games like that and on good faith play their best game.
This doesn't make sense. Of course people aren't going to do something ridiculous like what you used. The point I'm making is that if people want to play to rank up, they will play on ladder, and practice on custom.
You seem skeptical that people will want to practice on custom, but personally I think that we will be seeing a lot of it than previous games. The reason why people practiced on official ladder games rather than custom games was simply because smurfing was easier to do, and it was often hard to find a custom game since everyone just smurfed instead. Now that smurfing is no longer an option, people who want to practice without screwing their rank will move on to custom games instead. Human beings adapt by nature, and if they can't create their "practice" culture on the ladder, then they'll simply move it somewhere else.
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United States47024 Posts
On September 23 2009 07:51 Spawkuring wrote:
This doesn't make sense. Of course people aren't going to do something ridiculous like what you used. The point I'm making is that if people want to play to rank up, they will play on ladder, and practice on custom.
The problem is that someone practicing a new build will need the exact specificity that title implies. The game name sounds absurd of course. But how else would you word it in such a way that you don't get people outside the parameters you're looking for joining your game?
On September 23 2009 07:51 Spawkuring wrote:
You seem skeptical that people will want to practice on custom, but personally I think that we will be seeing a lot of it than previous games. The reason why people practiced on official ladder games rather than custom games was simply because smurfing was easier to do, and it was often hard to find a custom game since everyone just smurfed instead. Now that smurfing is no longer an option, people who want to practice without screwing their rank will move on to custom games instead. Human beings adapt by nature, and if they can't create their "practice" culture on the ladder, then they'll simply move it somewhere else.
Ladder ensures a large volume of games, at a fairly consistent game level. Practicing on custom games gives you questionable volume of games, no specificity (you're at the mercy of whoever the hell joins your game), and a lot of white noise (UMS games fill up the custom games list, and people who join games you host just to screw with you). Ladder isn't just a practice enviroment because it's easy to access, but because those features in place actually promote practicing on it, coupled with the guarantee that people will play seriously. Basically, you're saying people should settle for less when they don't need to. A little tweaking with how stats-resetting works could very easily make the ladder a suitable practice environment without screwing up the gaming experience for new players.
A more formal presentation of my ideas, in case you didn't get them from my previous post:
1) Stats-resetting is a useful feature. Due to the fact that people leave and enter the player pool, and the fact that people may dramatically shift their skill level, the ability for a player to change his league position when he is conscious of a noticeable change in his play skill is one that should be available.
2) It is a given that such a feature is prone to abuse. Therefore, there should be some form of system in place to prevent that abuse. Removing the ability to stats-reset at all is just an easy-way-out that leaves a bunch of problems.
3) From what Blizzard has told us, players are initially placed at their appropriate skill levels by a small sample of 10 games across the player pool, so that one can initially be quickly placed at their appropriate level. There is no working up from the bottom. This both saves the player's time, and prevents his advancement from affecting the accuracy of the ladder too much. It also means he plays a minimum of games against players far below his level.
4) A stats-reset feature that uses a similar 10-game sampling could be used to reslot a player who believes his level of play has changed drastically since the last time he played (reasons for such are not limited to simply practicing a new build--a player who got up to silver league, but left the game for two years should not be stuck in silver league when he comes back). This, likewise, limits the number of games a player has to play outside of his appropriate level.
5) The above feature has the obvious flaw that a player looking to abuse it could simply throw a bunch of the test games, to drastically lower his ladder position. To prevent this from happening, any ladder reset should factor in the player's previous skill level--instead of starting the sampling with players at the bottom, it starts sampling with players at the original skill level, and works down from there. Furthermore, multiple resets that happen close to one another should have reduced effect. A player should not have unlimited versatility with his resets. A flat-out cap on the number of resets per day/week/month could work as well, but this runs the risk of the number of resets available not being adequate, depending on the dynamics of the Starcraft II metagame.
The fact that you even brought up rank shows you don't know the issue at hand. It's not an issue of being able to practice without losing rank at all. I don't think anyone who'd actually want this level of practice specificity gives a damn about their rank. A stats-reset is fine. What shouldn't need to happen is a bunch of free-winning to move down the ladder. I don't see how free-winning your way down is any worse than free-winning your way up (via smurfing). You disrupt ladder accuracy equally in either direction.
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On September 23 2009 04:03 EchOne wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2009 05:23 dupsky wrote:On September 20 2009 16:06 closed wrote:
This whole thread is pathetic, I tried to read through it, but it's just few smart people vs 51523 scrub players. If you want to improve, you need to play better players.
I think there is only one reason to make people use 1 nickname (not sure if anyone has mentioned it, Ive stopped reading at page 15): if 2+ million people buy the game, it might be pretty hard to make an account.
an analogy is in order here.............so...if i just want to start, to learn to box, i should be placed in the ring with MIKE TYSON( in his prime) , instead of similar to my rank fighters. ......oh, and i guess there are only 2+ million POSSIBLE name combinations on this earth....not even a single 1 more. that post is beyond stupid. An analogy that is not analogous illustrates nothing. In your example, unremitting bodily injury awaits. This and the adrenaline involved in violence tend to inhibit learning. In competitive computer games, ego damage may follow for the weak of heart, but learning opportunities abound uninterrupted by physical pain.
the analogy is valid. reason being, learning with or without violence is not the primary point. learning opportunities may not materialize when such "ego" devastation takes place, especially when it becomes a common and repetitive occurrence, just as a outright physical beating will discourage initially. the degree of dissatisfaction may vary with each individual as will each scenario, however the result will remain. i view your argument as nitpicking, rather than a reasonable view to this dilemma.
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On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 07:51 Spawkuring wrote:
This doesn't make sense. Of course people aren't going to do something ridiculous like what you used. The point I'm making is that if people want to play to rank up, they will play on ladder, and practice on custom. The problem is that someone practicing a new build will need the exact specificity that title implies. The game name sounds absurd of course. But how else would you word it in such a way that you don't get people outside the parameters you're looking for joining your game?
I understand that, but how exactly does smurfing solve this? It's not like I'll be able to join a ladder game and say "Play standard please, I'm trying out a new build". The problem you're describing will exist regardless of whether smurfing is allowed or not.
On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:
Ladder ensures a large volume of games, at a fairly consistent game level. Practicing on custom games gives you questionable volume of games, no specificity (you're at the mercy of whoever the hell joins your game), and a lot of white noise (UMS games fill up the custom games list, and people who join games you host just to screw with you). Ladder isn't just a practice enviroment because it's easy to access, but because those features in place actually promote practicing on it, coupled with the guarantee that people will play seriously. Basically, you're saying people should settle for less when they don't need to. A little tweaking with how stats-resetting works could very easily make the ladder a suitable practice environment without screwing up the gaming experience for new players.
The fact that you even brought up rank shows you don't know the issue at hand. It's not an issue of being able to practice without losing rank at all. I don't think anyone who'd actually want this level of practice specificity gives a damn about their rank. A stats-reset is fine. What shouldn't need to happen is a bunch of free-winning to move down the ladder. I don't see how free-winning your way down is any worse than free-winning your way up (via smurfing). You disrupt ladder accuracy equally in either direction.
Most of the problems you describe are pretty much being fixed in the new Battle.Net. You say that there's a lot of white noise due to other custom games, but you forget that the new Bnet allows you to filter games at your leisure. You bring up players screwing around, but again that's something of a risk regardless of smurfing being allowed or not. Jerks will be jerks, and there's always an ignore list if necessary.
You also say that people won't care about their rank, but I think that this is false. People don't care about their rank on ladders not because they want to practice, but because the ladders provided are optional for the most part. Nobody cares about the Bnet ladder because it's full of flaws, and it's importance was supplanted by Korean leagues. Korean leagues are the ladders that people actually care about, and that's when your rank and performance are extremely important. Battle.Net is going to be the new e-Sports platform, so I definitely believe that people are going to take their ranks a lot more seriously than before because those with high ranks gain the potential for real-life fame and money. Hell this isn't even speculation; just look at WoW and see how obsessive players get over arena ranking. It's a very big deal over there.
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United States47024 Posts
On September 23 2009 08:27 Spawkuring wrote:
stuff
Before I respond to what you wrote, please take note of the edit I made to my post. You keep referring back to smurfing, but I'm not making any arguments in favor of smurfing. Rather, I'm saying the ability to reset one's rank should still be in (when it seems to be the case that it isn't). There are ways to make stats-reset hard to abuse, while at the same time useful to those who need to adjust their level of play. I want to make sure we're on the same page before I continue.
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On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 07:51 Spawkuring wrote:
This doesn't make sense. Of course people aren't going to do something ridiculous like what you used. The point I'm making is that if people want to play to rank up, they will play on ladder, and practice on custom. The problem is that someone practicing a new build will need the exact specificity that title implies. The game name sounds absurd of course. But how else would you word it in such a way that you don't get people outside the parameters you're looking for joining your game? Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 07:51 Spawkuring wrote:
You seem skeptical that people will want to practice on custom, but personally I think that we will be seeing a lot of it than previous games. The reason why people practiced on official ladder games rather than custom games was simply because smurfing was easier to do, and it was often hard to find a custom game since everyone just smurfed instead. Now that smurfing is no longer an option, people who want to practice without screwing their rank will move on to custom games instead. Human beings adapt by nature, and if they can't create their "practice" culture on the ladder, then they'll simply move it somewhere else. Ladder ensures a large volume of games, at a fairly consistent game level. Practicing on custom games gives you questionable volume of games, no specificity (you're at the mercy of whoever the hell joins your game), and a lot of white noise (UMS games fill up the custom games list, and people who join games you host just to screw with you). Ladder isn't just a practice enviroment because it's easy to access, but because those features in place actually promote practicing on it, coupled with the guarantee that people will play seriously. Basically, you're saying people should settle for less when they don't need to. A little tweaking with how stats-resetting works could very easily make the ladder a suitable practice environment without screwing up the gaming experience for new players. A more formal presentation of my ideas, in case you didn't get them from my previous post: 1) Stats-resetting is a useful feature. Due to the fact that people leave and enter the player pool, and the fact that people may dramatically shift their skill level, the ability for a player to change his league position when he is conscious of a noticeable change in his play skill is one that should be available. 2) It is a given that such a feature is prone to abuse. Therefore, there should be some form of system in place to prevent that abuse. Removing the ability to stats-reset at all is just an easy-way-out that leaves a bunch of problems. 3) From what Blizzard has told us, players are initially placed at their appropriate skill levels by a small sample of 10 games across the player pool, so that one can initially be quickly placed at their appropriate level. There is no working up from the bottom. This both saves the player's time, and prevents his advancement from affecting the accuracy of the ladder too much. It also means he plays a minimum of games against players far below his level. 4) A stats-reset feature that uses a similar 10-game sampling could be used to reslot a player who believes his level of play has changed drastically since the last time he played (reasons for such are not limited to simply practicing a new build--a player who got up to silver league, but left the game for two years should not be stuck in silver league when he comes back). This, likewise, limits the number of games a player has to play outside of his appropriate level. 5) The above feature has the obvious flaw that a player looking to abuse it could simply throw a bunch of the test games, to drastically lower his ladder position. To prevent this from happening, any ladder reset should factor in the player's previous skill level--instead of starting the sampling with players at the bottom, it starts sampling with players at the original skill level, and works down from there. Furthermore, multiple resets that happen close to one another should have reduced effect. A player should not have unlimited versatility with his resets. A flat-out cap on the number of resets per day/week/month could work as well, but this runs the risk of the number of resets available not being adequate, depending on the dynamics of the Starcraft II metagame. The fact that you even brought up rank shows you don't know the issue at hand. It's not an issue of being able to practice without losing rank at all. I don't think anyone who'd actually want this level of practice specificity gives a damn about their rank. A stats-reset is fine. What shouldn't need to happen is a bunch of free-winning to move down the ladder. I don't see how free-winning your way down is any worse than free-winning your way up (via smurfing). You disrupt ladder accuracy equally in either direction.
It seems you don't quite understand how the ladder works,
the first 10 games aren't the only ones that matter.
Any time you play 10 games, the system will shift you around... now if it is not your First 10 games it might not move you as fast, but I'm pretty sure you could work your way from Pro al the way down to Copper by losing 30-40 games straight (or the other way if you won 30-40 games straight). And if you actually PLAY those games then you get any practice you need While you are falling (also unless it is a trully stupid strategy or a race you are incapable of playing, I doubt you would lose 30-40 games straight).... Play losing games until you figure out how to win with the strategy.... and if it is harder then switch back to your standard strategy and enjoy a few easy wins while you move back up to your appropriate level.
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On September 23 2009 08:31 TheYango wrote:Before I respond to what you wrote, please take note of the edit I made to my post. You keep referring back to smurfing, but I'm not making any arguments in favor of smurfing. Rather, I'm saying the ability to reset one's rank should still be in (when it seems to be the case that it isn't). There are ways to make stats-reset hard to abuse, while at the same time useful to those who need to adjust their level of play. I want to make sure we're on the same page before I continue.
Ok, I've read you post about stats-resetting. It's certainly an interesting idea that I wouldn't mind having, but I'm kinda curious as to how much you expect people to use it.
One of the main points behind my argument is that players overall are going to be much more serious about their rank and position of the ladder when it comes to SC2. And I feel this way because Bnet is being treated as the new e-Sports platform where high-ranked players will have the opportunity to become pro-gamers and possibly make a career out of it. This isn't the old Bnet where most people couldn't care less about their record, and because of that I can't imagine too many people being willing to throw their rank away when something like pro-gaming status is at stake. Maybe if the ladder is rigged to screw you over permanently if you lose too much, but I find that unlikely.
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ladder is not for training. It was used for that because blizzard dont put another option . Lets hope they put otherwise just join a clan and train there.
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United States47024 Posts
On September 23 2009 08:55 Krikkitone wrote:
It seems you don't quite understand how the ladder works,
the first 10 games aren't the only ones that matter.
Any time you play 10 games, the system will shift you around... now if it is not your First 10 games it might not move you as fast, but I'm pretty sure you could work your way from Pro al the way down to Copper by losing 30-40 games straight (or the other way if you won 30-40 games straight). And if you actually PLAY those games then you get any practice you need While you are falling (also unless it is a trully stupid strategy or a race you are incapable of playing, I doubt you would lose 30-40 games straight).... Play losing games until you figure out how to win with the strategy.... and if it is harder then switch back to your standard strategy and enjoy a few easy wins while you move back up to your appropriate level.
The thing is, 30-40 games is a LONG freaking time. It's not an efficient use of time, and it gives people freewins along the way. If it's possible to implement a system that can reduce those 40 games to 10 games with minimal exposure to abuse, why NOT do it?
Also, you still haven't addressed what happens when someone gets to Silver league, leaves the game, and comes back in 2 years. What then? How many games do they have to lose to get back to the absolute beginning?
On September 23 2009 08:58 Spawkuring wrote:
One of the main points behind my argument is that players overall are going to be much more serious about their rank and position of the ladder when it comes to SC2. And I feel this way because Bnet is being treated as the new e-Sports platform where high-ranked players will have the opportunity to become pro-gamers and possibly make a career out of it. This isn't the old Bnet where most people couldn't care less about their record, and because of that I can't imagine too many people being willing to throw their rank away when something like pro-gaming status is at stake. Maybe if the ladder is rigged to screw you over permanently if you lose too much, but I find that unlikely.
I am honestly very skeptical about how much Blizzard will be able to promote Battle.net as the progaming jump-off point, for a couple reasons.
1) The people who control who becomes progamers are the people who control the salaries. It's the SK Telecoms, Samsungs, and Hites that have ultimate control. Kespa is, ultimately a proxy for those organizations (as it basically came together under the control of the corporations involved). Blizzard doesn't have the money to be paying Bisu, Flash, Jaedong, Fantasy, etc. their salaries, and it doesn't have the clout to bring all the potential sponsors into line. If they can't control the money flow, the don't control who gets paid.
2) Similarly, Blizzard's ladder platform is not something that the sponsors have any control over. Effectively, you are expecting sponsors who fund progamers to be taking on faith that the players Blizzard say are good are actually good. If you're putting down the cash for a lineup of players PLUS coaching, PLUS facilities, you're not going to want to just take it on good faith that someone's giving you good product. You'll want your own experts to check them out. This is why a generic ladder system can't supplant a league. A league (particularly an offline league) lets the sponsor get their own people in to actually see who has talent. They can send their Coach Parks and Coach Chos, and Iloveoovs, and actually see the players play, as opposed to having a pile of replays show up in their inbox.
3) The best players don't come out of numbers, and everyone knows this. Bisu and Flash's TLPD ELOs are higher than Jaedong's, but Jaedong's still the player that deserves to be called number 1 and brings in the results to warrant higher salaries. A system where your ladder ELO actually has a direct effect on your progaming status is obviously flawed by similar logic.
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On September 23 2009 09:00 TheYango wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 08:55 Krikkitone wrote:
It seems you don't quite understand how the ladder works,
the first 10 games aren't the only ones that matter.
Any time you play 10 games, the system will shift you around... now if it is not your First 10 games it might not move you as fast, but I'm pretty sure you could work your way from Pro al the way down to Copper by losing 30-40 games straight (or the other way if you won 30-40 games straight). And if you actually PLAY those games then you get any practice you need While you are falling (also unless it is a trully stupid strategy or a race you are incapable of playing, I doubt you would lose 30-40 games straight).... Play losing games until you figure out how to win with the strategy.... and if it is harder then switch back to your standard strategy and enjoy a few easy wins while you move back up to your appropriate level. The thing is, 30-40 games is a LONG freaking time. It's not an efficient use of time, and it gives people freewins along the way. If it's possible to implement a system that can reduce those 40 games to 10 games with minimal exposure to abuse, why NOT do it? Also, you still haven't addressed what happens when someone gets to Silver league, leaves the game, and comes back in 2 years. What then? How many games do they have to lose to get back to the absolute beginning?
You Never get back "to the beginning" (unless they have a system where long strings of win/losses make you begin to 'move faster')
I wouldn't be surprised if they set it so that 5 straight wins/losses in a row make you begin to move increasingly fast with additional wins/losses (until the streak is broken then you adjust at normal speed again)
so that way it would never be more that 20 or so games to reach your new 'true level' for the strategy/race you are trying (of course your 'true level' would change over those 20 games, because you would also be practicing the strategy.)
As for being away, they did say that if you had been away for a while then they would do something to reflect that (whether it is automatically dropping you a level or having you start moving faster when you get back in)
So how "fast you move" through the system could be based on
1. Number of games you have played [Confirmed]
2. How long it has been since your last game [Suggested]
3. how many wins/losses you have had in a streak [Sensible... they are having a statistician come up with this]
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On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:
A flat-out cap on the number of resets per day/week/month could work as well, but this runs the risk of the number of resets available not being adequate, depending on the dynamics of the Starcraft II metagame.
I still think it would be a mistake to allow any resets at all, as it's my view that custom games are quite adequate for the sort of "new build practice" you describe. That said, at the very least, a cap on resets would be necessary to prevent abuse. Without such a cap, a smurfer could simply stats reset, lose by quitting out 10 times in a row, then smash his way through the low level ladder. Once he gets to a level where he might actually lose a game, he can just do the same thing over again. The limit should probably be 1 per week maximum, maybe fewer.
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On September 23 2009 09:00 TheYango wrote:
I am honestly very skeptical about how much Blizzard will be able to promote Battle.net as the progaming jump-off point, for a couple reasons.
1) The people who control who becomes progamers are the people who control the salaries. It's the SK Telecoms, Samsungs, and Hites that have ultimate control. Kespa is, ultimately a proxy for those organizations (as it basically came together under the control of the corporations involved). Blizzard doesn't have the money to be paying Bisu, Flash, Jaedong, Fantasy, etc. their salaries, and it doesn't have the clout to bring all the potential sponsors into line. If they can't control the money flow, the don't control who gets paid.
2) Similarly, Blizzard's ladder platform is not something that the sponsors have any control over. Effectively, you are expecting sponsors who fund progamers to be taking on faith that the players Blizzard say are good are actually good. If you're putting down the cash for a lineup of players PLUS coaching, PLUS facilities, you're not going to want to just take it on good faith that someone's giving you good product. You'll want your own experts to check them out. This is why a generic ladder system can't supplant a league. A league (particularly an offline league) lets the sponsor get their own people in to actually see who has talent. They can send their Coach Parks and Coach Chos, and Iloveoovs, and actually see the players play, as opposed to having a pile of replays show up in their inbox.
3) The best players don't come out of numbers, and everyone knows this. Bisu and Flash's TLPD ELOs are higher than Jaedong's, but Jaedong's still the player that deserves to be called number 1 and brings in the results to warrant higher salaries. A system where your ladder ELO actually has a direct effect on your progaming status is obviously flawed by similar logic.
Funny that you point those issues out since I'm actually in full agreement with them. I'm still in a wait-and-see mode right now, but I do agree with you that making Bnet an e-Sports platform has a high chance of failure simply because of all the third-party efforts needed to make it a reality. Of course, this all depends on exactly how much control Blizzard wants to have over it.
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United States47024 Posts
On September 23 2009 09:14 Krikkitone wrote:
So how "fast you move" through the system could be based on
1. Number of games you have played [Confirmed]
2. How long it has been since your last game [Suggested]
3. how many wins/losses you have had in a streak [Sensible... they are having a statistician come up with this]
I actually wouldn't mind with an effectively-implemented number 3 in place. It's functionally equivalent to a stats-reset if done well, and is a lot cleaner implementation than reset caps and whatnot.
On September 23 2009 09:16 Matrijs wrote:
I still think it would be a mistake to allow any resets at all, as it's my view that custom games are quite adequate for the sort of "new build practice" you describe. That said, at the very least, a cap on resets would be necessary to prevent abuse. Without such a cap, a smurfer could simply stats reset, lose by quitting out 10 times in a row, then smash his way through the low level ladder. Once he gets to a level where he might actually lose a game, he can just do the same thing over again. The limit should probably be 1 per week maximum, maybe fewer.
Again, new builds aren't the only scenario that someone might need to make use of a stat reset. But after some thought, I think it's likely that 1 per week might be more than enough. The most relevant times at which one might need to stats reset is when a new map enters the map pool or when there's a drastic metagame change (e.g. post-Incruit TvZ). That happens far less often than once a week.
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On September 23 2009 09:16 Matrijs wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:
A flat-out cap on the number of resets per day/week/month could work as well, but this runs the risk of the number of resets available not being adequate, depending on the dynamics of the Starcraft II metagame.
I still think it would be a mistake to allow any resets at all, as it's my view that custom games are quite adequate for the sort of "new build practice" you describe. That said, at the very least, a cap on resets would be necessary to prevent abuse. Without such a cap, a smurfer could simply stats reset, lose by quitting out 10 times in a row, then smash his way through the low level ladder. Once he gets to a level where he might actually lose a game, he can just do the same thing over again. The limit should probably be 1 per week maximum, maybe fewer.
Actually, that is another thing, losing by "quitting out" early might not move you down as fast as a normal loss (its no reflection of your skill, just of how much of a jerk you are)
Ideally, super early quits and back stabbing your team, etc. would count for something entirely different than "ladder level", they should count against 'sportsmanship' so that you get AMM'ed against people with similar sportsmanship as well as similar ladder levels
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United States12224 Posts
On September 23 2009 09:25 Krikkitone wrote:Show nested quote +On September 23 2009 09:16 Matrijs wrote:On September 23 2009 08:10 TheYango wrote:
A flat-out cap on the number of resets per day/week/month could work as well, but this runs the risk of the number of resets available not being adequate, depending on the dynamics of the Starcraft II metagame.
I still think it would be a mistake to allow any resets at all, as it's my view that custom games are quite adequate for the sort of "new build practice" you describe. That said, at the very least, a cap on resets would be necessary to prevent abuse. Without such a cap, a smurfer could simply stats reset, lose by quitting out 10 times in a row, then smash his way through the low level ladder. Once he gets to a level where he might actually lose a game, he can just do the same thing over again. The limit should probably be 1 per week maximum, maybe fewer. Actually, that is another thing, losing by "quitting out" early might not move you down as fast as a normal loss (its no reflection of your skill, just of how much of a jerk you are) Ideally, super early quits and back stabbing your team, etc. would count for something entirely different than "ladder level", they should count against 'sportsmanship' so that you get AMM'ed against people with similar sportsmanship as well as similar ladder levels
That is actually a really good idea, and fits right in with their ideals for the new Battle.net. If it was the system itself that determined whether you were a player of good or poor manners, rather than an exploitable "reporting" or "avoid/prefer" user system, that would be great.
EDIT: I think it should only flag you for really egregious infractions though, like killing dozens of your teammates' units intentionally, or a bunch of their structures, or leaving the game very early as you said.
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EPT
