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Racial Distribution in Patch 1.0 - Diamond Ladder - Page 7

Forum Index > SC2 General
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Kryptix
Profile Joined August 2010
United States138 Posts
September 02 2010 00:37 GMT
#121
This really doesn't mean anything to BLIZZARD, just to the competitive scene. Platinum and Diamond are both Protoss dominated leagues, and the issue with this is that they don't make up a majority of the players overall, so it actually tells you that the top end is Protoss favored with Terran making up more of the Bronze leaguers etc...

800 people at the top compared to over a million on 1v1 ladder, it would seem that P is the overpowered race allowing their general population to skew towards diamond rather than T being overpowered since T players overall skew towards the low end of the ladder...
StarDrive
Profile Joined September 2010
90 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-09-02 00:38:19
September 02 2010 00:37 GMT
#122
On September 02 2010 09:31 ToxNub wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 09:24 StarDrive wrote:
On September 02 2010 09:21 ToxNub wrote:
Only a basic understanding of statistics and logic is required to understand this information, and yet so many people fail. (Pretty much everyone but the "pill" guy)

1. Popularity is not identical to "overpoweredness". This is a BIG assumption. More top players prefer terran, that's true, but knowing why they do so is infinitely more informative than just the population data. If they all say "I play terran because I do better" (and we have reliable confidence they have no reason to deceive us) then sure, get up on your soapbox. But it won't be because of this graph, it will be because of the top players' reasoning. For all you know, they might say "I like challenge" (to play devil's advocate).

2. To settle the sample size debate once and for all: The top players cannot be their own population if you are trying to make a generalization about the GAME. You can make a generalization about top players or top end play, if you like. That's what samples do, they generalize. So it completely depends on what exactly you are trying to generalize. It will be too small for some generalizations, and plenty large enough for others. It's not one or the other, it depends what you are trying to argue.


Yes it could be that they play Terran since they like a challenge and they are so much more talented than everyone else that they can dominate even with the additional challenge. However, this explanation seems unlikely.


Sure, but this data doesn't say that. That's your opinion. That's all i'm saying.


Well by this argument then all the data in support of General Relativity could have been manipulated by aliens to make it look like General Relativity provides a good model of the universe when in reality Newtonian mechanics is better. The data does not disprove that hypothesis so to anyone who believes otherwise: "It's just your opinion."
imbecile
Profile Joined October 2009
563 Posts
September 02 2010 00:38 GMT
#123
On September 02 2010 09:14 NATO wrote:
Alternative explanation: Racial differential in skill scaling:


I think this has very little to do with skill scaling.

It's simply a result of promoting for wins and demoting for losses. So someone who wins a lot quickly disappears from the lower ranks, and in the lower ranks the win percentages necessarily are always near the perfect balance. That's the point of the whole system.

At the top there is no more promotion, so any discrepancy will accumulate there. When there is a group that consistently adds up more wins than everyone else, there will be more of that group at the top. And the most obvious group that consistently gets more victories than everyone else is terrans.

And just the fact that they are terrans is a sufficient explanation. And it's the only explanation that the data allows. Because every other explanation needs data that is not available, and frankly is a hard sell with a lot of unreasonable assumptions.

Now what exactly causes this high terran win rate, that can't be swept under the rug, that is a a different question. All you can say for now, that it is more likely/easier for terrans to win.
Synk
Profile Joined April 2010
United States297 Posts
September 02 2010 00:48 GMT
#124
You're never going to see elevated win percentages really due to the way the matchmaking system works. What you will see is elevated ratings because the "cushion" is effectively your rating, if your winning too often your rating climbs and your matched up against people far above your true rating until you start to lose, forcing you closer to 50%. So this means since the system is designed to jack your rating up as high as required to keep you as close to 50% as possible, ratings will tell the true story of balance as opposed to win percentages. So the fact that we see so many Terran's at the highest level of rating says to me either 1) all Terran players are just better players than everyone else, or 2) it is in fact easier to win with the Terran race. I think #1 will be a more temporary possibility as other players learn, practice, and get better. However #2 is something that just won't go away, in fact it will grow throughout the player population as everyone's skill level starts to grow.

Only time will tell and I imagine Blizzard, having a lot of experience in balancing games, knows this and they are waiting to do anything drastic. So its no surprise 1.1 is a relatively small patch, if these kind of numbers continue though for say 6 months I bet they start making some pretty sweeping changes.
Don't argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.
tacrats
Profile Joined July 2010
476 Posts
September 02 2010 00:50 GMT
#125
On September 02 2010 08:31 Mortecian wrote:
It means that at the highest level of play, there are more terrans than all other races combined.

If you are looking at the whole population, for instance, let's say that population is "Highest level of play", then there is no need to speak of sample size... you're looking at the whole population, there is no estimate.

Is this totally indicative that there is imbalance? No. But it supports that idea.
- If many experts are saying terran is imba, it again supports it.
- If blizzard says terran is imba and will tweak in 1.1, it again supports it.
- If experts in other races do not refute that terran is imba, it again supports it.

So, saying that at the top level of competitive play, terran is imbalanced is supported by:
- Data above.
- Experts opinion (Idra, Sheth, Morrow, etc. etc.).
- Designers opinion (Blizzard Patch 1.1 status update).

Whether it's true or not, I'm not really vested in or against... as I dont play starcraft 2, but these three sources all point toward the same idea and that gives the idea weight.


So many signs pointing to one thing, but people still will defend it until their deaths. its amazing.

ToxNub
Profile Joined June 2010
Canada805 Posts
September 02 2010 01:15 GMT
#126
On September 02 2010 09:27 blacktoss wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 09:21 ToxNub wrote:
Only a basic understanding of statistics and logic is required to understand this information, and yet so many people fail. (Pretty much everyone but the "pill" guy)

2. To settle the sample size debate once and for all: The top players cannot be their own population if you are trying to make a generalization about the GAME. You can make a generalization about top players or top end play, if you like. That's what samples do, they generalize. So it completely depends on what exactly you are trying to generalize. It will be too small for some generalizations, and plenty large enough for others. It's not one or the other, it depends what you are trying to argue.


I'm only going to respond to #2.

Um, the GAME [sic] is not a population. The GAME is what it is. The players of the GAME form a population. The data discussed in this thread is not talking about the population of all players. If it were, then it would be useless, because it is not a random sample. It is all diamond players. If you want to make inferences about a population from a subset of that population, you want to use random sampling.

But that is not the reasoning used here. The first line of reasoning is to ask whether there is any racial bias in the distribution of players in higher level diamond league that is not due to random chance. The answer is, without a shadow of reasonable doubt, yes. There is such a bias. The next question is "What causes this bias?"

And in this case, there can be many claims trying to explain the bias. Why is racial imbalance a good one? The claim is not that one is trying to generalize from a 'sample' (diamond population) to a 'population' (the GAME), it is one of measuring one variable with another.

The variable we have to work with is racial distribution in upper diamond league. The variable we are interested in is racial balance. When you try to infer one variable from another, the one you measure is called a proxy. This is not the same as an inference about a population from a sample. Please do not conflate the two.


It is an inference about a population from a sample, you simply word it in a way that obscures it. You want to say "the current players in top diamond have a racial bias". Yes, the data shows that. However, then you want to pretend (and this is a subtle difference) that it implies that any new top diamond player is likely to follow the distribution. You must, if you intend to propose that the game, which affects any player that uses it (and not just the current top diamond players), is responsible.
A simple example:

I flip a coin to determine the "preference" for heads or tails, let's say I do that for different brackets. But for each bracket I flip it a different number of times.

1300 (10 flips): 5:5
1400 (5 flips): 3:2
1500: (1 flip) 1:0

Now I could make a big graph of this, inflate the number of trials on the low end, and make a thread about coin imbalance. You would come into my thread, and you would ask "Is there any preference bias in the distribution of coin flips in higher level coin league that is not due to random chance. The answer is, without a shadow of reasonable doubt, yes."

Think about that for a second. It doesn't matter if all of the coin flips in 1500 is the entire population, you must consider a NEW sample's likelihood to follow this distribution. That is the whole point of a confidence measure.
ToxNub
Profile Joined June 2010
Canada805 Posts
September 02 2010 01:22 GMT
#127
On September 02 2010 09:37 StarDrive wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 09:31 ToxNub wrote:
On September 02 2010 09:24 StarDrive wrote:
On September 02 2010 09:21 ToxNub wrote:
Only a basic understanding of statistics and logic is required to understand this information, and yet so many people fail. (Pretty much everyone but the "pill" guy)

1. Popularity is not identical to "overpoweredness". This is a BIG assumption. More top players prefer terran, that's true, but knowing why they do so is infinitely more informative than just the population data. If they all say "I play terran because I do better" (and we have reliable confidence they have no reason to deceive us) then sure, get up on your soapbox. But it won't be because of this graph, it will be because of the top players' reasoning. For all you know, they might say "I like challenge" (to play devil's advocate).

2. To settle the sample size debate once and for all: The top players cannot be their own population if you are trying to make a generalization about the GAME. You can make a generalization about top players or top end play, if you like. That's what samples do, they generalize. So it completely depends on what exactly you are trying to generalize. It will be too small for some generalizations, and plenty large enough for others. It's not one or the other, it depends what you are trying to argue.


Yes it could be that they play Terran since they like a challenge and they are so much more talented than everyone else that they can dominate even with the additional challenge. However, this explanation seems unlikely.


Sure, but this data doesn't say that. That's your opinion. That's all i'm saying.


Well by this argument then all the data in support of General Relativity could have been manipulated by aliens to make it look like General Relativity provides a good model of the universe when in reality Newtonian mechanics is better. The data does not disprove that hypothesis so to anyone who believes otherwise: "It's just your opinion."



WTF are you talking about. YOU are manipulating data and providing your own indepedent opinion as a substitute for an accurate interpretation. If you have to fill in holes in the data with your opinion, then it's no longer data, it's your opinion.
STS17
Profile Joined April 2010
United States1817 Posts
September 02 2010 01:27 GMT
#128
This doesn't really prove anything. I guarantee if you did the same thing for BW you would not see an even distribution of the races (in fact, this is quite widely known). While I don't discount the notion that if a race is imbalanced, more players will play that race, the opposite (if more players play a race, then that race is imbalanced) is not always true.
Platinum Level Terran - Take my advice from that perspective
Cloak
Profile Joined October 2009
United States816 Posts
September 02 2010 01:27 GMT
#129
The numbers seem even worse when you realize that 40-50% more people play Protoss than Terran. Zerg is the combination of being unpopular and weak.
The more you know, the less you understand.
ReplayArk
Profile Joined August 2010
Germany23 Posts
September 02 2010 01:37 GMT
#130
40-50% more people play Protoss than Terran


@Cloak, I would like to see the source for this number.

TehForce
Profile Joined July 2010
1072 Posts
September 02 2010 01:39 GMT
#131
Say what you want, this data CAN'T PROVE terran is op. It PROVES that there are more high level terran players. And there can be many many reasons for that
NesTea <3
Sisko
Profile Joined May 2010
United States121 Posts
September 02 2010 01:43 GMT
#132
Its shocking that people are claiming that the far end of the bell curve is meaningless because it has few people in it. There are few people in it precisely because each group must be smaller than the previous, and the trends appear to hold even in the extreme case of 1500+

Whether this has to do with the perceived preference for terran or an actual one is an interesting topic that is hard to evaluate. My gut says the trend TvZ represents the array of viable openings on one side that Z just gets to suffer through until midgame.
noD
Profile Blog Joined August 2010
2230 Posts
September 02 2010 01:43 GMT
#133
this can also by protoss players are easier to play and get on high leagues and terrans harder but more consistent ....
Grend
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
1600 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-09-02 01:50:32
September 02 2010 01:46 GMT
#134
Why people are choosing to ignore what Tyler says is beyond me. This sint a statistical test, this is a mapping of everyone! And as such it shows the reality of the composition of top ranked players, so don't try to sound like a smartass with your course in statistics and say something that is blatantly false and ignorant. Can you tell something from this graph? Yes! At the top of ladder there ARE less zerg! That's no statistical conclusion its the fact of the matter!

Edit: that does not mean Zerg is up.
♞ Against the Wind - Bob Seger ♞
Three
Profile Joined April 2010
Japan278 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-09-02 01:53:26
September 02 2010 01:51 GMT
#135
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level, and he isnt saying what will happen to future players. He is showing what has already happened in this patch.
TitleRug
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
United States651 Posts
September 02 2010 01:52 GMT
#136
On September 02 2010 10:51 Three wrote:
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level.

I think by "sample size" they mean the low amount of top level players compared to the rest of the population.
coLCruncher fighting!
Three
Profile Joined April 2010
Japan278 Posts
September 02 2010 01:54 GMT
#137
On September 02 2010 10:52 TitleRug wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 10:51 Three wrote:
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level.

I think by "sample size" they mean the low amount of top level players compared to the rest of the population.


Thats not what hes looking at
Sentient
Profile Joined April 2010
United States437 Posts
September 02 2010 01:55 GMT
#138
On September 02 2010 10:52 TitleRug wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 10:51 Three wrote:
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level.

I think by "sample size" they mean the low amount of top level players compared to the rest of the population.

Right, but it's still a decent sample size. Medical studies on rats are often done with only 8-10 samples and those are generally statistically sound. Someone needs to actually crunch the uncertainties instead of letting people merely assert that the sample size is too small. If you think it's too small, do the uncertainty calculations to prove it.
esaul17
Profile Joined May 2010
Canada547 Posts
September 02 2010 01:55 GMT
#139
People keep saying that that with imperfect control (1100 and below) it is easier for Protoss to win and at higher levels (1200 and above) Terran has an advantage.

Is it not equally possible that Protoss players who approach perfect control start losing to Terran players with lesser control at around the 1200 level and this just gets worse as the ratings get higher? It seems unfair to say "At lower skill levels Protoss can win more" when it seems just as likely that the figurative skill ceiling of Protoss is simply lower, causing more skilled protoss players to be left at the lower levels.

And man I feel sorry for Zerg in the TvZ match up.
TitleRug
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
United States651 Posts
Last Edited: 2010-09-02 01:56:56
September 02 2010 01:55 GMT
#140
On September 02 2010 10:54 Three wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 10:52 TitleRug wrote:
On September 02 2010 10:51 Three wrote:
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level.

I think by "sample size" they mean the low amount of top level players compared to the rest of the population.


Thats not what hes looking at

maybe you're right, I lost track of what people said.

On September 02 2010 10:55 Sentient wrote:
Show nested quote +
On September 02 2010 10:52 TitleRug wrote:
On September 02 2010 10:51 Three wrote:
Nice to read comment from people who have heard the word "sample size" before saying that it isnt large enough. He isnt using part of the population of high ranked players to show a trend for high ranked players. He is using ALL of the high ranked players. He isnt saying anything about what effect race has below diamond level.

I think by "sample size" they mean the low amount of top level players compared to the rest of the population.

Right, but it's still a decent sample size. Medical studies on rats are often done with only 8-10 samples and those are generally statistically sound. Someone needs to actually crunch the uncertainties instead of letting people merely assert that the sample size is too small. If you think it's too small, do the uncertainty calculations to prove it.

don't quote me, I'm just assuming that's what those people meant.
coLCruncher fighting!
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