Ordered Titan Divisions

[onealexleft]

(07-17-2012 07:34 PM)calmon Wrote:  

(07-17-2012 06:55 PM)Fluffysox Wrote:  I totally think Harti didn't mention this in like 50 other threads aswell, that DIVISIONS AREN'T MEANT TO SEPARATE SKILL FURTHER THAN LEAGUES DO

Edit: you beat me kamikaze >:o

Well on top of the leagues having something like this is a nice feature. SC2 has it and there is at least no reason to not even considering it.

I suggested '1st Division' instead of 'Top-ofTop-League' just because it makes technically less sense to have another league instead of just a division or like I suggested ordered divisions in titan league (<- only titan, because it makes indeed not much sense in lower leagues).

The main "problem" starts when the difference between the points goes to far away inside the division but the Top has no chance to promote away like the top players can do in other leagues. At this point the division lacks the information/competition/whatever you usually would love to have.

Outwitters actually use to have 'tiered' divisions similar to SC2 early on in beta. But like Sc2, there was no labeling to tell you if you were in the 'top tier' division of that league or 'bottom tier'. Since player skill in a league largely varied (from the bottom threshold to the top) it made sense to try to sub-divide that group even further so that the ladders would be a bit more competitive (due to the volume of users). It was mostly for division grouping on the back end, and not really a visible thing to the user.

Whether we enable this again or not depends on league size/active users, and if we do, it'll probably be transparent to the user and most likely only apply to bottom/mid tier leagues. As for making points competitive and handling inflation, we will address it but it'll be in a season 2 of league play.

[calmon]

Thanks for the answer Alex. I can imagine the challenges you have to optimize this system. More/Less skilled player, more aktive/nearly inactive players, different player opinions about stats/competition/etc. a pain!

One point confused me:

"most likely only apply to bottom/mid tier leagues"

Why not applying this on top?

[onealexleft]

(07-18-2012 06:48 PM)calmon Wrote:  Thanks for the answer Alex. I can imagine the challenges you have to optimize this system. More/Less skilled player, more aktive/nearly inactive players, different player opinions about stats/competition/etc. a pain!

One point confused me:

"most likely only apply to bottom/mid tier leagues"

Why not applying this on top?

Player population is the deciding factor. If each league has the population then breaking it apart a bit more can help. For instance, Super Titan is miniscule compared to the rest of the leagues (last I recall only about 250-ish players total, and dropping).

[ArtNJ]

In the 50 member "Black Stick" Super Titan Division (Black Stick??? You need to hold a naming contest...) it appears that at least half the members got in because of the bug (half have points under 75 and many are just above that) and just havent been downgraded yet, presumably because they havent played another game yet.

If there are 250 players, I guess their are 2 full divisions, plus Black Stick which is half full.

[Syvan]

(07-19-2012 03:58 AM)ArtNJ Wrote:  In the 50 member "Black Stick" Super Titan Division (Black Stick??? You need to hold a naming contest...) it appears that at least half the members got in because of the bug (half have points under 75 and many are just above that) and just havent been downgraded yet, presumably because they havent played another game yet.

If there are 250 players, I guess their are 2 full divisions, plus Black Stick which is half full.

My division, Red foot is down to 45, with only 25 players having greater than 75 ladder points.

I clicked through some replays to check the other ST divisions:
Gray Beek is at 50, but looks to be mostly recent promotions
Clever Tree is at 48.
Black tree looks like it has the most active players, with several that dwarf the top of my division.

There must be one more division floating around, although 250 could have easily dropped to 200 depending on how many were left floating around.

[swimj]

(07-19-2012 04:13 AM)Syvan Wrote:  There must be one more division floating around, although 250 could have easily dropped to 200 depending on how many were left floating around.

Indeed, that division is mine and Calmon's, also has about 50 people-Ailing Trail.

[nivra0]

I'm ranked # 12 in Black Stick with 385 points. The next closest player has 578. Whuh? That really doesn't incentivize me to try and play more games. It's so far out of reach to add another 200 points, especially as I get exclusively matched against ST or top masters players now, and my winning pct has gone way down.

I thought this points system was supposed to incentivize playing more games?

At least if I knew my MMR, I would want to try and raise in ranking that way. Now I'm basically stuck at #12 for the forseeable future. I guess my job is to stay ahead of #13 who's at 311. Kinda boring, honestly.

[Syvan]

Most likely, being top of the division has more to do with activity than with ordering by skill. In SC2, due to the bonus pool, it was kept active players moving upward. You're in the top league, give in just let go of the need to rank by skill. Once tournaments get going you can make a name for yourself

If you want to go up in the division, just keep playing.

[nivra0]

But that's my point. One of the stated reasons for the current points system is that it's supposed to incentivize playing more so you can accumulate points.

However, when the next closes person is 200 points away, that incentive is gone, too.

[CombatEX]

I strongly disagree. Rather, I hope a Grandmaster equivalent league is added in the future for the top 200 or so players. I'm not sure what fraction of players are in supertitan, but if it's like 10% then it would be cool to have a top 2% league like sc2 masters too. Thats less necessary, but I think GM is a must. There should be a real 'elite' league that the best players can strive for. As has been stated, points don't really mean anything besides how active someone is so it would be nice to have a highly selective GM league for the top super-titans to compete for

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(07-18-2012 04:44 PM)onealexleft Wrote:  

(07-17-2012 07:34 PM)calmon Wrote:  

(07-17-2012 06:55 PM)Fluffysox Wrote:  I totally think Harti didn't mention this in like 50 other threads aswell, that DIVISIONS AREN'T MEANT TO SEPARATE SKILL FURTHER THAN LEAGUES DO

Edit: you beat me kamikaze >:o

Well on top of the leagues having something like this is a nice feature. SC2 has it and there is at least no reason to not even considering it.

I suggested '1st Division' instead of 'Top-ofTop-League' just because it makes technically less sense to have another league instead of just a division or like I suggested ordered divisions in titan league (<- only titan, because it makes indeed not much sense in lower leagues).

The main "problem" starts when the difference between the points goes to far away inside the division but the Top has no chance to promote away like the top players can do in other leagues. At this point the division lacks the information/competition/whatever you usually would love to have.

Outwitters actually use to have 'tiered' divisions similar to SC2 early on in beta. But like Sc2, there was no labeling to tell you if you were in the 'top tier' division of that league or 'bottom tier'. Since player skill in a league largely varied (from the bottom threshold to the top) it made sense to try to sub-divide that group even further so that the ladders would be a bit more competitive (due to the volume of users). It was mostly for division grouping on the back end, and not really a visible thing to the user.

Whether we enable this again or not depends on league size/active users, and if we do, it'll probably be transparent to the user and most likely only apply to bottom/mid tier leagues. As for making points competitive and handling inflation, we will address it but it'll be in a season 2 of league play.

Season 2! In excited to see this is planned =) point inflation is annoying in outwitters. Not having a bonus pool or substitute feature makes points a simple matter of grinding and not any true indication of skill. Nice to see this will be addressed! Also any plans on letting us click player profiles from division lists? Or search for players? I just want some way to look at my friend's profiles without have to be in a game with them (or other people in my division).