🌿ELO System Updates

[MiniEve85]

I'm so sad about taking away ELO. That took away all the fun for me...

[torvaldur_makan]

So I did a quick simulation on what is happening to Elo with this power leveling penalty. I think many of you already pointed this out, but this is basically a visualization of that.

Suppose two people at equal skill level and rating are playing each other multiple times. Their Elo is traded back and forth, average Elo still the same:


If we then add a penalty for consecutive wins, both their ratings goes down and will continue to go until the 100 Elo floor is hit. The Elo is deflated:

The same thing, but much faster, happens in multiplayer games:


Suppose one player is much better than the others (not unusual in Arena where you cannot restrict the Elo rating of your opponent) even more Elo is destroyed:


Keep in mind that this simulation is just that the same people play each other over and over again. This, however, not that far from the truth in some games. Small player base for that game, or that you always play the same time of day as a few others. Or that you mostly play friends in a smaller group.

I wasn't sure of how big the penalty was, but in the examples it is set to 20%. The point I'm making isn't to give you exact numbers but to show what is happening.

[Roger B comme Bär]

"[...] I want an ELO system that isn't negative weighted to unavoidably reduce ELO over time where freak losses outdo any gains. Please can we just have the old system back. It wasn't perfect but we all knew where we stood."

100% OK with KenFin1

[KenFin1]

So I did a quick simulation on what is happening to Elo with this power leveling penalty. I think many of you already pointed this out, but this is basically a visualization of that.

<snip>

I wasn't sure of how big the penalty was, but in the examples it is set to 20%. The point I'm making isn't to give you exact numbers but to show what is happening.

An excellent post, and thank you for displaying visually so well one of the objections people have been protesting about.

Unless I've missed it there's still no response or update from BGA since the last one over a month ago!?!?!

[h_illes]

Unless I've missed it there's still no response or update from BGA since the last one over a month ago!?!?!

The last response from BGA was on 2 January (I wonder if I will have to eventually include the year as well in that date). Page 33 of this thread. Here is a direct link so you don't have to click through: https://boardgamearena.com/forum/viewto ... &start=320

[zizzeus]

I have an alternative explanation; not sure if it's simpler, 3D-chess on BGA's part, or tinfoil hat.

BGA is like a fitness gym, and we are the gym rats who work out every day and tie up the prime equipment for hours at a time. The gym doesn't make money off people like us, it makes money off people who buy a year-long membership on Jan. 1st, show up 3 or 4 times in Jan. and then NEVER COME AGAIN.

Would a gym trade 10 power users for 10 New Years hopefuls? Absolutely, because the net revenue is the same, yet far fewer resources are needed for the latter group. You could support way more New Years hopefuls in a gym with fixed equipment than you could gym rats.

You just have to replace them every year (unlike your power users), which is perhaps a problem BGA hasn't thought through. But given the monthly server issues, perhaps they are now running out of equipment and looking for ways to get the gym-bros out of the way.

If you want to get their attention, you could cancel your membership and then play loads of non-Premium, non-ranked games anyway.

[GeoPaladin]

I have an alternative explanation; not sure if it's simpler, 3D-chess on BGA's part, or tinfoil hat.

BGA is like a fitness gym, and we are the gym rats who work out every day and tie up the prime equipment for hours at a time. The gym doesn't make money off people like us, it makes money off people who buy a year-long membership on Jan. 1st, show up 3 or 4 times in Jan. and then NEVER COME AGAIN.

Would a gym trade 10 power users for 10 New Years hopefuls? Absolutely, because the net revenue is the same, yet far fewer resources are needed for the latter group. You could support way more New Years hopefuls in a gym with fixed equipment than you could gym rats.

You just have to replace them every year (unlike your power users), which is perhaps a problem BGA hasn't thought through. But given the monthly server issues, perhaps they are now running out of equipment and looking for ways to get the gym-bros out of the way.

If you want to get their attention, you could cancel your membership and then play loads of non-Premium, non-ranked games anyway.

Regular players almost certainly benefit the site as you won't having paying customers without a reasonably active environment.

While the silence paints the devs in a very bad light, I doubt it's a conspiracy on their part. Most likely someone or some people got overly fixated on solving a problem (and imagined problems) to the exclusion of all other concerns, resulting in the creation of new problems such that the solution was worse than the original situation.

As to why they say nothing, your guess is as good as mine. My experience is that often, people don't want to deal with unhappy customers and just mouth platitudes in hopes they go away. There may also be stubbornness, egotism, and/or plain inertia involved.

One can hope that enough complaints will eventually get through to them. I wasn't too bothered at first (beyond the obvious unfairness that caught my attention and led me to realize the system existed) but I've been incredibly disappointed with the lack of serious response.

[Stroom]

→ Cooperative play and non competitive game
For cooperative games such as Hanabi, The Crew, or Just One, competition is already disabled. However, some players were too focused on the ELO, which led to unnecessary competitiveness in an environment which should instead incentivize cooperation.
For such games, we decided to hide the ELO value of each player and only display their current rank, from Beginner to Master.

Please revert this change too. It heavily matters whether a player is 700 or 900 or 1100 elo in Hanabi. I would like to estimate how good a player is before I give advanced clues to them. I shouldn't have to make personal notes about every single player and their play style.

It is not about being focused on elo. It is about predictability of the players. It is hard to cooperate with differently skilled players.

[dinnyesbacsi]

I am playing around 5-10 games of nova luna per day, my Élő (note that it is named after a Hungarian mathematichan, Élő Árpád) is around 500. I just played against a player having around 300 Élő. It was the 11th game between us over ~6 weeks, received 0 points... does it really seems as "Power levelling"??

https://boardgamearena.com/gamestats?pl ... me_id=1628

[GeoPaladin]

I am playing around 5-10 games of nova luna per day, my Élő (note that it is named after a Hungarian mathematichan, Élő Árpád) is around 500. I just played against a player having around 300 Élő. It was the 11th game between us over ~6 weeks, received 0 points... does it really seems as "Power levelling"??

https://boardgamearena.com/gamestats?pl ... me_id=1628

Welcome to the club. They've decided 6 wins within 30 days is enough for a 100% penalty.

It's ridiculous and the devs seem to be ghosting us.