ELO on luck based games

[Strode]

Just don't worry about Elo for luck-based games.

It's less complicated that way. Plus, we'll never all agree as to which games count as luck-based and to what extent.

[FrankJones]

Maintaining over 200 Elo in a very high luck game is almost impossible mathematically.

With a 100 Elo rating difference you are expected to win 1.78 games for each loss, which is a 64% win rate, 36% loss rate. If the game is such high luck that a 100 Elo player has over 36% chance to win then sustaining over 200 Elo should not really happen.

Perhaps. But, did anyone actually look up this game? There are six players rated above 300, and 430 players rated above 200.

So, not only is 200 possible, but so is 300.

Related note - the OP in this thread is currently at 234, and has been able to maintain an Elo between 180 and 234. I wouldn't really describe that as "falling back toward 100" as was stated in the original post.

[BananaHarambe]

Yeah they are obviously being dramatic.

[FrankJones]

Hi,

I am.playing 2 player dozito, which, when played by two advanced players, is mostly (if not pure) luck.

I see that i lose about 3 times what i win in ELO rating.

Lets consider a pure luck game for example, a toss of the die hame, highest wins, re-roll.on tie.

Once you reach 100 ELO, you lose 3 times what you win, you will never reach a high ELO. The more you play, the more you will "decay" back towards 100.. how can this be right?

I would have expected a zero sum system, at least for luck based games.

Love to hear everyone's thoughts on this.

You don't lose 3 times what you win in elo, you made that up. I see your last 4 games were +7, +7, -7, -8. Looks about even to me. I see some higher variation if I scroll lower, which will show things like -13 and +13.

Your elo gains/losses are determined by your relative rating to your opponent. If you play someone lower rated you lose more for losing and gain less for winning, while if you play someone higher rated you lose less for losing and gain more for winning. It is zero sum. The winner gains the rating the loser lost. There's some acceleration in your early games to get your account to the right rating, but after the first X games it will settle to normal.

If you're playing a game largely determined by luck, don't expect to get a very high rating. You don't earn rating just for showing up, you have to do better than your opponents, which in the long run requires playing a better game to win more often, something which games of mostly luck don't offer as much opportunity for.

I noticed this when i was around 200, managed to get just above, lost one game, then needed 3 games to get just above 200, lost one game, needed 3 more to get above 200, and so on.

You know people can view your entire game history, right ? Or maybe you're not aware of this, since your statements are contradictory to the actual facts.

1) The swingy k-factor rating system helped you get near 200 Elo in the first place. The k-factor of 60 during your first 11 games resulting in your winning 6 of your first 7 games, gaining 189 Elo points for the 6 wins. That's more than 30 Elo per win. You also did not lose any Elo for the loss. (nobody loses Elo for losses until getting above 100.

* 2) I don't see any instances of you losing one game to drop below 200 and then needing to win 3 games to get back to 200 Elo.

3) Even if that were to happen, it means you're playing against players with sub-100 Elo. Which is:

a) Avoidable if you're not playing Arena (In fact, you could restrict your opponents to only 200_ Elo, in which case you would gain more points for wins than you would lose in losses),
or
b) impossible if you're playing Arena, since players need to be 100 Elo to play in the Arena.

* To elaborate more on point number 2: The occasions in which you dropped below 200, you either lost two (or more) games in a row, not just one game; or, you lost one game but then quickly got back to 200 with one win (not three).

[Archisian]

I think what the OP is saying that losses are much more penalizing than wins are rewarding. Not that their specific ELO was "decaying" to 100.

If you lose to someone with an ELO around the same as you, you lose ELO in a relatively equal amount, sometimes a little bit more to split a fractional difference. For example, I lost a game of Wingpsan where I was 339 ELO and my opponent was 326. I lost an equal amount of ELO to what they won: -11. However, in another game where I was 340 ELO and my opponent was 377 ELO, they won 4 ELO points and I lost 9. I'm not sure how this was calculated (I'm guessing by opponent's number of games).

If you lose to someone with a much lower ELO than you, you'll lose substantial amount of ELO.

If you win against someone with an equal amount of ELO, like I mentioned, you will gain a roughly equal amount as they lose. But, let's say you win a game against someone with an equal amount of ELO, but then lose 2 in a row to people with an equal ELO, you are in the net negative. Essentially, losing streaks hurt ELO badly, no matter if it's against players with equal ELO or lower.

Winning is only a really net positive if you face someone with a much higher ELO than you. But, because they are at that ELO level, the odds of you winning aren't good.

Now, some people here don't have a problem with the way ELO works here. I'm not arguing either way. I'm just saying this is what I understood the OP to mean in this thread.

[FrankJones]

I think what the OP is saying that losses are much more penalizing than wins are rewarding. Not that their specific ELO was "decaying" to 100.

Direct quote from the OP in the original post:

"Once you reach 100 ELO, you lose 3 times what you win, you will never reach a high ELO. The more you play, the more you will "decay" back towards 100.. how can this be right?"

If you lose to someone with an ELO around the same as you, you lose ELO in a relatively equal amount, sometimes a little bit more to split a fractional difference. For example, I lost a game of Wingpsan where I was 339 ELO and my opponent was 326. I lost an equal amount of ELO to what they won: -11.

Yes. When players of equal Elo play, the winner will gain 10 Elo and the loser will lose 10 Elo.

However, in another game where I was 340 ELO and my opponent was 377 ELO, they won 4 ELO points and I lost 9. I'm not sure how this was calculated (I'm guessing by opponent's number of games).

This is not possible.
(Unless this player has won 6 or 7 games in a row against you, in which case the built-in Elo decay for consecutive wins against the same opponent applied. And that's not relevant to this discussion.)
Assuming both players have established k-factors of 20 (Meaning, 21 completed ranked games), the Elo won by one player will be the same as the Elo lost by the other player.

If you lose to someone with a much lower ELO than you, you'll lose substantial amount of ELO.

Yes. That's the point of the system. Losing to low-rated players will hurt your rating more than losing to a grandmaster. Exactly what point are you making or attempting to make? I'm not sure I understand where you're going with this post.

If you win against someone with an equal amount of ELO, like I mentioned, you will gain a roughly equal amount as they lose. But, let's say you win a game against someone with an equal amount of ELO, but then lose 2 in a row to people with an equal ELO, you are in the net negative. Essentially, losing streaks hurt ELO badly, no matter if it's against players with equal ELO or lower.

I don't think you understand the Elo system. Regardless of whether your Elo is close to your opponent's Elo or 500 points apart, if/when you win the game, your Elo won will be equal to the amount of Elo that your opponent loses.

Regarding the second part of your sentence - Umm. yeah, generally speaking, winning ONE game and then losing TWO games will put you in the net negative. That would be true even if all 3 games were against players with similar Elo, but it will be even more significant if the losses were against low-rated players.

Just in case I'm somehow not making myself clear - expert players generally do not lose two games in a row to low-rated players. A player who does that is likely not an expert-level player, and the significant hit to that player's Elo will then reflect that.

Winning is only a really net positive if you face someone with a much higher ELO than you. But, because they are at that ELO level, the odds of you winning aren't good.

This is just not true. Several games in my own game history show to be false.

Now, some people here don't have a problem with the way ELO works here. I'm not arguing either way. I'm just saying this is what I understood the OP to mean in this thread.

Most of what the OP said is demonstrably false by a simple viewing of the OP's game history for the game in question.

[Archisian]

I don't think you understand the Elo system. Regardless of whether your Elo is close to your opponent's Elo or 500 points apart, if/when you win the game, your Elo won will be equal to the amount of Elo that your opponent loses.

Here's a game I played recently where I lost to someone much higher than me. They gained 7 ELO, but I lost 8. Any reason why that happened?

https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=818164405

[Ceaseless]

This is not possible.
(Unless this player has won 6 or 7 games in a row against you, in which case the built-in Elo decay for consecutive wins against the same opponent applied. And that's not relevant to this discussion.)
Assuming both players have established k-factors of 20 (Meaning, 21 completed ranked games), the Elo won by one player will be the same as the Elo lost by the other player.

Game percentage from getting kicked, they only noted the 9 points for the game loss without the extra 10. The winner only gets the percentage, but the loser takes the full loss. https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=817072948

[Archisian]

This is not possible.
(Unless this player has won 6 or 7 games in a row against you, in which case the built-in Elo decay for consecutive wins against the same opponent applied. And that's not relevant to this discussion.)
Assuming both players have established k-factors of 20 (Meaning, 21 completed ranked games), the Elo won by one player will be the same as the Elo lost by the other player.

Game percentage from getting kicked, they only noted the 9 points for the game loss without the extra 10. The winner only gets the percentage, but the loser takes the full loss. https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=817072948

Yeah, I didn't mention the extra 10 because that's a standard penalty (I had to go afk during that game, so I got kicked). Was the -9 also a part of that too?

[Ceaseless]

I don't think you understand the Elo system. Regardless of whether your Elo is close to your opponent's Elo or 500 points apart, if/when you win the game, your Elo won will be equal to the amount of Elo that your opponent loses.

Here's a game I played recently where I lost to someone much higher than me. They gained 7 ELO, but I lost 8. Any reason why that happened?

https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=818164405

The gain/loss isn't actually in integers, if you scroll over the gain or loss you get details of elo calculation that tell you a closer approximation (to the hundredth) looks like. In this case it was +/- 7.44, resulting in the truncation to look like 8 points was lost when it showed the basic version in integer form. 364.2 (truncated to 364) losing 7.44 to get to 356.76 (truncated to 356). 364-356=8, hence the display of 8 when going over the loss in integer form.