Arena Suggestion

[ChiefPointThief]

Yeah I knew it. Op plays luck based games. Captain flip to be specific. The reason why people sit at the top in games involving luck is because the risk isn’t worth the reward. It requires getting into the 1800s to win captain flip arena. Which takes an incredible streak to reach such a level. Then when you are there the majority of the field is in the 1500s or lower. So you need to win at a ratio of like 7 to 1 vs those players to break even in a game that not even the top players have a 70% win percentage in. It is grueling, tiring, & personally I don’t find the grind fair or fun which is why I don’t play it in arena even though it may be my favorite game on the entire site.

As mentioned already applying some inactivity penalty would punish players who participate earlier in the season which would be completely unfair. And having some universal rule like this would be completely unfair to players who play luck based games in a system that already affects luck based players more than non luck.

[tbhp]

This probably varies game to game, but I would say far more of the top players are in tournaments than Arena, at Heat like 95% of the top 50 ranked players are playing tournaments, only about 30-40% of them are regularly playing Arena (some will play the odd game, but you're never going to win Arena that way), and that's reflected in the play too, I would definitely say the highest level games all take place in tournaments rather than Arena. This may vary massively from game to game, as some games lend themselves to tournaments much better than others.

I'm not too sure. I mean, I rarely watch other people's Arena games, but the times I have there were some very high quality boards. And when I've played it myself, it often feels like overkill because I give it my best but a lot of the time my opponent just crumbles and I realize I didn't actually need to play very well to beat them. But the thing is, you can't know that at the start of the game. Even if the other player is lower rated, you are always going to worry that they could outplay you in that particular game. So you have to treat every game the same and treat every opponent like a potential threat.

Of course, games that have a high level of confrontation where both players are playing well are more likely to be seen in tournaments. But that doesn't mean climbing in Arena doesn't require the same quality of play on your part. All it takes is one person playing better than you expected for you to fall and lose many points. You are allowed very little mistake in Arena.

[FrankJones]

So, this is mostly unrelated to the thread.

But, I am going to post it anyway, became .... well, this might be the most brutal game ever.

https://boardgamearena.com/archive/repl ... s=87790301;

Here is what was at stake:

Before the game started, I was at Elo #1.

But, you cannot "backdoor" the achievement for Elo #1. You cannot get the achievement by falling into Elo #1 when the current Elo #1 loses. You need to finish a game and still be at number 1.

I jokingly said to the #1, a buddy of mine, "So, I just need you to take a brutal loss to a low rated player."

Sure enough, fate intervenes! He somehow ends up with a time forfeit accidentally; and I find myself in Elo #1 in my favorite game.

He even messaged me, "So, that happened. Go for it!"

(Again, remember, even though that put me at Elo 1, I still need to complete a game and not lose.)

So, All I need to do it complete one game and win. Against any player. So, I start a random arena game. Just give me a weak opponent !! Or give me a winning hand. Not to be. I had to battle with La Palme against Nishinoshima. (That's bad).

Uh oh. My opponent is Averleigh, who knows how to play. This won't be easy.

I battled, I fought, I battled until the very end. I was way behind. Facing a seemingly insurmountable lead. Many players would have conceded.

And nevertheless, on the last turn, I thought I had it. Down 60 points, I had an 80-90 point final turn.

Alas, it was not enough. I lost. BY ONE POINT. 231-230.

If I had one more sprout. Just ONE MORE SPROUT. I win, and I gain world Elo #1, and probably lock up Arena #2.


Undoubtedly the most heartbreaking loss ever in my history on BGA.

[BalGAmor]

Over the last year or so I've gotten more into the arena side of BGA and I really enjoy it. One of the things that I noticed is that once someone reaches the top of the arena, they generally don't play as many games and just sit there and wait for somebody to try to pass them so that they can win the arena. A suggestion would be that each day people lose a certain amount of arena points just for lack of activity to begin to cause people to work their way down for not continuing to play

A harsh but decent suggestion.

Not playing, if it is far from being my favorite option, is a valid strategy to maintain your rank.

That being said when you don't play in Arena, you don't win, so you don't score points. Others who keep on playing - and of course if they keep on winning - have a chance to take over your spot.

PS: this is not a "we'll do it" post, more of an opinion.

[ChiefPointThief]

Over the last year or so I've gotten more into the arena side of BGA and I really enjoy it. One of the things that I noticed is that once someone reaches the top of the arena, they generally don't play as many games and just sit there and wait for somebody to try to pass them so that they can win the arena. A suggestion would be that each day people lose a certain amount of arena points just for lack of activity to begin to cause people to work their way down for not continuing to play

A harsh but decent suggestion.

Not playing, if it is far from being my favorite option, is a valid strategy to maintain your rank.

That being said when you don't play in Arena, you don't win, so you don't score points. Others who keep on playing - and of course if they keep on winning - have a chance to take over your spot.

PS: this is not a "we'll do it" post, more of an opinion.

In addition to reasons that have already been stated it is also bad because of the turn based option. Which you would now be penalizing players on how fast their opponent plays. I can make several moves a day. Some ppl can take 1 or fewer. So if the game drags a extra week why is my aes being hurt???

If I open 10 games at once and finish them all at the same time but another player gradually opens 10 games so they finish at different times why am I receiving a penalty when we are equally active?

[RazorOz]

A harsh but decent suggestion.

Not playing, if it is far from being my favorite option, is a valid strategy to maintain your rank.

That being said when you don't play in Arena, you don't win, so you don't score points. Others who keep on playing - and of course if they keep on winning - have a chance to take over your spot.

PS: this is not a "we'll do it" post, more of an opinion.

Issue is if BGA ever even think about doing this the ELO reducer has to go, it should go anyway, but doing an Arena decay and keeping it would be be madness. Because here's the issue at any game that doesn't have a huge player pool. If you are one of the top players, and just play a ton of Arena solid every season without ever pausing you end up 0'd out on players forever more, because your winning streak never ends until they beat you, so your actual ELO gets crushed because you keep playing games you can only lose ELO in.

[RazorOz]

I'm not too sure. I mean, I rarely watch other people's Arena games, but the times I have there were some very high quality boards. And when I've played it myself, it often feels like overkill because I give it my best but a lot of the time my opponent just crumbles and I realize I didn't actually need to play very well to beat them. But the thing is, you can't know that at the start of the game. Even if the other player is lower rated, you are always going to worry that they could outplay you in that particular game. So you have to treat every game the same and treat every opponent like a potential threat.

Of course, games that have a high level of confrontation where both players are playing well are more likely to be seen in tournaments. But that doesn't mean climbing in Arena doesn't require the same quality of play on your part. All it takes is one person playing better than you expected for you to fall and lose many points. You are allowed very little mistake in Arena.

One thing I would disagree with, is you can definitely make mistakes in Arena, because if you throw a game, you'll have plenty of time to recover as long as you play enough games, do that in a tournament and it's over. Whether tournaments or Arena are tougher likely depends on the game, at Heat, it's common to get latter rounds of tournaments where nearly everyone is 500+ ELO, in Arena you'd basically never play a table where that's the case.

[Meeplelowda]

One thing I would disagree with, is you can definitely make mistakes in Arena, because if you throw a game, you'll have plenty of time to recover as long as you play enough games, do that in a tournament and it's over.

This is assuming a single elimination bracket, right? The groups format for tournaments definitely allows for imperfect play in the groups stage at least if more than one person advances out of the group.

[RazorOz]

This is assuming a single elimination bracket, right? The groups format for tournaments definitely allows for imperfect play in the groups stage at least if more than one person advances out of the group.

True, though even in leagues I am in I think there is less room for error than an Arena season, because there's always only a finite amount of games. Obviously if it's just being used as qualification you will have more room for error.

[tbhp]

One thing I would disagree with, is you can definitely make mistakes in Arena, because if you throw a game, you'll have plenty of time to recover as long as you play enough games, do that in a tournament and it's over.

Indeed, but you don't judge success in tournaments the same way you judge success in Arena.

For tournaments, if a player enters a 512 players elimination tournament 10 times and wins it once, you'd consider that impressive. But the player didn't need to make no mistake. They just needed to keep trying until they managed a streak of 9 wins in a row. Achieving that is impressive, but it's not more impressive than someone winning Arena thanks to a 90%+ winrate over hundreds of games.

I'll maintain that Arena allows very little mistake, because once you get to the top of the ladder wins against most opponents don't give you many points. For every loss against a lower rated player you definitely shouldn't have lost against, that's something like 10 games you will have to win against regular opponents to get back to where you were. And if you fail again before getting back there, you'll fall down even further. This is a format of competition that is particularly harrowing for the player and requires you to constantly perform to even hold on to your position. There's a reason it's called "arena".