Is this against the rules? Is it okay?

[Pacaholic]

The player currently ranked 2nd in Battleship has played all of their games against 1 opponent. It looks like the opponent is an actual player and not the same account. It doesn't seem right that you can be ranked highly when you only play 1 other person. But I have reported this a week ago and their rank climbed since then. I also want to add, their winrate is 84% and they play the version of battleship that includes two "1 hit" ships. This version is a lot more luck based than the other version. To have an 84% winrate even against someone who is bad is pretty unbelievable.

The players name is Pamil. Here is their game history:

https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!gamesta ... me_id=1111

I guess my question is...

1. Is this against the rules on boardgamearena?


2. Is it okay to play only 1 person and be potentially ranked 1st at a game?

[N_Faker]

1. Is this against the rules on boardgamearena?

It is not.

2. Is it okay to play only 1 person and be potentially ranked 1st at a game?

It is ok.


You can read the report conclusion by looking up the reports you have sent. They are linked on the profile of the player you have reported.
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If this shouldn't be allowed, what are your proposed changes to fix this?

[RicardoRix]

I spot a few losses in the list, but recently it's very one-sided set of results.

It would probably be best to only allow a certain 'amount' of exchange of ELO points between the same 2 players.
So the 'amount' could be:
1. The first 20 games in a given year.
2. A decrease % in the exchange after 20 games.
- or any other reasonable

I have the same scenario when I play LITS. I only play with my mum and see plays with other people, while I do not, but we play together quite frequently. I pick up most wins, but lose occasionally and it seems that my ELO rating has come to a natural balance of around 420(ish). Now this is quite high and perhaps not a true reflection of my skill, but that's that. She is rated 'good' and I don't actually win every game.

I also have the reverse happening too, when I play my brother who doesn't play often here on BGA and has low ELO, but does beat me more often on pretty much all games we play, so all in all it works both ways sometimes.

[Liallan]

I find that win rate kind of weird. I accidentally took a game with the little 1 ships, and because they are so difficult to find, we got even and then it was just a matter of pure luck who found those baby ships first. I think I won, but it was a bit annoying and I'll have to be more careful in the future not to take those. But anyway, being at 84% wins in that situation seems almost impossible, unless the other person is just really, really horrid.

But as to your point, I see nothing wrong with playing just 1 person. I do think it screws with the ELO a bit, because you're being rating on how well you can play one person, rather than how well you overall play the game. I don't think you play a game well unless you can beat various different opponents, proving you can go up against various strategies, etc. But, well, first it's only Battleship. And second, I don't make that big a deal out of ELO, and lots of other things throw it out of whack, and I don't believe any rating system is without its flaws, so I just don't worry about stuff like that much. It will never work perfectly, nor ever be totally fair. So I don't care to start messing with it or adjust it and make rules about it.

That said, it seems odd that playing mostly 1 other person would put someone so high in the ranks. It doesn't seem like it ought to work like that. Wouldn't you just sort of stagnate somewhere, just playing someone who rarely wins?

[N_Faker]

That said, it seems odd that playing mostly 1 other person would put someone so high in the ranks. It doesn't seem like it ought to work like that. Wouldn't you just sort of stagnate somewhere, just playing someone who rarely wins?

It will. But it is delayed by how BGA has tweaked their "ELO rating", by negating any ELO loss past 100.
In addition to starting at 0.

[RicardoRix]

just checked the stats with my LITS games with my mum.

If I win I get +5 ELO, if I lose I get -15.
My win % rate is 75%.
So for every 4 games, I win 3 and get +15 ELO, and the other game I lose I get -15, so very balanced. In fact I think you can't get much better.

The only suggestion would be that I am not really a 420 ELO rated player, but from just the numbers I think you'll struggle to find a better solution.

At-least you know that it does level out. The other opponent at battleships was at 100, so the gain from continually beating that player can't be worth it. There must be better ways to cheat, not that I'm advocating it.

[KaosBombix]

No, it is not allowed.

It is cheat. Multi account for 2p games and kingmaking for more than 2 games.
The problem is that BGA doesn't act again those type of players. I have reported more than 10 of them. Only 1 has been banned (he was 1st on some games...).

I you play against someone you know personally, you normally have to put elo off. but nobody does it...

[Pacaholic]

1. Is this against the rules on boardgamearena?

It is not.

2. Is it okay to play only 1 person and be potentially ranked 1st at a game?

It is ok.


You can read the report conclusion by looking up the reports you have sent. They are linked on the profile of the player you have reported.
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If this shouldn't be allowed, what are your proposed changes to fix this?

Thank you, I didn't notice you can see responses. I do not believe it is okay but like other users have added, no system is perfect. Systems also work best when users don't take advantage of flaws, either purposefully or not purposefully. I never understood in video games where people would hack or cheat to get high scores. I would get zero satisfaction from that, and it would feel like a waste of time. A proposed change would be to limit the elo gain you can get from one opponent. But again this would fix some issues but cause other issues.

The best solution comes from the users self policing themselves but thats not going to work obviously. This user, knowing he is only going to play 1 other player, has no need for an elo system. They do not need to play ranked this way.

When I asked if it was "okay," I realize that is a pretty broad question. So I will rephrase what I was thinking:

Should an elo system allow someone to reach #1 only playing 1 player?

My answer would be no. That doesn't mean the current system needs replaced, just that a better elo system wouldn't allow this.

[N_Faker]

This user, knowing he is only going to play 1 other player, has no need for an elo system. They do not need to play ranked this way.

I do not even believe the mentioned player plays because of rank at all. But just for the fun of it.
And I expect the greatest reason for them playing ranked games, is because ELO defaults to "on".

Should an elo system allow someone to reach #1 only playing 1 player?

Absolutely not. Any ranking system that allows someone to gain and maintain first place by only playing against a single opponent is flawed to the extreme. It would hardly qualify as a ranking system.
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Also, the mentioned player managed to reach such a rank because of the aforementioned tweaked "ELO ranking" BGA implemented. And because Battleships is played fairly infrequently. As the game is played more, it should automatically sort itself out.
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A proposed change would be to limit the elo gain you can get from one opponent. But again this would fix some issues but cause other issues.

That seems to be a sensible idea. I have seen something like it.
And I think it worked rather well, but then again. It would likely not function on BGA, as there are so many >2 player games. ELO in itself works quite badly for anything other than 2 player games.