Arena needs rating decay

[6element]

I'd favor not a daily decay (people do get sick, have crunch at work, life happens...), but removal from a season a player who isn't playing set number of games per certain period of time. Let's say in 7 Wonders (pretty short game) 10 games each 10 days is mandatory. It's like an hour and a half per 10 days, pretty reasonable for a competitive player.

This way "camping at place X till the very end" is impossible, regardless what X is - 1 or 15. Camping shouldn't be a viable strategy.

[TESTDEL]

I'd favor not a daily decay (people do get sick, have crunch at work, life happens...), but removal from a season a player who isn't playing set number of games per certain period of time. Let's say in 7 Wonders (pretty short game) 10 games each 10 days is mandatory. It's like an hour and a half per 10 days, pretty reasonable for a competitive player.

This way "camping at place X till the very end" is impossible, regardless what X is - 1 or 15. Camping shouldn't be a viable strategy.

90 games, minimum, in a season? That's way too much. Some do play a lot, but most don't. All this will do is that a lot of people will stop playing in the start and only start at the end.

[6element]

I'd favor not a daily decay (people do get sick, have crunch at work, life happens...), but removal from a season a player who isn't playing set number of games per certain period of time. Let's say in 7 Wonders (pretty short game) 10 games each 10 days is mandatory. It's like an hour and a half per 10 days, pretty reasonable for a competitive player.

This way "camping at place X till the very end" is impossible, regardless what X is - 1 or 15. Camping shouldn't be a viable strategy.

90 games, minimum, in a season? That's way too much. Some do play a lot, but most don't. All this will do is that a lot of people will stop playing in the start and only start at the end.

7 games per 7 days or 10 games per 10 days - the numbers can be tweaked. Regardless, minimal number of games per season should be sufficiently representative for defining a champion of a season, I honestly think 300 is a bare minimum for 7 Wonders, but since seasons are short maybe 150 is enough. 90 is quite low, folks who don't play enough during a particular season shouldn't have a path to become season's champions.

PS: Regarding starting at the end - this system should start from the 1st day. You didn't play 10 games during 1st 10 days of a season - you wait till the next season to start.

[TESTDEL]

I'd favor not a daily decay (people do get sick, have crunch at work, life happens...), but removal from a season a player who isn't playing set number of games per certain period of time. Let's say in 7 Wonders (pretty short game) 10 games each 10 days is mandatory. It's like an hour and a half per 10 days, pretty reasonable for a competitive player.

This way "camping at place X till the very end" is impossible, regardless what X is - 1 or 15. Camping shouldn't be a viable strategy.

90 games, minimum, in a season? That's way too much. Some do play a lot, but most don't. All this will do is that a lot of people will stop playing in the start and only start at the end.

7 games per 7 days or 10 games per 10 days - the numbers can be tweaked. Regardless, minimal number of games per season should be sufficiently representative for defining a champion of a season, I honestly think 300 is a bare minimum for 7 Wonders, but since seasons are short maybe 150 is enough. 90 is quite low, folks who don't play enough during a particular season shouldn't have a path to become season's champions.

PS: Regarding starting at the end - this system should start from the 1st day. You didn't play 10 games during 1st 10 days of a season - you wait till the next season to start.

Maybe you misunderstood. Forcing people to play minimum 90 games in 3 months and over and above that force them to play, almost every day, the same game is not correct. After all the intent of this thread was to get the best player as the winner and not the one who can brute force their way to the top.

If at all something needs to be implemented, then it should be keeping a cap on games per month so that people cannot brute force. For this the median number of games played per person in the Arena last season could be a representative.

[6element]

Maybe you misunderstood

I'm not talking about forcing people to play. Arena is optional, participating in each season is optional. For example, I'm skipping 4-player seasons of 7 Wonders, but I'm still playing 7 Wonders while these seasons are happening, just not at Arena. Maybe if a person cannot play required number of games per season, they should skip the season and play non-Arena games?

What I'm saying is that to claim that someone is a champion of a season, that person should at least:
- play enough games with different opponents so the data is representative. If this isn't the case, the "champion" title is irrelevant.
- participate in games through the entire season, do not sit idle at place X, trying to jump to #1 at the very end or hoping nobody will do so. This is not a strategy which should be rewarded.

[TESTDEL]

If Arena is optional then making minimum requirement is not required and this thread doesn't have any purpose. Those who don't like the current system can chose not to play this optional thing.

A true champion will score more points playing the same number of games as everyone else, not playing 2x-10x the number of games as others can or want to. So a cap would serve the purpose as everyone will have the same chance of becoming the champion and it will be more of a function of skill. And those who want to play the same game hundreds of times can also do, play normal games.

[6element]

Competition is about comparing skills, which requires sufficient data to be meaningful.

Let's say a person played 20 games per season and won 19 of them, are they a candidate to be "champion"? Their win rate is almost perfect.

Another person played 100 games and won 80, can we say that it's quite possible the second player is weaker? Can we compare them reliably?

Also, a competition is about actively participating in it and actually winning games. Sitting idle for weeks (camping) is what precisely removes such a "competitor" from a particular competition.

PS: Also, how many Arena games have you played?

[TESTDEL]

Competition is about comparing skills, which requires sufficient data to be meaningful.

Let's say a person played 20 games per season and won 19 of them, are they a candidate to be "champion"? Their win rate is almost perfect.

Another person played 100 games and won 80, can we say that it's quite possible the second player is weaker? Can we compare them reliably?

Also, a competition is about actively participating in it and actually winning games. Sitting idle for weeks (camping) is what precisely removes such a "competitor" from a particular competition.

PS: Also, how many Arena games have you played?

Which is why the same number of games. If both players can play only a fixed number of games, say 40, it is directly comparable. All the real life tournaments, which I am aware of, involve fixed number of games.

Most people like to play more than 1 game so creating an artificial minimum barrier is noncompetitive and only favours those who want to play 1 or 2 games.

[nmego]

To add another perspective, I'm finding it harder and harder to find arena games (especially on 7 wonders and RaceFTG), so that I'll probably have to settle to playing them turn-based. So if rating decay was ever implemented, it should take these factors under consideration. Especially for longer games that take a while to finish.

[6element]

I'm not proposing rating decay (actually I'm against it), it is annoying and unfair. I'm saying that number of games should be sufficient to compare players and "being good at meta-game of sitting and waiting / jumping at last minute" is not a skill worth a reward. The second issue IMHO must be addressed in order for Arena to be more enjoyable, but it can be addressed differently.

Fixed number of games isn't that bad. 40 games is clearly too small if we're talking about games with random opponents (with non-restricted ELO). If ELO > 400 is used as a filter (for 7 Wonders, other games will have different limit), 40 games per season might be sufficient for defining a champion, but it'll require some coordination because strong opponents live in different time zones. If restriction is more forgiving (say ELO > 250), I still think at least 100 games per season would be necessary to determine a champion.