how bout stats for red thumbs/green how many moons yOU have passed ,how many moons helped ya .what city what county what type of shoes you ware . stop it ///////////keep it ///////////SIMPLE/STUPID. WINS OR LOSSES.
New ranking -- inexperienced
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
There are two different issues here - inexperienced players, and players who have played a reasonable amount (and are therefore "experienced") but are, well, not very good.
For me the major issue is the "not very good" player; not because losing to them costs so much - if a good player loses to a poor player you deserve to get your rating hit hard! But because it makes for a poor game for all concerned if the standard is so very different. Backgammon is one of the few games I'm reasonably good at, and playing somebody who plays extremely badly is no fun for me and, surely, can't be great for them either. I don't know what you'd call the lower level - nobody wants to be labelled "poor player", but "inexperienced" isn't what the original post seems to be about. And actually, the cut-off seems to be around 1500 in the games I play - players below 1500 are significantly less good than players at 1599. Perhaps "below average" really is what we want!
Learning a new game then sometimes I like to play better players, to see how they approach it. But I also want to play poorer players at my own level to get some practice in games where there is actually something for me to play for.
Incidentally, > Silene, elo ratings change according to the existing ratings of the players involved - the actual numbers, not just a broad banding.
For me the major issue is the "not very good" player; not because losing to them costs so much - if a good player loses to a poor player you deserve to get your rating hit hard! But because it makes for a poor game for all concerned if the standard is so very different. Backgammon is one of the few games I'm reasonably good at, and playing somebody who plays extremely badly is no fun for me and, surely, can't be great for them either. I don't know what you'd call the lower level - nobody wants to be labelled "poor player", but "inexperienced" isn't what the original post seems to be about. And actually, the cut-off seems to be around 1500 in the games I play - players below 1500 are significantly less good than players at 1599. Perhaps "below average" really is what we want!
Learning a new game then sometimes I like to play better players, to see how they approach it. But I also want to play poorer players at my own level to get some practice in games where there is actually something for me to play for.
Incidentally, > Silene, elo ratings change according to the existing ratings of the players involved - the actual numbers, not just a broad banding.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
I don't understand your last sentence. And what is a "broad bending"?
Check out the Allround-League: https://boardgamearena.com/group?id=7870115 --> a league where you have matches of random games vs. other players in your group. Season 9 registration oct. '25.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
Sorry Silene - I obviously misunderstood your post. "Broad bending" was actually "broad BANDING" - as in Expert ... Good ... Beginner. But ignore it - I was wrong!
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
Maybe i wasn't clear. What i wanted to say is if you change new player ELO to 1400 (instead of 1500) the ranking distribution will form the same curve but around 1400 instead of around 1500 --> which means that there are fewer players fitting the condition for master/expert/goodplayer.
Check out the Allround-League: https://boardgamearena.com/group?id=7870115 --> a league where you have matches of random games vs. other players in your group. Season 9 registration oct. '25.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
If you want to go straight to the fact, just read the "Important part".
Silene and Pedros, you're definitely right. Some people above you don't understand what elo is.
I'll try to be clear, there might be some langage errors in such a long text I'm going to write - please ask me if they're something that isn't understandable. Since I don't write that in a straightforward way, just tell me if it seems I didn't finish a sentence or an idea.
ELO is a mathematical formula which takes the 2 previous ELOs, the result of the game (who won) and gives 2 new ELOs. In addition, for chess (I dunno how it's implemented here), there is already a coefficient which takes into account the "experience" (numbers of games already played). This coefficient (a round number) is higher (40) for new players (less than 30 games) : allows new players to get to their real place faster. This coefficient is also lower (10) than average (20) for people who already went above 2400 once (whether they're still above 2400 or not). It alows people proven solid players not to be taken down too easily. Since the field of players on BGA is not big enough to get a consequent number of players above 2400, I won't speak more about the coefficient for those real solid guys.
I don't know if BGA have different coefficient already but I guess they probably do.
Anyway, you guys want to make this coefficient lower for beginners ... this is the contrary of what is done for chess. Some also want to make beginner start with lower elo ... Basically, you're seing it from a self-centered point of view. As Silene was depicting, all our ELOs are a kind of (swimming-)pool : when a new players gets in, it makes some waves, then after few seconds, everything's calm and even again. And if each new player is "smaller" (lower elo), it will just make the whole pool smaller too. The pool is fine. But you are a small water drop that takes this wave and gets stirred. In the process, you get "hit" by another water drop (the new player, with is still moving because it has an anaccurate elo), and you'll hit other water drops (other players) because your elo is now a bit inaccurate too. This is the wave spreading. But don't worry, the system is stable. Maybe after 10 new players, who appeared to truly be masters, dived in and after the wave got blurred ; you'll have 10 less elo points, but so will have the other players of similar level. Mathematics are cool in a pool (sorry I put that in bold but it sounds good
).
Smaller coefficient would make the wave smaller ... but longer. This is worse for the new player, and overall for the pool.
Of course, as I just explained, the single water drops (you), gets "hurt" :/ But you shouldn't care about that, this is not what matters. Don't be offended, I'm not saying you guys are selfish : I think you're seeing it that way because of the restrictions. ELO is made for ranking. And ranking is made for competition. And competition is good for 2 things : playing with guys of your level, and distinguish the best guys (seen with labels GoodPlayer/Expert/Master and the prestige points related to them). Restriction takes place in the competition to use elo and allow you to play with players of the same level. And the current restriction system (1600/1800/2000) is too rigid. This rigidity makes you look at those artificial 1600-1800-2000 boundaries. The rigidity makes the wave caused by a new player looks uncomfortable and dangerous. It divides the pool in 4
Like 4 different pools of 4 different colors. It creates discrimination (I know I sound dramatic - just kidding). And the water drop is afraid it could be pushed in a pool in which it doesn't fit, founding itself with strange water drops, with a strange color. But those color are superficial, we're all brothers and sisters 
(yeah, I went far). Let's break down walls which separate siblings ! Let's make a unique pool again, where we can play in the waves like children in the sea.
IMPORTANT PART
For me, the center of the problem is indeed the "restriction", as the subject of this thread points out (creating new category). Yes, a guy with 1620 elo wants to play with a guy with 1585 elo but doesn't want to play with a guy who has 1795 or 1450. Not even talking of people with 1304 elo and 1596 who are supposed to fight in the same category.
So may I suggest that player could set a custom elo-fork when restricting a game ? Of course, we'd keep the "bands" (as Pedros calls them) for Prestige points. Beyond that, what should be a fork ? I see several options :
- totally loose system where a player can input the values he wants (I'm 1589, I want players between 1557 and 1632).
- bounds of the fork can be ticked on a scale from 1000 to 2500 with 25- or 50-points steps, with possibility to let one of the bound open. Or instead, of ticking, could be sliders on a scale.
- make a whole new simply way to restrict the game to players whose elo is +/- 50,100 or 150 compared to the table's host's elo. Again, we would just have to tick "restrict to player who have +/- 50 elo points than me", "restrict to player who have +/- 100 elo points than me", "restrict to player who have +/- 150 elo points than me".
I like the last option best. I even think we could go for only 1 option "restrict to player who have +/- 100 elo points than me".
Since categories seems fine for me for some games (I think of Hanabi, which is collaborative and compares the players' elo with a fixed game's elo, depending on which dificulty we're playing), we could also keep current category restrictions. In the end,it would add just one button. Not much complexity here, and a fairer way to restrict.
END OF IMPORTANT PART
Of course, as it's been modified by the guys of BGA last year, and whatever option is chosen, one player couldn't set a fork in which he wouldn't be included. And, of course, to restrict is optional, as in the current system.
Since people want to create a new category to have more accurate restrcition, this new "restriction system" would allow us to avoid the creation of a new category for players below 1300 or 1350, which could make them feels bad and wouldn't be logical regarding the prestige-points giving labels - I mean, with an "average" label giving 0 prestige point.
The new restriction, though, doesn't bring any novelty about new players' plunge. Makes things look less dramatic but you'll still get a little bit "hurt". I'll just detail a bit more how I think about that. I wasn't totally honnest about that before
In chess, usually, a player gets his first elo at the end of his first tournament ... So it can be set to a number quite close to his real worth. Here, we can't make that. Our ELO is based on 1500. Bascially, players who are good are inclined to keep on playing and those who are less good are inclined to stop. That's why it can look like average elo is above 1500. But if you take all inactive players, 1500 is the average. This is how ELO works, changing the "1500" landmark would just move the problem a bit further. As said in other posts, setting to 1400 would make it better if the new player is a real newbie but way worse if the new player turns out to be experienced. So basically, we can't do much about that
Well ... I see a solution but it doesn't fit with the prestige points and a ultra-competitive spirit, and possible dishonnest guys. I'm fine with that since the main purpose for me is the game but I already hear a lot of protestations from players who are more attached to absolute ranking. The solution would simply be to allow new players to set their initial elo by themselves. Of course, this wouldn't be perfect, be it would decrease the "wave", the volatil effects of playing against new players. To avoid people wondering "what the hell, I don't know anything about elo and they ask me to give a number", a new player, in his first game, could chose from "never played that game before=1400elo", "already played some games=1500elo", "experienced and rather good=1600elo", "I'm so smart I'm beating all my friends irl=1700elo". But even like that, it could be seen as a nuisance for a new BGA-user or even regular BGA-players. Dunno ... maybe can someone think further about that
To finish, I'd just precise again that ELO is initially a system for 2-players game, and is quite fugace when it comes to rank people after a 4- or more players game (hello Saboteur, Perudo, Elfenland, ...). It's even more fugace when it comes to games who have a greater "random" factor than chess ... i.e. main games on this site. I don't know anything about other ranking systems and I'm not a big mathematician so I can't propose anything else (and honnestly I'm rather fine with the actual system
). Anyway I feel it would maybe make sense to make a lowering coefficient for games with higher number of player and/or for games with a higher luck factor. This coefficient would be related to the number of players. For luck factor, difficult to judge how high it is, but everythings that include dices or other random generators could get a lowering coefficient.
Please tell me someone read that ... took me some time to write XD
Silene and Pedros, you're definitely right. Some people above you don't understand what elo is.
I'll try to be clear, there might be some langage errors in such a long text I'm going to write - please ask me if they're something that isn't understandable. Since I don't write that in a straightforward way, just tell me if it seems I didn't finish a sentence or an idea.
ELO is a mathematical formula which takes the 2 previous ELOs, the result of the game (who won) and gives 2 new ELOs. In addition, for chess (I dunno how it's implemented here), there is already a coefficient which takes into account the "experience" (numbers of games already played). This coefficient (a round number) is higher (40) for new players (less than 30 games) : allows new players to get to their real place faster. This coefficient is also lower (10) than average (20) for people who already went above 2400 once (whether they're still above 2400 or not). It alows people proven solid players not to be taken down too easily. Since the field of players on BGA is not big enough to get a consequent number of players above 2400, I won't speak more about the coefficient for those real solid guys.
I don't know if BGA have different coefficient already but I guess they probably do.
Anyway, you guys want to make this coefficient lower for beginners ... this is the contrary of what is done for chess. Some also want to make beginner start with lower elo ... Basically, you're seing it from a self-centered point of view. As Silene was depicting, all our ELOs are a kind of (swimming-)pool : when a new players gets in, it makes some waves, then after few seconds, everything's calm and even again. And if each new player is "smaller" (lower elo), it will just make the whole pool smaller too. The pool is fine. But you are a small water drop that takes this wave and gets stirred. In the process, you get "hit" by another water drop (the new player, with is still moving because it has an anaccurate elo), and you'll hit other water drops (other players) because your elo is now a bit inaccurate too. This is the wave spreading. But don't worry, the system is stable. Maybe after 10 new players, who appeared to truly be masters, dived in and after the wave got blurred ; you'll have 10 less elo points, but so will have the other players of similar level. Mathematics are cool in a pool (sorry I put that in bold but it sounds good
).Smaller coefficient would make the wave smaller ... but longer. This is worse for the new player, and overall for the pool.
Of course, as I just explained, the single water drops (you), gets "hurt" :/ But you shouldn't care about that, this is not what matters. Don't be offended, I'm not saying you guys are selfish : I think you're seeing it that way because of the restrictions. ELO is made for ranking. And ranking is made for competition. And competition is good for 2 things : playing with guys of your level, and distinguish the best guys (seen with labels GoodPlayer/Expert/Master and the prestige points related to them). Restriction takes place in the competition to use elo and allow you to play with players of the same level. And the current restriction system (1600/1800/2000) is too rigid. This rigidity makes you look at those artificial 1600-1800-2000 boundaries. The rigidity makes the wave caused by a new player looks uncomfortable and dangerous. It divides the pool in 4
Like 4 different pools of 4 different colors. It creates discrimination (I know I sound dramatic - just kidding). And the water drop is afraid it could be pushed in a pool in which it doesn't fit, founding itself with strange water drops, with a strange color. But those color are superficial, we're all brothers and sisters (yeah, I went far). Let's break down walls which separate siblings ! Let's make a unique pool again, where we can play in the waves like children in the sea.IMPORTANT PART
For me, the center of the problem is indeed the "restriction", as the subject of this thread points out (creating new category). Yes, a guy with 1620 elo wants to play with a guy with 1585 elo but doesn't want to play with a guy who has 1795 or 1450. Not even talking of people with 1304 elo and 1596 who are supposed to fight in the same category.
So may I suggest that player could set a custom elo-fork when restricting a game ? Of course, we'd keep the "bands" (as Pedros calls them) for Prestige points. Beyond that, what should be a fork ? I see several options :
- totally loose system where a player can input the values he wants (I'm 1589, I want players between 1557 and 1632).
- bounds of the fork can be ticked on a scale from 1000 to 2500 with 25- or 50-points steps, with possibility to let one of the bound open. Or instead, of ticking, could be sliders on a scale.
- make a whole new simply way to restrict the game to players whose elo is +/- 50,100 or 150 compared to the table's host's elo. Again, we would just have to tick "restrict to player who have +/- 50 elo points than me", "restrict to player who have +/- 100 elo points than me", "restrict to player who have +/- 150 elo points than me".
I like the last option best. I even think we could go for only 1 option "restrict to player who have +/- 100 elo points than me".
Since categories seems fine for me for some games (I think of Hanabi, which is collaborative and compares the players' elo with a fixed game's elo, depending on which dificulty we're playing), we could also keep current category restrictions. In the end,it would add just one button. Not much complexity here, and a fairer way to restrict.
END OF IMPORTANT PART
Of course, as it's been modified by the guys of BGA last year, and whatever option is chosen, one player couldn't set a fork in which he wouldn't be included. And, of course, to restrict is optional, as in the current system.
Since people want to create a new category to have more accurate restrcition, this new "restriction system" would allow us to avoid the creation of a new category for players below 1300 or 1350, which could make them feels bad and wouldn't be logical regarding the prestige-points giving labels - I mean, with an "average" label giving 0 prestige point.
The new restriction, though, doesn't bring any novelty about new players' plunge. Makes things look less dramatic but you'll still get a little bit "hurt". I'll just detail a bit more how I think about that. I wasn't totally honnest about that before
In chess, usually, a player gets his first elo at the end of his first tournament ... So it can be set to a number quite close to his real worth. Here, we can't make that. Our ELO is based on 1500. Bascially, players who are good are inclined to keep on playing and those who are less good are inclined to stop. That's why it can look like average elo is above 1500. But if you take all inactive players, 1500 is the average. This is how ELO works, changing the "1500" landmark would just move the problem a bit further. As said in other posts, setting to 1400 would make it better if the new player is a real newbie but way worse if the new player turns out to be experienced. So basically, we can't do much about that Well ... I see a solution but it doesn't fit with the prestige points and a ultra-competitive spirit, and possible dishonnest guys. I'm fine with that since the main purpose for me is the game but I already hear a lot of protestations from players who are more attached to absolute ranking. The solution would simply be to allow new players to set their initial elo by themselves. Of course, this wouldn't be perfect, be it would decrease the "wave", the volatil effects of playing against new players. To avoid people wondering "what the hell, I don't know anything about elo and they ask me to give a number", a new player, in his first game, could chose from "never played that game before=1400elo", "already played some games=1500elo", "experienced and rather good=1600elo", "I'm so smart I'm beating all my friends irl=1700elo". But even like that, it could be seen as a nuisance for a new BGA-user or even regular BGA-players. Dunno ... maybe can someone think further about that
To finish, I'd just precise again that ELO is initially a system for 2-players game, and is quite fugace when it comes to rank people after a 4- or more players game (hello Saboteur, Perudo, Elfenland, ...). It's even more fugace when it comes to games who have a greater "random" factor than chess ... i.e. main games on this site. I don't know anything about other ranking systems and I'm not a big mathematician so I can't propose anything else (and honnestly I'm rather fine with the actual system
). Anyway I feel it would maybe make sense to make a lowering coefficient for games with higher number of player and/or for games with a higher luck factor. This coefficient would be related to the number of players. For luck factor, difficult to judge how high it is, but everythings that include dices or other random generators could get a lowering coefficient.Please tell me someone read that ... took me some time to write XD
Last edited by Tyeor on 27 January 2016, 19:27, edited 5 times in total.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
Huuuuuum, here I am 2 hours later, was still thinking about that, and thought of the fact that non-members can't see ELO. Then it'd be a nightmare for them, not being abe to know if they can join a table or not.
I also thought "people must have thought of +/- elo restrictions before me". Searching in the forum, found 3 threads about restrictions, new players and categories as we spoke about them here.
- Summer/Fall 2015 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... n&start=10 Basically a guy who had same idea, but with +/- 5%, 10% or 15% elo restriction. Some people approving, and speaking of +/-200 elo. And others speaking of a more precise scale than categories
- Summer 2015 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... ion#p22112 same as above, less developped
- 2012 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... tion#p4635 a guy not happy about new players who don't really have an average level
Back to the problem : non-members can't see their ELO. I'd like to say I didn't get a membership to be able to see ELO, statistics, and have the privilege to open some tables. I did it because I had played for 2 years and I felt that was just normal to give some money to BGA, to "Donate", precisely what the button says I'm grateful for the little privilege, but I think they should be given to all players. I like BGA as a free site 
I dunno if that could be changed ... maybe if enough members express similar feelings.
Else, if non-members can't see their elo, elo-based restrictions aren't good. Then, yes, because non-members can see their category, a new category would be better than nothing.
I also thought "people must have thought of +/- elo restrictions before me". Searching in the forum, found 3 threads about restrictions, new players and categories as we spoke about them here.
- Summer/Fall 2015 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... n&start=10 Basically a guy who had same idea, but with +/- 5%, 10% or 15% elo restriction. Some people approving, and speaking of +/-200 elo. And others speaking of a more precise scale than categories
- Summer 2015 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... ion#p22112 same as above, less developped
- 2012 http://forum.boardgamearena.com/viewtop ... tion#p4635 a guy not happy about new players who don't really have an average level
Back to the problem : non-members can't see their ELO. I'd like to say I didn't get a membership to be able to see ELO, statistics, and have the privilege to open some tables. I did it because I had played for 2 years and I felt that was just normal to give some money to BGA, to "Donate", precisely what the button says
I'm grateful for the little privilege, but I think they should be given to all players. I like BGA as a free site I dunno if that could be changed ... maybe if enough members express similar feelings.
Else, if non-members can't see their elo, elo-based restrictions aren't good. Then, yes, because non-members can see their category, a new category would be better than nothing.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
I pick some ideas from this and other threads and add my 2 pence to some ways on how I think ELO and table restriction would be better:
Suggested changes for table restriction:
A player's ELO should be more stable (right now you can easily go up/down some hundred by a few games). So:
Suggested changes for table restriction:
- Don't display labels (GP,Expert,Master) - it might lead to bad feelings (might be ok for prestige-badges in player info but looks not so nice on open tables).
- Display ELO instead to avoid judgement (and feelings of being lower class players).
- Allow table restriction by steps of +- 100 ELO (compared to host) instead of by labels
- Make restriction one doesn't fit visible on "Play now" screen: i.e. highlight it red
- In turnbased: table host should be able to tick "don't allow players i dislike" (don't highlight this)
A player's ELO should be more stable (right now you can easily go up/down some hundred by a few games). So:
- Lower overall ELO coefficient
- Lower it even more for quick luck-based games
- Change how it's done for games with 3 or more players (change ELO by 100 because you get 1st/last in a 6 player-game is insane)
- Keep very high coefficient for new players so they reach their rank quickly (keep asymetric ELO-change - could be even more extreme)
Last edited by Silene on 28 January 2016, 14:14, edited 2 times in total.
Check out the Allround-League: https://boardgamearena.com/group?id=7870115 --> a league where you have matches of random games vs. other players in your group. Season 9 registration oct. '25.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
agree totally that bga site causes friction with discrimination with elo and catagorys.Silene great suggestion one huge step forward if bga implements.
Re: New ranking -- inexperienced
Hi guys ... I thought I should reply because .. one thing bothers me about BGA, and it is the way we use it (and I include myself in we).
I think a lot of player (including me sometimes ) just focus on elo ranking and only try to become an expert player (or good or master depending on your current ranking). In the real life I like playing because I like to have fun. So many times people have complained about ELO, and I really think the simplest solution is that we should stop worrying about ELO ranking, and stop trying to improve our own ranking ... we should just play and try to have fun! (and try to win of course )
What I mean more precisely: restricting a table to players at your level because you do not want to get bored is a good thing, but restricting a table to players at your level because you do not want to loose ELO points is just wrong (I think this reflects the friction and discrimination mentioned by intrepid)
I want to play with players that are nice and polite, that reply when I talk to them, sometimes with player that do not take too much time to think if I am in a hurry. I do not think the problem is BGA, you can change the ELO however you want there will always be people "cheating with the system" (I mean playing so that they improve their ELO instead of playing and have the ELO reflect their level). The problem is the way we use BGA!
With a few people, we tried to create a talkative and friendly game group a while ago ... was not much successful, probably this was not the right tool ... but at least I tried!
SOrry if this was long I thought it would just be my 2 cents but ...
Ludo
PS: you want to just have fun playing, contact me I will be happy to help!
I think a lot of player (including me sometimes
) just focus on elo ranking and only try to become an expert player (or good or master depending on your current ranking). In the real life I like playing because I like to have fun. So many times people have complained about ELO, and I really think the simplest solution is that we should stop worrying about ELO ranking, and stop trying to improve our own ranking ... we should just play and try to have fun! (and try to win of course )What I mean more precisely: restricting a table to players at your level because you do not want to get bored is a good thing, but restricting a table to players at your level because you do not want to loose ELO points is just wrong (I think this reflects the friction and discrimination mentioned by intrepid)
I want to play with players that are nice and polite, that reply when I talk to them, sometimes with player that do not take too much time to think if I am in a hurry. I do not think the problem is BGA, you can change the ELO however you want there will always be people "cheating with the system" (I mean playing so that they improve their ELO instead of playing and have the ELO reflect their level). The problem is the way we use BGA!
With a few people, we tried to create a talkative and friendly game group a while ago ... was not much successful, probably this was not the right tool ... but at least I tried!
SOrry if this was long I thought it would just be my 2 cents but ...
Ludo
PS: you want to just have fun playing, contact me I will be happy to help!