Ideas to improve the Guru system

[tbhp]

Did you not get a notification a few days ago saying something like "now it's other people's turn"?

It's possible that they make exceptions for games that don't have enough players to afford doing this. Maybe the game got more popular lately and that's why you got skipped for the first time.

[Meeplelowda]

I'm confused. I've been a continuous Guru at "Earth".

Hmmm. Then I'm very confused, because I've "termed out" of games I've been a guru in and was very active. Oh well. I'm not too invested in the whole system.

[FrankJones]

Did you not get a notification a few days ago saying something like "now it's other people's turn"?

It's possible that they make exceptions for games that don't have enough players to afford doing this. Maybe the game got more popular lately and that's why you got skipped for the first time.

Perhaps. The game has actually been played significantly less in the last 2 seasons compared to the first 2.

As Meeplelowda said, not a big deal; I'm just puzzled how the process works. The gurus probably didn't vote to change anything, same as how I would have voted.

[RazorOz]

Hmmm. Then I'm very confused, because I've "termed out" of games I've been a guru in and was very active. Oh well. I'm not too invested in the whole system.

This doesn't make sense to me because I have never lost my Heat guru status since I gained it, and I have months where I'm taking a break and the only games I'm playing are a handful of tournament games, My feeling has always been you have to go > 2 months of low activity to get thrown out of gurus. And that's how it should be I think, because if it was just based on the last 30 days at all time the throughput would be too high, and you wouldn't get a coherent discussion as the players would constantly be changing. If anything I think guru status should look at a longer period than 30 days, as you want people who are invested in the game, as they are more likely to take an interest, currently it can be very easy for most games to play it for a few weeks, qualify for gurus on the back of it, but in reality have already stopped playing, and those players don't really have any interest in gurus or Arena.

[RazorOz]

One of the changes I'd like to see is I feel like the system should weight playing at a higher player count higher. You can't go off time played as how would it work for turn-based then, and I'm not sure how say how the system for win % works would work either as that might weight it too far, as not in every game is adding a player linear in the amount of time it adds.

There is a clear issue though, that if you play 2 player you have a significant advantage at qualifying for gurus under the current system. It isn't a problem for Heat currently, but I can see how it could become one, and therefore how it might be one at other games, where you can play a 2 player game in a 1/3 or a 1/4 of the time of the most popular ways to play the game, yet if 2 player ever become the Arena format I think it would damage interest in the game, because gameplay is just nowhere near as good at 2 player. Indeed one of the reasons it went from 3 to 4 player was because players didn't like the gameplay at 3 player, and there is debate to change it to 5 player, with time being the main concern for not doing it rather than gameplay, as pretty much everyone agrees gameplay would be better.

[tbhp]

Maybe in practice a simple enough solution would be to ask people in good faith if they want to be a guru. Sure, some people might lie, but I think most of the people who play a lot of games but aren't interested in the Arena format would just say "yeah, I'm not interested, it's better for someone else to take my spot".

When you think about it, it's a bit weird that becoming a guru is something that is just forced on people. It should be possible to say no, if you feel it's not your role or like you aren't the target audience.

[Cile]

The whole guru system just overly complicates things. Just make it "anyone who has played at least X arena games during the current season can vote on the settings for next season." 'X' can vary based on the length/popularity of the game.

People who aren't playing arena don't need to vote on arena settings, but there are reasons not to limit the voting to the people who are just trying to complete as many games as they can as fast as possible.

[RazorOz]

The whole guru system just overly complicates things. Just make it "anyone who has played at least X arena games during the current season can vote on the settings for next season." 'X' can vary based on the length/popularity of the game.

People who aren't playing arena don't need to vote on arena settings, but there are reasons not to limit the voting to the people who are just trying to complete as many games as they can as fast as possible.

That doesn't seem a good idea. If you do this, get a bad format, you'd never get out of it as players will just not play it, while the people playing will just keep voting for the same thing.

[Cile]

The whole guru system just overly complicates things. Just make it "anyone who has played at least X arena games during the current season can vote on the settings for next season." 'X' can vary based on the length/popularity of the game.

People who aren't playing arena don't need to vote on arena settings, but there are reasons not to limit the voting to the people who are just trying to complete as many games as they can as fast as possible.

That doesn't seem a good idea. If you do this, get a bad format, you'd never get out of it as players will just not play it, while the people playing will just keep voting for the same thing.

That's already what happens: the players that want to grind the arena ranks by playing a high volume of games vote for settings that allow for the fastest possible games (such as 2 players at the table), and then they are the only ones who get to keep voting on the arena settings due to the volume of games they are playing.

I'm not suggesting a high threshold to be able to vote. For most games I'd think 3 to 5 games would be enough to establish "I like this game enough to want to play it, I've given the current arena settings a reasonable try and would like to vote for something different". For very fast games like Can't Stop you might want a higher threshold, for something like Twilight Imperium I could see that being no higher than 2 or 3.

[tbhp]

I'm not suggesting a high threshold to be able to vote. For most games I'd think 3 to 5 games would be enough to establish "I like this game enough to want to play it, I've given the current arena settings a reasonable try and would like to vote for something different". For very fast games like Can't Stop you might want a higher threshold, for something like Twilight Imperium I could see that being no higher than 2 or 3.

I think 3 to 5 is a nice balance, as this is generally not enough games to qualify for Elite League. So, you could try out the settings enough to be a guru, without having to "taint" your record by getting the Elite badge for a season you didn't adhere to.

Right now the problem is, if I don't like the settings of a current season, how am I supposed to make my voice heard for next season if I have no interest in progressing in the current season?