Board Game Arena

Now that the new Arena season just started, it is a little late (or very early) to discuss other formats for the Arena. But I do it anyway. Currently, seasons alter between 4p and 3p. I think that throwing 5p into the wheel would be a good idea. The current format was decided when the old edition was in place. To me, the new edition enhanced the games with higher player counts significantly. But obviously 4p is the most popular mode and should keep a priority role.

So my suggestion is to alter Arena formats in the following way: 4p - 3p - 4p - 5p.

Please leave your vote and/or opinion.

4p - 3p - 4p - 5p - 4p - 6p would be my suggestion
Or
4p - 6p - 3p - 5p

I think it should alternate just between 4 and 5. With 3 players the military is too important and the resource blocking/card hiding game is not that deep. With 6 and 7 players the game is a bit too random.

7 Players is indeed very random, but I think 6 players can be more strategic than 5 players and 3 players (not always of course), because the pool of cards is excellent.

There is a dual per player (the only player count to do that), there is plenty of greys in the early rounds to make green strategies very possible, but also this makes sure a lot of people are taking them and fighting each other. There is dual chamber of commerce to support just grey pushes, there is dual arena, dual lighthouse to support yellow strategy, there is ludus for military small cards push, just an excellent undeapprieciated player count in my opinion.

It would be cool if, for games that have very large player counts (I think 7 wonders fits the bill), they had separate arenas for more than one player count. You could have individual champions for each player count and then perhaps an overall or combined champion (think world cup skiing or Olympic climbing). The overall could be weighted based on number of games (so you can't just dominate one player count) and perhaps use a harmonic mean (for the same reason).

How should the player count for Arena games change between the seasons over one year?

It shouldn't. Changing player counts means that the comparing performance between seasons is meaningless when every 4er season has more chaos than the ones on either side of it. That chaos also undermines the stated Arena goal of determining the best player of this game.

Anyway, given the fundamental bias of this poll, I'll skip it.

I like 4 player the best so my preference would be:
4/3/4/5 repeat

I'm pleasantly suprised how unpopular 3P is.

7 Wonders is virtually unplayable with 4 players, because the gray resources are too rare.

I only play seasons when it's 3 players.

I guess I would be happy with 3-5-3-5 but that wasn't a poll option.