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Wins Loss stats is killing the game

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Wins Loss stats is killing the game

from Demigod Forums

I don't know about you guys, but personally, starting a game is a living pain. Because of the stats, nobody ever wants to be on the losing team. It is not possible to start a game unless either the teams are perfectly balanced, or you are lucky enough to play against players who don't care to lose, and accepts to start the game. Not to mention rage disconnects right before the citadel falls...

New commers who don't know about this, or who aren't very good get a 2W/20L, and get kicked out of games. And when they don't get kicked, the game never starts anyways, because nobody wants to play a game along side the noob.

Not only that, but it creates an obsession about winning. I personnally just want to have fun, and don't care about losing, but not if I am later judged for not having enough wins. It prevents me from trying to experiment alternative builds, or just plain having fun. I used to not mind losing, but now it really pisses me off, and that is not the way I want to play this game. Playing Demigod has become a source of anger and stress for me.

Isn't there a way to simply have a "ranking"? In lots of games, you have "levels/rank", including supcom. If a player with a high rank wins against a player with a low rank, he gains nothing, and vice versa. Defeating higher ranking players nets higher reankings though.

I think it is vital to try to give players a ranking on something less binary as Win/Loss. I think it is vital that a player can just "Play his best", and have a rank that reflects on his skill, on his performance, and not just on the outcome of the game.

I don't have a concrete solution, but I think something as simple as "Favor per match" could be a better alternative. If you are the best on your team, and still lose, you won't go home empty handed. If you suck, but are on the winning team, then the net gain will be pretty low.

 

How do you guys feel about this?

demigod
16,932 views 30 replies
Reply #26 from Demigod Forums Top

The Elo rating system has been used successfully in tournament chess for about fifty years. About the only significant area which would need tweaking would be to take into account team games with more than one person per side; Yahoo games rate partnership games based on the average team ratings.

Reply #27 from Demigod Forums Top

if they impliment this system i think they should keep the old custom game system up too where people just hop in to the lobby  the player base is so low that the new system your talking about may make waiting for games even longer for people who like to play together if they dont then im against this new system

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Reply #28 from Demigod Forums Top

I've played a lot of single player and LAN games. These don't obviously show in the stat. I tried playing online today. Got kicked off almost every server. On the few games I did manage to get into, I lost 4 of them.. and for some reason my 2 wins today didn't "count" (for some bizarre reason). I have no chance of getting into matches now with a scorecard of 4 games, 4 losses.

 

GG, Stardock. Your pandering and mollycoddling of the stat whores on the Internet have killed the online segment of Demigod. 

Reply #29 from Demigod Forums Top

Has anyone realized the real root of the problem is that there are so few people playing at any given time that there isn't a good mix of skills around at any given time?  The real problem isn't the stats, it's that there aren't enough people playing.

Reply #30 from Stardock Forums Top

Dec 2009

I tried playing online today. Got kicked off almost every server.
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I really hope you don't get completely turned off by online play based just on those experiences.  What you need to understand is that its not necessarily people obsessing about stats.  In fact, it probably isn't that at all.  Its the fact that a new player on any team in mid or higher level of play will almost certainly cause the team that the new player is on to lose.  And unless there are 2 new players in a lobby, you really can't even balance the game at all as someone will end up with the inexperienced player and lose.  So, the typical solution is to kick or ask the new player to leave so a more experienced player can join - that way, everyone in the game gets a fair shot a winning (I'm talking about a balanced game of course).

The solution to avoid getting kicked is somewhat simple, though - host or join noob or new player games.  Some experienced players even host their own noob training games that are often very useful at helping new players learn how to play in multiplayer.  Once you play in enough of those, you'll get more experienced and shouldn't have as much trouble joining games. 

Has anyone realized the real root of the problem is that there are so few people playing at any given time that there isn't a good mix of skills around at any given time?  The real problem isn't the stats, it's that there aren't enough people playing.
End of quote

Yes and no.  I know our community is dwindling (though we are getting some new players - they all start with roughly the same experience - join a MP game and get kicked :( ), but I don't really have that big of a shortage of decent players that join my games regularly. 

The whole thing with stats is this:  yes, its a useful tool.  It generally tells you, at a glance, if the person that joined your game has enough experience to be able to play in a particular type of game.  I'm glad its in the game.  That said, like Saul said, if we had a higher population, there would probably be more noob games hosted, etc, and perhaps a little less kicking (though I've sadly heard about some people getting kicked from noob games).  I agree that the low population is probably the bigger part of the problem.