Yes but, from my understanding, most "simple" ELO systems -- as Jon describes it -- just take into account wins and losses. While they can take into account draws and close games, they don't have to. I would imagine that the 1st iteration of the system will probably be along these lines with maybe a more sophisticated system (though I dont think that would be necessary) implemented later on.
First, thanks for the link. I have some understanding of statistics (shh: I've taught college statistics) so a good skimming was enough to give me faith it can work. And I also caught how Wikipedia, surprise surprise, has poor writing that contradicts their own explanation and would confuse the casual reader. Now: Unfortunately, they HAVE to acknowledge one sort of "draw" game: a dropped game. That is, a dropped internet connection for a player due to who-knows-what-reason, or the deliberate tendency of some players to go "oh no, I don't want my record to get SLIGHTLY WORSE, I'm gonna close the browser five seconds before my opponent can win!" If there's nothing in place for a dropped connection, players will get ticked. And if there's nothing in place for sore losers . . . players will get ticked.
Sure, I dont think that the server can distinguish between those 2 incidents. I guess there are 2 options: 1) dont have the match count for anything at all or 2) count it as a loss no matter the cause. I'm personally indifferent as long as its consistent. Boardgamearena.com has a nice system where time outs or dropped matches dont count against your ELO rating but are shown visibly next to your user name during match making. That way if someone has 15 "dropped" matches you can choose to just not play them, even if on the off chance that they do just have a very bad connection. That way you have a points rating system for winning and losing and a self-enforced "reliability" rating as well.
Oh, I've never been happy. Actually, I was mostly just trying to make an Electric Light Orchestra reference. Success? Fail? Maybe both? I would say that there's a lot of competitive games out there that have unappealing communities. In my youth, I played some competitive Magic, until the distinct lack of sportsmanship and camaraderie pushed me out. I'm also quite fond of MOBA/aRTS/LPG games like League of Legends and DOTA 2, but their communities are notorious for their lack of compassion for newbies and misplays. This is something I've been meaning to post about in relation to Card Hunter, in fact. If we want Card Hunter to be a cool game to play competitive multiplayer in, it falls to us to create an inclusive, newbie-friendly community that values sportsmanship and fun above all else. This starts now, but thankfully I think we've all been doing a great job of not being jerkbags on the forums so far. I don't believe there are draws, but the way victory points worked in the multiplayer demo is as follows... If you are the only player with characters standing in a "victory area" at the end of a turn, you gain 1 VP. In the demo, this victory area was a 2x2 square covered with gold coins in the middle of the arena. If you defeat one of the enemy's characters, you gain 2 VP. First player to 6 VP wins. Thus, yeah, you can differentiate between a "blowout" victory and a "close" victory. I'm pretty sure DOTA 2 goes one step further and will start matching players who drop/disconnect from games a lot up with each other, separating them from the general playerbase. I think a "Reliability" rating like you describe is probably as far as we'd need to go down that route for Card Hunter, though. Does the site you describe have any mechanism for resetting your Reliability at some point, besides just starting a new account?
It also goes without saying that if you drop, you lose. It doesn't matter if your internet connection 'dies out' and it 'wasn't your fault', you're essentially wasting your opponent's time. If your mom, teacher or santa claus tells you to stop, you lose. If your house is on fire, you have more important things to worry about than winning a card game. (spot the Dota 2 jerk)
I agree. yes there was a way to reset. I dont recall exactly, but after some time period of "good" behavior the drops weren't visible anymore. Something like "greggors: X drops and Y timeouts in Z recent games". I believe at some point of good behavior the number of recent games stayed the same and the drops and timeouts stayed the same. Not entirely sure though
It was a success from my perspective. Eh. Not to be a Negative Nancy, but we're also a very, very small community of people sponging up information about a game that we are highly anticipating. One that isn't out yet. PAX Demo aside, there are no players here. Other than a couple scattered incidents of people trying to prove that they will like and support this theoretical game more than anyone else on the forum, we've lacked any external conflict. We have yet to draw in and keep any unnecessarily-competitive "average players" that those other games live off of. Because, you know... there's no game for them to play yet. No one has yet had reason to proclaim someone else's inferiority at the top of their internet lungs, nor reason to yell back. I sincerely hope we can keep a positive, helpful community as the game grows, but those require both a strict, self-policing community and very active Mods. I've been in games where we've managed it, but those games were the exception. ----- As someone with a horrid internet connection I am rather frequently dropped from games. Even ones that I was winning. Especially ones that I was winning. It is incredibly frustrating watching a timer tick down while my computer or internet connection or both struggle to keep a game running and inevitably be automatically kicked from a match. That said, I fully understand the reason for, and support, "reliability" metrics and auto-losses in such cases. The potential for abuse needs to be curtailed. That, and I'm just not much into multiplayer to begin with, so I don't really care. I'll try a match or two once every blue moon just for a change of pace, but I'll not likely be a fixture of the multiplayer scene.
Zoorland totally sucks! I'm way better than him. In fact I'm the best there ever was and ever will be! Jk, jk, I'm sure he's way better than me.
Indeed. Back more in the direction of the original topic (what? I can do that too, occasionally), I would be perfectly supportive of purchasable "Multiplayer decks" for those who just wanted to jump in to the competitive scene and show off their elite skills. Tiered multiplayer gear that can be purchased to kit out characters for level-appropriate multiplayer games. Above average, perhaps, but strictly inferior (I really do mean that) to the best items you could find in single player. This would be starter gear so that brand new, horribly impatient players could jump right in and be competitive without having to first go and actually play the game. I suggest "tiered, level-appropriate" gear simply because I do not know how the multiplayer will be divided up; if we're all thrown into the same pool and not separated by level or some other metric than of course only a single package would be necessary (or desired). Supplement this with, as suggested previously, loot for PvP matches (every ten to twenty wins, or some such?) and you have a workable system for standalone multiplayer. Make this purchasable gear strictly usable in multiplayer only and you keep any bleed-through from affecting the single player experience. Now, because I actually have very strong feelings about this, I want to make it clear that what I am suggesting would be a suite of gear identical in every way to gear that could be acquired in single player. Also that it is specifically good, but not great, equipment. Not special multiplayer-exclusive cards, not the best stuff you could find, just a selection of solid starter gear for those too hip for single player.
I like the idea of being able to buy cards, and buy good cards at that, but not buy the best cards. Would those would be acquirable by the multi-player only crowd by trading though? This is a card game, and one of my favorite parts of CCGs is the trading, I wonder if it will exist, and how it will if it does.
Even though "you get cards by playing the game," it is not the case that all items are loot in a strict sense of the word. The CH map includes an item store (probably several, with varying quality levels). Jon uses it to get something for his wizard when preparing for the Black Forest. So there could be a side-by-side system where some use their looted gold while others pay in Pizza for store gear. We've heard little about what might be sold for cash, but I have the impression that Jon's ideas include things like XP boosters or loot drop improvers. Selling the items straight out wouldn't be too far off that plan, granting players the privilege to obtain the exact gear they want while skipping some of the grinding. Part of the design is to have your lovingly developed characters for both sides of the game, so I just can't see them restricting any items to only one mode of play.
I actually think that might be unnecessary. Your ability to equip items in multiplayer is presumably gated only by whatever "level tiers" are available competitively. I'm guessing multiplayer will always be between characters of the exact same level, be it max level, or one of many options lower than that. The latter case would presumably exist so that people can fairly fight each other with Sharpened Sticks instead of Metal Babble Swords. In order to use the same equipment in single player, though, you'll have to level your characters up by actually playing! So, sure, buy Roshirai's Blade for your multiplayer battles on day 1. It takes two gold talents to equip, though, so if you wanna use it in single player, you'll have to get to level... whatever. Some high number.
I thought there was mention, maybe it was in one of the PAX videos, that multiplayer (at least some version of it) would be played for cards. i.e. if you lost the person that beat you would get their pick of one of your items or an item in your pack. This would deal with the issues of acquiring items in multiplayer quite nicely as the items you got would be presumably from someone close to you in level (assuming there are 'level' tiers) and therefore most likely could be equip-able immediately
I don't remember hearing about that in the videos I watched, but I haven't been a good devoted fan recently, and I have not watched all of them. If you remember which video, or if someone else does, think you guys could post it? I would be very appreciative. I've always wondered what would happen if this kind of game implemented this into their competitive games. I like the idea, but it's also sort of terrifying to think about losing some of my more precious items.
I thought it was in the screw attack video. But upon listening to it again I couldnt find it. Maybe im just hearing things that I want to hear...
Yeah, I don't think that taking cards from other players is a feature at the moment. For the rest, don't forget that "In balanced multi-player we just pick a standard level and give you the talents that you’d have at that level." (We're getting a lot of mileage out of that dev diary.) So you'll still get use out of anything you buy, but you cannot simply buy 30 of "the ultimate item," equip your characters, and romp to multiplayer victory. You know, all this rambling is getting me more and more okay with just allowing item purchases. Their use would always be limited by single-player leveling and the multi-player level standard. The remaining concern is how high the "multi-player level standard" should be, but I'm sure that's a question for beta testing.
Unfortunate. It's something I wanted to hear too. Maybe not in every instance of multi-player, but it would be cool to have a specific format where the stakes are raised. I think I'm down for allowing item purchases as well, Sir Knight. And yes, the beta testing, ooooh the beta testing.
I've been thinking a lot about this. My current line of thinking for how I think I'd like in-game purchases to work is as follows... Every regular item shop in the game has its items priced in both Gold Coins and Pizza Slices, and you can buy them with either currency. Thus, if you find an item in a shop that you really want but don't quite have the Gold for just yet, you can play a few more single player modules to earn the Gold, or spend a few Pizza Slices to get it immediately. There is a special "Pizza Slice Shop" somewhere that is themed like Gary's game shelf. A bunch of stuff is available for purchase here for Pizza Slices, each themed like an object that Gary would almost certainly have on his shelf. You can think of spending the Pizza Slices here as bribing Gary to share some of his gaming paraphernalia with you. Items that would be available here for purchase... New single player adventures, themed like old-school adventure module books. New character figures, themed either like miniatures in blister packs, or action figures (mint in box!). Starter Packs, themed like the old D&D boxed sets. A single player Starter Set that comes with a small array of equipment mostly suitable for when you first start out (and maybe some aspirational items?), an adventure module or two, and some unique cosmetic stuff. A multiplayer Competitive Set that comes with an array of equipment suitable for jumping right into multiplayer. Maybe it also has some unique cosmetic stuff. MAYBE: Boxes of "snacks" that you can give to Gary to increase your Gold Coin and/or loot drops for a period of a few days. Alternatively, they could increase any rewards that you and your opponent would normally get from multiplayer. In that case, only one of you would need a box of snacks: you can share! MAYBE: Booster packs of random equipment, themed like... well... foil booster packs. Would people be OK with these sorts of things available for sale? I really, really like the idea of the "Cash Shop" being Gary's game shelf: there's just something special about buying and taking home a new RPG book or booster pack, and theming the purchasable items in this manner triggers that warm sense of nostalgia in my brain.
I am losing track of the number of rants I have written here and then deleted without submitting. New single player modules, sure. New character figures, definitely. No. I am not okay with purchasing, via real money (and their "pizza slice" abstraction), items that are directly added to single player. Items earned through completing real-money-purchased modules are more acceptable; you still had to play and beat the module to get it. But never a direct addition to the character. Nothing that adds value to a character which you did not put in the time to earn. No. I am not okay with purchasing, via real money (and their "pizza slice" abstraction), XP boosts or gold / item find boosts that affect single player. I realize that this is not a battle I can actually win, though. For multiplayer only, sure, I can pretend to be okay with it. But even then, only as a necessary evil to allow ever newer players the option to be minimally competitive without being "forced" to actually play the game. That is as non-ranty as I seem capable of being on the subject right now.
Two things. First, "Pizza Slices?" Is this some standard metaphor for your cash account in for-pay gaming? Second, Roshirai: I think you've mostly summarized the topic, and not so much proposed new methods. Looking down that list, I would re-summarize it as: Maybe Blue Manchu can make money by selling . . . . . . normal in-game items (players can otherwise buy them with in-game gold) . . . some modules (players can get all others through normal play) . . . cosmetic items . . . randomized or standardized packs . . . items to speed up looting and character advancement Both the developers and the fans have debated all of these. Though the idea of putting many in a "Gary's game shelf/store" wrapper is new, and I wonder if it could fit into Blue Manchu's plans.
