Suggestion: Eliminate individual ranking rewards entirely

James13

Issues:
- Cheating allows individuals to claim named limited rewards.
- Timezones and other complications make tiebreakers problematic.
- Events are hit or miss in terms of separating scores, but always gravitate toward score homogeneity at the end as people familiarize themselves with them.

Drastic solution(?):
Eliminate the problem entirely by doing away with the current individual reward system. Extend progression through the entirety of potential event scoring.

Detailed thoughts on the matter:
By going to a more progression style reward, we can extend progressive rewards all the way up to perfect scores on events.
Rewards could solely be in the form of packs rather than mythics specifically. Perhaps with a fat pack reward at perfect score progression in the event. The more packs you get, the higher your chances of mythics, so there is still clear individual performance incentive. This also dilutes the effect of powercreep overall.
By eliminating the individual ranking, we also render the effect of cheaters on others completely moot. And also solve the current tiebreak issue in one fell swoop.
There is also then no need to continually tweak to try to separate out event scoring.
As a bonus we also solve the lesser issue of people complaining about progression ending eliminating the incentive of some to play out events.


Thoughts? I kind of like the idea of it.

wereotter

I agree with this idea. Also to add the current ranking system rewards those who played longer and already have powerful cards with more powerful cards to ensure they stay on top. There's an inequity of opportunity in the game with our current ranking system that keeps the same players getting free mythics and keeps out newer players. This would address that as well.

tomatus89

I agree. Just extend rewards all the way up to perfect or near-perfect scores. And flat down the difference between the very top and the near-very top.

Also for QB cheaters are always getting #1. It would be awesome if they could give better rewards for #2-5.

Ohboy

wereotter wrote:

I agree with this idea. Also to add the current ranking system rewards those who played longer and already have powerful cards with more powerful cards to ensure they stay on top. There's an inequity of opportunity in the game with our current ranking system that keeps the same players getting free mythics and keeps out newer players. This would address that as well.

When I pointed out this positive feedback loop months ago, I got attacked like crazy.

What you see on the individual boards is a result of not stopping this exact thing on the coalition reward side.

wereotter

Ohboy wrote:

wereotter wrote:

I agree with this idea. Also to add the current ranking system rewards those who played longer and already have powerful cards with more powerful cards to ensure they stay on top. There's an inequity of opportunity in the game with our current ranking system that keeps the same players getting free mythics and keeps out newer players. This would address that as well.

When I pointed out this positive feedback loop months ago, I got attacked like crazy.

What you see on the individual boards is a result of not stopping this exact thing on the coalition reward side.

Perhaps only giving crystals, runes, and packs as rewards even for coalitions would address that. Let people buy packs for a chance at a rare, but don't guarantee one. <shrug>

Also those who attacked you are probably the ones most benefiting from the system as is. They felt threatened that someone would point it out in case they lose the advantages they currently enjoy.

Ohboy

Yes, all events should only pay out boosters, runes and crystals.

That would at least slow down the loop, though I'm actually not sure if it's already too late to do anything.

James13

Ohboy wrote:

Yes, all events should only pay out boosters, runes and crystals.

That would at least slow down the loop, though I'm actually not sure if it's already too late to do anything.

It's never too late to make an improvement, I think.

There's precident for this reward format I'm proposing in some of the existing events (and I actually enjoy those). Those are generally PvE, but I don't see why it doesn't work in PvP also.

The primary issues it addresses are those voted on by the community. Solves both cheat and time-based advantages in the existing event reward structure. The pack suggestion does veer it toward addressing an additional point. A single "rare or better" could also be a good final goal reward in an event under a new structure.

Ohboy

James13 wrote:

Ohboy wrote:

Yes, all events should only pay out boosters, runes and crystals.

That would at least slow down the loop, though I'm actually not sure if it's already too late to do anything.

It's never too late to make an improvement, I think.

There's precident for this reward format I'm proposing in some of the existing events (and I actually enjoy those). Those are generally PvE, but I don't see why it doesn't work in PvP also.

The primary issues it addresses are those voted on by the community. Solves both cheat and time-based advantages in the existing event reward structure. The pack suggestion does veer it toward addressing an additional point. A single "rare or better" could also be a good final goal reward in an event under a new structure.

I say it's too late because there's already a critical mass of players who got all the powerful mythics from bfz and Soi. As far as I can tell from kld, they have intentions to counter power creep. This means the op cards these people have will stay op for a very long time. Which means they dominate for a very long time.

So for the scene to actually be competitive again, one of two things need to happen :

1) nerf certain op cards from past sets. This will not be popular for obvious reasons.

2) introduce power creep to offset the dominance of existing cards.

Of course, the prerequisite to this working at all is to stop handing out mythics like candy to a select group of players.

wereotter

I think I read in another post that they are looking into reducing the power of some cards. Olivia is one I'm seriously hoping they're looking into. Her paper card is only a 3/3 flier. She doesn't even give herself haste. Also she only gives +1/+1 to the creatures who enter and gives them haste. No flying. No lifelink. It would be easy to keep her powerful by granting a buff and haste to creatures in this game when they enter while eliminating haste and lifelink.