HoD Prize Rankings Need a Re-Think

Mburn7

You know, an errant Hour of Devastation doesn't automatically mean a failed objective if you plan around the possibility properly.

I ran Orbs of Warding in my left node, and didn't play any creatures until I had it out (against a red walker).

Sure 2 Hours would ruin my day, but usually I can win before the second one (since the AI prioritizes other stuff).

I'm not saying that the objective is good, but there are ways to work around issues like that.  That's what makes the game so much fun.

And, I mean, there were still several perfect scores in the event, so clearly its possible.  Just requires a bit more thought than cycling everything.

TheExaminer

I joined HOD pretty close to its end, won one match in order to get 7 points, which got me into top500 XD
Easiest 30 gold+5 pinkies in my life. I absolutely loved this event, 10/10 would recommend.

babar3355

span_argoman said:

I was under the impression that the event Progression rewards were the rewards for players who were willing to put in the time and effort to play the event. And it's capped at 150 in this event to ensure that many newer or weaker players who can't always hit the secondary objectives will be able to achieve the top Progression reward still.

On the other hand Ranking Rewards, as their name suggests, seemed to be the rewards for competing to be better than the other players rather than to reward effort or be a consolation prize.

Separately there are also the coalition ranking rewards which one's event scores contribute to regardless of Progression and indivudal Ranking, helping to improve the coalition's ranking and hence overall coalition rewards.

So are people feeling like the Progression rewards aren't enough, or are Progression rewards being taken for granted, or is it something else?

This... 

Personally I found this event to be one of the most fun in a very long time.

1. The prizes for top players were worth fighting for... unlike Terrors, NoP, EC, etc.
2. No one could use cycling as a crutch, so you didn't feel the need to either cycle or lose out to players who would cycle.

Now I will say that some of the objectives were annoying.  It does suck to lose 150 jewels to a turn 1 inferno jet... (and sorry, but the odds that you were able to get down spell protection on turn 1 is not good... and if you had it could have been a turn 1 Verix Bladewing and Skinshifter.)  We can argue til we are blue in the face, but you can't create a deck that can protect against taking any damage ever.  However, we all face the same odds of this happening, so it doesnt bother me that much.

The Bolas objectives on the other hand, led to really long and grindy games.  I think these games are what made the event feel like such a grind.  Especially when it was a NB mirror match where graveyards were filled to capacity.

Anyway, not sure why falling outside of the top 500 should net you competitive rewards.  The progression was pretty generous for HoD..

DumasAG

Mburn7 said:

You know, an errant Hour of Devastation doesn't automatically mean a failed objective if you plan around the possibility properly.

I ran Orbs of Warding in my left node, and didn't play any creatures until I had it out (against a red walker).

Sure 2 Hours would ruin my day, but usually I can win before the second one (since the AI prioritizes other stuff).

I'm not saying that the objective is good, but there are ways to work around issues like that.  That's what makes the game so much fun.

And, I mean, there were still several perfect scores in the event, so clearly its possible.  Just requires a bit more thought than cycling everything.

Also, we don't have a shortage of discard at the moment. If you're worried about the angle shot, pack infinite obliteration, heartless pillage, cast out (and preferably a way to discard it, like Tutelage (which ALSO helps keep the pressure off)).

In my opinion, the "take 10 or less damage" objective has more legs than the "kill three opponents' creatures" objective, because we still only have dowsing dagger to guarantee the opponent will have a creature, and some of us don't have that card.

boopers

I think the heavy competition is fine. We get personal progression rewards and coalition rewards too. But point taken that carrot for investing a large amount of time to get paltry rewards is not good. I think I was -9 on the event (96.7%)... and pretty certain I only managed 4th tier rewards. That does seem a bit off. I guess that ratio of reward to performance trends down real fast. 

bk1234

I finished just outside of the top 50 in the second bracket with 4 freezes and one dropped objective -- that is -29. I would have probably not even made top 250 in the first bracket. 

Why should someone who puts in as much effort and gets the same score get lower rewards because of the time they enter the event?

We don't ever talk about brackets here -- and I think we should, because a lot of big groups track these to give their players an advantage. 

Personally, I would like to see personal rewards as they are abolished. 

Personal progression stays, but individual rewards are determined by win %. A perfect score would get top rewards. 95% and above next and so on. 

This way you are rewarded for your time and you're rewarded the same way everyone else in your tier is rewarded for the same effort, no matter what time you join. 

Mburn7

bken1234 said:

Personal progression stays, but individual rewards are determined by win %. A perfect score would get top rewards. 95% and above next and so on. 

This way you are rewarded for your time and you're rewarded the same way everyone else in your tier is rewarded for the same effort, no matter what time you join. 

I like this idea, its definitely fair and reasonable.

There are just 2 problems I can think of for it.

1)  If its an overly difficult event, whether due to bugs or a new rotation or whatever, there wouldn't be a lot of to scores.  An event like that would be better overall if it stayed as is (a great example is when I got top 10 in the first Terrors with a half a dozen losses because it was super new and nobody had figured it out yet, the same score the next event barely got me in the top 50, the same score now would put me in dead last).  Also, if the event is buggy (like the time an entire node went missing for a lot of players) it would essentially lock you out of good rewards, instead of just shifting the top levels downward like the current system does.

2)  For events that have been "figured out" there would be a dramatic increase in the amount of currency given out as a reward.  That isn't a problem for the players, but it definitely could be an issue for the devs, since giving out too much "free stuff" isn't great from a design standpoint.

DumasAG

bken1234 said:

I finished just outside of the top 50 in the second bracket with 4 freezes and one dropped objective -- that is -29. I would have probably not even made top 250 in the first bracket. 

Why should someone who puts in as much effort and gets the same score get lower rewards because of the time they enter the event?

We don't ever talk about brackets here -- and I think we should, because a lot of big groups track these to give their players an advantage. 

Personally, I would like to see personal rewards as they are abolished. 

Personal progression stays, but individual rewards are determined by win %. A perfect score would get top rewards. 95% and above next and so on. 

This way you are rewarded for your time and you're rewarded the same way everyone else in your tier is rewarded for the same effort, no matter what time you join. 

I'm not sure I full understand what you're advocating. You're suggesting we drop the current individual ranking system (not progression) in favor of a win-percentage ranking system? I thought the current tie-break system already avoided the problems with "first to the finish line". Are you suggesting that win-percentage over x amount of wins would be your rank? So essentially every node you play is a new bracket you reach, and your rank within that tier is based on win percentage? Are you suggesting that we get rid of support objectives and based solely on win-percentage (which I'm a fan of, actually, because it encourages experimentation and innovation in my mind if I don't have to run streamlined decks over and over for support objectives)?

Perhaps a workable ranking model would be:

• Every node played moves the player into a new reward bracket, with incrementally increasing rewards
• Final ranking within every bracket is based off of win-percentage as opposed to point total, every 3-5% could be the cutoff for a new tier
• Points for support objectives are added together as a multiplier. Every 10 points multiplies final rewards by x amount more. This could be a relatively small amount, and thus your individual rewards grow for your commitment to objectives, but your ability to win the base rewards doesn't change depending on support objectives

Mburn7

DumasAG said:

bken1234 said:

I finished just outside of the top 50 in the second bracket with 4 freezes and one dropped objective -- that is -29. I would have probably not even made top 250 in the first bracket. 

Why should someone who puts in as much effort and gets the same score get lower rewards because of the time they enter the event?

We don't ever talk about brackets here -- and I think we should, because a lot of big groups track these to give their players an advantage. 

Personally, I would like to see personal rewards as they are abolished. 

Personal progression stays, but individual rewards are determined by win %. A perfect score would get top rewards. 95% and above next and so on. 

This way you are rewarded for your time and you're rewarded the same way everyone else in your tier is rewarded for the same effort, no matter what time you join. 

I'm not sure I full understand what you're advocating. You're suggesting we drop the current individual ranking system (not progression) in favor of a win-percentage ranking system? I thought the current tie-break system already avoided the problems with "first to the finish line". Are you suggesting that win-percentage over x amount of wins would be your rank? So essentially every node you play is a new bracket you reach, and your rank within that tier is based on win percentage? Are you suggesting that we get rid of support objectives and based solely on win-percentage (which I'm a fan of, actually, because it encourages experimentation and innovation in my mind if I don't have to run streamlined decks over and over for support objectives)?

I believe she means you get rewards based on your final score relative to the total number of possible points in the event.  So if there are 273 possible points, and you get 270, you get X rewards while someone who only has 250 points gets Y.

It would function similar to the current system, except less dependent on brackets (so you can't just hop in 10 min from the end and get 1st prize rewards, or get unlucky in the "first" or "second" bracket with a dozen perfect scores locking you out of the top)

bk1234

DumasAG said:

bken1234 said:

I finished just outside of the top 50 in the second bracket with 4 freezes and one dropped objective -- that is -29. I would have probably not even made top 250 in the first bracket. 

Why should someone who puts in as much effort and gets the same score get lower rewards because of the time they enter the event?

We don't ever talk about brackets here -- and I think we should, because a lot of big groups track these to give their players an advantage. 

Personally, I would like to see personal rewards as they are abolished. 

Personal progression stays, but individual rewards are determined by win %. A perfect score would get top rewards. 95% and above next and so on. 

This way you are rewarded for your time and you're rewarded the same way everyone else in your tier is rewarded for the same effort, no matter what time you join. 

I'm not sure I full understand what you're advocating. You're suggesting we drop the current individual ranking system (not progression) in favor of a win-percentage ranking system? I thought the current tie-break system already avoided the problems with "first to the finish line". Are you suggesting that win-percentage over x amount of wins would be your rank? So essentially every node you play is a new bracket you reach, and your rank within that tier is based on win percentage? Are you suggesting that we get rid of support objectives and based solely on win-percentage (which I'm a fan of, actually, because it encourages experimentation and innovation in my mind if I don't have to run streamlined decks over and over for support objectives)?

Perhaps a workable ranking model would be:

• Every node played moves the player into a new reward bracket, with incrementally increasing rewards
• Final ranking within every bracket is based off of win-percentage as opposed to point total, every 3-5% could be the cutoff for a new tier
• Points for support objectives are added together as a multiplier. Every 10 points multiplies final rewards by x amount more. This could be a relatively small amount, and thus your individual rewards grow for your commitment to objectives, but your ability to win the base rewards doesn't change depending on support objectives

Progression is fine -- like @span_argoman said -- it rewards people for the effort they put into an event -- it's equitable and it doesn't depend on your tier. 

BUT -- the current tier system makes individual rewards over progression unfair. 

Last NOP a bracket opened up 35 minutes before the event ended. I entered the event, played 5 nodes with the fastest, untuned decks I could come up with and finished first -- someone else spent 2 days building decks and winning every charge for the same rewards. How is that fair?

With HoD and RtO, it's the same -- the first tier is widely-known to be tougher. I could score 240 there and not even finish top 250, or I could wait until the second bracket opens, get the same score, and get higher individual rewards. 

The only way to make it equitable is to give out individual rewards by score, and not by rank. This way, a player in Europe who is probably heading to bed when the first bracket opens, thus doesn't start until the morning when the second bracket is opening gets the same rewards for their effort as someone did if they entered when the event started. 

OR a player who purposely waits until the last minute can't get 300 pinkies (this happened recently when a third bracket opened a couple hours before one of these events ended) for putting in almost no effort, when other players have been grinding for 4 days and have higher scores and get lower rewards. 

boopers

Well, since the topic has been broached... the placement method of filling one bracket first, then opening another is ridiculous.  it certainly has been abused... for the entire history of this game by those that know how it works.  It is entirely unnecessary, and a relic of lazy event coding by hibernum when they didn't bother to analyze their player data to determine how to set-up events.

Quick fix:
1) take the cap limits off each bracket, lock-in the number of brackets for each master tier (we can deal with the insanity of mastery tiers another time)

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

DumasAG

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

bk1234

DumasAG said:

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

Current system is one fills up, another opens. This is why big groups and even individual coalitions often report the size of the brackets when they enter. Getting in a later bracket offers huge advantages. 

Not only that, but with the current state of the game, there is little change on the top 2 tiers and the brackets flip at around the same time every event -- which makes it even easier to track flips on. 

DumasAG

bken1234 said:

DumasAG said:

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

Current system is one fills up, another opens. This is why big groups and even individual coalitions often report the size of the brackets when they enter. Getting in a later bracket offers huge advantages. 

Got it. That is a terrible system - I'm a little irritated actually.

Mburn7

DumasAG said:

bken1234 said:

DumasAG said:

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

Current system is one fills up, another opens. This is why big groups and even individual coalitions often report the size of the brackets when they enter. Getting in a later bracket offers huge advantages. 

Got it. That is a terrible system - I'm a little irritated actually.

Yeah, its always been like that.  Used to be the same thing back in Quick Battle, if you timed it right you could get a free mythic after just 1 or 2 matches.

Its a terrible system and I personally hate bracket snipers, but hey, I can't blame them.  Just the game that lets them do it.

boopers

I feel like we are "talking about fight club" in this thread.  lol.

Gunmix25

Mburn7 said:

DumasAG said:

bken1234 said:

DumasAG said:

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

Current system is one fills up, another opens. This is why big groups and even individual coalitions often report the size of the brackets when they enter. Getting in a later bracket offers huge advantages. 

Got it. That is a terrible system - I'm a little irritated actually.

Yeah, its always been like that.  Used to be the same thing back in Quick Battle, if you timed it right you could get a free mythic after just 1 or 2 matches.

Its a terrible system and I personally hate bracket snipers, but hey, I can't blame them.  Just the game that lets them do it.

Woah... this is new news to me. I had no idea that this was being done. It is all in the past now though, but still a rather surprising bit of info. crazy

bk1234

Gunmix25 said:

Mburn7 said:

DumasAG said:

bken1234 said:

DumasAG said:

2) Assuming three brackets total:  assign the first to join to to the 1st bracket, second player to join to the 2nd, third to the 3rd, then 4th to to the first bracket.

There is no reason to cap the brackets, except to perpetuate the auto-generation of the new brackets.  With this method, the brackets are evenly populated, and the potential rewards are largely locked down.

I thought this is what already happened. I had no idea that you could join an event late, be placed in a new bracket of other people that joined late, and get final rewards with minimal effort. Man, do I feel like a chump now... 

Current system is one fills up, another opens. This is why big groups and even individual coalitions often report the size of the brackets when they enter. Getting in a later bracket offers huge advantages. 

Got it. That is a terrible system - I'm a little irritated actually.

Yeah, its always been like that.  Used to be the same thing back in Quick Battle, if you timed it right you could get a free mythic after just 1 or 2 matches.

Its a terrible system and I personally hate bracket snipers, but hey, I can't blame them.  Just the game that lets them do it.

Woah... this is new news to me. I had no idea that this was being done. It is all in the past now though, but still a rather surprising bit of info. crazy

This is how tier tracking started. It was only realized about a year ago that there is an advantage for doing it on events as well. 

Quantius

Well then, I just learned about the bracket system in the last few posts here and that's really some mother **** **** to the max.

The gap between tiers of rewards is garbage as well and I'd love it to be get blown to bits and remade with something a bit flatter.

Bil

Mburn7 said:

You know, an errant Hour of Devastation doesn't automatically mean a failed objective if you plan around the possibility properly.

I ran Orbs of Warding in my left node, and didn't play any creatures until I had it out (against a red walker).

Sure 2 Hours would ruin my day, but usually I can win before the second one (since the AI prioritizes other stuff).

I'm not saying that the objective is good, but there are ways to work around issues like that.  That's what makes the game so much fun.

And, I mean, there were still several perfect scores in the event, so clearly its possible.  Just requires a bit more thought than cycling everything.

   Oh, I'm not saying it isnt possible to get perfect scores ... I'm saying the luck factor is too heavy to avoid frustration among players.
   Of course, orbs of warding is an option for red hour, so is jace's defeat. But playing them just lower the chances of bad surprises ... If you get unlucky you're screwed up anyway.   
   From my point of view the problem isn't loosing points, it is the fact that loosing a bunch of points over about 300 just leaves you with **** rewards.