Same thing. You say they don't deserve them because they never fought you, and you're lower than them.
No, they're saying that it isn't fair that they're being judged against those who have faced lesser competition, without the opportunity to face that same competition. If it was the eq, we wouldn't say it was fair if it was prestige locked but all the rewards were the same for each tier. Incursions gives higher rewards for higher tiers, where people are locked into a certain level of competition.
Define lesser. Everyone compares the opponent but they don't factor in what they're using.
By lesser I mean the competition is weaker in every way including champs (rarity, rank, sig, variety) masteries, and experience (which potentially impacts opponents skill level).
Yes. So is the Roster they're using to fight with. Which means the challenge level (affected by Nodes Rarity, Rank, Sig, variety) is scaled the same. People compare the opponents they're facing with the ones higher Players are facing, but they're not facing them with the same Roster either. The Matches are scaled within a close proximity of each other, given what both sides are using versus their own Opponents. The comparison is one-sided. It's also self-serving. "They wouldn't last against my Account." You're not lasting WITH your Account, and you expect people with less to be slaughtered just because you're not succeeding. (By you I mean the Royal "you".) It's lacking perspective. They're not fighting Rosters 5 times their size, but neither are you. You're facing Rosters within the same range of what you're working with as they are. I'm going to be blunt. If people spent more time on their own Matches than they did being jealous of the progress other people are making, they would progress more.
Right, but the game mode only has 1 pool so the job then is to determine if the challenge is equitable and decide if the rewards are meant to be equal for those differences or similarly scaled (the value of t6 cats for a paragon player versus the value of t6 material for a uc player etc). I would say its like in pro sports, where the roster is judged against the same competition across the board (they don't sub out stars for less skilled players when facing an inferior roster as a rule, and the prizes are the same for everyone).
The Store limits what you can buy. So they're not having access to the same Mats.
What do you get through tiering up to arcane? Or for season rewards or solo/alliance rewards?
You get what you put in. If they're not supposed to be there, they're cheating and it is being dealt with. If they're fighting their way up, they're earning what they earn. The GC is based on results, not Roster.
Same thing. You say they don't deserve them because they never fought you, and you're lower than them.
No, they're saying that it isn't fair that they're being judged against those who have faced lesser competition, without the opportunity to face that same competition. If it was the eq, we wouldn't say it was fair if it was prestige locked but all the rewards were the same for each tier. Incursions gives higher rewards for higher tiers, where people are locked into a certain level of competition.
Define lesser. Everyone compares the opponent but they don't factor in what they're using.
By lesser I mean the competition is weaker in every way including champs (rarity, rank, sig, variety) masteries, and experience (which potentially impacts opponents skill level).
Yes. So is the Roster they're using to fight with. Which means the challenge level (affected by Nodes Rarity, Rank, Sig, variety) is scaled the same. People compare the opponents they're facing with the ones higher Players are facing, but they're not facing them with the same Roster either. The Matches are scaled within a close proximity of each other, given what both sides are using versus their own Opponents. The comparison is one-sided. It's also self-serving. "They wouldn't last against my Account." You're not lasting WITH your Account, and you expect people with less to be slaughtered just because you're not succeeding. (By you I mean the Royal "you".) It's lacking perspective. They're not fighting Rosters 5 times their size, but neither are you. You're facing Rosters within the same range of what you're working with as they are. I'm going to be blunt. If people spent more time on their own Matches than they did being jealous of the progress other people are making, they would progress more.
Right, but the game mode only has 1 pool so the job then is to determine if the challenge is equitable and decide if the rewards are meant to be equal for those differences or similarly scaled (the value of t6 cats for a paragon player versus the value of t6 material for a uc player etc). I would say its like in pro sports, where the roster is judged against the same competition across the board (they don't sub out stars for less skilled players when facing an inferior roster as a rule, and the prizes are the same for everyone).
The Store limits what you can buy. So they're not having access to the same Mats.
What do you get through tiering up to arcane? Or for season rewards or solo/alliance rewards?
You get what you put in. If they're not supposed to be there, they're cheating and it is being dealt with. If they're fighting their way up, they're earning what they earn. The GC is based on results, not Roster.
Incorrect, you are getting rewards that have an inherent value difference without that difference being expressed in the actual content.
That's not correct. They're being given Rewards that are equal to the content that everyone else is completing in the GC.
Let's say the Yankees, Guardians, Astros and Blue Jays are in the same division and only play one another all season for the right to go the World Series (these were all playoffs teams last season). Two of them finish at 82-82, the top team finishes at 86-76 and the last place is 76-86. This is indicative of paragon players facing each other.
In the other division, you have Rays, Twins, A's and Angels. There's a wide range of teams in here. One is very respectable, two are mediocre and one is awful. The best team in here are the Rays and they finish 120-42 and go to the World Series because they have the best record. UC and Cav have a wide range of skills/rosters.
How do you think the first four teams would feel and about the Rays going to the World Series knowing they are better than them but never had a chance to face them?
Let's say the Yankees, Guardians, Astros and Blue Jays are in the same division and only play one another all season for the right to go the World Series (these were all playoffs teams last season). Two of them finish at 82-82, the top team finishes at 86-76 and the last place is 76-86. This is indicative of paragon players facing each other.
In the other division, you have Rays, Twins, A's and Angels. There's a wide range of teams in here. One is very respectable, two are mediocre and one is awful. The best team in here are the Rays and they finish 120-42 and go to the World Series because they have the best record. UC and Cav have a wide range of skills/rosters.
How do you think the first four teams would feel and about the Rays going to the World Series knowing they are better than them but never had a chance to face them?
Interesting also that in real life those teams all have different payrolls, rosters and market sizes and somehow still manage to compete against each other.
We need to stop with the Sports analogies because they don't apply here. Totally different systems. If you were going that route, you'd have to separate those leagues somehow, and it's literally the same. Score the same amount of Points within the same 2 and a half (appx.) minutes, with the same Nodes, same scoring metrics, and the same range of strength, on either side. A Paragon is not facing different or tougher Nodes than a UC Player. They're not facing a different set of scoring, or different objective. It's the same for everyone. Everything in the GC is allegedly random within the same Tier you're in, which is the system people claim is fairest to begin with. If people are advancing there by legitimate means, they're doing it fairly. You literally have one objective in a Fight. Score more than your opponent. Not highest Champs, closest scoring, longest time without getting hit, highest Title, or any variation thereof. Same objective. Score more than your Opponent. Do that 2 out of 3 times. That's it.
Same thing. You say they don't deserve them because they never fought you, and you're lower than them.
No, they're saying that it isn't fair that they're being judged against those who have faced lesser competition, without the opportunity to face that same competition. If it was the eq, we wouldn't say it was fair if it was prestige locked but all the rewards were the same for each tier. Incursions gives higher rewards for higher tiers, where people are locked into a certain level of competition.
Define lesser. Everyone compares the opponent but they don't factor in what they're using.
By lesser I mean the competition is weaker in every way including champs (rarity, rank, sig, variety) masteries, and experience (which potentially impacts opponents skill level).
Yes. So is the Roster they're using to fight with. Which means the challenge level (affected by Nodes Rarity, Rank, Sig, variety) is scaled the same. People compare the opponents they're facing with the ones higher Players are facing, but they're not facing them with the same Roster either. The Matches are scaled within a close proximity of each other, given what both sides are using versus their own Opponents. The comparison is one-sided. It's also self-serving. "They wouldn't last against my Account." You're not lasting WITH your Account, and you expect people with less to be slaughtered just because you're not succeeding. (By you I mean the Royal "you".) It's lacking perspective. They're not fighting Rosters 5 times their size, but neither are you. You're facing Rosters within the same range of what you're working with as they are. I'm going to be blunt. If people spent more time on their own Matches than they did being jealous of the progress other people are making, they would progress more.
I think you don’t understand or wilfully ignore the points people are making.
The average Paragon will have played the game for years, have most of the meta champs at 6* r3 minimum, completed all or most content in the game, play high tier war and therefore know how to counter all the nodes and champs in game.
There will be some variance in number of r4 champs and rank up decisions, the odd R5 now, plus new champs that some have and some don’t. Spot, Absorbing Man etc.
In my experience, the decks I face are incredibly similar bar the differences described above.
So consider the gap in skill (top tier players aside) is much narrower at the higher levels because of how experienced the players are. Then consider current VT meta adds zero difficulty to the fights which narrows the skill gap even more.
So unless your average Paragon is willing to invest in a lot of Victory Shields, progress can be painfully slow because the margins are so fine.
At lower levels the range of skill and knowledge is much broader. Roster’s are far less developed so if an 11k prestige player has been lucky with some meta champ pulls, they have a big advantage over their BG peers.
So a “lucky” account with a reasonable skill level has a huge advantage and able to progress through VT no problem.
Equally, a skilled player at lower levels has a much bigger advantage because they won’t constantly match players of similar skill level.
I would wager if there was a metric that measured skill, game content cleared and bg meta champs in roster then plotted distribution curves by progression level… the Paragon curve would be the flattest by some distance.
That’s why so many Paragons are getting road blocked by each other and the other progression levels that are the right side of the curve are flying through.
Final thought… I wonder how many of those lower rated accounts in GC are second accounts of Paragon players that have progressed further than their main account.
A Paragon is not facing different or tougher Nodes than a UC Player. They're not facing a different set of scoring, or different objective. It's the same for everyone.
But they are facing different competitors. It doesn't matter if they are better or worse, stronger or weaker. The problem is they are different, period.
I have to credit another player (whose name escapes me) for providing the critical insight in Alliance war that originally eluded me. I was thinking statistically, but they were thinking - correctly - geometrically.
Take any group of players. Any group, composed any way you like. Then split them in half. Let all the competitors in one half compete against each other, and let the other half compete against each other. Then compare the records between the top finishers in both groups. Is that fair?
It isn't, because the groups were partitioned. Because they were, their records cannot be directly compared, period, for the simple reason that those records did not come from identical competition. The ideal situation is where everyone faces everyone else. If everyone was required to fight all umpteen-thousand other BG players in a round robin, we'd know who was stronger and who was weaker. But we can't do that. However, we can attempt to compare everyone against everyone else if there are at least interconnected chains of comparison. If I beat Zola, and Zola beats Fred, and Fred beats Chatter, we can presume with some degree of confidence that I am better than Chatter. We wouldn't know that with certainty because strength is not always transitive: Chatter might always beat me because he just has my particular number. But given the imperfect circumstances, this is at least a reasonably fair way to compare.
When no such chains exist, the two populations have no point of comparison. Just saying "well, they are both facing the same nodes, so it is fair to compare because I say so" is objectively false. There is no mathematical game theoretical justification for such a comparison. Everyone is entitled to an opinion about anything, but this would be textbook incorrect. You'd get an F for that opinion in an academic setting.
The geometric insight I am referring to is related to this mathematical analysis. It imagines the players are separated into individual silos. Within each silo, players compete with each other and climb in rating. At some point someone is going to climb to the top of each silo. But because the silos are separated, the player at the top of any one of those silos does not have to have any particular relationship between themselves and the other top players. *Someone* has to be on top of each silo no matter what.
Consider the case where we make a silo of blind players. Someone will be the best blind player and end up on the top. But can we say they are one of the top players in the game? Almost certainly not. But here's the more important point. Let's say you don't even care about that. Let's say you argue that while they were not one of the top players of the game as a whole, they still deserve to be one of the top players in the competition because they beat all the other blind players, so on a relative basis they were just as good as everyone else?
There's no way to know that. It could be that the top blind player was ten times better than the average blind player, or they could be only 2% better than the average blind player. The top blind player could be almost unrecognizably average compared to their peers, and just happened to end up on top. Because someone must be on top no matter what. For that matter, we don't know if the top Paragon player is ten times better than the average Paragon player or just a little better. All we know is they ended up at the top of their silo. We know they are the best in their little silo. We don't know what that *means*.
*If* there was a way to compare across silos, we could extrapolate what placement in particular silos meant. We could compare relative strength. But when players are isolated from each other, when you cannot directly compare their strength by actual competitive matches, you can't compare period. Because someone always climbs to the top of every silo. They might deserve to be at the top of their silo, but that means nothing for the competition as a whole.
When you isolate players into segregated groups, the only thing you can say is whether a player is better or worse in their peer group. But you are not allowed to say whether that means anything across the players as a whole. This realization that every silo automatically promotes someone to the top means if you dice up the players enough, we all can become winners. We could all be #1 in our own little competitive group of one. Saying that separated competition is valid is basically validating this extreme case. Which is obviously nonsensical.
Someone always rises to the top of every pyramid. Which means the more pyramids you make, the more "winners" you create automatically, regardless of competitive strength. If you want three winners, make three pyramids. If you want a thousand winners, make a thousand pyramids. And you will end up with a thousand #1s, all of which would have equal claim to being #1. But that's ludicrous. If it is ludicrous for a thousand, it is ludicrous for a hundred, and it is ludicrous for ten.
At lower levels the range of skill and knowledge is much broader. Roster’s are far less developed so if an 11k prestige player has been lucky with some meta champ pulls, they have a big advantage over their BG peers.
So a “lucky” account with a reasonable skill level has a huge advantage and able to progress through VT no problem.
In another thread I made a similar observation, but I think it goes beyond luck. At lower progress tiers rosters are far more diverse, which means you will face a much wider set of match ups, many of them suboptimal. But even though these match ups are suboptimal, they are also uncommon. In such a setting, the players with the deeper knowledge and experience will likely have a much larger advantage than in the highest roster strength tiers.
Let's face it, by the time the Paragons are duking it out, we all are doing the same stuff, even if we don't all have the same rosters. Ban Abs, make sure you can counter Hulkling, etc etc etc. But in the lower tiers, you *will* be trying to decide whether to burst Captain Marvel with CGR or save him for the Torch that your opponent inexplicably placed on defense, because its completely crazy in the mid tiers. An edge in knowledge or experience in the high roster game is an edge, but that same edge in the lower roster BG matches is checkmate.
If you're a veteran on an alt or if you're a particularly experienced progressing player, the game lets you keep on bashing the children until you reach GC. That's what makes the current situation not about Paragons vs Uncollecteds. It is about winners matching against losers over and over again because the game doesn't care how much better you are or how much worse you are than your competition, it will just keep sending you against the same opponents over and over until the winners Scrooge McDuck themselves into a giant pile of loot and the losers set their phones on fire.
It is about winners matching against losers over and over again because the game doesn't care how much better you are or how much worse you are than your competition, it will just keep sending you against the same opponents over and over until the winners Scrooge McDuck themselves into a giant pile of loot and the losers set their phones on fire.
Last few lines are pure gold.
Something you noted also made me think: who are the low account “losers” the low account “winners” are crawling over to get to the tippy-top of their little silo (and close to the top of all the silos)?
We need to stop with the Sports analogies because they don't apply here. Totally different systems. If you were going that route, you'd have to separate those leagues somehow, and it's literally the same. Score the same amount of Points within the same 2 and a half (appx.) minutes, with the same Nodes, same scoring metrics, and the same range of strength, on either side. A Paragon is not facing different or tougher Nodes than a UC Player. They're not facing a different set of scoring, or different objective. It's the same for everyone. Everything in the GC is allegedly random within the same Tier you're in, which is the system people claim is fairest to begin with. If people are advancing there by legitimate means, they're doing it fairly. You literally have one objective in a Fight. Score more than your opponent. Not highest Champs, closest scoring, longest time without getting hit, highest Title, or any variation thereof. Same objective. Score more than your Opponent. Do that 2 out of 3 times. That's it.
What about when you used a sports analogy on this topic in a different thread and we're torn apart because your own analogy proved you were wrong.
I don't blame you for wanting no more sports analogys after that, but it's extremely hypocritical as you were among the first to use sports analogys on this topic in previous threads.
I'm pretty sure I said I don't like Sports analogies then, and I still don't. You're describing complex gaming systems with a sporting game. Not the same at all.
A Paragon is not facing different or tougher Nodes than a UC Player. They're not facing a different set of scoring, or different objective. It's the same for everyone.
But they are facing different competitors. It doesn't matter if they are better or worse, stronger or weaker. The problem is they are different, period.
I have to credit another player (whose name escapes me) for providing the critical insight in Alliance war that originally eluded me. I was thinking statistically, but they were thinking - correctly - geometrically.
Take any group of players. Any group, composed any way you like. Then split them in half. Let all the competitors in one half compete against each other, and let the other half compete against each other. Then compare the records between the top finishers in both groups. Is that fair?
It isn't, because the groups were partitioned. Because they were, their records cannot be directly compared, period, for the simple reason that those records did not come from identical competition. The ideal situation is where everyone faces everyone else. If everyone was required to fight all umpteen-thousand other BG players in a round robin, we'd know who was stronger and who was weaker. But we can't do that. However, we can attempt to compare everyone against everyone else if there are at least interconnected chains of comparison. If I beat Zola, and Zola beats Fred, and Fred beats Chatter, we can presume with some degree of confidence that I am better than Chatter. We wouldn't know that with certainty because strength is not always transitive: Chatter might always beat me because he just has my particular number. But given the imperfect circumstances, this is at least a reasonably fair way to compare.
When no such chains exist, the two populations have no point of comparison. Just saying "well, they are both facing the same nodes, so it is fair to compare because I say so" is objectively false. There is no mathematical game theoretical justification for such a comparison. Everyone is entitled to an opinion about anything, but this would be textbook incorrect. You'd get an F for that opinion in an academic setting.
The geometric insight I am referring to is related to this mathematical analysis. It imagines the players are separated into individual silos. Within each silo, players compete with each other and climb in rating. At some point someone is going to climb to the top of each silo. But because the silos are separated, the player at the top of any one of those silos does not have to have any particular relationship between themselves and the other top players. *Someone* has to be on top of each silo no matter what.
Consider the case where we make a silo of blind players. Someone will be the best blind player and end up on the top. But can we say they are one of the top players in the game? Almost certainly not. But here's the more important point. Let's say you don't even care about that. Let's say you argue that while they were not one of the top players of the game as a whole, they still deserve to be one of the top players in the competition because they beat all the other blind players, so on a relative basis they were just as good as everyone else?
There's no way to know that. It could be that the top blind player was ten times better than the average blind player, or they could be only 2% better than the average blind player. The top blind player could be almost unrecognizably average compared to their peers, and just happened to end up on top. Because someone must be on top no matter what. For that matter, we don't know if the top Paragon player is ten times better than the average Paragon player or just a little better. All we know is they ended up at the top of their silo. We know they are the best in their little silo. We don't know what that *means*.
*If* there was a way to compare across silos, we could extrapolate what placement in particular silos meant. We could compare relative strength. But when players are isolated from each other, when you cannot directly compare their strength by actual competitive matches, you can't compare period. Because someone always climbs to the top of every silo. They might deserve to be at the top of their silo, but that means nothing for the competition as a whole.
When you isolate players into segregated groups, the only thing you can say is whether a player is better or worse in their peer group. But you are not allowed to say whether that means anything across the players as a whole. This realization that every silo automatically promotes someone to the top means if you dice up the players enough, we all can become winners. We could all be #1 in our own little competitive group of one. Saying that separated competition is valid is basically validating this extreme case. Which is obviously nonsensical.
Someone always rises to the top of every pyramid. Which means the more pyramids you make, the more "winners" you create automatically, regardless of competitive strength. If you want three winners, make three pyramids. If you want a thousand winners, make a thousand pyramids. And you will end up with a thousand #1s, all of which would have equal claim to being #1. But that's ludicrous. If it is ludicrous for a thousand, it is ludicrous for a hundred, and it is ludicrous for ten.
It's pretty much inevitable if you're going to have a competition with such a range of Players that you have some degree of separation starting out. There's just too much of a variation in between ends. Yes, they're facing different competitors. They're also at different points themselves, with stronger Rosters to do it with. That power comparison isn't complete without examining that aspect. Otherwise it's just a one-sided look. If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with. You can't have one side of that and not the other. What we're talking about is the fact that someone is bitter that Players with a smaller Roster are making it to the GC and they're not. That mentions nothing of their own skill at BGs, whether or not they're earning their own Wins with the Matches they have, what their own efforts are looking like. It's an entitlement to do better simply because their Roster is comparatively stronger than people winning their Matches. Unless they introduce some kind of metric that legitimizes that, it's not a standing point. We're not measuring how they do in their own Fights VERSUS how others do in their own Fights, PLUS Roster size. We're measuring how they do. All the way up to the GC, which is for Rank Rewards. I'm not saying things should all stay the way they are. I'm saying people need to stop being ignorant to the fact that others are progressing from winning their own Matches. The rest of the "I could take you out." is just plain bitterness.
If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with.
The way I compare the strength of two players is I have them fight, and the winner was stronger.
Sure. If that strength doesn't include systems that multiply the strength of their Opponent, compounded by differences in Ranks, Rarities, CR, and other factors.
If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with.
The way I compare the strength of two players is I have them fight, and the winner was stronger.
Sure. If that strength doesn't include systems that multiply the strength of their Opponent, compounded by differences in Ranks, Rarities, CR, and other factors.
Does this mean that something like the gauntlet should account for lower players and adjust nodes accordingly so they aren't facing such steep conditions? If not, why not? Is the intention of each mode (to gain excellent rewards by various means) so different?
The Gauntlet is not open to Players UC and up, to the best of my knowledge.
If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with.
The way I compare the strength of two players is I have them fight, and the winner was stronger.
Sure. If that strength doesn't include systems that multiply the strength of their Opponent, compounded by differences in Ranks, Rarities, CR, and other factors.
Does this mean that something like the gauntlet should account for lower players and adjust nodes accordingly so they aren't facing such steep conditions? If not, why not? Is the intention of each mode (to gain excellent rewards by various means) so different?
The Gauntlet is not open to Players UC and up, to the best of my knowledge.
Yeah, I mean maybe use your imagination?
I don't need to. My whole main point has been if the game mode includes such a range, then it's not reasonable to leave the lowest at the door and tell them their problems are invalid. You need to accommodate to their gaming experience as well, and it's only going to get more vast between them and the top as 7*s are added, and the game progresses. While they're a part of BGs, you can't just use them as shark bait for the highest Accounts and tell them to Git Gud, or do other content. They're in it. It's not just for the Top Players. It's for everyone.
I believe that they will change unfair matchmaking after players will stop spending as it was previous in war matchmaking. After profit will go down than matchmaking will be fixed. And this time will be with introduction of 7 stars. People will be too afraid to progress the game and increase prestige so people will not spend money on 7 stars. I stoped open my relics and for sure will not open any 7 star until matchmaking will be fixed
I believe that they will change unfair matchmaking after players will stop spending as it was previous in war matchmaking. After profit will go down than matchmaking will be fixed. And this time will be with introduction of 7 stars. People will be too afraid to progress the game and increase prestige so people will not spend money on 7 stars. I stoped open my relics and for sure will not open any 7 star until matchmaking will be fixed
It is a matter of time they change it. Only thing slows it, is probably trying to find a solution to handle and soften the lower accounts outcry. But as this matchmaking continues, lower accounts are feeling more and more entitled to VT and GC rewards. ANY change at BGs will mean lesser rewards for them. But again, I will repeat because people tend to be focusing on matchmaking. Yes it is broken and objectively unfair, but more than that, the whole structure of VT is a death sentence for BGs, sooner or later. And again @DNA3000 ’s post (that was moved to Suggestions and Requests 😠) is a great write up that includes ways of “saving” BGs long term, and make them successful mode for all tiers of players 🙂
If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with.
The way I compare the strength of two players is I have them fight, and the winner was stronger.
Sure. If that strength doesn't include systems that multiply the strength of their Opponent, compounded by differences in Ranks, Rarities, CR, and other factors.
Does this mean that something like the gauntlet should account for lower players and adjust nodes accordingly so they aren't facing such steep conditions? If not, why not? Is the intention of each mode (to gain excellent rewards by various means) so different?
The Gauntlet is not open to Players UC and up, to the best of my knowledge.
Yeah, I mean maybe use your imagination?
I don't need to. My whole main point has been if the game mode includes such a range, then it's not reasonable to leave the lowest at the door and tell them their problems are invalid. You need to accommodate to their gaming experience as well, and it's only going to get more vast between them and the top as 7*s are added, and the game progresses. While they're a part of BGs, you can't just use them as shark bait for the highest Accounts and tell them to Git Gud, or do other content. They're in it. It's not just for the Top Players. It's for everyone.
Of course inclusion is important, but we're looking at a situation where lower accounts give the impression of winning more than higher accounts (note I said give the impression of). This is appearing to be a mode meant to facilitate lower accounts closing the gap super fast. While I'm all for speeding up the process, it's already been sped up a good bit. So where do you think bg fits in the overall meta of gameplay and progression, and what problems do you think DO need to be addressed in bg?
I would agree to a certain extent that Players who are much lower advancing faster is an issue. To a certain extent. That extent depends entirely on whether or not it's a widespread issue, or a small number of skilled Players among a bunch of modders. As a principle, I'm not set on Paragons must progress more than anyone lower. Not as a given. Having the Title doesn't mean someone should automatically progress better than those competing better. It all depends on who is winning their Matches. I'm the same as I've always been. I said I think the GC is where the actual Rank Rewards are, so that should be random. The VT should be mitigated at least in part because it's not reasonable to throw everyone in amongst each other and call it fair. Any derivative of that I would be fine with.
Agree. Every day matters. Those low accounts right now they benefit from the system. When system will be fixed they will think that something was taken from them. Longer Kabam will wait with a fix - more damage it will be for BG
Comments
In the other division, you have Rays, Twins, A's and Angels. There's a wide range of teams in here. One is very respectable, two are mediocre and one is awful. The best team in here are the Rays and they finish 120-42 and go to the World Series because they have the best record. UC and Cav have a wide range of skills/rosters.
How do you think the first four teams would feel and about the Rays going to the World Series knowing they are better than them but never had a chance to face them?
Dr. Zola
If you were going that route, you'd have to separate those leagues somehow, and it's literally the same. Score the same amount of Points within the same 2 and a half (appx.) minutes, with the same Nodes, same scoring metrics, and the same range of strength, on either side.
A Paragon is not facing different or tougher Nodes than a UC Player. They're not facing a different set of scoring, or different objective. It's the same for everyone.
Everything in the GC is allegedly random within the same Tier you're in, which is the system people claim is fairest to begin with. If people are advancing there by legitimate means, they're doing it fairly.
You literally have one objective in a Fight. Score more than your opponent. Not highest Champs, closest scoring, longest time without getting hit, highest Title, or any variation thereof. Same objective. Score more than your Opponent. Do that 2 out of 3 times. That's it.
The average Paragon will have played the game for years, have most of the meta champs at 6* r3 minimum, completed all or most content in the game, play high tier war and therefore know how to counter all the nodes and champs in game.
There will be some variance in number of r4 champs and rank up decisions, the odd R5 now, plus new champs that some have and some don’t. Spot, Absorbing Man etc.
In my experience, the decks I face are incredibly similar bar the differences described above.
So consider the gap in skill (top tier players aside) is much narrower at the higher levels because of how experienced the players are. Then consider current VT meta adds zero difficulty to the fights which narrows the skill gap even more.
So unless your average Paragon is willing to invest in a lot of Victory Shields, progress can be painfully slow because the margins are so fine.
At lower levels the range of skill and knowledge is much broader. Roster’s are far less developed so if an 11k prestige player has been lucky with some meta champ pulls, they have a big advantage over their BG peers.
So a “lucky” account with a reasonable skill level has a huge advantage and able to progress through VT no problem.
Equally, a skilled player at lower levels has a much bigger advantage because they won’t constantly match players of similar skill level.
I would wager if there was a metric that measured skill, game content cleared and bg meta champs in roster then plotted distribution curves by progression level… the Paragon curve would be the flattest by some distance.
That’s why so many Paragons are getting road blocked by each other and the other progression levels that are the right side of the curve are flying through.
Final thought… I wonder how many of those lower rated accounts in GC are second accounts of Paragon players that have progressed further than their main account.
I have to credit another player (whose name escapes me) for providing the critical insight in Alliance war that originally eluded me. I was thinking statistically, but they were thinking - correctly - geometrically.
Take any group of players. Any group, composed any way you like. Then split them in half. Let all the competitors in one half compete against each other, and let the other half compete against each other. Then compare the records between the top finishers in both groups. Is that fair?
It isn't, because the groups were partitioned. Because they were, their records cannot be directly compared, period, for the simple reason that those records did not come from identical competition. The ideal situation is where everyone faces everyone else. If everyone was required to fight all umpteen-thousand other BG players in a round robin, we'd know who was stronger and who was weaker. But we can't do that. However, we can attempt to compare everyone against everyone else if there are at least interconnected chains of comparison. If I beat Zola, and Zola beats Fred, and Fred beats Chatter, we can presume with some degree of confidence that I am better than Chatter. We wouldn't know that with certainty because strength is not always transitive: Chatter might always beat me because he just has my particular number. But given the imperfect circumstances, this is at least a reasonably fair way to compare.
When no such chains exist, the two populations have no point of comparison. Just saying "well, they are both facing the same nodes, so it is fair to compare because I say so" is objectively false. There is no mathematical game theoretical justification for such a comparison. Everyone is entitled to an opinion about anything, but this would be textbook incorrect. You'd get an F for that opinion in an academic setting.
The geometric insight I am referring to is related to this mathematical analysis. It imagines the players are separated into individual silos. Within each silo, players compete with each other and climb in rating. At some point someone is going to climb to the top of each silo. But because the silos are separated, the player at the top of any one of those silos does not have to have any particular relationship between themselves and the other top players. *Someone* has to be on top of each silo no matter what.
Consider the case where we make a silo of blind players. Someone will be the best blind player and end up on the top. But can we say they are one of the top players in the game? Almost certainly not. But here's the more important point. Let's say you don't even care about that. Let's say you argue that while they were not one of the top players of the game as a whole, they still deserve to be one of the top players in the competition because they beat all the other blind players, so on a relative basis they were just as good as everyone else?
There's no way to know that. It could be that the top blind player was ten times better than the average blind player, or they could be only 2% better than the average blind player. The top blind player could be almost unrecognizably average compared to their peers, and just happened to end up on top. Because someone must be on top no matter what. For that matter, we don't know if the top Paragon player is ten times better than the average Paragon player or just a little better. All we know is they ended up at the top of their silo. We know they are the best in their little silo. We don't know what that *means*.
*If* there was a way to compare across silos, we could extrapolate what placement in particular silos meant. We could compare relative strength. But when players are isolated from each other, when you cannot directly compare their strength by actual competitive matches, you can't compare period. Because someone always climbs to the top of every silo. They might deserve to be at the top of their silo, but that means nothing for the competition as a whole.
When you isolate players into segregated groups, the only thing you can say is whether a player is better or worse in their peer group. But you are not allowed to say whether that means anything across the players as a whole. This realization that every silo automatically promotes someone to the top means if you dice up the players enough, we all can become winners. We could all be #1 in our own little competitive group of one. Saying that separated competition is valid is basically validating this extreme case. Which is obviously nonsensical.
Someone always rises to the top of every pyramid. Which means the more pyramids you make, the more "winners" you create automatically, regardless of competitive strength. If you want three winners, make three pyramids. If you want a thousand winners, make a thousand pyramids. And you will end up with a thousand #1s, all of which would have equal claim to being #1. But that's ludicrous. If it is ludicrous for a thousand, it is ludicrous for a hundred, and it is ludicrous for ten.
Let's face it, by the time the Paragons are duking it out, we all are doing the same stuff, even if we don't all have the same rosters. Ban Abs, make sure you can counter Hulkling, etc etc etc. But in the lower tiers, you *will* be trying to decide whether to burst Captain Marvel with CGR or save him for the Torch that your opponent inexplicably placed on defense, because its completely crazy in the mid tiers. An edge in knowledge or experience in the high roster game is an edge, but that same edge in the lower roster BG matches is checkmate.
If you're a veteran on an alt or if you're a particularly experienced progressing player, the game lets you keep on bashing the children until you reach GC. That's what makes the current situation not about Paragons vs Uncollecteds. It is about winners matching against losers over and over again because the game doesn't care how much better you are or how much worse you are than your competition, it will just keep sending you against the same opponents over and over until the winners Scrooge McDuck themselves into a giant pile of loot and the losers set their phones on fire.
Something you noted also made me think: who are the low account “losers” the low account “winners” are crawling over to get to the tippy-top of their little silo (and close to the top of all the silos)?
Bashing the children may not be far off…
Dr. Zola
Yes, they're facing different competitors. They're also at different points themselves, with stronger Rosters to do it with. That power comparison isn't complete without examining that aspect. Otherwise it's just a one-sided look. If you're going to compare the strength of what they're coming up against, you have to factor in what they're using to do it with. You can't have one side of that and not the other.
What we're talking about is the fact that someone is bitter that Players with a smaller Roster are making it to the GC and they're not. That mentions nothing of their own skill at BGs, whether or not they're earning their own Wins with the Matches they have, what their own efforts are looking like. It's an entitlement to do better simply because their Roster is comparatively stronger than people winning their Matches. Unless they introduce some kind of metric that legitimizes that, it's not a standing point. We're not measuring how they do in their own Fights VERSUS how others do in their own Fights, PLUS Roster size. We're measuring how they do. All the way up to the GC, which is for Rank Rewards.
I'm not saying things should all stay the way they are. I'm saying people need to stop being ignorant to the fact that others are progressing from winning their own Matches. The rest of the "I could take you out." is just plain bitterness.
And this time will be with introduction of 7 stars. People will be too afraid to progress the game and increase prestige so people will not spend money on 7 stars.
I stoped open my relics and for sure will not open any 7 star until matchmaking will be fixed
Only thing slows it, is probably trying to find a solution to handle and soften the lower accounts outcry.
But as this matchmaking continues, lower accounts are feeling more and more entitled to VT and GC rewards.
ANY change at BGs will mean lesser rewards for them.
But again, I will repeat because people tend to be focusing on matchmaking.
Yes it is broken and objectively unfair, but more than that, the whole structure of VT is a death sentence for BGs, sooner or later.
And again @DNA3000 ’s post (that was moved to Suggestions and Requests 😠) is a great write up that includes ways of “saving” BGs long term, and make them successful mode for all tiers of players 🙂
As a principle, I'm not set on Paragons must progress more than anyone lower. Not as a given. Having the Title doesn't mean someone should automatically progress better than those competing better. It all depends on who is winning their Matches.
I'm the same as I've always been. I said I think the GC is where the actual Rank Rewards are, so that should be random. The VT should be mitigated at least in part because it's not reasonable to throw everyone in amongst each other and call it fair.
Any derivative of that I would be fine with.