About AW rating and tanking

It is no secret that a lot of alliance have decided to “tank” their war rating during off season by losing on purpose. This practice subverts the competitive spirit of The Contest, not only during off season, but during season as well.

We are one of the alliances that decide to challenge ourselves and always play to win and keep the competitive spirit up all the time. We don’t believe in tanking.

However, we are finding ourselves being penalized by this. So far this season we have faced 2 master level alliances, losing both times unfortunately. Now, alliances that decided to tank are ahead of us in the leaderboards.

A suggestion to offset the advantage tanking gives would be to apply the multiplier to both alliances. In other words, for example, if an alliance on the top end of tier2 face a master alliance in tier 1, both alliances should get a 7x multiplier for that match. That way there is at least some kind incentive for alliances to always keep winning and not to tank.

With the shorter season this is now more important, as tanking now gives an unfair advantage during more than half of the season. After that then war rating should stabilize but by that time is already too late because its such a short season.

I hope kabam comes up with something to offset tanking or else more alliances will also start tanking

Comments

Hulk_77

Pretty sure when alliances matchup for war, the multiplier is map driven, meaning the same for both alliances for that particular war.

SiriusBreak

@Hulk_77 the multiplier is based on the tier. Both would get the same multiplier IF in the same tier. In the case that @DJSergy is speaking of, provided matchmaking is doing it's job, this theoretically shouldn't be an issue. As far as I was aware, both Alliances should be in the same tier, hence same multiplier. However, if that is not the case, matchmaking needs a tweak to stop this. OR like the OP said, if they ARE in fact facing an Alliance from T1 and they're in T2, they should be awarded the higher multiplier even if they lose. That could increase competition in the point standings.

If we're talking strictly about tanking though, how would they judge someone tanking vs a string of bad luck? If the Alliance has a wicked win streak and then suddenly isn't dropping anything, or any bosses, then perhaps they could view that as tanking. Just the same, things happen and it could just be bad luck. Problem with this scenario is, plausible deniability. So again I ask, how can you judge this? How can they pick out that an Alliance that was in tier 1 purposefully dropped back too tier 2 just for the sake of facing easier opponents?

DJSergy

@Hulk_77 the tier is not map driven.

You can see in this image we matched uo against a top 15 war rating alliance (obviously tier1) yet our tier was still tier 2 and our points score were apllied a 6.2 multiplier (tier2).

So despite we matched against tier1 alli, our multiplier applied to season score was only tier 2 multiplier.

@SiriusBreak i agree, gonna be hard to penalize alliances that tank. Thats why the solution i propose is an inventive for alliance that do not tank, not a penalty for those who do tank. Regardless of tanking, the issue when you get a bad matchup and face an alliance in a higher tier, your season points should get the same tier multiplier they are in to make it fair. Also helps with the feeling of getting screwed in matchmaking. This should be fixed for next season, or else more alliance wil lchose to tank in order to avoid these bad matchups.

JamesM

Treat the off-season like it is supposed to be a break from season which means don't pressure yourself on clearing, boosting and use your items. It is completely your fault for pushing yourselves in off-season. In sports it is the same way you use the off-season as training experimenting, you don't actually "play to win". I left an alliance that was pushing during the off-season. Only reason you should play to win is to get to a higher tier to position yourself for more points, however you may find yourself outclassed once season starts.

DJSergy

JamesM wrote: »

Treat the off-season like it is supposed to be a break from season which means don't pressure yourself on clearing, boosting and use your items. It is completely your fault for pushing yourselves in off-season. In sports it is the same way you use the off-season as training experimenting, you don't actually "play to win". I left an alliance that was pushing during the off-season. Only reason you should play to win is to get to a higher tier to position yourself for more points, however you may find yourself outclassed once season starts.

We did not push hard during off season. What i mean we played to win is that we actually had our best defense placed and gave a good effort on attack phase (no crazy boosting or anything, of course). What i mean is that we did not try to lose on purpose. This was enough to go about 50/50 with minimal use of resources.

Tanking is different. We faced at least 3 allies during season tanking. One placed 2*, another didn’t place defense and another just didn’t join. Even in sports like you mention, teams try to get better during off season. You dont get better by losing on purpose, even on friendly matches.

Anyways, the system is flawed and kabam should fix it. Just the fact that you are saying you dont play to win during off season, and that losing during off season benefits your alli should tell kabam there is something wrong with their system.

Omni

Why because it doesn’t benefit you ? It’s not against the rules. And it shouldn’t be. How can kabam judge someone’s level of effort. If they don’t full clear one war are they tanking ?

JamesM

I agree, that is kind of dumb and the war statement is flawed. However, as long as alliances are willing to push to win causing players to spend for minimal rewards it won't get better.

JamesM

I believe in item free wars in the off-season when I say you shouldn't play to win.

DNA3000

DJSergy wrote: »

A suggestion to offset the advantage tanking gives would be to apply the multiplier to both alliances. In other words, for example, if an alliance on the top end of tier2 face a master alliance in tier 1, both alliances should get a 7x multiplier for that match. That way there is at least some kind incentive for alliances to always keep winning and not to tank.

I don't understand what this suggestion is supposed to do. The problem people mention when it comes to "tanking" is that they are facing an alliance that is clearly stronger than their tier, so that alliance has a huge advantage in the war. But if they have been tanking their rating in order to get matched up against lower alliances they will have the same multiplier when they face each other. You can't simultaneously be complaining about being matched up against an alliance that has tanked their rating down to you, and also complaining that they are getting a higher multiplier than you. If they have a higher multiplier than you, they didn't tank their rating to match against you, because their rating is still much higher than you.

I'm wondering if you are confusing war tier and season bracket. The multiplier is based on war tier, not season bracket. An alliance that deliberately tanks their rating kills their multiplier at the same time, regardless of which season bracket they score enough points to be in.

Vale84

This practice subverts the competitive spirit of The Contest,

I like how now everything concerning anything in war that is seen as not "mash the lower tier ally even in off season" is addressed with these words, lol.

While imo tanking is completely fine if you don't care for 6* shards and 5* shards (i do), it also helps mixing up almost all war ratings around the same level. Which means that anyone can face anyone. It surely might end up matching lower tier allies given a lower war rating, but last season we saw more than once 3400+ war ratings matching 2800- allies in the same way.

So nothing changes really, if not that the pool of possible targets covers more allies. Which is more or less better for lower tiers. The problem is balanced within itself. A lower tier ally will most likely get to tier one beating weaker allies, and a master ally will most likely keep in master beating said allies approaching master bracket mentioned above.

If you hit a limit and can't stay over a certain tier, then considered your member's strenght you aren't meant to have the potential still to climb higher.

DNA3000

Vale84 wrote: »

While imo tanking is completely fine if you don't care for 6* shards and 5* shards (i do), it also helps mixing up almost all war ratings around the same level. Which means that anyone can face anyone. It surely might end up matching lower tier allies given a lower war rating, but last season we saw more than once 3400+ war ratings matching 2800- allies in the same way.

Tanking doesn't match a 2800 alliance against a 3400 alliance. The match system factoring in alliance rating (as opposed to just war rating) seems to be doing that. Tanking affects your match making when a 2800 alliance faces another 2800 alliance that is clearly far stronger than you'd expect a 2800 alliance to ordinarily be. Tanking lowers rating. It doesn't magically keep rating high but match you against someone with lower rating.

Vale84

DNA3000 wrote: »

Vale84 wrote: »

While imo tanking is completely fine if you don't care for 6* shards and 5* shards (i do), it also helps mixing up almost all war ratings around the same level. Which means that anyone can face anyone. It surely might end up matching lower tier allies given a lower war rating, but last season we saw more than once 3400+ war ratings matching 2800- allies in the same way.

Tanking doesn't match a 2800 alliance against a 3400 alliance. The match system factoring in alliance rating (as opposed to just war rating) seems to be doing that. Tanking affects your match making when a 2800 alliance faces another 2800 alliance that is clearly far stronger than you'd expect a 2800 alliance to ordinarily be. Tanking lowers rating. It doesn't magically keep rating high but match you against someone with lower rating.

I guess i wasnt clear enough.

I said that in season 2 we had cases of 3400 Wr allies matching 2900 Wr allies at lower tiers, with NO tanking in place being season.

Therefore, tanking or not the risk of an extremely unbalanced matchup is alwais there, whatever the case. Finally, i added that the only add tanking brings is that, given most allies do it, it mixes up the pool of possible matches in a wider way. That's all.

DJSergy

Omni wrote: »

Why because it doesn’t benefit you ? It’s not against the rules. And it shouldn’t be. How can kabam judge someone’s level of effort. If they don’t full clear one war are they tanking ?

This is not what i meant. Read my comments before posting. I do not want kabam to penalize for tanking. Actually it will be imposible to determine who is tanking like you just say so penalizing it is not a posibility. What in saying is to incentivize the alliance that DO NOT tank.

DJSergy

Vale84 wrote: »

This practice subverts the competitive spirit of The Contest,

I like how now everything concerning anything in war that is seen as not "mash the lower tier ally even in off season" is addressed with these words, lol.

While imo tanking is completely fine if you don't care for 6* shards and 5* shards (i do), it also helps mixing up almost all war ratings around the same level. Which means that anyone can face anyone. It surely might end up matching lower tier allies given a lower war rating, but last season we saw more than once 3400+ war ratings matching 2800- allies in the same way.

So nothing changes really, if not that the pool of possible targets covers more allies. Which is more or less better for lower tiers. The problem is balanced within itself. A lower tier ally will most likely get to tier one beating weaker allies, and a master ally will most likely keep in master beating said allies approaching master bracket mentioned above.

If you hit a limit and can't stay over a certain tier, then considered your member's strenght you aren't meant to have the potential still to climb higher.

I just copy/paste moderators words from another thread 😂 (using their own words to make a point, even tho that has proven to be inconsequential in these forums 🤦‍♂️ )

As for the point you are trying to make, getting screwed over in matchmaking may or may not be related to tanking, but one thing we can all agree is that the feeling of getting screwed in matchmaking and going against a OP alliance will be offset a little bit if the higher multiplier is applied to both alliances. Tanking or not tanking, its the fair thing to do.

I do believe however that if they do so, it will reduce the need for tanking in order to be successful in season.

unknown

This content has been removed.

Omni

DJSergy wrote: »

Omni wrote: »

Why because it doesn’t benefit you ? It’s not against the rules. And it shouldn’t be. How can kabam judge someone’s level of effort. If they don’t full clear one war are they tanking ?

This is not what i meant. Read my comments before posting. I do not want kabam to penalize for tanking. Actually it will be imposible to determine who is tanking like you just say so penalizing it is not a posibility. What in saying is to incentivize the alliance that DO NOT tank.

They do in the form of shards and more loyalty for winning the war which can better position the “non-tankers” as they are able to buy more of the war boosts

DJSergy

DNA3000 wrote: »

DJSergy wrote: »

A suggestion to offset the advantage tanking gives would be to apply the multiplier to both alliances. In other words, for example, if an alliance on the top end of tier2 face a master alliance in tier 1, both alliances should get a 7x multiplier for that match. That way there is at least some kind incentive for alliances to always keep winning and not to tank.

I don't understand what this suggestion is supposed to do. The problem people mention when it comes to "tanking" is that they are facing an alliance that is clearly stronger than their tier, so that alliance has a huge advantage in the war. But if they have been tanking their rating in order to get matched up against lower alliances they will have the same multiplier when they face each other. You can't simultaneously be complaining about being matched up against an alliance that has tanked their rating down to you, and also complaining that they are getting a higher multiplier than you. If they have a higher multiplier than you, they didn't tank their rating to match against you, because their rating is still much higher than you.

I'm wondering if you are confusing war tier and season bracket. The multiplier is based on war tier, not season bracket. An alliance that deliberately tanks their rating kills their multiplier at the same time, regardless of which season bracket they score enough points to be in.

Wrong. You don’t necessarily have the same multiplier as the alliance you are facing. Look at the picture I posted above. So alliances that tank and do it smartly, they stay in the lower end of the tier so they don’t lose the multiplier. By doing this they reduce the probability of tougher matchups that usually could result being matched against an alliance in a higher tier than you. They also increase the probability of being matched against an alliance in a lower tier. What im proposing is that during any war matchup, both alliance score the same multiplier, the higher of the two. This helps offset the effects of tanking. Doesn’t necessarily fixes the issue but it will be a step in the right direction.

I’m not confusing season bracket and war rating. But you can’t talk about one without mentioning the other becasue they are related. War rating determines your multiplier and matchups you get, which in turn dictates the score you put in, which places you in the respective season bracker.

Hulk_77

DJSergy wrote: »

@Hulk_77 the tier is not map driven.

You can see in this image we matched uo against a top 15 war rating alliance (obviously tier1) yet our tier was still tier 2 and our points score were apllied a 6.2 multiplier (tier2).

So despite we matched against tier1 alli, our multiplier applied to season score was only tier 2 multiplier.

@SiriusBreak i agree, gonna be hard to penalize alliances that tank. Thats why the solution i propose is an inventive for alliance that do not tank, not a penalty for those who do tank. Regardless of tanking, the issue when you get a bad matchup and face an alliance in a higher tier, your season points should get the same tier multiplier they are in to make it fair. Also helps with the feeling of getting screwed in matchmaking. This should be fixed for next season, or else more alliance wil lchose to tank in order to avoid these bad matchups.

Yes, but that doesn't prove that your opponent had a different multiplier. They should've had the same as yours.

Mattylo

The fact that the offseason impacts the AW season means the system is flawed. No i dont blame alliances for tanking bc its a current strategy that has already been proven to be beneficial.

However our rankings (tiers) should only be changeable during the season. This gives everyone in the game an even playing field when the season starts. Sure the offseason you can test new strategies like defender placement, members paths etc without the fear of dropping to many tier levels. Just like I think someone mentioned with the offseason in any sport pre-season (offseason) is essntially meaningless and done in order to be ready for the actual season.

Yes if you joined a tier 6 alliance but want to be in Master well you have two options. Work your way up or join a Master alliance. The manipulation has to stop.

KuBcOoL

boy this post got derailed quickly.....

DJSergy

Hulk_77 wrote: »

DJSergy wrote: »

@Hulk_77 the tier is not map driven.

You can see in this image we matched uo against a top 15 war rating alliance (obviously tier1) yet our tier was still tier 2 and our points score were apllied a 6.2 multiplier (tier2).

So despite we matched against tier1 alli, our multiplier applied to season score was only tier 2 multiplier.

@SiriusBreak i agree, gonna be hard to penalize alliances that tank. Thats why the solution i propose is an inventive for alliance that do not tank, not a penalty for those who do tank. Regardless of tanking, the issue when you get a bad matchup and face an alliance in a higher tier, your season points should get the same tier multiplier they are in to make it fair. Also helps with the feeling of getting screwed in matchmaking. This should be fixed for next season, or else more alliance wil lchose to tank in order to avoid these bad matchups.

Yes, but that doesn't prove that your opponent had a different multiplier. They should've had the same as yours.

Yeah they should’ve, but they didn’t. War rating of 3100+ is for sure tier 1

SiriusBreak

@Hulk_77 - The War rating does look like it's T1, in which case, yes the multiplier would in fact be different. Rating will dictate tier, which then dictates multiplier. So in theory, if the other Alliance is T1, they could have 2 different multipliers.

So, what most seem to be overlooking here is this.... IF you are in fact pinned against an Alliance that is in a higher tier, win or lose, you should get the same multiplier during the season. Obviously during the off season this would be a moot point. Matchmaking already changes the war rating boost/loss judging by the Alliances' current ratings (overall and war) in relation to each other. In theory this would help Alliances that have been somewhat unfairly matched in AW during the season. Everyone has been victim of matchmaking bonking your Alliance clean on the head from time to time. In those instances, perhaps the little boost in multiplier for the extra challenge is in order. That way the loss isn't as damaging to their points in the overall standings. Be honest, everyone here should agree that the underdog Alliance should be given the same multiplier as the Alliance that's CLEARLY stronger. It wouldn't hurt the higher rated Alliance, it would just help the one that got a bad break thanks to matchmaking doing what it occasionally does.

This would ONLY be applicable in the cases of an Alliance of a lower tier facing another in a higher tier. As I previously stated, I thought this wasn't possible, but it does seem feasible that it could happen. The rating differences in the image above do seem to be large enough to guess that the lower Alliance is in T2, and the higher rated is in T1. I could be wrong. If so, this all is a moot point. However, if not, and there are cases of Alliances in lower tiers facing Alliances in higher tiers; they should even the playing field a bit by awarding the lower tier Alliance the same point multiplier as the higher. Win or Lose.

DNA3000

DJSergy wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

DJSergy wrote: »

A suggestion to offset the advantage tanking gives would be to apply the multiplier to both alliances. In other words, for example, if an alliance on the top end of tier2 face a master alliance in tier 1, both alliances should get a 7x multiplier for that match. That way there is at least some kind incentive for alliances to always keep winning and not to tank.

I don't understand what this suggestion is supposed to do. The problem people mention when it comes to "tanking" is that they are facing an alliance that is clearly stronger than their tier, so that alliance has a huge advantage in the war. But if they have been tanking their rating in order to get matched up against lower alliances they will have the same multiplier when they face each other. You can't simultaneously be complaining about being matched up against an alliance that has tanked their rating down to you, and also complaining that they are getting a higher multiplier than you. If they have a higher multiplier than you, they didn't tank their rating to match against you, because their rating is still much higher than you.

I'm wondering if you are confusing war tier and season bracket. The multiplier is based on war tier, not season bracket. An alliance that deliberately tanks their rating kills their multiplier at the same time, regardless of which season bracket they score enough points to be in.

Wrong. You don’t necessarily have the same multiplier as the alliance you are facing. Look at the picture I posted above. So alliances that tank and do it smartly, they stay in the lower end of the tier so they don’t lose the multiplier. By doing this they reduce the probability of tougher matchups that usually could result being matched against an alliance in a higher tier than you. They also increase the probability of being matched against an alliance in a lower tier. What im proposing is that during any war matchup, both alliance score the same multiplier, the higher of the two. This helps offset the effects of tanking. Doesn’t necessarily fixes the issue but it will be a step in the right direction.

I’m not confusing season bracket and war rating. But you can’t talk about one without mentioning the other becasue they are related. War rating determines your multiplier and matchups you get, which in turn dictates the score you put in, which places you in the respective season bracker.

Because of the way war ratings work, to a first order approximation to stay at the same rough rating you basically have to win at a 50% rate. But that's also the rough rate of winning for any alliance that is in roughly the appropriate war rating for their strength. Winning at a 50% rate is not by any reasonable definition "tanking." Tanking refers to tanking one's rating, which is synonymous with losing at a rate high enough to drop it significantly. An alliance might conceivably tank their rating to reach a certain rating, but they aren't tanking when they hover there. Hovering is indistinguishable from absolutely normal play.

Awarding alliances the higher of the two multipliers also appears to be exploitable. Other players have already done the legwork to demonstrate that when an alliance has a higher war rating than most alliances of similar alliance rating, the game tends to match them by more relaxed criteria to expedite matching. They can sometimes be matched against much weaker alliances with similar alliance rating but lower war rating, and sometimes against alliances with higher war rating. This already incentivizes degenerate play where players dump lower champs to decrease alliance rating, creating this disparity. Awarding the higher of the two multipliers adds an additional incentive to do this for the matchups that end up going in that direction.

DJSergy

DNA3000 wrote: »

DJSergy wrote: »

DNA3000 wrote: »

DJSergy wrote: »

A suggestion to offset the advantage tanking gives would be to apply the multiplier to both alliances. In other words, for example, if an alliance on the top end of tier2 face a master alliance in tier 1, both alliances should get a 7x multiplier for that match. That way there is at least some kind incentive for alliances to always keep winning and not to tank.

I don't understand what this suggestion is supposed to do. The problem people mention when it comes to "tanking" is that they are facing an alliance that is clearly stronger than their tier, so that alliance has a huge advantage in the war. But if they have been tanking their rating in order to get matched up against lower alliances they will have the same multiplier when they face each other. You can't simultaneously be complaining about being matched up against an alliance that has tanked their rating down to you, and also complaining that they are getting a higher multiplier than you. If they have a higher multiplier than you, they didn't tank their rating to match against you, because their rating is still much higher than you.

I'm wondering if you are confusing war tier and season bracket. The multiplier is based on war tier, not season bracket. An alliance that deliberately tanks their rating kills their multiplier at the same time, regardless of which season bracket they score enough points to be in.

Wrong. You don’t necessarily have the same multiplier as the alliance you are facing. Look at the picture I posted above. So alliances that tank and do it smartly, they stay in the lower end of the tier so they don’t lose the multiplier. By doing this they reduce the probability of tougher matchups that usually could result being matched against an alliance in a higher tier than you. They also increase the probability of being matched against an alliance in a lower tier. What im proposing is that during any war matchup, both alliance score the same multiplier, the higher of the two. This helps offset the effects of tanking. Doesn’t necessarily fixes the issue but it will be a step in the right direction.

I’m not confusing season bracket and war rating. But you can’t talk about one without mentioning the other becasue they are related. War rating determines your multiplier and matchups you get, which in turn dictates the score you put in, which places you in the respective season bracker.

Because of the way war ratings work, to a first order approximation to stay at the same rough rating you basically have to win at a 50% rate. But that's also the rough rate of winning for any alliance that is in roughly the appropriate war rating for their strength. Winning at a 50% rate is not by any reasonable definition "tanking." Tanking refers to tanking one's rating, which is synonymous with losing at a rate high enough to drop it significantly. An alliance might conceivably tank their rating to reach a certain rating, but they aren't tanking when they hover there. Hovering is indistinguishable from absolutely normal play.

Awarding alliances the higher of the two multipliers also appears to be exploitable. Other players have already done the legwork to demonstrate that when an alliance has a higher war rating than most alliances of similar alliance rating, the game tends to match them by more relaxed criteria to expedite matching. They can sometimes be matched against much weaker alliances with similar alliance rating but lower war rating, and sometimes against alliances with higher war rating. This already incentivizes degenerate play where players dump lower champs to decrease alliance rating, creating this disparity. Awarding the higher of the two multipliers adds an additional incentive to do this for the matchups that end up going in that direction.

I do not see a scenario where an alliance could exploit anything if the higher of two multipliers is applied to both alliance. The alliance in the higher tier that will most likely take the W doesn’t care about this, they will score the same points and the W regardless. However, this does helps the alliance that got screwed over by matchmaking and matched against an alliance in a higher tier, by scoring a little bit more points in the loss. So dumping champs to lower your alliance rating won’t really benefit from this at all.

Al3x

One way is to have a separate on season and off season rating to prevent “tanking” @Kabam Miike

JamesM

It can be really simple, war rating is frozen during off-season. No brainier if you ask me.

TitoBandito187

Look at it as strategy. They tank, but lose half of the shards they could have earned i they had won. So they are giving up something in hopes it will pan out better at the end of the next war season, but that’s not guaranteed.

If someone is trying to lose, the other team benefits that war. If they both want to lose, then may the better loser win, but it’s still a competition either way.

All in all, it’s a risk/strategy with no guaranteed outcome. Especially if others are doing it too. We have a no item use policy off-season because we don’t care if we lose. We don’t try to, but can easily result in a loss because of it. However saving items for season is a smart strategy.

DJSergy

@JamesM @Al3x Freezing the war rating during off season could be a good idea but also has some disadvantages.

You got new alliances being formed or merged trying to climb up the ratings and also other alliances trying to stay on top. So if you remove the posibility of climbing up during off season you take that away.

You also take away tanking. So some pros/cons from this approach.

JamesM

@TitoBandito187 in a ladder system if you lose x amount in a row you will face weaker opponents and will win a net x amount of wars throughout the system. On another note, I really don't get how misunderstood a competitive ladder system works, I can't tell you how many alliance mates think they can always win. Eventually you reach equilibrium where you find alliances that you are equivalent to and you will win 50% on average at that point.