Unfair Alliance War Imbalance

@Kabam Miike Is this really intentional and fair? We're fighting an alliance with 6* r3 and the Alliance rating difference is over 15,000.

This is very unfair just because we have the same alliance war rating. Most of their members are in the 1.5-2 million rating.

P.S. Katy Candy is in the alliance were up against so that should be a gauge of how strong they are.

Comments

AzKicker316

You already said it, the war ratings are close enough so that you're matched up. Doesn't matter what the alliance rating is. If you're a lower rated alliance that keeps winning wars, you will run into higher rated alliances.

SummonerNR

Assuming you are the 2nd picture, it does seem to be a little unbalanced regarding Alliance PRESTIGE (note, Alliance/Member Rating itself really doesn’t factor into it).

Although you have just a slightly higher War Rating than them at this time, maybe the Matchmaking was done (before WR war-5 adjustment yesterday) when you maybe were even higher WR and maybe they were even lower WR. And then with both war-5 adjustments to WR you are now a little closer (post-Matchmaking).

And so could have been a case where higher Prestige cancelled out the (at the time) much higher WR difference, and allowed you to be matched against them. ??

SiriusBreak

Assuming you are the 2nd picture, it does seem to be a little unbalanced regarding Alliance PRESTIGE (note, Alliance/Member Rating itself really doesn’t factor into it).

Although you have just a slightly higher War Rating than them at this time, maybe the Matchmaking was done (before WR war-5 adjustment yesterday) when you maybe were even higher WR and maybe they were even lower WR. And then with both war-5 adjustments to WR you are now a little closer (post-Matchmaking).

And so could have been a case where higher Prestige cancelled out the (at the time) much higher WR difference, and allowed you to be matched against them. ??

Interesting theory @SummonerNR . Although let's be honest, having over 1k difference in Prestige is ROUGH. I mean, that is just plain ouch.

Patchie93

But prestige shouldn't matter

Only thing that should matter is war rating and look yours is higher.

Mellie_Mel

So let me ask this question...would this be considered a fair match-up?

Worknprogress

So let me ask this question...would this be considered a fair match-up?

You cant block out war rating when asking is a war match fair. That's just silly

Mellie_Mel

It was intentional @Worknprogress based on prestige, rating and member rating, which alliance has the greater edge?

SummonerNR

It was intentional @Worknprogress based on prestige, rating and member rating, which alliance has the greater edge?

Forget about Alliance/Member Rating, doesn’t mean anything since it includes the whole assortment of useless lower champs that people may (OR MAY NOT) still be keeping on their Roster.
PRESTIGE (top champs) is much more reliable indicator used to compare strength of different people.

And it has been shown that Kabam apparently uses BOTH War Rating and Prestige for Matchmaking.

But maybe they have (or at least ought to) start to throddle that somewhat now and eventually have High WR ally's with Low Prestige start to face at least “some” WR ally's that are higher Prestige if they really want to maintain their position at such high WR they may be at.

Worknprogress

It was intentional @Worknprogress based on prestige, rating and member rating, which alliance has the greater edge?

I'm aware it was intentionally and it's still ridiculous

Moosetiptronic

Wars should match on war rating only, unless they do a sub league that assesses on prestige. But then your rewards should be capped.

Example, if you have 10k average prestige, you compete in the Platinum league and war rating is only assessed against other plat league members. You get 6* shards for wins.

If you have 8k prestige you are in the gold league and you get 5* shards and war rating is only assessed against other gold league members.

Sounds fair?

If it doesn't sound fair, then the only measure of ranking, rewards and matching should be war rating. You only have 7k prestige but 3k war rating? Expect to be matched against alliances with 10k rating and get stomped until you find your level again.

(Although they could always have two war systems. One with lower rewards but only 3* or 4* are allowed and it's purely skill. The second with any champs allowed and it's only matched on war rating.)

If they are rigging match making, so that a 20m 8k prestige rated alliance only matches against alliances with a similar prestige, rather than on war rating only, it will disincentivise the big alliances that make kabam all they money. So this can't last.

Mellie_Mel

Here is my point...

The top picture is an alliance in plat 2. I agree that war rating should be what determines matches, but we all know it is not the only factor. The second alliance is a plat 4 alliance. The reality is, even with a similar war rating, they would never get matched because of the disparity in alliance rating, member rating and prestige. So just like Moose eluded to in the previous post, that 20m 8K prestige alliance is getting easier matchups than much larger alliances. If those two alliances matched, the second alliance would destroy because their rosters are deeper (better defenders with full diversity and more options on attack to counter difficult matchups)

hungryhungrybbq

Full disclosure, I've only skimmed so far. However this looks at first glance to be a war... based on war rating as it should be and is quite fair imo. It's what a lot of us have been asking for a return to. Many low prestige alliances have been unfairly shielded from facing higher prestige alliances for a couple seasons now. Allowing them to win greater rewards than older, more experienced, stronger alliances because they haven't had to face any of them. This is what it actually looks like to face someone with the same war rating as you if you aren't being artificially shielded by low prestige. Hey, I'm sorry though. I'm sure it will be a rude awakening and rough to adjust to if it does get reverted back to war rating as the primary factor.
It may seem unfair now, but that could be because your war rating is artificially inflated based on gaining easy matches based on prestige. It will take a little time for things to even out.

DarthPhal

So let me ask this question...would this be considered a fair match-up?

Hard to say with all the relevant data blocked out.

Seraphion

Guys the problem with only warrating is that ppl use shell allinaces.

Imo the only fix for that would be personal war rating. Not the alliance but every member like prestige. That way you cant switch alliances to get lower enemys (if you dont know what "shell alliances" are you can find infos on youtube)

Mellie_Mel

So let me ask this question...would this be considered a fair match-up?

Hard to say with all the relevant data blocked out.

That is precisely the point. If war rating was all that mattered, there would be no issue. So I removed the war ratings to show what is actually happening. The top alliance (plat 2) matches with alliances with similar stats as them. The second alliance (plat 4) matches with alliances with similar stats as them. It's an unfair advantage for low prestige/low rated alliances. Are they truly a top 100 alliance? No. They are just better than all the other alliances with similar stats.

As others have mentioned, putting alliances into brackets based on war rating would be a great option. Top xxx in each bracket moves up while bottom xxx in each bracket moves down. First ever bracket could be based on war rating, but after that, there would be no need for any ratings. All match-ups would be won/lost head-to-head.

hungryhungrybbq

Guys the problem with only warrating is that ppl use shell allinaces.

Imo the only fix for that would be personal war rating. Not the alliance but every member like prestige. That way you cant switch alliances to get lower enemys (if you dont know what "shell alliances" are you can find infos on youtube)

I understand that this is what using prestige as a factor was intended to combat, but imo the unfairness that this prestige system has created far outweighs the unfairness we experienced with shell swapping. Barring a better solution, I'd rather see it reverted back to war rating. It's giving such an advantage to lower prestige alliances.

DNA3000

It was intentional @Worknprogress based on prestige, rating and member rating, which alliance has the greater edge?

Setting aside the "siloing" issues that currently afflict the match making system, in general the *definition* of a fair match is two alliances have the same war rating, because war rating is a measure of how often they win or lose. As imperfect as Kabam has implemented war rating (and mathematically speaking, Kabam is mathematically illiterate) war rating is a mathematical encapsulation of a win/loss metric. As such, it measures how strong the alliance is in alliance war. That is the only thing that should matter when it comes to "fair" wars: are the two alliances equally good at winning. If two alliances have the same war rating, that implies they are winning and losing at roughly equal rates across similar competition. So even if they have wildly disparate alliance rating or prestige, that's still a fair match up.

DNA3000

So let me ask this question...would this be considered a fair match-up?

Hard to say with all the relevant data blocked out.
That is precisely the point. If war rating was all that mattered, there would be no issue. So I removed the war ratings to show what is actually happening. The top alliance (plat 2) matches with alliances with similar stats as them. The second alliance (plat 4) matches with alliances with similar stats as them. It's an unfair advantage for low prestige/low rated alliances. Are they truly a top 100 alliance? No. They are just better than all the other alliances with similar stats.

As others have mentioned, putting alliances into brackets based on war rating would be a great option. Top xxx in each bracket moves up while bottom xxx in each bracket moves down. First ever bracket could be based on war rating, but after that, there would be no need for any ratings. All match-ups would be won/lost head-to-head.

I proposed something similar many times, but I think you're missing the point here. If we implemented such a thing, someone could use your very post to claim that your system was unfair. Just block out win/loss record and demand that you tell them based solely on alliance rating whether the match up was unfair. In your system, alliances that were millions of rating apart would be matched against each other based on their win/loss record. For your system to be fair, you have to believe that everything else besides win/loss record was irrelevant, and if the system matched alliances millions of rating apart that is still fair.

But how can you defend your system against that charge, when you're willing to lodge the same charge against the current system? If you're willing to say that a 38 million alliance facing a 20 million alliance is unfair, then it will be equally unfair in your system as well.

In the current system, imperfect as it is, war rating should be the *only* match criteria. The fact that it isn't actually *breaks* war rating in many cases. But the solution isn't to break it more, it is to remove the breakages by completely ignoring alliance rating and alliance prestige. Anyone who thinks two alliances should have the same prestige or alliance rating for match ups to be "fair" or thinks no alliance with much lower prestige can ever hope to compete with alliances with much higher prestige have instantly lost this fight. Because all fair match up systems ignore alliance rating and prestige Any system that looks at either is broken, sight unseen. And any player that thinks either is important to fair match ups can't make a proper match up system.

CASCAOV

@Kabam Miike it’s true the alliance war this season is closed? Because the issue we had last week. Some people are telling us the season is closed or locked , Please tell us what’s going on ...

DNA3000

Guys the problem with only warrating is that ppl use shell allinaces.

Imo the only fix for that would be personal war rating. Not the alliance but every member like prestige. That way you cant switch alliances to get lower enemys (if you dont know what "shell alliances" are you can find infos on youtube)

This has been proposed many times, going back quite a ways. I haven't seen anyone actually try to propose one in terms of specifics, or address the manipulation problems inherent in such a system.

For example, wars have nine paths not ten. So you can actually swap a single player into a BG without seriously compromising its attack strength. That account could theoretically have any war rating right down to zero (and any system that arbitrarily assigns one to start off with either penalizes casual players severely, or it is itself vulnerable to manipulation by just sticking it into a shell and dumping rating). So you can eliminate as much as ten percent of your rating just by swapping one account from each battlegroup.

People use shells because it is the most straight forward way to change alliance rating. But if you implement personal rating, you're actually handing alliances an even better way to manipulate war rating. They don't have to all leave and join another alliance. They can, without losing a single war, artificially lower alliance war rating instantly by swapping just a couple accounts.

Remember: when you use shell swapping, one alliance is winning and the other one is deliberately losing to lower that alliance's rating. That also, in a "personal war rating" system also lowers the war rating of the individual accounts in that alliance. That can now serve as alliance rating stooges to lower an alliance's rating.

This ignores all sorts of other extremely complex problems. Suppose I'm a high progress but otherwise casual player and I join an alliance that does alliance war. I'm actually the weak link there, but in spite of that they keep winning and eventually the alliance has a 2500 rating or something. But I can't stand it any longer so I leave. Do I now poison every casual alliance I might try to join with my 2500 war rating I'm carrying around? Or does my 2500 instantly drop to 1200 when I join a casual alliance and fight a war or two. If the former, I'm screwed. If the latter, I'm a fantastic war rating stooge account. I don't see a way to eliminate both problems simultaneously.

What I've learned studying this problem going back to before 14.0 is that if you don't treat war rating like a true competition rating - it is only affected by wins and losses, and is tied to the *competitor* which for AW is the alliance - everything you try to do after that is mathematically doomed.

GroundedWisdom

I've always been a proponent of using War Rating and Prestige or some other measurement to Match. I've had many people disagree with that, which is fine. At one time, War Rating was the only measure of skill. Aside from the manipulating that goes on, it's also became askew because of various punishments administered, and the result is the Matchmaking no longer reflects skill accurately. People may disagree, but Prestige has always been a measure of strength. Not just some random number that determines AQ Rewards. When looking at the overall Prestige of an Alliance, you can gauge certain limitations. I think something was lost in removing scoring for the Rating of Defenders placed. In the old system, it would adjust people naturally because higher Ratings yielded more Points, and weaker Allies would fall in line. That's no longer a factor.

SummonerNR

... it’s true the alliance war this season is closed? Because the issue we had last week. Some people are telling us the season is closed or locked , Please tell us what’s going on ...

@CASCAOV , Unless something NEW came out in the last few hours, NO the season is NOT closed.
Dont know where you are getting info you think is saying it has been Closed.

Are you looking at a Season 16 Announcement Thread that has a RED “closed” wording in it ? Which just is saying that the Thread is closed to member replies in the forum here.

Seraphion

Guys the problem with only warrating is that ppl use shell allinaces.

Imo the only fix for that would be personal war rating. Not the alliance but every member like prestige. That way you cant switch alliances to get lower enemys (if you dont know what "shell alliances" are you can find infos on youtube)
This has been proposed many times, going back quite a ways. I haven't seen anyone actually try to propose one in terms of specifics, or address the manipulation problems inherent in such a system.

For example, wars have nine paths not ten. So you can actually swap a single player into a BG without seriously compromising its attack strength. That account could theoretically have any war rating right down to zero (and any system that arbitrarily assigns one to start off with either penalizes casual players severely, or it is itself vulnerable to manipulation by just sticking it into a shell and dumping rating). So you can eliminate as much as ten percent of your rating just by swapping one account from each battlegroup.

People use shells because it is the most straight forward way to change alliance rating. But if you implement personal rating, you're actually handing alliances an even better way to manipulate war rating. They don't have to all leave and join another alliance. They can, without losing a single war, artificially lower alliance war rating instantly by swapping just a couple accounts.

Remember: when you use shell swapping, one alliance is winning and the other one is deliberately losing to lower that alliance's rating. That also, in a "personal war rating" system also lowers the war rating of the individual accounts in that alliance. That can now serve as alliance rating stooges to lower an alliance's rating.

This ignores all sorts of other extremely complex problems. Suppose I'm a high progress but otherwise casual player and I join an alliance that does alliance war. I'm actually the weak link there, but in spite of that they keep winning and eventually the alliance has a 2500 rating or something. But I can't stand it any longer so I leave. Do I now poison every casual alliance I might try to join with my 2500 war rating I'm carrying around? Or does my 2500 instantly drop to 1200 when I join a casual alliance and fight a war or two. If the former, I'm screwed. If the latter, I'm a fantastic war rating stooge account. I don't see a way to eliminate both problems simultaneously.

What I've learned studying this problem going back to before 14.0 is that if you don't treat war rating like a true competition rating - it is only affected by wins and losses, and is tied to the *competitor* which for AW is the alliance - everything you try to do after that is mathematically doomed.

I see your problem and you are 100% right but I might have an easy solution.

Make the warrating of the individual count less the farther away you are from the middleground of the "pack".

With a softscaling in the near of the middle and a hardscaling when you are far away.

So when you put in 3 mini accounts to lower your warrating it has minimal effect.

At the same time if you are far below the average war rating your earn a lot of points when you win.

And when you are far above the average warrating you dont gain points or very little on a win but lose a lot if you lose.

That way outliner would not have a great impact on the alliance and manipulation will be a lot harder than at the moment.

What ya think?

GinjabredMonsta

@Kabam Miike it’s true the alliance war this season is closed? Because the issue we had last week. Some people are telling us the season is closed or locked , Please tell us what’s going on ...

Who ever told you that is wrong. Hopefully you didn't stop participating in war because it is very much active

unknown

This content has been removed.

DNA3000

Guys the problem with only warrating is that ppl use shell allinaces.

Imo the only fix for that would be personal war rating. Not the alliance but every member like prestige. That way you cant switch alliances to get lower enemys (if you dont know what "shell alliances" are you can find infos on youtube)
This has been proposed many times, going back quite a ways. I haven't seen anyone actually try to propose one in terms of specifics, or address the manipulation problems inherent in such a system.

For example, wars have nine paths not ten. So you can actually swap a single player into a BG without seriously compromising its attack strength. That account could theoretically have any war rating right down to zero (and any system that arbitrarily assigns one to start off with either penalizes casual players severely, or it is itself vulnerable to manipulation by just sticking it into a shell and dumping rating). So you can eliminate as much as ten percent of your rating just by swapping one account from each battlegroup.

People use shells because it is the most straight forward way to change alliance rating. But if you implement personal rating, you're actually handing alliances an even better way to manipulate war rating. They don't have to all leave and join another alliance. They can, without losing a single war, artificially lower alliance war rating instantly by swapping just a couple accounts.

Remember: when you use shell swapping, one alliance is winning and the other one is deliberately losing to lower that alliance's rating. That also, in a "personal war rating" system also lowers the war rating of the individual accounts in that alliance. That can now serve as alliance rating stooges to lower an alliance's rating.

This ignores all sorts of other extremely complex problems. Suppose I'm a high progress but otherwise casual player and I join an alliance that does alliance war. I'm actually the weak link there, but in spite of that they keep winning and eventually the alliance has a 2500 rating or something. But I can't stand it any longer so I leave. Do I now poison every casual alliance I might try to join with my 2500 war rating I'm carrying around? Or does my 2500 instantly drop to 1200 when I join a casual alliance and fight a war or two. If the former, I'm screwed. If the latter, I'm a fantastic war rating stooge account. I don't see a way to eliminate both problems simultaneously.

What I've learned studying this problem going back to before 14.0 is that if you don't treat war rating like a true competition rating - it is only affected by wins and losses, and is tied to the *competitor* which for AW is the alliance - everything you try to do after that is mathematically doomed.
I see your problem and you are 100% right but I might have an easy solution.

Make the warrating of the individual count less the farther away you are from the middleground of the "pack".

With a softscaling in the near of the middle and a hardscaling when you are far away.

So when you put in 3 mini accounts to lower your warrating it has minimal effect.

At the same time if you are far below the average war rating your earn a lot of points when you win.

And when you are far above the average warrating you dont gain points or very little on a win but lose a lot if you lose.

That way outliner would not have a great impact on the alliance and manipulation will be a lot harder than at the moment.

What ya think?

It sounds like this would be difficult to work out all the algorithmic details. Consider the case of an alliance merge, which happens all the time. A group of ten or twelve joins another alliance of fifteen to twenty players. How do you determine what the "middleground" is? Do we define it as the average, or the median, or the rating of the original alliance? Depending on the specifics of how this worked, there could be a lot of exploitable situations within the system.

Another details thing seems to me to be that the system seems to try to "ignore" the rating of outliers, but also change those ratings over time to conform with the alliance average (or whatever). Doesn't that imply there is a transition period where as the outlier gets closer to the overall alliance rating they also have a greater impact on the alliance rating computation as a whole? I'm not sure if there exists a good balance point between those.

To really know if such a system is workable, its specific details covering these situations would need to be specified.

kenadroid

Hi all, I know that my alliance had a higher rating but with very high difference in prestige and alliance rating, but if the game can only base the war rating, it should also give like a +- 5k difference in terms of alliance rating to make it a more fair war.

We brought stones and they have guns. Of course we'd lose.

Patchie93

In war the only thing that should matter is war rating thats it