Alliances already swapping to shells to avoid War Rating freezing

Alliances are already finding ways to sidestep the implementation of frozen war ratings in the off season. By using old shells or creating new ones, these alliances can take advantage of low or very low ratings to basically harvest free shards. I guarantee this will continue to happen until war ratings are locked onto individual accounts and not alliance shells. Until then, top tier alliances will get to take advantage of lower tier teams both in and out of season.

Comments

Stellar

There will always be people trying to cheat in a way or another, but at least, with the freeze of the war rating, middle tiers alliance will not find themselves against top tiers alliances at the beginning of the season.

It's maybe not perfect but it's better than before

Speeds80

They were already using the shell alliances it’s not a new exploit

Husky54

They were already using the shell alliances it’s not a new exploit

It's still an exploit, though. It just serves different purposes. Now they can both manipulate war rating and avert the donation lockout period for buying donations.

Dexman1349

Please explain this "exploit" to me. I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about.

If an alliance's war rating is frozen, they can literally run no-item use, 2* wars for participation rewards with zero penalty and without having to move anywhere. Those participation rewards are better than winning a war at lower tiers, and they don't have to forego SA rewards in the process.

Husky54

Please explain this "exploit" to me. I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about.

If an alliance's war rating is frozen, they can literally run no-item use, 2* wars for participation rewards with zero penalty and without having to move anywhere. Those participation rewards are better than winning a war at lower tiers, and they don't have to forego SA rewards in the process.

The old off-season method was to tank wars to lower war rating to get easier matchups at the beginning of in season. This made it easier to place higher at the end of season.

You can't tank your war rating during off season anymore. So, if you have a shell with a low war rating, you jump to that low rating shell. Rinse and repeat with multiple shells.

The other possibility is they're doing it so they can still buy illicit donations. When the 7 day donation lockout period was implemented, alliances lost the ability to momentarily bring in single accounts for massive donation dumps. Jumping to a shell allows you to do this again and not worry about your current shell. It's a little more difficult for the person dumping because they have to wait a week. But, it's still a workaround.

Lormif

Please explain this "exploit" to me. I honestly don't understand what you're complaining about.

If an alliance's war rating is frozen, they can literally run no-item use, 2* wars for participation rewards with zero penalty and without having to move anywhere. Those participation rewards are better than winning a war at lower tiers, and they don't have to forego SA rewards in the process.
The old off-season method was to tank wars to lower war rating to get easier matchups at the beginning of in season. This made it easier to place higher at the end of season.

You can't tank your war rating during off season anymore. So, if you have a shell with a low war rating, you jump to that low rating shell. Rinse and repeat with multiple shells.

The other possibility is they're doing it so they can still buy illicit donations. When the 7 day donation lockout period was implemented, alliances lost the ability to momentarily bring in single accounts for massive donation dumps. Jumping to a shell allows you to do this again and not worry about your current shell. It's a little more difficult for the person dumping because they have to wait a week. But, it's still a workaround.

The problem is this is kinda like the dripping of a faucet when turned off. They can switch to a lower rated alliance only for as long as they have the extra shells, but when those shells run out then it runs dry. It will take a season, maybe 2 depending on the number of shells, then they will basically have to find other alliances that are willing to sell their alliances to them to keep their ratings low, which again will only go so far. Eventually all the alliances they can use will have high ratings and they cannot do anything but start completely over or just play fair.

Dexman1349

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?

Lormif

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?

They get easier fights that can lead to more points.

GroundedWisdom

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?
They get easier fights that can lead to more points.

How does that work out when Points don't start until the Season starts, and they will be back in the Shell?

Dexman1349

So the situation as I understand it is like this:

Say you have an intense day-to-day job (high-tier season AW). You are paid a base salary (participation rewards) but also get bonuses for doing well in the job (wins). Then, for 2 weeks you can still get paid your base salary whether you continue to work hard (for some modest bonuses, aka win) or sit at your desk in your underwear just for "clocking in".

Why would they then take up a different job down the road at McDonalds where they would have to "work hard" just to earn what they could have gotten for sitting around in their underwear?

Or is this a case of opening up your cushy job to your poor friends who normally work at McDonalds? They can get your base salary to get themselves ahead while you enjoy some time off.

Lormif

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?
They get easier fights that can lead to more points.
How does that work out when Points don't start until the Season starts, and they will be back in the Shell?

the lower your rating, which used to float even in the off season, the easier the fights you have for a point multiplier cut at the start. It means you front load easier fights hoping by the time you catch up with people who are winning/losing matches constantly you have a decent point lead.

GroundedWisdom

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?
They get easier fights that can lead to more points.
How does that work out when Points don't start until the Season starts, and they will be back in the Shell?
the lower your rating, which used to float even in the off season, the easier the fights you have for a point multiplier cut at the start. It means you front load easier fights hoping by the time you catch up with people who are winning/losing matches constantly you have a decent point lead.

Only it wasn't floating even. They were Tanking and zig zagging it. This theory is counterproductive because their Multiplier is less with lower Rating. They can try, but it won't yield much of an advantage. Besides, the point of Shells is to reserve the place until the big Rewards start. I assume they'll jump back to their original Ally at that time. They might score a few easier Wins, which I agree is not fair. It won't give them any advantage in the Season. Not that I can see.

Lormif

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?
They get easier fights that can lead to more points.
How does that work out when Points don't start until the Season starts, and they will be back in the Shell?
the lower your rating, which used to float even in the off season, the easier the fights you have for a point multiplier cut at the start. It means you front load easier fights hoping by the time you catch up with people who are winning/losing matches constantly you have a decent point lead.
Only it wasn't floating even. They were Tanking and zig zagging it. This theory is counterproductive because their Multiplier is less with lower Rating. They can try, but it won't yield much of an advantage. Besides, the point of Shells is to reserve the place until the big Rewards start. I assume they'll jump back to their original Ally at that time. They might score a few easier Wins, which I agree is not fair. It won't give them any advantage in the Season. Not that I can see.

If they can have a streak of wins with the extra 40k bonus, which is also multiplied, then the slightly lower multiplier will not matter compared to fighting at the top and having a 50/50 record.

Dexman1349

So instead of just taking some time off and returning to their original alliances, they move to some mid-level Plat alliance knowing their matchups will be easier once season starts. Meanwhile, they let their alt accounts tank during the season so it becomes the shell for the following.

Main accounts in Ally A
Alt accounts in Ally B

Ally A finishes season with high ranking, Ally B finishes season with mid-level ranking. Main and Alt accounts swap alliances. Ally B then uses the easy matchups to quickly climb the ladder to high ranking rewards while Ally A tank matches to make it a mid-tier ally for the following season.

Simple solution: tie war rankings to the account, not the alliance. It would be like AQ and prestige. The rankings over a certain threshold would be locked in the offseason like the new rules.

GroundedWisdom

The really simple solution to it all is to run Wars during Seasons only and have a break in between. However, I'll accept improvement over none. Shells have been going on a long, long time. I agree it's not fair play. The tricky part is, how do you address it? You can't really stop people from leaving. Using Prestige is an option, but it's one people complained about. So there's no perfect solution. At least with Tanking being worked on, it brings Shells to the forefront. That's progress anyway. There really is no way to stop people from trying to manipulate the system 100% unless it's a completely controlled environment.

klobberintyme

So instead of just taking some time off and returning to their original alliances, they move to some mid-level Plat alliance knowing their matchups will be easier once season starts. Meanwhile, they let their alt accounts tank during the season so it becomes the shell for the following.

Main accounts in Ally A
Alt accounts in Ally B

Ally A finishes season with high ranking, Ally B finishes season with mid-level ranking. Main and Alt accounts swap alliances. Ally B then uses the easy matchups to quickly climb the ladder to high ranking rewards while Ally A tank matches to make it a mid-tier ally for the following season.

Simple solution: tie war rankings to the account, not the alliance. It would be like AQ and prestige. The rankings over a certain threshold would be locked in the offseason like the new rules.

If you can name the accounts present from the season 9 champions and track where they and their secondary, tertiary, etc. accounts are with 5 wars left in season 11 (spoiler: it's not together in the same alliance), you win the mcoc no-prize.

Kobster84

What do they gain by going to a lower tier shell?

They get people into the main ally and do donations

Kaladin_

I think the break down of this conversation is the misunderstanding of how AW ratings work.

unknown

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Longshot_33

I think if people can actually be bothered to go to all the trouble of working around this with all the hassle that goes with it then they deserve the extra shards 😂

Also I think it’s funny that because all the top alliances were tanking they were still getting matched together in the end anyway when season started so hadn’t actually achieved anything 😝

HENRIQUE_FORTE

Implement a system like football (socer) has: multiple divisions and relegations/promotions at the end of the season: 200 Alliances on Division 1, with 50 being relegated; division 2 with 2 groups of 200 alliances, top 25 would get promoted, bottom 25 would get relegated. And so on.

Husky54

I think the break down of this conversation is the misunderstanding of how AW ratings work.

I think if people can actually be bothered to go to all the trouble of working around this with all the hassle that goes with it then they deserve the extra shards 😂

Also I think it’s funny that because all the top alliances were tanking they were still getting matched together in the end anyway when season started so hadn’t actually achieved anything 😝

Eh, this still frequently comes at the expense of smaller alliances. It's anti-competitive.

Husky54

Implement a system like football (socer) has: multiple divisions and relegations/promotions at the end of the season: 200 Alliances on Division 1, with 50 being relegated; division 2 with 2 groups of 200 alliances, top 25 would get promoted, bottom 25 would get relegated. And so on.

I say just lock all rating stats to individual accounts. Team rating becomes an aggregate of all individuals—just like AQ prestige. If you decouple things from alliance shells, it makes the shells useless for nefarious purposes.

Neotwism

@Husky54 Im not sure i understand. If war rating is linked to individual accounts and a few plat level players drop down to lets say a gold 1 alliance to have a break won't that hurt the gold1 alliance? Their rating would then increase, wouldn't it? What if a player decided to go casual? I'm just not sure how having ratings linked to accounts affects situations that can happen every season.

Was525

It had to do with aq and dumping resources so they can pay for map7 during the season. It has nothing to do with war or war rating.

xNig

@Husky54 Im not sure i understand. If war rating is linked to individual accounts and a few plat level players drop down to lets say a gold 1 alliance to have a break won't that hurt the gold1 alliance? Their rating would then increase, wouldn't it? What if a player decided to go casual? I'm just not sure how having ratings linked to accounts affects situations that can happen every season.

How will it hurt the Gold 1 Alliance?

War rating is an indication of an alliance’s ability in war. Having some plat players join a gold ally will increase the gold ally’s war abilities. So that is correctly reflected by an increase in war rating.

Imo, this is the fairest way in determining war rating.

SiriusBreak

How would you go about dictating a player's war rating? What metric would be used?

xNig

How would you go about dictating a player's war rating? What metric would be used?

Use the moving average of the war rating of the past 6-12 wars (0.5 to 1 season worth of wars) participated by that player. It should give an indication of a level of difficulty that the player is used to.

Husky54

@Husky54 Im not sure i understand. If war rating is linked to individual accounts and a few plat level players drop down to lets say a gold 1 alliance to have a break won't that hurt the gold1 alliance? Their rating would then increase, wouldn't it? What if a player decided to go casual? I'm just not sure how having ratings linked to accounts affects situations that can happen every season.

Gold1 Ally is getting a couple of higher tier players. It's a wash from my perspective.

DrZola

How would you go about dictating a player's war rating? What metric would be used?
Use the moving average of the war rating of the past 6-12 wars (0.5 to 1 season worth of wars) participated by that player. It should give an indication of a level of difficulty that the player is used to.

Haven’t thought through all the ramifications, but I like the concept. Only other real option I can think of to get around it would be shell accounts, or accounts with purposefully dropped ratings that could be purchased (against TOS). Have to cycle through different accounts by season for entire alliances. Doable but harder and probably easier to police.

Dr. Zola