MP Ranking System

[ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88]

Do you think they will (and should) add in a MP Ranking system like they did in STW 1? I think they should. I started MP on Viking Invasion back in the year of 2004, and at the time I was told there was a ranking system for STW 1 and I always thought it was neat and I was hoping they would do it for M2TW, but didn't, and ETW and NTW it's not really the best system, plus it is no where near how good like the STW 1 system for ranking once (besides keeping track of your kills, which is nice in ETW and NTW).


What you guys think?

[Sp00n]

:P :P :P

[Swoosh So]

Your probably right spoon the old ladder rank wouldent mean much nowadays but a new version may if they put alot of effort into it. But in all honesty theres bigger fish to fry such as the lobby, we need some kind of confirmation from ca if it will be included or not this time round.

[Jochi Khan]

The current system in NTW creates similar effects with players hosting games ie with minimum 3 star or higher in the name.
Most of us knew who the really good players were in Shogun and not that many of them were in the top 10 of the ranking system.
Looking back at it 10 years on I don't think its needed.

I have to agree with you sp00n. What happens to the spirit of the game where the 'better' players used to help out the 'newer' players in order to build a better playing community.

Also, bring back the MP Lobby with the option to create private chat rooms that was so good in STW.

[drone]

MP rankings are such a minefield. You have to deal with:

• Ego-maniacal stat whores
• Smurf accounts
• Laggers/droppers
• Newbstompers
• Team manipulation
• Illicit clan cooperation
• Team match sabotage
• Abuse and alienation of new players
• and so on...

Basically, the G.I.F.T. in it's purest, rawest form. Smurfs can alleviated by tying the online stats to the product key, but some sad sacks will buy multiple copies. I've always thought droppers should get an automatic loss. Visible rankings and player "reviews" in the lobby are a must. Wins and losses should add/subtract from the ladder scores relative to the rankings delta between the sides, 2v2 and up would require some fancy math, but I imagine it's doable. Measure the overall skill level, diminishing the importance of an individual win/loss will make for a friendlier environment. And it is very important that the scoring/ranking system is bug-free, otherwise it will be exploited like crazy.

And of course, there should always be the option of non-ranked games, so you can play for fun or for training/experimental purposes without worrying about the precious ladder score.

[Jochi Khan]

Deleted

[Swoosh So]

I never saw any blue smurfs running around with a ladder it was just abit of a side distraction to try to put a nice run together, its not like you won a prize for being top anyway.

Jochi - the funny thing is even though we dont have a chat lobby we do have the option to create our own private chat rooms in ntw O_o, sometimes i think CA are like some sadistic company you can have this but we take away that ahah! or like making a wish with a dodgy genie or like in that movie bedazzled where u have to word all ur wishes correctly to the letter or you will get done! but with regards to the ladder stopping people helping new players there i dont agree after all i myself trained many people in stw and was myself taken under the wing of fearofucyuman who was in a top clan at the time and me a nub, i just asked him a ton of questions after the game like how his ashigaru beat my monks and we got into a conversation about unit stats and honor. The ladder wasent a dominant thing it was something u engaged in for fun for a few days with a new 2v2 partner or something to see what rank you could get. there were some obvious names on there that shouldent have been but noone really bothered about it.

The big multiplayer thing was the tournaments and it would be nice to see Creative assembly get more involved in these offering prizes like that samurai sword they did in the past. Or god forbid host a tournament themselves if theyre serious about multi this time round or at least talk with the fansites about organising tournaments and prizes etc - Get involved...

Kinda on topic does anyone have sc2? ive heard battlenet is great how exactly does it work?

[Mars]

Hi Chris.

Well, to say, that the Rankingsystem was not that good, is of course correct.

You could exploit it pretty easy and get in a few hours a pretty high ranking, i remember that at the end some people kinda exploded there ranking.
Anyway, a MP ranking had one very good aspect.

It brought us tons of 1v1 games and many defender, the hilly maps was mostly played, coz the defender wanted to climb up the ladder.
2v2 ranking wasn't that interesting although there was a few teams who played it....

What i try to say, once the ladder was gone, we saw more and more 4v4 or 3v3, it ended in totally flat maps without a single tree.
I think in MTW and maybe later on too, almost every game was played on that stinky flat map, this was one effect of the left out ladder.


To avoid this u just have to autoarrange the games, dont let player set up their own ladder games.


The ladder is a must in my opinion, it will bring more player, introduce new player much faster, since other will play them for the ranking.
Right now you have some good trouble to get into the game, foyer is empty, u cant join games as new player.

Ladder will open the door for new guys and its a good and quick way to learn the game. In 3v3 you learn teamplay, yes, but in 1v1 u gain skill.


Koc


edit:

Tournaments. Well the 1v1 tournament skull and me did run was some insane work. if i remember well, we had over 200 player taking part.
To let players run the tournaments themselves, with such bad system like 20 different chatrooms, this is sadistic.

Once again i point my finger on WC3, there are tournaments almost every weekend. Set up from blizz, without a major input from the player.

This could be easily done in TW as well, there could be an entering phase from one hour, than the system put the player together automatically.
If you lose, your out, if you win, you get to the next game. This would save us tons of time, make it quick and probably done in a few hours.


Battlenet = WC3

first time i spoke about it was like 6 or 7 years ago. On the other hand, as long we dont see more player playing MP, the whole ting is worthless anyway.

[Sp00n]

Kocmoc good to see you hope your well :) get your ass off Battlenet and back to TW. You do get 1v1s under the current system, the main issue now is that theres no user created maps so we have a couple of flat maps these days at least in Shogun some of the flat maps could look different.
There are some different maps that are good and I know the Tournys use mainly non flat maps but in 1v1s they tend to go for flat due to balance, can't see that changing that much tbh.

NTWs no different to past TWs though I find you learn faster in 1v1s.

Really though there's no way of telling how many people are playing TW, there could be thousands on steam but you'd need them all added as friends. We need a foyer of some sort.

I can't ever see it being in the same league as Blizzards games though its too much of a niche game.

Just be nice to have a foyer and some old faces return for Shogun 2.

Great to see you anyway :), get off that shaman in wow and return

[ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88]

I think it can produce healthful competition. Sure, it can make some people pad the system, but I personally seen people cheat the systems in BF 2.... COD4.... And so on. So you going to get it no matter wrong.

[Tera]

Honestly, the old Top 100 players & clans did not produce cocky players who did not respect their underlings. Some good players took the ranking seriously and worked their way up; other good players simply ignored it and just went with the flow. It was a nice addition to the experience but by no means dominating or undermining it. Of course, the system could easily be exploited via multiple accounts. That's why everyone took it with a pinch of salt.... but then again there were some players who showed true effort in climbing the ladder and these people were genuinely recognized by the community, as they should.

Giving a competitive edge to the game is always a good thing, IMO.

[Kocmoc]

The community was smaller those days, it was easier to have an overview about players.

With having more people playing and without a foyer you hardly will have a good overview.
There should be a system who rate player, so you have some competition.

In STW it was for many player a reason to defend on some hills, later in MI the ladder lost his attraction more and more, yes.
The start was good.

Koc

[Togakure]

Heh, I think that time has dulled the memories of some (peace--not implying anyone in particular). I came late to STW MP, after the MI 1.02 release, but even so, I do remember some extraordinary cockiness in regard to ladder scores from some folks--mainly the old-timer clannies from the "known" clans who had left for the most part but came back for a few games now and then. By 2003, the ladder was pretty much dismissed by the remaining regulars because of all the exploits. Very few played competitive games.

I remember some clannies coming back and beating up on newbs in comp games or playing against each other using throw-away alias accounts, just to try and up their comp score. Because it was so easy to cheat up your score, no one took it seriously anymore, and tended to laugh when someone put up a comp game. A high score usually just meant that the person figured out the exploits quicker than the rest and used them to effect. The real ability of a player was demonstrated on the battlefield, in battle. A high ladder score didn't mean much unless it was backed up with consistent observed skill in game.

I guess my point is, if there's going to be a ladder/competition mechanism, it will need to be very solid from the standpoint of not being easily exploited, or its worth will be very short-lived. If exploits exist, players will find them, which will render any rating system meaningless.

[Reenk Roink]

I'd love for such a system to work as described in some posts here, but I'm betting it will be like what drone says. So no, no, no!

[pevergreen]

They could adopt something similar to the current Sc2/DoW2 ranking systems.

The starcraft 2 one is rather good, pitting you against people and trying to maintain a 50% w/l ratio for each player.

It doesn't have the playerbase however.

[Magyar Khan]

A ladder is only usefull when its very good done and as swoosh said its better to put effort in a good handsome chatlobby first.... altho i had fun in the old ladders i hated it that you couldnt find much guys above you cause it missed some decay calculation in it....

[UglyElmo2]

I think instead of a ladder or ranking system, just have a simple stat system: It would show games played, type of game (1v1, 2v2, 3v3, or 4v4), won/loss record, and #of dropped games. This way you would have some idea about how experienced a player is, and how many times he dropped out of games (would indicate connection problems or escaping because the player was losing). This is really all the information anyone needs to determine how good a player really is.

[vartan]

What you guys think?

I was born and raised right here in the USA, so I'll have to say this: as long as there is absolutely no way that someone can use cheats online, then it would be great and welcomed competition.