Draft League Rules

[TinCow]

The discussion in the Ladder thread has shown that there is some interest in an Org-hosted TWS2 League. This thread is to discuss the precise rules of this league and explain how it would operate.

First, let me explain how this would work. Our Ladder utility is automated, just like the Tournament utility. You can see a tiny example of what an in-progress Ladder would look like here. In function, this TWS2 League would work like football (soccer) leagues, where there are multiple tiers of teams and at the end of each season teams are promoted to a higher tier or relegated to a lower tier depending on their performance during the season. Each tier of the League will be represented by a single Ladder in our utility. It would work in the following manner:

1. The League will consist of multiple ladders (number yet to be decided). All new players will enter the League at the bottom-most ladder. The League will have 'seasons', during which play is open and players may challenge other players in the same tier to matches. When the season ends, the rankings become final. Top ranked players in lower tiers will move up to the next higher tier, and bottom ranked players in higher tiers will move down to the next lower tier. Following a short period for rest, a new season will start with reset stats.
2. New players can join at any time, though the season start and end dates will not change to accommodate them. No new player will be permitted to join the League until they agree to abide by all the League rules.
3. While a season is in session, players can challenge any other player in the same tier to a match. The utility has a built-in system for arranging match times/dates, but coordination can be done with other methods as well. After a match is completed, the result will be automatically submitted if both players confirm it within the utility (unlike in the tournament, where only the loser had to submit the result). Players can contest reported results, which would be referred to a Gamemaster for arbitration. Scores can also be submitted manually by the Gamemasters.
4. Rankings change during the season as games are completed, and will be based on the ELO rating, which gives points for victories and subtracts them for defeats, with the number of points varying depending on the ranks of the players. Defeating a player ranked higher than you will gain you more points than defeating a player ranked lower than you, and losing to a player ranked lower than you will lose you more points than losing to a player ranked higher than you.

Ok, now on to the specifics about the precise rules that would be in place. Here is a draft of a rule set I've been working on during the Tosa Cup. It's split into two parts. The first part, Universal Org Competition Rules, are designed to apply to ALL competitions hosted on the Org, which would include this League. The second part, Draft League Rules, are specific rules for this particular league and would not apply to other competitions on the Org. I've poached some of this from CWC (with Tomisama's blessing), as many of you appear to hold that rule set in high regard. In particular, the rules about Drops and the attacker/defender rules listed in the Matches section are designed to eliminate problems encountered multiple times in the tournament.

Please provide input on any changes/additions/deletions you think would be good. None of this is finalized, all suggestions are welcome. It is very important that we get a good rule system in place so that this league operates cleanly and efficiently.

Universal Org Competition Rules:

1. All players must add their Steam ID to their Org forum profile and join the Org Steam Group prior to registration. No player will be permitted to play in any Org competition if they have not done this. Players must also Friend all Gamemasters who are involved in any competition they are participating in, and accept all Friend requests they receive from other competitors.
2. Gamemaster - All competitions must have at least one Gamemaster to supervise the competition and resolve disputes. If there is only one Gamemaster in a competition, the Gamemaster cannot play in the competition. If there are multiple Gamemasters in the competition, they can play, but they have no powers to enforce rules or resolve disputes in their own matches. If a player believes a Gamemaster is behaving improperly, the issue will be referred to the Org Staff.
3. Drops - The first two drops by one player or team will result in the battle being replayed. A third drop by the same player or team will result in an automatic loss for the dropper, and win for the other player or team. Extended Considerations:
   • Obvious Advantage: If a player drops while the other player or team has an obvious advantage (as indicated by the battle bar) then the player or team with the winning advantage can either choose to replay the Battle, or claim the win. Screenshots or replay must be submitted in order to claim the win if the dropping player does not agree.
   • Slight Advantage: If one player or team has only a slight advantage, the Battle is to be replayed with same factions, armies, and conditions. If this is the second try at completing the same Battle, and one player or team has dropped with a slight disadvantage in both attempts, the player or team with the slight advantage can then either choose to refight the Battle, or claim the win (as above).
4. Red-Line Camping - Positioning a unit to take advantage of the red-line to support its flank or rear is against the rules.
   The criteria for a charge of red-line camping must include these three things:
   • The positioning of a body of forces to use the red-line as a tactical advantage.
   • The proximity of that body of forces to the red-line, inhibiting out-maneuvering on that flank or to its rear.
   • Maintaining that position for a period of over three minutes, without showing signs of any attempt to break the appearance of camping; that would demonstrate that this was truly of temporary intention.
5. Inactivity - The lack of effort to arrange and complete Battles before any assigned deadline will result in a forfeit of the Match. The competition's Gamemaster(s) will evaluate effort according to the available evidence of attempts to arrange the battle, including posts anywhere on the Org, PMs, logs of Steam chat conversations, etc. A technical victory will be awarded to the team which made a greater effort, or both teams could be forfeit, if neither is considered to have done enough. An extension will only be awarded if both teams show good efforts to arrange the battle, and it is likely to be fought in the near future.
6. Bugs and Exploits - It is forbidden to use known bugs or exploits in the game, regardless of whether the bug/exploit was explicitly forbidden in the Rules. Intentional use of a bug or exploit is considered dishonorable behavior, and could result in forfeit of the match, expulsion from the contest, or any other punishment the Gamemaster feels is warranted. The discovery of new bugs or exploits must be publicly communicated to the Gamemaster(s). Known exploits include, but are not limited to, the following:
   Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

   • Repeated use of Stand and Fight to artificially inflate a General's Charge Bonus.

Draft League Rules:

1. Seasons - Each season of the League will last for one month. At the end of each season, the top and bottom ranked players (number to be determined based on the number of competitors) in each tier will be promoted and relegated to the proper corresponding tier. At the end of each season, there will be a one week break before the next season begins.
2. Completing Matches Promptly - All League players commit themselves to playing their scheduled matches before the end of the season, and will strive to complete them much earlier than that to account for scheduling difficulties with later opponents. Players that do not demonstrate sufficient commitment to completing their scheduled matches will be penalized, with possible penalties including loss of individual matches, loss of all matches in an entire season, and permanent expulsion from the League.
3. Conduct - All players will be expected to abide by the TW Code of Honor standards, regardless of whether they have personally signed the CoH.
4. Challenges - All matches will be arranged through challenges by the players. Players may use one of two kinds of challenges (instructions on how to do this through the utility will be provided before play begins):
   • Open Challenges - Players may declare that they are available to fight a battle at a certain date and time against anyone who wishes to play. Any player in the same tier may accept the challenge and will be required to show up to fight the battle at the specified date and time.
   • Direct Challenges - Players may challenge a specific person in the same tier. The other player cannot refuse to fight the battle, though negotiations on scheduling are permitted.
   
   Regardless of the challenge method utilized, two specific players cannot fight each other more often than once every two weeks.
5. Matches - All matches will be played as a best of three battles. All battles will have a designated attacker and defender, with one player defending in battles 1 and 3, and the other player defending in battle 2.
   
   • Map - All battles in each match will be fought on the same map, with the choice of map up to the players. If no agreement can be made regarding the map, the map will be Rice Fields.
   • Determination of Attacker/Defender - If the players have fought each other before, the player who was the attacker in battles 1 and 3 during the last encounter will be the defender in battles 1 and 3. If the players have not fought each other before and the match comes from a direct challenge, the challenger is the attacker in battles 1 and 3. If the players have not fought each other before and the match comes from an open challenge, the challenger is the defender in battles 1 and 3.
   • Roles of Attacker/Defender - The attacker/defender rules only exist to break stalemate situations, they are not intended to force defenders to sit still if they wish to attack. Camping is highly discouraged and ideally both players will engage each other aggressively. However, if a stalemate occurs, the designated attacker in each match will be the player who is responsible for moving forward and breaking the deadlock.
6. Reporting Scores - After each match, both players will report the match score in the League utility. The score will be reported as 2-0 or 2-1, depending on how many matches were played before one player won two games. If a technical victory is awarded due to inactivity, the score will be reported as 1-0. If a match is forfeited by both players due to inactivity, the score will be reported as 0-0.
7. Replays - All players will save replays of all matches and will post links to the replays in the comments section of the League utility for that specific match. Players can also give the replays to the Gamemasters, who can post the replays for them. Replays will be posted promptly and without complaint.
8. Deviation From Rules - Any of the rules listed below this rule may be changed by the players as long as both parties agree to the change prior to the match. Players are strongly encouraged to document any agreement by both sides to any rule changes via a forum post or screenshot of a chat log prior to the start of the match. If there is any dispute between the players in which the changed rules are instrumental, and the Gamemaster concludes there is insufficient evidence of the alleged rule change agreement, the battle will be discarded and re-fought with standard rules.
9. Battle Funds - 14k
10. Unit Size - Medium
11. Unit Restriction - No artillery (Mangonels, Fire Rockets, Cannons). No DLC units.
12. Season/Weather - Spring/Dry
13. Time Limit - None
14. Key Buildings - None
15. Battle Type - Classic Mode

[Nowake]

Oi TinCow
Personally, I find it all sounds about right; I've seen this type of league play out before and it worked.

However, in regards to the last rule, could we reopen the discussion?
I know Veterans have been discussed as part of the Tosa Cup and I read the arguments on both sides. It was most probably appropriate. Would it not be opportune to use Classic Battles for a League at this point in time? I understood they function correctly now and in one versus one encounters, there should be no sashimono coloring issues and other minutiae mentioned by others.
For one, no matter how you view it, Veterans require you to actively play the Avatar system beside the League to prepare. Leaving aside the debate about pre-patch Veterans and what's fair in that regard, they do skew the result in favor of the player with more games in the Avatar system, or the players who stage mock battles to level them up.
While understanding troop composition is part of the task a player must live up to, "working" for it in a league system is a bit odd. It makes it all close more to Magic: The Gathering than to Chess or Go. We want a perfect ELO-based league pitting players against eachother regardless of time spent online.
Moreover, the .Org would thus exclusively host the only pure competition around. It seems fitting considering the .Org's origins and history over time -- the "old school" syntagm comes to mind --and it would perhaps be seen as a respite from a certain type of engagement even for players advanced in the Avatar ladder.

Why link the League to the Ladder basically?

[TinCow]

That's a good point. Making battles Classic would level out the playing field further to make it even more of a straight skill contest, which really is the whole point of this League in the first place. Would the Classic battle setting be something that we should allow people to alter with the Deviation From Rules bit? As it stands now, that rule would allow players to override the Classic battle rule and use veterans in a battle if they both agreed to it prior to the match. That seems fair to me, but would it somehow make the results of the League as a whole less accurate?

[TinCow]

As per this post, I've recently noted some issues with the built-in league part of the utility we use. As such, it's not really good for what we want. However, we can easily still run a League by simply using a single ladder for each tier of the League, with a little extra manual organization (to be done by me) to link them together. This actually seems like a better method, as it allows us to utilize the greater flexibility of the Ladder system while still keeping the tiers and promotion/relegation aspects of the League. I've changed the first part of the OP to account for this switch over the ladder system plus manual organization.

The benefits from using the combination system are as follows. First, we can rank players based on either ELO ratings or win/loss, instead of being restricted to only win/loss. People seemed favorable to the ELO system anyway, so that's a good thing. Second, new players can join a ladder at any time, not just in between seasons. That will make it a lot easier for new people to join in and keep the pool of active players healthy. Third, we are no longer restricted to a pre-defined set of matches. Instead, players can play anyone they want on their tier while the season is in play. However, we'll need to decide a few extra things as a result of these additional options.

1) How often do we want players to be able to challenge the same person? I'm thinking that each season should be 1 month long, so maybe no more than once every week?

2) What kind of restrictions to we want to place on how challenges are made? There are two ways for players to challenge each other in the ladder system. First, Gamemasters can specifically set up a match between two people. Second, each player can issue their own individual challenge, which is open for ANY other player to accept. Essentially, the player sets a date and time when they will be online and ready to play. Anyone can accept that challenge, and a match will then be scheduled between them accordingly. This system can be used to arrange matches between players independent of the Gamemaster, as two players can simply work out ahead of time when they want to play, then the first player creates the challenge and the second player accepts it after it's been posted. There's another cool feature about the challenges though... I can actually make the name of the challenger anonymous until after the challenge is accepted. That means players will not know who they are going to fight, just the date and time. They will only discover the identity of the challenger after they accept the match. I'm not sure whether that kind of anonymity would be desirable, but it's worth thinking about.

A hybrid system might be fun too. Maybe allow unlimited challenges using the opt-in system where opponents can pick which games to fight, with the only limitation being the frequency with which two people can fight (once a week?). Then on top of that, allow each player a set number of straight challenges (2 or 3?) which cannot be refused. Those would be PMed to the Gamemaster, who would add the specific challenge between the two players. This would allow flexibility in challenging, while still preventing players from completely avoiding someone else who really wants to fight them.

[AMP]

Nice work so far :)

I think ELO will be better over wins/losses since not everyone is going to be playing everyone in their tier each season, this makes more sense anyway.

I would say maybe just allow people only to play another opponent just twice a season (two times best of 3). And a month per season is good.

Allowing unlimited challenges might be fine and same with straight challenges is a good idea, no dodging forever. :)

[TinCow]

Ok, I've updated the OP with a few changes:

• Switched it to classic battles as default, though the system allows use of veterans if both players agree in advance of the match.
• Made it clear that ELO ratings will be used to rank players.
• Added the Seasons rule to set out clear time limits.
• Added the Challenges rule to clarify how matches are arranged and detail limits on repeated games between the same players.

I have a few more questions that I'd like some input on before I start broadcasting this rules draft for more input from the general MP community.
1) Should the corner camping rule be extended to all red line camping? This is a CWC rule, and it allows red line camping if there is only one red line involved.
2) Is there a fairer method of determining the attacker/defender in Round 3? Whoever defends there will certainly have an advantage, and I'd like to reduce that advantage as much as possible.

Also, it seems like during the first season we should just have one tier. I cannot think of any fair method of picking which players belong in which tiers at the moment. Everything I come up with is going to have some bias in it and is likely to upset some people. So, let's start everyone off at the same level. After the first season, we can use those results to add the additional tiers and allocate players to them. From season 2 onwards, all new players would start in the bottom tier.