War #3 - Feedback

[jmdt]

I will say that teams playing other teams 4 times in 1 round was pretty rediculous last war.

[Amilir]

There is a group of people that think that the elements are quite well balanced thank you very much.  Seriously, what is this nonsense about stronger elements running rampant over weaker ones?  The real problem is that the better players flock to the perceived stronger elements.  Obviously this helps maintain a perception, but that does not mean that the perception is accurate.  Now, if we were required to use mono decks or something similar, you could make a case.  However, if such were the case, there would still be much better solutions to the problem than just not letting the strong teams fight weaker ones.

If you must limit it, again, there are better ways to do so.  Say, no more than three matches in two rounds?  A classical round robin?  No more than X matches without fighting Y element?

[ddevans96]

For better or for worse, I split this discussion off into a different topic so people who want to give unrelated feedback can do so in relative peace.

[Daxx]

It's lovely for all of us to talk about theories and this and that. I actually know what I'm talking about; I actually know how to design a successful game; I actually have designed successful games. But that's completely not the point and I'm not here to talk about my resumé.

If we're going to start making appeals to authority I should point out before chiming in that I am a game designer as well - and I have also designed successful games. I'm also well versed in game design theory and familar with how this works in practice.

We are trying to:

Try to make the game as fun as possible

The concept of "getting the short end of the stick" is CHILDISH. There is a reason why children are not put in charge of making rules for such events. Seriously Kael, the concept is childish. If you feel that way, you are simply not thinking about things correctly. It's a plain fact.

The fundamental mistake you have made here is in assuming that everyone must share the same conception of the aims of the game as you do. In fact you have made a number of assumptions and unsupported statements in this and other threads about the nature of the game, which are based on your opinions and not any agreed-upon schema for the game's scope and design. Making broad statements of fact is not conducive to helpful discussion if you refuse to recognise that your conception of the purpose of the game is not the only valid one.

The intent of the rule, as I see it, is to minimise potential for overly "unfun" outcomes. This is separate to any argument about fairness - both methods are perfectly "fair", given that they are both random and unbiased towards any given team. And there is a serious argument to be made for attempting to eliminate or reduce unfun outcomes, because they detract more from the game than the benefits of their inclusion improve it.

A more even distribution of matchups serves two purposes. Firstly, it eliminates these unfun outcomes, and it also has the side effect of increasing the relative skill required to win the event by reducing randomness. To elaborate - teams are less subject to matchups which are very easy or very difficult for reasons outside the realms of skill, and so their matches are more likely to represent the team's strength relative to all opposing teams. In fact I'm pretty surprised that you're not supporting this rule change for precisely this reason.

Thank you ddevans, I've thought this was necessary from day one. (I even got myself a warning and temporary ban as a result).

As you know, your warning and ban were not given because you wanted discussion on this topic, but for other reasons which I am told were made very clear to you at the time. Please don't resurrect the drama by dragging this out into public.[/list]

[TStar]

I find it highly troubling that a Warmaster seems to have the belief that some elements are inherently "weaker" than others.  The elements don't make strong players, the players make strong elements.  and didn't win because they were better cards, they won because their teams found ways to utilize the cards at their disposal in ways other teams were not prepared for and failed to build their vaults to account for it.  Is it the winning teams fault that the losers aren't having fun because they were simply out-strategized from the very beginning?  Honestly, anyone who sit there and says that an element is inherently weaker than others when you can use 50% of your deck as any other element is just talking ignorance.

[Glitch]

Hrrm, this seems like a good time for a table.

Sir v. Kael, round 1, FIGHT!

Sir Valimont	Kael Hate
Why was the rule added?	To balance the war better
Why was there no discussion of this?	This was posted with plenty time for discussion.
Well, I didn't see it.	It was there.  However, if you personally didn't see it, you may quit the war.
The rule doesn't make sense.  Other unfair aspects of the war weren't changed.  For instance: discord	Discord is fair.  There have been other rule changes too.  Will you quit due to them?
I won't be quitting for something as stupid as a dogsboy.  However, I will be quitting due to the new less-random duels.	Tag team question from: Youngsot!  Isn't less luck-based stuff better?
Part of the skill of war is adapting to bad luck.  Tag team response from:  Amilir!  Less double-duels means one single-element counters, which is easy.	Right, but the new method gets rid of double jeopardy due to imbalanced matchups and losing teams.  (Or I think that's what he said, it was confusing)  Tag Team answer from: Youngsot!  Less luck required means the competition is more about skill.
Losing teams are just that, losing.  They don't need a rule change to make things "more fair" for them.  On the contrary, it makes things /less fair/ for winning teams.  Luck requires players to have more skill to overcome issues, not less.	I agree, losing teams don't deserve a rule change to favor them.  However, if a team if forced to pick from weaker cards, that isn't fair.  This of rock paper scissors.  If one player can't pick paper, the game isn't fair.
What are you talking about?  Are you talking about elements weaker from the start, because that's personal opinion.  At the start, all teams have a fair chance, as they lose, they lose.	Tag team answer from: YoungSot!  One of your arguments contained a logical fallacy (I didn't include it as it was a digression and a fallacy).  More luck = Less skill.  Kael:  Do you believe that when restricted to a card set from an element, all vaults are equal?
Tag team response from: xDude!  You balance the war, not the game.  Youngsot: Isn't the war proving that the elements are imbalanced, and proving which ones are better?  Sir Valimont:  What the other two people just said.	Some people enjoy being part of a better element, there are others that hate being part of the weaker element.  I'm not balancing the game, I'm balancing the elements in the war
You are being CHILDISH.  This entire issue is personal.	JMDT:  Facing the same element four times in one rounds sucked.  Daxx:  Not everyone thinks more luck means more challenge means more skill.
Unfair games are not, by definition, unfun games	End of argument, up to this point.

Alright, not that the summary is made, the question of the thread breaks down to this:

Would you rather have the war have more luck, more challenges to overcome, and more skill involved, or less luck, less unfair advantages to random teams, and the winner being based purely on skill?

Which takes more skill:  Winning an unfair game (not knowing whether or not it's in your favor), or winning a completely "balanced" game, that goes "easy" on losing teams.


DISCLAIMER:  I apologize if I paraphrased any of your opinions wrong, I will fix them if you ask.
/true neutral opinion post

Kael, as someone who has been on both sides of the "stick" I must say I disagree with you.  I was part of life twice, which I personally believe is a strong element.  One time it did well, one time it failed miserably.  Now I'm part of time.  Now, I /could/ complain that time is a weak element, but when life lost, I thought /it/ was a weak element too.  All losing elements think their element was weaker than the rest.  When you see your element lose, there are only two common factors.  The element, and you.  When you personally do well, the only logical conclusion is that the element was at fault.  I did it, you're doing it, GG did it too.  But.  As hard as you tried, the problem was not the element.  I promise you whichever "weaker" elements you think there are would be offended if you named them.  If you believe some elements are weaker, and cannot maintain neutrality in the matter, I do not believe you should be warmaster.  Please keep all opinions on the respective strengths of elements to yourself.

Due to the above, I may have unfairly represented your argument.  For that, I apologize.  I will do my best to alleviate bias.

Sir Valimont, I am of the opinion that less luck means more skill.  While it does take skill to overcome a bad match up, if /every/ matchup was fair, than the only way you can possibly win is with skill.

Due to the above, I may have unfairly represented your argument.  For that, I apologize.  I will do my best to alleviate bias.




Round 2, FIGHT!

[Glitch]

Edited as per your request.

I'm afraid we'll have to agree to disagree about the last point.

[Amilir]

Quite amusing, thanks. 

Sir Valimont, I am of the opinion that less luck means more skill.  While it does take skill to overcome a bad match up, if /every/ matchup was fair, than the only way you can possibly win is with skill.

Anyway, this is not true.  Simple question, is there more skill in poker or in tic-tac-toe?  Tic-tac-toe has ZERO luck involved, yet you can't say it's more skill dependent than poker.  All decent players draw.  Always.  In elements, the top deckbuilders and players all have about the same skill level.  There's nowhere to progress to.  In an event like war, each team has someone at or near the top.  Because of this, if you just threw the teams at each other without limitations, it would mostly be a toss up.  The other factors in war add complexity, and raise the bar at which you can be considered a top player.  This change, I feel, causes more damage to the skill involved than it makes up from reducing chance.

[kobisjeruk]

Being unlucky happens.

true

You don't change rules to stop it from happening.

but if you could do something to reduce the luck factor, wouldn't you?

[Glitch]

Quite amusing, thanks. 

Sir Valimont, I am of the opinion that less luck means more skill.  While it does take skill to overcome a bad match up, if /every/ matchup was fair, than the only way you can possibly win is with skill.

Anyway, this is not true.  Simple question, is there more skill in poker or in tic-tac-toe?  Tic-tac-toe has ZERO luck involved, yet you can't say it's more skill dependent than poker.  All decent players draw.  Always.  In elements, the top deckbuilders and players all have about the same skill level.  There's nowhere to progress to.  In an event like war, each team has someone at or near the top.  Because of this, if you just threw the teams at each other without limitations, it would mostly be a toss up.  The other factors in war add complexity, and raise the bar at which you can be considered a top player.  This change, I feel, causes more damage to the skill involved than it makes up from reducing chance.

This is a lovely argument, and I understand your point, however, I personally believe that if you ignore the skill of poker is recognize whether or not your opponent has a good hand, not getting a good one yourself.  If you are playing poker against a machine, where there is no betting or reading involved, than yes, tic-tac-toe does take more skill (despite being a solved game).  When playing in person, I regularly employ tricks to win that less-skilled opponents don't recognize.  Believe it or not.

There is skill in the strategy behind tic-tac-toe.  There is no skill in drawing five coincidentally good cards.

However, this is a barebones analogy with little holding on the initial argument.  I personally believe that if the duels are perceived as "fair", than it will be proven once and for all that the winner won because of better playing, not better luck.

[BluePriest]

Although I dont like SV's attitude he is taking on the subject, and that alone makes me want to disagree with him, I do have to agree with him. You realize your true potential when you are backed into a wall. To relate to elements, would we say that darkness's battle shouldnt count because its dusk shield blocked 99% of the attacks that wound, or that entropy shouldnt have lost because the only reason the opponent won was because the 2nd round discord was out it put all the quanta it scrambled previously, back into its previous place?  Although all these things are unlucky, they definitely aren't unfair.

[pervepic]

Well, what I like about card games is the element of luck/unluck and I personally would prefer that it stays that way. Also in war, I like when I never know exactly what is gonna happen and who will be my opponent and if i have good or bad draw in that regard. But it is just me, I still also understand  people for who the element of luck/unluck is too high there and needs to be nerfed.

I agree with Amilir that already in last war every team had some deckmakers whose skills were quite close to maximum and there's can't be too much development there. But there can be some improvement in predicting, vault making, mind games and in level of concentartion.

So, if we reduce the element of luck/unluck too much, then there is not so much skill that starts to play, but rather elements themselves - a bit stronger elements will just dominate over weaker elements and everything becomes too predictable.

The problem is solvable if we interprate being lucky/unlucky as the part of the person's skill, then we don't have to fight against it  .