I'm new to the site but I like PPSC as well (perhaps because I'm still learning the game). It opens up interesting negotiation dynamics. Surely (I say with no statistical backing) most folks still play to win because that's the nature of the game and because folks here are a proud, sneaky lot.

@Ges - Yes people play to win, what they don't do is play to draw. PPSC encourages someone in a strong 2nd place to take the SCs and throw the win to his ally

@abge, Personally, I would vote to keep the points system and just have GR be something available on the side.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "point metagaming". Couldn't people GR metagame too? The examples that people suggested are also issues with GR. As stratagos pointed out, people will always find a reason and way to "game the system".

I also think that the way GR is calculated could be improved. It may look similar to, but it behaves actually quite differently than Elo. I was intending to do some coding work to put out my own rating system that at least more closely behaved like Elo, but I haven't gotten around to it since I've been busy. I've talked to Ghost about it, and he's helped me out by providing the GR code, which I could modify to make my system. Hopefully, I'll find the time to get around to it someday.

Well playing to win is all fine and good, but PPSC is good when you have a good ally that has helped you from the beginning, I feel its only fair to draw in that circumstance

The most effective player control mechanism is password protected games. If you want to play with a specific set of players that have a certain skill level, commitment, and/or motivations, the best way is to recruit for a private game on the forums and PM them the password. A player's reputation on this website is their best measure of skill, behavior, and reliability.

So, with enough experience on the website, you get to know who plays to win, who plays well, and who is just generally fun to play with.

@Shep315, reply to "... I feel its only fair to draw in that circumstance".
I think that's awfully naive. This is what I feel:

If you have a chance to force a win in the end game, you should take it no matter what you said or promised before hand. Although, there's nothing wrong in pretending that you will let them share in the draw, even though your ultimate aim is just to use them as a pawn to put yourself in the winning position. That's the nature and the art of the game.

It's very fair and respectful to draw with a game-long ally and I have no argument with that method of playing the game, but I would be careful about implying the ONLY fair thing in a game-long alliance is to draw at the end.

I'vw drtawn with allies and I've stabbed allies for the win (right Eden?) In the end it's just important to remember it is just a game. The lies and the deceit and the double dealing are all part of it, so have fun and try to see through your opponents words to the real truth.

Ok, I've said a lot of things, but here I have tried to condense my ideas and arguments as to why we should keep points and NOT replace them with GR. See my previous posts in this thread for more info on some of the items.

Right now, points and GR are both just arbitrary measures of skill. One can point out the flaws with both of them. Some would say that GR is better, since it treats games "equally" and it puts more pressure on the skilled players playing against weaker players. Some would say that points are better, since it allows players to play practice low-point games while also being able to play important, high stakes games.

Points, GR, neither is perfect or better. Removing one in the favor of the other only reduces the amount of information available if you are concerned with getting an accurate picture of a player's ability.

Also, I do not think that replacing points with GR improves the incentive mechanism (i.e., you can game both systems, but I agree that players Should play to win/have fun) or the access control mechanism (i.e., GR is not necessarily the most accurate measure of skill or reliability, and anyways reputation and passwords are a better option for ensuring quality games).

Some people suggested a reliability/commitment rating. It would be a nice feature, but:
1) Kestas wants to keeps things simple
2) It's a lot of work, so that probably won't go anywhere unless someone is willing to do some coding to back this idea up
Even still, again, I think that reputation and password protected games do the best job at ensuring that you get reliable players.

Grr. Right. (less begrudgingly agreed with your overall point Draugs ;) )

Definitely no to this new idea.

The reason why the system STILL hasn't been changed (I've seen many threads like this in the 3 years here) is because it works.

yeah.... this is similar to the "when are we going to get tabs in the forum?!?!?" thing.

because there's no need to.


if it isn't broken...

The point system is not working well for me; I have great trouble finding games with players of about my level (GR 248). A min/max GR setting might help a good deal.

@Aurens - Have you tried just playing people? I have to say lots of people seem to think too heavily about rankings etc rather than just playing the game!

At this point, my main interest is neither points nor playing: it's learning the game. And it's hard to do that when you play far above or below your level.

I do learn most when I bet 100 (d). But with the points system as it stands, I can't do that often.

@Aurens,

Just got into a game with those in the 300 - 600 range. Try this technique:
1. Start your own game. Advertise in a thread what you are looking for in players. Password it and tell everyone that the first 6 in get the spots.
2. Identify other players in that range by looking at the games of those players on their historical record. SEND THEM PMS telling them you have the perfect game for them, free of newbies.

This way, YOU set the points (40-50 will attract those in our range) and you assure yourself of a competitive game. Try it, it works. Just have to send about 20 PMs, but that's what cutting and pasting was invented for.

As for Points vs GR, I agree with the caller who said they both have their advantages.
If I had to choose, I'd go with GR...but why? Predicting a game's impact on GR is hard to do.. ..whereas if I win a game and win 150, I know what I've done.

I STRONGLY endorse some kind of RI.

RI ?

Reliability index. (Baskineli's abbreviation)

Predicting GR is actually easy unless it's PPSC. Everybody contributes 2/35th of their ending GR to the pot. WTA, it all goes to the winner or is divided amongst the drawees equally. PPSC draws are the same as WTO, but wins and survives have some calculations based on expected result. That is the only time it isn't fairly easy to predict.

@yebellz,

You've contributed a lot, so I want to make sure I respond.

1) I realize that this would be a lot of work for the dev team and I'm sure Kestas wouldn't want to implement it until it's been tested. The purpose of this thread was to see if it would be worth testing out.

2) I agree that GR can be improved, but it is clearly a much, much better indicator of skill than points.

3) I don't understand how you can "game" GR. If anyone can show me how to do that, I'd be very interested. However, you can easily game points through PPSC games.

@ figle

re: deposit. Yes, I remember talking about this. I think it is something worth trying, but in some ways it also exacerbates the problem. Now, new players need even *more* points to join decent games?

@strat

Metagaming is just one of the reasons I think this is a good idea, as I mentioned in the OP+1.

@whoever said it

I agree that a good reputation and PW'd games will always be the best solution. But, wouldn't it be nice if it was a little easier to join good games without everyone knowing you? Especially if this community gets much larger, that isn't the best solution, imo


@everyone

Thanks for the input.

@Gob/Thucy

No, the reason it hasn't been changed is because it isn't broke enough. It would take a decent amount of work which (very understandably) the dev team doesn't have time for. Don't confuse the two.

I've moved back and forth on this quite a bit, as has TGM and the general community, but here's where I think things stand at the moment:
- The points system is pretty effective for what it does, it's efficient, simple, and serves multiple purposes
- GR is pretty effective for what it does, apparently some people place more weight on that which is fine, and it still correlates with points to a reasonable degree so it would be a refinement and not something entirely different

Re: PPSC vs WTA:
- This is a long debate, there's no right answer to it. Even the original creator of Diplomacy wrote an essay on the advantages of either choice
- I'm not very familiar with GR but doesn't it also score relative to supply centers anyway?
- Low stakes games where the only objective worth playing for is victory might as well be 5 turns long, or a 7-sided die, because when someone thinks they're unlikely to win they just drop out and find another

Re implementing it within the site:
- I would like to do this at some point so we can host tournaments on a more official, well supported basis, but apparently the way GRs are calculated is based on a spreadsheet that would be difficult to code(?) There has basically been a back and forth over whether and how GR could be officially implemented, and how, and whether it should be
- GR isn't perfect either, and I think it gets a lot of consideration because it's the alternative to the points system (which also isn't perfect).
The points system is simple and open enough (as well as being the default) to be, I think, more open/subject to criticism than GR. I'm convinced if GR was the default system it wouldn't put an end to these debates, because it's a subjective thing. For example the recent thread where someone said they wanted to be banned because they had a negative GR; if it really was a no-brainer we would have switched, but it's a lot more complicated than that


Finally if you want to get more into the nuts and bolts of this debate please read this post:
http://forum.webdiplomacy.net/viewtopic.php?p=288#p288

GR has since changed, the debate and proponents have become less black and white about it, and it likely addresses more of the concerns than it did at the time, but it's still worth reading that post to get a more complete picture of what the points system is supposed to do, because those who weren't here before the system was put into place and treat it as the baseline situation, which can only be improved from, probably don't realize how it was before

@ Baskinelli- Down 20% for one missed turn is a little extreme, especially if you have more than one game going. Sometimes things happen and people can't avoid missing turns, despite the fact that they are otherwise reliable. For example, I had an NMR this week because construction workers cut a fiber optic cable and wrecked the internet for all residences in my area. Not something I should lose 20% of my reliability rating over.

Kestas speaks!

It will be a cold day in hell before I allow my points to be taken away! ;-)

@abge: you made the point that people metagame the points system. I'm not too sure what you mean by that, but the only thing I can guess is that you are talking about people ganging up on the person with the most points first since they might view them as the biggest threat. The same issue could happen with GR of course. Actually it would be even worse, since the highest ranked player puts the most in the pot and it would most profitable to knock that person out and split his GR stake.

@yebellz
With GR, it doesn't matter who you knock out. In a loss, the points you lose depends only on how many you had, not on whom you played. In a win, the points you earn depend only on the sum of your opponents' GRs. If you draw, the points you win/lose depend on how many points you had AND the sum of your opponent's GR.

@ somebody
From the Bounced help site:

Your commitment is an average of the percentage of times you get your orders in before the deadline. It is weighted so that the distant past matters less (exponentially). The basic system is:

* If you make a deadline: c = 0.95*c + 5
* If you miss a deadline: c = 0.95*c
* If you abandon a game: c = 0.60*c

If you want to work this out, you'll see this is equivalent of computing the average of a sequence of 100's and 0's (100 for making a deadline and 0 for missing) where the average is weighted by an exponential (0.95 as the base).

Because of the way they round the result, the maximum commitment you can actually get is 99.91