A Note on How Players are Pushed Away from Participation by the Ranking System

Personofsecrets

Although the ranking system in TOT is bad, I want to take a moment to post some ideas here that show some of the problems that it has.

@RCubed1967 has supplied plenty of data regarding the TOT ranking system and what they consider to be "series." They are right to think about the game in these terms.

I have my own data regarding my play and it is pictured below.



This data seems to be from only around August 1st, 2023, but is sufficient for the narrative that I want to lay out.

You see, I can't get to the top of the leaderboard. And no, that's not a complaint, because I still have room to improve.

There is a theoretical maximum of how much any player, even some kind of super computer, can win though. I'm not there, I'm not at that point, but the point exists.

I have played TOT about 18 hours or so the last few days in the ranked mode. As you see, I win about 80% of my games in ranked.

Or we could say that I lose 1 out of 5 games.

This amount of winning is not sufficient to climb.

Losing only 1 out of 10 may start to get close to the threshold that is needed to climb the ladder.

The reason why is simple. I very rarely win more than 50 points for my games and I lose 150 points for my losses the vast majority of the time.

This system is self reinforcing.

Players on the leaderboard are PUNISHED for risking their score further. So good players, at a certain point, don't have much to gain and just stop participating.

That means that other players below them, players who might take 150 points from them, now have less opponents to take score from.

I don't even get 150 points WON from the currently 2nd rank player.

The fact that I cannot even find them or the 1st rank player in the game enough to play them means that I have to rely on the aforementioned players who give me very few points, but take many points from me. Reminder, that's the case no matter how many times I've proven my skills against them in a "series" or how fortunate they may happen to have gotten in the game or 2 that they did win.

Again, this shouldn't be read as a complaint post. I recognize that I have further skills to hone that may assist me in getting that 85% or 90% win rate on the ranked lader that I need.

That said, the system pushed high level players away from playing.

Likewise, this system has discouraged very bright players from putting more of their time into TOT.

A good number of familiar faces have opted to just not take TOT that seriously or walk away altogether.

Oh well.

Meji

It's a bit ridiculous that I have to win 5-6 games to make up for a loss. Even if I face anyone in the top 10 the gains are so miniscule it's just not worth the effort unless I really wanted first place.

I get excited when I see the top players actively moving up the ladder and find that's when I am likely to queue.

NoSoup

There is a proven work around though. When you are low on the table concede 10 or so games in a row, you will obviously end up on zero points and have to start again. But, you will then get 150 points with every game you win for quite some time regardless of the opponent.

Personofsecrets

NoSoup wrote: »

There is a proven work around though. When you are low on the table concede 10 or so games in a row, you will obviously end up on zero points and have to start again. But, you will then get 150 points with every game you win for quite some time regardless of the opponent.

Do you have some evidence or personal experience of this method?

I tried to do something like that some time ago and I didn't really notice an improvement to my point gaining.

I'm not doubting this possibility, but want to know a little bit more about it.

NoSoup

There is a forum thread on it somewhere. Confirmed it worked for me when I tried it, I tired it at the start of a season and didn't get any 0 point games for the remainder of that season. I am getting 0 point games now so it may be something you have to do each season as it was probably 2 or 3 seasons ago when I tried it. But it definetly worked.

At the time it was theorized that the match making is account wide and does no't reset with each season, so players that play lots for an extended period are going to have a much higher rank than newer players and as other older players drop off you're less likely to be matched with someone on an "even internal rank" so you need to tank your rank down to recreate a balanced playing field. For my mind this makes sense as it was only in about the 3rd season that I first started seeing a real series of 0 point games.

Personofsecrets

Unfortunately, I don't want to sacrifice my win % stats to do this, but it is interesting information. Thank you for elaborating.

NoSoup

Only a couple of days before this season ends, just try it at the start of next season as soon as you hit Rubedite and see how the data correlates to this season....

Personofsecrets

NoSoup wrote: »

Only a couple of days before this season ends, just try it at the start of next season as soon as you hit Rubedite and see how the data correlates to this season....

Maybe I can disable my tribute tracking addon and give this a try afterall.

Meji

Throwing on purpose is also poor sportsmanship to get around the flawed ranking system. Us as players shouldn't really be forced to resort to this to climb though..

Personofsecrets

Meji wrote: »

Throwing on purpose is also poor sportsmanship to get around the flawed ranking system. Us as players shouldn't really be forced to resort to this to climb though..

It also could damage ones reputation or seem like an actionable offense from the perspective of people who don't know.

Well, even people who are in the know could see this type of score manipulation as gaming the system.