[SUGGESTION] Tie PvP Experience to Point Results

So all the good people are in Maelstrom right now then? And if they all switch out to the Flames tonight you'll still win as much, right? What if they all only start queueing Freelancer? What about strong premades that don't even get to choose which team they'll be on? What if your team is filled with bots consistently for days?

I'm not calling you out but that's spoken like someone who really didn't PvP before, so you're not aware just how much GC imbalance impacted queues. I win far more than I lose, and I always queue Freelancer. What GC I'm on doesn't matter even remotely as much as whether what team I land on will focus objectives or players properly, communicate, coordinate, and actively play and play well. Neither my strategy, nor ability changes purely because of what GC I'm on, and neither should yours or anyone's.

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Originally Posted by Dizhonor

1. Kick the offending players: But this requires people to select "yes." In my experience, you're going to have "don't tell me how to play" trolls who are going to click "no" because they think you are being a playstyle-nazi, or you won't get sufficient votes because too many of the people who can vote are the offending players you are trying to vote-kick (if half of your team are AFK'ers and bots, then you're out of luck).

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My experience has always been the opposite. People always hit Yes without considering whether the person actually deserves to get kicked. If the Vote Dismiss thing says they're AFK, everyone will assume they're AFK and they'll get kicked.

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Originally Posted by Dizhonor

3. Tie rewards to individual-effort: There's many ways to win a match. Sometimes the 'effort' that contributes to a win isn't measurable. For example, by harassing the enemy by constantly being a presence around their base, making them divert people to make sure you aren't going to capture it. So if rewards were tied to individual-efforts, then many of the non-tangible/non-measurable efforts would go unrewarded. It would also punish individuals for thinking creatively rather than being rewarded for mindlessly following a zerg.

4. Tie rewards to final points: The only result that matters is the final points. And points are acquired through killing the enemy, shattering crystals, and so on. Because current rewards are tied to place, points are only valuable insofar as they secure place, and in any case arbitrary. For example, in one match 2nd place may be acquired by 1500 points. But in another match, it may be acquired by 500 points. So if 2nd place is worth (say) 500K experience, then you can acquire 500K experience with 1500 or 500 points. So the current system promotes defeatism; after all, why continue fighting f you can get 2nd place with 500 points? Therefore, by tying place to points, you make acquiring points relevant even if you're on the "losing" side, because you get more exp by finishing with more points. This would discourage defeatism for many. It might discourage minimalism for some. It might do nothing at all about AFK'ers or bots.

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You seem to be arguing against your own point here. As you said, many actions that could lead your team to victory aren't going to show up on the scoreboard, so tying rewards to personal points seems like a bad idea. There are two other major problems with this solution, as well:
1. It would be incredibly difficult for the devs to set up a system that calculated rewards based on Kills/Deaths/Assists/Damage done to players/Damage done to Ice/Amount of time spent on objectives/Healing done/Damage mitigated etc.
2. Even if they did do that, people would quickly find out what gave the most rewards for the least effort. You might wind up with people healing each other in spawn the entire match, because you get higher rewards for Healing Done.

As an aside for "Which GC is better?" Since the PVP changes, Frontline has been anyone's game, at least on Aether. Sometimes Maelstrom will dominate, sometimes they'll lose spectacularly. The same is true for the other two GCs. Sometimes it'll be a tight three-way race. Sometimes two teams will be neck and neck with the third struggling in last place. From my own experiences, I've noticed absolutely no GC consistently doing better or worse since the update.

I think I've shared this story before:

I landed on Adders one time recently, and the team was fairly strong actually. We took an early lead, but then we slipped up and Maelstrom got not 1, but 2 large ices. This was because Flames - who had been generally playing passive all match - decided they were gonna come try and take our base. . . That ended VERY badly for them. Then right behind them, Mael decided to try and hit us too. We pushed them back.

A lot of people on the team were starting to think it was over. I got mad and said "Screw that, let's take the fight to them" and people listened and followed me for a counterattack against Mael. They were already near like 1580 points. A few stayed at the base, ready to give up. Meanwhile, we're stomping out anything with a red nameplate over their head and pushing further inward toward their base. We literally dropped their score down to the 1540s purely by fighting them. I called to the defeatists to get back in the fight, and when they saw the score catching up, they came running to help.

The last large ice spawns in the middle. We fall back to it, knowing if we can score the most from it, we win. Third place Flames show up, with Mael not far behind them, and we continue to fight them while attacking the ice. And what happened in the end? A draw between Adders and Mael.

Now you tell me; how did we win (a draw counts as a win for achievements)? We weren't Maelstrom. Was it because I saw my team had the strength to fight off 2 other teams before, and made a call to go on the offense? Was it because we chose to keep fighting instead of giving up? Maybe it was it because we played smart and didn't wait for that last ice hoping that would save us? How did we win without being on Maelstrom? Please do tell me.

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Originally Posted by Dizhonor

Your "argument" is purely anecdotal https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/anecdotal. Here are some examples:



The conclusion doesn't follow necessarily from the premise.



Again, the conclusion doesn't follow necessarily from the premise.

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We're dealing with inductive reasoning, not deductive reasoning. By definition, inductive reasoning is invalid, but that doesn't make it worthless. For instance, science is based entirely on inductive reasoning, while math, aside from statistics, is based on deductive reasoning. So of course the premises don't necessarily lead to the conclusion. They aren't intended to. They are intended to strongly suggest the conclusion is the case, the exact strength with which they do so depending on the specific instance. Indeed, deductive reasoning is rarely able to be applied in any useful fashion in our day to day lives, as typically it doesn't tell us anything new. For instance, most syllogisms simply spell out things people would generally intuitively understand if they're aware of the premises. Most of the reasoning we use is inductive in nature. Since all inductive reasoning is invalid and depends on cogency rather than soundness, it must be evaluated for the specific content, not merely the form, and therefore saying that the premises do not necessarily lead to the conclusion is a waste of everyone's time, unless perhaps you need to remind someone to entertain other suggestions. I am not failing to entertain other suggestions. I am failing to see anything else more plausible than that there is not even distribution between all three GCs under the current game structure. Indeed, as the conditions are not right for even distribution, it would be virtually miraculous if there were.

As for the specific fallacy, the issue isn't that it's an anecdote at all. The fallacy they're calling "anecdotal" is actually a hasty generalization, which is when you are too quick to jump to conclusions after a single event. However, this is not what I am doing and indeed my argument is statistical in nature, being based on the ever growing improbability that my result is simply RNG, especially when taken together with the fact that the game setup should not be expected to produce an even distribution. If it really doesn't matter what GC you are on, then all GCs should have a 33.33333% win rate and my 40% win rate should eventually converge with that, as per the Law of Large Numbers. Less competent persons who seem to have neither even a rudimentary understanding of statistics nor the ability to do more than attribute anything they don't understand to RNG, are instead disregarding my arguments in favor of repeating that I must be wrong over and over and over.

If I take my two sets of trials (ie Freelancer w/l and Maelstrom w/l) and put them in a contingency table and run a χ2 test, my p-value is 0.0262. By convention, anything under 0.05 is generally considered significant, though you can select a bit lower or higher based on your own needs. Provided this win rate is maintained, the p-value will continue to shrink, until it's even less than 1. As this shrinkage occurs, the likelihood that it is merely RNG likewise decreases. It is of course possible that's merely RNG, but given the game design, we shouldn't expect even distribution to begin with, so it's a bit strange to see everyone insist that it's the only possible explanation, even without any statistics whatsoever of their own to back up that contention.

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Originally Posted by ThirdChild_ZKI

So all the good people are in Maelstrom right now then? And if they all switch out to the Flames tonight you'll still win as much, right? What if they all only start queueing Freelancer? What about strong premades that don't even get to choose which team they'll be on? What if your team is filled with bots consistently for days?

I'm not calling you out but that's spoken like someone who really didn't PvP before, so you're not aware just how much GC imbalance impacted queues. I win far more than I lose, and I always queue Freelancer. What GC I'm on doesn't matter even remotely as much as whether what team I land on will focus objectives or players properly, communicate, coordinate, and actively play and play well. Neither my strategy, nor ability changes purely because of what GC I'm on, and neither should yours or anyone's.

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Your post reads like it was written by someone who neither understands my argument nor even basic statistics. Like no kidding what your team does is what matters the most. That's my entire point: Your team is what matters and at least on Aether, most of the cooperative and productive teams seem to be flying the Maelstrom flag, whatever the reason may be. If those players all start playing for Flames, I'd expect Flames' win rate to likely go up accordingly. You seem to have this bizarre idea that I think the increased win rate is an intrinsic property of the GC, rather than a product of who happens to play for the GC generally speaking, which is just a baffling way to interpret anything I've said.

My questions are easier. Please answer them.

Just going to say this:

Before the xp nerf all I ever saw was people trying to win, and trying to enjoy themselves.

Ever since the xp nerf all I ever see is people giving up when they do not have the lead. People have become more insulting, and less prone to trying to work together. They have also been starting to go "looks like *insert GC here* got the bot team this time". And coinciding with the nerfed XP we have seen a large influx of bots, and also probably a large exodus of people who actually try leaving it making it more likely for entire teams to be bots instead of entire teams being people who try cause to be frank...

Frontlines pvp sucks and you get more xp and tomestones running potd for the same amount of time excluding poetics.

So you want to nerf the xp further? Go right ahead, all its going to do is make the bot problem worse because the people playing and trying for the xp are going to give up and just run potd again because it is consistently good xp, not sometimes to rarely good xp.

Also GC affiliation still matters because everyone who unlocked frontlines before the freelancer default on change (aka the vast majority of the people playing) have theirs default to off, and the majority of people (especially the ones who do not read patch notes) do not even know the freelancer option even exists.

Yeeah like PVP needs further nerfs. Anyone notice how the amount of bots skyrocketed AFTER they nerfed the XP for losers? just return it to an equal high amount of XP for all participants and ignore the whiners. You do want people to queue for pvp right SE?

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Originally Posted by Beckett

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Quote Originally Posted by Dizhonor
1. Kick the offending players: But this requires people to select "yes." In my experience, you're going to have "don't tell me how to play" trolls who are going to click "no" because they think you are being a playstyle-nazi, or you won't get sufficient votes because too many of the people who can vote are the offending players you are trying to vote-kick (if half of your team are AFK'ers and bots, then you're out of luck).

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My experience has always been the opposite. People always hit Yes without considering whether the person actually deserves to get kicked. If the Vote Dismiss thing says they're AFK, everyone will assume they're AFK and they'll get kicked.

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Maybe I'm just unlucky then. It's difficult to quantify these sorts of experiences. Out of the last 30 matches, maybe 2 people were kicked. And they weren't even kicked for AFK'ing. They were kicked for complaining about folks not participating.
And that's partially why I mentioned that the AFK problem is a post itself. I'm mostly concerned with the so-called Minimalists and Defeatists. If someone can get more xp by scoring more points, that's an incentive to continue trying / playing. But if someone will get the same xp by sitting in the base, then that's a problem.

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Originally Posted by Beckett

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Originally Posted by Dizhonor
3. Tie rewards to individual-effort: There's many ways to win a match. Sometimes the 'effort' that contributes to a win isn't measurable. For example, by harassing the enemy by constantly being a presence around their base, making them divert people to make sure you aren't going to capture it. So if rewards were tied to individual-efforts, then many of the non-tangible/non-measurable efforts would go unrewarded. It would also punish individuals for thinking creatively rather than being rewarded for mindlessly following a zerg.
4. Tie rewards to final points: The only result that matters is the final points. And points are acquired through killing the enemy, shattering crystals, and so on. Because current rewards are tied to place, points are only valuable insofar as they secure place, and in any case arbitrary. For example, in one match 2nd place may be acquired by 1500 points. But in another match, it may be acquired by 500 points. So if 2nd place is worth (say) 500K experience, then you can acquire 500K experience with 1500 or 500 points. So the current system promotes defeatism; after all, why continue fighting f you can get 2nd place with 500 points? Therefore, by tying place to points, you make acquiring points relevant even if you're on the "losing" side, because you get more exp by finishing with more points. This would discourage defeatism for many. It might discourage minimalism for some. It might do nothing at all about AFK'ers or bots.

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You seem to be arguing against your own point here. As you said, many actions that could lead your team to victory aren't going to show up on the scoreboard, so tying rewards to personal points seems like a bad idea. There are two other major problems with this solution, as well:
1. It would be incredibly difficult for the devs to set up a system that calculated rewards based on Kills/Deaths/Assists/Damage done to players/Damage done to Ice/Amount of time spent on objectives/Healing done/Damage mitigated etc.
2. Even if they did do that, people would quickly find out what gave the most rewards for the least effort. You might wind up with people healing each other in spawn the entire match, because you get higher rewards for Healing Done. .

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Maybe I needed to be more clear here. What I was trying to tease out is the difference between being rewarded for one's individual contribution to the group vs. being rewarded for being part of the group. It's sometimes the case that an individual contribution can't be measured on an individual basis. So by awarding individual contribution, you leave out those folks. But those "intangibles" can be measured in at least one way: the groups points.
So we agree: it would be incredibly difficult to try and parse out individual contribution. And it would likely leave out the "intangible" efforts that don't fit into some neat category.

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Originally Posted by Beckett

As an aside for "Which GC is better?" Since the PVP changes, Frontline has been anyone's game, at least on Aether. Sometimes Maelstrom will dominate, sometimes they'll lose spectacularly. The same is true for the other two GCs. Sometimes it'll be a tight three-way race. Sometimes two teams will be neck and neck with the third struggling in last place. From my own experiences, I've noticed absolutely no GC consistently doing better or worse since the update.

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It depends on who is playing, and at what hours. Some folks will play until they get challenge log bonuses at the start of the reset. There is no real rhyme or reason. It's completely random.

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Originally Posted by Nixxe

Your team is what matters and at least on Aether, most of the cooperative and productive teams seem to be flying the Maelstrom flag, whatever the reason may be.

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So again, what happens when those cooperative and productive teams go Freelancer? What happens when a bunch of knowledgeable, long-time PvPers just randomly end up on a NOT-Maelstrom team?

Seriously, I'm just going to be blunt in saying if you think you're winning more because you're on one GC over another now, you're wrong.

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Originally Posted by TankHunter678

Also GC affiliation still matters because everyone who unlocked frontlines before the freelancer default on change (aka the vast majority of the people playing) have theirs default to off, and the majority of people (especially the ones who do not read patch notes) do not even know the freelancer option even exists.

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And what about those of us who were PvPing well before that? Pretty sure any of us could swap GCs tonight, turn off Freelancer, and still win. That is unless somehow us not being in one GC over another makes us play worse, despite our experience?

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Originally Posted by Sylvina

Yeeah like PVP needs further nerfs. Anyone notice how the amount of bots skyrocketed AFTER they nerfed the XP for losers? just return it to an equal high amount of XP for all participants and ignore the whiners. You do want people to queue for pvp right SE?

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If you ever think that it would have never skyrocketed without the xp nerf, then you're completely wrong. When a broken system is exploited, more and more will go for it, especially since most people in FF are taking the "muh pvp" meme as fact. ANyone that had pvp'd a lot before know that very well because it already happened: first season of feast when ppl afk'd/botted/threw match, other seasons of feast with cheaters/wintraders.

Those that made bot scripts didn't said: "hey, pvp gives exp for nothing, let's wait for it to be nerfed to promote and sell our shit"