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Feedback and Suggestions / Vote to Balance Levels in Matches
« on: August 22, 2013, 01:51:11 pm »
This has been at the back of my head since 1.1, and we've all seen it time and time again. Blue team has ships with level 6 and 7 pilots, and similarly leveled crew. Red team has level 2 and 4 pilots, similarly leveled crew. The match begins, Blue team wins 5-0, Blue team stays, some of Red shuffles with new players, and the cycle repeats itself. It's not fun to get stomped, but it's also not fun to have continuous uncontested wins either.
Could there be an option to attempt to "balance" experience levels? (balance in quotes, since we know that levels are an indirect indicators.) Of course it's doable by swapping through the spectator slots, but that's very cumbersome when the match is full, and it is prone to having spots ninja'd.
I felt it would be better to give full details than it would be to just suggest it, so I worked out the details. (I feel like I am I inventing the beginnings of a matchmaking system...)
Provided the countdown timer has not started, people have the option to request the teams to be balanced. If more than 25% of players request balancing, (this way a single player cannot stall matches indefinitely), a poll would be held asking every player if they wish to balance the teams. After 30s of voting, if there are more 'yes' votes than 'no' votes, the balancing system would rearrange the ships (i.e. crewmen would stay under the same captain)
The balancing would assign a weighted sum of levels to each ship and try to rearrange the ships so that each team's sum would be as close as possible to the other team's sum. Rather than simply adding the active levels of each member, the system would take the following into factor:
Example:
Consider these four ships Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta. Currently, on the blue team, Alpha has a level 7 captain with levels 5, 3, and 8 crew, while Bravo has a level 6 captain with two crewmen levels 3 and 6, as well as an AI. On the Red team, Charlie has a level 4 captain with three engineers levels 2, 5 and 3, while Delta has a level 3 pilot with levels 4, 2 and 3 crew. While Delta has the lowest levels, a lot of them are playing their off-classes so they are actually more experienced than their active level may indicate.
Alpha's total is 30, Bravo's 25.5, Charlie's 18 and Delta's 19.5
A + B vs C + D (current configuration)
(30 + 25.5) - (18 + 19.5)
55.5 - 37.5
18
A + C vs B + D
(30 + 18) - (25.5 + 19.5)
48 - 45
3
A + D vs B + C
(30 + 19.5) - (25.5 - 18)
49.5 - 43.5
6
The balancer would put Alpha and Charlie against Bravo and Delta in attempt to make the most balanced match.
It's a bit simple and obvious with a 2v2, as there are only 3 combinations, but with 3v3 there are 10 combinations and with 4v4 there are 35 combinations.
lol did i overthink things?
Could there be an option to attempt to "balance" experience levels? (balance in quotes, since we know that levels are an indirect indicators.) Of course it's doable by swapping through the spectator slots, but that's very cumbersome when the match is full, and it is prone to having spots ninja'd.
I felt it would be better to give full details than it would be to just suggest it, so I worked out the details. (I feel like I am I inventing the beginnings of a matchmaking system...)
Provided the countdown timer has not started, people have the option to request the teams to be balanced. If more than 25% of players request balancing, (this way a single player cannot stall matches indefinitely), a poll would be held asking every player if they wish to balance the teams. After 30s of voting, if there are more 'yes' votes than 'no' votes, the balancing system would rearrange the ships (i.e. crewmen would stay under the same captain)
The balancing would assign a weighted sum of levels to each ship and try to rearrange the ships so that each team's sum would be as close as possible to the other team's sum. Rather than simply adding the active levels of each member, the system would take the following into factor:
- the captain is double-weighted (a level 3 captain would be given a value of 3×2 = 6
- A player's value should be no less than half his max level (I, at the time of writing, am 1/5/7, so if I were to gun, i would be 7÷2 = 3.5)
- AI are assumed to be level 3
- If there is one pilot on the ship, but not in a captain slot, it is assumed that he is captain (I don't understand why people do this, but it happens)
Example:
Consider these four ships Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta. Currently, on the blue team, Alpha has a level 7 captain with levels 5, 3, and 8 crew, while Bravo has a level 6 captain with two crewmen levels 3 and 6, as well as an AI. On the Red team, Charlie has a level 4 captain with three engineers levels 2, 5 and 3, while Delta has a level 3 pilot with levels 4, 2 and 3 crew. While Delta has the lowest levels, a lot of them are playing their off-classes so they are actually more experienced than their active level may indicate.
Alpha's total is 30, Bravo's 25.5, Charlie's 18 and Delta's 19.5
A + B vs C + D (current configuration)
(30 + 25.5) - (18 + 19.5)
55.5 - 37.5
18
A + C vs B + D
(30 + 18) - (25.5 + 19.5)
48 - 45
3
A + D vs B + C
(30 + 19.5) - (25.5 - 18)
49.5 - 43.5
6
The balancer would put Alpha and Charlie against Bravo and Delta in attempt to make the most balanced match.
It's a bit simple and obvious with a 2v2, as there are only 3 combinations, but with 3v3 there are 10 combinations and with 4v4 there are 35 combinations.
lol did i overthink things?