Originally posted by mghrn55
You've completed 9 challenges so far this year.

What do you expect ?

I expect a fair shake.

As another poster pointed out, a very large clan could play 100 challenges, lose 75 of them, and still have enough net points from 25 wins to claim the championship. That can't be right either, now can it?

Originally posted by moonbus
I expect a fair shake.

As another poster pointed out, a very large clan could play 100 challenges, lose 75 of them, and still have enough net points from 25 wins to claim the championship. That can't be right either, now can it?

No, that is not true. You can do math can't you?

In the best possible case, if they won 25 challenges of 20 players
(not really possible because there aren't nearly enough 20 player clans with the restrictions)
But lets say there were. 25 x 40 = 1000
75 x 2 (if they lost 75 1 man challenges) = 150
In that instance they would have a net 850 points.
This would be the BEST case and it is IMPOSSIBLE to attain.

Last year 912 won it all.
The year before was 1098

So all you have to do is the math and you can dismiss silly statements.

Originally posted by moonbus
Name any sport where defeating the champion doesn't count for a lot?

Suppose, for the sake of comparison, that some team at the Chess Olympiads had defeated the USA and Russia and China and only narrowly lost to Ukraine. That'd be pretty darned impressive, wouldn't it?

The Misfits defeated Metallica 5 -1. We narrowly lost to Be :-) 3 - 4. We defeated E ...[text shortened]... me of the results were from 2016). We're half way down page two. Not a level playing field, IMO.

I told you the most industrious clan sits on top
This clan set up has nothing to do with being fair
According to Wycombe Al what you need to do is get a load of players and play as many games as is possible you might then get on the front page
If you did that you would increase your negativity and still not get on the front page

Originally posted by padger
I told you the most industrious clan sits on top
This clan set up has nothing to do with being fair
According to Wycombe Al what you need to do is get a load of players and play as many games as is possible you might then get on the front page
If you did that you would increase your negativity and still not get on the front page

I think what it comes down to is that if you were going to limit each clan to say 20 challenges per year (and all clans were the same size and played all 20 challenges with 20 players) then you wouldn't need a negative for losses.

This is not the case under the current system and should not be either as some clans are bigger than others and some clans like to play more challenges. The clan league caters for that.

I think also we don't want a format where the clan that plays the most challenges is the winner. There must be some skill involved especially clan leaders in their choice of challenges.

Given that then negative points are a must to negate the clan that plays the most challenges is the winner. The current format addresses that aspect but needs a bit of tweaking to make it fairer to clans who get pipped in a challenge and ensure that clans play out their challenges to gain more points.

I have addressed this issue in an earlier post and haven't seen anything yet that changes my idea on the scoring factor.

If you have a better plan stick it up here so we can see how it fits.

Originally posted by shortcircuit
No, that is not true. You can do math can't you?

In the best possible case, if they won 25 challenges of 20 players
(not really possible because there aren't nearly enough 20 player clans with the restrictions)
But lets say there were. 25 x 40 = 1000
75 x 2 (if they lost 75 1 man challenges) = 150
In that instance they would have a net 850 point ...[text shortened]... year before was 1098

So all you have to do is the math and you can dismiss silly statements.

Whether the loss:win ratio is 75:25 or 70:30 or 65:35 or 59:41 makes little difference. The example is sufficient to demonstrate that a large clan can skew the standings by sheer weight of numbers. No clan which loses more than it wins should claim the championship, but just that is theoretically possible under the current system of calculating standings.

Originally posted by moonbus
Whether the loss:win ratio is 75:25 or 70:30 or 65:35 or 59:41 makes little difference. The example is sufficient to demonstrate that a large clan can skew the standings by sheer weight of numbers. No clan which loses more than it wins should claim the championship, but just that is theoretically possible under the current system of calculating standings.

Yes the whole thing is complete rubbish
I would think that the clan system was in the first place a way of playing games with as many players as each clan could muster
Under this system the complete opposite is true
The fewer players you have in a challenge the better

Originally posted by padger
Yes the whole thing is complete rubbish
I would think that the clan system was in the first place a way of playing games with as many players as each clan could muster
Under this system the complete opposite is true
The fewer players you have in a challenge the better

Why then does the larger clans (with the exception of Lemondrop who sandbags his rating and colludes with clans associated with last years cheating scandal) fill the top 15-20 placings every year.

Honestly I can't really understand what Moonbus and yourself are trying to say. Do you want the clan that plays the most challenges crowned the winner ??

Originally posted by moonbus
Whether the loss:win ratio is 75:25 or 70:30 or 65:35 or 59:41 makes little difference. The example is sufficient to demonstrate that a large clan can skew the standings by sheer weight of numbers. No clan which loses more than it wins should claim the championship, but just that is theoretically possible under the current system of calculating standings.

So you prefer the theoretical "My clan wins 12 challenges for the year and lost none
therefore we are the champions"??

That is hardly representative of anything.

Maybe what you really need is two divisions, large clan and small clan.
A 20 man clan is expected to mop the floor in points against a 5 man clan in volume.
By the way, volume does not necessarily erode quality.

But it is the choice of the tiny clan to compete with the larger clans, is it not?
Also, it is the option of the smaller clan to get larger so it can compete, is it not?
So why do you feel you need to penalize the larger clan because you are smaller?
Why do you feel if one clan works harder than your clan, that they are not worthy of their gains?

These are all questions about the competition.
The floor equity is there is you want to get it.
It is just easier to bitch about why you don't have it.

Originally posted by radioactive69
Why then does the larger clans (with the exception of Lemondrop who sandbags his rating and colludes with clans associated with last years cheating scandal) fill the top 15-20 placings every year.

Honestly I can't really understand what Moonbus and yourself are trying to say. Do you want the clan that plays the most challenges crowned the winner ??

Yes, why do the same large clans fill the top spots every year?? (Discounting a limiting case who need not trouble us...) Answer: because the system of ranking is skew whiff. It favours large clans which play many challenges at quick time limits, to the evident detriment of smaller clans, or those which play longer time limits. It's not a level playing field.

Absolutely not should the clan which plays the most challenges be champions, but that is de facto how it works here, since the clan which plays the most challenges is most likely to garner the most net points.

There are quite a few clans in the range of 5 - 9 members who hardly have a chance to garner enough net points even if they win every challenge, compared to a clan the size of Metallica which can afford to lose half their challenges and still garner enough net points from the rest of the challenges they win to bulldoze their way to the top.

Shortcircuit has said that there are hardly enough clans for him to play. Don't you (or he) wonder why that is? If more clans are to play actively, then the larger clans in particular will have to be seen to level the playing field and allow smaller clans a realistic shot at the top rungs of the ladder.

But please, don't think I'm harping about any one clan in particular. It is not about any clan cheating or sandbagging or colluding. There is really something skew whiff with current the ranking system based on net points.

Net points would make sense if all clans were the same size and if they all played the same number of challenges with the same number of players and never twice the same opponents in one season. But that's not how it is organised here. Hence, a different ranking system is needed which is neutral with respect to clan size and number of challenges played. (Discounting a limiting case who wins two challenges and then sits on his laurels and need not trouble us.)

Originally posted by shortcircuit
So you prefer the theoretical "My clan wins 12 challenges for the year and lost none
therefore we are the champions"??

That is hardly representative of anything.

Maybe what you really need is two divisions, large clan and small clan.
A 20 man clan is expected to mop the floor in points against a 5 man clan in volume.
By the way, volume does not ...[text shortened]... equity is there is you want to get it.
It is just easier to bitch about why you don't have it.

It is not about penalizing any clan. It's about finding a metric which ensures that smaller clans compete on equal terms with large clans.

Of course, volume of games is not necessarily at the expense of quality games; I never said it was. But why should volume be the criterion of success, given that some clans play very well indeed and even beat clans at the top of table? As it is, the deck is stacked against smaller clans by reason of volume, not by reasons which have anything to do playing good chess, and that is what I think needs to be addressed.

Originally posted by moonbus
Yes, why do the same large clans fill the top spots every year?? (Discounting a limiting case who need not trouble us...) Answer: because the system of ranking is skew whiff. It favours large clans which play many challenges at quick time limits, to the evident detriment of smaller clans, or those which play longer time limits. It's not a level playin ...[text shortened]... g a limiting case who wins two challenges and then sits on his laurels and need not trouble us.)

I think the clan league would be more suited for what you want.

The clan system consists of clans of various size with players of various ratings, some playing lots of challenges, some not so many. There is no one size fits all here. To have the freedom that the clan system allows to accommodate everyone the current point scoring system with a few tweaks is about the fairest.

Just because on clan beats a few of the top clans in a challenge or two does not make them the best clan.

To be honest I think Russ has done a bloody good job in running the clan system given the facts above to be in most cases a pretty competitive competition.

We tend to rubbish him a bit on here but overall he does a pretty good job.

Tell me, how do you think the clan system should run and what changes would you make to improve it?

Originally posted by radioactive69
I think the clan league would be more suited for what you want.

The clan system consists of clans of various size with players of various ratings, some playing lots of challenges, some not so many. There is no one size fits all here. To have the freedom that the clan system allows to accommodate everyone the current point scoring system with a few t ...[text shortened]... l me, how do you think the clan system should run and what changes would you make to improve it?

get rid of negative points

Originally posted by padger
get rid of negative points

Then the clan that plays the most challenges becomes the winner. No question about that. Is that what you want?

Originally posted by padger
get rid of negative points

You can always sort your view of the clan table by Gross Points if you want.
The feature is there. Top right corner.

But the default sort remains the net points.
There has to be a risk in mounting numerous challenges simply for piling up points without regard for a sound won/lost record.

As to unfair advantages with clans that don't play enough challenges, I can only say this.
You have to play to win.

Net points is not perfect. but it strikes a balance between the 2 extremes.
Those being Volume of challenges in the Gross point setup.
And the other being the failed Clan Rating (Robbie's ELO) system which put a clan at the top of the table with only 12 challenges.

Simply put:
There has to be a risk/reward feature to clan challenges.
And you have to play to win !!

Originally posted by radioactive69
I think the clan league would be more suited for what you want.

The clan system consists of clans of various size with players of various ratings, some playing lots of challenges, some not so many. There is no one size fits all here. To have the freedom that the clan system allows to accommodate everyone the current point scoring system with a few t ...[text shortened]... l me, how do you think the clan system should run and what changes would you make to improve it?

You may be right that the clan system is just not to my taste and that the league feature here would better suit me.

I appreciate that from the standpoint of a large-clan captain, there is a lot of administrative overhead involved in setting up a 10:10 challenge, and that such a captain would naturally like to see all his hard work acknowledged and rewarded in some way, even if it does not always lead to a victorious challenge.

But I also see the other end of the spectrum. Small clans sometimes achieve impressive results with great economy of means. And why should economy of means not be equally respected and rewarded?

I would like to see a clan ranking metric which is neutral with respect to clan size and number of challenges played (with a minimum number of challenges to be played in order to stay on 'active' status), or at least more neutral than it is now (net points). mghrn55 suggested a hybrid metric; I believe it would be fruitful to pursue that line of discussion and see whether we can get broad consensus on such a metric which would level the field.