Current state of TWD Cup & Pivoting to another league

[RaCka]

To avoid further confusion I'm posting this thread to address the current state of TWD Cup and the decision to pivot to another league. The initial hope for TWD Cup was to keep activity up while trying to be some what inclusive with Ogron leading the charge. Unfortunately, Ogron has stepped down from hosting this league and the interest in this league wasn't to the level we expected it to be. I believe TWD Cup could be very successful at a future date when the population and activity level can support it. TWD Cup will be shelfed for the time being and circled back to at a future date.

So what's next?

TSL Season 5 will be the next upcoming league. TSL will help activity headed into the summer months and is the MOST inclusive league we've had to date. This TSL will include Warbird, Javelin, AND Basing. We have an improved match-making system, algorithm for basing, and a few more minor fixes. We will have an official announcement within the next few days with start dates and rules for this season.

As usual thanks to Dwopple, Wirah, BIET, Mark, and others behind the scenes who help to make Subspace run smoothly and make hosting these leagues easy.

[Tiny]

twdt

[Vehicle]

Womp womp. Thanks for stepping up to get something going for the off-season.

It's summer, running anything was always going to be tough. The pandemics over, we can always look back fondly on the activity of Summer 2020/1

[Jessup]

TWEL season leading to a DUEL2 season. Do a pairing for the DUEL 2 season based off final stats from TWEL to make it competitive. Unsure of formula currently to use. Perhaps something like top 10 get a draft from the lot as a reward and then pair the rest off their final rating scores during TWEL.

Also we need set times/days for duels and to make a duel bracket of some type which starts out premade with who faces who based off stars or something and works it way down according to wins. The old TWEL style where people can milk their rating by dueling who they choose has major weaknesses.

My 2 cents.. Could be great for smaller population too during the summer.

[Dreamwin]

Sorry for not being able to arrange a group for TWD cup. I have had very limited time to log in during NA hours and euro evenings it has been pretty much dead.

Feels like much effort went to waste here but in reality you pretty much have ready concept with the most of ground work done for future TWD Cup. It just needs the right time and place.

What went wrong here IMO was that we didn't utilize the momentum after super successful TWDT. If the next league was announced when playoffs begun, I feel like we would have had a competitive league to play now. Instead we got random polls after the league ended written in jibberish which were hard to take seriously (told you riv). I think many people(including myself) were anticipating a short TWL season and were ready to set up teams for that.

This "mistake" has been made multiple times in past but it is more so due to the fact that running a league is hard work(requires time which is valuable) and all volunteers need a break too.

Best thing we can do to keep competitive leagues going in the future is to set up dates/leaders for TWDT/TWL in autumn and start promoting these leagues early so people know when to come back.

Thanks for the effort!

[Rab]

The trick is to automate a league as much as possible. Depending on a bunch of manual work always burns people out. Have to plan in advance though as dev work takes time.

[viop11]

Sry I dun assembil squidrin for twd c1p i jus like dr1ft1nk/assemblink team n fingirink on sundays 4 the b1dge n thats y i cud vs twdt/twl but i dun vs iriction from blistink othir spaceships nemore as 35 yr old wirld cl1ss athlete like when i was 15 yrs old n sprint home aftir biskitbill prictice to vs cintinim until 2 am everyday

i wish 4 tw 2 survife 4efir though n its my/efery1s respinsibility 2 particip8 in leagues that ppl like 1k1r1nt n r1k1 organize so am very sry twd c1p didnt wirk

furthirmore allow twdt/twl like tiny riquist

[saiyan]

TWEL season leading to a DUEL2 season.

This. Preferably in a way that makes it as grindy as possible.

Run those as a side-show alongside a win-based TSL that isn't about k/d.

The world isn't going to end if you prioritize player-improvement/optimization over "fun and inclusivity" for a short time.

[Banks]

TSL gonna kill the zone. Just run a draft tourny with no star cap, or another DT

[Crazy Canockout]

I like the idea of TSL as well as some kind of Duel league. Both sound perfect for this time of year..

Thanks for time and effort Ogron and staff, as DW said, this Hybrid Cup is primed now and we can bring it forward at the right time in the future and get it going properly.

Cheers

[RaCka]

TWEL season leading to a DUEL2 season.

Run those as a side-show alongside a win-based TSL that isn't about k/d.

I think these are both doable

[qan]

If doing TSL, yes, moving to W/L would be a huge improvement.

As we've identified in the past, the biggest issue with TSL (other than people reccing vs playing to win matches) has been that imported star ratings poorly quantify skill. Humans understand the difference between 7* and 8*, but if you use that in a bot to try to create balanced teams, the results will just not be very good.

We could do a very basic W/L Elo where everyone starts the season at the same rating, should people be willing to wade through the requisite tedious/unbalanced qualifying matches. Each player's first ~5 matches would have a delta multiplier, meaning ratings would change much more than in standard matches. Quals would still need to count toward rec to avoid players tanking rating in quals for an advantage in standard matches. This would introduce a substantial random element at the start of a season (and might result in a less-skilled player winning), but this rating could be carried over in future seasons or possibly even in other parts of the zone. If people were willing to deal with unbalanced qualifying games in the name of more balanced ones later on (a big "if"), it would work. In the long run, finally having a system that can automatically create somewhat balanced teams would be worth it. It would also save Ops the tedium of constantly trying to adjust ratings based off of a star system that was never meant to be a linear representation of skill.

Also, from a dev perspective, Elo is actually pretty simple, mathematically. Not exactly rocket appliances.

[RaCka]

If doing TSL, yes, moving to W/L would be a huge improvement.

As we've identified in the past, the biggest issue with TSL (other than people reccing vs playing to win matches) has been that imported star ratings poorly quantify skill. Humans understand the difference between 7* and 8*, but if you use that in a bot to try to create balanced teams, the results will just not be very good.

We could do a very basic W/L Elo where everyone starts the season at the same rating, should people be willing to wade through the requisite tedious/unbalanced qualifying matches. Each player's first ~5 matches would have a delta multiplier, meaning ratings would change much more than in standard matches. Quals would still need to count toward rec to avoid players tanking rating in quals for an advantage in standard matches. This would introduce a substantial random element at the start of a season (and might result in a less-skilled player winning), but this rating could be carried over in future seasons or possibly even in other parts of the zone. If people were willing to deal with unbalanced qualifying games in the name of more balanced ones later on (a big "if"), it would work. In the long run, finally having a system that can automatically create somewhat balanced teams would be worth it. It would also save Ops the tedium of constantly trying to adjust ratings based off of a star system that was never meant to be a linear representation of skill.

Also, from a dev perspective, Elo is actually pretty simple, mathematically. Not exactly rocket appliances.

Your suggestion is better than the current TSL format and is a huge move in the right direction.

[Lock]

If we did Qan's suggestion for TSL and also throw in that same idea for TWEL 2v2, then that would hugely increase activity in the zone. Would prefer TWEL 2v2 to just run as TWEL 1v1 has in the past instead of scheduled matches and all that.

The replayability for an open 2v2 TWEL would be huge. People like rankings.

Could also do TWEL 1v1 but I feel like less people are inclined to play that these days.

[Exalt]

a win-based TSL that isn't about k/d.

This. K/D is meaningless if you don't win. The Jessups out there should not be rewarded for losing, while the selfless players who do the little things that don't always equal k/d should be rewarded for winning.

edit: looks like qan already got to this point. ELO system all the way. Don't reward losers.