The learning curve with regards to the large number of templates (51) on MDL can be a challenge. To address this issue, I have a proposal. I would like to hear what people think.

• Divide all the current templates into template packs.
  
• There is one base template pack which contains 10 templates. Everyone must be signed up to this pack. This pack will contain the most mainstream templates, but at the same time should be as diverse as possible.
  
• All the other templates are split up into packs of 5 each. These template packs are optional and will group similar templates together.
  
• If a player receives a game on a template in an optional pack, they will get some bonus points regardless of the result of that game(for being brave!). This encourages you to try new templates once you get familiar with the base pack.
  
• The probability of getting a game from the base pack or an optional pack will be the same for every player. This ensures that everyone has an equal chance of getting bonus points from playing on optional templates.
  
• Every player will get a total of 3 vetoes in the new system. If two players(signed up to just the base pack) are matched up, the CLOT has at least (10 - 3 vetoes from A - 3 vetoes from B = 4) templates to choose from when allocating the game.
  

This allows us to keep a lot of templates on MDL, but at the same time reduce the learning curve for new players. Breaking up templates into appropriate template packs will be a challenge, but can be worked on.

If this feature is implemented, it will pave the way for a member-only pack. This pack will contain templates which use member-only features like commanders, bomb cards etc. A player signing up for this pack must be a member. If their membership status changes later, and game creation fails, they will be awarded an auto-loss.

@Quiksilver, you don't have to learn 30+ templates. You just start it and if something different comes up, just check some games if you want and play it.

I think similar to Rakleader, template amount is not the problem; I think the problem is time and advertisement. Talk with Fizzer and if he puts it in the community page I think the numbers will increase.

How does the rating system work on MDL? Do ratings expire?

If I could play a bit, and then pause if I get busy with other things/have too many new templates, and then resume w/o taking a rating hit because of a break then I think I would get round to playing MDL sooner.

In general MDL works great, but I think there are 2 main reasons why players retire:
1) It is an elitist ladder
If you see the average rating of the participating players, it becomes pretty clear, that for average players it is even hard to keep their rating about 1500 points. This can be really frustrating.
For me this means I would need to invest a lot of time to get a decent rating.
2) There are many other games to play.
To get good results on MDL you have to spend time on the templates and I think some players lack of tome. If we take me for example: I participate in CL and play 3 templates. Current competition in my group is hard so I have to spend a lot of time on these games. Furthermore I need to practice the other templates which means at least 4 games on ladders (2v2, 3v3). Then there is AWP, seasonal ladder, internal clan league and many other events and games.

Right now I think the biggest problem of MDL is, that it has attracted a lot of very good players and average and low level players avoid this ladder. This leads to a very hard competition. If these low level players join the ladder they start with 1500 elo points and play against players, which are way better than them. This can be really frustrating.

Maybe it is an idea to create games with open seats and promote MDL in these games. I do not know if an advertisement at the end of such a game could be done by a Mod in future versions of WL, but maybe thats an idea.

In general I think, we need to attract more average level players (everyone likes to win some games).

How does the rating system work on MDL? Do ratings expire?

If I could play a bit, and then pause if I get busy with other things/have too many new templates, and then resume w/o taking a rating hit because of a break then I think I would get round to playing MDL sooner.

Games expire after 5 months but I think only a certain amount of games count towards your rating (like most recent x number or so?). Don't worry about ratings just hit it up and see if you like it :P

I think the Packs sound interesting but imo advertising and a wider range of skills is more important (obviously not so much you can do about that but perhaps the Packs might help lead to a greater diversity in skill )

Edited 4/7/2017 21:26:30

yeah i also think template variety is positive rather than negative, there are couple of expections, but most templates seem to be so that you can play them at least relatively well even if you have never tried that template before (and you can always check games for that template which should help too)
though this might still be a problem for a player whose main interest is superhigh win rate and ratings, that kind of player might find a problem with not knowing each template perfectly, but perhaps MDL is more about finding new templates and having fun than being only about how high rank/ratings you can reach? It's propably not even possible to make one ladder so that it has great variety and is fun to play and also fits for player whose only interest are win rates and ratings
Also about the issue with need of more players i think that the main problem might be only certain corner of WL might even really know about MDL and spreading it to those who don't know about it might help to get more players but also help with the issue with the average skill level being quite high (which in turn might help to get back some of the players who had left cause they thought that the MDL was too hard for them)
since it seems that only couple of clans have more than two or three ppl in MDL, one way to get more might be that those players in clans with only them or one or two other players from that clan in MDL could perhaps advertise MDL for their clanmates, buns's idea of letting clan with most games finished/most players on top 30 and so on to decide about template swapping could be modified for this, there have been polls about some settings of some templates i think (and might have been about templates as well) so what if this would be implemented so that say once in month (or weekly or whichever time period is good) there would be some possible changes with templates/template settings amd say clan with most active players on MDL could choose one thing, then perhaps clan with most players on top 20 could choose one thing and so on this might be good incentive to get players recruit their clanmates for MDL, i don't know perhaps there could even be some sort of clan leaderboard haha (this wouldn't actually even need to be clan-based, it could be player based so that player with most games and player who has recruited most could get to choose from templates/template settings, but i don't know how feasible it was to do in that way(to know who has recruited which new players)

Edited 4/7/2017 21:41:24

I am still of opinion that 2 things should be integrated in WL : MDL as an official 1v1 ladder and Muli's userscript.

If you want a high rank and rating with easy wins on a boring template, join the 1vs1 ladder. If you prefer diversity and good competition with a great opportunity to learn, join the mdl.

yeah that what i thought as well, i don't think it's worth the effort to try to get back those ppl whose main problem with MDL is that they have to learn about 50 different templates, rather try to figure out ways to get new blood

honestly, you don't have to learn all 50 templates.
Just some special ones, that use uncommon settings.
Most templates have pretty standard (maybe +/-2 here and there) settings. If you get the hang of one of these, you can play well on almost all of them.

If you want a high rank and rating with easy wins on a boring template, join the 1vs1 ladder. If you prefer diversity and good competition with a great opportunity to learn, join the mdl.

Agree!

I'll play MDL because I like MOD and MOtD, also you guys made a great work here, congrats!

Achievements would be a fizzer task as well

When I wrote achievements I didn't mean what Fizzer did :P
Can be some those type of achievements too (for the lower level players), but I spoke about the different rankings possibilities :O
I mean, MotD own the database, he can make any of rankings...
Can be constantly updated ranking lists for every templates for example! :O
So perhaps will be a good feeling for somebody who is, for example 15th in the main Rankings, but first in one of the 51 template rankings, and this can be a cause that not quit the ladder and continued to play. I don't know.
But again, MotD's possibilies is infinite because he owned the database and "only" need write some queries :P

In the AWP World Tour Rankings, hard to reach the first position too, but that type of competition consists of invidual single elimination tournaments, and given the chance for anyone to get some limelight to win one of these tournaments, not only the TOP10 ranked players.

+1 tim

Most the templates I've never played, and alot of the time its just MME SR on a different map so its easy enough.

Also if having a bad rating turns you away from playing then thats pretty lame.

To ask a totally unrelated question. does the win rate per template graph shows all games played or only the non expired ones?

Edited 4/8/2017 14:49:37

"Also if having a bad rating turns you away from playing then thats pretty lame" not everyone is a beast like you Buns...If someone loses most of his/her games it is pretty demoralizing.

Edited 4/8/2017 17:39:18

Think about it from a psychological perspective. If someone enters a ladder competition at a baseline of 0 and their rating goes up from that point to 1200, it is generally viewed in a positive light. If their rating starts at 1500 and eventually drops to 1200, they will view their performance far more negatively, even if they had the same number of wins and losses in both scenarios. I believe the entry rating of 1500 discourages many players, and yes, this includes myself.

Also, that's all well and good that most templates are rebranded versions of Strat MME. You know who isn't good enough to recognize anything more than the most superficial of similarities between templates? Everyone who isn't at the top end of the Warlight ability spectrum. Some of us actually need to watch videos for every single template because we are not skilled enough to successfully identify strategies from other templates that would apply to ones we've never played before.

@Ben I would expect most people at the top end of MDL that when they first joined a ladder they lost repeatedly. I know I did and that made me want to carry on playing to beat the players who were repeatedly beating me.

@Dog The 1500 thing is a good point, and that likely is demotivating. Also if people are struggling with recognising similar templates, then maybe its worth someone who knows the majority to make a post grouping templates together (eg MME, Battle Islands and volcano island). Then a quick glance at the list and you know how you need to play it.

- Elitist asshole #1

Except the problem is that even with such knowledge of the similarities, people like me would still not be able to play new templates at anything close to the same level of templates we've played before. Being told they're similar is not the same as understanding why they are similar.

@buns you got a point there. Some competitive persons will not settle for average and keep trying until they get good at something.

MOTD: maybe try a 1 hour livestream to go through dogberry's weekly post and review two or three of the best games and answer random questions? might engage players more, and the livestream notice on the top right or warlight page might get new players to check it out. doing it weekly or once every 2 weeks would do the trick. doesn't even need to be pre-announced and fixed schedule.

regarding the number of templates i think you should drop 5 or 6 of them. 30 is way too many for players learning strategic settings imho.