How can that be fixed? A combo of player elo and clan elo for matchmaking?

Either no rating for matchmaking, or just player rating.

Personally, the main qualm I have with the current system is that the clans competing at the top for first place rarely play each other - I understand it is meant to be more casual than something like clan league but the rewards are quite significant, which I believe does ascribe some seriousness to the competition (and the fact Clans are listed by their performance in the previous season).

To me it would be weird if you had two football teams competing for a trophy, but where you never played each other and just had to try to score the most goals against other opposition, which I guess is the most apt comparison I can find for this.

However, I think making all match making based on wins alone is an awful idea, because more elitist clans with lower activity should not be getting matched solely with larger, more casual, clans, as it will be a bad experience for both sides and not motivate either to play (eg GG has the 4th highest war rating, and has roughly the same wins as KING, with the 33rd highest rating - I don't see the benefit of these two being matched every slot).

The best solution, in my opinion, which would still give the clans not taking the CW so seriously representative games, but also allow the top of the leaderboard to fight it out, would be to first match any clans in the top 5 by wins (or top 10) together first, and then match any other players by rating. If there is a timeslot with only 1 Master, 1 GG and 1 TSFH, it feels odd to give the clan in first a free win, and then make Master and GG duke it out.

I also really like the idea of making free wins count as a win against someone with the same rating as you currently have, and giving the free win to the clan with the least number of outright wins, rather than the lowest rating.

I think trying to fix quality difference inside a clan could only be done by a player elo basis - and probably only complicates things unnecessarily. I don't think this is that important for the quality of the system so would leave it for now.

Edited 4/9/2021 10:28:09

If there is a timeslot with only 1 Master, 1 GG and 1 TSFH, it feels odd to give the clan in first a free win, and then make Master and GG duke it out.


This has happened so many times I'm very annoyed of it

I think free wins shouldn't be handed so easily.....instead that player should play in one of the next slots of the day.......if they can't, sucks for them but there are 6 slots in a day....and if they again don't find any game for 2nd time that day, then I'm fine with free win cause more than that will be frustrating for the player too

If matchmaking was based on territories, then clearly the winner of each and every season would be Masters, as long as nothing changes. I see what you guys are doing there ;)

Edited 4/9/2021 11:12:35

I think free win is a punishment, so I don't know why Masters players would want to take them from TSFH.
Like, you sign up, wait 10 minutes for a fun game, and then get told, meh you can't play a game. It sucks.

The question is, wheter you play these templates for fun anyways, or just for the competition to get first :P

If matchmaking was based on territories, then clearly the winner of each and every season would be Masters, as long as nothing changes. I see what you guys are doing there ;)

I wouldn't agree with this - Python gave us a good run for our money in season 1 until the final few days, and I think it was really fun being matched up primarily with them every game, where winning or losing had a significant bearing on the outcome, as each win also denied them a win, and the head to head was pivotal.

Also, we are still far from the activity limit, if MH or TSFH were hitting the limit of 40 each day and we were being matched with you guys it would still be very close I think.
If your argument is don't let 2nd place try to beat 1st by playing them then it takes away some part of the competitive aspect of it?

Is Clan Wars the pinnacle of competitive play?
No, in short clan wars is just an online competition where the participation prize is also the winners medal. Edge had a nice description for it:

If you're looking at it like that, than TSFH and MH played more games than any of the other two clans. It doesn't matter if they received free wins or not, if any of the other two clans had played as much games or just came close to the amount of games the other had played, they'd be leading by a good margin of wins, since their winrates are higher. That was always obvious to be the case in this competition. So if you want to beat them, you neet to rise your participation. Otherwise just accept, that this comeptition isn't a competition for strategic purposes, but rather casual clan game.

Also, masters, please stop whining.
This echo-chamber of a forum post you have created for yourself is comical at best, and expresses bad sportsmanship at worst. You complain about the rules and setup of Clan Wars only after you have fallen slightly behind.

What is the goal of this Forum-thread?
Is it to complain a lot, brand the competition as unfair and make a lot of noise, or is it to change the setup and rules of a community event so it favors you?
Hate to break it to you, but TSFH is better suited than you for this competition. Your solution to not winning seems not to be joining more games (TSFH does that), but to instead complain about the rules in order to have them tailormade for you.


Lets look at the solutions provided by various Masters members:

Solution 1: Clan territories should decide matchmaking.
Masters are 2nd and TSFH (1st) would have to play them every game in order to get their next territory. Do you think its good for the community to have a clan who allows everyone to join play almost exclusively against the clan with the highest amount of trophies on the site? I dont.

Solution 2: No free wins to top 5 clans on the rankings.
This is just directly taking away free wins from TSFH, which would give TSFH a penalty of 11 and put Masters up front.

Solution 3: Giving a weight to the amount of territories for a clan when distributing free wins.
Yet again trying to steal wins directly from TSFH.

Honestly, this should be beneath you.
Im no big fan of TSFH getting the top spot either, but this is a casual competition for clans to enjoy. TSFH were voted best clan of the year and they generate way more activity than you right now, so sit down.

Personally, the main qualm I have with the current system is that the clans competing at the top for first place rarely play each other

I completely agree. But I don't know if it is a flaw in the system or whether Masters and Python are purposefully avoiding each other.

I'm afraid you're completely missing the point Ralph

Shouldn't the goal of CW matchmaking be more of a round robin style affair? Try to best pair up all clans vs all clans.

This isn't a typical single or double elimination tournament where teams are eliminated until it's down to a Team 1 vs Team 2 head to head final match, but rather a comparison of a clan's performance over the entire season. The algorithm should try to team up clan matches that haven't played yet. Nor it is a ladder, nor should it be treated as one. It's not the same people playing everyday. The idea of a "clan ELO" is kind of odd tbh, b/c obviously there's a huge variation in skill, particularly in the "less elite clans". If Ursus is TSFH's best CW player, I'm likely down in the middle or bottom somewhere, so applying an average ELO to either of us is misleading and bound to lead to poor matches. Same problem for other clans. Instead, just make it round robin, every clan rotates as best as possible playing matches with every other clan.

An example for the matchmaking: if in the current season there have already been 10 Masters vs M.Hunters matches & 10 M.Hunters & TSFH matches played, but only 5 Masters vs TSFH, and both Masters and TSFH are in the queue, it should prioritize making that happen.

The only way to "manipulate" the matches in this case is to opt out of queueing for matches if you want to avoid getting paired against someone in that queue - but you can't see that, and if you're opting out of playing, then you've already lost and you're only hurting your own clan.

The prime driving force here should be participation. Get more players in each clan playing in slots each day, because over time you'll be paired up against EVERY clan, which will on aggregate determine your success.

Edited 4/9/2021 14:23:12

....

I'm afraid you're completely missing the point Ralph

my bad.

You had played 43 games less than TSFH at the time when you posted the first post in this thread. 164 vs 207.
That is 79.22% of TSFH's games. You were 5 wins behind and had a winrate of 63%. 43x0.63=27. Had you played the same amount of games as them and performed on your own average then you wouldve been 22 wins ahead of TSFH. If you had performed on TSFHs average winrate (51%) you wouldve been 16 or more wins ahead.
The problem is NOT that TSFH are getting free wins or that they are getting easier opponents. The problem in this scenario is that Masters dont play enough games.

But what do I know? Maybe complaining about the matchmaking, instead of doing whats necessary to win, is the mature solution to losing a competition.

Edited 4/9/2021 15:32:55

Filthy casuals able to compete, unheard-of!

Regardless of why this thread was made, free wins should count as wins for the rating.

If they don't, the same clans will always get the free wins, and that opens up the opportunity to abuse the system if you play it smart.

Besides that, taking wins into account when matchmaking can be done to let the top clans play each other more only punishes those who are very active and not Div A good, so thats a bad idea.

Using player ELO instead of clan ELO, would just turn CW into a terrible version of the ladder, so that doesn't seem to be the solution either.

Regardless of why this thread was made, free wins should count as wins for the rating.

If they don't, the same clans will always get the free wins, and that opens up the opportunity to abuse the system if you play it smart.

You couldn't abuse the system if it's constantly trying to round robin matchmake you with clans you haven't been matched up against.

Using player ELO instead of clan ELO, would just turn CW into a terrible version of the ladder, so that doesn't seem to be the solution either.

100% agree. CW is meant to be casual fun & to garner clan participation. Player based ELO would achieve the opposite. It'd make clan leaders benefit from mandating who is permitted to represent in CW, denying weaker players a chance to play. Or maybe with the current matchmaking system it'd encourage both very strong. Higher participation should continue to be the main force being success. Play more, win more, get better results.

Many have said it already ... there are already strategic competitive options. CW isn't one of them. It's for quick fun aimed at making clans great again -- I'm being dramatic with that statement, but there's also some truth to it. Some clans are likely getting activity boosts b/c of CW. I think it's a great addition to WZC, and has intelligently targeted a facet of WZ that hasn't been done already in the form of ladders, clan league, tournaments, etc. Part of what makes it great is that it's materially different than everything that's come along so far, and it also stimulates clan activity for the masses and not just the hardcore strat players.

Edited 4/9/2021 14:50:48

CW shouldn't round robin, since that would take away any fun whatsoever.

The top 20 clans would have played each other in 20/6 = about 4 days . After that, there are 80 clans with players that don't know how to play, or play so bad it becomes a matter of autopilot. (If they dont get booted in the first place.) I think the current system with ratings works fine, it should just count free wins as a win.

Just change the name to "Clan Race" and everything is fine.

CW shouldn't round robin, since that would take away any fun whatsoever.

How so? Don't agree with that. I think we agree that player ELO ruins the goal of CW, but doesn't enforcing clan ELO on a player also result in random matches (skill-wise) = taking away the fun? The best player in an average clan will primarily get paired up with players he can beat, and the worst player in that same average clan will get paired up with players that he primarily loses to.

I say at least start the season with RR by making every clan play every clan, and perhaps as the season heats up or winds down, pit the top 33% of clans against each other more often, but never to the point where it's just focusing on a clan vs clan rivalry.

Edited 4/9/2021 14:58:27