Feature request: new balancing methods

Feature request: new balancing methods

SpringRTS Perl Autohost for Dedicated Server

Moderators: Moderators, Lobby Developers, SPADS AutoHost

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Neddie
Community Lead
Posts: 9406
Joined: 10 Apr 2006, 05:05

Feature request: new balancing methods

Post by Neddie »

I'm late to the discussion, but I don't see any reason not to grant moderators the ability to sort out games if no users with rights are available for a host. I do think the choice is that of the person running the host, however, but... eh.

Licho did not respond whatsoever to an autohost suggestion I made and while I was one of the primary supporters of Springie in ages past with nearly a score of hosts, and still prefer the command syntax, I figure I might just turn over the idea to you, bibim. Personally, I think with some revisions SPADS might replace Springie for me when I bring back my hosting. It just seems like a number of the commands are different just to be different while others are implemented unintuitively.

Anyway... new balancing methods. Possibly very useful when the ladder returns. Anyway, I think these could be handy. Certainly more useful than Springie's ELO.
neddiedrow wrote: And, to be more directly constructive, if you're working on balance mechanics... ...here are three more to consider...

1. Random/rank balancing once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by elective switching by people who agree mutually to switch.
2. Random captain selection once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by turn-based draft selection by captain.
3. Random organizer selection once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by turn-based draft. Each turn all members of present team vote on next member, organizer has deciding vote in a tie.
Anyway, keep it up!
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Licho
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Joined: 19 May 2006, 19:13

Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by Licho »

Note that i plan big redesign of springie asociated with winter and new central server for them.
They will work very differently and im open to suggestions just dont expect it to be done soon, since its winter dependent :)

As for balancing, i would be afraid of using ingame stats. Springie has them too but i did not want to use them for several reasons:

1) in a team game, player with best stats was not necessary the most usefull. If you sacrifice or just hold the line while others tech you can have crap score but effectively be the most important team member.

2) stats whoring - you will get what you measure. If you measure damage done people would try to optimize this on the expense of other aspects (for example in team game with communism, they might neglect economic buildup and rely on their team instead).
[oxnull]Lupus
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Joined: 12 May 2009, 14:52

Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by [oxnull]Lupus »

Licho wrote:As for balancing, i would be afraid of using ingame stats. Springie has them too but i did not want to use them for several reasons:

1) in a team game, player with best stats was not necessary the most usefull. If you sacrifice or just hold the line while others tech you can have crap score but effectively be the most important team member.

2) stats whoring - you will get what you measure. If you measure damage done people would try to optimize this on the expense of other aspects (for example in team game with communism, they might neglect economic buildup and rely on their team instead).
I suggest to measure everything. Make some formula(algorithm?) that will calculate efficiency of a player in game. Probably it must be BA specific not to be way general.
As if player made great eco but his resource sharing is 0 and damage dealt is 0, he proably was teching in the corner and should be low ranked.
Something like this :)
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Licho
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Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by Licho »

How would this be better as opposed to just measuring if team wins or not..
If its a team game, there is only team victory or team defeat. Nothing else..

If the player sacrifices himself with something that ruins him, like comm drop, but this leads to victory it would be unfair to punish him.
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Neddie
Community Lead
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Joined: 10 Apr 2006, 05:05

Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by Neddie »

I didn't realize you would fight for my sizeable support share. :3

Anyway, I spoke with a few people about draft balancing, and nobody dislikes the idea, though of course it wouldn't be used the majority of the time. There really could be nothing better for a bunch of unclanned friends fighting each other (See: 1944 games) or a single clan having a training brawl (See: 1944 games).
YokoZar
Posts: 883
Joined: 15 Jul 2007, 22:02

Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by YokoZar »

Licho wrote:How would this be better as opposed to just measuring if team wins or not..
If its a team game, there is only team victory or team defeat. Nothing else..

If the player sacrifices himself with something that ruins him, like comm drop, but this leads to victory it would be unfair to punish him.
This is exactly right. It would be nice if we had some magic way of determining who the best was algorithmically but there is simply no better metric than "my team won". I regularly leave metal spots to my teammates, bleed large amounts of resources, play in coop, and so on. Sometimes these are wise strategies that help us win, sometimes they are not.
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bibim
Lobby Developer
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Joined: 06 Dec 2007, 11:12

Re: SPADS AutoHost beta release

Post by bibim »

neddiedrow wrote:Personally, I think with some revisions SPADS might replace Springie for me when I bring back my hosting. It just seems like a number of the commands are different just to be different while others are implemented unintuitively.
Can you be more specific ? Actually, each time I chose a different syntax than Springie, there was a reason behind it (usually to allow more generic usages / more configurable behaviours).
neddiedrow wrote:Anyway... new balancing methods. Possibly very useful when the ladder returns. Anyway, I think these could be handy. Certainly more useful than Springie's ELO.

1. Random/rank balancing once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by elective switching by people who agree mutually to switch.
2. Random captain selection once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by turn-based draft selection by captain.
3. Random organizer selection once server has reached manage value/full value, followed by turn-based draft. Each turn all members of present team vote on next member, organizer has deciding vote in a tie.
Imo, the problem with balancing methods that require votes for team assignment of each player is that votes don't work well in lobby. Maybe it would be better if the vote system was fully integrated in lobby clients, but currently players are annoyed by votes: it takes time, there are always afk players that don't vote or players who don't understand what's going on. And usually players want to play ASAP, they don't want to wait tons of never-ending votes to choose the teams. Furthermore, even when the server has reached manage value/full value, usually there are still players who leave/join the battle, so what would happen to the teams ?
neddiedrow wrote:Anyway, keep it up!
I will try ;)
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