^you can though. Just give your login details to someone else in your clan...

Edit:

Clan league takes too long, and specifically is much slower in some divisions than others

Don't honour vacations; use bank boot times instead.

Edited 6/1/2017 14:01:01

Games being decided by non-joins
If possible with CLOT (might require quite some programming?): do not delete such games after 3 days, but instead allow a replacement. I.e.: non-joins can be "removed by host" and replaced by the replacement. Delete after 7 days (or so) if still not joined.

i don't think it's possible - you can only create or delete game, there's no way to change players programatically. Moreover, i'm pretty sure that if game is created by CLOT you can't even do that manually.

@ Krzy

I think the scorekeepers are the guys who make regular updates in the division threads. Posting results, talking about them and the standings in these threads.

^you can though. Just give your login details to someone else in your clan...

That's some really good advice !

Games being decided by non-joins

• I dont think this is a problem. A player not joining is nothing different than a player not taking his or her turn. They fail to do what they have to do within the 3 days range they have been given. The only thing that is a problem imo is that the player that failed to join is invited to the next game right away. Maybe that should be changed so that a clan doesnt lose 3 or 4 games because someone went inactive. So freezing the slot might be a good idea.
  
  
• An option for teamgames is to have a substitute player who will automatically fill in if one of the players fails to join within 3 days. This does make it harder in regards of maximum slots a player can have, but it might be a relatively easy solution to this problem. All teams will always be filled with players, just that it is their 3rd / 4th choice instead of their 1st or 2nd.
  

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Clan league is stalled by players taking vacations in excess of 40 days

• Players who take longer than 20 / 30 (whereever you want to put the limit) days to take one turn will automatically lose the games they are in and the next games will be created.
  
  
• Maybe do the same if they take 10+ days on the last 2 turns out of 3 (so you prevent them quickly making moves inbetween two vacations)
  

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Problem: Alts and multi-clan membership is a growing problem.

Solution

• Unless they can get explicitly excempted by the Panel, the account that the player used for the previous season of clan league must also be used for the current season of clan league. (This would force players to change the clan their account is in if they want to play for a different clan.)
  
• Unless the player is only in one clan, the account that the player can use to play in clan league must be their highest leveled account, unless they are explicitly exempted by the council, or are already using a lower-leveled account in clan league from a season from before which this rule was implemented. (since mains usually have a higher level than their alt counterparts, this could help.)

I think this is a pretty decent solution.

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Every x days a game will be created without taking into account how much games the players already have.

My main problem with this is that it also punishes the team that isnt stalling. If my opponents go on a 40 day vacation, why should I then be given an extra 3v3 game? It puts more pressure on players who have done nothing wrong as well. I understand it is an option to look at, but I would prefer it if we can find a way without "harming the innocent"

Edited 6/1/2017 13:19:39

@linberson

alts and multi-clan membership
Why do believe this to be a problem and are there examples?

People are free to have alts and be in multiple clans. However, with respect to the CL, this is like the Miyagi situation all over again. If someone has membership in 5 clans and can represent any of those clans on a whim, it is a problem with regards to clan stability and that clan's level of performance. Promotion and relegation doesn't mean much if the same set of players come back to play in a Group they just relegated from. It is also unfair to everyone who is making an honest attempt to improve and rise through the divisions.

There is also the additional concern that a bunch of alts play for a clan for one season and take them higher than their level, which leads to that clan crashing hard next season. We've already seen what bad seasons can do to clans ;)

I won't give examples as we're not looking to point fingers. We want to improve stability long-term and have a competitive league where clans can compete well in their respective divisions.

I also have a question which I meant to ask for a long time: As CL is run right now, are there any monetary costs?
If so, how much and how can I chip in?

It costs about 20$ a month to host CL. I'm fine for now, but appreciate the offer :)

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@Krzychu

What do all those scorekeepers do? Isn't it automated already(that's what i thinking looking at those spreadsheets)

Checking for games, updating their results and all the spreadsheets are automated. However, the spreadsheet needs to be presented on the forum in a digestible format. That is the work scorekeepers do today. We're exploring ways to automate the redundant aspect of that as well(next season). Ideally, you want "scorekeepers" to just provide commentary and not bother with anything else. But if we can't get there, we need volunteers.

Edited 6/1/2017 16:46:09

^you can though. Just give your login details to someone else in your clan...

Doesn't work like that, unless you only have CL-games running on your account. on my behalf, i wouldn't want someone else to play MY games during my vacations.

On the topic of Alts and Multi-Clanning.

"Unless the player is only in one clan, the account that the player can use to play in clan league must be their highest leveled account"

This would basically be purpose built to destroy our clan's chances in CL. Alot of our players now (Dr.Love, Rikku, Xenophon, Bugs) all have mains that have since moved to other clans. These players still want to compete in our team because they see it as one of if not their main clan.

They are still involved heavily in our community through Alts that they have left here and the main reason their mains have left TJC is because alot of clans in Division A/B wont accept alts into their own clans. This proposed solution forces anyone from a lower tier clan to choose between 'not competing for their original clan' or 'turning down an offer to join a top clan'.

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Another problem is that this would stop anyone who is not good enough to make the roster for their main clan from joining the competition with another of the clans that they're members of. Unfairly penalising such players and stopping them being able to take part in CL.

Finally it would open up the option for clans from higher divisions to destroy the competition rising from lower divisions by recruiting the best mains from those clans simply because they can, even if they don't intend to use them in CL themselves.

@dry-clean

Then if they want to support their original clan then they should turn down the offer and keep their main in tjc. Trouble is few people have a sense of loyalty to their first clan, as soon as an elite clan offers them a place they jump ship.

@dry-clean-only: That is exactly the point. In clan league, you should represent your main clan. Also, you should have your main account in your primary clan as well. If players want to compete in representation of your clan, they should be main accounts.

Another problem is that this would stop anyone who is not good enough to make the roster for their main clan from joining the competition with another of the clans that they're members of. Unfairly penalising such players and stopping them being able to take part in CL.

Also exactly the point. This purports to cause clans to resort to "Free Agency" tactics, and trying to lobby players from each other. For example, take Drizzy Drake from FCC and Drizzy Hendrix of 101st. Both 101st and FCC want to play this player for cl10. As a result, clan league becomes less about the player's commitment to the clan, and more about the clan trying to gain leverage in clan league. For me, clan league should help build communities, not dissolve them.

Finally it would open up the option for clans from higher divisions to destroy the competition rising from lower divisions by recruiting the best mains from those clans simply because they can, even if they don't intend to use them in CL themselves.

Trust me, I feel for you there. FCC is always a prime candidate to be preyed on by higher clans looking for new blood. We have lost our fair share of members that way. But frankly, its the way it goes, whether or not you like it or not. Players are always looking for a challenge. I am out to prove that this can be overcome, however, I myself know its a long uphill battle.

Edited 6/1/2017 18:33:14

Games being decided by non-joins
I think that with a scheduled game start, this should be avoided/the responsibility is entirely on the player. So I would not change anything here.

That being said, an option I would think works well is: For each day a clan/team fails to join, they lose 1 point to the other team. If all points are lost, then the game is deleted.

More player level breakdown of stats needed
As MathWolf already said, other things should take priority.

Substitutions require manual work to be done by the league organizers
It would definitely be nice if players could do it. One user friendly way is if the CloT could read forum post (think Knyte's stuff, where you enter commands into the thread) and any player in the clan could sub?

Notification issues: notification requires manual work by organizers and sometimes fails to reach the necessary audience
In another CL thread I briefly suggested utilizing a Announcement thread that had weekly updates (including 'No updates'). MotD said he would do this for next CL. If the thread is updated every saturday/sunday for example, it should at least be able to reach the audience/ clan representatives. This still requires some manual work, but at least I think it has been minimized?

Alts and multi-clan membership is a growing problem.
First, I haven't observed this issue during the current CL? Some of the above suggestions (Use highest ranked know player/main only etc. ) seems to shot a bird with a cannon ball. (i.e. The tool is way to big for the task.)

Here is a hypothetical: say a clan is pretty much disintegrated, and all good players leave and join new clans. Then all the players play for CL next time, under a different tag. Yep, thinking of Blitz. I mean, do we want to stop them from playing? "Hey, your clan got demoted from A, so now you can't play in A for another clan next league? Oh, and not in B either?" Note: *Hypotetical* What will happen to Blitz is not clear yet ofc.

I would rather do A: Open up/encourage training clans. What is the difference between two MH teams and Lynx + 101st, GG +GGr etc. Thus players don't have to look for another clan, just to be a part of CL. Speaking of which, there is no rules against a clan having two teams, so can a clan enter two teams?

There is also the additional concern that a bunch of alts play for a clan for one season and take them higher than their level, which leads to that clan crashing hard next season. We've already seen what bad seasons can do to clans ;)

I won't give examples as we're not looking to point fingers. We want to improve stability long-term and have a competitive league where clans can compete well in their respective divisions.

Unless you are talking about an older CL, I would appreciate examples. Given the length of CL, it is not really unreasonable to see a lot of players change. Maybe some are abusing the system, but let's deal with that individually? As dry-clean-only pointed out, any sort of strict anti-alt rule could hurt perfectly fine clans.

Finally it would open up the option for clans from higher divisions to destroy the competition rising from lower divisions by recruiting the best mains from those clans simply because they can, even if they don't intend to use them in CL themselves.

+1
There is a very fine pathways to walk when recruiting. Unless a player asks another clan to join them, they should be 'protected' so to speak, from approaches from other clans. Just no way to prevent that ofc.

Using Google Docs instead of a more robust database limits functionality and complicates improvements
Lack of a clear schedule
I can't speak of the backend, but from a User-perspective it works well.

Clan league takes too long, and specifically is much slower in some divisions than others
The consensus seems to be reached already. Some sort of fixed format, where the created day of games is know. This CL games got made during exams (the starting point of the 1v1's was horrible imo.) Before the CL, when making the initial lineups, the start day excepted was January. I don't really like the 'staggered' start for 1v1,2v2,3v3's either. I would rather have them start at the same time. Right now it feels like the system was set up to benefit smaller clans, where players had more tournaments each. (Whether that was intentional or not.) Sure, it may be more exciting that the last 1v1 and last 3v3 games for MH, both can secure MH a promotion atm, but CL is not an entertainment show.

Clan league is stalled by players taking vacations in excess of 40 days
I think this was in part happening due to the timing of CL. As I mentioned earlier, CL overlapped almost -if not- all spring exams. Ofc Players take the month during exams of by placing a Vacation on.

The issue here , is that if we are going for a game every X day format, then back-to-back hurts 3rd parties. For one, I would require any player on vacation to be subbed out, in case of new games. Maybe all clans needs to have two backup-players/slots filled at all times?
For game-in progress, it hard. The only option I see, is to completely change the boot time, and disable vacations.

Edited 6/1/2017 20:49:15

1 suggestions I saw mentioned a couple of times was that non-joined games should have the option to use a substitute.

I just have to say: Absolutely not. Not joining a game is the same as a boot. There's really zero excuses for booting in CL. Three days is a long time to spend 5-15 mins to take your turn (or 5 seconds to click join). If you can't commit to that, then don't commit to CL, cause your slow play is holding everyone else up.

The delay of CL A is the real issue. I liked the idea of scheduled starts. I think that should solve the issue for CLA. For the qualifiers, just break it down into groups of 3 instead of 6 and have 1 team promote per qualifier. We can spread out the good qualifier clans to prevent an early elimination.

RE: Non-joins/Boots -

I don't think anything need to change in terms of this being a loss. You didn't play your turn, so you lose. However, a freeze before making new games to allow a clan to substitute a player makes sense. Having a player boot 4 games instead of 2 because you only have a couple hours to deal with it is a tough situation.

BTW, having to join games adds up to an additional 3 days to every game. Is there any way to do it where the game just starts on the picking phase?

RE: CL is too long/Scheduled starts -

I liked the staggered starts for the 3v3s, 2v2s and 1v1s. Partially because it's nice having everything kind of hit a peak together, and partially for game management if a player is in multiple formats.

I think scheduled starts make sense as long as you arrange a reasonable time frame (this will obviously be most difficult for team games). For example, start with 2 games and then force-start a new one every 24 days if necessary (equivalent to 8 three-day turns). Or whatever everyone decides is an appropriate number. You can take vacations, but it penalizes you if you end up with lots of on-going games. It would also save on time that's wasted like one team surrenders but it takes a few days for everyone to surrender and accept, etc.

I don't think banked time is a good idea. Let's say each player has 5 days banked time, that's 15 days of free time per team to burn every game and probably results in slower play than if players took vacations.

Games being decided by non-joins

There have been so many non-join losses and instead of awarding a loss, a fraction of the points can be reduced and the game can be remade with subbed players. Some specific cases where people fail to understand how much time they have to join or misunderstand how vacation work and even when they're online-failing to join and lose all points is too harsh.

We can have an initial banked time(maybe 1 day or so) for joining or even for picking. This may lengthen the league by a fair amount of time, but will help to avoid non-joins.

Alts and multi-clan membership is a growing problem.

dry-clean-only have given it concisely and everyone knows that Div. A and B clans are not alt friendly(Lynx maybe the only exception though-as i find some alts there) and someone like me will feel, if I can contribute something to my first clan it is good. Am not blaming many clans recruiting good players, but constantly going after good players from other clans puts more strat players into these good clans and the other clans who lose the players becomes bad or alt clans.

Imo, alts/multi-clan membership isn't a growing problem. This will exist as long as lower tier clans lose good players to higher tier clans or higher tier clans.

Clan league takes too long, and specifically is much slower in some divisions than others

I guess it is specifically slower in divisions where there are more good players. It can't be avoided, as each small parts in picking/ playing is vital and needs attention. Scheduled games as suggested earlier will help starting comparatively more games, but the finishing may be still slower in some divisions.

Maybe the divisions can be reduced to smaller group of clans (4 maybe?) so that there are lesser games in each division and will be fast paced overall. Like D1/D2, if we have A1/A2, B1/B2,... CL will become fast and maybe 3 CL per year will be possible.



Clan league is stalled by players taking vacations in excess of 40 days

TBest got subbed out because he was about to take such a vacation and this has helped for Div.B to complete fast. This kind of subs/sportsmanship needs to be encouraged and maybe have a separate count for this subs.

With limited subs and real life problems, many feel that longer vacations are much helpful. Scheduled games can help in avoiding this-as all have rough idea of when they can play and be in lineup accordingly.

Non-joins and boots.

Let's not look at boots as a punishment only for the booted team. It affects the whole division. When someone boots against clan X and then wins against Y, it renders the competition unfair and less interesting.

Therefore, if there's a possibility to reduce the number of boots, it should be used. I think adding banked boot times of 1 day to games would be a good move. Or maybe even less, like 12 hours. Not 5 days, that's ridiculous. Autoboot stays at 3 so you have to play your turns in same pace as before and banked boot acts like a very limited life saver. And doesn't require coding in clot.

It wouldn't make the season any longer if the game starts are scheduled. If they are not, the effect would still be nothing compared to people taking 40 days of vacation.

Additionally freezing slots that booted would be great as well.

Alts

I don't have a strong opinion here, but the least that should be done is revealing all alts at the beginning of the season. What's great about CL is this atmosphere, making predictions on how each clan will fare. Not knowing who is who destroys it.

Hello,

here my few cents:

- In case of a "boot" due to a non join the game gets deleted and thus the information also isn't immediately visible any longer which exact player got booted. Since chances are that those non joining players get substituted, it now looks like the new player was responsible for not joining.

- It's a problem for the M'Hunters clan that not everybody can play due to a limited amount of slots. Other clans and players bypass this problem in two ways which aren't favorable:
1. The clans create a B tier version of themself aka recruitment clan or however you wana call it.
2. The members of those clans who aren't good enough to represent that clan play as alts in lower tier clans.
For this reason, I recommend that a big clan like M'Hunters should be allowed to have a B tier lineup which isn't allowed to promote from the lowest division.


As for the guys being worried, about the elite leeches stealing their players, it's time for a new clan in division A to seriously kick those elite butts. Also we could make a forum wall of shame where we record all those stealing attempts from the self proclaimed elites.

Games being decided by non-joins

As suggested in CL A thread, freeze games involving an already booted player, to allow clans to sub the player and avoid furthers non join boots (not only for 1v1).

Forget the idea of using AI to compensate non join in team games, since picks are manual in all templates, plus you refuse the take back control so really what's the point, the team will surr instantly despite the AI.

I also like the delete one loss for non join per game and offer a replay. Maybe add a -1 point penalty. And 3 days instead of suggested 1 week should be enough for the replay, so delay is not abusive (anyway, I doubt non join involve more than 1 player per clan and therefore, won't impact more than 1 game overall).

More player level breakdown of stats needed

If you are talking about updates including individual performance, I love the idea. This is down to the guy(s) managing the updates. There could be 2 dedicated people instead of 1 for that matter ?

Substitutions require manual work to be done by the league organizers

Can't a program import the line up from the gsheet for each team and create the game automatically from there ?

Or, as suggested, have one thread where managers list their substitutions, so CL panel have only 1 thread to follow constantly. CL panel could "hire" 1 guy to this task specifically.

Or even better, as suggested by Tbest, use Knyte thread system.

Alts and multi-clan membership is a growing problem.

For change of clan during a season, can't players leaving a clan be forbidden to keep on playing in CL with their new tag ? They could postpone their joining of the new clan or something.

For change of clan between 2 CL, and often for a one shot CL, clans could line up only players registered in the roster from previous CL season. If so rosters should list all clan players starting each season to give them more security in future seasons. Exception would be if previous clan is not registered for coming CL (clan desintegration or whatsoever). This may also help lower clans prevent their best players from being stolen by stronger clans.

This would basically be purpose built to destroy our clan's chances in CL. Alot of our players now (Dr.Love, Rikku, Xenophon, Bugs) all have mains that have since moved to other clans. These players still want to compete in our team because they see it as one of if not their main clan.

As well explained by Aura, I think TJC is the main clan targeted by this issue, without naming the clan.

Clan league is stalled by players taking vacations in excess of 40 days

Can't you make holidays allowed only for games started, and force a substitution for games not starting due to a vacation ?

For games already started, add a point penalty for any abuse (such as any hols > 2 weeks, or 1 week if 1 week was already used previously by the same player) ?

As suggested before, add another division before qualifiers, and reduce the number of clans in them. 3 main divisions + qualifiers would give more attract to CL too, with more consistency for clans in CL (currently most clans, all outside A and B, have to start from 0 each season ; that may be too much and also too far from original format).

I would like to add the following suggestions :

disclose templates of next CL at least 1 CL season in advance, so clans can start preparing earlier. Ofc this may favour clans who finish their CL sooner, but this could be seen as an incentive to play faster during CL.

Regarding boots during team games already started, add AI with take over possible, so that games are penalysed with orders taken by AI during some turn(s), but not necessarily lost by boots.

For a more competitive CL and implying clans to get deeper composition than just rule CL with only a few players in their clan, limit further template participation per player. For example 2 templates per player is enough (9 different players should be listed in line ups with current templates).

Remove EU 3v3 which gameplay is a bit "scripted" and experience effect is strong, so players playing it for years have a strong advantage on others, and you cant fill the gap of experience in a few weeks on this template. Or add wastelands or some cards to make it a bit more exotic and neutral to everyone.

Allow unlimited subs, as long as replacing players were not maxed on templates allowed and were not previously subbed out from a template.

Edited 6/4/2017 15:34:17

2 templates per player is a bad idea imo. Forces a clan to have at least 9 active members to play. Right now we barely had 6 active people because life happens.

All that does is encourage clans to steal people from other clans to fill up their roster.

Why is forcing a clan to have 9 or more active players bad?

Not saying 2 templates max is the right or wrong way. But finding a way to allow more players from a clan to play is certently a good thing.

All that does is encourage clans to steal people from other clans to fill up their roster.

Or you could recruit talented players from opean games. In fact I would argue that Mike's two templates idee may even reduce the incentive to steal players. Since now more players gets to play for their main clan.

^^ Thing is that almost all clans won't actually have much problem with fielding 9 players on their lineup (even though many had 7-8 player lineups). If a player is on WL only for CL it won't make for him that much difference if s/he plays for WG or something more lively. Only downside is that some clans won't capitalize this hard on a chosen few greats, but the upside is that overally more players would get to play for their respective clans.

Edited 6/6/2017 19:57:05