New alts of previously ranked players allow them to "cut in line" for games and to "unfairly" lower the ratings of their peers. Such alts accomplish this by deceiving the system and the other players about the alt player's previously observed skill. Below is a more detailed explanation.

NOTE: To be clear, alts of players truly new to the ladder are not a problem. Using an alt would be fine if the player's previously established rating could be transfered.

>>>Cutting in Line and Ratings Deflation<<<

In the current RT ladder matching algorithm, the joined player with the lowest rating gets first priority for the next game. As a result, average wait time generally increases as rating increases. This is significant as RT ladder games are scheduled every 5 minutes. For high ranked players, creating an alt allows more games per day.

A loss to a new alt of a high ranked player results in higher point drop than a loss to the main. A win results in less points gained. The result of such an alt run is almost inevitably a net loss in ratings from those that play the alt. (deflation)

Under the current policy, there is nothing stopping a high ranked player from going inactive, running a new alt to damage peers, repeating as necessary, and then resuming with the original account.

>>>Misrepresentation of Actual Skill<<<

The purpose of a rating system is to assign ratings based on known skill. Fizzer designed the RT ladder to match players similar in skill. An alt of a previously rated player deceives the ladder about the player's known skill.

Here's an example. If you establish a rating of 1800 with one account, the system will try to pair you with others rated near 1800. If you create an alt, your skill doesn't change. However, the system will assume the alt is a new player and give you an inaccurate rating of 1000.

With your new alt and inaccurate rating, the system will now pair you with lower skilled players. You have deceived the system and deceived the other players. Generally the other players do not appreciate this.

Edited 9/18/2017 06:59:00

I agree. Alts runs are really annoying on the rt ladder. I sometimes don't join the rt ladder when I see someone that seems like an alt because I don't want to feed him points in case I would lose to him/her.

Edited 9/17/2017 20:28:59

"A loss to a new alt results in higher point drop. A win results in less points gained."

Wrong.

This is nonsense.

Rating fluctuation is based on trueskill mean, not actual rating, as such losing to an alt is typically less point loss than losing to their main would be, beating them is also typically more gain.

neal Not Ranked with a rating of 1947. neal's profile
TrueSkill Mean: 2420.43
TrueSkill Standard Deviation: 157.89

Ranked 1st with a rating of 2056. Timinator • apex's profile
Best rating ever achieved: 2214. Best rank ever achieved: 1st
TrueSkill Mean: 2223.0
TrueSkill Standard Deviation: 55.82

Losing to neal is much better for your rating than losing to Timinator right now. Beating neal will also give you a bigger boost.

Edited 9/17/2017 20:58:30

Nothing is wrong with a ladder where the best way to get #1 is to wait a couple of years. What you talking about :P

But yeah, the deflation is real.

Should the current policy be changed?

Sure, just precisely to what are you suggesting? Oh, and to make it fun it has to be implementable. (i.e. Ban alt's is not that easily implementable. For example a 'wait 5 months' rule needs someone to keep track. Besides rating's don't expire so it doesn't help anyway.)

@Nauzhror,

In my noobish understanding. A new account comes into the ladder. Plays for a bit, wins a bit, gains some rating. Then quits playing the RT ladder. The rating points that new account just won has been removed from circulation, leading to deflation. Bet I am oversimplifying af and everything I wrote here is just wrong, but this means the "average" rating of active players is decreased.


Either way, when QM and Unty is out the RT ladder is "replace" in a sense I guess. Not sure if RT ladder would still be around or not, but the need for it is certently gone at that point.

Edited 9/17/2017 21:08:43

Sure, just precisely to what are you suggesting? Oh, and to make it fun it has to be implementable. (i.e. Ban alt's is not that easily implementable. For example a 'wait 5 months' rule needs someone to keep track. Besides rating's don't expire so it doesn't help anyway.)

Don't use TrueSkill, use Glicko2. In Glicko, you rating converges back to the rating of an unranked player if you're inactive, albeit slowly. Ratings also rise slower so alt runs get at least a lot harder, if not impossible (if the goal of the run is first place).

Edited 9/17/2017 21:11:20

yeah this really is a big problem tbh, and it really sucks, not to mention it kinda makes u lower you're guard when you see a less experienced player. We should get them to ban those guys cause it really waters down the validity of the rankings

RULE 3
You shall not operate more than one WarLight account in a way that gives you an advantage in a game, tournament or ladder.

Either way, when QM and Unty is out the RT ladder is "replace" in a sense I guess. Not sure if RT ladder would still be around or not, but the need for it is certently gone at that point.

I asked Fizzer about it on stream and he said QM wont replace the RTL.

"[...] not to mention it kinda makes u lower you're guard when you see a less experienced player".

Very true.

Edited 9/17/2017 22:24:42

Edited 9/19/2017 00:08:03

Who is this high ranked player doing alt runs and decreasing players' ratings?

If a particular player or a group of players are doing that, I am sure Fizzer will take action.

But why to ban alts for this?

Since you believe that alts are unfair here is my proposition: The real-time ladder should run with elo decay then people would be forced to play if they want to keep the account rating. Also, I think the higher rank you are the faster you should decay. For example, if you are running at 2000+ you decay faster than a guy at 1900+ and 1900+ faster than others below it. With this system, people might actually play more with their main and not alt account.

Note: I do not think alts should be banned from the RT Ladder but I just suggested elo decay since it might get people to play on their main. I actually do not care that much about the real-time ladder tbh. If you play it that's fine and if you do not that is fine as well.

Just my two cents. :D

The purpose of a rating system is to assign ratings based on known skill. The RT ladder system attempts to match players similar in skill.

If you establish a rating of 1800 with one account, the system will try to pair you with others rated near 1800. If you create an alt, your skill doesn't change. However, the system will assume the alt is a new player and give you an inaccurate rating of 1000.

With your new alt and inaccurate rating, the system will now pair you with lower skilled players. You have deceived the system and deceived the other players.

Generally the other players do not appreciate this.

Using an alt would be fine if the person's previously established rating could be transfered.

"However, the system will assume the alt is a new player and give you an inaccurate rating of 1000."

This is nonsense and shows how little you know about the RT ladders scoring. After as few as 2-3 wins someone will have a trueskill mean that is super high until they start losing matches, and trueskill mean is what it used for matchmaking as well as determining the affects of opponents rating swings.

Edited 9/18/2017 11:39:52

New players are considered unranked so start from the bottom in the matching process.

Nauz is right though, from experience I know it's much to win/lose to a new player with a high trueskill than a solid 1700.

Yes, there is a big deflation of the rating in the RT ladder. The effect is particularly obvious for good players that were ranked 10 or 20 months ago and did not play many games in recent months. All these players lose rating points in the following games. So returning after inactivity is a good way to grab a top spot and the rating and ranking reflect not only skill but also some time component.

Alt-runs might contribute to that.

Another factor that contributes is that good players lose rating points when they get booted. An estimated 25% of the games I lost were due to boots because I forgot that I joined or because I played while receiving a phone call or something else to prioritize. Some of these lost games were against low rated players. That lowers my rating by a lot. Which lowers the rating of players I did beat after that more than normaly.

Sometimes I also play a game from my phone or at work for mere distraction and don't play well at all. The same applies as above.

Whereas the alt-runs could be considered unfair and unwanted, the other two factors are in the nature of the RT ladder. Also because games don't expire (although I admittedly don't know the exact effect of that). Losing games against lower skilled players for such reasons might apply to other ratings as well, but might be particularly obvious for real-time games. I don't find it very problematic since I just play the RT ladder for the quick real-time strategic game and not to get a certain rating or ranking.

If one would want to improve something, maybe the number of games (or low rating deviation) could weigh stronger to determine a rating? Although I don't find it important myself.

Just my two cents. On a different note: in general I think we need more people on the ladder to have it working better (faster match-ups, more different opponents, more opponents with comparable skill). How to improve that? Time for template changes? Maybe we can remove 2 of the least popular templates and replace them by 2 of the more popular templates (preferentially votes count stronger for frequent RT ladder players). Other suggestions?

Saw this in a discord chat, might be a laugh posting it here ;)

Player12345 wants to ban alts because they're unfair.

Meanwhile, he loses games, and begs his opponents to surrender in won positions so his rating doesn't go down.

Stay hypocritical player, stay hypocritical.

PS: If people wanted their games analyzed they could get much better players than you to do it, that wouldn't ask them to throw games in exchange.

EDIT: I didn't realize Buns had posted the image while I was writing my post, but yes, that is what I was referring to.

Edited 9/18/2017 18:34:18

Roflmao

Wow!
Is this real?

i always offer the same deal but on one takes it :*(