How to make rating system for AOE:DE?

Age of Empires: DE I - Discussion
1

There has been a lot of talk about the ELO rating that was introduced in the Beta but is absence from the current game.
the ELO rating in beta had multiple problems:

  1. Only 1v1 games were ranked
    There was no team game ranking system.
  2. It was not toggleable
    Not being able to play casually, testing new strategies or teaching new players without loosing ELO was a problem.
  3. You could choose who you wanted to play against
    Grinding ELO with few friends was easy and the players who played fairly would not feel rewarded due to how easy it was to cheat the system.
  4. Every game style was counted in the same rating
    Playing with revealed map at 1.0 speed doesn’t attract high skill players making it easy way to obtain high rank without needing to play against pro players.

Only 1v1 games were ranked

Being able to play with a team (clan vs clan) or random team games in a competitive style would be great, but the ranking system would need to be adjusted and different rank queues might need to be made (i'll write more on that at later post).

It was not toggleable

Whereas the solution to this problem is fairly simple i wanted to remind everyone that this is part of the reason why there wasn't ELO ranking when this game shipped.

You could choose who you wanted to play against

Creating games with a specific rules (map size, game speed, map type, pick/random civ, revealed/unrevealed map, staring resource amount) is good for a lot of players.

But with all the choices it meant that matching two players with their game style choices would not be possible without either compromising on some of their choices, or by giving players the choice to pick the lobby and their opponent allowing the setting to match both players likings without unfair compromises.

Every game style was counted in the same rating

The most competitive players whose are playing with 2.0 speed, non revealed map, standard start and standard resource amounts would be playing in the highest competitive environment, those players would have hard time on getting above the average ELO score whilst the players whose are playing with lower speed would have much higher ELO even though they are much worse players.

Having two different ranking ladders would be one way to solve this problem.
First ranked ladder would be with a specific settings; same or similar settings as the current Vietnam tournament (standard start, no reveal, standard resource, Large map size [for 1v1 games], 2.0 speed, random civ.)

The second ladder would give players more choices (game speed 1.0/1.5/2.0, map size Tiny - Gigantic, resource amount low - high). Having two different queues would allow the second one to have less demanding settings and ensure that everyone has a way to play this game competitively.

What do you think about the idea of having two (or more) ranked ladders for 1v1 games?
Should 1v1 have its own ladder or be same with team games (2v2, 3v3, 4v4)?
Should 2v2, 3v3 and 4v4 have same ladder for all or have two or more ladders?
On to a what extent should players be able to choose the setting of the ranked games?
Should players be able to choose who they want to play against in ranked games?
Is there some other problems with AOE:DE ELO rating that are not addressed above?

2

Elo is simpled, one RM one DM no scenario , and 16 point ( same rating ) in 1v1 16 point in mutiplayer divided by number of player, like was in msn gaming zone, voobly or is in steam…

3

MSN Gaming zone was about the room ranking. You would climb room numbers until you get to room 1 then hold onto it until you lose. No ELO. Required imagination though.

ELO system is fine. Tier based system is probably better based on the number of games and wins.

4

I made this suggestion ^ Maybe there could be some solutions throughout this for certain problems.

And I agree that a toggeable system would be interesting. It’s not fun when you’re playing a game that you know ahead of time is unfair (ex: pro vs. newbie for coaching)

5

Voobly can handle it just fine so I don’t know why it’s supposedly so difficult to do. Voobly can do it for all sorts of different game types. And Forgotten Empires also handled it just fine for AoE2: HD.

And the MSN gaming zone had Elo for team games back in 2000 … so …

… not good enough.

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6

Exactly. It’s not difficult. And the reason why I’ve quit AoE DE until further notice, despite the fact that I was a beta tester as well, and was so excited about the game, is because I’m so extremely disappointed that it’s been so long and they still haven’t fixed Elo which is absolutely PARAMOUNT for competitive multiplayer. It’s killed the game for me because I don’t play this game casually. I notice it killed the game for the AoE2 pros who were having fun trying this game out initially, as well, as they got bored waiting for a rating system as well. Fix it already. Elo is a necessity for competitive multiplayer.

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7

I think having an official ladder would be great and is much needed among all the other fixes needed for the game.

The expert players have set up there own elo system on http://aoederate.ddo.jp/. The problem is it doesn’t record all players games because not all the players have it linked to add games to the rating. I believe it was set up by daiz but is maintained by the Japanese DE community. But it does include some top non Japanese players but they don’t generally have the opportunity to climb the rankings as much as some of the other players who play with them regularly. As to answer you’re question, you could try get in contact with daiz so you and whoever you play with can use it too.

@SpartanHoplite
That was what it was at the beginning but around 1999 or 2000 they adopted elo for player rankings, which also saw a rise in smurf accounts from then on.

1 Like
8

lets discuss the system that they will never dare to re-release

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9

A static ladder is exploitable in my opinion. Climbing a dynamic ladder like msn zone with room hopping ie you start at room 30 play a few games and get to room 15 play a few more and reach room 1 and play it until you lose. Then the ladder changes again based on who won. You can keep something like an ELO for your entry level game match. It should decide where you start on the ladder. Say you have a low ELO you start further down the ladder unless it is a team game. Team games should be based on the highest ELO on the team. Rising the ladder should by done dynamically so that in one sitting say 2 hours you can have enough time and games to go to room 1 or position 1 on the ladder and you don’t necessarily need to beat anyone to get that position if you are the only person online.

10

I am extremely happy with AoE1 DE now that we have ELO.

I’m even more excited for AoE2 DE because I’ve played AoE2 more than any other game by far.

11

Now that they are merging Xbox Console and PC platform together and with AOE II DE’s focus on live multiplayer spectator view including game replay the following rating system would be much more logical imho.

12

The Elo system already works fine for team games with multiple players. Allow Spirit of the Law to explain:

13

In general a good rating system is not only about wins and losses. It should take all aspect of playing that game into account. So that in the case of AOE rushers should be able to compete with other rushers, defensive players should be able to compete with other defensive players, supportive players should be able to compete with… aggressive and agile players should be able to compete with… and so on. So before defining a good rating system for AOE they should define all those different key points of interest for an AOE player first. From there you can build up and even combine it with some kind of player progression system and interesting matchmaking of course. Again like with the spectating they could learn a lot from Valve regarding these matters.