Planet M.U.L.E.

Hello all,

I have been researching existing games for about the past week, and have been coming up with some new metrics for creating a new player ranking method.  I have identified several key areas in which players can be comparatively rated, and now I would like to share what I have found.

First off, let me explain how the ranking works right now.  It's a simple system - Basically, the more games you take first place in, the higher your ranking.  If you tie with other players on your number of wins, then your ratio is used as the tie-breaker.  If you tie both categories, which is extremely rare, then the sort order goes to the player with the highest score, etc, etc.

Using the current system, players who play most frequently are most rewarded.  While this is an important factor (no player should rank high with just one or two freak games), it does not reward players who play the game with the most skill.  You can theoretically win 26 games with miserable colonies rankings and still take a top 10 place (as of this writing).

Currently, there are 6 key areas on which the new proposed ranking model is built:
1) Average Player Score
2) Average Colony Score
3) Number of Games played
4) Average Game Ranking (whether you place 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th)
5) Average Percent of Colony Score (similar to ranking - higher ranked players have a higher percentage of the total colony score)
6) Average Number of AI players you play with per game, also counting players who abandon as ai (higher percentiles means fewer ai players)

Each one of these factors are broken down into a percentile, so each player is ranked relative to all other players.  For instance, if you have an average score percentile of 95.6, then that means your average score is higher than the average score of 95.6% of all other ranked players.

The only percentile which is modified is the number of games played.  Due to the extreme high number of players who have played only 1 or 2 games, the minimum number of games played to rank in this percentile is 3.  Players who play only 1 or 2 games will be in the 0.0% percentile of number of games played, which limits the ability of players to rank high with just 1 or 2 games.

The final ranking is determined by averaging together your six percentiles in a weighted average to come up with the composite ranking percentile.

The proposed weights of these six factors are as follows:
average score = 3x weight
average colony score = 3x weight
number games played = 6x weight
average ranking = 2x weight
average percent of colony = 1x weight
average ai players ranking = 1x weight

Now, a quick note about the number of ai players: remember that you are always ranked relative to all other players.  We all have problems with players bailing from games, and the numbers show that those players in the low percentiles are players who consistently play with 2 ai players.  Playing consistently with too many ai players can drag your ranking down, but the weight of this is also only 1/16 of your overall ranking.  Please keep this in mind before complaining about other players abandoning and dragging rankings down.  Nearly everyone has played games where other players have quit before the end of the game, so long as you don't consistently play with 2 ai players, there is almost no penalty.

As far as which games are counted, any tournament game finished by at least one human player is counted in ranking, and only the final round 12 results are counted.  I have been contemplating disqualifying any tournament game that did not finish with at least 2 human players, but have not worked this into my calculations yet.

Anyway, this is your opportunity to voice your opinions.  Do you feel like there should be other metrics involved?  What are your thoughts on the weights of the player metrics?  Do you have more detailed questions?  Let me know!

Thanks!

I do have another thought on this.  The final ranking will also probably take abandonment ratio into the ranking as well.  That way, abandoning a game will be able to negatively affect player ranking.  Should abandonment negatively affect player ranking?  There is one note here - if all players abandon a game, then the game would not be ranked at all.  That way if a player drops out, there would be no penalty for all players quitting and restarting a new game, if desired.

Thoughts:

- Does your Number of Games played refer to the number of games Finished (so disregarding Abandoned) or the total joined (Finished + Abandoned)?

- Why is the Number of Games three times more powerful then the Game Ranking; namely, why is the number of games so much more important to determine one's rank then whether one *won* those games?

- Why do we care about Colony Score when determining rank?  Player Score, sure, but Colony Score doesn't really reflect on the player in particular.  It would make higher ranked players loathe to play with beginners, as they would bring their rank down due to poorer overall performance.  Now the Percent of Colony makes sense, as it still reflects overall prowess compared to one's competition.  But if we just use that, correspondingly experienced players would *only* want to play lower ranked, so that they dominate that much more.  I personally would leave Colony Score factors out of the equation.

- Very much approve of factoring in AI player quantity in determining the strength of the win.  

Edited for typos...

I disagree with your proposed weights. First, I believe who wins a game is very important. Yes, it encourages a win-at-all-costs motive. Winning the game, most of the time, is the primary goal in my games. About 20-odd years ago when I first started playing, this is how I played with my brothers--this is my nostalgia. So, therefore I think the colony-related weights are too high. Additionally, I think the games played weight is way too high. I think it is significant how often you win. But as long as you have "enough games," I think the total games played in much less important. Furthermore, an area missing is something measuring 1st place wins and/or the ratio of 1st place wins over total games. Also, an area weighting overall rank by 1st place needs to be added.

So, my weighting would look more like this (compromising from your weights and taking out average player score; First place ratio is better than average player score. Plus, average player score is more about the colony than the player. To have a high player score usually means the colony did well. Two colony-based weights already exist.):

first place wins =1x
first place over total games =2x
overall ranking calculated by the above = 1x
average colony score = 1x weight
number games played = 0.5x weight
average ranking = 2x weight
average percent of colony = 1x weight
average AI players ranking = 2x weight

As far as AI's are concerned: Playing with an AI makes winning and high colony scores substantially easier. You know almost exactly what an AI will do, especially if you use them often (learning their behavior by watching them play). Any games starting with AI's should not be ranked. If players care about the love of the game, they shouldn't care if their games are ranked. So, if a player just wants to play immediately, they play with AI's. Without the game being ranked, their playing is about the love of the game. If a player cares about rank, they should be willing to wait for 4 human players. Consider it the cost for the privilege of ranking. Last without, at least, 2 human players at the conclusion of a game, that game should not be ranked. I understand people bail or what-not, but to keep playing when it's only you -- love of the game, not rank worthy.

Thanks for your consideration.

Your abandonment affecting ranking is okay with your all-abandon stipulation.


edit: added abandonment sentence

C64, I respect your thoughts a lot.  You are definitely a serious player, and your stats are top notch in all six categories.  I will create a percentile for the number of games won, and will play with your suggested weights.  The only thing I don't get right off is "overall ranking calculated by the above = 1x"


Do you mean that we should create another metric for this?  Since we are talking about percentiles, it would basically be the same thing as counting the above metrics again, which would make their overall weights go from 1x/2x to something more like 1.5x/3x.  Did you mean to place more emphasis on the first two metrics?

Paladinian, I also respect your input as well.  Again, the serious players will have the most pull in these decisions.

Here's what we have so far:

• Number of wins is more important than number of games played
• Average AI players ranking is a good thing
• Colony Score should not be important
  Should we consider factoring colony score for players with a higher percentage of the colony score, or just dump that metric altogether?

Questions:

• Using percentiles is a more accurate way to be ranked relative to other players.  Are we in agreement about using percentiles in the key areas for ranking purposes?
• Are we in agreement that the rankings should also take player skill (scoring, percent of colony, etc) into account, and not just the number of wins?
• I think that if we keep number of wins that the number of games played will be a much less important stat.  In this case, do you think we should just remove the number of games played?

To do:

• Create a percentile for number of wins
• Create a percentile for wins ratio
• Create a percentile for abandons

Just to clarify, my original proposed weights were merely a starting point, so don't take them as final.  Thanks for your input guys! ;D

I must admit thinking about percentages of many percentages is confusing me. So, let me clarify another way.

Starting here:
Reset the rankings completely
Make games starting with AI's unranked
Make games concluding with less than 2 human players unranked

These metrics are most important to me:
Win/loss ratio (with some added value for high ratios with many total games)
Wins in games with good players
Individual game ranking (something like -- no value for fourth, most value for first; second and third in-between, respectively)

Additionally, some colony metrics should be included to temper the win-at-all-costs motive. Colony metrics would carry much less weight than the individual metrics.

Thinking some more... abandon rates should not affect rankings unless a history of consistent abuse emerges.

I hope this helps... my goal was nice and simple (for me, at least ;)).


[edited for formatting]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in your proposed ranking system, technically you can both play each other until one of you reaches rank #1.

Hi! Too tired to give a thorough read atm, just a few comments on C64's last post (that has supposedly already thought over the previous ones):


I'm against not ranking a game finished with less than 2 human players, a bad sport could ruin the winner's game if this was a rule.

I used to play a league with my friends with a scoring 3-2-1-0 (or 2-1-0-(-1)), and a penalty for a low colony (under 60000), it was either -1 point to everybody or one point less than in a "good" finish. This would encourage to try one's best even if victory was out of reach. Maybe even more points to the winner, though. And leaving the game (either purposedly or accidentally) means 4th place...

Actually, one can do that today.  You and I can decide to play each other several games a day, as quickly as possible with no regard to scores, and take our turns winning to get ranks 1 and 2.  Going with percentiles and weighing the factors it ensures that players should strive to play skillfully (get the most points).

My original thought was going by sheer number of wins is not necessarily a benchmark of skillful playing.  It just means that you play the game a lot.  The fact that we're talking about ranking players on individual attributes and piling them together in a weighted average means that someone could not necessarily rank #1 by merely winning games or playing a high number of games.  It just means that your scores will not be pulled down as much by playing the highest number of games.

Take a look at the percentiles for number of games played (in the data I have):

1   0.0   (below floor)
2   0.0   (below floor)
3   26.0
4   42.6
5   54.6
6   63.1
7   69.8
8   73.2
9   75.9
10   78.7
...
47   99.0
50   99.2
59   99.4
60   99.6
63   99.8
65   100.0

You can see the more games you go up (or the higher number of samples you have), the more close together the percentiles get, which makes this score less and less important as a deciding factor for ranking, but it is very significant for those who have more samples in their data.

That is why the number of games in my initial proposal has such a high weight.  It is really just a limiting factor to ensure that the number of games to sample data means your average score is more consistent.

I originally didn't factor number of wins because that is a cut down version the more robust average game ranking.  Basically, if you took 1st place 10 more times than I did, that's like getting 10 more 1's averaged in to your average game ranking.  This is the same as percentage of the colony score.  If you are in 1st place, you naturally have the highest percentage.

I've thought more about the proposal and, while I understand the desire to rank by percentile, intuitively it isn't the most striaghtforward system for people to understand.  

I think the current system isn't bad... it is understandable enough that #of wins = highest rank, with other metrics for tie-breaking.  I do concur that it is disappointing that coming in second is the same as coming in last.

Personally, if I were designing the thing, this is what I would do... what are your thoughts?

 - Players are ranked by victory points: most points wins.  Victory points are earned by scoring higher in a game then another human player in the game.  So, in a 4 human game, winning gets you 3 points, second gets you 2, and third gets you 1.  In a 2 human, 2 AI game, the winner only gains 1 point.

 - If one wants to further increase the competitiveness at the loss of simplicity, one could add a few tweaks to the above:  Winning might always grant an additional +1 on top of the rest so as to increase the benefit of true victory.  You might also gain an additional point for every player you defeat who was ranked higher then you.  (So the #2 player beating the #1 player gets more benefit then the #1 player beating the #2).  

 - I would never take points away... the complaints to such events would overwhelm these boards without a doubt... though it would be tempting to put some manner of penalty on Abandons.  Again, the potential for complaint is too high, so I would favour leaving such situations out.

The relatively straightforward Victory Point method simplifies greatly any talk of "weighted averages", I think, while still giving people *some* progress from playing a good game but not quite winning.

The one issue is that you do get a situation where one who plays many games marginally can out-rank one who plays now and then but consistently wins.  I can certainly see how people would dislike that aspect.

Whad'ya think, rommager?

Unless you penalize players for playing the same people over and over, the ranks have absolutely no credibility (including the current system).  And so changing the current system without fixing that problem is pointless.  I hardly consider some dude who had a private tournament between him and his buddy to be the best MULE player. LOL!  And to be honest, I don't feel like sifting through everyones games to find out who is legit and who isn't.  I can just assume that everyone at the top of the list simply doesn't deserve it.   :-\  I'm willing to bet that at least 2 or 3 of those players played with each other in a heck ton of games.

Well, you also have to look at the fact that most of us play whoever is available at the time.  I end up playing several of the same guys over again.  It's not like I plan it that way, it just happens.  The sad fact is that this is still a small community of faithful players to a game that is relatively obscure.

I'm sure that there are buddies out there that play mainly each other over and over, but IMHO that's still better than playing the ai repeatedly to boost scores.

Paladinian,  I actually kind of like the idea of points, although it would actually be difficult to calculate a point for beating a higher ranked player on the historic games.  We simply don't have historical ranking data.  Still, it's going to be difficult to make everyone happy with a new ranking system.

I think in the end, if we're going to change the ranking system, then someone will just have to make a decision and roll with it, then perhaps present the candidate systems for a majority vote.

Good point. I guess what I'm trying to say is that probably no matter how the ranking system is revised, I will always consider it just bragging rights amongst a small group of players and not anything really factual or credible.

What I think would help bring more people to the site, and motivate them to play is a daily/monthly/annual/all-time scoring system.  I don't really care what model is used, at least this way, you've got some chance to be "relevant".  I think High Score for game (Individual) and TEAM should also be listed this way.  Give lots of opportunities to stand out, even if you just started playing a day ago.  People like to be seen and recognized.  It's part of why to play.  If the only way you can ever get to number 1 is winning the most games, then anyone who didn't start playing in December 2009 is pretty much screwed at this point.

I second to weekly/monthly/quarterly/annual/all-time ranking (daily is maybe ott, not that many players must play more than 1-2 games per day)

I think the thought is that the developers would one day adopt such a system.  Right now I am focused on working on the ranking method.  After we figure that part out, then it will be simply applying it to work with a daily/monthly/annual/all-time format.

On a side note, sorry the progress is stalled at the moment.  Life has taken a slightly higher priority.  :)

I think the point system is a good basis to start from. One point awarded for each human player in the game minimum of 2 players to rank a game. Everyone receives points if they finish the game. I would even take away one point from players who abandon the game.
Example with 4 human players starting the game         
      1st 4 pts
      2nd 3 pts
      3rd 2 pts
      4th 1 pt
      Abandon -1 pt     
3 human players
      1st 3 pts
      2nd 2 pts
      3rd 1 pt
      Abandon -1 pt

This would encourage people seek out 4 player games to achieve more points per game played.   
Hopefully loosing a point for abandonment will keep players who care about rank in the game.

Would you want to assign more reward for games whose endings are better? Would you not award points if the $60,000 minimum isn't met?

I would reward the winner at least one point more, just to make the victory more attractive and important.

And penalty for colony under 60000, for sure ;) I don't know about rewarding good colonies since it's quite easy to manipulate the colony score. An earned high colony score should be enough reward.

Awarding points for overall colony score is questionable because its like awarding points for the best team and not the best mule player. High individual scores by a player does tell you that player is skilled and should be included in the rankings somehow.

However, if there is no incentive for the group to score as high a score as possible, if I know I am not going to win, I will knowingly sabotage the game so the colony fails.

At least, that's what the average anonymous internet s**twad will do.

There needs to be a reason why I should try to maximize the colony score even if I won't make 1st...this would simulate the real-life motivations of the planeteers, if we put ourselves in their shoes. No one IRL would willingly suffer starvation and death simply because they didn't end up with the most money.

Zach, if you get more points being 2nd than 3rd or 4th, you would be really stupid to sabotage the colony... Sabotaging would take you almost certainly to the last place

unfortunately the way mule works it will always be first and not first in my eyes... colony score is good but only if you are winning or close... otherwise, let's say i end with 12k and the colony is 120k+... i really wouldn't care because i know that i was doing sh$tty in the game :)

Tell me, what good is to reinvent a wheel? There's a good ranking available... TrueSkill. It's a bit complex, but it's based on a solid mathematic model.
http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/trueskill/ (http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/trueskill/)

I know - the point I was making is that if I am in the business of preventing the 1st place player from advancing in score, and the game will penalize / award fewer points for a failed colony, I'm going to fail the colony.

The original game's premise is that a score of less than 60,000 is a failure, and that higher totals are "better" than making the required minimum. From a gamer perspective, if the game doesn't recognize the 2nd-4th players for helping the colony achieve a higher level of success (even if it means letting the 1st place player win), what motivation is there to let the 1st place player get their points?

From a real life perspective, no one would do that. But if I'm John Q. Internetgamer and I'm well behind the leader with no hope of catching up and advancing to a better position, I'd rather see no one score points (or score fewer points), reducing the lead in the rankings the others will achieve.

The ranking system needs to account for that kind of behavior.

Well, you bring up an interesting point - what if points were awarded based on the percentage of the total colony score that you contributed to?

...With an obvious scaled bonus for coming in 1st,2nd,3rd, and 4th too.

If this were implemented, there'd be huge incentive for people to attempt to come as close as they can to winning, even if they don't. It would also reward the players who do manage to pull out ahead - they would get a larger portion of the "stake", as it were. In either case, if this was combined with greater rewards for better endings (and bigger penalties for worse failures), it'd put your average minmaxing munchkiny powergamer in the right mindset for a game of this type.

yeah Zach, that sounds pretty good... you're right, that would make some incentive to get highest score even if not 1st...  i just don't think there is going to ever be a possible ranking that will solve all issues but i guess we can come close! :)

I think a "Daily Top" would actually encourage more people to play.  People want recognition.  It encourages more people to play, so they can have their name seen in lights.
-S

After reading the posts and thinking, here is my current position.

I still really want the following stipulations concerning AI's. AI's make it far too easy to win. Show me a player with a high win/loss ratio without AI's in their games, and I see a player that deserves respect. Winning those games required skill and talent. MULE is predictable and stale with AI's. Only humans perform complex planning and execution, in an effort, to win. This human ability makes a relatively simple game addictive. Humans make MULE a classic.

Make games starting with AI's unranked
Make games concluding with less than 2 human players unranked


I like the graduated points for first, second, third: something like 4, 2, 1, 0. Giving 2 more points to first keeps outright winning the importance it deserves. Additionally, to keep fourth trying and to give the colony score a little weight: 0.25 points given to all players with a "Comfortable ending"; 0.5 points given to all players with a "Elegant ending"; and a full point given to every player with a "Luxury ending".

The only thing lacking in the point system is weight given to wins against better players. I would really like this element included in the ranking system. This could also address AI's (assuming my stipulations are not included) -- giving severe penalties to playing with AI's.

Last, abandons... I feel abandons are a subjective quality. Something not to be included in a more objective system. I operate under the assumption if a person bails, their internet connection was the cause; or something important came up. I know, in reality, this is not accurate. If we had more active players, we could simply avoid the "bailers". This would be my ideal solution. However, since we pretty much play with first available players, I propose giving allowances -- something like 3 a month. If a player goes above that threshold, all their games till the end of the month are given half-credit; If more than 6, only quarter-credit; if more than 9, eighth credit...


And finally, thank you rommager for taking the time to improve the ranking system.


[edit: changed a word to improve clarity.]

Well, Piete has virtually all 4 human players in his games...  and he's the current #1.  So do you... and you are current #2, so what is your point about the ranking system exactly???

I'm not sure what you're asking, Mega Byte.

I do know the major reason I am ranked 2nd is because I have played more games than anyone else. I do not think this is a good reason to be ranked 2nd. I want the ranking system to be more inclusive and ideally, more accurate. So, I share my thoughts to encourage movement towards these goals.


To add to my last post: To have all-time rankings (minus the current ones), year, season, month, week, or whatever is a great thing. Everyone can be a star this way.


[edit: modified to make my post more neutral]

C-64, my earlier comment was, you said "Show me a player that has all humans that's #1, and that's a player who deserves to be there".  My response was, both #1 (Piete) and #2 (You) in particular both share that in common.  I live in Tokyo.  When I'm on and playing, I have very few people to pick from.  So, should I be punished because not so many people on the site?  I can see right now 1 game on, and 6 people logged in.  This is my evening (10:00pm)...

So you have been heard... we proudly present
The Weekly Top Ten.   ;)

I firmly stand behind what I said. AI's are very predictable. Therefore, playing with them makes winning much easier. Thus, to encounter penalties and/or exclusions from playing with AI's is fair.

Using my 2nd place ranking as the basis for your argument is flawed. The current ranking system suffers greatly from the tendency of the more games you play, the higher your ranking. This makes it extremely difficult for new players to have top-tier rankings regardless of their ability. So, I am ranked 2nd, but I have also played more tournament games than anyone else. I do not consider my ranking to be valid because of this correlation. I hope no one else gives my ranking much credit, either.

As far as "punished": I presume, most everyone has trouble starting games at one time or another. I routinely wait (sometimes for long periods of time) to have enough players to start a game. Unfortunately in my experience, waiting to play on Planet MULE is a given rather than an exception, regardless of the number of players online. Additionally, people have not played with me because of my high ranking. That is their choice. Do I consider myself punished because I wait to play without AI's? I could, but I don't.


Last, nothing of what I've written singles you, Mega Byte, out specifically. My thoughts are what I believe. Parts of what I advocate will affect some more than others. That is the nature of measurement. I'm glad you voiced your opinion. Everyone should have a chance to be heard. Ultimately, it seems some voting will be a good idea. My only goal is to help create a better ranking system. So, I voice my opinion. However, my opinion is only my point of view. But, it is certainly not the truth or necessarily the best way to do something.


[edit: proofing]

I like the new weekly ranking, I even made it to the 10th place on Tuesday morning! ;)

Another quick ranking update (although it will mean that I'll lose my top position immediately looking at the number of games some people are still able to play  :'() could be version-wise high scores (you could be able to see all old version-wise high-score lists and of course maintain the (current default) "all-time" high score list, but I think the default high-score should be for the current version).

What C64 nostalgia wrote about requirements for games to be ranked, I agree on the starting requirement, only humans (although this would be fairer when other than winner got points too and having ai's would decrease those points) but I still disagree on the requirement that the game should finish with two players. I already said it before, but if there are only 2 players left, the second player could just be nasty and disconnect in order the winning player not to get the point. So the winning player did nothing wrong, spent 1,5 hours and would not even be rewarded for his good game that he thought he would finish with 3 other human players in the beginning.

I think he was possibly referring to a tactic in which multiple accounts are used, and a game with several "humans" is started, then all but one of the humans "misfortunately disconnects", leaving one user to play against 3 AIs.

What if you had three separate ranks by the number of human players. In other words three separate ranks for 4 player, 3 player and 2 player. Start a 4 player game and if one drops out the game is rank in the 3 player tier and so forth. This might resolved some of the issues being discussed here and it would definitely make it easier to judge the strength of a player by his 3 separate ranks. You could still have a overall combined game rank.  So to recap you would end up with 4 different rankings. One rank each  for 4, 3, and  2 player games and a 4th overall combined rank.

I'm not sure what this would be like on the back-end, but it would be interesting to have a separate ranking(s) for the best cooperative MULE game. I guess making teams and taking the highest colony score would be all that's needed. I'm not sure... but that's my rough idea.

we plan for a complete overhaul of the ranking system.
that said, currently all our time is spent on modding pm1 with ideas suggested in the "future of mule" board.

unfortunately having so many different rankings just makes it hard to read and a busy interface... i think that starting with 4 humans is the only real option because people will leave for whatever reason... however if the host kicks when they didn't get a message saying not responding or waiting a couple minutes, then it should also not be ranked... i agree with piete that people would start disconnecting at the end if they knew that would make it so the other player would not get credit for the win

when are the high scores going to be reset?  i heard about this and felt i would just as soon know when and how often they are reset before trying to make it back up the rankings... honestly i don't care much for playing with newbs because it's not much fun... i like playing against people that know what they're doing... i'm sorry if that hurts people that are trying to start out but why should i waste 1.5 hours of my time if i'm not having fun... now if i'm really itching to play a game, i'll play with whoever but there is nothing more frustrating then trying to teach someone and then they quit after a round or two to have an AI take over their spot

Looking at the number of daily games for some players, it seems that I was wrong... ;)

A wild idea - why not to have multiple ranks? One for all games, one for non-AI games, for four-players games, etc etc... It should not be hard to implement, and let the user choose which rank should be displayed on top of the web page.

Well, maybe extremely difficult but not impossible, look at the number of games that for example kipley and rhodan play (and win)! I sincerely hope kipley gets a job asap! ;)

How did you know that I was unemployed?  Oh, right, all the mule gaming pretty much gives it away....

FYI for Mr Piete because he has my respect as a player of our beloved game.

I work a 56 hour week. I have three grade school children and my fiancee has her three grade school children who live with me. I am able to play during the day while they are at school and in the evening when they are asleep, Eastern Standard Time. Unfortunately, none of the children are old enough to grasp the intricacies of Mule to be able to play with us. And the fiancee? well I spend to much time playing Mule and farmville on facebook is about all she can grasp which is fine by me. I doubt she could handle me denying her food and energy that she has come so accustomed too.
As for me, I first played Mule briefly on the atari when it first came out then extensively on the C64 when it made it to that system.

My suggestion? Toss the ranking system entirely. Even HAVING a ranking system only introduces a system that detracts from the actual playing of the game for FUN, as people quickly aim to game the ranking system rather than playing the game. You can continue to track individual games, but without a global ranking system, people don't have anywhere they can really paint their name on, or plaster themselves with a flashy number to make themselves look good, so meh.

Thank you Mr. Rhodan, the respect is mutual :)

I envy your possibility to play Mule as much as you do. My wife was quite tolerant before our son was born, but now it's very difficult for me to play more than 1 game per day, some days not even that. At least during Christmas holidays I could pursue the no1 ranking, but not without some arguments.

So now the life has other priorities, I cannot complain since our son brings so much joy to our lives that nothing gets even near. And after a few years I'll teach him the basics of the game, and everything gets even better! ;)

Here's my take on a ranking model:

Assumptions:
- game on central server (to avoid ping and kick issues)
- majority rules for kicking player (to remove ignorant players)
- a kicked player does not count as an abandon for points up for grabs (to avoid penalizing players for playing respectable game)
- 2 player game, no kicking
- for a game to be counted for points: at least 50% of players have recorded 2 or more finished games, whether training or real (to avoid new player exploitation)


1) Each game is worth Maximum of 100 points: 1st = 50%, 2nd = 30%, 3rd = 15%, 4th = 5%.

2) Ending (live) Players Factor for Maximum points: 4=100%, 3=66%, 2=33%, 1=1%


Examples with no abandons:
4 start, 4 Finish = 100 pts x 100% = 100 pts  as follows 1st=50, 2nd=30, 3rd=15, 4th=5
3 start, 3 Finish = 100 pts x 66% = 66 pts as follows 1st=33, 2nd=20, 3rd=10, 4th=3
2 start, 2 Finish = 100 pts x 33% = 33 pts as follows 1st=16, 2nd=10, 3rd=5, 4th=2

Examples with abandon:
4 start, 4 Finish = 100 pts x 100% = 100 pts  as follows 1st=50, 2nd=30, 3rd=15, 4th=5
4 start, 3 Finish = 100 pts x 66% = 66 pts as follows 1st=33, 2nd=20, 3rd=10, 4th=3
4 start, 2 Finish = 100 pts x 33% = 33 pts as follows 1st=16, 2nd=10, 3rd=5, 4th=2
4 start, 1 Finish = 100 pts x 1% = finishing player gets 1 point

3 start, 3 Finish = 100 pts x 66% = 66 pts as follows 1st=33, 2nd=20, 3rd=10, 4th=3
3 start, 2 Finish = 100 pts x 33% = 33 pts as follows 1st=16, 2nd=10, 3rd=5, 4th=2
3 start, 1 Finish = 100 pts x 1% = finishing player gets 1 point

2 start, 2 Finish = 100 pts x 33% = 33 pts as follows 1st=16, 2nd=10, 3rd=5, 4th=2
2 start, 1 Finish = 100 pts x 1% = finishing player gets 1 point


Hopefully simple and effective...
Cheers,
WIYM

Greetings, I'm a bit late to give my idea about rankings. I always liked the way many RTS games used to score based on the difficulty settings, so I propose something like this:

PlayerScore = ((5-PlayerPosition)*(NumberOfHumanPlayers-1))*100 / 12

Or if you prefer it based on the "cooperative spirit" for the colony (as the Federation would have expected from them):

PlayerScore = ((5-PlayerPosition)*(NumberOfHumanPlayers-1)*ColonyBonus)*100 / 21

Colony bonus multipliers would be:
0 = Total starvation
0.25 = Debtor's prison
0.5 = Failure, left behind
0.75 = Living in tents
1 = Minimum standards
1.25 = Comfortably life
1.5 = Elegant estates
1.75 = Luxurious retirement

If you prefer a more precise calculation, to avoid giving the same score for a 60.000 colony than for a 79.999 one, use this one instead:

ColonyBonus = ((ColonyScore*100)/60000)/100

You should change 21 for 32 for the new calculation. This one would give higher scoring than the previous one. A luxurious retirement would give a multiplier bonus of x2 instead of x1.75 like in previous one. Or more, if the colony score is higher than 120.000. However, this one would surpass 100% for a player winning first place VS 3 human players and getting more than 120.000 total colony score.

Both calculations would give a measure of the success rate of the player. We should just crop it to two numbers after the comma... :P Then, just summing all of them and dividing by the number of played games would give the overall success rate of the player. (2 numbers after the comma again.) Due to many technical issues, abandoned and kicked should not count toward the total score. Just keep counting them separatedly. (Played games, abandoned games.)

Adventages I see:
-Getting both their value as players, and their value as workers for the Federation.
-Rating the players for their achievements more than the time they spend playing. (Medals or badges could follow the example somehow too.)
-No more easy scores for 3AI games, as they are just not the same. :P The major penalty is the AI player bonus, so even if they spent several games playing VS the AI, the score for playing a single game with 4 human players would still be higher. Unless you play with apes.

Alternatives or changes for my idea?


* EDITED: Added the third calculation for ColonyBonus based on real colony score rather than its "quality".

Thats a bunch of BS !!!!!!! I have never QUIT a game of MULE in my life but have 3 negatives(abandoned) to my credit! 2 times the HOST stopped the game and i received a abandoned credit and the other time our power flickered off and i couldnt get back to the game in time to continue. When a outside force like a Host stops the game or it crashes dont give me a ABANDONED game on my record! I do agree on showing a persons abandoned stats if the system works properly but not when outside forces beyound my control do it!