DiM wrote:not really mate. let me develop. at this point most people in the top 10 will play a 6 player standard game vs people like me (1400 points). the only 6 player standard games they'll play are against people within a few hundred points of them. why is that? simple in the games they play they lose normal points (20-25) and they must win 20% of the time to break even.
in the current system playing against 1400 pointers means they have to win 40% of the time to break even. that's really hard to do. if the change i suggested they'll probably be more willing to play because they'll just have to win 30% of the time instead of 40% and that's doable.
if they are really good they'll get that 30% and keep their rank. if they aren't that good they'll lose some points and get back to what they are doing now (elite games). so i don't really see the downside of my plan.
OK you make some good points there - and yes i haven't done the maths (although currently I think the required win ratio would be more like 50%), but certainly a 30% win ratio would be more doable, although I suspect if you crunch the numbers it would actually be much higher. (Although this is for 1400 points which is already above average. For 1000 point players, roughly average, a colonel probably needs to win 2/3 of 6 player games to break even.)
However, points isn't the only reason high rankers like to play each other - comic said it well in his post:
many of us do not enjoy playing with deadbeats,suicide merchants,trash talkers and downright hopeless cases
I constantly had problems with borderline lunatics when I played public games - one player suicided on me for attacking him too much when I hadn't attacked him once in the whole game. We mainly play because the games are more skillful and you do not get crazy people playing.
In any event your example, whilst illustrating the benefits for open singles play, does not address my objection that it would benefit public teams players even more as they stand to lose a lot less from each loss.