The ELO ranking system is bad

I accept. Thank you to jh1234l for setting up this debate. For the sake of clarification -- Bad: Of poor quality; inferior or defective Let us begin. Case 1: Pro claims that the Elo system discourages new debaters from making debates, but a quick gander at the "challenge period" page shows that there are currently two pages of open debates, most of which are instigated by new members . This is the same as it was before the Elo score was introduced. I'm just going off of memory here, but as Pro stated, sources aren't required, and I'm sure the voters will recall that what I'm saying is true. Pro claims that experienced debaters will avoid taking these debates due to the high risk one takes in debating noobs. TURN: This is true, but this the point of the Elo system -- it discourages noob-sniping. This is not a "bad" thing, in fact it was one of the main reasons why Elo was introduced in the first place. Pro claims this causes many debates to be stuck in the challenge period. Firstly, there are currently two pages of debates in the challenge period. This isn't unusual, in fact it's pretty typical. What my opponent has failed to take into consideration is that after a week, if no-one takes the debate, the challenge expires -- so debates are constantly cycling through either way. Case 2: Pro states that the Elo system is unfair because high-Elo users avoid debating low-Elo users. Again, this is basically the point of Elo. It doesn't make things unfair. To the contrary, it discourages noob-sniping and drastically cuts the rewards of noob-sniping thereby evening out the Leader Board. That is to say, Elo makes things more fair, not less. Pro states that Elo is unfair because people with already high Elo don't gain as many Elo points from winning a debate. This is true, but once again this is the point. Just as it is unimpressive for a pro-boxer to punch-out a four year old, so too is it unimpressive for someone with an Elo of 5000+ to beat a user with an Elo score <2000. The accomplishment is lesser, so the gain is lesser. This is the way it should be under a logical ranking system. Case 3: Pro states that the Elo system contains loopholes, such as users deactivating their old accounts and creating new accounts to start with a fresh-slate. This is not a loophole, because these users aren't getting away with anything. They remove all their old loses, but they also remove all their old wins, and since most of the active user-base has an Elo above 2000 (the default Elo after completing 1 debate), most users would actually be lowering their own Elo. For users under an Elo of 2000, we must ask why they are so low. If they are that low because they are not good at debating, then likely they will have a similarly low Elo with their new account. If they are not a bad debater, then their old score was not representative of their ability and so creating a new account makes things more fair, not less. Finally (and most importantly), closing your account has no effect on the Elo scores of those you've debated with your old account, so it makes literally no difference to the DDO community if one chooses to close their old account and open a new one. Pro states that the Elo system doesn't take into account vote-bombing. This is a non-sequitur. Vote-bombing was an issue before the Elo update as well. Elo wasn't meant to solve vote-bombing. Vote-bombing is an issue distinct from the issues Elo was made to solve, and so Vote-bombing is irrelevant to this resolution. Conclusion: The disadvantages Pro points out in his argument are either non-existent, non-sequiturs, or actually reasons why the Elo system is advantageous. As such, Pro has no grounds to claim that the Elo system is bad. His burden of proof is unfulfilled and the resolution has been negated. I look forward to Pro's response.