From: mcgrew@dropout.rutgers.edu (Charles Mcgrew)
Newsgroups: rec.games.empire
Subject: Re: top 10 list, well rather top 3 list...(Was: Re: :tcejbuSeltiT)
Date: 14 Sep 92 15:24:19 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.


	heinlein@matt.ksu.ksu.edu (The tired one) writes:
	how come nowadays, 90% of people that are being attacked and
	obviously at a disadvantage, fold up without a fight?

... I've never understood this either; I always fight to the end.
I've also never understood why some attackers get annoyed when
the defender *does* put up a fight in an apparently hopeless case.
("Why are you still fighting?  My time is more important than yours.")

... it all comes down to egos, I guess.  People take the game
seriously, since it takes so much time to play, and then too 
seriously, when they find they're good at it.  (In wargaming, this is
known as the "My penis is bigger than yours disease".)  

   Someone a while back suggested a rating system for players, rather
like that used for chess.  It has some flaws (for instance a player
who is good, but can't put in 20 hours a day playing may be outranked
by a player who is less good, but can put in the hours; a run of lousy
start positions can damage your rating; people might begin using their
rating as another ego-enhancement, etc.)  But it might give a measure
for Deities to use in selecting players, e.g. only players with
ratings above a certain number, only players with lower ratings, etc.
There has been a movement sort of in this direction already, with
invitation-only, and novice-only games...

   The way I'd suggest it is that there be some person or committee
who "sanction" games as being "ratings" games (sort of like chess
tournaments are -- this would stop people putting on private games
just to enhance their rating), then points are gained based on 
place-at-the-end, with the end-point (for ratings) decided by the
deities involved (presumably with the acquiescence of the players).
Something like:

1st = 10
2nd = 6
3d =  4
4th = 3
5th = 2
6th = 1
7-10 = 0
lower = -1

Games would have to have a certain number of players to be rated this
way, perhaps there would be a separate rating point system for
lower-number-of-players games and "grudge matches".  I'd also suggest
ratings be not lower than 0 (just because new players and lesser
players might not want to participate if their score goes so low they
could *never* be reasonably ranked.)  Has this all been hashed out
(and discarded) before?  

   Clearly this scheme would have to have general support amongst
players to be worth anything.  A real sticking point would be ratings
from past games; good players would naturally like their past wins to
be counted; it might be possible for a "ratings committee" to do this,
but it would be difficult (and controversial) to do properly.  My
suggestions are that if such a system were adopted, it would use only
games currently happening (and, of course, future games), and that the
"ratings committee" be made up of well-known, current players.  (It
should not, for instance, include me, since though I'm a "name
player", I'm not a particularly good "name player".)  I would
volunteer to do record-keeping, however.

Charles (Baldric)
Newsgroups: rec.games.empire