Island Defense ELO

[aRt)Y]

Referring to the current (again) ELO discussion: viewtopic.php?f=101&t=93208 and the 2014 poll on ELO wipe viewtopic.php?f=166&t=46787, I would like you to vote again.

The map is pretty much stable now (except for endless balancing discussions, duh). Neco has stated he does not wish ELO and apparently ENT has a terrible ELO formula for ID, making the win/loss gain pretty much pointless. As someone has yet to step forward and provide a useful ELO calculation, we might as well remove it.

Please keep in mind that this discussion is not meant to work out a proper formula, we had enough time by now and you can still do that in the ID forum anyway.
Neither would I like to discuss that the map is still "bad" and "unbalanced". We've heard all sides by now on several topics.

You may post questions regarding the poll's options. I am leaving a 24h window open to adjust them.
The poll will run three weeks to give everyone time to vote and you may change your vote as well.

[1337hamburger]

aren't 2 and 4 the same thing?
@aRt)Y

[aRt)Y]

@1337hamburger More or less - the 2 and 4 mean: keep the ELO and do not reset. You could also keep the ELO and reset it. See the difference?
In total, there are four options.

I would strongly recommend voting for two things. If you vote for wiping only and the ELO removal wins, the ELO will be wiped and removed.

[pep]

@aRt)Y the map is not stable at all, just so you know, regardless remove ELO.

[Remixer]

I see no point having ELO as long as the map is unbalanced. There are so many things that are off and I especially see no point that a titan who gets -froff and -exp and wins gains the same score as the Titan who does not - it's a lot harder. Also, as it's impossible to create some kind of ladder I don't really see how it would be fair.

To be honest I don't really find it very fair that there can be games where titan only gets feed from walls, since everything else is denied, or that titan gets an early minion but remaining 8~ builders stack into 2 or 3 bases that he just cannot break. There needs to be limitations that prevent actions that are not supposed to be made - be that stacking all builders into one base or just slaughtering titan at the mound (be that tauren rush, or nature army rush) those things need to be fixed. As long as they are not fixed we have nowhere near "balanced" or "fair" map.

A few things that would bring balance to the game:
1. Reduce the effectiveness of Wand of the Wind and buff Titan somehow else
Reason - Only very good and pro titans can use those effectively and sadly, spamming them is very unfair tactic in my eyes, maybe because there is no quick counter play (how good the players have to be to have Workers at range?). This causes the situation where average and bad Titans suffer for lacking the ability to use one game-mechanic (called WotW), meanwhile good titans just rampage the game. At the same time, as long as WotW remains unchanged the Titans cannot be buffed, since pro-titans would become even more brutal.

2. Remove the timer for the structures, after a builder is killed
Reason - This system is good as an idea - even if a builder suicides the Titan still gets feed. However... it's not working as intended. The intention is to help out Titan, and at the same time builders - if a waller dies from e.g. nukes the baser isn't instantly fucked up. However there is a bigger, unintended side of the system as well. In many games the builders won't start "-froff" or "-exp" for one reason: if a builder is killed the game is lost. If titan manages to kill the baser in any way he will get superiorly fed and it has such a huge impact on the game that most builders don't enable "-froff" or "-exp". Sadly, thing is that if the Titan does not get to kill a baser, he just cannot win and remains underfed, leading to a simple suicide eventually. Creating a high-risk high-reward systems is not generally a good idea in a tag game, especially if you have no choice to use them or not. The black-building time at least needs to be nerfed: A) Only keep the buildings in certain range of the titan (killing a baser at mound has no connection to the base, and thus it's stupid to not remove the buildings) and B) Reduce the time the structures remain or create a counter to cap the amount of feed Titan can get from them.

3. Reduce the sizes of certain bases
Reason - Currently certain bases are simply too large, and thus creates the situations where a baser has 3 supporters. Bases in the Top/Center, Top/Right and Right/Center are just too large, as an examples. They include a lumber harvesting areas, and space for all food sources and end up having extra space for supporters. My opinion is that if a baser has a supporter there also must be a con for him, be that reduced amount of workers or less towers. Currently it's only good to have a supporter (back in the days there used to be a risk of the waller dyings and all walls disappearing, leading to a defeat. But that risk no longer exists). With the same logic, the "Giant Fruit Trees" should not be implemented, as they support this kind of gameplay even further, when it should be reduced.

4. Reduce the amount of minions or balance them out
Reason - Okay this one is a bit complicated. I think we all know that having 3+ minions has just too huge impact in the game: that simply destroys every single baser unless they have a supporter ( A REALLY STRONG ONE ) and thus playing supporters is usually more safe than playing a baser. Playing against a titan who has 6 minions, spamming heal or nuke, is really frustrating and feels a bit unfair - sure the titan did deserve (at least most of) the minions but it's just unbalanced as it is. On the other hand, having one minion is mostly a punishment to the titan, having a unit that will most likely get killed sooner or later, is also unfair in my eyes: if you get it early, it's a level 2 minion with 2000~ hp that will die way too easily, and if it's a level 4+ minion the builders have surely gotten enough gold to kill it. Either way the game isn't a smooth as it should be. The worst scenario is that there is some complete beginner, feeding off like crazy and the dying. I'd suggest following changes to the minion system.
A) Ultimate top feeders (e.g. 75%+ of the feed) should not yield a minion. Why? Because in such scenarios the builder is obviously out of the level of the other builders and thus is not fair towards the builders, and rarely to the Titan either.
B) Minions gotten previously must gain levels automatically as the game goes forward, having level 3 minions makes no sense, if your new minions spawn at level 5. (Automatically set the levels of previously gained minions to the new minion's level -1, unless it's already higher level), that is of course, when a new minion is gained.
C) Minion's levels should scale with the amount of gold stolen - it makes literally no sense to have a level 4 minion spawning, if all it means is +45 gold to builders and 2 eggs. And usually that is the reason I decide not to kill any builders, when there is e.g. demo, tauren, satyr and nature plus a couple basers with hunters.
D) Give the titan chance to not accept the minion - in a way or another. For a few reasons: A) Getting a first low level minion too is just useless and pain in the ass unless you are a born microwave. AND if you already have 5+ minions another one is not very rewarding.

More things are broken but enough crying for now.

[aRt)Y]

I guess we dont need more time.

The ELO for Island Defense will be removed from the bot. I would like to request the stats wipe (as for LIHL at the end of seasons), too.

Approved.

[HazarDous]

Island Defense stats recording disabled and Elo wiped.