Voting Gauntlet: A Hero Rises 2023!

[Mercakete]

Hmm okay, I'm fairly happy with the winners. 🙂 Out of these four, the only one I really don't care about getting is Ninja Camilla. And even with Ophelia, I'm not particularly interested in getting her, it's just that, since she's a rearmed hero, she's inherently (har har) useful. The bigger news for me is that Veronica and Fomortiis made it through. I hope one of them wins. Sure would be nice to get a free one. My preference is Veronica, between the two of them. I wonder if Wave 3 of Engage's DLC will help her here...

[Ice Dragon]

It looks like the banner is going to be nearly perfect for me. Veronica, Camilla, and Ophelia all got in. Robin didn't, but that match was the one I was most ambivalent on since I have uses for copies of both units.

 

8 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

But part of it is I think the exact opposite of you described where it feels way to skewed towards the "underdog".

Of the four matches this round, three of them were won by the larger team. How is that screwed towards the underdog?

[vikingsfan92]

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

It looks like the banner is going to be nearly perfect for me. Veronica, Camilla, and Ophelia all got in. Robin didn't, but that match was the one I was most ambivalent on since I have uses for copies of both units.

 

Of the four matches this round, three of them were won by the larger team. How is that screwed towards the underdog?

For starters I think it's more of an issue of scale and is more of a complex issue. Just because something doesnt happen 100% of the time doesnt mean it still cant lean a certian direction.  I am sure we can find some past results to argue over but I feel alot of that would be justifying the result rather than actually seeing if the meathod has issues.   As the issue tends to hit the most popular of the charcters the hardest.  Chrom another very popular charcter also in this vg has a track record of pretty much strictly losses continuing here.  It's far from an Edelgard exclusive problem she is just the poster child of it.

I also think the part where you don't apppear to fight against how it can feel like you are hurting your team if your schedule doesnt let you contribute at max bonus time is more of problem than people give credit for. Especially for the bigger team as more people can screw it up for their team.  And even if it doesn't the fact it's a feel bad mechanic for people not being able to contribute the most they can for their given team is still motive enough for voting gauntlet to be deleted/reworked imo and removed from ahr.

 

 

Edited March 3, 2023 by vikingsfan92

[Ice Dragon]

19 minutes ago, vikingsfan92 said:

For starters I think it's more of an issue of scale and is more of a complex issue. Just because something doesnt happen 100% of the time doesnt mean it still cant lean a certian direction. I am sure we can find some past results to argue over but I feel alot of that would be justifying the result rather than actually seeing if the meathod has issues.   As the issue tends to hit the most popular of the charcters the hardest. 

When something doesn't happen 100% of the time, looking at past results to get more data points is precisely what you're supposed to do to determine if the effect is real or not. The human brain is notoriously bad at intuiting probability and has a tendency to remember data points that leave a stronger impression and forget all of the ones that were ordinary.

Three of the four larger teams progressing past the first round is very normal.

 

19 minutes ago, vikingsfan92 said:

I also think the part where you don't apppear to fight against how it can feel like you are hurting your team if your schedule doesnt let you contribute at max bonus time is more of problem than people give credit for. Especially for the bigger team as more people can screw it up for their team.  And even if it doesn't the fact it's a feel bad mechanic for people not being able to contribute the most they can for their given team is still motive enough for voting gauntlet to be deleted/reworked imo and removed from ahr.

A single player on a smaller team can hope to contribute at best 0.2% of the score accumulation for a single bonus hour. Your points aren't going to be enough to sway the result.

Furthermore, due to the way the multipliers work, everything that happens before hour 40 statistically doesn't matter (outside of giving you points towards the feather rewards). More players will be playing during the last couple hours, which means your contributions matter even less.

The game does a good job of selling that "you're contributing" by making your scores very big, but the sheer number of digits in the total score makes it hard to realize just how small your score is in comparison.

[EricaofRenais]

Well I am happy.  The 2 units I already have lost in round 1 and now whoever wins will be new and the banner will be great for me.

[Some Jerk]

One of these things is not like the others!

Spoiler

It's Camilla. She's the only one without wings. (No, the wyvern doesn't count.)

 

[vikingsfan92]

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

contribute at best 0.2% of the score accumulation for a single bonus hour. Your points aren't going to be enough to sway the result.

Furthermore, due to the way the multipliers work, everything that happens before hour 40 statistically doesn't matter (outside of giving you points towards the feather rewards). More players will be playing during the last couple hours, which means your contributions matter even less.

The game does a good job of selling that "you're contributing" by making your scores very big, but the sheer number of digits in the total score makes it hard to realize just how small your score is in comparison.

Sure but when your contributions are already at or below 0.2% I would argue the last thing you would want to do is make that 0.2% feel like it matters less. It's a feels bad that doesn't need to be their.  The fact that you can be forced to not even contribute the max simply by your schedule is also a problem.  I get that it's not an easy one to solve but there surely is a way to make it better.

 

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

When something doesn't happen 100% of the time, looking at past results to get more data points is precisely what you're supposed to do to determine if the effect is real or not. The human brain is notoriously bad at intuiting probability and has a tendency to remember data points that leave a stronger impression and forget all of the ones that were ordinary.

Three of the four larger teams progressing past the first round is very normal.

I think you are not fully understanding my point as I may not have explained it clearly its not just about the numbers of big team who wins its about how the matchups go.   The problems I am pointing to existing are more about the descprency when super popular charcters go against others being skewed towards the underdog. Its not the type of problem that occurs in every vg because sometimes their simply isnt a huge popular charcter even competing but it still is ugly when it does imo. 

And why I think looking at the one outlier is important.  Its not just straight the underdog vs popular as not every match is the same distribution like when the super popular charcters enter vg. When there is a more even match-up popularity wise the problem is lessend simply because its not the huge diffrence in numbers that some of the more problematic charcters have. 3 different charcters who have consistently lost lose yet again in separate unique matchups ( Chrom and double Edelgard).  Chrom has lost 7 vgs now.  And the one remaining match was between two of the most recent charcters who haven't had a chance to be in many vgs.  Especially Foremortis who is still an extremely new charcter by comparison to alot of others. 

Edited March 3, 2023 by vikingsfan92

[Midnox]

EDELGARD LOST TO THE THOT? WHAT THE HELL IS THIS? 

[Tybrosion]

7 minutes ago, Midnox said:

EDELGARD LOST TO THE THOT? WHAT THE HELL IS THIS? 

Camilla actually knowing how to win in VGs while Edelgard still doesn’t have the slightest clue.

Also, people rightfully kicking F!Edelgard to the curb where she belongs. It was ridiculous she was even in the VG instead of like Embla.

[Diovani Bressan]

2 hours ago, Tybrosion said:

Also, people rightfully kicking F!Edelgard to the curb where she belongs. It was ridiculous she was even in the VG instead of like Embla.

I totally agree on this. I really hope people don't meme next year and put her again in the Top 8. I accept Summer Edelgard in Top 8 next year again, because I believe she will still be considered a good unit. We will probably have a new Edelgard alt this year though, which will guarantee to take a slot.

The matches would be totally different if we removed Fallen Edelgard and moved everyone else below her 1 up:

• Summer Edelgard Vs Embla;
• Fomortiis Vs Veronica; (which would make me sad since I would want both in the banner)
• Chrom Vs. Robin; (which would be funny, honestly)
• Camilla Vs. Ophelia.

[Xenomata]

4 hours ago, Some Jerk said:

One of these things is not like the others!

It's Veronica! She has the... lowest sex appeal! The smallest assets!

Edited March 3, 2023 by Xenomata

[Tybrosion]

59 minutes ago, Diovani Bressan said:

I totally agree on this. I really hope people don't meme next year and put her again in the Top 8. I accept Summer Edelgard in Top 8 next year again, because I believe she will still be considered a good unit. We will probably have a new Edelgard alt this year though, which will guarantee to take a slot.

Yeah, I didn't have a problem with Summer Edelgard getting in. I just opposed her anyways because I already have her but do not have Legendary Veronica.

I could've easily picked Fomortiis or Ophelia (and I will if Camilla eliminates Veronica) instead but figured Veronica probably needed the most help.

[Sunwoo]

I was going to choose either Veronica or Chrom, and just ended up picking Veronica based on where my mood was at. I legit didn't expect her to topple Summer Edelgard though. And obviously I'm not complaining since I joined her in the first place, but it's just kind of lolzy that having two Edelgards in the VG just resulted in the both getting the boot.

Just wait until the year that we have five Edelgards, including Fallen and Brave Edelgard, voted into the top 8 of AHR ...

[Ice Dragon]

11 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Sure but when your contributions are already at or below 0.2% I would argue the last thing you would want to do is make that 0.2% feel like it matters less. It's a feels bad that doesn't need to be their.  The fact that you can be forced to not even contribute the max simply by your schedule is also a problem.  I get that it's not an easy one to solve but there surely is a way to make it better.

I'm sure most people are aware that there are more than 500 people on their team playing each hour, even if it doesn't register exactly what that actually means. From a rational perspective, you should feel insignificant, but game is doing its best to convince you otherwise. The fact that you feel like your points matter at all means it's doing its job.

 

11 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Chrom has lost 7 vgs now.

That's not surprising. There are eight contestants in each event and seven of them have to lose.

I would also argue that Chrom isn't "super popular", or at least not in a way that translates to Voting Gauntlet wins. The mechanics of the Voting Gauntlet mean that it isn't just the character that's being represented, but also the unit (and the unit's availability). In this Voting Gauntlet's case, Chrom was behind Ophelia in team size by about 10% in the first hour and by about 40% in the last hour.

And given the scoring mechanics, actual super popular characters still only have around a 1 in 3 chance of winning a Voting Gauntlet at best.

 

7 hours ago, Xenomata said:

It's Veronica! She has the... lowest sex appeal! The smallest assets!

Actual clothes.

Fomortiis literally standing there naked.

Edited March 4, 2023 by Ice Dragon

[vikingsfan92]

5 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

5 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

That's not surprising. There are eight contestants in each event and seven of them have to lose.

I would also argue that Chrom isn't "super popular", or at least not in a way that translates to Voting Gauntlet wins. The mechanics of the Voting Gauntlet mean that it isn't just the character that's being represented, but also the unit (and the unit's availability). In this Voting Gauntlet's case, Chrom was behind Ophelia in team size by about 10% in the first hour and by about 40% in the last hour.

And given the scoring mechanics, actual super popular characters still only have around a 1 in 3 chance of winning a Voting Gauntlet at best.

 

Chrom has consistently been near top of cyls for years. Not just middle of the pack but very near to winning it several times before he actually did win. So not sure where the notion he is not super popular.

It's not just about winning the whole thing though.  If there are charcters that you know are not finals or even semi finals contenders in the bracket you have issues with that alone. The whole point is supposed to be anyone can make it to the finals if not outright win.  While Chrom is not in as bad shape as Edelgard he still hasn't even been close to winning one.   

 

5 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

I'm sure most people are aware that there are more than 500 people on their team playing each hour, even if it doesn't register exactly what that actually means. From a rational perspective, you should feel insignificant, but game is doing its best to convince you otherwise. The fact that you feel like your points matter at all means it's doin

  I hate acting like the systems in place can not be improved upon.  Ahr loses all appeal if the meathod being used is to decide it is not in the best state possible and it is clearly not on several angles to the point it is problematic imo.  I am far from the only one who doesnt like vg or its current state. I think you might differ on the degree of the problems you see vs the ones I see or what problematic elments even are or how much they actually are an issue.  But the system in place can be replaced with something better be it minor tweaks or something new entierly. 

And I think this is one of those circumstances where they do need to actually look at feedback that says it's not perfect more than feedback that says it's fine as is. Not because one opnion is more valid but because looking at feedback that says it's fine is stagnation essentially and that is where some bad things can pop up. 

Look at other game modes who haven't changed for long periods of time and how they needed a kickstart to revitalize/rebalance them for the changing times and remove problems and how they feel after updates. Arena tickets for instance were a huge positive for the mode. 

 

 

[Tybrosion]

Related to the “Chrom has never won a VG” point, I would like for us to pour one out for Laevatein. She has been in six different VGs (3 as her base version and 1 as each of her alts) and lost in Round 1 in all six of them. Those losses involved losing to characters like F!Kris, Hana and Wolt.

If that isn’t a good enough indication that VGs are just glorified Chance Times from Mario Party, then I don’t know what to tell you.

[vikingsfan92]

25 minutes ago, Tybrosion said:

Related to the “Chrom has never won a VG” point, I would like for us to pour one out for Laevatein. She has been in six different VGs (3 as her base version and 1 as each of her alts) and lost in Round 1 in all six of them. Those losses involved losing to characters like F!Kris, Hana and Wolt.

If that isn’t a good enough indication that VGs are just glorified Chance Times from Mario Party, then I don’t know what to tell you.

I think a good way to sum up how I feel is even if it is not intended it still to feel like a not very inclusive event if certain charcters like Lavetian don't ever get the slightly postive results  of even a single round win.  There are alot of people who are content with just simply not losing round 1.  Which for a for fun game mode being made more important because of ahr is not ideal.

[Ice Dragon]

6 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Chrom has consistently been near top of cyls for years. Not just middle of the pack but very near to winning it several times before he actually did win. So not sure where the notion he is not super popular.

As you've chosen to ignore me saying: he's not popular in a way that translates to wins in Voting Gauntlets. Voting Gauntlets are more than just the character, as the mechanics mean that unit availability and unit performance are also a factor. CYL performance does not translate well to Voting Gauntlet performance.

Chrom's Voting Gauntlet results look like this:

• AHR 2023 (Mar. 2023):
  • Duo Chrom lost against Rearmed Ophelia, team size down 10% on first hour, down 40% on last hour
• CYL 2022 (Aug. 2022):
  • Brave Chrom won against Brave Marth, team size up 120% on first hour, up 110% on last hour
  • Brave Chrom lost against Brave Marianne, team size down 10% on first hour, down 15% on last hour
• Kingdoms vs. Empires (Jan. 2020):
  • Helpful Chrom won against Walhart, team size up 440% on first hour, up 20% on last hour
  • Helpful Chrom lost against Brave Veronica, team size down 35% on first hour, down 40-60% on last hour
• Bunny Battle Ballot (Apr. 2018):
  • Spring Chrom won against Spring Catria, team size down 65% on first hour, down 40% on last hour
  • Spring Chrom lost against Spring Lucina, team size down 65% on first hour, down 25% on last hour
• Winter Festival vs. New Year's (Jan. 2018):
  • Winter Chrom lost against Winter Tharja, team size down 75% on first hour, down 65% on last hour
• Choose Your Legends Top 8 (Aug. 2017):
  • Chrom lost against Hector, unable to find a tracker for this Voting Gauntlet
• Princes vs. Princesses (Mar. 2017):
  • Chrom won against Alfonse, no multipliers during this Voting Gauntlet
  • Chrom lost against Ephraim, no multipliers during this Voting Gauntlet

Sounds like he's doing as well as we should expect him to do. He's never lost to multiplier shenanigans (other than possibly against Hector, but I wasn't able to find a tracker) and he's only won with multiplier shenanigans once.

 

6 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

I hate acting like the systems in place can not be improved upon.

And I don't let "perfection" get in the way of "good enough".

Voting Gauntlet is functionally a spectator sport. Cheering for your team won't help it win, but it still feels like you're helping.

 

6 hours ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Arena tickets for instance were a huge positive for the mode. 

And has zero bearing on how the mode works. It only gives players incentive to play without making the gameplay any better or any worse.

[Othin]

The way to think of Voting Gauntlets is, X players pick one team, Y players pick another team, and then the odds of each team winning are determined based on the ratio between X and Y. (Not proportional to that ratio, but having a more complicated correlation with it.) Then the winner is randomly determined based on those odds.

This is how Voting Gauntlets have been for years, and it's how IS likes them.

Edited March 4, 2023 by Othin

[Midnox]

On 3/3/2023 at 6:04 AM, Mercakete said:

Hmm okay, I'm fairly happy with the winners. 🙂 Out of these four, the only one I really don't care about getting is Ninja Camilla. And even with Ophelia, I'm not particularly interested in getting her, it's just that, since she's a rearmed hero, she's inherently (har har) useful. The bigger news for me is that Veronica and Fomortiis made it through. I hope one of them wins. Sure would be nice to get a free one. My preference is Veronica, between the two of them. I wonder if Wave 3 of Engage's DLC will help her here...

Wait, the winner will be given for free? In that case, I can’t be that mad for THOT could be winning. Even she gets use as a combat manual fodder 😁. I can’t decide between the other three. Ophie and Veronica being the new kind of hero of inheriting once without being lost, on top of being strong themselves, and Formortiis being an absolute unit, makes it hard to chose a fav (I do prefer Veronica over Ophie, but that’s a personal taste)

[Sunwoo]

Veronica ≥ Formortiis > Camilla > Ophelia, personally. Honestly, I wouldn't be upset about any of them winning, but Ophelia is my lowest priority because I'd like to have a new unit, and I have two Ophelias already.

[Medeus]

I'm honestly happy with the result, all of them are either units I wanted more merges of or could use their fodder so it was a good result for me. I'll stick to voting for Fomortiis as I'd like a free copy to use so I don't have to pull Colorless, but whoever wins I don't mind.

Also, it's just funny to me that both Edelgard lost in the first round, she's cursed to not be on the AHR banner. 

On 3/3/2023 at 4:00 AM, Humanoid said:

IS will fix the Edelgard situation by releasing five versions of her this year, thus guaranteeing a second-round appearance next year. Let's see, Baby Edelgard, Mythic Edelgard, Ascended Edelgard, Rearmed Edelgard, and uhh, Hot Springs Edelgard?

And then they forget to upload the event and cancel it. 

[vikingsfan92]

5 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

And I don't let "perfection" get in the way of "good enough".

Voting Gauntlet is functionally a spectator sport. Cheering for your team won't help it win, but it still feels like you're helping.

Improvement to the base system =/= wanting perfection.  I think the real argument we have is our definitions of good enough don't match in this case which is subjective.  I have said countless times in my posts I am wanting it to simply be less bad than it currently is. I have also said I personally find the state it is in to not be good but any improvement is welcome.   Just because I am not the best at coming up for a solution to this problem doesn't make me wrong for wanting it refined.

And having feels bad in you "cheering" system is not good especially if you have to be somewhat active to do so.  And I think the fact "its worked like this for x period of time" alone is reason enough to for IS to do a deep dive on the mode and see if it can work better imo.

 

5 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

And has zero bearing on how the mode works. It only gives players incentive to play without making the gameplay any better or any worse.

And my point is the player feeling is actually hugely important. Make a mode feel like it has issues for any amount of people and less people engage in said mode.  Maybe people like me who have issues with the mode would be more tolerant of the flaws (which again I am not saying is possible to remove entirely) if there were other stuff in place to make it feel better. When said mode is supposed to be a community wide event and you are actively making people not want to do it is not good. You want more people to participate not less and I promise you that the way its set up has turned off people. Not just this year either as their have been complaints about it literally every single year. 

 

6 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

As you've chosen to ignore me saying: he's not popular in a way that translates to wins in Voting Gauntlets. Voting Gauntlets are more than just the character, as the mechanics mean that unit availability and unit performance are also a factor. CYL performance does not translate well to Voting Gauntlet performance.

6 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

Sounds like he's doing as well as we should expect him to do. He's never lost to multiplier shenanigans (other than possibly against Hector, but I wasn't able to find a tracker) and he's only won with multiplier shenanigans once.

I am having a tough time explaining how I feel about this in words mainly because I feel its not easy to explain how I feel. To give it my best effort though its the type of situation that I feel falls under conflicting valid points I think is the closest description I can give. Or maybe in other cases simply we don't put the same weight behind separate factors.  Its the type of thing where I think points are simultaneously working for and against both sides no matter who makes them.  While I don't agree fully or see eye to eye on these thing its the type of situation where I think were points can be simultaneously true.  Maybe our overall stances don't match like the fact I am not convinced the multiplier system is without shenanigans built in but I see that the reasons we are using can be reworked/reframed for both sides if I am honest. 

 

 

[Othin]

51 minutes ago, vikingsfan92 said:

Improvement to the base system =/= wanting perfection.  I think the real argument we have is our definitions of good enough don't match in this case which is subjective.  I have said countless times in my posts I am wanting it to simply be less bad than it currently is. I have also said I personally find the state it is in to not be good but any improvement is welcome.   Just because I am not the best at coming up for a solution to this problem doesn't make me wrong for wanting it refined.

And having feels bad in you "cheering" system is not good especially if you have to be somewhat active to do so.  And I think the fact "its worked like this for x period of time" alone is reason enough to for IS to do a deep dive on the mode and see if it can work better imo.

 

And my point is the player feeling is actually hugely important. Make a mode feel like it has issues for any amount of people and less people engage in said mode.  Maybe people like me who have issues with the mode would be more tolerant of the flaws (which again I am not saying is possible to remove entirely) if there were other stuff in place to make it feel better. When said mode is supposed to be a community wide event and you are actively making people not want to do it is not good. You want more people to participate not less and I promise you that the way its set up has turned off people. Not just this year either as their have been complaints about it literally every single year. 

 

I am having a tough time explaining how I feel about this in words mainly because I feel its not easy to explain how I feel. To give it my best effort though its the type of situation that I feel falls under conflicting valid points I think is the closest description I can give. Or maybe in other cases simply we don't put the same weight behind separate factors.  Its the type of thing where I think points are simultaneously working for and against both sides no matter who makes them.  While I don't agree fully or see eye to eye on these thing its the type of situation where I think were points can be simultaneously true.  Maybe our overall stances don't match like the fact I am not convinced the multiplier system is without shenanigans built in but I see that the reasons we are using can be reworked/reframed for both sides if I am honest. 

 

 

IS keeps an eye on player participation. I assume they've found that the current VG system is a big improvement compared to earlier versions and that they've gotten participation to a point that they're happy with.

Edit: Looks like Fomortiis and Veronica are getting the final multipliers.

Edited March 5, 2023 by Othin

[Midnox]

Just leaving these here
 

 

Edited March 5, 2023 by Midnox