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Some thoughts on the ladder (with apologies to Pav)...
I was thinking that the ladder doesn't really work any more, so I was wondering what angfolk thought about these ideas.
1> There should be completely separate ladders for different variants
This seems obvious to me. Combining them makes for nonsense. It just puts Furyband at the top. I could create a variant where every character starts at clvl 101 and claim the top spot instantly. (Well, I couldn't create my own variant, but you get my point).
2> Furthermore, there should be a separate ladder for each release of Vanilla
This would serve not only to make it fairer (some V's are harder than others), but also keep things fresh and interesting by encouraging people to submit their characters. The only reason I posted my first character onto the ladder this week (only my third winner, as it happens) was because I was thinking about this post. It had never crossed my mind to do so before now, to be honest. Think how much fun it would be when 3.5 is released and there is a fresh, blank ladder to fill. It would be just like a competition!
At the moment we have 3,500 Vanilla entries all jumbled together, but separate ladders for ZceAngband, FayAngband and Frazband with 9, 8 and 1 entries respectively. (All brilliant variants, I'm sure).
This would also filter out all of the dirty and dev versions into some kind of 'other' category, which makes sense to me.
3> Characters should be sorted by fastest win (then by clevel for non-winners)
At the moment the top of the v-ladder is fixed for all eternity. Those first people who bothered to xp their characters up to 99,999,999 will stay at the top. If it were sorted by least turns for a win then the top spot, however brilliant, will always be beatable. I should add that I will never be at the top on that criterion as I play very slowly (last win 176k turns), but it would be cool to try and get a higher position on the ladder by winning faster. Yes, this will encourage people to retire the moment they kill Morgoth rather than explore levels 101-127, but isn't that kind of the idea? Get Lantern, kill Morgoth, live out the rest of your life sitting in your kitchen, wearing your Power Dragon Scale Mail, slicing rations of food with Sting and spending your million gold on fine wine from the general store and the odd hallucination mushroom from the black market?
4> I also agree with what Nick said in another thread that the default settings should be the easiest.
This would mean that if anyone wants to tinker with the birth settings it's only going to make their ladder attempt harder, not easier.
Having said that, I believe that the masochists who want to play Ironman should be recognised for their madness. Perhaps the ladder should recognise those options as a separate variant (although I doubt that's possible). Maybe it could simply be a matter of changing the version number in the savefile?
I don't know if all/any of this is possible but, more importantly, do people want this?
That's my two cents' worth, and I'd be interested to hear what people think...
I was thinking that the ladder doesn't really work any more, so I was wondering what angfolk thought about these ideas.
1> There should be completely separate ladders for different variants
This seems obvious to me. Combining them makes for nonsense. It just puts Furyband at the top. I could create a variant where every character starts at clvl 101 and claim the top spot instantly. (Well, I couldn't create my own variant, but you get my point).
2> Furthermore, there should be a separate ladder for each release of Vanilla
This would serve not only to make it fairer (some V's are harder than others), but also keep things fresh and interesting by encouraging people to submit their characters. The only reason I posted my first character onto the ladder this week (only my third winner, as it happens) was because I was thinking about this post. It had never crossed my mind to do so before now, to be honest. Think how much fun it would be when 3.5 is released and there is a fresh, blank ladder to fill. It would be just like a competition!
At the moment we have 3,500 Vanilla entries all jumbled together, but separate ladders for ZceAngband, FayAngband and Frazband with 9, 8 and 1 entries respectively. (All brilliant variants, I'm sure).
This would also filter out all of the dirty and dev versions into some kind of 'other' category, which makes sense to me.
3> Characters should be sorted by fastest win (then by clevel for non-winners)
At the moment the top of the v-ladder is fixed for all eternity. Those first people who bothered to xp their characters up to 99,999,999 will stay at the top. If it were sorted by least turns for a win then the top spot, however brilliant, will always be beatable. I should add that I will never be at the top on that criterion as I play very slowly (last win 176k turns), but it would be cool to try and get a higher position on the ladder by winning faster. Yes, this will encourage people to retire the moment they kill Morgoth rather than explore levels 101-127, but isn't that kind of the idea? Get Lantern, kill Morgoth, live out the rest of your life sitting in your kitchen, wearing your Power Dragon Scale Mail, slicing rations of food with Sting and spending your million gold on fine wine from the general store and the odd hallucination mushroom from the black market?
4> I also agree with what Nick said in another thread that the default settings should be the easiest.
This would mean that if anyone wants to tinker with the birth settings it's only going to make their ladder attempt harder, not easier.
Having said that, I believe that the masochists who want to play Ironman should be recognised for their madness. Perhaps the ladder should recognise those options as a separate variant (although I doubt that's possible). Maybe it could simply be a matter of changing the version number in the savefile?
I don't know if all/any of this is possible but, more importantly, do people want this?
That's my two cents' worth, and I'd be interested to hear what people think...
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