I was under the impression the highest players were like 2000 or so but I never actually checked top-ranking player stats.  My god, it would take so many 1v1 wins to get to 2.5k.

berickf wrote:

1000 does not mean that a player is necessarily a "noob", only in-as-much as they are new to the site.  They can be expert risk players, however.  It's just the starting point in the ranking system.  So, to put such a score in context one would need to know how many games are built into settling on that ranking. 

Very good point - additionally a global ranking can fluctuate quite dramatically. Mine has been as high as 2100 and as low as 1200, so I suppose you could cherry pick a mediocre player when they are peaking out, but that would entail a lot of research. 

As well, you have to consider a history too...  I signed up, lost a boat load of games, managed to get my score as low as 700 or so.... Then I learned how to play and It took the better part of a year to get it back into a respectable range. 

One could easily be fooled by my score. 

Minimal wrote:

 I was under the impression the highest players were like 2000 or so but I never actually checked top-ranking player stats.  My god, it would take so many 1v1 wins to get to 2.5k.

Actually, the highest ranked players are 3k+!

1		Luieuil	3505
2		falker1976	3424
3		Toto	3354
4		Conan	3214
5		BlackDog	3197
6		berickf	3064
7		RECON	2962
8		Hugh	2925
9		Harry Chest	2876
10		Andernut	2846

Minimal wrote:

 I was under the impression the highest players were like 2000 or so but I never actually checked top-ranking player stats.  My god, it would take so many 1v1 wins to get to 2.5k.

My opinion. Risk is a fair at best 1v1 game.  The standard board is probably best played by 4-5 players.  most boards on this site play well in the 4-8 player range. There are very few good to excellent 1v1 offerings.  I've said this before on other threads, but as a designer, I find it very challenging if not impossible to make decent 1v1 scenarios for otherwise standard playing boards. 

What are some better 1v1 boards?

Minimal wrote:

What are some better 1v1 boards?

What are you after?  Boards like Risk, or boards that are purely deterministic?  Designed for 1v1 or those that just play well as 1v1?  SimulGear or Standard?

Spy vs. Spy and Antastic are really popular for duels.  Battle for Waterloo is great one that doesn't rely heavy on the dice.  Hex of course is the game of hex and Ninja ball is a good change of pace. 

I personally like Gunslinger or Hockey although they both come off like simple games of chance after a while. (imo)

Battle for Waterloo, Spy vs. Spy, Gunslinger, and Invention have been my favorites.

And Lego Factory Battle

Go-Geared and Battle of Waterloo are my 1v1 designs - but they are very un-Risklike.

Battle of Waterloo relies on dice - but a skilled player can dominate.  Terrain and position weigh heavily on battle outcomes, and the victory conditions are tactical, not quantitative.

Go-Geared is about as non-Risklike as it can get.  The pure game with 0-sided dice is purely deterministic (as far as the game mechanics are concerned), but the 8-sided dice version is adds an element of luck that changes strategic considerations in a subtle yet dynamic way. 0-sided is the way to learn to develop sound playing skills.

If you wish to learn either but don't want your rankings affected, feel free to invite me to a private game.. 

Minimal wrote: The rating system used here seems very flawed. Systems like Glicko and ELO change the point adjustments considerably depending on each player's rating. Under ELO an expert playing a novice can expect +1-2 for a win and something like -20 (or much more) for a loss. On this site even with the largest rating disparity going into the game the adjustment is only about half. For this to be accurate a 1000 should have about a 25% chance to beat a 2000 which I find extremely hard to believe. I think the smartest strategy to climb in rating on this site is just to play only noobs for this reason.

@Recon They must have played really large games. In fact it might just be "lottery" winners.

This is brought up every so often. Glicko is often advocated because the reliability of a rating is part of the calculation. And it is well-known and well-tested in many arenas. It achieves stability very fast and encourages strong players to play each other. (Indeed, especially on new boards, you should play the weak players to optimize your ranking here!!) The last time this was brought up, at least for testing and presenting differences between systems, tom indicated that it would be difficult to get us game data to play around with.

And truthfully, I think using high-powered ranking algorithms only makes sense at the level of individual boards. Some of our metrics, such as global ranking, attempt to measure skill across boards. This task appears impossible to me in the sense that such a ranking is always optimized by playing the board you are best at, always choosing the optimal number of players from the point of view of ranking.

I sometimes create 'duel' scenarios for my boards which attempt to remove the 1st mover advantage that makes 1v1 games on  most boards so biased.  Simple World & Lizard Tesselations both have them:

• http://www.wargear.net/boards/view/Simple+World
• http://www.wargear.net/boards/view/Lizard+Tesselations

Ozyman wrote:

I sometimes create 'duel' scenarios for my boards which attempt to remove the 1st mover advantage..

This should really be the standard.  There's no reason not to compensate those who move last when you can so easily do so in Risk by just giving them an extra army or two. 

Minimal wrote:

Ozyman wrote:

I sometimes create 'duel' scenarios for my boards which attempt to remove the 1st mover advantage..

This should really be the standard.  There's no reason not to compensate those who move last when you can so easily do so in Risk by just giving them an extra army or two. 

The paradigm I use is to give the first player "less" armies.  Depending on how much I perceive the advantage to be, I give them nothing - so all they have is a fortify or attack with nothing in hand.  Waterloo is an example of this.

M57 wrote:

Battle of Waterloo relies on dice - but a skilled player can dominate.  Terrain and position weigh heavily on battle outcomes, and the victory conditions are tactical, not quantitative.

*ahem*

I disagree.  With the dice I've had on that board, anyone would have trouble.  (I think that I didn't manage better than -10 in that whole tournament...)

btilly wrote:

M57 wrote:

Battle of Waterloo relies on dice - but a skilled player can dominate.  Terrain and position weigh heavily on battle outcomes, and the victory conditions are tactical, not quantitative.

*ahem*

I disagree.  With the dice I've had on that board, anyone would have trouble.  (I think that I didn't manage better than -10 in that whole tournament...)

*ahem*

..unless your name is btilly and you roll silly stupid dice.

...or your name is Thingol and you roll silly stupid dice...

Going back a ways - the "noob hands someone else the win" situation is one you have to build into your strategy.  If you've reached a point that a single turn can make or break the game for someone, you're at least a few turns in. You should have a sense by then of who's a noob and who's not. 

Managing this situation is a part of the game.  Some players I'll attack preemptively, some players I'll deter with more defenses than makes mathematical sense.  Sometimes I'll intentionally leave neutrals as a buffer.  Some players I will only attack if I'm sure I can finish them off - because I know they'll go crazy and attack only me.  Sometimes I'll leave a continent incomplete (to make the noob feel like I'm stupid or nonthreatening).  Sometimes I'll go to great lengths to eliminate someone who is just plain unpredictable.

All the best players manage the players as well as the map and the math.  No, it doesn't always work, but it is definitely not luck.  It's paying attention. 

There are four places I can think of that are legitimate luck:

1. Turn order.  Often first move has an advantage.  Some boards (or game sizes) later moves have an advantage.

2. Randomly assigned territories.  (including neutral distribution)  In Wargear Warfare 1v1, this is huge.

3. Which cards you get.  AAA or AAB can make a difference.  Neither player controls it.

4. Dice rolls - with caveat: if you're attacking a lot with two dice or (gasp) with one, you are intentionally submitting yourself to worse odds.  No sympathy for people who lose this way and blame luck.

Everything else is skill - yours or your opponents.  Defining opponents moves as luck means you're not learning from what they're doing, and that's a big, big mistake.

I very rarely lose because of luck.  I very often get beat by someone more skilled than I am.

Nice post BT