Heya!
First off, I want to say that I _love_ the new Leagues feature. I imagine you do as well, as I can only imagine this will improve engagement in a big way. I think it's a great feature, and it's really brought out my competitive spirit, as well as my desire to get better. I can now easily have multiple goals in my chess learnings.
However (ah, there it is, the _but..._), I think there's a fatal flaw in Leagues: it rewards the most active, not necessarily best performing, players. For example, currently in my Bronze league, which started yesterday, the top place already has 621 points. This would be the equivalent of 41 won rapid games. This is something the vast majority of people simply can't compete against, as we are unlikely to have 8 hours a day to dedicate to playing.
How can this be curbed? That's a good question, and I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm thinking perhaps a maximum number of games per day should be put towards League point accumulation. The playing field needs to somehow be levelled, otherwise the most active players on the site will rise to the top, regardless of how well they're actually performing.
Thoughts?
Where's your competitive spirit? Quit your job if necessary!
/ The Bronze leaderboard already shows a bunch of people with more than 2000 points since Sunday. There were people putting up 7000 point weeks last week.
/ I made it to Bronze but I faced the same fact the other day. I concluded that I made Bronze by spending 27 hours. To get 7000 points, I would need to spend way more than 168 hours per week playing. I will gladly enjoy my retirement.
/ I actually feel sorry for the people who will make it to the top. What a gruesome task, like a galley-slave, chained to an oar, week after week, to the beat of the drum...
Heya!
First off, I want to say that I _love_ the new Leagues feature. I imagine you do as well, as I can only imagine this will improve engagement in a big way. I think it's a great feature, and it's really brought out my competitive spirit, as well as my desire to get better. I can now easily have multiple goals in my chess learnings.
However (ah, there it is, the _but..._), I think there's a fatal flaw in Leagues: it rewards the most active, not necessarily best performing, players. For example, currently in my Bronze league, which started yesterday, the top place already has 621 points. This would be the equivalent of 41 won rapid games. This is something the vast majority of people simply can't compete against, as we are unlikely to have 8 hours a day to dedicate to playing.
How can this be curbed? That's a good question, and I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm thinking perhaps a maximum number of games per day should be put towards League point accumulation. The playing field needs to somehow be levelled, otherwise the most active players on the site will rise to the top, regardless of how well they're actually performing.
Thoughts?