What can Splatoon do to break Splatoon's problem with Splatfest in America?

[Award]

The core of the matter is the six extra Super Sea Snails. It's why I advocate removing that incentive, giving an equal amount to both teams at the end based on their rank. Either that, or provide bonus Super Sea Snails for reaching King or Queen and continuing to provide more for each victory accomplished after that (like, say, 1 Super Sea Snail for every three wins past King or Queen).

You can't remove incentive to win and make "everyone's an equal winner" That would be a terrible contest. You already get a participation prize....being given the SAME prize as the victor makes it not much of a contest. Why not give everyone in the league their own Heisman Trophy? o_O

Basing it on rank would be awful too. My rank fluctuates, wildly, these days, between B+ and A+ - I'd hate to be stuck having to make SURE to climb back up every time there's a splatfest!

But I do like the idea of continuing to provide more snails if you keep playing past royalty. Not only would that make my extended play on Splatfest days more fun, but it would encourage more players to keep playing past their snail allotment.

With the Pokémon one though, Charizard is an icon that's appealed to kids of multiple generations AND is fondly remembered by older gamers; so Charizard gets the edge over Blastoise and Venusaur in both the younger and older age ranges. Then again, that might explain the pretty high popularity across all three regions, albeit less pronounced in North America. It might be there are enough people deliberately picking Blue in North America, however, to cause the numbers to be more even in popularity, but it doesn't explain how Team Red in Japan got such a trouncing in the matches themselves.

I think part of it is "Team Read" in both was the mainstream version. The one everyone bought when it was popular. So the "counter-culture" version appeared to the "real gamers" who want to set themselves apart in a hipster sort of way. Similarly the "better gamers" would favor blue/green again here.

As for the card tables, it's definitely full of energy. I think it's the human element. There has to be a dealer there, and if the dealer is enthusiastic, so will the guests.

Splatoon is definitely more like the card tables than the machines. It's energetic, rage inducing fun for the whole family!

The reason In-N-Out is west coast only is because they have a company policy of never freezing their beef, and they mean never bringing it below the freezing point of water, not the government rule of slightly below freezing. Since they get all their beef from the San Joaquin Valley, In-N-Out Burgers, with a few exceptions, are restricted to as far as their trucks can carry the beef before it spoils. By the way, it's worth taking a read on the family that owns In-N-Out: There are enough suspicious deaths to rival the Kennedys. At this point, everyone with the family name has died, and for about a year, a high school age girl was the CEO because of the rule that it must be run by a member of that family. She was the only living member left.

As for McDonald's, they're not really a mall chain around here. They're a staple of the suburbs. I have not seen any McDonald's location close down in the past six years, but then again, I haven't seen a new one open for longer than that. There are four locations within 5 miles of where I live. As for Chick-Fil-A, it originated in the southeast quadrant of the country, and California is one of the most distance places. There are a few here and there, but not a lot, probably because, like Five Guys, they only recently got here. Them being closed on Sundays seems to really hurt them.

SCARY about the In-N-Out family....apparently the name is apt!

The mall locations have closed. The stand alone locations are MOSTLY still open though they plan to close a good number nationally I believe. But they're far and few between, mostly on major highways and such. I have a semi-local McDonald's but it's a pain to get to. The others I'd have to go some distance. THANKFULLY BK is closer :) Though McD's is still more common than Wendys. Which is a shame.

It always drives me crazy with Chick-Fil-A being closed on Sundays, and YET I'm glad to see one store left that does it. I still remember a time when *ALL* stores were closed on Sundays, and later were closed by noon. The malls were all closed as well.

In East Asia? No, I said that they go for McDonald's because it's the only hamburger place they care about. Kind of like how Panda Express is the only Chinese food place most Americans care about. (It is Americanized but authentically Chinese. The founders and the chefs all immigrated from China.) Burger King tried to open up there but everyone just cared about McDonald's. Kind of like how Dunkin' Donuts (which only started appearing in southern California two years ago) and Krispy Kreme tried to set up there, but everyone stuck to visiting Mister Donut. There is literally the market for only one hamburger chain there.

Interesting, I can't imagine Panda Express (and I've heard of PF Changs as well) bing "the only Chinese food place" people care about. I did say we have a robust Chinese food scene here, and apparently it's better than I thought. I have 3 in sort-of-if-I-had-to walking distance from home (with plenty more outside that radius. None of them chains, all of them mom&pop, right from China or Taiwan, with Chefs all trained in culinary schools in China, Taiwan, or, back in the day, British controlled Hong Kong. One can argue if it's "American-Chinese" based on the dishes, though I still consider that a red herring. It's like arguing if Cantonese or Szeschuan is more authentic. It's dishes Chinese chefs concocted with whats available in their given region same as any other. Drives me crazy when they hire American help for the register....wait...you understand what I'm ordering? How do I know you'll get my order right then? :D


Mr. Donut STILL EXISTS?! We had a Mr. Donut around here back in the 80's. It became another Dunkin back then, too, and that was the last I ever saw one. I thought they were all gone.

I heard Krispy Kreme has been facing financial difficulties too and has been closing stores. The Los Angeles area seems to be the exception. The Krispy Kremes here are franchised by a third party company, which seems to be running them competently enough to not only not close any of them down, but have been opening new locations.

They tried exploding too far too fast about 10 years ago. Then they stepped back and started vending through convenience stores (which is never the same with old stale donuts.) I think they overextended and really hurt themselves. Worse Dunkin became a coffee chain that happens to have donuts. McD's hurt themselves trying to join that fight as well.

 

[DavAndrus]

Let me offer another angle to this discussion. Some people are talking like every good player is in a secret pact to join the less popular team, while this could be a factor I don't think it's the biggest. I don't need to tell you guys that some Splatoon players have connection issues. Well the more people on a side the better the chances that more of them will have connection issues. I made a graphic to show a scenario that results in an advantage for the less popular team.



I'm no mathematician so I don't know how something like this would average out over a thousand games with the laggers being distributed in different ways but I do know that we all find ourselves in 3v4s or 4v3s especially during Splatfest. I would also note that North America, especially the United States, has a worse Internet infrastructure compared to Japan and Europe so it could affect NA more then any other region.

If what I'm theorizing is true then there could be little that Nintendo could do to make the more popular team better AND with all of this said we should not forget the REAL problem with Splatfest. The real problem is that Splatfest is the only effective way to farm slots and rerolls. 30k is too much compared to what you earn in other modes and it makes the prizes for winning far to valuable. Splatfests should be fun not mandatory to for anyone that doesn't want to savescum their rolls.

 

[No-Intro-Needed]

I'm just gonna chime in and say that for some reason, I kinda think that it might be best to remove Splatfests in the sequel Splatoon (if there ever will be one). I just don't really seem to enjoy Splatfests as much as I would have originally. It is a nice concept on paper, but I feel like I just play it to grind for rewards. It gets boring after having to play 2-4 hours of Splatfest for 18-24 Super Sea Snails. That's just my opinion.

 

[Award]

I'm just gonna chime in and say that for some reason, I kinda think that it might be best to remove Splatfests in the sequel Splatoon (if there ever will be one). I just don't really seem to enjoy Splatfests as much as I would have originally. It is a nice concept on paper, but I feel like I just play it to grind for rewards. It gets boring after having to play 2-4 hours of Splatfest for 18-24 Super Sea Snails. That's just my opinion.

I love splatfests. I think its fun and I happen to like TW. The best part is if you get a fun team it's like an impromptu squad. Rather than being shuffled you get to keep playing with them and you learn a sort of team strategy and ping booyahs at each other etc.

What I think is wrong about it is that it's the only viable way to gain an important ingame currency. I agree 30k is way too much to buy snails. Keep Splatfests, keep rewards, but don't make it mandatory for in game currency.

 

[DavAndrus]

I think Splatfest would have been better as a week long event rather then one day, where Turf War is in Splatfest mode and you still have the option to play ranked. That way people could easily find the time to get to obtain royalty and people that have plans on Saturday aren't screwed.

 

[MrL1193]

Let me offer another angle to this discussion. Some people are talking like every good player is in a secret pact to join the less popular team, while this could be a factor I don't think it's the biggest. I don't need to tell you guys that some Splatoon players have connection issues. Well the more people on a side the better the chances that more of them will have connection issues. I made a graphic to show a scenario that results in an advantage for the less popular team.

View attachment 2830

I'm no mathematician so I don't know how something like this would average out over a thousand games with the laggers being distributed in different ways but I do know that we all find ourselves in 3v4s or 4v3s especially during Splatfest. I would also note that North America, especially the United States, has a worse Internet infrastructure compared to Japan and Europe so it could affect NA more then any other region.

If what I'm theorizing is true then there could be little that Nintendo could do to make the more popular team better AND with all of this said we should not forget the REAL problem with Splatfest. The real problem is that Splatfest is the only effective way to farm slots and rerolls. 30k is too much compared to what you earn in other modes and it makes the prizes for winning far to valuable. Splatfests should be fun not mandatory to for anyone that doesn't want to savescum their rolls.

That logic doesn't hold up because it assumes that all the laggy players on the more popular team will end up playing against the less popular team. In reality, however, they will actually spend some time playing mirror matches (in other words, getting placed in those bottom boxes, where they don't get to play against the other team), and mirror matches don't affect the win percentage.

I've gone over this point with people numerous times in the past. There's always someone who tries to argue that the popularity difference creates an inherent advantage for one team (be it because of the distribution of skilled players or the distribution of laggy players), but that's simply not true. In every case, the fact that, at any given time, part of the more popular team will be stuck playing mirror matches balances it all out.

Bottom Line: If both teams have equal percentages of skilled/unskilled players and laggy/non-laggy players, there is no inherent advantage for either side.

 

[Vitezen]

That logic doesn't hold up because it assumes that all the laggy players on the more popular team will end up playing against the less popular team. In reality, however, they will actually spend some time playing mirror matches (in other words, getting placed in those bottom boxes, where they don't get to play against the other team), and mirror matches don't affect the win percentage.

I've gone over this point with people numerous times in the past. There's always someone who tries to argue that the popularity difference creates an inherent advantage for one team (be it because of the distribution of skilled players or the distribution of laggy players), but that's simply not true. In every case, the fact that, at any given time, part of the more popular team will be stuck playing mirror matches balances it all out.

Bottom Line: If both teams have equal percentages of skilled/unskilled players and laggy/non-laggy players, there is no inherent advantage for either side.

The fact that there are mirror matches is a factor in why the more popular team loses, I believe. Some portion of the players will only play Splatfests until they reach the top rank, then stop playing. This is a problem for the team with more players, because that team will be playing more mirror matches.

What will end up happening is that players who are good at the game, but will only play to top rank, will play tons of mirror matches that don't actually help their team win, then log out. This means that in the long-term, for both teams, most games will be played by the worst members of their team as they struggle to reach top rank. However, the popular team will have even less wins in non-mirror matches, because once those top players max their rank, they will stop playing. On the less popular team, every player will play against the enemy team much more often. This means that the skilled players that want to stop once they reach max rank will be getting their wins necessary where they count, instead of in mirror matches. I'm not claiming that there is an association between stopping and skill, but only examining from the law of averages.

In short, on average, the top players on the popular team will play less matches against the opposing team then their skilled counterparts on the less popular team, leading to less wins overall.

 

[Flareth]

I wonder what would change if teams weren't allowed to fight themselves...

 

[MrL1193]

The fact that there are mirror matches is a factor in why the more popular team loses, I believe. Some portion of the players will only play Splatfests until they reach the top rank, then stop playing. This is a problem for the team with more players, because that team will be playing more mirror matches.

What will end up happening is that players who are good at the game, but will only play to top rank, will play tons of mirror matches that don't actually help their team win, then log out. This means that in the long-term, for both teams, most games will be played by the worst members of their team as they struggle to reach top rank. However, the popular team will have even less wins in non-mirror matches, because once those top players max their rank, they will stop playing. On the less popular team, every player will play against the enemy team much more often. This means that the skilled players that want to stop once they reach max rank will be getting their wins necessary where they count, instead of in mirror matches. I'm not claiming that there is an association between stopping and skill, but only examining from the law of averages.

In short, on average, the top players on the popular team will play less matches against the opposing team then their skilled counterparts on the less popular team, leading to less wins overall.

Again, your entire argument is one that I've already had to shoot down multiple times in the past. I'm not going to go hunting for the exact post right now, but I did in fact map it all out with numbers at one point specifically to prove that mirror matches don't make a difference. (And yet people STILL don't seem to get it... How many times must I repeat myself?)

The reason your argument is wrong is that it incorrectly assumes that only the skilled players on the more popular team will get stuck playing mirror matches. In reality, unskilled players will also have to play some mirror matches (more, in fact, if we assume that they take longer to get to their desired rank), and whenever they do, that prevents them from dragging their team's win percentage down. (Conversely, the unskilled players on the less popular team will play all their matches against the opposing team and thus will be dragging their team down full-time.) This perfectly balances out the effect of the skilled players being caught in mirror matches, resulting in no net change to the win percentages.

I wonder what would change if teams weren't allowed to fight themselves...

That's exactly how it was during the very first Splatfest, over in Japan. The only effect it had was that it severely annoyed people on the more popular team, who couldn't find opponents and had a harder time reaching the top rank. There is absolutely no benefit to going back to that system.

 

[Flareth]

Gotcha.

Pardon me, I'm probably mistaken (and I might sound aggressive, I'm not trying to be), but it's how it looks to me: you don't think that a team will lose solely because it's more popular. You don't agree with the notion that better players will choose the less popular team to get more Sea Snails.

What, then, do you feel is the issue with Splatfests? Or do you not think there's an issue to begin with?

 

[MrL1193]

you don't think that a team will lose solely because it's more popular.

Correct. Statistically, there is no inherent advantage for either team with regard to how easily they will win their matches against the other team.

You don't agree with the notion that better players will choose the less popular team to get more Sea Snails.

Oh, I know they've done it before. Sometimes. Mostly here in America, though it seems the European and Japanese players may be starting to follow suit. But just reducing the win multiplier won't solve the problem.

What, then, do you feel is the issue with Splatfests? Or do you not think there's an issue to begin with?

The problem is that there's a sizable incentive to try to side with the winning team--an incentive worth 180,000 coins, to be precise. Even if you're S+, you'd need to win upwards of 30 ranked matches to make that kind of money. (And before you mention save scumming, let me remind you that you still need a sizable chunk of change if you want to scum your gear into shape in a timely manner.) It's no surprise, then, that people will set aside any personal preferences if they think they know which team is going to win.

If you really want to stop people from trying to stack one team with all the best players, just de-incentivize it. Make it so that Kings/Queens on both teams either win the same number of Super Sea Snails or are separated by only a small number. (For instance, you could give the winning Kings/Queens 25 snails and the losing Kings/Queens 24.) That would be by far the best way to get people to pick the teams they actually like.

 

[Flareth]

Hmm... on the one hand, I'm not keen on making everyone a winner in a competition... on the other hand, I could see even 2-3 extra snails being enough of an incentive to try and game the system... perhaps I'm being too cynical.

Maybe it wouldn't be as much of an issue if the cost of rerolling stuff wasn't so high. I'd be fine with lowering that to... oh, I dunno, is 5K too cheap?

 

[Vitezen]

Again, your entire argument is one that I've already had to shoot down multiple times in the past. I'm not going to go hunting for the exact post right now, but I did in fact map it all out with numbers at one point specifically to prove that mirror matches don't make a difference. (And yet people STILL don't seem to get it... How many times must I repeat myself?)

The reason your argument is wrong is that it incorrectly assumes that only the skilled players on the more popular team will get stuck playing mirror matches. In reality, unskilled players will also have to play some mirror matches (more, in fact, if we assume that they take longer to get to their desired rank), and whenever they do, that prevents them from dragging their team's win percentage down. (Conversely, the unskilled players on the less popular team will play all their matches against the opposing team and thus will be dragging their team down full-time.) This perfectly balances out the effect of the skilled players being caught in mirror matches, resulting in no net change to the win percentages.


That's exactly how it was during the very first Splatfest, over in Japan. The only effect it had was that it severely annoyed people on the more popular team, who couldn't find opponents and had a harder time reaching the top rank. There is absolutely no benefit to going back to that system.

That is false, I did not say anything about the proportion of mirror matches having anything to do with skill. The only factor that influences the frequency of mirror matches is the number of players on each team.

You also cannot prove that players on the less popular team will only play against the opposing team, as it is false.

 

[MrL1193]

That is false, I did not say anything about the proportion of mirror matches having anything to do with skill. The only factor that influences the frequency of mirror matches is the number of players on each team.

And where, pray tell, did I say anything about the frequency of mirror matches with relation to skill? You summed up your argument thusly:

In short, on average, the top players on the popular team will play less matches against the opposing team then their skilled counterparts on the less popular team, leading to less wins overall.

And simply put, that conclusion (that the less popular team wins more due to the matchmaking) is wrong, for the reasons I've already stated. You failed to take into account the fact that the bottom players on the popular team will also play fewer matches against the opposing team than their unskilled counterparts on the less popular team, which balances things out.

I said I wasn't going to look up my old analysis post, but since you now seem to be trying to deflect attention from your original argument, I did go find it. Here you go:

Next US Splatfest: Pirates VS Ninjas

 

[Litagano Motscoud]

Holy ****ing ****, you guys sure do type a lot.

Nothing wrong with that, it's just...wow.

 

[Award]

Again, your entire argument is one that I've already had to shoot down multiple times in the past. I'm not going to go hunting for the exact post right now, but I did in fact map it all out with numbers at one point specifically to prove that mirror matches don't make a difference. (And yet people STILL don't seem to get it... How many times must I repeat myself?)

The reason your argument is wrong is that it incorrectly assumes that only the skilled players on the more popular team will get stuck playing mirror matches. In reality, unskilled players will also have to play some mirror matches (more, in fact, if we assume that they take longer to get to their desired rank), and whenever they do, that prevents them from dragging their team's win percentage down. (Conversely, the unskilled players on the less popular team will play all their matches against the opposing team and thus will be dragging their team down full-time.) This perfectly balances out the effect of the skilled players being caught in mirror matches, resulting in no net change to the win percentages.


That's exactly how it was during the very first Splatfest, over in Japan. The only effect it had was that it severely annoyed people on the more popular team, who couldn't find opponents and had a harder time reaching the top rank. There is absolutely no benefit to going back to that system.

@Vitezen has a solid point here. One factor with mirror matches is, the skilled or "serious" (I.E. players that play ranked primarly and play Splatfest only to grind for snails for their ranked builds, which represents a majority of the skilled player pool) are the ones most likely to drop out after they hit royalty. The lower skill players are representative of a group that generally loves TW, and is eager to play in the festive atmosphere of Splatfest because it's something different. These are players that for the most part do not relish every moment of ranked they can get and don't get any shield popping related memes. So if you take two groups of players, we'll call one "S" and one "C" and give them each 15 mirror matches, the "S" group will play those matches then leave shortly after once they get their royalty. The "C" group will keep playing. Allll day. Into many non-mirror matches.

I happen to love TW and Splatfest, so I'm in the minority of the skilled player group that still plays Splatfest all day. HOWEVER, After royalty I'm also apt to mess around with weapons I'm less experienced with for fun, and therefore less apt to play super tryhard win win win.

So there's merit to that thinking. Even if both groups of players get the same number of mirrors, the mirror matches will be a greater percentage of the skilled group's total matches played than the unskilled group's, which is a bigger liability for the popular team.

 

[ShinyGirafarig]

@Vitezen has a solid point here. One factor with mirror matches is, the skilled or "serious" (I.E. players that play ranked primarly and play Splatfest only to grind for snails for their ranked builds, which represents a majority of the skilled player pool) are the ones most likely to drop out after they hit royalty. The lower skill players are representative of a group that generally loves TW, and is eager to play in the festive atmosphere of Splatfest because it's something different. These are players that for the most part do not relish every moment of ranked they can get and don't get any shield popping related memes. So if you take two groups of players, we'll call one "S" and one "C" and give them each 15 mirror matches, the "S" group will play those matches then leave shortly after once they get their royalty. The "C" group will keep playing. Allll day. Into many non-mirror matches.

I happen to love TW and Splatfest, so I'm in the minority of the skilled player group that still plays Splatfest all day. HOWEVER, After royalty I'm also apt to mess around with weapons I'm less experienced with for fun, and therefore less apt to play super tryhard win win win.

So there's merit to that thinking. Even if both groups of players get the same number of mirrors, the mirror matches will be a greater percentage of the skilled group's total matches played than the unskilled group's, which is a bigger liability for the popular team.

On the flip side, say the less popular team has skilled players who get tired of playing any more matches and quit after royalty rank. The less skilled players get left behind and since they are less likely to play mirror matches, they may hurt the score.

 

[Vitezen]

@MrL1193 I've read and understand your model, but I've noticed that it's neglecting why people will stop playing. It simply assumes that every team will play an average of 30 matches, but doesn't address any variation, or why it will occur.

My point is that variation in the number of matches played is a HUGE factor in the discrepancy of wins at the end of Splatfest, and that variation is closely tied to the skill of the players.

What's important is that whether you're playing a mirror, or a match that counts, you still get the same number of points for winning. And once you realize that many people will only play until they reach max rank, that's where the number of matches played, mirror or not, counts.

Let's assume that it takes 100 points to reach max level. You get 1 point for losing, 10 for winning. And let's assume that there are bad players, and good players, evenly split on each team. Good players always win against bad players, and win half the time against good players. Bad players always lose to good players, and will win half the time against other bad players. If we take this to be true, it means that good players will win 75% of their matches, and bad players 25%. That means that good players will play, on average, about 13 matches before stopping, and bad players 31 matches.

Now let's take mirror matches into account. Let's assume that the more popular team will face a mirror match 25% of the time, and the less popular team only 10%. With these numbers, you can see that out of those 13 and 31 matches, on the more popular team, 4/13 matches will be mirrors for the good, and 8/31 for the bad. In turn, on the less popular team, you have 2/13, and 4/31.

Now you can see the issue. On the less popular team, good players will be playing about 11 matches against the enemy team, and bad players 27. But on the more popular team, you have 9 matches for the good players, and 23 for the bad. Even though the more popular team will still have less bad players playing against the other team due to mirrors, 71.875% of their matches versus the less popular team will be played by bad players, compared to the 71.053% of the less popular team. This difference is what explains the discrepancy due to team popularity. And keep in mind that these mirror match percentages of 10/25 are just an estimate.

 

[Award]

On the flip side, say the less popular team has skilled players who get tired of playing any more matches and quit after royalty rank. The less skilled players get left behind and since they are less likely to play mirror matches, they may hurt the score.

True, though that might be an argument in favor of the x6 multiplier. Popularity is only an "advantage" if the majority of skilled players are not on it or are playing little.

But in theory the skilled players would reach royalty playing the other team exclusively when on the less popular team. If we assume a "perfect" outcome of equal numbers of skilled players on both teams, and if we assume that they will all quit after reaching royalty, the ones on the popular team will play more mirror matches, meaning the skilled players on the less popular team played more matches that counted.

Of course that's all theory. And the good players on the team with fewer bad players will probably play more (further unbalancing it) since it won't be as frustrating. Which would be an argument against x6.


@Vitezen That description is a good argument for @Zombie Aladdin s idea of offering additional snails for every x # of points after royalty. It gives VERY solid incentive for the good players to keep playing well past royalty to accrue more $30,000 snails from "easy wins."

 

[talkingbeatles]

I thought Red v Blue made for a pretty contentious Splatfest...

I like the idea of getting rare, maybe randomized items for Splatfest rewards in a Splatoon sequel.