So I like playing competitive games online - and I thought I was pretty good. But I fell into the trap. You see King.com hides under the facade that they are skill based. Which should mean that the better you are (ie your skill) the more likely you are to win. However I began to notice that as I got better that I didn't necessarily win more games.in fact I lose more games now than whan I first started out (and foolishly keep pumping more money into the system).
The thing that frustrates me is that almost every game I lose by a very very small margin. Which leads me to believe that the idea of matching someone up against the same skill means lining up all the scores and matching you acording to who allready scored similiar to you.
I know this my sound confusing, but let me illustrate an example to make it more clear. The game I like is Magic Spinball.in reality the scores should vary quite a bit anwhere from 0 - 40,000 pts. SO any game that you score above 30,000 it quite an accomplishment. The ironic thing is no matter what I score my opponent scores very close to mine. (literraly within a hundred pts to me on a regular basis, now I'm not rocket scientist, but the odds of my opponent always beating me buy such a small margin on a consistent basis are pretty slim - which points to the fact it is designed purposefully that way)
Let's say you have 100 players and theoretically (keep in my this is an illustration not reality). Each one scores 100 pts more than the one before.
So your point total would be like 10,000 - 10,100- 10,200... 30,000 30,100, etc. Well in a "skill" base scenario your "opponent" should be chosen randomly from somone with a similar "Rank". The word "rank" is just a cover up for whoever scored closest to you for that game. SO you should be just as likely to match up against someone who scored in the 10,000 pt range as the 20,000 pt range as the 30,000 pt range.)
(Oh by the way tournaments - don't apply to this scenario - just the 2,3, or 4 player tournaments).
The said reality is that whoever scored 10,000 would be paired up against whoever scored 10,100 opposed to being selected at random against the other 99 opponents.
Just in case you haven't caught on yet where I'm going yet with all this... It's rather quite brilliant on the part of midasplayer and very frustrating to the players end. Unless you always always score the absoulte highest score your odds are the exactly the same - the outcome is determined by complete luck.
How well you are skilled (aka how high you scored that game) has no bearing that game on your results - it's all just part of system. You might as well go to vegas and play roulette because your odds of wining are not determinate of how well you played but where you just happen to be lined up. And since they always line up scores that are close you're just a likely to win by and inch as you are to lose by an inch.in other words all the best scores are matched up against the best scores, and all the low scores against the low scores.
Kind of a funny side effect is that many times you end up winning when you play horribly and you thought "for sure I'm gonna lose this one", cause no worries, you'll just be matched up against other crappy scores.
So if you are looking to win money off skill based games - I suggest either being "really, Really really" good and only play in the tournaments (but only like the top 5 % really make any money) or using a different service.
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