Implementing ARS in RF season 3

A very minor detail, which I expect has been discussed previously, but the trait ranges as documented on the wiki are unbalanced:

The low-rare range contains 8 values, the high-rare range 7 values.
The low-uncommon range contains 15 values, the high-uncommon range 16 values.

To be symmetrical, the boundary between high uncommon/rare should probably have been 89/90 (like it is between uncommon/rare eye shapes), instead of 90/91. But the main website matches the ranges on the wiki, e.g showing “ENERGETIC (90)” and “HYPER (91)”.

Now if ARS is going to make trait ranges important (is it for the first time?), it might be nice to get an official confirmation of whether these existing ranges or a corrected set would be used in the calculation. E.g. for people making decisions on investments or spending spirit points.

10 Likes

I’m personally in favor of implementing ARS as first introduced in the wiki and therefore considering the gotchi’s naked rarity score. Wearables already play a very big role on BRS score. Taking them into account also for ARS would dilute any benefits of having “unique” gotchis, therefore leading to a very similar ranking to the current one.

Regarding the introduction of a new godlike cathegory, I see it as a good idea, specially after the introduction of the aging proposal. If wearables are disregarded for checking the trait range, I would prefer to start the godlike cathegory directly below 0 or above 99.

One thing to be addressed soon along with this proposal is the addition of a reset functionality mentioned by @coderdan on Discord, even if it implies certain cost for the user. If we could confirm soon that this will be a future option, that will help to spend spirit points for this rarity farming season without the fear of making a wrong decision.

13 Likes

I like the idea of adding in Godlike traits as a part of a package deal with ARS scores, there should be a benefit to Gotchis who dedicate their skill points to pursuing extremely negative or extremely positive traits.

On the subject of using MRS or BRS only with an ARS scoring system, I agree that wearables should be included. No doubt it will steepen the learning curve, but the upside to that is players who have lower BRS Gotchis may be able to make up for that by carefully choosing wearables based on where their Gotchis traits fit within the different percentiles. Myself and many others are going to do our best to educate the masses on optimizing thier ARS to soften that learning curve :slight_smile:

Data will have to be collected and displayed in a way that accessible to everyone so they can make good judgments on what wearables they should be equipping ideally. Hopefully Gotchi Lending and Wearable renting becomes possible by the time we implement this as it will minimize players’ monetary exposure to selecting the best fitting wearables. Adding wearables will also promote a trading/lending economy in the long run as certain wearables become more expensive, and RF rewards increase.

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I think this is really important to clarify early on as people are actually allocating points following those ranges (as displayed by the site)

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I second what gotchinomics said above, I’m in favor aswell of implementing ARS considering only the naked rarity stats, exp, aging points should be enough to move the traits ARS wise and leave wearables for BRS

3 Likes

I also strongly agree with gotchinomics. We have diluted natural rarity by introducing the aging mechanic. ARS is an opportunity to celebrate and give value to unique gotchis. We will also incentivize engagement and earning XP in the gotchiverse by rewarding godlike traits earned by obtaining three levels. I really hope we can pass the ARS vote and that we DO NOT include wearables in the ARS calculation.

5 Likes

I am strongly in favor of INcluding wearables.

By using naked score we close a lot of doors. Consider two workflows for someone trying to get onto the leaderboard.

  1. Buy a portal. If gotchis don’t have naked myth stats, repeat.

  2. Buy a portal. If a Gotchi has a couple rare stats, take it and look for complimentary wearables. If a Gotchi has some myth stats, take it and optimize BRS with wearables. If no gotchis have stats close to rare or myth thresholds, repeat.

#2 offers a much deeper gameplay experience and feels less like a lottery. I wouldn’t be opposed to an additional tangential leaderboard (like rookie ones) for naked ARS ranking to celebrate the gotchis that are born unique.

3 Likes

agreed wearables should be a part of the ARS, especially if it helps fund rewards. Absolute rarity score should be a separate bracket from BRS, not added to it; in order to achieve fairness. Appearance data may be a way to factor collateral type into the scoring with eye shape and color.

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I fundamentally disagree with including wearables in any ARS scoring.

I think that by including wearables it detracts from the point of introducing this type of scoring in the first place. Wearables make it easy to go +- the myth stats of 1/99 and already contributes heavily to BRS calculation. I also think that it would just skew the rewards that much higher to the rarest gotchis that can afford such a stat booster, increasing ecosystem inequality.

Let the aging mechanics/XP factor into changing the stats with spirit points, but nothing else imo.

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Just as a counterpoint, that’s what could make it really interesting. If wearables are excluded, you pretty much know what ARS will be leading up to the snapshot. But if people can swap out wearables to move categories, it makes it a much more dynamic and difficult-to-optimize game.

And I think it might do just the opposite of what you say, rewarding lower BRS gotchis for being able to intelligently switch into the rarer category, and making it that much more difficult for the most expensive gotchis to maintain their leads.

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Exactly, especially since 2 rare equal 1 godlike when the bonus stats for wearables are 6,5,4,3,2,1 it also makes the extra set bonus points strategic.

1 Like

I completely agree.

#1 Wearables are already extremely overpowered compared to numericTraits (the random VRF stats of the Gotchi). Calculating ARS based on numericTraits would put a tiny bit more weight towards the Gotchi itself, compared to wearables.

#2 In the proposed calculation for FRS, BRS and ARS are added up. So by including wearable boni in the ARS calculation, wearables would end up boosting ARS and BRS at the same time.

#3 What is the purpose of ARS? Some people claim it would add this new layer of strategy to the game, so that you have to look at the ecosystem and what stats are “hot” to boost your Gotchi in the right way. If you believe this, I’d like you to think it through and give me a detailed example. Because I can’t think of one. It seems to me that any way you’d implement ARS, it would always be the best strategy to boost your most extreme stats even further. Unless you are close to 50 (in which case ARS is insignificant anyway), you can’t change which side of the bell-curve your traits are on. And due to the stats random nature, there isn’t any stat that is inherently more often extreme than other stats in a significant way (disregarding the high / low discrepancy between Haunt 1 and 2, which doesn’t matter for strategy as you can’t change which side of the bell curve you’re on in a way that would have an impact on ARS).

E.g. looking at how many Gotchis have a mythical stat in their numericTraits:

NRG Pos: 6.19%
AGG Pos: 5.75%
SPK Pos: 5.59%
BRN Pos: 6.72%
EYES Pos: 6.24%
EYEC Pos: 5.12%

NRG Neg: 3.21%
AGG Neg: 3.25%
SPK Neg: 3.49%
BRN Neg: 3.42%
EYES Neg: 3.99%
EYEC Neg: 3.39%

The maximum difference between the mythical numericTraits percentages (on the same side of the bell curve) is 1.13% (1 ARS point).

And now with wearables and set boni (withSetsNumericTraits):

NRG Pos: 7.34%
AGG Pos: 7.17%
SPK Pos: 6.32%
BRN Pos: 6.85%
EYES Pos: 6.24%
EYEC Pos: 5.12%

NRG Neg: 3.52%
AGG Neg: 3.86%
SPK Neg: 3.89%
BRN Neg: 4.04%
EYES Neg: 3.99%
EYEC Neg: 3.39%

The maximum difference between the mythical withSetsNumericTraits percentages (on the same side of the bell curve) is 1.02% (1 ARS point).

While this is not a complete analysis of the outcome, it gives a pretty good indication that implementing ARS would not result in any strategic plays, but simply boost low trait Gotchis compared to high trait Gotchis; i.e. disproportionally benefit H2 holders. Furthermore, implementing ARS with wearables would result in an even greater benefits for owners of expensive wearables.

So after writing this, I’m actually against wasting dev time on this altogether.

[EDIT:]
After some discussion in Discord and backreading the beginning of the thread, I realize that there are some more interesting proposals out there for implementing ARS. I’d guess some of those would actually result in some significant changes to the ranking. Maybe some of those proposers could do some models or examples? If an ARS proposal would actually bring about some significant change in the ranking in a reasonably fair way, it could be a good idea afterall.

4 Likes