BrettspielWelt

I know that Elo's system only works for 2 player games, but there are ways to extend it to several player games. I was wondering if there would be interest in implementing Elo style ratings for the three and more player games.

hi Nicias,

here (http://www.brettspielwelt.de/Forum/index.php/topic,37711.msg290090.html#msg290090) there was a short discussion about ELO for more-player games.

I try to translate the main things:

Somebody asked, if there is a possibility to implement an ELO-valuation for Tichu.

Answer: There is too much danger because with more-player games it depends too much on the opponent-choice and this is not desired.

Mokkel

Do you meant that your rating would depend on who you play against? Of course, but so does your percentage, and BSW shows us that.

Or are you referring specifically to team games, where someone could advance mostly by having good partners?

I see the second point, and why a rating system might not work well for team games. However, I was still think it would be worthwhile for 3 and more player games without teams.

Hi Nicias,

there have been a few discussions, most without a result, about this topic in the past. Still, there was a kind of "general agreement" that the best way for a multi player ELO would be to judge a game as a umber of 2-player-games. So far so good. But the creators of this page unfortunately have some objections to Multi-ELO in general. A few of the larger issues:

- It may be easier to win against two decent opponents as opposed to beating two weak opponents, who may randomize the game for other players in a way that strength becomes less of an issue. This would lead to players shunning matches against a number of weak opponents, where there would be high risk and little reward. TAMM does not want to encourage choosing opponents based on ELO at all - for precisely this reason, the original ELO system led a very inofficial life.

- Playing strategy in an ELO rated game may easily differ to the strategy in a non rated match due to the rating. Especially in the later stages it would be possible, that players who would otherwise take that long shot against the odds for winning, will now settle for 2nd and at least "take some ELO" or similar situation. ELO should not change the strategy of a game, since not only one opponent is involved, but sometimes also others who do not have any stakes in the actual decision, thus lose control over what happens to their ELOs.

Personally I would still love to see it implemented. TAMM knows, that some of us do, but I am afraid, it will not happen too soon :)

Terveisiä, Ulkomaalainen

I see what you mean with all these issues. What I don't understand is this: These issues would be the same if you replaced "Elo" with "Percentages" and yet, percentages are freely shown. For some things, such as going for the tie, percentages are worse, since the percentage will give both players full credit, where Elo style ratings would make them split the points somehow.