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Using sc2ranks.com we can see the points accumulated by each player.

Are the points of a player comparable to players in other leagues?

If not, why not and what happens to a players points upon demotion/promotion?

Is there a better way to compare players ( other than just playing each other )?

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1 Answer

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Ive played through a couple promotions and it seems like points are maintained across promotions.

I know this wasn't always true, but it was on nov 17 (last promotion I had).

That said there is no good way to compare players who haven't faced off... Period.

Not across leagues, not across divisions, not within divisions. Points are a completely inaccurate measurement and rankings are based off of points. If we look at the blizzard top 200 (released) we see poor correlation with points. Blizzard uses hidden ranking for those numbers. If we compare that ranking to the ELO ranking that some fan sites use, we see an even different set of results.

The reality is that voting systems (game theory) require impractical amounts of data for a game like starcraft. The result being that you rarely ever get an accurate ranking system.

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I was afraid of that. Care to link to where you can see ELO rankings? – troynt Dec 21 '10 at 23:14
@tzenes ...The top 200 is based solely off of points after applying the division modifiers. Also, I am fairly confident you lose some of your points upon being promoted, although I could not tell you how many. – en1gmatic325 Dec 21 '10 at 23:42
@en1gmatic I thought the same, but I did not lose any points on my last 3 promotions so I'm starting to doubt that. As to the top 200. I have heard a lot of talk about "division modifiers" but I have yet to see hard evidence to back that up. Usually the modifiers used are very large numbers that provide a nice "fit" to the 200 data points, but aren't able to accurately predict successive lists. – tzenes Dec 21 '10 at 23:56
@Troynt added.. – tzenes Dec 21 '10 at 23:57
@tzenes No inconsistencies for division tiers have been found as far as I know: teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=169830 – en1gmatic325 Dec 21 '10 at 23:58
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