The Oracle of Death

[Blahnu]

^The PPA is pretty amazing. What's interesting is the how on KPU, MBT-PPA beats MBT-Marauder but Harasser-PPA is outclassed by Harasser-Marauder. Not entirely surprising I guess, but worth noting. I'm curious about how the two weapons compare on the Harasser for experienced players, so I'm eagerly awaiting the 2nd pass on Harasser weapons.

The default launcher KPU for high BR Vanu is weird, I can't come up with many plausible explanations. For indoor/anti-MAX work a high BR player, Vanu or not, would likely own and pull a Decimator - ABR and KPU quartiles for the Decimator corroborate this. Maybe some high BR Vanu were trying to Aurax the S1 during the weekend.

Originally Posted by Oracen

If I may beg the Oracle, I think we'd find AR numbers would throw some additional light onto the problem, and I think we'd see a similar phenomenon; versatile weapons outperforming their specialised counterparts.

The Assault Rifle numbers were posted earlier, they're the first thing on page 9. I agree with you on the point that KPU is more an indication of versatility than anything, on infantry weapons at least.

The versatile ARs for the NC and TR - Gauss S (UBGL), T1S Cycler (UBGL), Carnage BR and TAR are the highest KPU ARs for those two factions. The Vanu UBGL is however less popular, with more preferring the H-V45. You'll notice that the Vanu use their short-range AR much more than the other two factions use theirs (GR-22/TRV).

I suspect a lot of Vanu medics use the NS-11A for a mid-range option - general consensus seems to be that the CME and Corvus are better suited for long-range engagements, with the H-V45 being forced in the 'versatile' role for those who don't own the NS-11. It is worth noting that the CME does have the highest KPU for the Vanu but there were few users.

[maradine]

Originally Posted by Blahnu

^The PPA is pretty amazing. What's interesting is the how on KPU, MBT-PPA beats MBT-Marauder but Harasser-PPA is outclassed by Harasser-Marauder. Not entirely surprising I guess, but worth noting. I'm curious about how the two weapons compare on the Harasser for experienced players, so I'm eagerly awaiting the 2nd pass on Harasser weapons.

Be careful about comparing numbers across early runs where I didn't explicitly pull timestamps and publish a duration, or published a different duration. KPU scales up over time - more slowly than kills, of course, but enough to eliminate direct comparison with the early stuff.

Originally Posted by Varsam

I have to agree with this, actually. While the numbers are novel and interesting, I'd never use them to support anything other than a claim about popularity. Attempting anything else (mostly weapon effectiveness/balance) would be dangerous - there seems to be no rational correlation between the two.

In this interpretation, how would you interpret the Striker? (post #142)

I'd also like to point out that, if we see KPU go up with BR quartile, for what is reasonably interpreted as skill/exp reasons, then we have independent confirmation that kpu reflects the effectiveness of the user/weapon pair. When we take the whole group, we are left with the weapon.

Put simply: if skill has an effect on KPU (it seems to), it reasonably follows that weapon effectiveness does as well, independent of the popularity of the weapon.

[Varsam]

Originally Posted by maradine

In this interpretation, how would you interpret the Striker? (post #142)

I'd say that the Striker is overwhelmingly popular as the go-to lock-on for the TR - the TR ES lock-on uniques are a fraction of their VS and NC counterparts.

The closely grouped quartile KPUs is indicative of the Striker's oversimplicity - its design makes it simultaneously easy to use for all skill levels while leaving no ceiling for more skilled players to excel. The slightly lower ABR (which I'm guessing means average BR of uniques) compared to the other two ES launchers corroborates this.

Originally Posted by maradine

I'd also like to point out that, if we see KPU go up with BR quartile, for what is reasonably interpreted as skill/exp reasons, then we have independent confirmation that kpu reflects the effectiveness of the user/weapon pair. When we take the whole group, we are left with the weapon.

Put simply: if skill has an effect on KPU (it seems to), it reasonably follows that weapon effectiveness does as well, independent of the popularity of the weapon.

I'm sure that weapon effectiveness does indeed have an effect on KPU, but there are also so many other variables affecting it as well (both known to us and unknown) that attempting to infer meaning in KPU trends in anything but very broad contexts means you also get myriad outliers, exceptions, and contradictions which hurts the very argument you were trying to make. There are also major factors that contribute to weapon effectiveness that we simply don't have metrics for, like area denial.

[maradine]

Originally Posted by Varsam

I'd say that the Striker is overwhelmingly popular as the go-to lock-on for the TR - the TR ES lock-on uniques are a fraction of their VS and NC counterparts.


The closely grouped quartile KPUs is indicative of the Striker's oversimplicity - its design makes it simultaneously easy to use for all skill levels while leaving no ceiling for more skilled players to excel. The slightly lower ABR (which I'm guessing means average BR of uniques) compared to the other two ES launchers corroborates this.

edit: sorry, totally broke that quote up there.

Yes, but it's an extremely (even ludicrously) popular weapon with a lower KPU than a less popular counterpart, was the point I was making.

Originally Posted by Varsam

I'm sure that weapon effectiveness does indeed have an effect on KPU, but there are also so many other variables affecting it as well (both known to us and unknown) that attempting to infer meaning in KPU trends in anything but very broad contexts means you also get myriad outliers, exceptions, and contradictions which hurts the very argument you were trying to make. There are also major factors that contribute to weapon effectiveness that we simply don't have metrics for, like area denial.

I agree completely. I also think that, like in any large sample set, many of the outliers, exceptions, and contradictions tend to cancel out, especially when looking at things in the same item class over long periods of time.

I get that there are lots of things we don't know here, and I also get that there are a bunch of unmeasureables. You make the best effort on a model with the best data you get, and you try to make it better with every revision. I said it early on - everyone is welcome to take away whatever they want from this project. I haven't seen anyone use that license to fly off the handle and ask for ridiculous things. I think there's a healthy dose caution here. And pardon, because I'm using this post to segue right into a data set -




Original here: http://bit.ly/16LFGEk

[Omnimon]

Thanks for the reply oh great Oracle of Death. I guess there are limits but, I suppose that there's only so many different ways of slicing and cutting up the data. I'm sure there's probably a way to pull it since PSU has that aspect , but I don't know what off sets / values that are required for that to work . Might have to ask Hamma for that heh .

Just one request, I just wanted to see how the various AA guns were working between factions along with the ESF/ liberator / galaxy guns for KPU say pulled for 1 or 2 days ? . It'll be interesting to see what values might turn up, unless that is too much to ask .

Meanwhile I'll be sure to soak Vanu Archives ( if the TR are there ) with the heretic(s) blood :P .

[Plaqueis]

Originally Posted by maradine

Original here: http://bit.ly/16LFGEk

Hmm.. pattern continues. I feel bad for the NC guys on this one.