Weight and Value

[Mr Changsha]

Score related to team game value outside of clan games:

1600-2000: Should play moves competently, need minimal external direction tactically and make useful suggestions at least a couple of times a game. If you are around this score and don't contribute to at least this extent, then you shouldn't be surprised if you get dropped from a winning team with, from your point of view,rather unseemly haste. Your score may be relatively low, but it isn't so low that a team will tolerate numerous mistakes, missed opportunities and a general lack of useful input.

2000-2300: At this level one's score is heavy enough to expect more than just playing the move well enough, not fucking up all that much and 'playing silently'. You should be taking the lead in some games (as in you have maps and styles at which you have no little expertise yourself), you should be able to properly influence a game in which you may not be in control but still make constructive suggestions and you should generally be seen by your team as 'very competent'. There are numerous majors+ playing teams games (or trying to) who really aren't all that good or useful and these will be the ones who are unable to be part of a stable, winning team.

2300-2800: At this level one's team has the right to expect regular match-winning performances, as the weight of the player means that they can properly be considered a real drag on point gain. A player at this level who cannot formulate the strategy for an entire game against solid opposition is absolutely useless to a team - as in another player could be brought in that would make a similar contribution for far less weight.

2800+: Increasingly this player becomes a drag outside of clan games or despicable farming settings. To maintain viability they must either be extremely good, or play with much lower ranked partners. The simple fact is that such players, in combination, will be unable to win sequential no cards games at a high enough rate against leaner, but still well-organised, opposition and will increasingly find themselves in a world of obscure maps and settings to stay viable. The poor dears....man up and lose some rank, split up and lead majors...anything rather than to besmirch oneself by awful farming-related antics. "We aren't farming! We are just a really scary proposition!" I can hear such sad jokers cry. Sorry, but you are. The reason no decent teams play against such outfits is because the map and settings are a joke.

So one can't defy one's weight. If you are heavy your contribution needs to increase and, at a certain point, no matter how good a team may be their combined points total makes playing 'fair' games an impossibility without losing score. The more honourable of such players team up with much lower ranks and lead or drop rank or limit themselves to clan games. The more ridiculous turn to farming (while often protesting all the way that they really like hive quads fog escalating or whatever is currently in vogue for such types...)

One could make the argument that the rise of clans has been as a direct result of the issues I am writing about here. If a team cannot stay viable within casual games - which are to a greater or lesser extent based on point gain - then a new external form of competition must be found. So we have the clan construct as a solution and it works very well, as now a general can lead a few majors and colonels to victory and the team doesn't care that they only received 14 points each, for they are enthralled with 'the greater good and all that'.

[Funkyterrance]

While I generally agree with the breakdown above I have never played with anyone over Colonel so my firsthand experience ends after the first two score ranges. I can surmise that the rest is accurate between my observations of the settings in which these players almost always play and the talk about town. I suppose in a perfect world those score ranges would be a very accurate representation of how well a player would perform in a team setting but this is, as Mr Changsha suggests, not necessarily the case. One can basically stink at team games and gain points in-between these team losses by beefing up their rank with super-specialized map settings AKA "soft farming"(well, that's what I call it). I don't really have a special bone to pick with soft farming, I just feel that we may as well call a spade a spade. The way the points system is designed there are not many other options for those who want, more than anything else, noticeably higher rank. Anyone who has been here for any amount of time can tell, however, that this noticeably higher rank is not an accurate gauge of player strength. But I digress.
On the other hand, within the range of Major through Colonel I do notice a more or less directly proportionate relation between ability to follow instructions/contribute. Colonels just tend to be more careful and have a slightly stronger strat, at least those who I've played with. So I feel that if I were to judge by my personal experiences with the teammates in the first two point ranges, I think that score does give a pretty accurate reflection of how valuable a player will be and generally speaking this player carries his/her "weight" as expected considering their score. Of course this could be isolated to my personal experiences and this could all fall apart at the higher score levels but I am inclined to think not.