SteemHop should limit the number of games based on users average score

The best way to make SteemHop more equitable is to reduce the number of games for people with a high average game.

The Argument

SteemHop is a game of survival. A marshmallow shaped chicken appears at a busy crossroads. The chicken needs to hop across a number of busy roads, log flumes and railroad tracks—picking up nickels along the way.

The problem with the game is that—once a player learns to survive—the player can survive a long time. Playing 30 games can take a couple of hours.

Mid Season Rule Change

By season 18, the makers of SteamHop noticed that the same players were winning every season. They wanted to make a rule change that would restore equity.

The programmers decided to limit game play to 2 minutes thinking that this would limit the game play of survivors while not affecting new players.

I do not think that this change had the desired effect.

The players who are good at surviving will be good at maximizing the coins earned in the first two minutes of play.

My Experience with the Change

I am not the best player. My average game score is about 164 points per game. There are several players who average over 200. Notably @bokhtiar1444 is both better looking than me and a better player. His average score was about 336.

FWIW @bokhtiar1444 was set to win the season. I played all of my games. He played only half of his games.

To annoy @bokhtiar1444, I decided to stay up late and play my full hand.

It just so happens that I managed to jump past @bokhtiar1444's just before the rule change.

NOTE: I had a string of 400+ games after the change took place. I spent a frustrating two hours trying to figure out why the system stopped recording my score.

IMHO it is bad form to make changes without informing the audience. The SteemHop team should have a page in the interface that explains the rules and changes.

But this is SteemIt and SteemIt has notoriously bad documentation.

Playing with the New Rules

The two minute cut off does not make the score more equitable. People who are good at surviving tend to be good at picking up coins in the first two minutes of play.

My new strategy is to play with a stopwatch on hand. I start the watch just as I start play. I jump into the brink when I see the stopwatch hit 1:55.

The new goal is to play fast and to pick up all of the coins that I see.

So when I was playing for survival; I would skip coins that I passed. Such coins were not worth the risk.

Since the new goal is to gather as many coins as I can in two minutes, I jump back to catch any coins that I miss.

My new strategy involves a great deal of frantic hopping. But when speed is the name, frantic hopping is the game.

I've managed to improve my game opening. I also got to the point where I can get a 200+ score in two minutes ... if I am lucky.

If SteemHop continues the 2 minute cutoff, I am likely to be one of the leaders in the next season.

I don't think that they should. I think there are better ways to make the game "equitable."

Limit the Number of Games

One of the best ways to make the game score equitable is to limit the number of games by the player's average score.

One might decide that 50 points a game is a good cutoff.

The site delivers 30 games every twelve hours.

50 * 30 = 1500.

1500 is the ideal score for a session. The following pseudo code might determine the number of games for a player:

user_id = 3;

// It would be easy to get the average if your data is in a sql table.

sql = 'SELECT avg(score) FROM Games WHERE user_id=? ORDER BY game_id DESC LIMIT 30';
avg = floor(runSQL(sql,[user_id]));
games = round(1500/avg);

if (games > 30) games = 30;
if (games < 5) games = 5; // set the minimum games to five.

I don't know your program. In the above code, a person with under 50 average would get 30 games.

My average was 164 per game. I would get round(1500/164) which is 9.

@bokhtiar1444 averages 336 per game; so he should get only 4 games.

That sounds stingy. Lets give everyone at least 5 games per session.

Limiting the number of games could make a completely even playing field.

Another way of creating an even playing field would be to limit the amount of game time.

Conclusion

The current program that limits a game to 2 minutes is not a good way to create an even playing field.

Basing the number of games on one's average would create an even playing field.

I am likely to score well in the next season because I figured out how to get a good score with the 2 minute rule.

I generated the image of frogs playing leap frog on Night Cafe