BuzzerBeater Forums

If the competitiors are too strong for new teams, one of the main issues is the size of the league. New users join, lose a few games by a huuuuuge margin, are discouraged (because they can't buy players) and have to spend like 2 real years to catch up.

I think bigger nations lost less users (relatively) because the gap between the worst established teams and newbies is smaller. If you join in Austria you can expect to get beat by teams like mine, by 50-60 points for a few seasons. You could advertise as much as you want, as long as this leak isnt plugged we wont see a significant trend upwards.

Again....how many users are potentially joining BB Austria per year??? Not enough!
Even if we would keep all of those new users playing.....we are losing more on the "old" teams side!

So the solution of the declining user base is what?!? Merging? NO. Maybe spend some dollars on advertising? Maybe YES.

So far I think I have seen only one or two suggestions that have all of the following attributes:

1. Every team retains its national identity and retains its flag.
2. Every country could continue in BBB.
3. Every country would continue to have its own forum.
4. Countries that do not want to merge with each other would not have to do that.
5. Every world would have a full Division 1, 2 and 3 at least, and probably a full Division 4.
6. The competitive and financial advantages and disadvantages of playing in a macro country or a micro country would be completely evened out.

I think all of those are essential to the health of BB and should be the minimum standard for any change.

(continued in next post)

Last edited by Mike Franks at 4/12/2016 6:17:33 PM

Some additional features I consider good but not deal breakers:

7. Every team could retain its own history.
8. The drafts could continue as they do now, making it easy for Marin to put better players in the draft and have it apply to everyone evenly.
9. Private Leagues could become more important to the game as they showcase teams of the same country.
10. New teams from any country would have an equal opportunity at the start.
11. Competition would be between relatively equal teams at the start (but of course some might improve and some might decline).

These are all true of the suggestions I was thinking of in my post immediately above.

Last edited by Mike Franks at 4/12/2016 6:16:46 PM

Looks like we (the micro nation users) are the bad guys. I remember that when I joined to BB, Colombia had more than 150 users. I began to play in a III division. My point is that it isn't our fault that some users get bored.

But, I still believe in a better competition. So, if the merge solves the current economic issues, it's have to be done. I only want that the lower divisions be filled with users with the same nationality.

Why do you think that having a shared top division and a mixed league is better than just having a mixed league? Regardless of the choice, the same problems exist in the form of a potentially different language, culture and a general unwillingness of several users to participate in a league with users from other countries.

It's an inbetween solution, and is based on a real life solution.

Real life Adriatic league has best teams from Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia&Herzegovina, Slovenia, Montenegro and Macedonia, which is pretty strong and competitive.

All countries have their own national league systems, but they are much weaker.

So in BB if you want to be a top dog, you have to make a good team and fight with a quality opposition in a shared Div I. If you have a solid team, you're in your national top league(which is Div II), and if you tank you have to do it in Div III.

It also adds better competition, cuts down on the overall number of Div Is, but preserves national leagues as well(so it's an inbetween solution).

Another pro is that most active teams will get to the shared Div I, and they are more likely to put their differences aside, and enjoy the game instead.

I think it's much better than to mix up everyone.

Also, this way draft could be more easily solved. Lower divs simply get national draftees, and the only problem remains in top div.

Advertising, as some pointed out, to get more user into micro-nations is useless. The whole internet is full of crap ads for crap things, people get used to (and will) ignore such stuff. Use that money to make the game itself more *hip* (Modern layout, dress options, diversified training options, whatever…) to attract new potential user and keep the old user.

I’m astonished about the fact that many user talking about being that proud of their country, that they won’t merge with another nation. Keep that for real life, this is so nonsense in an online game. I think keeping the flag, the NT’s and the forums is enough to show about this. And, wouldn’t it be great to have the chance to beat another team from an opponent country in the league?

As a member of a micro-nation I must say there is only advantage. Whatever I do, I’ll stay easily in the top league. Keep the team around salary floor means usually end up in the finals at the end of the season for somebody who understands the game well. Which I don’t do. Anyway, it’s easy as pie not to drop. Playing in a micro-nation means making tons of money and be able to train players for some season without losing the place in the top league. There is almost no competition.

I strongly support the merger plans. The merger will come in a certain way, no doubt. It’s great that BB was starting this topic to listen to the user. But in the end they will decide and I think the best way is to keep it smooth and easy. No derogation for countries to keep it fair for everyone, merge nations with less than (f.ex.) 80 user. Place them within the decided groups looking at their stats (How long they stay in BB, how many trophies won etc.) to keep the competition balance in the beginning. Well, even a random mix is okay with me. As mentioned, let flags, NT’s and forums be. Would be nice to play the Cup games within the nation and without bots if possible. If not, so be it. At the end of the season, the best placed team of each country in the mixed group will attend BBB. Drafts will automatically get the flag of the user's country.

I used to be into Internet stuff, not too much into programming. However, to keep the whole thing slim and easy without derogation for this and that, programming should be possible to bring this change in a few season. But it should be clearly announced, from when it will happen. Meanwhile, everybody who is not friendly with the merging idea, can get used to it and try to build up a team to compete well in a mixed league, instead of hoarding money and keeping the place in the sun easily as a member of a micro-nation. You can't satisfy anybody, somebody will be hurt in the end. Sure, there can be unfairly situations for teams in the beginning. If it's me, so be it. Always a reason to rethink about the strategy to make the team better.

Cheers to all

Last edited by Rorufuchan at 4/13/2016 2:05:04 AM

To part two: Such issues also occur regularly in much larger scale games. An example of a completely different game might be the current league of legends moba. They created a queue system more welcome to groups of players to move up the ranks together rather than allowing just solo players or 2 man players to move up the system. Players said please no 4 man groups (out of 5), and allow solo players to queue up for the game normally. What happened? they allowed all types of queues, and told the players "we know whats best for the future, and we know what players really want" and now have 17-18% of the users refusing to buy pieces of the game. What i saw happen there is similar to what i felt when we had an honest discussion about the financial issues surrounding hoarding of 40-50 million dollars. The design many felt was flawed from a financial front with regards to certain teams having less to compete for, and it allowed them to save 4x the cash of major nations. In the end, the result was fairly close to the initial plan, and for me until i see a difference, it's hard not to build an assumption.

to part 1: I said i wouldn't commit much time to honest solutions, but i can't help it to some degree. TV revenue changes would improve the situation, but it would be a bandaid while you found other solutions. I think in the end, you have a few people pretty vocal about being against what you or someone within the inner-workings of the BB crew proposed, and some in favor. If it were my game to buy and run, i'd spend most of my initial investment on improving the flow of the first page a new user would see, improve SEO to outperform most of the rival games, and create a formula based on users per country that reduced TV Revenues and increased volatility of fair-weather fans to make winning and being the best team more profitable than tanking as the primary game change. I'd then sit on my hands, and see where that got me, and decide whether or not i should make Cup games different. For the u21/NT, i would create a two tier system where teams under a certain threshold of users competed against similarly sized nations. The best of the top tier of national teams would compete, if you wanted to make it similar to club play you could make the worst of the larger nations relegate down to the micro-nation tournament or something, and then you would give micro nations more to play for and more to be proud of. Better than trying to strip the few who are worried about national pride of it.