Salary cap is as Apollo put it previously;

2 (maybe 3) squads actually competing to win
2 (maybe 3) squads that are borderline play-off squads
1 (maybe 2) squads that have no chance regardless

it's the same thing as it has been every season beforehand only there is a ton of restrictions causing players to not have the ability to play unless they want to join a squad that's not competing

is Devil worth 160 (or w/e he's rated) if he only shows up to 2 matches? he's def a top marine, but no squad captain can afford to pick him up @ that cost because of the activity; there's multiple players on that cusp

there's multiple other issues (such as the one sov pointed out) in which multi-position players are likely rated on their best position, is fax now permanently a medic and never allowed to play marine less he wishes to be a 225 (or w/e he is) marine? (aka the equiv of sov/champ).

as stated in the head staff forum, i can understand not being in favor of a draft league but salary cap is NOT the second best option and has done very little for balance while pushing players out as opposed to bringing players in.

People people like fax rate him over all? So take the avg of med and marin

adding further formulas to complicate a system that has provided minimal benefit does not = a solution, imo

you're still going to end up w/ only 2 or 3 squads capable of winning regardless of if you FFA or Salary so you might as well FFA and allow for the maximum amount of players to keep the playerbase at peak.

I don't think that breaks the system though, Staley. It's unfortunate for Devil, but captains had to prioritize and recruit people who were going to be more reliable. Some people might get left out if they aren't willing to join the "non competitive squads" That is up to them but it still reflects their own value to a team. I don't agree that the past 2 seasons have been just like all the previous in competitive balance.

Still, anythings better than a draft :>

Any system that pushes players out of an already tiny player-base is a broken system and many of the suggestions for "fixing" the current salary system are to reduce salary cap or increase player cap which further does that.

Salary's intention is to bring balance which you're claiming to be the key reason for using it and yet draft (assuming the captains aren't dumb) is the most balanced option. Salary is not a happy medium between draft and FFA. It's FFA while pushing players out.

You guys are saying only 2, maybe 3 are in the hunt for the champs, but the last two seasons the #4 squad(fear, glitter) went to the finals. Doesn't that show some signs of the league becoming more balanced?

It also felt like week to week throughout this season there were plenty of unpredictable games, or in general, closer games. Maybe that's not true, but that's how it felt to me. Champ, is there an easy way to compare the game totals between seasons?

You're right that FFA gives more people the opportunity to play(or atleast afking on active squads), I do think it reduces competition through stacking though.

Also, Draft takes away most aspects of FFA/play with who you want and gives you a more unpredictable competitive balance element. What also happens if someone gets drafted to a team they don't like and leaves 2 games in?

Nickk there were balanced seasons without the salary cap, most of the seasons excluding 2 or 3 of them have been fairly balanced. You're also forgetting the fact that it has only been 6 squads, when before it used to be 8. And now each squad plays each other twice.

If the season was like before and every squad played each other only once, It would arguably be a very one sided unbalanced season. The few rotations and swaps made it seem more balanced, but here is what everyone is missing:

Raw Dogs were not horrible, they were still bad, but with sov/yosh it made it more competitive.
PG was inactive and failing
Glitter overrecruited and had too many players
New Hope was "stacked" and undefeated, easily about to take the champs.

Rejects/Palms squad had minimal changes.

Basically I swapped squads with Colossal - which arguably helped both squads. Sov/Yosh left Raw Dogs which helped PG and CRIPPLED Raw Dogs. And New Hope went inactive due to the long season, they had no major roster changes so everything wasn't fresh like it was for PG.

Now I guess are we talking about balance for every squad, or just for the top squads? because if you want to say the league is becoming more balanced, crippling one squad, to strengthen another to go on an undefeated sweep and win the champs... sure that is definitely balanced.

How is any of that worse than regular stacking? They had to boot people to fit yosh and Sov. It's not the format's fault they ditched a squad and stacked another.

The top 4 squads had a chance to win the Champs this season despite yosh and sov joining pg. It made them alot better, but not unbeatable. WHYN was very close to making the playoffs. It's too bad RD didn't fare better. Yes, it was more balanced.
All this is a trade off of some less active players being left out unless they are willing to join lesser squads. That sort of thing still happens with roster limits, which are a must in open formats.

I wasn't here for many FI seasons, but if they were balanced why did we move to salary in the first place? Did the population drop too much around season 5-7 and the talent difference between the squads just become much more glaring?

-Raw Dogs were better because of Sov/Yosh knowing they could switch later, agreed. That made these games more competitive/fun(for everyone expect Sov/yosh I guess). Glitter only won by 1 against them in week 2. I think long season allowed this to happen though, and I'm not for long season either.

-Do you really think PG was failing? Somewhat inactive, certainly, but their first 5 games were: OT loss to Rejects, 2 kill lose to NH, 5 kill loss to glit, blowout over RD, blowout over whyn. That's 3 very close games to other playoff squads and two strong games over non-playoff. Seems a bit far to call it failing. But maybe they were just barely showing enough people to play. Em4, any input?

-I agree Glitter somewhat overrecruited early. Some of Glitter showed for the first 3-4 weeks and then went inactive as well, though(Iceman, Bulldog, noire, and much later Disktrikt after his infantry spirit was crushed into oblivion)
-NH were the clear favorite, I agree. I also agree the long season defintely took a toll on them as a squad and players that are not really known for SBs during the week.

I think the goal of balancing is to make it as competitive for everyone, but let's be real, that's not likely unless you have a successful draft league and get 6 competitive squads. That seems the most unlikely and potentially disastorous of all options presented though.

The fact that one and two seeds have been upset in semis in back to back years should keep salary around

Yeah I think PG was failing.. Darth was inactive, pandy was going to china or something, and the rest of the squad was unreliable.. Evidence being I played every week since joining, and i'm fucking horrible now. The first half of the season they never scrimmed and it was a sinking ship, thats why colossal left to join Glitter.

And I do agree with you that the BEST way to balance it is a draft league, way over salary. Except you have to factor in human emotion and I'm guessing a lot of people won't be happy with how they got drafted.

r - yeah we were stacked, towards the end of the season.. is that balanced though? Did salary really do anything to prevent that?

Lana Del Rey


Salary Cap Mod

Squad: Hugh Mungus
Skilled USL Champion (x5)
Posted on: 02/21/17 at 12:47 AM

adding further formulas to complicate a system that has provided minimal benefit does not = a solution, imo

you're still going to end up w/ only 2 or 3 squads capable of winning regardless of if you FFA or Salary so you might as well FFA and allow for the maximum amount of players to keep the playerbase at peak.

You just said it provided minimal benefit. It's minimal in your opinion and you're against it agreeing that it had provided a benefit. A minimal benefit is better than none so you kinda just said that salary cap is better.

" but the last two seasons the #4 squad(fear, glitter) went to the finals. Doesn't that show some signs of the league becoming more balanced? "
Rejects didn't show sol. I guess that proves the #4 squad can take a game off the best squad when they're missing an arguable top 3 marine(realistically top 50 but people somehow say he's elite) in the game. Rejects is not a top heavy squad that can do well without sol. Pretty dumb to argue this point.

Glitter beating a squad that goes inactive completely doesn't mean much. We saw what happened when New Hope was semi-active. They honestly had a great shot of winning it all if the season was 1 round robin. If EM4/Shasta stopped playing the game for nearly a month and played in the playoffs, I am pretty sure PG wouldn't be in the finals at all. I don't think the salary cap was the cause for why we did have certain games closer. It was honestly double round robin that actually was effective in impacting the standings. PG new lineup won every single game including playoffs by double digits except against New Hope. The Glitter match wasn't close. Watch the video and see how Glitter killed 10mins off the clock moving around their base. Once we got our double digit lead, we doubled it within 5minutes in a 7v7. Salary cap didn't change much. Rejects with sol last season would've easily made finals against the #2 seed Warhawks. This season the #1 seed didn't bother to be active because of the long season and lost.

"If the season was like before and every squad played each other only once, It would arguably be a very one sided unbalanced season. The few rotations and swaps made it seem more balanced, but here is what everyone is missing:" Apollo is right. Double round robin has a huge impact.

Can't believe someone is calling PG, a core that has won S3/4/5 and made finals in 6, not failing when they lost to chica playing marine in OT with no sol LOL.

You guys saying Sov/yosh 'crippled' us really should take it easy. Overall, those guys with Judinny helped make the squad and the league more fun for a while and were great squadmates. I said they could try some crazy tactics with different classes and whatever but they didn't even take advantage of it to the point of trolling other squads. We could have been way more trollish. I know what you guys are saying, but overall it was beneficial. I knew if we didn't win a few games then they would leave to a better squad. Still worth it

albert - a minimal benefit against multiple greater negatives does not equate to superiority in favor of salary

jordan - one and two seeds have been upset in years prior, it was never said that they couldn't - just that the balance didn't change which is the argument, a top two squad has still won every season in salary just as it has in every season prior

hank - understandable if you think draft league won't work, no argument against that. too many emos who might refuse to play w/ someone over grudges from 10 years ago. it's a superior option for balance if it worked, might people are correct in assuming it probably wouldn't for various reason ; ffa still trumps salary though as it provides greater playerbase participation while barely altering squad landscape. if minimal balance changes > increased playerbase, than salary is superior from your view, but if increased player base > minimal balance changes, then it goes the other way. the amount of upsets this season was a product of the extended season (about twice as much as a season half the length), but the result was the same as it always is.

Some more suggestions:

-Give sapper a larger count for their explosives. Starting with a ~5 each for demos/grenades would probably be fine.

-I saw this from someone else, but I like the idea of giving ripper a bit more health... probably 120.


Just for fun... an infeasible solution to the undeniable advantage of fighting near your own spawn (in case people still care about that):

-Use the coordinates/location of the player's death relative to their dropship to scale the respawn time.

For example, if you die right next to your base, the respawn time would be significantly longer... or if you die across the map from your base, it could be an instant respawn. But this is a dead game anyway, so it's not worth implementing even if it were possible... Just die...

-Do you really think PG was failing? Somewhat inactive, certainly, but their first 5 games were: OT loss to Rejects, 2 kill lose to NH, 5 kill loss to glit, blowout over RD, blowout over whyn. That's 3 very close games to other playoff squads and two strong games over non-playoff. Seems a bit far to call it failing. But maybe they were just barely showing enough people to play. Em4, any input?

Early in the season was tough because of inactivity. Pandy played 1/7 matches at a high salary cost. ER had to be pulled into the game. Darth was there but not. It was an easy choice to clear cap space for Sov and yosh to make a final push for playoff seeding. Once we picked Apollo up, our activity spiked and people logged during the week.

GM of the Year.

I think salary has helped to an extent. But maybe WHYN should have lost Pam week 1 and they would have made playoffs. (:

"Just for fun... an infeasible solution to the undeniable advantage of fighting near your own spawn (in case people still care about that):

-Use the coordinates/location of the player's death relative to their dropship to scale the
respawn time. " - Sol

Or add some handicap for squads down 20/30/40+ kills. More damage, more health, larger heals.. ect??

The intent was to nullify an imbalance that compels leaders in USL to camp or use a boring playstyle when the competing squads are relatively even. Providing a handicap for weaker squads is a separate issue, and not something I think would be ideal.

People are looking for solutions to fix camping but I don't think using more support classes will help that. People aren't putting in naders and rippers to start pushing. Maybe look at getting rid of stand and fire for those classes. I personally am fine with just marines and medics.