To quote Terry from Feb 1,2010 and the rationale of Champs Divisions
As briefly touched in an earlier post, "Champion Divisions" are being added to some of our hourly games.

Why they are good for most players:

They are special divisions where our super-expert players can battle against each other in our hourly games without inadvertently stomping on newer players hour after hour.

Why they are good for the champions:

Champions get to fight it out with the best of the best in a small, comfy setting. It's you vs them. All champs get special rating statistics, and you can battle your enemies directly on a daily basis. Champions will also tend to earn more points than regular players due to their thinner numbers and exclusive division.
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Many, but not all of those who beat me now have the monthly and the Mastery badges and would then be Champs. I'm sure many of the Champs were not pleased with being separated from the masses in the other games, but they would then experience what many of the rest of us mediocre players have put up with all along. If the Champs have ALL the badges in the game, what are they really missing out on? Stomping? And if they are mediocre Champs, like I am in WaI, it's just back to being stomped by the real Champs like it was before. So be it. The best players win. The Champs are not losing out on anything. Winning a set in Champs in MM would lead to nothing else since there is no ELO in that game.
I am no better than the newbies who get to play in sets 6-15 yet I am being stomped on just the same. I gain far fewer points each day than they do as my 26- 30/30 in 250 sec gains me 20 -40 points but the same score in sets 6-15 will probably win or get 90 points. Those who are streamed into those sets will have the advantage of winning the monthly and Mastery long before others. But why? I have never had the privilege of being in those sets.
If Terry had a reason to create the Champs divisions, why is this game exempt? If there is no Champs division, then ALL players should be randomly spread across ALL sets. NO streaming. The newbies and casual players should not have a greater opportunity to win than other vets. WaI had a Champs Division of 2 sets long before there were 320 Champs as there are in MM, and then it was expanded to 5 sets. The best will win, regardless.
Giving the vets a chance to gain some points towards the monthly would be appreciated.

Wouldn't it be more like saying that everyone who is Immortal in GC has the option to play Hardcore but doesn't have to?

(Then, with those who would like to play hardcore kept busy in their own divison, the rest of the immortals carry on playing each other as normal. And everyone is happy?

From everything written here, the people who like the champ divison are people who enjoy stiff competition and don't feel put off by being worst of the best - so presumably they would opt for hardcore thus opening up the current divisions for the "veteran-but-not-feeling-very-championish-today" players.)

I am in favor if the champs division. It is in my opinion that if champs want to complain about not winning.... Tough. They have the badges. But a regular guy cannot compete against constant 85-110 second scores.

When the game started, I was in the top bracket. Power players emerged and skyrocketed to all the badges while us mediocre players could never get a good enough score to get many points. Now they have their badges, and still compete in the divisions. We still truck along.


That being said, though I am in favor of champs, I certainly won't be disappointed if it stays as is.

An alternate idea would be to put people with 50000+ melting points (I don't know how many of the 145 regularly play; if I counted correctly there were 10 in my set yesterday, so probably most) in their own sets. However, I would think a monthly badge (the person currently in 10th has average about 70 melting points per day) includes more strong players than the mastery badge, as it includes strong players who haven't played for well over a year. There could be 3 or 4 sets of masters, or perhaps about 7 sets of champs (I don't know how many of the 321 monthly winners regularly play, I assume most of them have won a set and gotten the achievement badge).

It should be noted that the main issue people seem to have with the Who Am I champ division (they don't actually need all the badges, they can lack the mastery badge, or even the whozit collector badge (although not many people would be a monthly winner before getting 5000 whozits)) is people getting the 50000 whozit points more slowly in those sets.

I can see the advantages and disadvantages regardless of any action or lack thereof.

Eh, my two cents' worth. I am not a Champ, obviously. I argue against having a Champ division because I think it'd be unfair to the less super Champs to be forever stuck in a division where they will almost never win. As is right now everyone gets a fair shot at winning every now and then. If the Champs themselves want to be in a separate division, then by all means, away with them! :-P Whatever way you do it some people will lose out, so I guess the issue is keep it as is and the vets lose points they ought to have, or some less Champy Champs almost never win, and so lose out... Now what to do?

I knew I was going to type something wrong...

I'm more of the "not feeling very championish EVERY day" sort of player lol. Doesn't matter to me which route is ultimately chosen, my chances are the same in either case. Sometimes I get lucky lol.

An interesting tidbit of information: the 10th person in the Who Am I monthly badge standings is 13th overall (note that the easy sets add a wrinkle here, I know that when I choose to go for the monthly badge I'll probably play easy), and the 10th person in the Mind Melt monthly badge standings is 86th overall.

All but one person in the Who Am I race have 5000+ whozit points (one has 50000+); three people in the Mind Melt race have 5000+ melting points.

This last point sours my disposition regarding the status quo. I was thinking that players could be separated based on whether they had won a timed set instead of 5000+ points (2860 have won their set, 2360 have 5000+ points), but that would probably cause the number of new people winning a set every day to more than double, and I think that would be a net negative. Also, should someone be moved up because 2048 was good enough to win their set?

Yes, the plan is to have a champ division for mind melt too, for players who have won all the badges there.

Very good news. Thanks.
When you say ALL the badges, you mean both the Monthly and the Mastery?

Yes

At that time, it might also be a good idea to update WAI champs to only accept players with 50k Whozits, not those with 5k (the division was created before the 50k badge and players there are at a significant points disadvantage).

Agreed. When the champs division was added in WAI, I don't think the 50K badge had been added yet so it made the journey to 50K much tougher. I think it's a good compromise.

Would you also please consider a champs division for the Daily Game? The "Daily Game Winner" badge was actually one of the hardest daily-set-winner badges to earn (for me, anyhow), after the "Who Am I?" equivalent. I realize there's no monthly badge (although that might be nice, too), but it just sort of seems unbalanced not to have a champs division, in principle, if other games do.

There are already champ divisions. Do you notice how 11 and 12 divisions always kick butt!

Will do.

Will you also be disbanding the MM sets 'reserved' for the newbies and casual players, ie 6-15? The rest of us who struggle just as much as they, are at a significant points disadvantage. They can win the monthly in their first or second month. Some of us have tried for nearly 2 years with scores that are better than theirs, but earn half the points. Levelling the playing field would be nice. They can 'pay their dues' the way the rest of us do. Let everyone play in ALL the sets, other than the 'champs'.

Just wanted to say that I support the movement to separate people who have won the Mastery badge (50000) from those who have just won the Monthly badge, for all daily games. When is this likely to be implemented?

Yes, I was kinda hoping that it would have been in place to start the month, but it wasn't. So another month of hammering away while the newbies and casuals fast-track to the monthly badge in the 'easy' sets. Time for a change, please!