I posted this thought in another thread about fighter score and vulching in La7, but it pertains here. One reason the ENY thingy doesn't really work very well is psychological.
If you have a numbers advantage and you are not penalyzed a good many may, for the sense of fairplay, maybe not after or during one night but if a pattern emerges, switch to the undersided team. However, once you start penalizing, that is to say handicapping the advantaged team a very different sentiment emerges. The thoughts are then that well, yes we outnumber team X, but we are spotting them 20 ENY in aircraft and vehicles, therefore they are getting an advantage over us that should equal things out, therefore all is fair why switch?
So, by saying the ENY itself balances the arena, is saying that it's fine to have 200 Knights to 125 Rooks to 75 Bishops because Knights are being handicapped accordingly. The absolute only reason now that a Knight would switch is if his loyalty to a particular plane he was being denied access to was stronger than his loyalty to his friends, squaddies and countrymen, that is to say, not bloody likely...You see how this works psychologically?
That is why I have always been an advocate of incentives to move, as I also outlined in the Fighter score thread, as opposed to disincentives to stay put. It is quite a different thing for a person to realize if he moved to country X that he would receive some sort of benefit for doing so, a reward for his altruistic sportsmanship, not simply the priviledge of access to the entire planeset which most take for granted anyways. Rather than handicap and penalyze, instead reward and bestow benefits to encourage the behavior you would like. Honey catches more flies than vinegar, the Wind and sun Vs. the man in the coat anology, , etc.
The other thing I mention in the other thread, I should have just cut n' pasted the whole thing. Is the ENY limiter affects everyone theoretically, but in actuality really affects the poor players and the new player most dramatically. Good players can adapt tactics to the situation, they are proficient in a wide variety of planes spanning the entire ENY spectrum, they often have established wingmen who are equally talented etc. It's the poor newbie plebe who can only manage to squeeze out a kill or two in a Niki or Spit before getting baby seal clubbed that suffers most. The problem is yes the newbie or weak player will probably move eventually, but so what, the poor bastard can only manage 25 kills in 100 sorties. However, the elite veterans who laugh at the ENY limiter kill 400 in 100 sorties and can do that in a p40B with as much alacrity as a Spit especially as part of a vulching gangbang horde.
So, you must move 16 noobs or poor players to equal out the one skilled veteran who does not move. Why not instead have a balancing system that tries to move the skilled 20% who account for 80% of MA kills with incentives to play for the underdog. Rather than the current ENY system that attempts to move the bottom 80% who account for only 20% of the MA kills through punishment, penalties and handicapping. The ENY system is psychologically bellybutton backwards, and inefficient in how it targets the least impactfull, but most numerous (ie: paying customer) demographic of the community in the MA. Not only that, but it punishes newbies, your newest customers, your future, the last people on Earth HTC should want to start wacking with the ENY Cat 'o Nine tails.
The end result of the ENY limiter in theory is a team that is numerically weak for an extended period may start to gain people from the other countries over time via the ENY limiter. They may begin to appear more numerically even on paper. But, the players they are getting are the ones most dramatically effected by the ENY handicap, that is the least skilled, the least experienced, the least talented and the least loyal, therefore the least likely to stay there long-term. So, even if and when the numbers do reach relative parity, the skill quotient definately does not. What you are left with is only the superficial illusion of balance.
Zazen
