steel gulch
I think we should keep a ranking system in place but it should be fixed to avoid manipulating it.
A major manipulation that happens is that you can currently takeoff in one season and land in the next, and all your collected fps will be recorded on the new season, this allows VAs to start a season with a unreachable number and still have a entire season to earn more, making it impossible to catch up to them.
Fixing this issue would greatly improve fairness in the ranking system.
The other way VAs can manipulate the system is flying in circles above a airport for hours. This could be fixed by adding a on screen prompt every few hours that asks if your still here. If you don't click yes your session ends with no points.
I believe that VAs and the ranking system however play a very important part in the community aspect of RFS. We have all been part of a "dead" VA, its not fun, and unfortunately, dead VAs can be the demise of many potential long term rfs players.
The ranking system allows players to see what VAs are active, not all VAs are in this discord and in fact many of the top VAs are not here. So the only way for those VAs to get noticed is through the ranking system.
By being able to see a VAs overall rank pilots are able to see what VAs are active and likely have a community atmosphere to be apart of.
Active VAs allow players to gather in smaller circles with like minded players, they allow for close friendships and bonds to be created over flying together.
Active VAs allow a deeper more immersive dive into RFS allowing for creativity in how they play the game and allowing players to find groups that play in a style they enjoy being apart of.
Active VAs are able to remain active by gaining new members regularly and working hard to keep the VA what your community wants, and new members are gained by working hard to be in the top ranks in order to be noticed.
I fear without a ranking system the smaller communities within RFS will fall apart, new pilots or pilots looking change VAs will have no way of knowing what VA is active and what VA was created and forgotten about. Member count doesn't show activity, as a lot of inactive VAs have 20/20 members as RFS is a large community.
I also think that many look at it all wrong, it doesn't matter if your in the top 10 or the top 30 or the top 100, what matters is trying to be above other VAs with your same play style, if your play style doesn't yield alot of fps, that's okay, people who want to play the way you do will find and join you even if your top 300 as long as the next group like you is behind you.
We need a rankings system, it just needs to be improved to be more fair.
raw gorge
sterile hill