the wasp game was actually 3:3, not 2:4

If you didn't add spread the odds would prolly be like 70-30ish at least that's what I think they should be. I really don't think the spread is necessary unless a team has under 15% or some number like that

That's right, but I needed a GC example and this is a game I had in my mind, we all know you're not worse than Tourettes :P.
But if you feel it's not ok, or misleading I will change the teams.

It'd be honestly a lot easier if on the page you just said "Team X needs 3 rounds to win. Team Y must win the game by at least 5-2 to win."

And for golden caps etc. "Team X must get 1 golden cap win or 2 golden cap losses to win. Team Y must win at least 1 map and 1 golden cap loss, or win at least 2 golden caps to win." Tbh ETF2L points I understand but that's probably only because I've played in it for ages.

But what if at some point there is a match with win advantage or it ends before either team gets 5 points? It sounds easier, it'd be even better if I was entering it by hand for every game, but it needs to be flexible.
And also I'm already stating GC wins needed on relevant matches :P

Hm ok yeah I see what you mean about not getting to 5 rounds. Fair enough, guess we just have to learn how to deal with it :D

Left it, by just stating difference for a win clearly, since people tend to crash when they see that a team gets amount of points with a fraction :D

I think the spread idea is very subjective and can lead to a lot of bad things. Just let the bets determine the odds like CSGL.

A really good example is this 20b vs Five Dollar Club game. Teams vary a lot in skill depending on the map and who they are going against. To say that there should objectively be a spread for a game like this (or any game at all) is kind of silly.

I also don't really believe that bets being more towards 50/50 would attract more people. I think for just about everyone you attract that would bet on that would equally make other people skip the bet.

This might be alright for some Froyo games, but really nothing else. There's a lot of good matches in Invite this season.

So uh, how are you locking up these bets when the match goes live?
Is it a manual thing, or an automated thing?

ya as of now I am still able to switch my bets for the 20b v. $5 match

Not again :(
Automatic

Could you do a failsafe locking 15 minutes after the scheduled time?

Removed those bets which were switched. Items for those will be returned as I have no way of telling if they were switched once, or they were just switched to one team and back to 5$ to check if it works.

Everyone whose bet wasn't changed after 23:00 EDT receives an "Honest Better" rank providing them with a shield next to their names and ability to bet 6 items as a reward for honesty. Those users didn't take advantage of a bug either knowing that they'll lose their items or just sleeping through it, but I still think they should get some compensation for it.
While i think I managed to fix everything that could crash EventsHandler (loop responsible for firing events) I will also add some condition to the switch action so it checks for match start time.

Is there any way you could clarify the spread betting better. There was someone fairly new to comp tf2 in the 20b 5$ game that was very confused about how it worked. It was cool to see them interested in the game because of the betting, but it got a bit annoying as well.

I think tonight was a good example of why the spread is a very bad idea. It turned out to be a very close game and with the original odds people who believe'd in the underdog would have gotten the pay out. And as someone who bets on csgolounge, I can say that it often adds hype to close games when you have items on the line. But in this game... all that hype would be killed half way into the game when it was 3-2 and bets were already over.

Another thing is that betting under/over is integral to the "game" of betting. I would have bet tonight if I had real odds, you can't play the game well if every game is a 50/50... that makes it completely random.

One more point I will make (and I can think of at least 4-5), is that it makes throwing matches WAY easier and less risky. you don't even have to THROW the match to get a payout! Teams often have a bad first half and then pick it up the 2nd half to win matches they are favored in, it would be impossible to tell if someone is throwing. Even worse, teams would falsely accused if they have a bad game against a team they are way better than. I really see no upsides to this.

@shrugger
One can just throw some of their regular season and still win the league because of playoffs. But every time they attempt to do so they have a chance of being caught so I don't think it's profitable long term. And it's not even more likely in eSports, you hear about iBP, but they just slipped. The more serious a sport is the better they are at throwing though it's often just selling games rather than betting against themselves. In 2005 we discovered that a lot of games in Polish football (from few previous games, were rigged with both clubs management, trainers, managers, referees (22 of them!) and players involved. Nobody would expect it before one of them blabbed.

I will take the first paragraph into consideration though :P The argument is valid since TF2 and most e-Sport games are definitely different in that is has the limit of rounds won as opposed to some real sports where time limit is the key. Then again if one team is very likely to win it could still make it far more interesting.
I will most probably just try to be more relaxed in terms of what games should I apply spread to.

Also I don't really agree that it makes betting more random. The way you bet is just different, you bet over or under the set score, but 50% - 50% gives those bets a little more purpose as there is no incline to bet when score is too easy to predict since payouts are scraps and betting on an underdog is most likely throwing items into the river.
When I bet without a spread I don't ask myself a question wether Team A is stronger than Team B. I ask myself a question wether underdog is more likely to take the game than percentage of bets indicate. Or the opposite. With a spread and even it's the same. You need to decide wether Team A is more likely to win 5-2 or better than the spread indicates.

@fireindaarcade
I'm doing my best I already reworded it to state rounds a team can be behind in a score, no idea what else should I do.

Betting on an underdog isnt necessarilly throwing items away, think back to the Meat Market playoff game, bets were something like 92% for meat market, who wound up losing.

I think it's more dealing with if a team had a match where the other team would "win" if they got one round (or maybe two rounds). I feel like it would be pretty ridiculous with people calling them out on that lost round. But then again, it would be pretty fucking easy to just intentionally get wiped at mid, don't kill the enemy medic, and lose to their last push. You couldn't possibly prove that.

I know people say shit all the time in cs like "omg c9 are throwing" or whatever, but that's a far difference from losing an entire match and losing a round or two.

Seriously, Invite is not as stagnant as you might think outside of Froyo. You don't need to handicap bets to make the odds more even. If anything, the people who believed that Five Dollar Club could completely beat 20b are losing money here. It's also not nearly exciting to bet on a low underdog and come out with a win.

This really doesn't affect me in any way because I don't bet on TF2 matches and have yet to bet on one, but I feel like the spread is just a really bad idea.

As I said I will try to be more relaxed with it and try to have it for as little games as possible, but either way I'm going to have people complaining, wether the payouts are smaller or there is a spread.
We don't want a lot of those: https://saloon.tf/match/349/
Or at least I don't want to have a friendslist not full when it occurs :)

that website gave me a 500 internal server error all night (haven't tried prior to today, I just went there because I heard about the spread).

I haven't been able to use Saloon.tf since last night. I keep getting the 500 Internal Server error. Is it just on my side ? Any ideas when it will be solved ?

Also what if I were displaying all possible outcomes and their effects like this:

http://i.imgur.com/b8eEIB3.png

Would it be any better?
EDIT: 500s should be fixed.

Far too confusing in my opinion Cherry.

Any news on the server coming back ?

still getting a 500.

Fixed :)

Thanks!

(just found the match to go with my earlier post)

https://saloon.tf/match/319/

And now they are invite while MM is IM. How often does upset like this happen :P
Then again UKIP can win too, so we may see it one more time :D
Anyways, I've added MASIF vs NB without a spread, we'll see :P
The game should be close, but betters will most likely prefer MASIF because of their previous scores.

imo leave spread out for most games and consult someone in the know about invite/prem if you think the match might need a spread. last night's game would have had great odds for 5 Dollar Club if there was no spread since most people didn't recognise how close it was going to be.

This. Exactly this.

I don't think the idea of spread is horrible in every scenario, but I think it shouldn't be used that much. And even when it is used, I don't think it should make the odds 50/50 (like a last place invite team getting one round against Froyo or something). Because again, I think having those low odds to bet on will really pay off if you are a knowledgeable person.

IMO, I wouldn't do spread whatsoever, maybe unless it was a top 2 team going against a bottom 2 team. Even then, I would make it so the bottom 2 team would have to get like 3 rounds or something.

Also, I'm not getting the 500 internal server error anymore. :) Thanks for fixing it.

I can't collect my payout, it keeps telling me "Couldn't reach websocket" and then reloading the page