i thought some of the titles were way too wordy.
for example the
Brigade Captain Minister Counselor....cant that be just senoir capt counsellor?
Emisary Appointed Diplomat- shouldnt that be just Emissary?
Consul Experienced Diplomat -(change to) consul
Diplomat Renouned Diplomat - renowned diplomat
Commander Ambassador - ambassador

i mush prefered your previous list churchill. from friday 12pm post. 1 or 2 word titles are good, but the 4 or 5 word titles overlong.
we have a few joke names in the lower ranks, thats good but what about the higher ranks. i would love to be a puppeter or a spider.

so whats next? if ghost and others have got the elo system sorted and chuchhill has the graphics then we need somebody with php coding to write it up. im sure kestas will install it once it has been written and tested. it doesnt change the point system economy so it shouldnt have any problems with changing the underlying nature of the site, just a qucik handy way of seeing how good your enemy really is rather than going to his or her profile and looking at their win rate and who they play against etc.

You're looking at it wrong sean... I was asked for a list of comparison of military/diplomatic ranks...

Brigade Captain OR Minister Counselor
Emisary OR Appointed Diplomat
Consul OR Experienced Diplomat
Diplomat OR Renouned Diplomat
Commander OR Ambassador

Military Rank OR Diplomatic rank

oh , sorry, yes then the diplomatic ones are better for the higer levels.

I'd like to limit to at most 10 ranks, and the number of ranks has to be limited by the number of symbols which are clearly distinguishable as to which is better. I think 6-8 ranks should be enough

I'd rather not use a list of every title which has ever been given, when it means the icons used for each title are only clearly understandable to those who have had a hand in deciding them

Also remember the actual names of the ranks are somewhat secondary to the icons, since only the icons will be displayed, the title is only given in the profile.

My 2c

I agree with you that the rank symbols need to be clearly distinguishable as to which is better. Maybe I'll try to work some more up in a little bit.

However, I don't see any harm in having more than 10 ranks. As long as they are distinguishable, I think the more, the better...because I'd be afraid that things could stagnate really quick. Moving up or down rankings would make the ranking system a bit more fun, I think. Is there a reason to limit them to less than 10?

As for the titles, I agree that they are less important than the icons.

Why not use simply alphabet or numbers?

the icons look pretty cool gobble, have a look at them from the links.

darwyn, are you afraid that it will take too long to move up or down a rank if there are less than 10 levels? but also if we have too many we might be in a situation were after you have a particular good victory against good opponents you jump a rank, day later another game ends with a defeat and you fall back down. Better to make the ranks less so as to make say.... 3-4 weeks of good results- wins, some draws, few defeats to move up a rank.

Sean, yes, that's what I'm afraid of. I think you should have to work for your rank, but sitting at the same rank for long periods of time wouldn't be much fun either. There's got to be a happy medium somewhere...and hey, maybe 10 is it. I don't know.

Gobbledy...I like that idea. Maybe it's a combination of numbers and letters, like A1, A2, A3, B1, B2, B3, etc...although I think some sort of representation of that would be better...like points on a star with a letter in the middle...or something.

Well, sean, for as long as Ranking is based on points people are going to jump around.

People were supporting a lot of ranks, (which I'm not sure is the best way to go) as opposed to fewer ranks. So, I made an example with a lot of ranks as it is easy to cut back down.

Gobble: too boring.

Okay, here's another shot at it:

http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/pp248/nsdarwin/DipRankMedals.jpg

It's simple: The more points on the star, the higher the rank. This should make the medals distinguishable while allowing for simplicity and disconnecting them from any sort of military type symbols. It's also less boring than just A, B, C or 1, 2, 3.

Here's a slightly better version, I think...

http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/pp248/nsdarwin/DipRankMedals2.jpg

The 8 rank list is great, do they still scale down to the size of the other icons (the size of the current D coin)?

Looking very good Darwyn

I did them in vector format, so if they get implemented, they can scale to whatever size you need. Thanks!

Pontuation sucks.

I like the 8. With the 13 it's difficult to know which is the higher rank.

this is just going to end up being a tug-of-war of opinions
i vote for the people who are designing these symbols to have a pow-wow and decide which ones are the easiest to pull off and which are the easiest to understand the level progression

that way no one can complain bc either they dont know what goes into making something like that and integrating it into the site or they didnt help

and to contradict myself....
i would prefer the 13 symbols mainly bc it puts some distance between people but not too much but adding more points onto a star that small is like trying to read the last line of a sight test from 30 feet away

True, Sammy...

If kestas finds it fit enough, let us form a committee then. I propose that Churchill, Ghostmaker, kestas, WhiteSammy, Sean and myself form the Ranking & Icon Creation Committee and work toward delivering a ranking system.

I dunno, what do you think? Seems like the next logical step.

and darwyn i didnt mean to bash your idea i was just saying that i think it would be kinda hard to distinguish the points if you made them smaller.

I think that if a committee is to be formed that those people come up with 2 maybe three options for everyone to chose from. I just dont think that you can get very far with any kind of thread when criticism is seldom constructive and there are many different varieties of symbols or theories on what looks best/rolls of the tongue the easiest.

"them smaller"=stars

sounds good. but really churchill, white sammy and darwyn have been doing all the work, i know nothing about php or icon making. 13 or 8 i think are both ok, so shall we go half way and have say 10? but i dont really like the new icons, i really liked the iron cross one and a few others from before

darwyns and churchills (sorry i forgot who made theses ones)

http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/pp248/nsdarwin/phpDip_medals.jpg

and from that use say the icon (not talking about the names as such here or the colours just the icon itslef) of
soldier
soldier fc
sergeant (i like that military arrow, and these are the easiest to understand, 1 ,2 and 3 arrows)
officer
lieutenant
sub captain (easiers to understand blue lines and dots)

general
emissary
and last two use the iron crosses from darwyns original icons.

well, since im really confuzzled as to how im to show you what i mean....
here this is what i mean
http://www.bungie.net/Stats/Halo3/RankHistory.aspx?player=WhiteSammy
and yes that is in fact me.

what i intend to accomplish out of posting my gamertag link is that you will notice that the level-progression is neat and organized with easy to decipher symbols.

what i am thinking is that you take the ranks one this page...
http://i416.photobucket.com/albums/pp248/nsdarwin/phpDip_medals.jpg
and replace the middle section (from graduate up to master statesman) with insignia like those from here...
http://b.imagehost.org/0985/OverviewDiplomatic_copy.jpg

Now what i propose is that you take that middle section and split it up into three sections or sub-divisions(whichever you choose to call them) and in the three parts there is a unique symbol to it. For example the first section would have the arrows but they would be upside-down like shown bc i would like this to have personality and not a gimmick of some well known organization or game. The second section would be the circles, and lastly the third section would be the stars.

As i have previously mentioned im not savvy with programming therefore i lack the neccessary skills to show you exactly what i mean but i do have ideas and i think that that should be enough.

In total there would be 5 parts:

Group 1 (lowest level)
Consisting of the Bars and are in the order as if a race was about to begin...therefore
3 Bars= Lowest rank
2 Bars
1 Bar = Highest Rank

Group 2:
Consisting of the Arrows are in order of least to greatest to signify gaining of knowledge or experience or both:
1 Arrow = Highest rank
2 Arrows
3 Arrows= Lowest rank

Group 3:
Consists of the Circles with bars added as the person excels in diplomacy
Basic Circle= Lowest rank
Circle+Bar
Circle+2 Bars=Highest rank

Group 4:
Consists of the Stars and would be ranked the same way as the arrows.
1 Star= Lowest rank
2 Stars
3 Stars= Highest rank

Group 5 is well...special:
Top 20(but not including the top 10 people)= Master Diplomat
Top 10(but not including the top person)= Lord's Council
Tippity Top = Sovereign

By doing what i have suggested you keep in simple.

My Reasoning:

You would have an introductery division of people with stupid names and very basic/meaningless symbols with no importance. Then you would have the bulk of the sites population within the groups 2,3, and 4. Seeing as many got so overrun having 17 symbols there would be only 9 in this big chunk. Many will argue that my proposal will have more than necessary but i feel that it brings space for organization and competitiveness. Although it does in fact consist of 15 ranks, i feel that it accomplishes both satisfying kestas's concern for less well also satisfying those who say more is better in order to fight inflation. This seemingly impossible task is acheived by spliting the playing field into the three big groups(nubs, everyone else, and the elites).

If anything needs clarification ill prolly catch it after this is posted so please hold on a bit for me to have a good look at what all i wrote exactly but if i dont answer any questions then feel free to have a go at me and my proposal.

ok so the biggies that i caught are in chronological order:

1)
Group 2...
1 Arrow=Lowest not highest like i said
and
3 Arrows=Highest not lowest like i said

2)
above "My Reasoning" that line should read...
"keep it simple." not "keep in simple."

3)
in "My Reasoning" after meantioning kestas
"...for less well also..." should read "...for less while also..."

thats all i noticed that i find confusing but once again if you have any questions or constructive criticism please let me know.

oh and i forgot to say

GO!!!!!!
after the line reading

"1 Bar = Highest Rank"




te-he-he

and one last thing
i didnt place a specific title next to a rank since this method of organization kinda chops some space out of creativity to make way for organization and easy to understand level progression.

and...um...that last sentence isnt supposed to sound like i have a superiority complex

so buddy-ol-pals what do you think of my awesome, flawless, master piece of a ranking system, you know to put it in an unbiased description.