Modern Warfare 2: The Importance of First Blood

I started doing full game's to determine winning probabilities. In that time, I began wondering "why do games say who gets first blood?" "Why does it matter?" So, I started to, along with all the other stuff I gather, mark which team got first blood and whether or not they win the match. I wasn't too startled by the results but it is intriguing. I found that about 63% of the time, the team that get's first blood goes on to win the game. 

Why would first blood matter that much? How can it have that much predictive power? One hypothesis I thought of was that the more "skilled" player in the match gets first blood and this person contributes a lot to his team and the team ends up winning. 

Modern Warfare 2: Map Breakdown Update

Here is the update. There are now 124 samples and I believe the true probabilities are starting to show themselves. Scrapyard and Skidrow come in first with 10.48%. The expected percentage is 6.25% meaning that if the probability for each map was equal, we should see the maps 6.25% of the time. Scrapyard and Skidrow are nearly double that. Rust is still in last place, I have yet to see it again since I started collecting data.

Modern Warfare 2: Search and Destroy

For those of you interested, here is a post by a guy that I read often. In this post, he explains those "must win games" in a series. While he uses an NHL example, because the series is a best of seven, it can be easily applied to a Search and Destroy match (best of seven). He shows that the most crucial game is in fact game seven of a 3-3 match, while the next most important match is the 6th game of a 3-2 match.



Click here for the analysis.

Modern Warfare 2: Map Breakdown

Ever feel like you're playing the same maps over and over again with no end in sight? Well, I did. So, after looking around the web for the probabilities of each map to play, I decided to take things into my own hands. Currently, I only have 53 data points for this but for now, it'll suffice. I'll be adding onto it with the more data I get. Right now, it seems that Scrapyard comes in #1 at 17% while Invasion and Terminal are tied for second at 11%. Below is a neat little pie chart for the rest of them as of right now.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 - Winning Probability

I think it would be pretty cool to be able to determine a winning percentage based on the score at any given time in a match. For instance, with 5 minutes left in a Team Deathmatch, Team 1 has a score of 4500 and Team 2 has a score of 4000, through the sample's I will be able to determine a winning percentage based on that (and all times and scores). Say, that through the samples a team with a 500 point lead (Team 1) with 5 minutes left to go in a match, they have a 55% chance of actually winning the game.

Example 2: Team 1 has a 1000 (6000 to 5000) point lead with :30 left to go. Their winning percentage is probably much more higher, maybe around 95% (I'm just assuming, I don't have all the data I need) (with nukes and other last minute killstreak rewards etc... accounting for the 5% Team 2 could win.)