Elo

Elo is a system of determining player ratings based on the strength of the players involved. It was created by statistics professor and chess master Arpad Elo in 1960 to improve the chess rating systems then in use, and has since been widely used by a large number of other competitive games to determine player skill. It is sometimes known as ELO, despite the name not being an acronym originally.

The MegaMek server uses the Elo system to determine player ratings. All players begin with a 1600 rating, and they gain or lose rating based on their performance in battles. Winning always increases your rating while losing always decreases it, but the amount that it increases or decreases will depend on the existing ratings of the players. A higher-rated player is expected to win more often, so their winning is not a surprise and moves their rating very little. If they lose, however, it will affect their rating significantly. In MegaMek, the amount that ratings will move(known as the "k-value") is 8, so the difference in final rating between winning a game and losing it is always 8. In general, a player below 1550 is probably a relatively weak player, and a player over 1650 is probably a relatively strong player.

For more details, see the Wikipedia article on the system.

Currently, the Elo of players will adjust the amount of resources and land that they will receive at the end of a combat. Stronger players fighting weaker players get lower rewards and capture less land if victorious, while weaker players fighting stronger players will get more rewards and more land if victorious.