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Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 08:30
by Espina
Hi,

As far as I can tell from playing tournament games, running out of time in a tournament game gives you a karma penalty, but no ELO penalty. Is this correct? Is this by design? Because if so, it is a VERY FLAWED SYSTEM, and VERY UNFAIR. Because it means that if you are definitely going to lose a tournament game (because your opponent has just made a move after which every response is a losing move), then you can avoid ELO loss by simply not playing the rest of the game. True, you lose some reputation but if you play a lot, you can gain that back pretty quickly. On the other hand, if you stand to lose a lot of ELO by winning a game, you can conveniently avoid losing it in this fashion.

I would have thought that nobody would do this (it is pretty unsporting!) but sadly I've been cheated out of ELO gain in this way several times in the last few weeks!

If I remember correctly, before the reputation system was changed, one *did* lose ELO for running out of time, and this phenomenon is new since the karma system was put in place. But maybe I am wrong about that. In any case, please fix this problem. Thanks!

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 08:50
by Espina
By the way, before posting this message, I did a search to see whether anyone else had posted about something similar. I did find another post (apparently with nine replies) with the same subject line. But when I clicked to go to that post I got an error message from the server. So I don't know whether this has already been discussed to death... Sorry.

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 09:37
by sourisdudesert
Do you have a table ID so I can have a look?

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 10:09
by Espina
Well, most recently it happened in Battle of LITS #29423261. In this case I actually skipped his turn (which I almost never do) about 15 mins before it would have been abandoned anyway (for the next round of the tournament) because I wanted to see if that would have a different outcome from if the game was abandoned automatically. Turns out it does not.

Anyway, he made several moves in quick succession before I made what should have been a winning move. And then he stopped playing with something like 10 hours on his clock. I will grant that in this case it may not have been deliberate because I understand he has a time difference from me, but on other occasions I have encountered people who, when they find themselves in a lost position, do not play for 5 days until the game is abandoned. Sadly I did not keep track of the table IDs at the time. Maybe I could find them if I scroll through all my games, but I don't know if I have the energy to do that. But I will certainly keep track of them should it happen again.

To clarify though, I didn't post here to ask that something be done about the tables on which this has already happened, but rather that something be done to prevent this sort of behavior in the future. (And I would also like to get a sense of whether other people are also encountering a lot of this sort of thing, or whether my experience is an anomaly...)

Thanks for your response.

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 13:30
by jhauser42
I also had a tournament game end that way recently. Table Carcassonne #29461698. I was the one who was out of time, likely due to our time zone differences. When the next tourney game was ready to start my opponent was declared the winner as he had more time left but there was no ELO change for either of us.

However, I am not sure this should be changed. This could also be abused by people to gain ELO, not just to avoid losing it. If a player in a certain losing position notices that his opponent is out of time all the certain loser would have to do is not play and make sure he has more time left when the game will end. Since the system declares the winner based on time remaining the loser would then be declared the winner and get ELO points he/she does not deserve. This is not as easy to abuse as avoiding losing points as you never know when your opponent will come back and play, but is certainly possible, especially in the last few hours before the next game starts.

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 16:13
by Cactus Tom
@jhauser42, you have a legitimate concern; having a rating change for time forfeits can also be abused. However, I think Espina's case is much stronger. Gaining points because your opponent runs out of time is not a problem that can be avoided by playing your moves in a timely fashion. On the other hand, I have seen abuse of the current system on quite a few occasions. I think people don't enjoy playing out their losing positions in the first place, and the fact that they won't lose rating points strengthens the temptation to walk away.

I had thought, because of the system messages, there was a real distinction between actively skipping the opponent's turn using the button, and simply waiting for the system to abandon the game, and I thought it was whether ELO was changed. I thought this was a rather clever design decision, because it allowed the player with more time to decide whether they wanted to consider that they had won, and claim the rating points, or to spurn this advantage if they thought their opponent didn't deserve to lose. I normally would allow games to be abandoned unless I felt I was in a winning position as well as ahead on time. But I would also support a system where the player ahead on time just wins, without having to make this decision.

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 18:01
by sprockitz
If you skip a players turn before the game automatically abandons, Elo rating points are exchanged (plus the opponent receives an extra -10 Elo penalty). You gain Elo at a rate of Normal Elo * Percent of Game Completed. Your opponent loses 100% Elo and 10 additional points.

Here is an example from today of a game that was ended by one player skipping another in a tournament.

https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!table?table=29370151

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 18:32
by Espina
@sprokitz So basically you are saying that it is indeed as Cactus Tom says. Hmm. I wonder why that did not happen in my Battle of LITS game.

https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!table?table=29423261

It says: Game abandoned, but if you look at the replay, you will see that I did skip his turn (which, as I said in my other post, I almost never do, but here I felt I had the high ground). Any thoughts?

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 21 April 2017, 19:21
by turtler7
Sorry if I double post, I tried to reply and it seems to have disappeared.

Skipping the players turn and the change for an automatic timeout appear to be identical.
https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!gamesta ... finished=1
Takenoko
#29480832
04/18/2017
-10 → 495
Takenoko
#29437928
04/17/2017
8 → 495

This change in elo from my elo log shows that I had already hit 495 from a game and then lost 10 to return to 495. It does not show the 10 point gain in the elo log from my opponent timing out. The end of game screen showed no numbers either so I didn't know it was 10 gained until compared to my elo on either side.
https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!table?table=29461676
Even though it didn't show the gain it DOES show a change in category because of the shift. I have this going the other direction in a different game.
https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!gamesta ... finished=1
#29461855
04/17/2017
6 → 436
Jaipur
#29370411
04/16/2017
-15 → 458
Here my elo dropped from 458 to 420 in between log entries from two games that timed out on the same day when I was too busy with a bad time zone matchup. All gains occur or are lost like normal from timeout and skip but the winner gains a little less based on the % game finished and the loser also gets a -10 per game elo penalty.

Re: Running out of time in tournaments

Posted: 24 April 2017, 16:58
by jhauser42
I am not at all sure I know what is going on here.

In this game https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!table?table=29600715 the system ended the game automatically and I had not skipped the other player's turn even though I had that option. When the game ended it declared me the winner but it does not show any ELO changes.

When I look at my Carc ELO history, https://en.boardgamearena.com/#!table?table=29600715, that game does not show up in the list but it is on my general list of games played in my profile.

When I look at my overall ELO scores it seems like my score went up 27 points, from 100 to 127. However I cannot see that change in the history linked above nor does it show in the game end page. So it seems that abandoned games count for ELO but the ELO change does not show up on the game results page or in the game ELO history list. Is this the way it is supposed to be?