How to chat at a game I'm invited to but not joined?

[Cos-]

I sadly cannot tell you how to do this as a step by step...

But you can put it back to the old interface. Something about Manual somewhere.

When I join or send invites I am back to using the old style interface and have my discuss button.

I find all new interface looks have been absolutely negatively impactful on function. To someone who just wants to click a single play button and never know what happened why or how, I suppose that is a benefit. But to anyone trying to organize groups, curate game settings, and play specific things it is so much worse.

Your solution exists! Hopefully someone else can help you figure out how to get it to show you the interface you want. I can still use mine the way it used to be and it still functions and has my ability to talk at the table in setup.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely do not want the new interface - it's very badly broken, confusing, and hard to use. If I could just get the old table interface all the time, I would. But I don't know of a way to do that. You say my solution exists, and you say I can put it back to the old interface ... how? I don't know how.

Right now there are two tables I've been invited to, where I want to say something _before_ I accept. In both cases, I want to ask them to change a setting, and I don't want to accept the table if they don't change it. But I have no way to say anything at those tables. I'm stuck with the new interface, and there is now chat there. Help?

[nik592]

You need to get to a URL of the form:

https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=xxxx&nr=true

Where you replace xxxx with the table number. If you click on the invite, you will see the table number in the URL for the game page. That takes you to the old interface and the discuss button is there.

And I agree, there should be a better way than this. There is a bug report for it, which actually mentions this thread: https://boardgamearena.com/bug?id=79791 (ETA: and I see you've already been there )

[Cullich]

I don't know if this is the "Manual" mentioned by turtler7 or not. But the way my game lobby looks has 3 boxes at the top: Simple Game/Arena/Tournament on the left; Real-Time/Turn-Based in the middle; and Friends/Automatic/Manual on the right. I have my right one set to Manual (selection of opponents).

And I have that discuss button when I go into the invite. I've seen it next to the "Join Game" button, but not always. But it seems to always be to the left under "Players around this table now," where the audio and video buttons are. It pops open the chat box for that game. But just starting to type (as sourisdudesert mentioned) doesn't seem to work. It does work in-game but not when you aren't joined. Not that I much care cause that one extra click isn't a big deal (to me).

[Cos-]

You need to get to a URL of the form:

https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=xxxx&nr=true

Where you replace xxxx with the table number. If you click on the invite, you will see the table number in the URL for the game page. That takes you to the old interface and the discuss button is there.

Yay, that works!! Thank you!!

[Cos-]

I don't know if this is the "Manual" mentioned by turtler7 or not. But the way my game lobby looks has 3 boxes at the top: Simple Game/Arena/Tournament on the left; Real-Time/Turn-Based in the middle; and Friends/Automatic/Manual on the right. I have my right one set to Manual (selection of opponents).

And I have that discuss button when I go into the invite. I've seen it next to the "Join Game" button, but not always. But it seems to always be to the left under "Players around this table now," where the audio and video buttons are. It pops open the chat box for that game. But just starting to type (as sourisdudesert mentioned) doesn't seem to work. It does work in-game but not when you aren't joined. Not that I much care cause that one extra click isn't a big deal (to me).

I don't understand what you're describing.

Attaching two images here. First is the "new" table screen for a game I've been invited to but have not yet accepted. It's the one with a big blue "Start" button on the right side. When someone invites me to a table and I click on that invitation, it takes me to a page that looks like this one. On this page, there is no way for me to chat with the other people at the table.

Second image is the old table screen, for the very same table, but using a URL like nik592 suggested. That's the one with a "Join Game" blue button at top center. That's what it used to look like by default when I would click on an invitation until... maybe two years ago? I forget exactly when it changed. On this old version of the table page, there is a "discuss" button on the left, and when I click it, the chat box for the table opens up at bottom right. Just like the chat box you get when the game is actually in progress, after everyone accepts.

BGA has hidden this older version of the page, so if you didn't know the exact form of URL, you can't get to it, as far as I can tell. You can't navigate two it. And on the new, more confusing version of the page (the first image), there is no way to open a chat box for the table.

[Edit: I tried to attach the images, but the forum just threw them out. I tried to attach again, and saw a message like "the board attachment quota has been reached" or something like that. So I guess I can't attach images here at all.]

[Cullich]

I don't know if this is the "Manual" mentioned by turtler7 or not. But the way my game lobby looks has 3 boxes at the top: Simple Game/Arena/Tournament on the left; Real-Time/Turn-Based in the middle; and Friends/Automatic/Manual on the right. I have my right one set to Manual (selection of opponents).

And I have that discuss button when I go into the invite. I've seen it next to the "Join Game" button, but not always. But it seems to always be to the left under "Players around this table now," where the audio and video buttons are. It pops open the chat box for that game. But just starting to type (as sourisdudesert mentioned) doesn't seem to work. It does work in-game but not when you aren't joined. Not that I much care cause that one extra click isn't a big deal (to me).

I don't understand what you're describing.

Sorry. My guess is it's the "old" version you are describing, but I'm not sure.

Attaching two images here. First is the "new" table screen for a game I've been invited to but have not yet accepted. It's the one with a big blue "Start" button on the right side. When someone invites me to a table and I click on that invitation, it takes me to a page that looks like this one. On this page, there is no way for me to chat with the other people at the table.

I'm not sure if I've ever seen that page, as described. And without the image, you know, I can't tell.

Second image is the old table screen, for the very same table, but using a URL like nik592 suggested. That's the one with a "Join Game" blue button at top center. That's what it used to look like by default when I would click on an invitation until... maybe two years ago? I forget exactly when it changed. On this old version of the table page, there is a "discuss" button on the left, and when I click it, the chat box for the table opens up at bottom right. Just like the chat box you get when the game is actually in progress, after everyone accepts.

Yeah, that's what I see, the blue Join Game button, and the chat at bottom right like you see in an ongoing game. But this is the way it always looks for me. I don't know if I got grandfathered into this, or changed some setting myself. Don't remember.

BGA has hidden this older version of the page, so if you didn't know the exact form of URL, you can't get to it, as far as I can tell. You can't navigate two it. And on the new, more confusing version of the page (the first image), there is no way to open a chat box for the table.

[Edit: I tried to attach the images, but the forum just threw them out. I tried to attach again, and saw a message like "the board attachment quota has been reached" or something like that. So I guess I can't attach images here at all.]

Yeah, I think I tried to add an image of what I was talking about as well, and haven't figured that out. I know they can be done because I've seen them.

This is a link I copied from a random 7 Wonders invite, which is just where it went. I didn't have to adjust anything.

https://boardgamearena.com/table?table= ... 43&nr=true

It just seems like you're stuck with the "new" interface. So it would be a good idea if they put that Discuss button back. Ironic that I get the page you want but rarely discuss anything ahead of time, and you're getting a page that would work for me. Weird.