Major improvement about quitting players

[jdietz]

I love the new system.

I wish you could do this in real life - to force players who are taking more than their fair share of thinking time (as compared to the other players) to skip the rest of their turn.

[LisaLisLi]

Well, I've found the new system to be terrible because of my experience last night, which I've found is similar to what several other players have recently experienced.
It allows for those very poor sport players to end the game prematurely when you're making your last move if you've just run out of time.

My example:
I was playing in Seasons in the last minute of the game, so we'd all invested some time into the game. I had a ton of stored energy saved up to transmute and was midway transmuting my energies gaining a ton of vp and was running out of time and a poor player named RiahBlood decided to skip my turn, which ended the game right then and there for everyone, giving me a red thumb, and of course I acquired not only a time penalty but also a leave penalty, which I've never received up until now. When he skipped me, I tried to get back in, but got a message saying that my timer was at 0 and therefore I had to leave the room. I stayed in disbelief and a few moments later, I was kicked out of the game to find that the game was forced into abandonment because RiahBlood skipped me, even though the other player left would never have agreed to abandon the game in the last move. The move before I knew I was running low on time and politely asked the players not to skip me (I didn't even think it a possibility, though, as we were at the very end of the game!), but RiahBlood obviously couldn't handle the lose so he decided to take a temper tantrum and ruin the game for everyone. I was ACTIVELY taking my turn, transmuting my energies when he did this- I obviously hadn't left the computer and I was clicking away in the game so he very well knew I was there and he was just being sour!

Since I've never run into getting a leave penalty before, and rarely even go over time, this new system really did a disservice to me here as far as my rep goes. It just gave the same sore sport players more power, imo. He ended the game within the last minute of it while I was actively playing it (and making a power move) because he didn't want to lose, and he topped it off with a red thumb, which is absurd! I knew something was up from the very start when he wouldn't say hello like everyone else. but I didn't expect all this!

[Liallan]

To collectively abandon the game, I would have to message the player and hope they actually read their messages. This is such a pain in the @$$

Yeah, it is. I guess I just prefer that to skipping turns which to me ruins stuff. And most of my turn-based get abandoned early so I wouldn't have any desire to play through the game.

The person on Seasons Table n°12242057 who(m) I'm skipping is new to the BGA website. And ever since turn-based started, the majority of zombies are people new to BGA. It would be nice to not allow "mortals" to be allowed to play turn based games.

Even though I get your point, I wouldn't want to see that. I came here only because of the turn-based, and while I play real time on occasion, that's not really my thing. And I was not comfortable playing real-time. So I wouldn't have liked being forced into getting the requirements of angel before playing turn-based. I also know a number of people who only came here because of the turn-based and don't want to play real-time.

But... that said, that's also why I prefer the expelling method, cause most of the abandons I get are early and yes, usually newbies. If we can expel them, it's not as much of an issue.

ARE ANY OF THE MODERATORS READING ANY OF THESE POSTS????? If so, please change it back immediately. This "improvement" is just awful, terrible, abominable, horrendous, atrocious, hideous, loathsome, repulsive, despicable, disgraceful, wretched, vile . . .

Not thinking of anything more I could possibly add to that.

[trojanrabbit]

Just had my own strange experience. Joined a game of Tash-Kalar and was first to be able to pick my faction. As soon as I did, it said the game was over and recorded as a tie, the score 0-0. No notice about what my opponent did. My Elo goes down and his goes up because of the tie. He gets no leave or timeout penalties.

This seems extremely open to abuse.

[Liallan]

Addressing both Krystal and LisaLisLi... meant to post this a few days ago, but my games wouldn't work in Firefox, but discovered the forum's a mess in Internet Explorer, so I just closed everything and said the heck with it.

Anyway, first a note @ Krystal -- yes, a lot of people were having problems with people abandoning games. I already addressed this to someone else who posted and asked the same thing. For real-time, people like to leave when they are going to lose, thereby screwing up the other people ever finishing the game. This also sometimes happens with turn-based, but the more likely scenario there is newbies taking a game and just never showing up to take a turn at all. It's the people leaving due to losing who are the more serious problem.

So, yes, there definitely is a problem. However, this is a pathetic solution.

I said in another post that I thought this was a good way to open a lot of abuse, and that people could use this to control certain things. It does suck that someone would purposely skip your turns when you were actively moving. If you haven't already, both of you need to report those players. It both cases it sounds like they didn't want to lose. Even if you were being too slow for their tastes, it certainly doesn't hurt to wait on one last move, so I do suspect they just didn't want to lose. And a lot of people could do that if you're a little long on time. So these are just some good examples of the abuse this will get, in addition to all the other problems with it. (Or in other words, the people who were abandoning games just now have a new way they can abandon the game.)

[Liallan]

And now I have my own story, except this is about the penalties...

At one time for turn-based you got an over-time penalty if you went over your turn time.

Then recently it seems this time got tripled, so you had to go over 3 times your turn time to get the penalty. I'm not sure why that happened to start with, and it only happened on some games. Funny thing was, I got an over-time penalty once and it was NOT 3 times the turn-time. I was over the basic turn-time. I guess I'm just special.

So now it appears no one gets the penalty unless they go over TOTAL time, not just turn time. I've already posted my reasons why I hate that concept to start with. Not that anyone cared.

However, making it worse, I missed a day coming on here recently (I've missed 2 days ever since I joined), and I got hit up with an over-time penalty for the two games I was still playing. One of them is a 1-turn-per-day game, where we get 24 hours for turn time, but a total start time of 5 days. I still had 5 days. If people don't get a penalty until the total time is gone, why would i get one for being over the 24 hours?

What's more interesting is that in my other game, which was a 2-turn-per-day game, my opponent was the one being slow. Partway through the game he started being late for pretty much every turn, i.e. over 12 hours. So his total time kept dropping cause he was cutting into the start time. NEVER did he get an over-time penalty for this, which is my proof that I'm correct in my understanding that you don't get a penalty unless you use up the full time. He never got a penalty until his time went into a negative.

However, because of that one day I wasn't here, I DID get an over-time penalty and I was never in a negative. I still had enough start time left that that should not have happened.

So I'm trying to figure out how my opponent was over the 12 hour time all the frickin' game, and never got a penalty for that, and only got it after he went into a negative, and yet I got TWO over-time penalties just for being over the turn-time and was never in a negative on either game. So how is I'm being punished for this? My opponent was slow the whole game, and I missed one day and got a penalty?? I guess I didn't get the "benefit" of this new plan.

Seriously, WTF?

Or more seriously, is anyone really even paying attention? I'm guessing not. I'm somewhat guessing no one cares, and I'm having to use a lot of control right now not to just start cussing up a storm, cause I'm pretty much seriously fed up with this place. And I'm most definitely fed up when I feel no one is even listening, and this isn't the first time no one was listening.

[LisaLisLi]

Addressing both Krystal and LisaLisLi... meant to post this a few days ago, but my games wouldn't work in Firefox, but discovered the forum's a mess in Internet Explorer, so I just closed everything and said the heck with it.

Anyway, first a note @ Krystal -- yes, a lot of people were having problems with people abandoning games. I already addressed this to someone else who posted and asked the same thing. For real-time, people like to leave when they are going to lose, thereby screwing up the other people ever finishing the game. This also sometimes happens with turn-based, but the more likely scenario there is newbies taking a game and just never showing up to take a turn at all. It's the people leaving due to losing who are the more serious problem.

So, yes, there definitely is a problem. However, this is a pathetic solution.

I said in another post that I thought this was a good way to open a lot of abuse, and that people could use this to control certain things. It does suck that someone would purposely skip your turns when you were actively moving. If you haven't already, both of you need to report those players. It both cases it sounds like they didn't want to lose. Even if you were being too slow for their tastes, it certainly doesn't hurt to wait on one last move, so I do suspect they just didn't want to lose. And a lot of people could do that if you're a little long on time. So these are just some good examples of the abuse this will get, in addition to all the other problems with it. (Or in other words, the people who were abandoning games just now have a new way they can abandon the game.)

Certainly agree with you that this is opening lots of windows for abuse. I reported riahblood for 'taking advantage of a bug' and the report came back as 'no rules were broken here', obviously bc its a flaw in the system which allows for abuse without any penalties. He did lose, was at the bottom of the scoreboard when it showed up at the end even though he made us abandon the game.

I have run into yet another flaw in this new system, which I will post below.

[LisaLisLi]

I just ran into another flaw of this system. I'm sorry that so much time and effort was put into this but more time is needed to correct it!

I just played over an hour long 4 player live game of seasons, where in the very last move, a player named 'shaftdiggity' decided he'd not come back to the game. About 10 minutes later he did come online, but didn't make his move. He's in last place, we counted up our scores. It's been over 35 minutes and he has yet to make his move. So what, we skip his turn and ruin all the time we put into it?

I contribute to this site almost monthly, and it doesn't seem like anyone is listening to us. I don't want to play with anyone I haven't played before, for fear they're a sore loser and will make everyone abandon the game during the last turn after an hours time has been put into it. Will this sore loser give us all a thumbs down- probably, and is it our fault he can't handle a loss? No! This is ridiculous, I'm sorry. I know how much time it takes to code all this up, but PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE FIX IT to where we're not afraid to play with people we haven't played before! In a short game, ok, fine, but in a longer game like seasons, why waste my time and risk getting the thumbs down from these people? You've opened the door for abuse abuse abuse of the system and the only ones losing out are the ones the system was supposed to be protecting in the first place!

edit to say 1 hr 10 mins has gone by and he's come back online 4 times for several minutes at a time. you can't say he isn't just waiting for us to skip him so he can play more games.

[firexed]

In a game of Jaipur, opponent made a move and then stopped playing.Only options then was to leave with a penalty or continue playing all 3 rounds by myself after skipping his turn.

This system is extremely flawed.

[Een]

Hi,

I know how much time it takes to code all this up

Thank you! Some commenters really don't seem to, or maybe they wouldn't be so harsh...

So what, we skip his turn

Yes, absolutely.

and ruin all the time we put into it?

No, you skip his turn, then you finish the game (which is near completed) with him skipping all his remaining turns. Then everyone gets his ELO according to the result, and he gets both a "leave" penalty and an ELO penalty (well deserved in this case).

I see that's he choice you made in the end, and the game is over with exactly that result.

With the old system, you would have had to expulse him, then continue to the end with the zombie skipping just the same and get no ELO, or agree to abandon the game and get no ELO. How is the new system not better in regards to this case? It has been precisely set in place for this kind of occurrence (rage quit or player not taking its turn near the end of the game).

I contribute to this site almost monthly

Thanks again! This site could not run without the community's financial support.

and it doesn't seem like anyone is listening to us.

Really? The system has been adjusted on several accounts since the first post in this thread, and a FAQ (http://boardgamearena.com/#!doc/Game_clock) has been set up by sourisdudesert to track the current state of affairs (some commenters clearly didn't read it, or didn't check for changes before posting).

Anyway, this is a free to play website, and we made the choice not to be riddled with ads. Our time is scarce: the fact that we don't use a lot of it answering the forums doesn't mean that we don't listen and don't value your input when it is thoughtfully, courteously and - if possible - concisely formulated. It's true, we usually choose to use our time improving the site over talking about what we did. Maybe that''s a mistake, but it allows for more progress with the time we have. Please also consider that we are not native English speakers, and writing a post such as this one takes more time and effort for us than for players from English speaking countries.

A big thanks to all the players who understand this and support this website with their contributions, whichever form they take.
Some posters seem to think BGA is a multinational hydra with lots of VPs of everything and business angels struggling to get us to take their money, and that we owe them the world just for showing up and having a game. In a sense, it's flattering, but still... nowhere near the truth.

I don't want to play with anyone I haven't played before, for fear they're a sore loser and will make everyone abandon the game during the last turn after an hours time has been put into it.

Again, the situation regarding this is better than before. I don't understand the reasons behind your fear.

Will this sore loser give us all a thumbs down

Maybe, but he will get more (one from you each), and so he will quicky be identified as a bad player if he goes on behaving like this, while you won't: red thumbs only have meaning in proportion to green thumbs. Getting one red thumb in one game is not significant and should not be regarded as such (or feared).

In a game of Jaipur, opponent made a move and then stopped playing.Only options then was to leave with a penalty or continue playing all 3 rounds by myself after skipping his turn.

You are mistaken. Your options were:

• Skip his turn, then finish the game with him automatically skipping his next turns, and get ELO at the end of the game;
• Skip his turn, then abandon the game with no penalty to you. As stated in the FAQ (http://boardgamearena.com/#!doc/Game_clock), players whose turn was skipped automatically vote yes when a player proposes to abandon the game.

In both cases, your opponent gets both an ELO penalty and a "leave" penalty. So your choice is in fact pretty simple: continue for ELO or just stop there and use your time for something else. Whatever your choice, you get no penalty.

You've opened the door for abuse abuse abuse of the system and the only ones losing out are the ones the system was supposed to be protecting in the first place!

This system is extremely flawed.

We don't think so. The new system may not be as good as we'd have liked it to be, but the ratio "number of games finished without trouble over number of played games" is pretty much the same, or even slightly better.

If we learned something from running this website, it's that no system is perfect. We won't rush this one to the trash before giving it a fair try and getting enough data to draw conclusions.
And yes, there are certainly some bugs left. That's a law of software, and it takes time to fix. Please report them as such or vote for them if they have already been reported: that's the useful thing to do.

Hope this clears some things up. Also, please remember that this is a gaming website, meant to be experienced as such! (that means, with a light heart and a touch of humor, even in the face of adverse draws and rolls )

Cheers,
Een