is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

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FrankJones
Posts: 2441
Joined: 30 June 2024, 00:24

is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by FrankJones »

Hey all,

I have been on BGA for a number of years but only recently started playing Terraforming Mars. (And I do not have much overall experience here in other games either. Sometimes I am not sure where important information is located on the screen). I like the way BGA displays the end-game situation and information and statistics, especially for point-salad games like TFM and Earth.

So, I was disappointed yesterday when an opponent quit (or conceded?) with literally one action left in the game. This resulted in a basically blank display of info, as though the game did not occur. (it indicated a score of 20-20, each of us with the starting 20 TR points and nothing else). I wanted to see how well I had done. It's not often one can end a 2-player game, corporate era, with no preludes, in 10 generations when the opponent only did 12 (at most) of the 42 necessary Terraforming steps. It would have made for a cool screenshot, being perhaps my most successful game out of hundreds played (mostly on other sites).

Anyway, I was surprised, because the player had decent Karma (88, I think it was), and it seemed like poor sportsmanship to not stick around for literally the final play (The 9th ocean).

I think the game notification said, "[PLAYER ____] has conceded the game".

At first, I thought the player had just rage quit, having had the game not go well. But maybe there is a "concede" option that is different from "quitting", and can be done without penalty in an obviously lost game? I do not know, because I am not overly familiar with this site, and I would not quit or concede. I finish the games I start, with chess being a notable exception - it's not considered bad sportsmanship to lay down your king when facing imminent checkmate. In fact, in TFM, I do not recall seeing a "quit" or "concede" button. I accidentally set a game to no draft (I wish it would keep my draft option to "yes" by default sine I always choose it), was obviously going to lose, being presented with 4 trash cards every time while my opponent got dealt one amazing card after another, but I still finished it. But I digress.

If this player did want to concede and move on, do it in generation 5, not generation 10 right before the game is about to end. I thought this was bad sportsmanship, so I gave the red thumbs down, especially since it was done with no comment in the chat box. We had previously exchanged pleasantries at the start of the game, including "gl hf" from the opponent.

Since real-time scoring is an option, I am a bit surprised that the end-game screen didn't at least show the scoring as of the concession by the opponent.

Thoughts?
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brh2113
Posts: 83
Joined: 26 January 2014, 02:25

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by brh2113 »

Conceding a game:

- Can only be done in 2 player
- Is available once the game is >50% terraformed
- Records a win for you and a loss for the conceder
- Grants full elo for a full win to you, and full elo loss to the conceder, exactly the same as if the game had completed
- Does not come with any karma penalty
- Does not record full BGA end-game stats, since the game didn't finish all the way

Rage quitting / timing out / etc is

- Available in any game size
- At any moment
- Records a win for your opponent, and a loss for the rage quitter
- Grants elo to the winner according to the % compelete the game was, and grants a full 100% elo loss to the quitter, with a large penalty on top (something like an additional 1x the loss they'd get from conceding)
- Comes with a karma penalty

The second one is clearly bad manner, and is actively punished by BGA, both in terms of karma and stacked elo subtraction penalties. I prefer not to concede either and I'm usually a little annoyed when my opponent does it unless the game was truly over but it'd take a while to resolve, but in terms of BGA rules / karma / elo, a formal concede is the same as a loss.
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xspuipuke
Posts: 221
Joined: 13 July 2021, 16:51

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by xspuipuke »

I don't mind if people concede—a win is a win, isn't it? :D Although, on the other hand, I would never hit the concede button without asking my opponent first if that's OK with them. And sometimes, even a seemingly lost game, can be turned into a win so conceding is not always the best idea anyway.
FrankJones
Posts: 2441
Joined: 30 June 2024, 00:24

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by FrankJones »

Conceding when there is literally ONE action left before officially ending the game and displaying the end-game stats is the height of bad sportsmanship. I think it should have a minus 30 Karma penalty. It is spiteful and childish. It is the equivalent of pulling the power cord from the back of a video game system when the opponent is about to win the video game.

It happened now in two consecutive games. I had clicked "plant conversation" in the second such game and was literally hovering my mouse over the spot, and the opponent quit the game, rather spitefully denying me the chance to see the final score or game situation (and also essentially deleting it from the records).

This was not a question of "conceding an obviously lost game". It was lost many generations earlier. Allowing it to play out that long only to concede with one move left is, well, as I described above, petty, childish and petulant. It's behavior I would not tolerate in an 8-year-old. It would be akin to a child playing a card game and, at the last trick of the game, knocking the table over and throwing the cards across the room.

It's weird how similar the two games were; almost as though it were the same person with two different accounts.

Both games were a complete slaughter.
Both games had the losing player scoring zero total points from Milestones, awards, cities, and greeneries,
Both games were conceded just as the final move was about to be made.
Both games were conceded without a word in the chat box even though polite pleasantries had been exchanged earlier in the chat box.
Both games had a 50-60 point margin of victory with the losing player failing to even attain a TR of 35 in a 2-player game despite also scoring 0 points in 4 other scoring categories.

So, okay, I get it, sometimes a game goes poorly. Maybe these players are so bad and so clueless that they honestly were not aware that it was a truly hopeless situation until they saw me about to perform TR#42. Should I turn on live scoring (which I hate, but I'll do it if it avoids this annoying occurrence)?
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xspuipuke
Posts: 221
Joined: 13 July 2021, 16:51

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by xspuipuke »

I don‘t get it. If it‘s so important to you, just calculate your final score yourself. You can always look at the final game situation—all information is there if you really need it.


Out of curiosity, I had a look at your latest game in which your opponent conceded: In that game, in the last generation before the conceding, you buy a useless SP city instead of just placing greeneries and ending the game, thus, forcing your opponent through yet another pointless generation. I can see how they value their time more and leave.
FrankJones
Posts: 2441
Joined: 30 June 2024, 00:24

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by FrankJones »

xspuipuke wrote: 05 February 2025, 21:10 I don‘t get it. If it‘s so important to you, just calculate your final score yourself. You can always look at the final game situation—all information is there if you really need it.


Out of curiosity, I had a look at your latest game in which your opponent conceded: In that game, in the last generation before the conceding, you buy a useless SP city instead of just placing greeneries and ending the game, thus, forcing your opponent through yet another pointless generation. I can see how they value their time more and leave.
What don't you get? I clearly laid out my reasons for objecting to this. And, yeah, he values his time, THAT is the reason he sat through the entire generation 11 but only left when he saw I clicked "plant conversion" for the final TR. You're really straining here.

Also, you are trolling me right? You cannot be serious regarding the city I placed in gen 10.

Had I not placed the city, I would have had 45 Megacredits. You're suggesting that with 45 MC I could have performed two temperature bumps (cost 28 MC), and FIVE oxygen increases? That's a cool trick; can you elaborate on that so I can demolish my opponents in future games with this heretofore unknown sequence?

Also, the opponent forced himself through unnecessary extra generations by spending his money on nonsense instead of terraforming. At gen 9, if he had just said, "Let's just both agree to SP Terraform and end this", I would have agreed. But it seemed as though he wanted to run his engine and leave the Terraforming to me. I calculated that I could not end the game in gen 10 (obviously; I'm not sure how you missed this), and that I could afford one city and still complete the TRs in the next gen. If I am going to spend 23 MC 5 or 6 times on greeneries, I'm putting a city next to them if I can afford it, which I calculated I would be able to. So, I "wasted" 10 seconds to do that, whereas basically every move my opponent made was a waste since he stopped trying to Terraform anything halfway through the game.

Come on, at this point, you're just giving me a hard time over nothing. If you want to support poor etiquette and poor sportsmanship, fine, but don't somehow put this on me. In the two games in question, I ended them in gens 10 and 11 with corporate era and no preludes despite little help terraforming by my opponent. Do not make it as though I am dragging the game out to run up the score. In both gamed I ended the game as early as I could possibly could, passing up some fun cards in the process that I would typically want to buy and play.
FrankJones
Posts: 2441
Joined: 30 June 2024, 00:24

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by FrankJones »

Apparently, I am just so good, no one can complete a game against me without conceding.

Where are the challengers?/

AE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED ????

:)

happened again, obviously.
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Suoivax
Posts: 345
Joined: 13 April 2022, 00:27

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by Suoivax »

Different perspective for ya....

Why should I be forced to watch your score tally just for the sake of your ego?
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xspuipuke
Posts: 221
Joined: 13 July 2021, 16:51

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by xspuipuke »

I may have mis-read the log of that game in question; I didn't watch the replay, just checked the log after game end—no need to become so angry about it.

By the way, I'm happy to play a game with you and not concede, turn based in a friendly setting. Anytime you want.
FrankJones
Posts: 2441
Joined: 30 June 2024, 00:24

Re: is "Conceding" different from "quitting"?

Post by FrankJones »

Suoivax wrote: 06 February 2025, 12:05 Different perspective for ya....

Why should I be forced to watch your score tally just for the sake of your ego?
Nobody is suggesting anyone be forced to do anything.
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