Skipping player turns and coding - curious question

[Dr Wilson]

If that was implemented, then the player running out of time could avoid getting kicked the first time, then after that take forever to play their moves since they aren't under threat anymore, which would kinda defeat the purpose of the kick out function.

If a player takes forever to complete turns after the mulligan/reset, that player could be expelled. It would be a one-time mulligan, not a permanent one.

But in op’s suggestion, the reset happens when they get back in the black. So they’d just have to make sure to always remain in the red to be safe from expulsion.

Actually my original suggestion was, that the expulsion option comes back when the player in the red " increase the time debt", leaving the details intentionally vague. The idea I read in this thread, that the clock could be resetted to zero would work the intended way: If the player exceeds the time limit again he is back in red, retriggering the expulsion option

[tbhp]

If a player takes forever to complete turns after the mulligan/reset, that player could be expelled. It would be a one-time mulligan, not a permanent one.

But in op’s suggestion, the reset happens when they get back in the black. So they’d just have to make sure to always remain in the red to be safe from expulsion.

Actually my original suggestion was, that the expulsion option comes back when the player in the red " increase the time debt", leaving the details intentionally vague. The idea I read in this thread, that the clock could be resetted to zero would work the intended way: If the player exceeds the time limit again he is back in red, retriggering the expulsion option

That explains why I was so confused about your vagueness, I thought you had the usual system in mind.

I agree in spirit that it's not fine to change your mind about expelling a player like that, however I'm not sure if a real solution exists for that.

If people were exposed with such a choice that showed up the first time a player goes in the red, I think we would see a lot more people being kicked out, because people would feel "stuck" with their choice if they were to agree to let them play.

This seems backwards, but in effect it's unrealistic to expect to change the way human indecision works for many people, especially on a subject like this where they may not have a very strong moral opinion.

So I think your suggestion would do more harm than good. Now, every time someone goes in the red, I would have to worry if other players are going to say "yes" to the option of kicking them out. Sure, I already worry, but it feels the likelihood would be higher if they were forced to choose something, instead of the current warning that people generally just ignore.

Another problem is that your idea doesn't work for tournaments, since those have a set duration of time, so it's not an option to indefinitely give a player more time to play. In this case, they would be taking time away from the other players, but then that's not fair for the other players who would end up with less thinking time of their own, and would see the game automatically end before their own clock reaches zero.

[RazorOz]

Heat is a special case because BGA introduced an experimental system for Heat only.
They promised it would be applied to other suitable games (e.g. Roll & Write games) if it is successful, but haven't heard anything since then.

The question is why that is the case though, as you say this system could be implemented for other games, it's a ready made solution to a problem that comes up every few months (and a lot more if you include game specific forums). It has been a huge success at Heat, I don't know anybody that doesn't prefer it this way.

I see ufm already responded, but yes, I was going to say that Heat is a case where dropouts don't really impact the outcome. Roll and Write games would absolutely be another category where this is true (and would be nice if this was implemented there), but for the majority of games (including Terraforming Mars for the most part), this doesn't work. Dropouts have a big impact on how the rest of the game plays out - you can't really continue if a player leaves.

I guess it comes a debate then whether that solution is better than the current solution. I think many more games would benefit from being coded like Heat is, I feel like the majority of games could easily play to conclusion where the impact on the result is minimal at best.

[tbhp]

I don't know Terraforming Mars, but Heat solved this issue ages ago. At Heat the game always plays to conclusion regardless of a player leaving the game. As someone who played before and after the change, I can say it did basically stop the concept of tactical timeouts, albeit that wasn't the reason it was implemented, it was because of quitters having the same effect, where somebody could and often would quit on the last turn when the game result was already decided or effectively decided, and it would void the result.

I am kind of surprised more games don't have this, because this topic constantly comes up for many games, and there always seems a lot of posts acting like nothing can be done, yet like I say the issue was solved for Heat over a year ago. It's also a way, way better implementation for tournament play.

Unless it's part of the original game's rules, this requires basically rewriting the rules of the game to decide what happens when a player leaves, which gets into the whole creator intent can of worms.

This is a French website, we care about auteur theory here.

I guess it comes a debate then whether that solution is better than the current solution. I think many more games would benefit from being coded like Heat is, I feel like the majority of games could easily play to conclusion where the impact on the result is minimal at best.

Minimal is already too much, and you haven't explained how it works for tournaments. How do you ensure games are always played to completion when there is a set duration of time? A game isn't going to magically complete itself if the players don't play. Unless you want to redefine what the completed state of a game looks like, but that would be totally nonsensical for most games. If say a game of Chess is forced to end before checkmate, how do you determine which player won?

[RazorOz]

Unless it's part of the original game's rules, this requires basically rewriting the rules of the game to decide what happens when a player leaves, which gets into the whole creator intent can of worms.

This is a French website, we care about auteur theory here.

Minimal is already too much, and you haven't explained how it works for tournaments. How do you ensure games are always played to completion when there is a set duration of time? A game isn't going to magically complete itself if the players don't play. Unless you want to redefine what the completed state of a game looks like, but that would be totally nonsensical for most games. If say a game of Chess is forced to end before checkmate, how do you determine which player won?

But it's not part of the rules for Heat, the game just plays on with 1 less player, that could be applied to many games. Indeed the way it works for Heat is already implemented for pretty much every game right, because all games I've come across if someone quits you can still play the game to conclusion, ie. the coding for that part to happen already exists, the only difference with Heat, is it's coded so the result isn't void, the result still counts.

That's debatable, I would far rather not waste an hour of my time to people quitting on the last turn, than the few % of the time someone quitting hurt my position in the game.

Games like chess are irrelevant, we're talking about multi-player games/tournaments here, at any 2 player game you can just time your opponent out and you win, you qualify. It's specifically multi-player games and tournaments we're talking about here where that voids the entire result. So the key difference with Heat in a tournament compared to any other game is if someone isn't playing, you can time them out and have it not void the result, you play to the end and the top 2 will qualify rather than it being pot luck/whatever random criteria is used, that would be a better way to do it in the vast majority of games.

[tbhp]

Indeed the way it works for Heat is already implemented for pretty much every game right, because all games I've come across if someone quits you can still play the game to conclusion

You can technically do anything, that doesn't mean the game would keep making sense and the results would keep being fair and balanced. In most games, they wouldn't.

It might not fundamentally change who is going to win most of the time, but in a tournament setting you should want everything to play smoothly according to the rules, precisely because tournaments are important.

Then again there is the issue of creator intent. Say the players have resources. What happens to the resources of the player who left? Do they get shared between the remaining players, or do they just disappear? That in itself is a specification that rewrites the rules of the game. It makes the game become a different one than the one the creators intended.

Now onto this resource example, say before the third player left, the first player was in the best position to win because the second player, the only one who was a threat to them, had resources issues and they capitalized on that in their strategy. Then, unexpectedly, the third player leaves and so some of their resources get allocated to everyone, which means that the second player now has the resources to win, something the first player couldn't have anticipated given the normal rules of the game. This would be a case where allowing a player to leave clearly changed the fair outcome of the game.

You may say "but maybe the first player should have anticipated that actually, knowing than on bga people can leave and then their resources will be reallocated". Right, but then we fall back on the creator intent issue: this becomes effectively a very different game than the one the creators intended. The whole strategy of the game changes because the invented site rules now require players to think differently about the game.

[BarnardsStar]

I am kind of surprised more games don't have this, because this topic constantly comes up for many games, and there always seems a lot of posts acting like nothing can be done, yet like I say the issue was solved for Heat over a year ago. It's also a way, way better implementation for tournament play.

Heat is a special case because BGA introduced an experimental system for Heat only.
They promised it would be applied to other suitable games (e.g. Roll & Write games) if it is successful, but haven't heard anything since then.

It was implemented for Formula D about 3 weeks ago.

[RazorOz]

You can technically do anything, that doesn't mean the game would keep making sense and the results would keep being fair and balanced. In most games, they wouldn't.

It might not fundamentally change who is going to win most of the time, but in a tournament setting you should want everything to play smoothly according to the rules, precisely because tournaments are important.

Then again there is the issue of creator intent. Say the players have resources. What happens to the resources of the player who left? Do they get shared between the remaining players, or do they just disappear? That in itself is a specification that rewrites the rules of the game. It makes the game become a different one than the one the creators intended.

Now onto this resource example, say before the third player left, the first player was in the best position to win because the second player, the only one who was a threat to them, had resources issues and they capitalized on that in their strategy. Then, unexpectedly, the third player leaves and so some of their resources get allocated to everyone, which means that the second player now has the resources to win, something the first player couldn't have anticipated given the normal rules of the game. This would be a case where allowing a player to leave clearly changed the fair outcome of the game.

You may say "but maybe the first player should have anticipated that actually, knowing than on bga people can leave and then their resources will be reallocated". Right, but then we fall back on the creator intent issue: this becomes effectively a very different game than the one the creators intended. The whole strategy of the game changes because the invented site rules now require players to think differently about the game.

I don't agree, I think most games would be better off with this method. With regards to tournaments are you seriously arguing that who qualifies effectively being down to random chance (or whoever has the oldest account or whatever) is better than the game playing to conclusion, and the winner qualifying? I can't imagine many would agree with that.

These points are just being deliberately obtuse. You're inventing your own argument to debunk, inventing scenarios which wouldn't happen, ie. resource redistribution. Like I say, the system is already implemented for pretty much every game for how it handles a player leaving the game, the only difference for Heat is how the result is coded, whereas for most games the result is neutralised, for Heat it isn't, the actual gameplay itself is already coded.

[tbhp]

I don't agree, I think most games would be better off with this method. With regards to tournaments are you seriously arguing that who qualifies effectively being down to random chance (or whoever has the oldest account or whatever) is better than the game playing to conclusion, and the winner qualifying? I can't imagine many would agree with that.

We don't have to choose between two bad options. We shouldn't be encouraging or normalizing leaving games and expelling players because "the game will still go on". We should instead do our best to avoid those things as best as we can.

Do you realize the consequences of such a system? It would likely be chaos where people feel free to leave and expel anytime because after all, it's no big deal. Your confidence when starting a game that it will end properly and with all players remaining would be much lower than what it is now.

Like I say, the system is already implemented for pretty much every game for how it handles a player leaving the game, the only difference for Heat is how the result is coded, whereas for most games the result is neutralised, for Heat it isn't, the actual gameplay itself is already coded.

But that's not meant to be a functional implementation, it just exists so that people can get the feeling that they are wrapping up their board after a player has left.

The results are neutralised precisely because it's understood that this "aftergame" doesn't have a real competitive value.

[FrankJones]

Some games would not function properly if a player drops out.

I have seen references to a small number of games in which the game designer including in the rules a mechanism for dealing with an absent player - but, this is rare. And without such a mechanism included in the rules, it would be difficult for the developer of a digital implementation to know how to handle such situations.