Stalling Abuse in Terraforming Mars

[CoseDaMatti98]

Dear everyone,
I hope this message reaches the right audience of moderators or players who should be made aware of this.
I recently discovered Terraforming Mars and I’m absolutely loving it, but something very unpleasant just happened to me with another player.
I would like to openly share this player’s nickname, but I’m not sure whether that would violate the platform’s rules, so I will avoid doing so.
During the game, since I was taking some time to think about my moves, my opponent assumed that I was intentionally “stalling,” which was not true at all. For those who may not know what “stalling” is (I didn’t until five minutes ago), I’ll try to explain it briefly: in a game like Terraforming Mars, when you cancel an action, you regain a small amount of time. The system registers this as progress in the game, while in reality a player can create a loop and prevent others from continuing.
In my last game, my opponent did this for more than 10–15 minutes — I assure you, an extremely long time.
This really frustrated me, but while checking the game settings I found a useful option to prevent this kind of abuse in case it happens to you: simply switch to turn-based mode.
I would really like to speak with a moderator and hope that the player who behaved this way receives a fair penalty. In the chat, they were not exactly polite, but not outright rude either — somewhere in between, making it hard to report them for that reason alone. However, their actions made me waste a lot of time and significantly reduced my enjoyment of a game I really like, such as Terraforming Mars.
Thank you for your attention. I hope this report can help improve the experience for everyone and prevent similar situations in the future.
Peace

[BarnardsStar]

Dear everyone,
I hope this message reaches the right audience of moderators or players who should be made aware of this.
I recently discovered Terraforming Mars and I’m absolutely loving it, but something very unpleasant just happened to me with another player.
I would like to openly share this player’s nickname, but I’m not sure whether that would violate the platform’s rules, so I will avoid doing so.

I’ll stop you right there: you are right to be wary of calling players out by name as it will get you moderated. But it doesn’t just apply to using their names; by saying “it just happened” when you’ve only played one game of TfM in the last 12 hours, you’ve specifically identified them and if somebody chooses to report this post, you can still get moderated.

in a game like Terraforming Mars, when you cancel an action, you regain a small amount of time. The system registers this as progress in the game, while in reality a player can create a loop and prevent others from continuing.
In my last game, my opponent did this for more than 10–15 minutes — I assure you, an extremely long time.

This really frustrated me, but while checking the game settings I found a useful option to prevent this kind of abuse in case it happens to you: simply switch to turn-based mode.

You wouldn’t be able to do this unilaterally if your opponent weren’t in the red on their clock. Which to me suggests that their alleged “stalling” didn’t work. Indeed, reviewing the logs I do see a stretch of 11½ minutes when it was their turn and they didn’t make a move and then the log reports they cancelled their move. But at the same time their clock went from +2m12s to -9m14s and ultimately it was this negative period that allowed to to switch to turn-based unilaterally and then kick them after all.

I would really like to speak with a moderator and hope that the player who behaved this way receives a fair penalty. In the chat, they were not exactly polite, but not outright rude either — somewhere in between, making it hard to report them for that reason alone.

Au contraire, pressuring you to move faster while your clock is still positive is something you can report them for, but this is not the proper outlet. Instead you should go to their profile page and click on “Report this player”.

[tbhp]

If I understand correctly, you got accused of stalling and then went on to accuse them of stalling in the same game? Do you think they decided to stall in retaliation to the stalling they perceived on your part?

Anyway, it seems like something that would be impossible to prove either way. Unless it was explicitly stated in the chat, you can't know for sure why a player is taking forever to make their moves. And at the end of the day, people are free to use their thinking time how they wish. It's an important principle to protect, because I'm sure you wouldn't like someone pressuring you to play when you still have time left on your clock.

The blatant issue I see here is with the system you describe. Why is it that in this game thinking time can be increased despite not making any move? That seems nonsensical and defeats the whole purpose of having a thinking time in the first place, since now people can just take forever to play if they want.

[BalGAmor]

You can always report a player's bad behavior if you feel like it. The Moderation Team will investigate and act if needed. Keep in mind you will not be informed of any action against other players, even if you are the one that reported them.

[FrankJones]

Undo and/or move cancellation should not add time to the clock.

My understanding is this happens in various games, not just Terraforming Mars. Which means it is a site-wide issue. Perhaps a BGA admin can look into this.

As for stalling, here is something from the BGA code of conduct:

What is the code of conduct?
On Board Game Arena, you should not:
Run out of time on the game clock.
Leave a game in progress on purpose.
Take an unnecessary and unreasonable amount of time at the end of game in an obvious losing position.
Engage in Kingmaking: enabling another player to win on purpose while there is a better move to make for yourself.
Give some piece of information about the current game situation that disturbs the normal game flow.
Communicate with another player about the game privately (for example with an instant messenging app).
Engage in provocation / triumphalism / defeatism... anything which is not fair play.
Use an avatar that may be shocking or offensive to other players (no advertisement, no politics, ...)
Breaking these rules will affect your reputation.

The only rule pertaining to stalling seems to very specifically apply to an end-game losing position.

That said, I believe using 11 minutes in a real-time game should be against the rules. But, I feel as though that is on BGA to fix the issue where time gets added back after doing an undo or cancel.

What's to stop a player from just doing that endlessly and causing the game to never progress while also not running out of clock?

[CoseDaMatti98]

I’ll stop you right there: you are right to be wary of calling players out by name as it will get you moderated. But it doesn’t just apply to using their names; by saying “it just happened” when you’ve only played one game of TfM in the last 12 hours, you’ve specifically identified them and if somebody chooses to report this post, you can still get moderated.

Ohhh, all right, all right, thanks, I didn't thought about it actually.. and to be honest I didn't know you could see the history of played games from a player. Do you suggest me to delete this forum?

You wouldn’t be able to do this unilaterally if your opponent weren’t in the red on their clock. Which to me suggests that their alleged “stalling” didn’t work. Indeed, reviewing the logs I do see a stretch of 11½ minutes when it was their turn and they didn’t make a move and then the log reports they cancelled their move. But at the same time their clock went from +2m12s to -9m14s and ultimately it was this negative period that allowed to to switch to turn-based unilaterally and then kick them after all.

Intresting, I didn't know, thanks.

Au contraire, pressuring you to move faster while your clock is still positive is something you can report them for, but this is not the proper outlet. Instead you should go to their profile page and click on “Report this player”.

Thanks, I'll procede this way

Anyway, thanks a lot

[CoseDaMatti98]

If I understand correctly, you got accused of stalling and then went on to accuse them of stalling in the same game? Do you think they decided to stall in retaliation to the stalling they perceived on your part?

Yes, my opponent accused me of stalling, which was not intentional. Then they started stalling on purpose.
I believe this can be proven: a player goes from having +2 minutes to -9…
And by reading the chat, you can also see that at some point I ask them multiple times to stop behaving this way.

[BarnardsStar]

I believe this can be proven: a player goes from having +2 minutes to -9…
And by reading the chat, you can also see that at some point I ask them multiple times to stop behaving this way.

If you report them, moderators can review the chat. Casual users, however, cannot see your chat; only the game itself.

Anyway, I thought your claim about stalling was that they got time back by canceling the move; while I do see the 11-minute stall, I do not see any sign of time being given back to them.

I tbink this is an important distinction, between just being annoying (and eject-worthy) and abuse of (what I have to think is) a bug.

[FrankJones]

I am confused now. If the player had 2 minutes and then took 11 minutes to make a turn, and the clock then showed negative 9 minutes ... what exactly is the problem ?

[fruktansvärt]

OP is a new BGA player and didn't know you can kick the other player when they are in the red?

If you are in a game you are not enjoying, and the other player is in negative time, you can kick them out and (thereby) ending the game. The player in negative time will get a karma hit.
This is a more immediate action than reporting the other player (no need for moderators to get involved).
Additionally, you can give the other player a red thumb, which will ensure you will not have to play with that player again.