Will any action be taken against blatant cheating for the recent Arena Season?

[busy-crocodile-]

The most recently concluded arena season witnessed someone throwing a game they were about to win, in order to help a person win the arena season, which they did end up winning. Would others say there is a tendency on BGA to not take any action against such behaviour? Because it sure feels like it.

Additionally, it also seems like while BGA does not like calling out any specific players, forum posts seem to be the only way to get their attention and take action. If BGA wants to keep such posts off the forums, would it not make sense to take moderation reports seriously instead of ignoring them?

Is there anyone on the moderation team that can appreciate the frustration honest players may feel and actually do something about such situations? Or is this a hopeless pursuit?

[ouguoc]

BGA is unable to effectively police Arena, as it is currently designed. Without significant changes, you should expect this to continue to happen, as it has in the past.

Arena, as it is currently designed, requires extensive policing. Unlike normal tournaments, where participants are both known (and therefore have a reputation to stake) and also have ~no control over their matches, Arena both allows anonymous players (usage of alts is widespread, though formally forbidden) and allows players to precisely pick their matches and opponents (by repeatedly queueing concurrently, and abandoning games upon a miss). This means that cheaters can enter Arena and affect its results at will, with basically no repercussions. In a normal tournament, the risk of permanently losing reputation keeps players in line, and means you generally need to do a small, fixed amount of policing at the very top. This means that effectively policing Arena requires monitoring ~every game played near the top of the Arena.

Furthermore, BGA's current revenue model makes it unable to do the policing Arena currently requires. BGA earns its revenue via a fixed, per-player subscription fee. In return, you get access to a large and growing body of games -- this is what makes BGA such a good deal! It's a huge part of their marketing! But it simultaneously makes them extremely sensitive to per-boardgame costs; if BGA was incurring moderation costs on every Arena game, they would need to either cap these costs, or change BGA's revenue model, otherwise they will very quickly find themselves losing money. Down that way lies play limits, reductions in new games, per-game fees... or worse, ads.

So far BGA management's approach has been to try to keep its head down, do the bare minimum moderation, and hope for the best, which is understandable; neither they nor anyone wants to make risky changes to a great site that's done wonders for the board game community. But the recent decision to make Arena load-bearing for a major Ark Nova tournament is pretty questionable in this light. I think the management has got to be clearer about what they want Arena to be, and align its design with their goals.

[Andrew Davidson]

I don't play Arena as It's just 2-player games, right? If people are using stooge accounts to help manipulate their ranking, this sounds like a lot of work. Why are players going to such lengths? What does winning Arena get you? There aren't any prizes, are there? And the bragging rights seem limited as there isn't much of a forum community -- the players mostly seem quite quiet. Are they just hyper-competitive, a-holes or what? Just trying to understand the dynamic.

Me, I join regular tournaments to get some matchmaking done so that I get some games with the folk out there. I like to win as that's the point but there doesn't seem to be much glory associated with winning.

So, what I'd like to see is more community activity such as forum discussions like this. I suppose the problem is that there are significant language barriers so perhaps there should be events in which players have a common language -- anglophone, francophone, etc. And players should be encouraged to socialise as well as grind out games. For example, I see that you are in a group of Toronto Boardgamers which has 68 members. Such local communities should be encouraged.

[yetiks]

this years top players from each hemisphere go to the ark nova world championships, theres also mechanisms to manipulate who you play apparently

[whelmking]

MODS: I would appreciate a reply just so I'm clear on this situation as an avid AN player (mid tier elo).

There was a blatant, obvious and provable case of cheating in the last arena season that may have (likely) led to the eventual winner winning the season, and BGA's reply (including mods) appears to be to ignore the cheating but threaten non-cheating players for bringing it up publicly in the forums after BGA took no action on the cheating. Am I correct in understanding that this is what BGA/mods do and prioritize on this site? I'm also a paying member on BGA, and if this is what I'm paying for I will seriously reconsider moving to being a free player and not contributing financially to a site that punishes whistleblowers rather than cheaters.

[FrankJones]

MODS: I would appreciate a reply just so I'm clear on this situation as an avid AN player (mid tier elo).

There was a blatant, obvious and provable case of cheating in the last arena season that may have (likely) led to the eventual winner winning the season, and BGA's reply (including mods) appears to be to ignore the cheating but threaten non-cheating players for bringing it up publicly in the forums after BGA took no action on the cheating. Am I correct in understanding that this is what BGA/mods do and prioritize on this site? I'm also a paying member on BGA, and if this is what I'm paying for I will seriously reconsider moving to being a free player and not contributing financially to a site that punishes whistleblowers rather than cheaters.

Yes, that's pretty much what happened.

[busy-crocodile-]

BGA is unable to effectively police Arena, as it is currently designed. Without significant changes, you should expect this to continue to happen, as it has in the past.

Arena, as it is currently designed, requires extensive policing. Unlike normal tournaments, where participants are both known (and therefore have a reputation to stake) and also have ~no control over their matches, Arena both allows anonymous players (usage of alts is widespread, though formally forbidden) and allows players to precisely pick their matches and opponents (by repeatedly queueing concurrently, and abandoning games upon a miss). This means that cheaters can enter Arena and affect its results at will, with basically no repercussions. In a normal tournament, the risk of permanently losing reputation keeps players in line, and means you generally need to do a small, fixed amount of policing at the very top. This means that effectively policing Arena requires monitoring ~every game played near the top of the Arena.

Furthermore, BGA's current revenue model makes it unable to do the policing Arena currently requires. BGA earns its revenue via a fixed, per-player subscription fee. In return, you get access to a large and growing body of games -- this is what makes BGA such a good deal! It's a huge part of their marketing! But it simultaneously makes them extremely sensitive to per-boardgame costs; if BGA was incurring moderation costs on every Arena game, they would need to either cap these costs, or change BGA's revenue model, otherwise they will very quickly find themselves losing money. Down that way lies play limits, reductions in new games, per-game fees... or worse, ads.

So far BGA management's approach has been to try to keep its head down, do the bare minimum moderation, and hope for the best, which is understandable; neither they nor anyone wants to make risky changes to a great site that's done wonders for the board game community. But the recent decision to make Arena load-bearing for a major Ark Nova tournament is pretty questionable in this light. I think the management has got to be clearer about what they want Arena to be, and align its design with their goals.

I appreciate the response, but none of this quite explains why moderation reports (with supporting evidence) aren't taken seriously.

[humming601]

I guess not. the front page of arena rankings is already full of new accounts that only play ark nova. it is very frustrating for any honest players that are still remaining