Sick and tired of Kingmaking plays :(

[Call me Ishmael]

I am getting fed up with playing a game, for example, Puerto Rico, and having the person in last place near the end, realises he can't win, and will make a play that doesn't benefit him, but has the sole result of knocking me out of first place and moving the player who was in second place into the win. This unethical behaviour is reflecting badly on Board Game Arena and it's administrators who condone said behaviour by choosing not to censure it.

BGA has some sort of nebulous policy against 'Kingmaking', yet a policy that doesn't really matter because they claim only to enforce it if it 'happens repeatedly and can be proven.' Most people don't have the time, nor do they have a buddy with the time who will play many games with them to lose so that they can gain some ELO. Even if they did, the losing buddy will have a diminished ELO and the winning buddy will gain little by
beating them over and over. So the policy as it stands really protects against nothing.

I have had at least three wins stolen from me in the last several weeks, because the person in last place thought it was funny to make a play whose only result was to switch the players in first and second positions, in other words, "If I can't win, I'll make sure that my friend at least wins". This showing of partiality is stealing the win from the lead player, and it's disgusting.

BGA will step up and censure when someone insults another player. Spending 45 minutes or so in a game, and to be winning, only to have the last place guy make a move that knocks you out of the win (with no benefit to himself) is as great as any insult, and BGA needs to start doing the right thing and prohibiting all forms of this behaviour, whether it's systematic or merely spur of the moment when someone realizes he's last anyway, so at least he'll make a play to give the win to his friend.

[e10ff]

If the players have no way to affect his elo change, other than not doing anything affect the rank of others, can he choose a better option which give him more VP points which will also affect the rank of others?

[Shaq Jenkins]

I've had this happen to me before. Recently, I was in first place in a Legendary Inventors game, and a person purposely made a move that screwed me over. This move didn't help him gain more points, so the only reason he made it was so I wouldn't win. In fact, there was a better move that he could have made that would have made him go from third to second place.

It's extremely hard to prove that someone is kingmaking, which is probably why the mods don't strictly enforce that rule. It's possible that the person isn't an experienced player and that's why they make questionable moves. In the Legendary Inventors example I gave, this person knew how to play, so this excuse didn't apply to him.

Some games are also more prone to kingmaking than others. I see TONS of kingmaking in Love Letter and Tokaido. This is also why there are some games that I refuse to play with people who have the same IP address.

[e10ff]

and, even though the player cannot do anything to improve himself, some players here choose to make a revenge on a player who previously pushed him to the last, or make a revenge on a player who had aggressive behavior inside the game.

[sourisdudesert]

BGA has some sort of nebulous policy against 'Kingmaking',

No we do not.

We cannot give a penalty against a player who did a single kingmaking, because kingmaking is not something obvious in itself. You can argue that "I was going to do this move anyway", you can argue that "this was the best move", you can argue that "I'm a beginner so I didn't know", and there is not much we can do about that.

This is why there are red thumbs : if YOU are convinced that some kingmaking has been done, give a red thumb, and a "public" one (ie : "I do not recommend to play with this player"). After 3 or 4 red thumbs, this player reputation will be so low that nobody won't play with him anyway.

You can also report this player to moderators. And yes, we are asking for SEVERAL example of kingmaking. If you "don't have the time" to check that, well, moderators won't have the time too as they already received 5 kingmaking reports like yours. So for this kind of subject, we are asking you to spend some time to provide some evidence. If you don't want to help, we are fine with that, so just leave a red thumb and it's not so bad.

So yes, we have an effective policy against Kingmaking, it's probably not perfect, and it cannot prevent ALL cases of kingmaking, but it's the probably the best we can have.

[turtler7]

Unfortunately this is not just a thing that happens here. I have played with many gaming groups in real life that put a huge bulls eye on me when play. Too many times they didn't realize what I was planning or when they figured it out, it was too late to stop me... So those friends tend to target every negative effect they can my direction. I try not to let it kill my mood, but I cannot play things like settlers of catan with people who know me well anymore as I spend the entire game being beaten into a pulp. In one memorable game, I had 4 points in catan to another player's 8 getting ready to win and they STILL were blocking my only resource spot and stealing what few things I did develop. The players were not intentionally trying to make one person win,just make sure it isn't me.

In other games, like Lords of Waterdeep, my friends always do this same thing and it actually enhances the game for me when I win anyway.

I have also had random groups have a person decide he didn't like the way I aggressively blocked him when it was clear what his objective was and would hold a grudge towards the end and do what you described. I do not feel that it was unjustified for someone who was set way back by me to try to do the same.

Sorry for your experience and I hope you can continue to find joy playing games anyway.

[Liallan]

I never have thought this was because the site just doesn't want to enforce their rule. It's just too hard to prove, and if it were me, I'd want some proof, and I would consider that you have the burden of proof, because there can be too many other things going on.

Now I have an excuse to tell my story without having to start a thread on it....

I played Love Letter two game nights in a row, and both times people were not picking on the lead player and essentially "let" them win. They weren't attempting to kingmake - they just didn't care. The one game I was behind and A had 3 pt. And finally K makes a move against me and I said, "You're supposed to be targeting him," pointing at A. K shrugged. And I sat there and thought (yes, literally), "I wish Call me Ishmael were here to see that." The shrug. He was not trying to help A win cause he didn't care. He wasn't even picking on me cause he thought it was funny. He just made the move he "felt like" making with no reasoning behind it whatsoever. It was a quick end-of-night game and he just wanted to have fun and not think. Sure, it was annoying but... That's just what some people do and they don't get why someone else is getting so serious about it.

And turtler7 is right - it's not like this is the only place this stuff happens. There's some people in my group who simply find being cutthroat to be fun, and hell, why not cut down the person in the lead? If you're going to do it, do it big. For some groups, this could be typical behavior, and even find it acceptable. And it doesn't have to be because they're trying to get any particular person to win - that may have nothing to do with it. (In fact, one guy has no qualms about dumping on his gf.) I could actually see the point of not playing people with the same IP, because it's perhaps more likely they want their friend/SO to win, but otherwise I'm not sure how you could know that.

As to Puerto Rico - hmm, I've been warned not to play with anyone experienced.

[ufm]

Well, now I avoid tables with only same IP players or same small group friends after suffering from such games few times.
But still, it can't prevented perfectly... Maybe I should stick to non-competitive games.

[e10ff]

In love letter, especially in 3players game, attacking the lowest points player until the current leader has 1point towards victory is good.

Players here like to target the current leader, this tends to balance the score of all players, sometimes result in 444 situation in last round (each player gets 4points), I have only 33% chance to win a game, which is very low and unpleasant. The above behavior makes the game even more luck-based (it is already very luck-based already), comparable to senet. I played many games in the past, attacking the current leader, and find out sometimes a condition of 444 or 3333 in last round occur. It makes the game much more luck-based.

I play games to have fun, but I should try my best to win (either the game or get a pleasant elo in the game career), which the game can actually 'a bit' competitive.

Still talking about 3players, attacking the lowest point allows me to guarantee to be at least the second, which ranking as the second usually lose ~5 elo, and victory brings about 1x elo. Ranking as a last is a disaster.

It is not easy for the leader to win in the game, if he gets 4points, 1round towards victory, he has to kill a player first. If there are 1player left, that will become a 1v1 situation but the first to play obviously have much greater advantage. If he fails to kill, according to the common behavior here they will choose to do 'real attack' on the leader. If they kill the leader, then they will be the disadvantaged against the last player. If the leader plays a handmaid, it does not matter too. I will do a 'fake kill', on the last player, i.e. use a guard to guess a less probable character, even have 2handmaids are played, I will still guess handmaid. This makes sure the leader is still in a 1v2 advantage and he is likely to lose the round. So actually I means the guy who initiates an attack is likely to lose the round.

When both the leader or the player ranked second both do fake kills, the player who rank the last need to do a real kill on others when he doesnt get a princess, or a card that can give him victory. If he doesnt start to attack, he will lose the game so he is forced to do so.

The trick of the game, to me, is to become the second player to have 1point towards victory. This make sure I start in the last round, and I can do real kills on others, without being targeted because I am not the only one with highest score. The preferable condition is the player with lowest score has a turn BEFORE me. This make sure when his turn comes, he is more likely to attack the old leader instead of me (because the old leader has seat more far from him), so that if he miss the kill he thought I could finish it. (Again common behavior for players to attack the furthest player). A difficult strategy will be the use prince the adjust turns so when the deck almost run out the player with lowest score is forced to make a real kill.

Very unorganized but I hope some players can read this.

[ufm]

I understand what you mean in the post, since I have played bunch of 3/4 player games here and in other sites whose system penalizes the last player heavily.
Especially when I played riichi mahjong in Tenhou literally nobody wanted to take the last place because only the last player's rating suffers
'Attacking' 3rd/4th players to secure your 2nd place is an acceptable strategic move, at least for me.

But I don't think other users in this thread blamed those cases.
Kingmaking (whether to push somebody intentionally or to just piss other players off) certainly happens.