Feature Request: Allow low-karma players to communicate in chat

[mickalot]

Playing on BGA when your karma is low is an unpleasant experience, both for those who have low karma and for those who are playing against them, because of the limitation on chatting for low karma players. Can we rethink that decision? Playing with low karma means that you can't exchange pleasantries with the other person at the beginning and end of the match, like "Good luck and have fun!" or "Good game!", so it makes the player seem rude/anti-social. And when I play against a low-karma player, I want them to be able to say "I would like to think a little, thank you" or the "Sorry, I have an emergency..." message so that I know to give them a little extra time.

Could we please either lift the restriction for low-karma players communicating in chat, or perhaps allow them to use the 9 or so stock responses in the chat menu ("Good move!", "Good game!" "I would like to think a little", etc.) for _everyone's_ benefit? Or maybe lift the restriction for _paying_ members, since we're financially contributing to the site?

By the way, before people get judgmental about getting low karma in the first place -- I'm a BGA premium member who enjoys some games (namely Tichu and Spades) that aren't super-popular, so when I play them in Arena mode, it can be a _long_ wait to get a game going (as in 20-30 minutes or more). After such a long wait, sometimes I'm not looking directly at the BGA browser tab when the game starts, and I don't realize the game has begun. BGA's browser notifications aren't prompt/reliable, either...they can often be delayed by a few minutes, just long enough so that by the time I realize a game has started, an impatient opponent has already booted me from the table (rather than just abandoning).

[wrldtrvllr]

Totally agree. I've ended up unable to communicate through getting booted for the same reason, and I could not see the logic. Misusing the communication tools seems like a good reason to lose access to them, but not paying attention doesn't so much.

[Jest Phulin]

Or maybe lift the restriction for _paying_ members, since we're financially contributing to the site?

I do not want to weigh in on the issue as a whole, just this part. People who pay should not be exempt from the same penalties for breaking the rules as those that don't. See the entire United States justice system for examples.

[Yorgad]

If you get bad karma, resolve this issue first (it's here for a reason), and then you can enjoy the chat again... Pretty easy, no?

More seriously, may I suggest you focus on the root cause (poor notification on arena), rather than its consequences (karma penalty for being away hence chat restriction).
This was adressed many times, you could vote for a suggestion idea in the bug tracking system if it exists already or create a new one.

Cheers,
Y.

[wrldtrvllr]

More seriously, may I suggest you focus on the root cause (poor notification on arena), rather than its consequences (karma penalty for being away hence chat restriction).

The consequence of a karma penalty is fair enough. But what is the logic in preventing communication? It is reasonable to focus on that.

[compte obelète]

I mean, if it is very low, maybe not whit 100% but like, other whit about the same karma level? As a table setting for the host whit limits of course. To not just include everyone.

[xxerox]

Karma means absolutely nothing. Its pointless and it just hurts the player base. When it was introduced i litteraly stayed at 1 karma for months and all it did was make some players avoid me cos i was keeping my karma low on purpose. Then they added repricusions.

Honestly, i believe most games require comunication and limiting it beasue of karma is bad because it stops players from playing certain games.

[mickalot]

This was adressed many times, you could vote for a suggestion idea in the bug tracking system if it exists already or create a new one.

Could you (or anyone else) please provide a link to those discussion threads or suggestions in the bug tracking system? (I'm not sure where to find them...I tried searching for previous conversations using terms like "chat restriction" and "karma restriction" and "limit chat" and couldn't find anything.)

It wasn't my intention to rehash old arguments -- I'm just expressing my experience using BGA for the games I like to play.

[xxerox]

They wont alow any cahnges to the karma system. They all love it and dont care about peoples suggestions. Why would they actually try to make it less impactfull? If it was up to them if you get -1 karma you should get banned >.>

[Jest Phulin]

Uh, citation needed.... I believe you are presenting as fact what is simply conjecture. In particular, looking at the bug tracking system (https://boardgamearena.com/bugs?sort=status_desc&game=0) shows 23 rejected suggestions for the BGA website (5 of which are for specific games and not the website, 3 of which are spam) and 41 implemented suggestions. This indicates that BGA staff does care about people's suggestions.

Back to the original request of allowing standard messages (good game, hello, etc.) by low-karma players. To do this would most likely require an overhaul of the entire chat system. The way it looks now is that the system looks at what your active tab is, and assigns messages to that tab. If at a table it will show the messages to others at the table, and if anywhere else on the site to the General messages chat. Having to do extra checks if a table configuration allows communication would require extra resources.