Board Game Arena

wrldtrvllr wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 07:52 Sure, that is clear and fine. The things that I find odd are firstly that this behaviour only started quite recently, for me. And yet for other players it seems to have been happening for a long time. Secondly, why are these games starting without me? I'm just clicking on the game and waiting for a table. When it says that I quit the game, it isn't when I started another game in the meantime. If I was on the game table at some point, then why was I removed from it before it started?

Did you recently set preferences for opponent karma or level? There are extra compatibility checks before starting the table to make sure those preferences are respected, which could explain what you are describing.

Een wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:18 Did you recently set preferences for opponent karma or level? There are extra compatibility checks before starting the table to make sure those preferences are respected, which could explain what you are describing.

Heh, this explains why it happens so often that I'm waiting on a table with a couple of players. Happy that the table is almost full. But when 5th player joins and the table starts, then immediately someone clicks refuse and leaves the table. That had me wondering many times why the heck did this player even join and wait with me all this time?

It's quite a nuisance for people who use manual table-creation. Because:

• It's frustrating to be pinged for gamestart but then there's no game (can happen anyway of course, but very often it is in this way)
• I sometimes create tables for other games at the same time to see where I can find a game better. These tables are automatically cancelled which would make sense if I had another game. But well - I don't...
• When using multiple tabs for BGA, all other (inactive) tabs get into a buggy status, being frozen on game-start-screen and keep showing moving-triangle even after game-start was cancelled. I need to refresh every other tab to get out of that false status (of course this is an unrelated problems with multi-tabbing - but in this situation it is especially annoying)

It would be great, if those preferences could be checked whenever someone joins the table and have the person with the preferences leave earlier (or not join the table in the first place) and not only after game-starting-process was already initialized. Maybe that would also help with the chatbox-issue?

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:42 Heh, this explains why it happens so often that I'm waiting on a table with a couple of players. Happy that the table is almost full. But when 5th player joins and the table starts, then immediately someone clicks refuse and leaves the table. That had me wondering many times why the heck was this player even join and wait with me all the time?

It's quite a nuisance for people who use manual table-creation. Because:

• It's frustrating to be pinged for gamestart but then there's no game (can happen anyway of course, but very often it is in this way)
• I sometimes create tables for other games at the same time to see where I can find a game better. These tables are automatically cancelled
• When using multiple tabs for BGA, all other (inactive) tabs get into a buggy status, being frozen on game-start-screen and keep showing moving-triangle even after game-start was cancelled. I need to refresh every other tab to get out of that false status (of course this is an unrelated problems with multi-tabbing - but in this situation it is especially annoying)

It would be great, if those preferences could be checked whenever someone joins the table and have the person with the preferences leave earlier (or not join the table in the first place) and not only after game-starting-process was already initialized. Maybe that would also help with the chatbox-issue?

I think you are misinterpreting what I said. Matchmaking checks these compatibilities _before_ starting the game, and it's about games that have to be started automatically by the matchmaking (for manual tables, it's the admin who has to start the table).

Preferences are also checked when joining the table, but depending on the join order it's not always sufficient, so they have to be rechecked before start to make really sure. Matchmaking is a complex piece of processing.

Een wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:47

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:42 Heh, this explains why it happens so often that I'm waiting on a table with a couple of players. Happy that the table is almost full. But when 5th player joins and the table starts, then immediately someone clicks refuse and leaves the table. That had me wondering many times why the heck was this player even join and wait with me all the time?

It's quite a nuisance for people who use manual table-creation. Because:

• It's frustrating to be pinged for gamestart but then there's no game (can happen anyway of course, but very often it is in this way)
• I sometimes create tables for other games at the same time to see where I can find a game better. These tables are automatically cancelled
• When using multiple tabs for BGA, all other (inactive) tabs get into a buggy status, being frozen on game-start-screen and keep showing moving-triangle even after game-start was cancelled. I need to refresh every other tab to get out of that false status (of course this is an unrelated problems with multi-tabbing - but in this situation it is especially annoying)

It would be great, if those preferences could be checked whenever someone joins the table and have the person with the preferences leave earlier (or not join the table in the first place) and not only after game-starting-process was already initialized. Maybe that would also help with the chatbox-issue?

I think you are misinterpreting what I said. Matchmaking checks these compatibilities _before_ starting the game, and it's about games that have to be started automatically by the matchmaking (for manual tables, it's the admin who has to start the table).

"for manual tables, it's the admin who has to start the table" --> No - manual tables also start automatically once they are full. And I do believe there are automatic-lobby users who can get among the players.

But when it gets checked before the gamestart, then it remains a mystery, how these people refuse + quit within half a second after gamestart-screen appeared. It was just a thought that this might be it...

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:51 "for manual tables, it's the admin who has to start the table" --> No - manual tables also start automatically once they are full.

I had forgotten about that change, you are right.

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:51 And I do believe there are automatic-lobby users who can get among the players.

Definitely, not separating the user bases of the lobbies was a priority.

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:51 But when it gets checked before the gamestart, then it remains a mystery, how these people refuse + quit within half a second after gamestart-screen appeared. It was just a thought that this might be it...

Well, it could always be that you are right, if the last person to join is a manual joiner with an incompatible level/karma for an automatic-lobby user at the table with level/karma preferences set. That's a narrow case, but maybe.

To get back to the main subject of this thread, in principle players from the automatic lobby should not be subscribed to table chat until the game starts. A change was done in the latest release that will hopefully fix this.

Een wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 11:06

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:51 And I do believe there are automatic-lobby users who can get among the players.

Definitely, not separating the user bases of the lobbies was a priority.

I'm definitely pro this decision. But it would be wonderful, if the annoyance they are causing could be reduced a bit.

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 10:51 But when it gets checked before the gamestart, then it remains a mystery, how these people refuse + quit within half a second after gamestart-screen appeared. It was just a thought that this might be it...

Well, it could always be that you are right, if the last person to join is a manual joiner with an incompatible level/karma for an automatic-lobby user at the table with level/karma preferences set. That's a narrow case, but maybe.

Maybe it would help to use a delay between manual table getting full + automatic start? Something like a few seconds that in addition to giving a chance to apply preferences would also give the game host the chance to remove someone from the table. That would also be useful in the case when the host is trying to actively put in a friend's name (or someone who's around the table who doesn't meet the restrictions but has asked nicely in the chat to join) into the last free spot but needs a few seconds to type/select the name.

wrldtrvllr wrote: ↑18 July 2022, 22:01Not sure any of that applies to what I'm saying. I'm not joining or opening any tables, or getting invited to anything. I'm just seeking a game, and getting chats from games that have started but that I am not playing at.

I never got that problem outside of what I said, but I often got it when I have two or three bga tab open.
But it look like your proplem is something else.

Silene wrote: ↑19 July 2022, 11:17 Maybe it would help to use a delay between manual table getting full + automatic start?

Adding such a delay would be tricky to implement and potentially create another class of issues by itself. We have to be careful of trying not to mess up things while trying to improve them That's part of the difficulty of maintaining a site that has grown in complexity over the years.

What was done (for the next release, not deployed yet):
- an issue was fixed where level preferences was not correctly checked for Beginners level
- manual tables will now start immediately when the max number of players is reached even if the last player joining is an automatic lobby player (before, it did only when the last player to join was a manual lobby user). This should reduce flip flops since when a table starts: automatic lobby players immediately quit all other tables when one starts, so they won't leave the table because another one started just before the admin is able to start it. Also, it makes the lobby behaviour more consistent.
- when a table is started from the manual lobby, preferences are now checked before starting; if an incompatibility is detected for the preferences of an automatic lobby player currently at this table (especially if the latest player to have joined doesn't match), this player will automatically leave the game, and the game will not start since the max player number is not reached any more. This will prevent potential invalid starts cancelling automatic lobby searches.

Hopefully these changes will improve the overall experience starting games.

While that might affect which tables you're "in", it does not affect the fact that you still get messages from tables you are not playing in.