Board Game Arena

ufm wrote: ↑02 December 2023, 18:37 The shield changes in Arena mode are not affected by the progression ratio. It's not ELO.
Also, some games start from >0%. Ask the developer.

I know it isn't elo. Just an example of how a player can benefit from a kick at the start.
Also for instance, I am playing a game of catch a lion. It is at 50% after my 1st move (I don't know where it started at but the other player hasn't taken a turn yet). If I were to kick them I would get 50% of what I should without them going. So depending on the game and your elo/k factor you can get a decent amount of elo for kicking a player who hasn't taken a turn yet.

ChiefPointThief wrote: ↑02 December 2023, 19:01 I know it isn't elo. Just an example of how a player can benefit from a kick at the start.

Well, the OP was talking about ELO... I don't like 'shield' though. It's so hard to fine-tune.

ChiefPointThief wrote: ↑02 December 2023, 19:01 Also for instance, I am playing a game of catch a lion. It is at 50% after my 1st move (I don't know where it started at but the other player hasn't taken a turn yet). If I were to kick them I would get 50% of what I should without them going. So depending on the game and your elo/k factor you can get a decent amount of elo for kicking a player who hasn't taken a turn yet.

In this case, you should report to the developer instead. Hence I said 'ask the developer'.

Cile wrote: ↑02 December 2023, 06:02

fleezybaby wrote: ↑01 December 2023, 22:04
so in your opinion, if you join a game where someone is 20s late on their first turn...

If I'm playing a game and someone is in the red on their first turn I am absolutely booting them and finding a new table.

You start the game with a full time bank. If a player has used up not only the time they get per turn but also their entire time bank early in the game there is no reason to believe they can play the game within the time frame set by the table. I've joined this table because I want to play at this speed, if they can't do it I'm going to cut my losses early and try again. It has nothing to do with ELO.

If you're the one being booted I recommend joining tables with more turn time. If it's someone else I'd personally recommend red thumbing the person that ran out of time (if you end up in a game with them again in the future someone else may boot them again) and you can also red thumb the person who did the booting if you find them to be too impatient and don't want to be matched with them in the future.

Absolutely agree. I come here to play, not to sit around waiting for opponents to play. If they run out of time on the first turn, I'm going to assume they started the game by accident and aren't actually playing. It doesn't happen often, but I've seen it a couple of times. Of course, I'll boot them and move on to something else.

Later in the game, I tend to give players a little buffer before booting them. Maybe let them get down to 10 or 15 seconds in the red before clicking to boot them. But then, they still have the 20 second warning from the system, which should be time to finish a turn in the games I play.

Honestly, if you're hitting time regularly, it means you need to slow down your time settings. I did this recently with one game I play a lot. I was playing Catan at fast speed, and rarely had time trouble, but occasionally, I'd have a tough time deciding starting settlements at the very beginning of the game, and I'd hit the red. So now I usually play at normal speed, just to get the extra minute at the start of the game.

fleezybaby wrote: ↑01 December 2023, 20:52the structure of ELO on BGA incentivizes kicking users as soon as a timer expires

It's more subtle than that. The player who's winning is disincentivised because they'll get more Elo by winning than by being forced into a "draw" with all but one player. I've been in situations where I would have won and do win anyway after the kick but get 0 Elo gain which would be negative except for a special case which prevents winners losing Elo. However, a player who's losing is incentivised to kick, especially if one or more of their opponents have much higher Elo.

There are multiple problems here, partly to do with the use of Elo outside of its design parameters and partly to do with the impossibility of projecting who "should" have won if one player's turns weren't skipped, and it's a bit of a lose-lose situation all round.

I proposed a while ago to put a penality on the elo win when you goes out of time.
An easy way is -1% of elo gained (and loss for the others players) per second out of time. Up to 50%.

fleezybaby wrote: ↑01 December 2023, 20:52 the structure of ELO on BGA incentivizes kicking users as soon as a timer expires. there needs to be control such that ELO is only awarded after X% of game has progressed, regardless of whether the player has already been expelled.

i've been in so many games where players want to kick someone as soon as the timer expires, and when I don't agree, i get red-thumbed to hell.

In many games widely-played beyond our hobby, such as chess, reaching zero on the time-remaining clock is an automatic loss. So BGA's system of requiring action to cause loss is already a massive concession to laggardly players. The delightful thing is that BGA offers a choice - we can each elect to play in a setting where there are no time controls (friendly mode), or play in one where excessive consumption of time is understood as a loss condition (rated mode).

Maybe you can use the chat around 30 seconds before the timeout to ask if the opponent is there. If you got no answer, kick him. But if you got an answer, you can let him play, depending on the answer of course.

The problem is not really the kickers, the problem is the slow player. So, i think it is normal to give ELO to players playing in time.

Otherwise, if time is a problem, you can play turn-based games

Patrick of the Isles wrote: ↑04 December 2023, 13:45 In many games widely-played beyond our hobby, such as chess, reaching zero on the time-remaining clock is an automatic loss. So BGA's system of requiring action to cause loss is already a massive concession to laggardly players. The delightful thing is that BGA offers a choice - we can each elect to play in a setting where there are no time controls (friendly mode), or play in one where excessive consumption of time is understood as a loss condition (rated mode).

I personally would love a system that auto-penalizes players if they run out of time. It shouldn't be on regular users to enforce the rules of the table. I had a turn based game recently where as we neared the end of the game the player in last place didn't make a move for 3 days. It's an incredibly frustrating position as a player to have to decide between "punishing this player and not being able to finish the game" or "finish the game but the player not respecting the table rules or your time has zero consequences for it".

I suggested elsewhere (although I didn't create an official suggestion in the bug report system) that the expulsion could be automatic, but giving other players a short time (maybe 20 seconds in real-time games) to actively cancel the expulsion. If some player votes no, or doesn't vote in time, the slow player is automatically expelled (and most importantly: no one appears as responsible except the expelled player).