Board Game Arena

Tyler1986 wrote: ↑11 January 2026, 20:43 Recently, I just got kicked from a turn-based game being just 30 min below the time limit and offline for a few hours.

I just wanted to point out one more thing that I hadn’t seen mentioned… From what I can tell you joined a 24x/day game whose playing hours ran from 03:00 to 15:00 (in Germany’s time zone). Maybe you’re up at 03:00 but if you keep a more usual sleep cycle, this was never going to end well…

One important thing to note:

It's an option to just collectively abandon the game instead of booting the player.

If a game is at 13%, why not just abandon? The BGA system will have the player who is out of time will automatically agree.

I had a game where the player had set the timer to 24 moves per day, +30 minutes per turn, and was obviously not able to do this. The player used all 12 hours before making move 1, and then went negative 3 times in the first 5 moves.

I could have kicked the player, but why? I just abandoned the game without penalty.

Tyler1986 wrote: ↑11 January 2026, 20:43 In my opinion, too many players use the option to kick players from games without any necessity. It ruins the game for everyone and most of the times players just lost their connection for a few minutes. Excluding players from a game should be the last option if nothing else is possible. I've seen players kicking others just because they're playing slowly (knowing they are still available). Switching to turn-based solves the problem in almost any case.

Recently, I just got kicked from a turn-based game being just 30 min below the time limit and offline for a few hours. I don't understand the point if it's not a tournament or arena mode. I mean, the other players were not blocked from playing at other tables. And I would have been back again just 30 minutes later. Being one of the most active players on BGA, I'd be very happy if there were less of these unnecessary situations where players get kicked for minor things.

Best
Tyler

I came here to have fun and play my time in one sitting, not sit through the torture that is turn-based. If the other player times out, they can't force me to switch to a format I have no intention of touching.

Just 30 minutes? I can finish an entire game in that time! More than one game in many cases. I find it wild that players even want to put up with the insanely long time limits you already have, let alone someone going overtime on them. Now, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, if players want to play under those situations, then go for it. But if someone objects to running over the time everyone agreed to right at the start of the game, they also have the right to say "hey, that's enough, you broke our agreement."

If you want to talk about minor things, getting kicked from a game and losing a few points from a game you timed out on is a minor thing.

FrankJones wrote: ↑12 January 2026, 16:35 It's an option to just collectively abandon the game instead of booting the player.

…

I could have kicked the player, but why? I just abandoned the game without penalty.

Thanks for the info, I didn’t know that. Most of the time, I’ll skip people who really overdo it anyway, as that’s what the reputation system relies on (edit: partially- ofc it’s also to warn others from bullies). But in certain situations, I’ll definitely consider that alternative.

Exotic Dreams wrote: ↑11 January 2026, 22:12 Agreed, although I especially think players who are unable to play should not be kicked.
We had a brief power outage in my area before and of course by the time I got back to the game, someone had booted me. It would have been obvious since it says on the screen so and so goes offline. It would have been kinder switching to turn based knowing I couldn't have played.

When it comes to distracted players, it helps to be kind and try and try and alert the other player in the game chat. Sometimes that's all it takes.

This also helps if the game or webpage is lagging. It's a common issue that BGA lags and shows as the screen as it being another player's turn. In the meantime, the other player is waiting for you to play without knowing it's your turn.
I've seen players run out of time and be kicked out of games because the site was lagging and it looked like it was the other player's turn on their screens.

The obvious reason it's done so quickly and without trying to get the other player's attention is because it means freebie points for the other players including the one who kicked the other player out.

On the other hand, I think it's good to communicate to other players when there's a delay for some reason rather than letting other players randomly wait.

You keep using the word "obvious" for things that aren't so obvious. If a player has gone offline there is no magical method to tell you the reason. You will have to look at the specific situation and make a judgment. It's case by case, and there's no guarantee that you will be right. They could have disconnected, they could have also decided they don't want to play anymore and want to waste your time. If someone wants to kick them, there is no one answer to why. They could want the points/win, they could want to move on to the next game, they may even want to penalize their opponent for wasting their time.

Turn-based is not something that everyone likes. Me? I find it awful. Games are meant to be played in one sitting and that's the end of it. Now, obviously when I say "games are meant to be played", that's not going to be an objective statement, that would be ridiculous. That's a subjective taste of the speaker at this particular time. In this case the speaker is me, and who knows, maybe over time my tastes will change. But in my games, we're not going to turn based. As long as I'm not going over time, it's my call. And I suppose even if it does go to turn-based I can just quit.

As for site lags, if your opponent seems to be taking longer than you'd expect, refresh the screen. That often fixes glitches on whose turn it is. I tend to ask if my opponent is still there if I suspect the possibility of such a glitch on their end.

FrankJones wrote: ↑12 January 2026, 16:35 One important thing to note:

It's an option to just collectively abandon the game instead of booting the player.

If a game is at 13%, why not just abandon? The BGA system will have the player who is out of time will automatically agree.

I had a game where the player had set the timer to 24 moves per day, +30 minutes per turn, and was obviously not able to do this. The player used all 12 hours before making move 1, and then went negative 3 times in the first 5 moves.

I could have kicked the player, but why? I just abandoned the game without penalty.

To answer the question "why not just abandon" keep in mind if you kick a player, you can give them an additional rating loss and a reputation hit, which is a strong reason to kick them even in games where you gain no points for it. The reputation system was made for things like this. It gives a pretty minor hit for one kick, so for cases where it's just one mistake, a player can shrug it off and move on. For recursive issues the hits add up. But if people keep passing on kicking a player, they can go overtime 20 times, and it won't show as anything more than going overtime.

It's like if a group of 21 people are given a green or red marble and have to determine what color the majority of them got by voting. If they all vote for the color they received, they'll accomplish this. Even if the first 5 voters all voted for red because they had it, if person 6 has green, they should vote green. If red is the majority, then the reds will outnumber the green and the majority votes prevails even if the greens votes green. But if green is the majority, and the green lets themselves get fooled by the initial red turnout, then the greens could get tricked out of their majority and the group will fail.

Reputation is closer to a collective vote. Give them the reputation they earned for their game, whether it be positive or negative. Let the collective sort itself out here, rare mistakes will be cleaned out by their positive performance, and the constant issues will show themselves and not get swept under the rug. If a player took a time control they couldn't follow through on, let them take the hit. It's one thing if you're having a good game and a minor time issue popped up, you're not forced to kick someone just because you can. But a free pass for not being able to properly play at all shouldn't be expected.

Ceaseless wrote: ↑12 January 2026, 17:56 Turn-based is not something that everyone likes. Me? I find it awful. Games are meant to be played in one sitting and that's the end of it. Now, obviously when I say "games are meant to be played", that's not going to be an objective statement, that would be ridiculous. That's a subjective taste of the speaker at this particular time. In this case the speaker is me, and who knows, maybe over time my tastes will change. But in my games, we're not going to turn based. As long as I'm not going over time, it's my call. And I suppose even if it does go to turn-based I can just quit.

Funny how people can have total opposite preferences : Except for real games, sitting with all the others around the same table, i don't do real-time games: I find them boring when it's the turn of some other player, wondering if they're going to make their move or if should stop wasting my time staring at the screen --- and stressful when it's my turn and i can't decide what to do.

With turn based games i play when i want to, take as much time as i need to decide what to do without being rushed by a ticking clock. Answering a telephone call is no problem AND i can totally ignore other players getting overtime or even never coming back -- life is too short to let something like that annoy me.

FDHenneberg wrote: ↑12 January 2026, 17:47 Thanks for the info, I didn’t know that. Most of the time, I’ll skip people who really overdo it anyway, as that’s what the reputation system relies on (edit: partially- ofc it’s also to warn others from bullies). But in certain situations, I’ll definitely consider that alternative.

If you're referring to red thumbs affecting karma, that effect was removed a long time ago:

Release 13th September 2023 230913-1000

• reputation: Red Thumbs are now advisory only, causing no Karma drop and
  the personal display banner for high Red Thumb percentage players has been reworded

Source

I agree with this. Being penalized for running out of time makes sense, because games have to end at some point (especially if it's a tournament), so there are cases where you have no choice but to declare a winner based on remaining time. However, when a game is still running and you can see the other person is playing their moves and is intending to finish the game, then kicking them out just because you can feels like bad sportsmanship to me. Especially if you weren't sure you would have won the game, in which case using the kick out feature serves as an "out of jail" option where you get all the benefits of a win, without having had to actually properly win the game.

Ceaseless wrote: ↑12 January 2026, 17:40
Just 30 minutes? I can finish an entire game in that time! More than one game in many cases. I find it wild that players even want to put up with the insanely long time limits you already have, let alone someone going overtime on them. Now, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, if players want to play under those situations, then go for it. But if someone objects to running over the time everyone agreed to right at the start of the game, they also have the right to say "hey, that's enough, you broke our agreement."

If you want to talk about minor things, getting kicked from a game and losing a few points from a game you timed out on is a minor thing.

I'm talking about turn-based games. And fyi, I'm anything but a slow player. I just had some work to do that day and - yes - I missed that the playing time started at 3am. I understand that it's annoying when you're stuck in a real-time game and just have to wait. My point is that there are also other options than kicking players. If you don't want to use it, it's fine by me. But I'm here for fun, not to punish others for having a life outside of online board games.