Board Game Arena

FrankJones wrote: ↑10 May 2025, 19:30 I am so utterly lost. In 3p, how does "knowing when to concede" translate to a higher likelihood of winning Arena? Can anyone shed some light on this for me please? I was not aware "concede" is even an option in 3p games.

It isn't. It's a complete nonsensical post by someone trying to look important. You are correct. There is no conceding in 3P and even if there was, it would not impact ELO lost.

ChesterDeBester wrote: ↑10 May 2025, 07:00

RoyalRook wrote: ↑09 May 2025, 21:15

xspuipuke wrote: ↑09 May 2025, 20:19 I try not to tell others what arena is for or not. If my opponent wants to run their engine, why not, let them. I can pass. And if final greenery placement comes, I can pass again. Two clicks, big deal. But the same applies the other way round: If my opponent wants to concede, they should. No one is forced to do it one way or the other.

I‘m not playing real time ever so, obviously, what I say does not apply to that. In real time play, I whole-heartedly agree that conceding is the way to go.

It's always good, understanding when you are beat is a skill 2. You save elo by conceding early b/c your opponent only get to farm you from the progress %; in turn free you up(time/energy) to farm other players. It's ALWAYS GOOD with correct read, end of discussion.

On a side note this is what most people don't appreciate in 3p as well. Understanding you can't always win is super important. If two players with equal skill compete in the same season, the one who understand when to concede(for 3p going for 2nd) will win. If you don't understand that, it's just mean that you are not on the level.

That's a very smart sounding response, except for the fact that progress % has no impact on the ELO-changes. Cool story though! It's only a factor when someone quits a game, which is why quitting a game gives an additional penalty.

This is correct, most players are not that fancy, but do I have to tell all the secrets? Also if it's a time out you lose all the elo it's the worst.

@Frank in 3p you "concede" by going for 2nd instead of 1st to preserve your rankings. The earlier you do it the better, comparing to going for 1st all the time till it's too late to secure 2nd for sure. Some players never competes at the high level or try to win a tournament so they don't understand meta games.

RoyalRook wrote: ↑09 May 2025, 21:15

xspuipuke wrote: ↑09 May 2025, 20:19 I try not to tell others what arena is for or not. If my opponent wants to run their engine, why not, let them. I can pass. And if final greenery placement comes, I can pass again. Two clicks, big deal. But the same applies the other way round: If my opponent wants to concede, they should. No one is forced to do it one way or the other.

I‘m not playing real time ever so, obviously, what I say does not apply to that. In real time play, I whole-heartedly agree that conceding is the way to go.

It's always good, understanding when you are beat is a skill 2. You save elo by conceding early b/c your opponent only get to farm you from the progress %; in turn free you up(time/energy) to farm other players. It's ALWAYS GOOD with correct read, end of discussion.

On a side note this is what most people don't appreciate in 3p as well. Understanding you can't always win is super important. If two players with equal skill compete in the same season, the one who understand when to concede(for 3p going for 2nd) will win. If you don't understand that, it's just mean that you are not on the level.

I totally diesagree on this! Especially with the "End of discussion part". True, it is a skill to understand when you are beat. One of the most important imo, just because that means, you are able to read the game in generell. Yet, "saving elo" as another pro to conceding sounds terrible, because you still got beaten 100%. In my logic, you should always loose 100% elo and even more when conceding, because obviously you got beaten by such a big difference.
That beeing said, elo means nothing anyways. Just a random number for a game, which can be played in so many different settings. If it is about competetion, it is only arena on bga. And yes, no one has fun playing while facing a dead loss. Still I agree a lot with the first statement of this thread - the two minutes you "save" by conceding after terraforming is finished and maybe even after you made your last turn is just unnecessary! That is what board games are for: play, fun, count, score. Concede after 50, 60, 70%. Whatever. Play it out, when you are almost at the finish line. IF your time is of the value you stated in your post before this I quoted - don't play boardgames online at all. Spend it usefull and in joy

Okay, let's get something clarified here, because I think Rook is wording things in a way that is causing a lot of confusion.

Rook is talking about "conceding" in a 3-player game by realizing that 1st place is unattainable and therefore playing for 2nd place to ensure not finishing in third place, thereby avoiding the much bigger Elo loss that comes with 3rd place compared to 2nd place.

I would not have used the word "concede" in that context because it has obviously caused confusion with the actual act of "conceding" by clicking the "concede this game" button which saves no Elo and which is not even possible in a 3-player game.

I hope that clarifies this entire misunderstanding

My two cents: I HATE the idea of ever giving up, and I HATE even more the idea of playing attack cards against 2nd place rather than first place. But, given the Elo system which does heavily punish 3rd place in a 3-player game, while minimally punishing the person who finishes in 2nd place, it's difficult to really argue against what Rook is saying. I don't like it, but it's the system in place. The same thing happens in Hearts, where 4th place is an Elo catastrophe, and remaining anywhere close to 300 Elo requires avoiding finishing 4th out of 4, and where finishing 2nd actually gains you Elo. Especially since, in Hearts, there are situations where it is literally impossible to catch up to first place, and therefore it does become a battle to avoid finishing last.

I would much prefer a system that awards Elo to the winner and gives equal Elo loss to all the non-winners. But that is not going to happen, so, the system is what it is.

Elo is not meaningless. It means something to a lot of players (myself included) who find personal value in climbing the leaderboard, especially if they believe they have a possibility of seeing their name in the top (whatever, top 20, top 10, top 1). Anyone can choose to not care about their own Elo, or to say it is meaningless, and that's a perfectly valid opinion, but it's also perfectly valid for any one person to care about his or her Elo. Each person has every right to care or not care about his or her own personal Elo for whatever reason. It IS a scoreboard, to some extent, and so I choose to care about it, just as I care about the final score in any individual game of Terraforming Mars or any other game that l keeps score.

I am in third place in ELo in a game that I like very much. Do I want to be number 1? Yes. Do I believe I can be the best? Yes. (Especially since the top 2 will not play me). Therefore, I care about my Elo in that game. And in a 3-player game, if first place were utterly unattainable, I would try to ensure I do not finish 3rd. For that reason, I ONLY play that game 2-player. In fact, I avoid playing ANY game 3-player, unless it has to be played 3-player (7-wonders, for example), or, if 2-player just makes for a lousy game (Scythe, for example).

I can’t say I comprehend a lot of the discussion here to be honest.

In 2p you should be able to concede whenever you want, it really doesn’t impact anything at all.

In multiplayer conceding is generally frowned upon quite heavily as it can dramatically impact the outcome of the game. On Steam the AI takes over and does ridiculously stupid things for the missing player resulting in some pretty gross AI kingmaking. Probably not an issue for BGA, but all the same the missing player taking no actions could prolong the game unnaturally, for example (I don’t know what BGA’s solution to afk players is for multiplayer formats).

Bottom line: if you’re conceding in 3-5p you’re acting in an extremely unsportsmanlike fashion and disrupting the gameplay for everyone else out of selfishness. Don’t choose to play multiplayer if you don’t want to finish. Yes, life happens and maybe lightning strikes or something and you get disconnected and nothing can be done or your child has an emergency and ya need to take em to the hospital, but this kind of stuff is very rare. In general, don’t sign up to play (particularly in competitive settings) if you’re not going to finish a multiplayer game, that’s terrible etiquette. 2p there’s no issues, but don’t do this in multiplayer.

FrankJones wrote: ↑11 May 2025, 16:49 Okay, let's get something clarified here, because I think Rook is wording things in a way that is causing a lot of confusion.

Rook is talking about "conceding" in a 3-player game by realizing that 1st place is unattainable and therefore playing for 2nd place to ensure not finishing in third place, thereby avoiding the much bigger Elo loss that comes with 3rd place compared to 2nd place.

I would not have used the word "concede" in that context because it has obviously caused confusion with the actual act of "conceding" by clicking the "concede this game" button which saves no Elo and which is not even possible in a 3-player game.

I hope that clarifies this entire misunderstanding


I would much prefer a system that awards Elo to the winner and gives equal Elo loss to all the non-winners. But that is not going to happen, so, the system is what it is.

Elo is not meaningless. It means something to a lot of players (myself included) who find personal value in climbing the leaderboard, especially if they believe they have a possibility of seeing their name in the top (whatever, top 20, top 10, top 1). Anyone can choose to not care about their own Elo, or to say it is meaningless, and that's a perfectly valid opinion, but it's also perfectly valid for any one person to care about his or her Elo. Each person has every right to care or not care about his or her own personal Elo for whatever reason. It IS a scoreboard, to some extent, and so I choose to care about it, just as I care about the final score in any individual game of Terraforming Mars or any other game that l keeps score.

I am in third place in ELo in a game that I like very much. Do I want to be number 1? Yes. Do I believe I can be the best? Yes. (Especially since the top 2 will not play me). Therefore, I care about my Elo in that game. And in a 3-player game, if first place were utterly unattainable, I would try to ensure I do not finish 3rd. For that reason, I ONLY play that game 2-player. In fact, I avoid playing ANY game 3-player, unless it has to be played 3-player (7-wonders, for example), or, if 2-player just makes for a lousy game (Scythe, for example).

Well, I don't think we got Rook wrong. This whole thread is about conceding in 2p TM due tue current arena settings... the 3p-"conceding" strategie is just sth, he/she mentioned aswell.
Which I btw totally agree with. Always play for your best possible outcome.

But the points of saving elo with conceding (which i am not sure is sth that actually works) and saving life time are just bogus. Therfore my reply.

About the elo, you are right that it can have a meaning to somebody and that is totally fine. It is definitly an Indicator about skilllevel. What I was trying to say is, that it's not more then that. Because it gives zero information about how strong the opponents are you play (which you could argue is the same in arena, but at least it's random) and your settings. How many players, expansions, other special-settings...
I guess this doens't impact games, which are by default same for everybody like spades or hearts. There I would give the Elo much more credit.

There is no conceding in 3p (or multiplayer in general), only quitting or running out of time and being kicked by another player. If either of those things happen, the game is basically over at that exact moment. The remaining players can choose to continue playing just for fun but everything after that moment is meaningless for ELO.

xspuipuke wrote: ↑13 May 2025, 09:07 There is no conceding in 3p (or multiplayer in general), only quitting or running out of time and being kicked by another player. If either of those things happen, the game is basically over at that exact moment. The remaining players can choose to continue playing just for fun but everything after that moment is meaningless for ELO.

That sounds quite horrible… just absolutely awful way to handle it but then I guess there isn’t a “good” way to handle that kind of thing in the first place. Just, ya know, don’t do that folks. If you choose to play multiplayer tfm you’re making a commitment so make sure you see it through and finish the game. Don’t be rude and ruin everyone else’s experience.

Got asked to gg out when the score was 90 - 33 against me.
Managed to actually catch up and win that game.
That feels amazing!!