What real fixes would you like to see BGA deploy?

[FrankJones]

It's been a while since I've filed a (duplicate) bug, so I can't speak for what the current state of filing reports looks like. All I know is 26 duplicate reports is craaazy. Alpha testers should know not to do that to begin with and the system should have shown the original reports and 25 duplicates when that last guy filed.

Somewhere, there's a breakdown that's costing developers a lot of time.

I feel your pain. And it's not just Alpha games.

I only manage bug reports for one game - Terraforming Mars. But that creates a lot of frustration for the reasons you mentioned. And this is a game that is well-established with no bugs of any significance.

Two main problems:

1) People reporting a "bug" when they just don't understand the rules. This is easily avoidable. As others have noted, the system encourages and gives a means for players to check the existing reports before posting a bug., They just choose not to. They also choose not to read the actual text on the card, or google the rule, or do anything to check that maybe, just maybe, in a well-established game, their "bug" is just their not understanding the rules. It's very frustrating. For example, if anyone were to google "Terraforming Mars Predators Pets" they would realize that Predators cannot remove animals from the Pets card. Or, if they searched the bug forum using either keyword: "Predators" or "Pets". Or if they just read the text on the cards.

2) Whenever the site was experiencing site-wide issues, dozens of players would post asinine "bug" reports in the Terraforming Mars bug forum, completely oblivious to the utter pointlessness of this.

I am not sure how much more BGA can do. People are just lazy and to some extent, entitled (in my opinion). "The site was down and I lost Elo and Karma! I DEMAND you fix YOUR GAME and restore my Karma and Elo, NOW !!!!"

Those kind of comments didn't sit well with me. I once got so irritated that I posted a rant in response to one of them, and I got moderated. For a post I made in a bug forum for a game I am part of the development team! (And rightly so; my rant was over-the-top.) But that has to be rare, a developer getting moderated for going over-the-top in a post in the bug forum in which the person being moderated is a developer for that game!

[FSKFSK]

Fix the longstanding issues with tournaments.

Fix the problem in multiplayer elimination after someone is skipped. Add an option for everyone to advance, or replay the game with 1 fewer player.

Karma penalty for tournament timeouts are too low. You can timeout a tournament game and play 5 normal games and recover the lost karma. Tournament karma should be tracked separately from regular karma.

[Kayvon]

I am not sure how much more BGA can do.

An ability to ban users from submitting bugs for a certain period of time may help. Even the threat of a ban, as superficial as it may be, would get people to read more closely. Sure, it sounds counterproductive, but realize that some people repeatedly post false reports to games without ever checking the rules of consulting the forums. At some point, "helping" is worse than nothing.

[lefalaf]

I am not sure how much more BGA can do.

An ability to ban users from submitting bugs for a certain period of time may help. Even the threat of a ban, as superficial as it may be, would get people to read more closely. Sure, it sounds counterproductive, but realize that some people repeatedly post false reports to games without ever checking the rules of consulting the forums. At some point, "helping" is worse than nothing.

A good start would be removing friction to seeing an unfiltered list of existing bug reports. Like starting them on such a list if they came in from a game and the game is thus known.

Along with something stronger encouraging this. Maybe forcing users to see the existing bug list before clicking to proceed with report creation. With some appropriate instruction directing them to do so and perhaps checking a box to acknowledge some text before proceeding like we have prior to starting a beta.

It used to be easier to see the full, unfiltered list for a game. It might have even been the first thing seen when coming in from a game, but I forget what it looked like some months ago before the changes. I do know it was vastly easier to find previous similar reports.

[FSKFSK]

For bug reports, there shouldn't be 3+ month old reports "not reviewed by developers yet" (or even 1 month old).

[Kayvon]

For bug reports, there shouldn't be 3+ month old reports "not reviewed by developers yet" (or even 1 month old).

For me, there aren't. I've reviewed over a hundred new reports and comments over the past 24 hours.

For other gamer? A lot of times the volunteer developers aren't around anymore. Unless you enforce life-long servitude (this would probably reduce volunteers further), it's unenforceable.

[FSKFSK]

If someone quits, someone on BGA staff should try to take it over.

[FrankJones]

I am not sure how much more BGA can do.

An ability to ban users from submitting bugs for a certain period of time may help. Even the threat of a ban, as superficial as it may be, would get people to read more closely. Sure, it sounds counterproductive, but realize that some people repeatedly post false reports to games without ever checking the rules of consulting the forums. At some point, "helping" is worse than nothing.

Agreed 100%.

It's a bit of a paradox, seemingly, right? If the site is (to some extent) non-functional, how can BGA communicate with members.
And yet, When this happens, I see splattered across the top of every BGA page, "WE ARE EXPERIENCING ISSUES RIGHT NOW. PENALTIES WILL RE RESCINDED. THERE IS NO NEED TO REPORT BUGS".

So, if that is possible, why not ... just disable the bug forums until everything is back in working order ??

[FrankJones]

For bug reports, there shouldn't be 3+ month old reports "not reviewed by developers yet" (or even 1 month old).

Some context here:

1) Most bug reports are nonsense and can and should be disregarded.

2) The lead developer for a game is not paid indefinitely to continuously respond to 100s or 1000s of "bug" reports. After a period of time, it's just unpaid volunteer work.

3) I am part of the development team for one of the games on this site. A very popular one. I receive $0.00 for this. Should I be expected to review and close/address every inane bug report?

4) If people reporting the "bugs" would just stop being so lazy, most of these unaddressed bug reports should not exist. So, you seem unhappy with the developers. Maybe some of the blame should go to the bug reporters who are posting nonsense, many of whom are paying $0.00 a month to use the site while creating unnecessary work for unpaid volunteers because they cannot be bothered to research whether their "bug" is actually a bug (99% of the time it is not, it is just user error).

[Jellby]

Why is this thread here, instead of several threads in Suggestions?