Major improvement about quitting players

[Quinarbre]

Is this saying that for turn-based, it's going to happen automatically?

Yes. Some players have something like 20 or 30 turn based games, and they certainly don't want to check all games to see if someone is over time. Turn based time limits are designed so that people have the time to play (with a margin) and they are even warned before, so this is not a big deal.

And... why do I now have 5 days to take a turn?

The time rules are specified explicitly when game begins. No speed profile gives 5 days per turn (but of course you can accumulate 5 days if you play fast). If this is not the case then please report a bug.

For turn-based games, it's not totally fair to rely on the single fact that time rules are specified from the beginning. I'll explain with an actual example.

I'm currently involved in a Stone Age game which is set to one turn per day, and so far every player in it has managed to keep up that rhythm, so we're all at 5 days left and we're all abiding by the time rules that were set in the beginning.
However, that game began 2 months ago (which is normal considering the number of players and the speed we agreed to), and we're probably going to play for about one month more. If one of us decides to take a one-week vacation without access to internet, a 3-month game is ruined whereas everyone has played by the rules most of the time, and no one can do anything about it. I think everyone would agree it's a bit abusive to ask such a commitment to people :
- you don't know in advance how long the game will take
- not everyone knows what they'll do during their weekends and vacations in the next 3 months (at least I don't !)

So, if turn-based games do skip your turn automatically, at least there should be a "vacation mode" like someone suggested in another thread. Of course some boundaries like "no more than consecutive 2 weeks of absence" or "warn 1 week in advance" could be enforced.

[Fishwick]

Yeah, a well known chess website has similar turn based games. They have a vacation system.

That's really why I haven't really started any turn based games here, I can't say for sure I can get to my pc every day or couple of days for however long it will last.

The automatic skipping I think will actually have the effect of fewer turn based games being finished.

[Korenwolf]

From the wiki page...

On turn-based games, you are warned by email when you are running out of time. As soon as you are out of time, your next turn is skipped.

I receive hundreds and hundreds of these emails sent by several sites, in a nice and neat folder I created in my email account, never to be looked at again until the sheer number of messages in the end will probably break the internet

[Occupeep]

The worst of it is that I had no choice - I was required to play in a tainted game.

I agree this is not a nice situation, but with the previous system the situation would have been exactly the same.

I do not understand "exactly the same". Under the previous system I am not forced to waste time playing out a game which I see as ruined by the zombie's poor plays - which are nothing like the plays made by the human. And then to have my ELO also affected by the ruined game... that never happened under the old system. I want some way to avoid all this, please.

Proposal:

If everyone on a board is happy with "skipping" then that's good for them, but if one person wants a "humans only" game then that is how the game is. That decision needs to be made at game-start, so people don't say "humans only please" just because they are in last place. So I suggest that when a person joins a game they have an option to join-with-humans-only-policy. If one or more people join that way then there are no zombies/skipping in the game - if players are over the time limit we eject them.

[glitter and doom]

The system has been updated 15 minutes ago to take your remark into account.

Great! This solution is much better.

However, I would prefer that in turn-based mode turn is NOT skipped automatically after the timeout. In case my opponent warns me that he will need more time (vacation, sickness, business trip...) I wouldn't expel him / make him skip the turn.

[Liallan]

Sorry - haven't read all 5 pages of this yet, but I doubt anyone responded directly about Perudo.

On Perudo when you reach 0 dice you have a "your have been eliminated window" that makes you choose between continue watching the game or leave. And of course you can leave. Please give it a try and you will see that there is absolutely no problem with this game.

I'm sorry, but you are wrong. First, I am not sure why you're telling me to "give it a try." Am I supposed to purposely play badly in order to get eliminated so I can "try" this???? Is that seriously what you're suggesting? And that is NOT the problem I described. The problem is that the people eliminated from the game are abandoning the game, and the game STOPS. i.e. the game goes away, it's over, it's done, for all of us. It does not continue. This has happened in all but one game I have played, where someone now eliminated just abandons the game, and the game just stops and we never get to finish. The choice to "leave" is creating an abandonment. So, you're just wrong. And this skipping-turns thing is not going to help that, cause they don't have any turns to skip.

Is this saying that for turn-based, it's going to happen automatically?

Yes. Some players have something like 20 or 30 turn based games, and they certainly don't want to check all games to see if someone is over time. Turn based time limits are designed so that people have the time to play (with a margin) and they are even warned before, so this is not a big deal.

I know what turn-based is for. Please do not tell me that something is "not a big deal" to me - you can't know how I feel about something and whether it's a big deal. It's a big deal to me to have it skip turns automatically if I don't want to do that. Skipping turns (or worse, the system is PLAYING turns for zombies in Hearts???) means the game goes differently. It ruins the game, it ruins the integrity of the game, and it ruins the integrity of the ELO. And you're saying if I play turn-based, I have NO CHOICE in the matter. How does warning anyone help? I'm not the one over time, so warnings aren't helping me in any way whatsoever. And then you have the audacity to tell me this is no big deal? How can you know if this is a big deal to me or not? Not everyone plays 20 or 30 games at a time, and if they don't feel like checking to see if someone is over time, then they're not going to notice, are they?

What I hear coming out of you is that you're not even listening.

And... why do I now have 5 days to take a turn?

The time rules are specified explicitly when game begins. No speed profile gives 5 days per turn (but of course you can accumulate 5 days if you play fast). If this is not the case then please report a bug.

Well, first I would have to understand what it's supposed to do before I can report a bug. When I started these games, they were all 1 turn a day games, and since I agreed to that, that's what should continue. However, when I went to them, they said 5 days in big red letters at the top, and the red bar is gone. Now today it no longer says anything at all at the top, but my total time is now down to 4 days, meaning it never added my day for my current turn. But I couldn't say it's a bug cause I don't know what the heck it's doing now. I'm supposed to have 5 days PLUS a day for each turn. It didn't have this problem before.

The worst of it is that I had no choice - I was required to play in a tainted game.

I agree this is not a nice situation, but with the previous system the situation would have been exactly the same.

No, it would not, not if everyone agreed to abandon it. The poster was complaining about the same thing I was - being forced into doing the skipping of turns whether they like it or not. And from what was described, it looks like you can't vote on it, so if you don't agree, too bad - you're forced to do it anyway. (Which is a really good way for someone to have control over the game.) That's what I said already in another post - that I can't control what the other players might choose to do and get stuck with this whether I like it or not. And it's just automatic for turn-based, so I would simply be forced into it.

I can only repeat, it seems to me you're not listening. Out of all of these posts, most of them have been negative. In fact, I have to seriously wonder if you actually play the games here. It doesn't sound at all like you even get what anyone is saying.

I refuse to start any new games under these conditions. I remember the post about the then-new turn-based and your claim to make this the best turn-based site. No, it's not, and I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but you're a long way from that. And you just made it worse. I came here cause you added turn-based. And now I refuse to start any new games with this nonsense turn-skipping crap. At least give a choice. Before, we had the CHOICE to expel a player, or do a group abandon.

I know people leaving games was a problem but... I think this is a bad solution and that you should just put it back the way it was until you come up with a better one. And as I've stated before (which I have to assume just got ignored), 98% of the abandoned turn-based games are NOT because someone is losing - they usually just don't even start the game at all, or quit after 1 or 2 turns. So it seems completely senseless to continue playing the game at all, and now this turn-skipping is going to be automatic.

[Babyrhinorainbows]

The system has been updated 15 minutes ago to take your remark into account.

Great! This solution is much better.

However, I would prefer that in turn-based mode turn is NOT skipped automatically after the timeout. In case my opponent warns me that he will need more time (vacation, sickness, business trip...) I wouldn't expel him / make him skip the turn.

Wanted to agree with this sentiment. Last week a person said they were going to be away for the weekend and I was fine letting them take the extra time. Having them lose a turn would be frustrating for all involved.

[Darnoc]

If a game is going to count for ELO then I think it should have real people, not zombies, making all the moves. And I would like to have an option to play in games which have no zombies and no skipped turns.

[chrisa]

Hi all,

(I could not read every post in this topic, I hope this has not be reported yet)

Our game Battle Sheep #12153891 suddenly finished today, I assume that one of the players has expelled XXX who had not played for several days.
Now look at the results:
- XXX (the player who was expelled) earns +24 ELOs
- two players lose ELOs (although the game was not played, we have not even placed all the tiles...), -1 and -24 respectively
- I am more lucky, since I earn 4 ELOs

Later, I expelled a player on Table Battle Sheep #12201863 (also, he had not placed a tile for several days). More precisely: I used the "skip his turn" button, which ended the game. The same happened: he earned +4, I lost -3.

I don't know if anyone had the same experience. I've created a bug report about it.

What can we do if we cannot expel people who join a table, then do not play, without risking to lose ELOs ourselves?
Or should we consider a new way to earn ELOs: joining table and waiting until we are expelled?

(This said, thanks a lot for this wonderful website
chrisa

[Korenwolf]

Well it hasn't taken me long to run into one of the downsides of these changes...

Second time. 4 player game of seasons, in the middle of my turn during my actions. The person who had me skip my turns won this game as well...

http://en.3.boardgamearena.com/seasons?table=12297283

This feature is all to readily utilized by exactly the type of players it was supposed to punish, jerks who don't play fair