BGA karma system in broken

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Spicy
Posts: 13
Joined: 01 October 2022, 01:41

BGA karma system in broken

Post by Spicy »

First of all, I'm not a perfect person. Sometimes I get annoyed by the random, sometimes I rage quit, etc. I got some fair karma reductions.

But! In no other game you get so much negativity from other people. I'm constantly getting "red thumbs" for no good reason. I can't appeal them, I'm not even entirely sure when and why I got many of them.

Most of the time I play in 3 people lobbies. And oh man, how easy it is to get into a game where there is one player who wants to trade and progress and another player who doesn't want to trade at all. You make your first trades and are immediately accused of teamplay! From that point on, the game is ruined and there is no fun in continuing it. The person who didn't want to trade also trying to make the game worse for everyone.
When the game ends, you find out you have 1 additional red thumb in your collection. You're also blocked by that player. Awesome!

Another significant issue I'm having is that I just can't play with a friend. Because my friends are usually from the same country as me and we're in each other's friend lists, many players think we're teamplaying. It doesn't matter where I put the robber, it doesn't matter from who I steal. "I'm reporting you two".

This is so frustrating!

Catan is a good game, but it feels like the community surrounding it is just so immature and embittered.
Last edited by Spicy on 24 November 2022, 04:08, edited 2 times in total.
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Mathew5000
Posts: 220
Joined: 02 January 2021, 01:41

Re: The BGA Karma system in broken

Post by Mathew5000 »

SpicyKitKat wrote: 20 October 2022, 07:25 When the game ends, you find out you have 1 additional red thumb in your collection.
How do you find out the number of red thumbs against you? I thought that information was secret?
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Spicy
Posts: 13
Joined: 01 October 2022, 01:41

Re: The BGA Karma system in broken

Post by Spicy »

Mathew5000 wrote: 20 October 2022, 10:17
SpicyKitKat wrote: 20 October 2022, 07:25 When the game ends, you find out you have 1 additional red thumb in your collection.
How do you find out the number of red thumbs against you? I thought that information was secret?
I don't. But I got a message saying I got too many red thumbs for teamplaying. Asked a few friend to give me the green thumb. The message went away. Then I played a few games and got the message again. Then the situation repeated.
Snowcrash000
Posts: 60
Joined: 10 September 2022, 00:15

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Snowcrash000 »

What I would really like to know is how it takes for red thumbs to "go away" or get synchronized against green thumbs. I got a message that I have too many red thumbs a few days ago, which is now prominently displayed on my profile page. Since then I have been actively avoiding games that tend to make people mad, been starting and ending all my games with a nice greeting and good bye note and have even been told by a few players that they gave me a thumbs up. How long does it take for that "red thumb alert" to actually go away?
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Romain672
Posts: 1014
Joined: 05 April 2016, 13:53

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Romain672 »

I don't want to do false claims so I will try to be very careful with my words.

From my experience on others forums, people which create posts like that are way more aggressive/annoying than they think/they show on the forum.

Maybe you lie in purpose/to yourself to appear nice while in fact, you know you aren't.

Maybe you instead strat the conversation with those players, and since they are mad they are more likely to do those false accusations. Maybe you use terms with friends or family which are limit, but some people will hate when someone else use them.

And btw, if you was on this case, then got one game where you got a red thumb for wrong reasons, the penality is not for your last game, but for all your previous game where you didn't behaved nicely.


If you still believe those red thumbs were unfair, others people seem to not have the same problem. And if it's the case, that mean the problem is for you. But if you just improve slightly, since you seem to be at the limit of having 60 or 100 karma, that will have a big difference.
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Kaladry
Posts: 63
Joined: 16 June 2020, 02:20

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Kaladry »

I agree, -40 seems excessive when you get just one more red thumb. It should be changed to -10 or -15 as many people give out petty red thumbs when they lose or just don’t like your playing style and why should that affect you?
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Romain672
Posts: 1014
Joined: 05 April 2016, 13:53

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Romain672 »

Kaladry wrote: 02 November 2022, 17:54 I agree, -40 seems excessive when you get just one more red thumb. It should be changed to -10 or -15 as many people give out petty red thumbs when they lose or just don’t like your playing style and why should that affect you?
Yeah I would agree on that. From my knowledge:
Actually the system give a maximum amount of karma depending of how many % of red thumb, which is 100, 60, or 20?
Then depending of how frequently you leave tables (and others factors), you can be at lower than your maximum.

So the limit of 100/60/20? karma can be pretty harsh because if one red thumb make you reach the limit, you will get a bga message and lose 40max karma.
The advantage is that you can explain to people what happen with their maximum karma when it change.

If you change that system and create like 11 limits: 100/90/80/70/60/50/40/30/20/10/0 karma, what would happen when someone reach 90 max karma? Would you add a message to the account?
If so, would you make that limit reach with a lesser % of red thumb? If you don't, that feel weird since reaching the actual limit of 60max karma will be way harder than actually. If you do, then people risk to cry on the forum saying they got 90 max karma for 'no reason', there would be more false positive just by randon, and more people which just talk on bga as they do IRL, but would not give 100max karma here.

Sorry, should be hard to follow, but what I mean by that is that it's complicated. If you want to rework the system, how would you do it?
Stroom
Posts: 404
Joined: 14 July 2016, 19:10

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Stroom »

You can just play a bunch of fast-paced 2-player games to get your karma up in no time. Maybe it would be better if the karma is counter per-game not overall.
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Kaladry
Posts: 63
Joined: 16 June 2020, 02:20

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by Kaladry »

As I understand the system it’s currently gain 1 karma point for each completed game you also didn’t go negative time in. So yes if you get knocked down for whatever reason you can play some of the fast games to put you right back up to 100 or whatever limit there might be? I have no idea if there are currently any limits on max karma if you’ve got infractions. The FAQ doesn’t mention anything about this but it also doesn’t specify what number you’ll go down by if you receive too many red thumbs.
Your initial Karma score is 75☯ (on a maximum of 100☯). Then:
Each time you finish a game, if your clock has never been negative during this game, you get +1☯.
If you quit, or get kicked out of a game in progress, you lose 10☯ or even 20☯ if you already quit another game recently.
If you miss out on a planned tournament game: -4☯.
If you receive too many 'Red thumbs' from the other players when compared to the amount of 'Green thumbs' received, your karma will be reduced to a low value each time you receive a Red Thumb. In this case, the best is to have a perfect behavior to get Green thumb and restore your ratio and reputation.
Just that “your karma will be reduced to a low value each time you receive a Red Thumb” bothers me because it seems excessive if you receive petty red thumbs. Maybe it should only count red thumbs where someone reported you for actually breaking a rule and not for the “this is my personal opinion” option.
bagofnails
Posts: 9
Joined: 22 September 2022, 11:25

Re: The BGA karma system in broken

Post by bagofnails »

I fi d the game of Catan naturally makesone suspicious. When coming across two players whohad the same ip, I automatically assumed that they were colluding against me, but this happens regularly in King of Tokyo, and I do not have the same feelings.
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