So, have the games gotten better?

[Silene]

Unfortunately I'd say it's gotten worse. What I now notice is I'm now held hostage.

I heard this claim of "being held hostage" even before the change. I don't quite get a grasp of what it's supposed to mean. Everyone agreed to play the game, but it's not like you're forced in front of the screen to keep playing. If a situation is unbearable for you, you can always quit the game and take the according penalty for breaking the initial promise.

But it was the same before the change that ending the game early was only for cases where everyone wanted it. The only change is now that if everyone wants to quit now, you get -10 ELO, which is fair, because you didn't win the game.

[aesche]

…

You miss / refuse to understand what ELO is for, a player score over all their games, not just the wins. The fix rightly removes the free way out for people that a) screw many of their games because of bad play, and b) heavily inflated their ELO before.

Getting people out of master that dont belong there and that are super rude to everyone that doesnt favour their manipulation was the goal of the fix, and herewith has proven to have worked. Great!

[Stroom]

Even the comment on the latest game he played from another player:
https://boardgamearena.com/table?table=442000113

Luca made numerous mistakes in this game, then started to make intentional mistakes. If you look at their rating, it has been tanking from over 1000 for a long time. I think they intentionally lose games to game their rating. They're very rude in the process. Avoid.

So the abandon feature is actually good as bad players do get shoved out of the master range if they do not behave and change their ways.

[ufm]

Well, this guy has effectively proved removing abandon in co-op is the right call.

[orgle]

Unfortunately I'd say it's gotten worse. What I now notice is I'm now held hostage. Notwithstanding the whole policy of so much of the moderation team clearly don't speak english as a first language, now what you tend to find in a 2p/3p/4p game (I tend not to play 5p), is that once one person makes a mistake, or they don't agree with some POV, they just misfire.

There's a report option for intentially disrupting the game. The player would have to be able to defend their misfire as a reasonable misunderstanding, rather than retribution.

While I'm sad to have lost the ability to abandon when a player unintentionally goes offline, or when it's clear a player doesn't have Master-level skills... I am happy to be running into fewer clueless low level Masters. Playing with one or two 750-800 ELO players is no longer a high risk endeavour.

I'm on board with separate ELO systems for 2p vs multiplayer. I've had a number of 5p games bomb out recently because 2p Masters decided to switch streams and they keep doing early saves on the chop. I salute those who can play 2p well -- I've tried and failed -- but you can't assume a 2p Master can handle a 5p Master game (and vice versa). They're completely different beasts and require completely different conventions.

[orchid]

Personally, I don't see any improvement. I still see tons of masters players that clearly have not mastered the basics, let alone more complicated skills like board vision.

I disagree that the goal was to weed out bad players. There is definitely a skill difference between 300 vs 500 vs 700 elo in the games I've watched, but I agree not reliably an accurate indicator (and now elo is mostly hidden, anyway). I also agree tiering out elo at 900+ might help, but I think it's reasonable to expect most 700 elo haven't yet "mastered" what you find basic. I haven't been playing hanabi as much the past few months, but was told today that bga is moving to chop focus, a convention I don't currently follow. And several months ago, players got annoyed that I didn't realize playing a non-chop right 1 before left 1 meant that k1 was seen, just because the onanistically named group said so, and I don't follow them to have read that discussion. I agree with the convention, just stating I learned it after the rest of the table found it automatic. My point being, while I'm one of the higher elo exclusively-5p-hanabi players on this site, I am still learning evolving "basics".

Re: what the goal of removing abandons in coop games tried to accomplish - avoiding elo inflation from players who abandon the minute a play does not go their way - I think it succeeded, and likely cut down on some hostility and moderations. Even in this thread, as well as from players we know, the same players that complained about being "held hostage" from not being allowed to abandon before, are the ones now not allowing people to concede. That's elo fluffing, and now it's not allowed, and I'm all for it.

[Travis Hall]

I haven't been playing hanabi as much the past few months, but was told today that bga is moving to chop focus, a convention I don't currently follow.

This is the first I’ve heard of that, and I’m active and fairly good. Some of us have used a very limited form of chop focus for ages, but I don’t believe there’s a widespread move to generalised chop focus.

And several months ago, players got annoyed that I didn't realize playing a non-chop right 1 before left 1 meant that k1 was seen,

It doesn’t. There are other reasons why a non-chop right 1 would be played first. (Usually it relates to the left 1 being clued directly while in blind finesse position, which often allows the holder to deduce that the left 1 is a non-urgent play, but the right 1 is urgent.) A player may attempt to hint that they see 1k by playing a right 1, but it’s not completely reliable.

[orchid]

This is the first I’ve heard of that, and I’m active and fairly good. Some of us have used a very limited form of chop focus for ages, but I don’t believe there’s a widespread move to generalised chop focus.

When playing with high-level partners, I generally try to regard a number clue touching chop as chop-focussed unless there is a timeliness consideration.

Quoting you from two different threads, but I did not claim it was a generalized move to chop focus, only that I am questioning your assertion that "high level masters" on BGA adhere to number clue touching chop=automatic chop focus.

I do not follow this chop focus convention, but do see varying pros/cons to either side and am open to discussion. However, right now, it just seems like you're making someone guess when you're playing chop focus and when you're not.

https://boardgamearena.com/archive/repl ... =;&goto=25 Lau clues me white to reverse w1w2. I clue 3s to draw out left focus 3k in Victum's hand. Orgle bombs her own 3k assuming 3b reverse due to chop focus. 1. Do you still play chop focus here since my 3 clue was "early" (chop not yet in danger, w1 had to answer first). 2. Do you still play chop focus even though b3 could have been more easily reversed with color clue? In my current play style, 3 clue without a save 3 in discard means play left, as well as 3k focus.

https://boardgamearena.com/archive/repl ... =;&goto=45 My second most recent game played with you (it's been awhile!) though recent enough that it should count as part of the "for ages" you referenced. Applegummy clues 4 on you, marked 3g plays, but there's no urgency/timeliness. The clue can wait for your chop 4 to drop to hint green, so contradicts your timeliness argument. But you chose to play left 4. Which means both prompts and finesse mean to play left for you, even though prompts could wait unless the corresponding 4 was on chop. In both of these examples, it seems arbitrary when those who play chop focus will decide to or not, and I don't think there's a clear concensus on BGA on how/when to play it, vs left focus on BGA is more consistent.

I recognise that many masters will clue 2s non-chop-focussed in the early game. Frankly, I’m not a fan, as this forces me to guess who does this and who does not, but I will guess because my rate of error is lower that way. I understand the consideration that 2s are the most valuable cards, but I’m not sure the risks are worth it.

I am wary of your number clue chop focus preference because of this exact scenario. Saving what you describe as "the most valuable cards" is worth most risks for me and I will do a lot to save them. Even still, those risks seem higher with your preferred chop focus, vs with left-focus, which is what I assumed most of BGA followed (until orgle pointed out she's newly adjusting to this shift to chop focus number clues, which you apparently adhere to). In the other thread, Silene gave a similar example to hint a playable 4 color with number clue to save a non-unique-but-not-yet-playable 4k on chop. At higher masters level play, the rate-limiting factor of most games is losing good cards early, not bomb risks. Left focus gives more opportunity to save multiple cards, chop focus's goal is to save 1 card.

Whenever somebody touches my chop with a number clue and expects me to play from the left, and I misfire, my question is always “Well, if my cards were the opposite way around, how would you have clued them?” Of the few who will answer that question at all, the answer is usually, “I would clue <number>,” and they don’t understand that this makes it impossible for me to do anything other than guess.

I would not clue it alone, I would expect another player to help me extract it. If they will not, I let it go (or debate if left is worth losing/bombing). Receiving the clue, I would generally play from the left, caveat being, unless there was only one card left of that number and the non-chop card hinted is in finesse position and could have been bluffed instead.

It doesn’t. There are other reasons why a non-chop right 1 would be played first. (Usually it relates to the left 1 being clued directly while in blind finesse position, which often allows the holder to deduce that the left 1 is a non-urgent play, but the right 1 is urgent.) A player may attempt to hint that they see 1k by playing a right 1, but it’s not completely reliable.

I'm not following your example. If both 1s are hinted in one clue, I don't think that this direct clue should imply one 1 is more urgent than the other, especially if no available bluffs seen. I agree not completely reliable, only that some masters on this site are arguing this to be an automatic assumed BGA convention. It appears you and I both disagree with their argument about this (or their attempt to force general use of new conventions that others may not always agree with or may not align with currently used BGA conventions).

Long digression and now I'm meshing threads, but my point was: even at 1000+ elo, you and I are disagreeing on plays and what is considered "standard" at "high level" (at least, I'd like to believe you and I mutually find one another to be part of that tier), so it's understandable that the 700 elo players are not going to have as smooth of games as jgpaladin seems to be expecting. Just because the abandon option was removed doesn't mean all of these players now plummet to 500. It just means that the most extreme of these abandoners (>30%) might eventually be 900 instead of 1200, or 700 instead of 900, and yes, some might drop to expert ranks, but those with 20% abandon rate (not all that uncommon) will be slower to drop and potentially not much at all. The point of removing the option to abandon wasn't that there wouldn't be subpar masters, just that we've now removed one of several methods of falsely elevating elo, but it will be slow to take effect, and not a comprehensive fix for what remains a flawed elo system.

[mmmmmikke]

I've seen a noticeable decline in the quality of play in the last few months. Not sure what the problem is.

[jgpaladin]

Coming back to this thread.

I think the average level of play in masters-only games has plummeted. It's painful and it's embarrassing.

I don't really care about the decision they made re: Abandons, but the lack of elo separation for player counts is killing the game.