Board Game Arena

Many games I join with fast speed requirements (8 turns per day or more). However, more than half of these games don’t finish (or barely get started) because one or more players never even tried to maintain that speed requirement.

For example - player joins game with 24 turns per day requirement and does their first turn and then doesn’t log in for another two days!

Is this just me? Should I be more patient? Are people just inconsiderate?

I bet many people just join games and they don't see the time settings or even know there's such a thing, let alone set their table search preferences.

It's probably a mix of players not noticing the setting (does the new lobby respect it? I don't actually know).

And, players thinking they can handle it, but don't realize they are in different time zones (is there any way to see time zones, especially with the new lobby?).

Nope. It isn’t just you. Because of this I won’t dare enter such games or fast tournaments. It allows anyone who is losing the option to get out of a loss by timing out the person over time. If they had an option to continue the game regularly after a player was timed out that would be great. That way they come in last and whoever timed them out (most likely was in last or 2nd to last) will still finish in a low spot as they were going to.

If someone is out of time for their first or second move, I boot them because I don't want to risk playing the entire game like that or play like 80% of the game and then get it canceled anyway. And I place a red thumb.
I do usually give them a few extra hours.

Phoxtrot wrote: ↑04 April 2024, 21:22 If someone is out of time for their first or second move, I boot them because I don't want to risk playing the entire game like that or play like 80% of the game and then get it canceled anyway. And I place a red thumb.
I do usually give them a few extra hours.

One thing I highly recommend to you and others is to first use the "Are you still there" translated emote. Or, type a sentence (which they can automatically translate) like "XYZ, would you like to cancel the game?"

Then everyone can vote to abandon, without anyone getting a karma penalty.

Far too often, people start spamming kick attempts, whether in real-time or turn-based, without once attempting to use the chat to communicate with the person in question. This just leads to a hostile, impersonal community.

I mostly play in turn-based but if the player is online, sure.

In my very limited experience, in arena mode or automatic matching, with turn based time set to "flexible", the settings are too flexible. I made the error of allowing flexible time settings from a one-move-a-day base, thinking I'd be fine with three or four moves per day, or a move every other day, and was dropped into a fast turn based game with playing hours that overlapped my sleeping hours. Haven't used flexible options since. (I dropped a note on a possibly-related bug report about option selections not being honored, which hasn't been updated since, but did not open one specifically about the unclear range on "flexible" for game speed.)

mapleleafbc wrote: ↑04 April 2024, 18:04 Many games I join with fast speed requirements (8 turns per day or more). However, more than half of these games don’t finish (or barely get started) because one or more players never even tried to maintain that speed requirement.

For example - player joins game with 24 turns per day requirement and does their first turn and then doesn’t log in for another two days!

Is this just me? Should I be more patient? Are people just inconsiderate?

It depends on the game. I had this happen constantly with Beyond the Sun, and frequently with Steamworks. Most other games I haven't had this issue with. I think it crops up more on games that have some popularity, but not a ton, and are premium. Some players will just join any game they can and hope the other players tolerate their slow play.

I found the best way to avoid this is to play in Arena, because that is where you find players that care about their rating and not getting kicked. Unfortunately that requires you to get to 100 ELO first (which can be difficult if you find it hard to complete a game) and you have to like the settings for the current Arena season.
Alternatively creating a table with fewer players and highest Karma restrictions can reduce the likelihood of encountering these users. Also, remember to red thumb so you don't get matched with them again.

GTSchemer wrote: ↑04 April 2024, 21:24

Phoxtrot wrote: ↑04 April 2024, 21:22 If someone is out of time for their first or second move, I boot them because I don't want to risk playing the entire game like that or play like 80% of the game and then get it canceled anyway. And I place a red thumb.
I do usually give them a few extra hours.

One thing I highly recommend to you and others is to first use the "Are you still there" translated emote. Or, type a sentence (which they can automatically translate) like "XYZ, would you like to cancel the game?"

Then everyone can vote to abandon, without anyone getting a karma penalty.

Far too often, people start spamming kick attempts, whether in real-time or turn-based, without once attempting to use the chat to communicate with the person in question. This just leads to a hostile, impersonal community.

They're in turn-based games and it's been a couple hours. A chat message doesn't help if they're not online to read it.

I usually play games that are 1 or 2 moves per day, so the time bank is 36-48 hours. If someone has managed to use up their entire 36 hour time bank I have no problem booting them immediately. You can't exactly "spam kick attempts" if it's been over a day since their turn started.

mikkashar wrote: ↑05 April 2024, 05:29 In my very limited experience, in arena mode or automatic matching, with turn based time set to "flexible", the settings are too flexible. I made the error of allowing flexible time settings from a one-move-a-day base, thinking I'd be fine with three or four moves per day, or a move every other day, and was dropped into a fast turn based game with playing hours that overlapped my sleeping hours. Haven't used flexible options since. (I dropped a note on a possibly-related bug report about option selections not being honored, which hasn't been updated since, but did not open one specifically about the unclear range on "flexible" for game speed.)

I could have sworn at some point I set my game speed preferences (I prefer to play at X moves per day, I'm okay with playing at Y moves per day, I never want to play Z moves per day) but for the life of me I can't find where. Perhaps another user remembers where those preferences are?