Board Game Arena

I am a Premium member playing a friendly, no time limit game of Wingspan with a non premium friend. Multiple times the game disappears if we don’t keep playing. Am I looking for the game in the wrong place? I have a game of Rummy with another person and I see that game and don’t lose it.

gennieg wrote: ↑15 October 2024, 23:18 I am a Premium member playing a friendly, no time limit game of Wingspan with a non premium friend. Multiple times the game disappears if we don’t keep playing. Am I looking for the game in the wrong place? I have a game of Rummy with another person and I see that game and don’t lose it.

How long are you letting it sit idle? The "no time limit" label is not literally true, because you can't just leave the table open and come back in a year. Some other users have discussed what they have observed the limit to be, but I don't remember what they said and when this was implemented they didn't update the FAQ to address it.

Unless you plan on leaving the table for more than six days, I'd suggest opening the table as turn-based set at 1 move every 2 days, which actually allows you to accrue up to a "maximum 6 days" thinking time per player. You can just play live, then pause when you need to take a break. If you resume within six days no one will even get a time expiration notation on their profile. If you don't resume in six days, the game won't end but the person whose turn it was will have a notation on their profile. But most importantly, I'm pretty sure the maximum time a turn-based game can be idle is longer than a no time limit real time game. Obviously at a minimum it's six days.

gennieg wrote: ↑15 October 2024, 23:18 I am a Premium member playing a friendly, no time limit game of Wingspan with a non premium friend. Multiple times the game disappears if we don’t keep playing. Am I looking for the game in the wrong place? I have a game of Rummy with another person and I see that game and don’t lose it.

It looks like you're doing "real time" friendly and not "turn based" friendly. Switch to turn based and it should last for months, I believe.

Remkar wrote: ↑15 October 2024, 23:50 It looks like you're doing "real time" friendly and not "turn based" friendly. Switch to turn based and it should last for months, I believe.

I didn't even know turn-based friendly existed as an option, but I only play friendly games that are going to conclude in a single evening.

Ed.: Oh, that explains it. There is no "turn-based" friendly option, at least at the time of table creation. Once you change the game mode to friendly it shows a description: "Friendly mode: no rankings, no time limit per turn, no penalties. Real-time game." Or do you mean start it as real-time, then use the "propose to switch to turn-based" option? I've never had to use that in a friendly game.

But like I said, the slowest turn-based game might as well be no time limit unless you plan not to play for weeks.

The "real-time friendly" thing has been a known issue for ages. I am not sure why the powers that be are unwilling to change its behavior, maybe concerns about games sitting around a long time.

If you want to make a friendly mode game, unfortunately you need to change your settings to turn-based first, THEN choose friendly mode.

One other option is to start a friendly mode game and then use the "vote for turn-based" thing in the top right menu. This is bugged, however -- it will add an 8-hour turn timer to the game even though it is friendly mode!

I submitted a patch to fix the vote for turn-based bug, and it has been reviewed, but BGA ownership vetoed allowing the fix unless they change their mind at some point.

GTSchemer wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 00:10If you want to make a friendly mode game, unfortunately you need to change your settings to turn-based first, THEN choose friendly mode.

Are you sure about this? I just tried it. Starting from the turn-based lobby, I created a table which defaulted to "normal" Game Mode and had the pull down menu for the various Game Speed options. Once I switched to the Game Mode "friendly," the Game Speed options were completely removed and the message "Friendly mode: no rankings, no time limit per turn, no penalties. Real-time game" appeared.

Meeplelowda wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 00:16

GTSchemer wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 00:10If you want to make a friendly mode game, unfortunately you need to change your settings to turn-based first, THEN choose friendly mode.

Are you sure about this? I just tried it. Starting from the turn-based lobby, I created a table which defaulted to "normal" Game Mode and had the pull down menu for the various Game Speed options. Once I switched to the Game Mode "friendly," the Game Speed options were completely removed and the message "Friendly mode: no rankings, no time limit per turn, no penalties. Real-time game" appeared.

Was it a solo game? If so, it might not happen.

Also, did you try reloading? The timer didn't appear for me until I refreshed the page.


*edit* I think I see what you mean, you're creating a real-time friendly table. Yes that will work, but that is the problem -- such tables will be deleted without warning after something like 4 hours of inactivity. I am intimately familiar with this risk because TI4 is going to be a very long game, and I wanted to avoid angry players who make a "no time limit" table that deletes itself overnight.


If anyone wishes to vote for the bugs in question, there is this: https://boardgamearena.com/bug?id=52289
And if you are a developer, this: https://studio.boardgamearena.com/bug?id=133

Meeplelowda wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 00:16

GTSchemer wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 00:10If you want to make a friendly mode game, unfortunately you need to change your settings to turn-based first, THEN choose friendly mode.

Are you sure about this? I just tried it. Starting from the turn-based lobby, I created a table which defaulted to "normal" Game Mode and had the pull down menu for the various Game Speed options. Once I switched to the Game Mode "friendly," the Game Speed options were completely removed and the message "Friendly mode: no rankings, no time limit per turn, no penalties. Real-time game" appeared.

With all my heart, I believe the "Real-time game" label is a bug on turn-based friendly games. Here is an example of a friendly game that lasted 15 days, but has the "Real-time game" label.

Shivaware wrote: ↑16 October 2024, 03:15 With all my heart, I believe the "Real-time game" label is a bug on turn-based friendly games. Here is an example of a friendly game that lasted 15 days, but has the "Real-time game" label.

I wouldn't be surprised if you were right. It seems like a detail that would be easily missed in terms of editing the text.

Yes, there was a big discussion about this around the time they removed the ability to play for ELO with no time limit. I believe the no time limit setting (with ELO) also used to have this real-time vs. turn-based distinction, people would inevitably choose the wrong one and then get "stuck" in their games because you couldn't quit without penalty (since ELO was being awarded) but also couldn't boot anyone (due to no timer). You could only play that mode with people you were friends with, so I can only assume that some people had jerky friends who just abandoned them in these no time limit games. But I know there was a complaint that if you got stuck in one of these "real-time" no time limit games, it prevented you from playing other real-time games while you were stuck (which should only have ever been 4 hours, so not a huge deal, but apparently, people complained frequently and admin had to consistently go end tables in this state?). Hence, yes, there is definitely a difference between "real-time" with no time limit (4 hour max idle time) and "turn-based" with no time limit (40 day max idle time).

Those of us who wanted to keep no time limit with ELO among friends did also suggest maybe just get rid of the "real-time" no time limit setting and ensure all no time limit games were setup as turn-based but this was never addressed. And I'm pretty sure the fact that both no time limit modes say "real time" even though one is and one isn't was also mentioned and ignored.