Include global timezone in Arena 1)notification banner and 2)FAQ

[LordChambers]

There is a purple notification banner that pops up on the /lobby or "play now" section of the website when the player selects "Arena" from a drop down menu. It reads something like "Last days for Arena Season 19! End of the season: 2025-01-07 at 05:00

Read Arena turn-based end of Season rules "

This is insufficient, because the text, and the hyperlink to the FAQ does not specify which timezone this hour refers to. I asked an AI, which guessed since the company that operates the site is in France, it's a French (CET) timezone. Is that correct?

Since players are locked out of starting turn-based arena games five days before the end of the season, there are many chances daily players will wonder "when does the season end for me?" Why not include the timezone in the text? "What is the global arena timezone?" should be in the FAQ.

[betsys99]

I was just coming here to say the same thing! It would be very helpful, thank you.

>We are determining Season winners and configuring Season 20.
>Get ready for Season 20, starting Jan 7th 2025 12:00.

Love the site, think it's a great bargain at $3/mo, thank you for all you do!

[Mathew5000]

It's intended that whenever BGA shows you a time of day (or a date), it refers to your own time zone (this is what Sourisdudesert stated here in 2019).

Sometimes BGA expressly states the time zone (specifically for the start time of a tournament) but usually not. That's problematic because many people will be uncertain whether a time stated is supposed to be in their own time, in UTC, or in Paris time. See https://boardgamearena.com/bug?id=27142 and viewtopic.php?t=40217 Aside from that there are other issues, like if the time on your device is incorrect, or if the time zone is set to a different place from where you physically are, it could be very unclear, because you wouldn't know whether the time displayed is based on (a) the time zone of your ISP or your device (by geolocation), (b) the time zone setting of your device, or (c) the time setting of your device even if not for its time zone.

For the specific case of the end of the Arena season, I did some experimenting and concluded that the season is supposed to end at 13:00 UTC. The weird thing is, when I changed the time zone on my device, and then logged back in to BGA, it didn't immediately show me a revised time for the end of the Arena season. It was only after I had been playing for a while and then went back to the page, that it showed me the correct time corresponding to my new time zone.

I wish BGA would eliminate all ambiguity by expressly stating a time zone, everywhere it shows a time, as it does with tournament start times. See for example https://boardgamearena.com/bug?id=33960

Another issue is that BGA does not always deal correctly with time zones like Newfoundland, India, or central Australia, that are not a whole number of hours different from UTC.