Could Somebody Explain the Clock?

[Liallan]

I have clicked on about everything I can find around here, and searched back about a year in the forums, and find no good explanation of how the clock works.

This is the only thing I can find that even mentions time at all, from the Wiki:
Most of the time, your initial delay at the beginning of a game is 3 minutes. During each turn, or on specific occasions, you get an additional delay.

I don't even know what that means because I don't understand how it works to start with. I also am quite surprised that there is no good explanation. I first came here about two years ago, and left. Partly cause I'm not excited by clocks, but a lot because I found no explanation of it or what the time limits were, etc. Without understanding this aspect, I just left. I only came back because you started the turn-based, and you have some games I've not found elsewhere. (Yes, you have attracted some people from Yucata, although it's still quite different.)

What I'd really like is examples, with actual numbers. I tried watching but the clocks were jumping around so fast I had no clue. I've taken turns in two turn-based games and they didn't even seem consistent. (One seems to have added extra time when I finished my turn and the other seems not to.)

Thanks.

[Trociu]

I will explain it on turn based mod. It look similar in every game and in both modes and all speed types but here i know where those numbers come from.

At the begining of the game every player gets amount of time. This is for making your turns. In turn based with 2 moves ped day it is 142 hours (or something similar) because after 1 week after some player done nothing in his turn the game is automaticly closed (in other real-time game it is based on how long the game should take - you don't need same amount of time for 6 nimmt and Tobago of course). Of course no one wants the game to last for so long, and that's where this additional delay is needed.

Every time you have to make move you get additional time for this move. If you will think longer than that (in 2 moves per day mode it would be 12 hours because that's 2 moves per day) then it is information for you that you have chosen wrong game speed. If you will use bigger amount of time (for real time games it is 5 minutes mostly) then other players can expell you so they don't have to wait for you to show up.

The amount of time for game and this delay is set by the people who make this game on BGA and is based on game speed and complexity of game. It is rather personal decision how to make it, and that's why one or two times some games showed up with too quick mode and had to be changed. Now whe you start the game it is shown how much time you get and what is delay.

And now some examples:
1. I play 2 player game with someone. First few turns went quickly and our amount of time raised (we weren't using full delay time, so our starting time was increasing). Then my opponent ask me if I can wait because postman came to him. I said ok and started to wait. He lost his delay time for this turn and started losing time but i knew he will be back so i was waiting. It took him about 5 minutes and delay time in this quick game with "quick" as game speed was 1 minute. Starting time was 10 minutes and we played 5 turns really quick, let's say 30 seconds per 1, so when he left to open the door he had 13 minutes (5 turns passed and he was in his 6). When he was back he had only 8 minutes. It's not a problem if you agree to be below 0, but it means that you were REALLY slow.
2. I play 2 player game with someone, lets say we were playing much longer game. Here the starting time was 100 minutes and you had 2.5 minutes to make a move (delay). After 20 quick turns (30 seconds per one) he would have 140 minutes. And it is now he's turn and he does nothing. I don't know what happend but i will surelly don't wait for 140 to expell him from table. I want to play some game now, or i just don't have so much time to wait because i have to go to work - doesn't matter. After 5 minutes i can expell him (proper button shows up) and i will do this because he haven't said that he will be back - maybe he run off because he thought it will prevent him from losing game? Doesn't matter, this system is making me safe.

Of course in game you see only one clock and you may not know how long delay is but you will surelly know when you are much slower than every one else Hope it is not too complicated

[Liallan]

At the begining of the game every player gets amount of time. This is for making your turns. In turn based with 2 moves ped day it is 142 hours (or something similar) because after 1 week after some player done nothing in his turn the game is automaticly closed (in other real-time game it is based on how long the game should take - you don't need same amount of time for 6 nimmt and Tobago of course). Of course no one wants the game to last for so long, and that's where this additional delay is needed.

Sorry, that is not making sense. I'm not relating how a game being closed relates to the 142 hours. I also don't understand how not wanting the game to last that long would make an additional delay. Why would you want to delay it further?? (I'm getting the feeling that word "delay" is not being used correctly, which might explain some confusion.)

Every time you have to make move you get additional time for this move. If you will think longer than that (in 2 moves per day mode it would be 12 hours because that's 2 moves per day) then it is information for you that you have chosen wrong game speed. If you will use bigger amount of time (for real time games it is 5 minutes mostly) then other players can expell you so they don't have to wait for you to show up.

You get 5 minutes for a turn in most games? This paragraph is referring to time per turn, 12 hours for 2/day turn-based, and 5 minutes for real time? That's a long time for a turn, so I don't understand this either.

The amount of time for game and this delay is set by the people who make this game on BGA and is based on game speed and complexity of game. It is rather personal decision how to make it, and that's why one or two times some games showed up with too quick mode and had to be changed. Now whe you start the game it is shown how much time you get and what is delay.

I don't know what this means either. The only game speeds are slow, normal and fast. Yes, I understand that the game administrator gets to pick this speed, but this sounds like they get to pick the actual time, and I doubt that is true. And that still doesn't tell me how much time we get. It also sounds like each game is different. Why not state on the game page (not the table page, the game page), what the slow, normal and fast speeds are? Is this like some big secret just to frustrate us newbies?

I play 2 player game with someone, lets say we were playing much longer game. Here the starting time was 100 minutes and you had 2.5 minutes to make a move (delay). After 20 quick turns (30 seconds per one) he would have 140 minutes.

That's the first thing that has made some sense. So 20 turns at 2.5 minutes is 50 minutes. If you've used up only 10 by being way quicker than this allowance, you still have 40 of it. (140 total) And I have to assume if I now take 3.5 minutes I'm cutting into that by an extra minute, etc. (Unfortunately that still doesn't tell me how much time you get on each game.)

And it is now he's turn and he does nothing. I don't know what happend but i will surelly don't wait for 140 to expell him from table. I want to play some game now, or i just don't have so much time to wait because i have to go to work - doesn't matter. After 5 minutes i can expell him (proper button shows up)

And what makes this 5 minutes? I wouldn't wait for 140 minutes either, but where did 5 come from?

Of course in game you see only one clock and you may not know how long delay is but you will surelly know when you are much slower than every one else Hope it is not too complicated

This implies that you don't actually know how much time you're getting for a turn. That doesn't seem fair or make any sense. I really don't want to find out the hard way that I'm much slower than everyone else. (The only thing I had the nerve to jump into live was Yahtzee cause I know I can play it fast - I was faster than one person and slower than another.)

I'm going to make an additional post just to show some examples of what is showing on the clocks on some turn-based games I have, and why I consider it confusing and not consistent. I do have some ideas on the new turn-based mode (since that's what I've been doing for two years), but this is something I want to understand first. Everyone on the "turn-based timing" thread already knows what they're talking about and I can't relate to it.

[Liallan]

OK, here we go.... these are all 1/day turn-based.

Stone Age: So we started with 144 hours. Fine. No one has taken a turn. The person on turn has 143h32m on their clock. If I have this figured right, when the game started and they were on turn, they would have had a "delay" of 24h added. But, the game had started almost 48 hours before, not 24. (i.e. they should have been closer to 120 hours.)

Hearts: The game started over 48 hours ago. All we're doing is picking the cards to pass. All of us have about the same amount of time, despite that 2 of us played immediately, the next person took one day, and the 4th person has done nothing. This tells me that picking our "passing" cards is not counting as a turn? If that's the case, it could take forever to get going on every round.

Yahtzee: Here's a fun one. 2 player. I've taken my turn. My opponent has done nothing. Makes sense he'd start with 168 hours (144 + 24). But when I checked he had 167h57m despite that I took my turn the night before. Then I looked again maybe 15 minutes later and he had 140h06m. HUH??? The second one makes more sense but why did it change so drastically 15 minutes later? He never came on.

(Anyone seeing why I'm seeing inconsistencies that make no sense?)

There's some interesting things with both Yahtzee and Can't Stop. In Yahtzee I have 191h 59m. It looks as though it's giving me 24 per roll. (2 rolls since the first is already there). 24 x 2 rolls = 48 + 144 = 192.

In Can't Stop, I have taken one turn and now have ~312 hours - seems to have given me 168 extra, which is 7 turns. Another player who's taken one turn has 144 + 480, which is 20 turns!!! The other two people haven't gone yet.

If these games are adding "delay" for each roll, I see that as being a problem. But I do want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly first.

(Sorry if I'm seeing a bit curt, but I'm just frustrated by all this.)

[Trociu]

Sorry for making confusion here - lack of linguistic skills I'll try to answer as much as I can and i have to say also that I'm only regular player and what I know comes from my experience.

Yes, you get this time delay every time you have to make some sort of decision (hour glass appears near your nickname in game). It wasn't a problem in real time but yes, it looks dumb in turn-based. Why? Because it is now in beta phase or something like this. They done this implementation in easiest way possible. And it is said that you shouldn't play short games in turn based

As i saw delay is used as this additional time added every time player makes move. I will now use it in this form "delay" to make it clear.

I don't know what this means either. The only game speeds are slow, normal and fast. Yes, I understand that the game administrator gets to pick this speed, but this sounds like they get to pick the actual time, and I doubt that is true. And that still doesn't tell me how much time we get. It also sounds like each game is different. Why not state on the game page (not the table page, the game page), what the slow, normal and fast speeds are? Is this like some big secret just to frustrate us newbies?

After implementing turn based they started to show time of game and time of delay. It is shown in real time, and in turn based after clicking "join table". And yes - every game varies on how this speed works. I don't know it is based on some algorythm or what but everywhere it works different. Maybe I'm not correct with those "5 minutes mostly" because it is based on my own experience. But it is something around 5 minutes - in some games 2 minutes, in other 4,5 minutes. In turn based this delay is connected with "2 turns per day". I'll try to post answers for you tomorrow becaus today I don't have much time.

[Liallan]

I realize you're "just" a player, and some of my comments are not really directed at you because I know you can't do anything about it. I am frustrated with the lack of information on this site.

I also am not specifically looking for just turn-based. I do like playing live games, but I don't like being rushed (it makes me more concerned about a clock than about what I'm doing), and I don't like not knowing what is going on. I do want to understand how the live games work - I'm fairly sure the basic concept for turn-based is the same, but there definitely are inconsistencies.

I know you can see the time when you join the game... I also know you can "not accept" it after joining. But I would expect that once I join, I've joined and too late - I would expect to get information before I join. So that's a little weird. The lack of information here makes us learn the hard way. I only saw that box with the "you're about to join a game with real opponents" thing with the times on it when I took a turn-based game. I then assumed that existed on live games as well, so I knew I could "quit" without accepting. But I wouldn't try any live games prior to that, because that was certainly not my expectation.

I can see it adds time at the beginning of each turn. If you don't use it all, it "carries over" so to speak. If you use more, it's going to cut into what existed before your turn started. (I just don't get why this is not actually explained somewhere. Even you are just guessing based on your experience.)

I'm finding inconsistencies about how you can get expelled. One place it'll say when the "time for your current turn" runs out, you can be expelled. Other places will say when your thinking time runs out. My impression is that "thinking time" is the total time on the clock, not just the current turn. This is not consistent.

I also understand that the turn-based is still in the works... I have some suggestions, but the better my understanding, the more refined I can make those suggestions without sounding like a newbie idiot. (People come to Yucata and make newbie suggestions without understanding the site - I don't want to do that.)

[Liallan]

I was just reading the FAQs for the turn-based and noticed where someone mentioned that for live you have to wait for the admin to launch the game before that "accept" box even comes up. That makes me feel even weirder joining a game just to check the time available -- I'm only checking out the game and don't feel I should have to wait for someone to launch the game first, and then quit when I don't like what I see. That just feels rude.

It makes so much more sense to be able to see that before bothering to join.

[Nanaki404]

The thing is that no one really cares about exactly how many time you have for each game with each "speed" option...

If you want to play fast, select the "fast" option, and if you'd rather have some time to think, select the "slow" one. Many players complain that even the "fast" option is still too slow (because it gives too much time to players), so if you play in "slow" you should probably have enough time (unless maybe if it's the first time ever you play this game).

I can see it adds time at the beginning of each turn. If you don't use it all, it "carries over" so to speak. If you use more, it's going to cut into what existed before your turn started.

Basically, that's that. You start with some amount, and it decreases while it's your turn. And at the beginning of your turn (or other events, depending on the game), some time gets added to your counter.
If your counter ever goes less than 0, you are going to get a "red clock" symbol, visible by all players, which means you are a slow player (well, not if you have like 2 red clocks for 100 games played, but you get the idea).

Finally, you can get expelled on 2 conditions :
- either you get to less than minus 5min (if you take too much time on each turn, your stock will decrease slowly, and might go below 0 and even further)
- or you take far too much time during one turn (I don't know exactly how much, but I think it depends on the game, and it's much more than the time given for each turn. maybe twice that much but not sure)
And you only get expelled if some player decides to click on the button to do so, which means it probably won't happen if you explain why you are being slow (internet connection problems, being a beginner, ...)

All this was mainly for realtime games, simply because turn-based is still new and quite bugged (the timer not decreasing for example seems weird).
Just give it a try and stop being afraid of the clock : most people just don't care.

[Liallan]

The thing is that no one really cares about exactly how many time you have for each game with each "speed" option...

Apparently I do, and I refuse to believe I'm the only one that does. Even the FAQs for the turn-based says they know newbies can be intimidated by the real-time thing. It's sad that you don't seem to believe these people exist.

I'm sorry if it bothers you so much that I prefer knowing things like this rather than learning the hard way.

[Een]

Hi,

This information is available when presented with the confirmation buttons (accept/refuse) to start a game.
Such as (under the buttons) :

Time to think : 5:00 + 0:30 / turn

Can get expelled if : not playing during 4:00 or go over time by more than 5:00

Hope this clarifies how the clock works.

Your point about it being better if this information was presented before, because it's useful to take the decision to join the game or not, is valid.
We'll need to think about how to add this though, as there is already quite a lot of information on this screen.

As for the actual numbers, they are different for every game, as we adjust them by looking at the statistics.

For beginners, when BGA was real-time only, we advised to create a game with the 'no time limit' and 'no elo' options and to add a description on the table explaining that you are new and would like someone to help you discover the platform/the game. There is usually people ready to give a little of their time to welcome new players.
Now that the 'no time limit' option is for turn-based, since the number of turn-based games by player is limited, some players willing to help might not be able to because they have reached their limit for turn-based games. The advice is still valid, but you might have to wait a little longer for someone to join.
Then for your next game, if wary of the clock, select the 'slow' speed setting and you should be fine.

For a first game, you can also try "Thermopyles" (which is a solo game) with the 'no time limit' setting, so you can get a first look around the interface with no peer pressure and no time pressure

Cheers,
Een