Knyte, I'm not arguing to make murder legal. Nor that your suggestion would not decrease stalling somewhat. I'm arguing that it wouldn't stop stalling. At all.

I am also not too optimistic on it's overall impact,numbers-wise. You think, say alhazi, would stop his stalling over the threat of...what, clan expulsion? clan league denied? We're very limited in what we can do in those scenarios. Like, blacklist.

We, as a community, can't even have a working etiquette on VTE first turn boot. Half the community will never do it. Tackling stalling that way is a very,very tall order.

And as for whatever positive impact the implementation of your suggestion would have, you'd raise all sorts of questions, slippery slope/precedent/gray area arguments between the people etc etc as a negative effect.

Next, what guarantees impartiality? A lot of those decisions would not really be in the hands of community as a whole but those of certain individuals.
What do we do when those individuals break our little unwritten rules? What if you have the same double standards you are annoyed by now?

Lastly,since this is an online game and not a triple homicide case, everyone should be able to redeem themselves. When, where and how is that decided? And by whom?

I am not against us trying to do all that, but it seems like too much of a hustle to think through over an unsportsmanlike behavior on a seasonal ladder and frankly unlikely to yield the results desired. That's why I'm saying that absolute solution needs to be systemic and has to remove the very possibility of abuse.

Thought a programmer would understand :P

Kicking MisterT out of |GG| won't discourage stalling at all?

A lot of those decisions would not really be in the hands of community as a whole but those of certain individuals.

Right. We're completely free to decide what behavior we condone. Just like the Olympics decided not to condone doping (but that didn't stop doping entirely), clans and the Clan League and decide not to condone cheating. You don't need a perfect decentralized mechanism controlling services that small groups of people provide.

But those are all questions we should be asking instead of just deciding not to do anything about the problem or attacking ACL Tears for even bringing it up. We don't need an absolute, perfect solution. We just need at least a little bit of caring about community norms- or just going ahead and recognizing that these norms don't exist in the first place. You have to pick one or the other- either actually do something or stop paying lip service.

Edited 7/15/2016 06:44:57

Discourage who? GG members. Ok.

I personally do not think that he stalled here. Nor do I think ACL stalled. It would also be a bitch to prove beyond any doubt that somebody did. Circumstantial stuff...What determines it, where's the line? We are talking one turn in a game where a guy in question had advantage the whole time and asked to finish the game so it would be a clean trophy.

Sorry, it's not evidence enough for me to cast a stone. This kinda stuff could end in a witch hunt and that's something I have no desire to be a part of.

Edited 7/15/2016 06:53:04

https://www.warlight.net/MultiPlayer?GameID=11494291

^

If I had one more turn, I would've won this game. But because he dragged it out, went on vacation or w/e I lost it. Fizzer needs to do something to change it.

@Cloud Strife: it'd just take one very small change to the query game API to detect wide-spread stalling. We could simply determine whether people take their turns slower when they're losing than when they're winning. That's essentially what stalling is- delaying losses because it gives you an advantage on a ladder.

Of course there's a gray area. Just like there is in real-life law- there's no clear or precise delineation for certain human rights violations in international law, for example. But just because the gray area exists doesn't mean we ignore the obvious examples.

I believe MisterT deliberately stalled this game. To me, his seasonal win is tainted, and I have little doubt many others will share this opinion. That said, I don't think there is enough evidence for Fizzer to officially strip MisterT of his title in this case.

For JV in the season on Poland, I really wish JV had been stripped of his title (perhaps by making him autolose the games he stalled), because he clearly stalled in multiple games, and his moves(or lack of) in those games at the end are solely about keeping as many armies as possible.

I see 2 possible changes to the seasonal that I think would be easy to implement and greatly reduce the ability of someone to stall:

1. Increase the length of the season. Keep giving games at the same rate and stop at 20 games. But allow 10-15 extra days for them to finish. This may have been an issue back when new seasons used to start within a week after the old one ended, but those days are long past. With all this time between seasons, it makes a lot of sense to increase the length of the season to allow more games to finish.

2. Don't allow vacations on the season. A lot of people probably don't like this idea, as many people legitimately want to take vacations during the season. That said, vacations give a player an easy option to stall near the end of the season and pass it off as a legitimate vacation. One potential option, rather than allowing vacations, is to have a banking boot set at the start of the game (maybe give each player 3 extra days, or 5 extra days). This would allow a bit of leeway on the boot time, but would also not allow a great deal of stalling like a traditional vacation would.

Im really angry how this thread is shaming my honoust and fair win in seasonal.

ACl is the one who just committed 5 turns in 10 days clearly not trying anything to end the game before the end of season. After 4 days i realised he plays really slow so for 6 days i tried everything to speed it up. i wrote in chat i wrote a personal message and i wrote a mail in which i even proposed to come online when he was online so we could play rt or could arrange anything to speed it up. On all of these attempts i didnt get any response at all while he obviously must have read anything of it (acl tears falsely claims he didnt read any of it on the forum).

as a last attempt because i hated if the crucial game in seasonal would end like this i wrote fizzer and he mailed acl. i dont know how but while he wasnt able to read all my messages for 6 days he could read that one so we played we for 1/2 days 1/2 turns.

Then i got into a busy 2 day so i didnt have to time to play this important game because that would require a bit of thought and i didnt have time for that. Obviously i realised i would win because i did have the better incomex2/army count but i had this on turn 1/2/4/5 and i was pretty sure i would have it in turn 6/7/8 so it wouldnt really matter if i played 1/2 more turns.

now i read the person who didnt do a single attempt to finish the seasonal game for 10 days out of the 12 days for the last game of seasonal doesnt only accuse me of cheating he is shaming my name on the forum. if i didnt write fizzer the game would just have made it 4 turns probably.

he writes on the forum that he will be online the last day of seasonal so he and i can finish it. he does this 15 hours before the end of seasonal. so for 11,5 days he commits 5 turns and then he suddenly with 15 hours remaining he writes he is willing to end it. this is extremly hypocritical especially because i was trying to arrange a time to rt/play faster for 6 days and he didnt even react. with the message 15 hours before seasonal how was i supposod to read it on time and make time to play it. i have no idea.

offcourse the seasonal ending idea is broken. but its not broken by me its broken by acltears. and acltears should be ashamed of that.

Edited 7/15/2016 10:01:21

At acltears/knyte

so because i played slow for 2and a half days you have enough profe to call me a staller on forum and shaming me ! that is just redicilious. that is no profe at all. the fact that i normally play quick doesnt mean i have time enough to always play quick. also if thats your way of profe that means quick players will be accused and punished way earlier for playing slow/stalling compared to slow players which doesnt seem honoust to me.

im really furious that me the person who did everything to end the seaonal on time is the one shamed on forum so go apologize to me or go f*** yourself.

Edited 7/15/2016 10:11:22

You had enough time to log in about half a dozen times and take enough actions for it to update your profile's last seen multiple times during the session... but not to take turns in one of your 9 ongoing games that just happened to be an ongoing Seasonal Ladder game?

Come up with a better excuse next time. Congratulations on the dirty win.

You were probably gonna win anyway, too. This is like being Michael Phelps-level good and still deciding to dope just to be safe.

Edited 7/15/2016 10:21:36

Being online =/= taking turns. I dont know why everybody thinks that. Im online multiple times every day, i take turns usually once every day if my opponents are lucky. It can also happen that i wont take my turns for almost three days even though im online everyday. Doesnt mean I am stalling, i might not have the time or will to think at that point.

see above +1

Edited 7/15/2016 10:35:53

@Min34: Of course. That's why I pointed out he was online:

- multiple times
- for meaningful stretches of time
- took enough actions for his "last seen" to update during those times

If he had enough time to do that, he had enough time to take one turn in less than 2d15h.

Aside from the debates, I wanted to share something interesting- the opinions of MisterT's actions (well, this is what I think they are):

A) He did not stall his last turn (or fairly won the season, or had no problems with his playspeed/position in this particular game):
Me (congrats to MisterT btw, well done!), Ollie (maybe- not sure), Norman (on the fence?), Motoki, Ctrl Alt Delete, Peixoto

B) He did stall his last turn (or unfairly won the season):
LeQuébécois_Benoit, timon92 (references to JV), Norman (on the fence?), Turkish, knyte, JSA, rouxbourg

C) Or they're on the fence (can't choose):
Ox (wants another game w/ custom scenario), Norman (on the fence?)

---

Clearly shows that me and some GG members have the same opinion (as for Norman I can't tell), but that players in clans other than GG or clan-less players despise of MisterT's actions. While I do see how this may be unfair to others (in particular alhazi (2nd), and ACL Tears), the main reason why I'm with option A is because he played faster and also visibly made attempts to get the game moving- well before the season would've ended. Feel free to disagree with me- just my honest opinion

I'm not solidly B. I don't think this is serious enough for MisterT to be stripped of his title. Just think this is how it went:

- MisterT plays the game, ACL Tears plays slowly

- MisterT tries to speed things up, ACL Tears unresponsive; MisterT gets Fizzer to speed things up, little to no effect

- It's 5 turns in and ACL Tears as been the slower player in 3 of them

- MisterT's life gets a bit busier, although he still has time to check WL and take turns (even if he decides not to)

- ACL Tears wants to finish the game now, it's close to even and he's got a shot (something like 30-70); he definitely doesn't want it to get decided by formula

- MisterT's logs in a few time, checks the game but decides "hey, screw that guy- he brought this onto himself." He realizes that he's already won the game and season if he doesn't take his turn, so hey what's the point? Plus he's busy anyway, even though he could take his turn, he'd rather not take the risk. He's busy enough to rationalize it away.

- Season ends. MisterT wins like he probably would've anyway if he'd taken his turns. By formula and stalling, he dodges the last threat he had to winning #1.

It's not particularly egregious behavior, especially since it only happened for 1 turn. But just something that we shouldn't condone or defend, either. Tainted MisterT's win at least, but not enough to cast doubt on him being #1.

Edited 7/15/2016 10:48:17

No need to defend yourself, MisterT. ACLTears is a great guy who was just salty for getting a mail from Fizzer. Maybe you two can work it out, he is famous for his slow play (https://www.warlight.net/MultiPlayer?GameID=11255378 for example). As for the other guys throwing around accusations around here, they are far from being neutral but just snitches and low level trolls, just ignore them. Replying to them involves the risk of sinking down to their level, everyone can see your games and see that they were played out fairly.

Edited 7/15/2016 11:00:15

Now, M'Hunters with AI? That's a more egregious case. That's a good example of the kind of cheating we should take action against. :P

This is nothing but a drop in the ocean compared to M'Hunters.

Edited 7/15/2016 10:49:22

@ MisterT: Nobody but knyte and ACL says you don't deserve the win. Well deserved imo! Congrats
Dont give a f*ck about this thread

Edited 7/15/2016 11:05:05

Ah, just what MisterT needed. The endorsement of an actual cheater.

Here is what i do when i am busy.. I have the app on my phone so i check in 2 or 3 times a day to make sure I dont get booted. Logging in takes me about 3 seconds. Checking how long i have before getting booted another 5 seconds. Takes me less then half a minute a day but it showed i was online 3 times that day on my profile.

Serious games, like misterT's deciding seasonal game, take me easily 15 minutes to determine what i am gonna do cause i want to go through every possible scenario. Considering he does have 8 other games, which might have shorter times before he got booted its very possible he still got forced to spent more time on warlight then he already had (speaking from experience on this point)

Lets just sum up the facts:

1. Both players claim they were busy during a part of the game but acl spent 5 times as much time being busy then misterT

2. Visable for us misterT did several attemps to speed the game up which all got ignored by ACL

3. ACL claims not to have read the messages from misterT. Possible that its true he didnt READ them but i dont believe at all he didnt SAW them. In other words he CHOOSE not to read them. He saw a message from Fizzer within a day while didnt see any message from misterT for 6 days

4. MisterT behaved like an adult at all times. He messaged ACL in all possible ways for several days, when he went out of options contacted fizzer directly about what to do. When misterT takes his time for 1 turn ACL goes screaming on the forum in the hope the community will turn against MisterT (which he ofc achieved cause the biggest screamer always wins on the internet...) because he also knew he stalled to much for fizzer to take him seriously

5. MisterT askes us for days in our clan chat desperately how he could speed it up. He wanted to report him sooner and put a forum post about it. Several people, including me, advised him not to make a forum post but wait a few days to give ACL the chance to speed up. When he didnt he had to report him to keep he chances alive at winning the seasonal.

6. I guess this is preferential but everybody complaining about misterT taking the win with a 'possible' stall of 1 turn while otherwise a known staller took first place? Its not a coincedence half the community calls him stalhazi

@ knyte: Actually I don't think that he takes your opinion more seriously than mine...

Edited 7/15/2016 11:33:40