Proper behaviour

[Jimmy V.]

Hi all,

We have been informed that a few players have had bad manners in the last few weeks. Although in minority these players clearly don't stick to the Happy Meeple spirit and we do not want to tolerate this.

We endeavour to offer a place to play board games online and have fun in a nice environment.

We want to make clear that the use of swear words is absolutely forbidden on the platform. Playing moves very slowly on purpose (generally when losing) to annoy the opponent is also extremely bad manners that we do not tolerate.

The range of sanction goes from temporary ban in chat to account deletion.

I know that games can be frustrating at times. If you have a tendency to lose temper, please buy a giant meeple plush and kick it hard to relieve the stress when needed! This will be much better than throwing your anger at your opponent.

Thanks very much for your understanding!

Nicolas Guibert.

[Guest 130293]

I'm pretty new here and just trying to learn how to play these games.  It's very discouraging to try to start a game and then be joined by a very experienced player.  It seems unsportsmanlike for a high level player to target new people.  It's called farming newbs on other sites.  I was surprised to see it is not only accepted here, but even admin join in this practice. 

I think people should have to play others close to their own level.

[Jimmy V.]

I fully understand your concern.

When Happy Meeple project was started, there was a matching system in place (you could not see the other players, there was no inn). In online play, you have always been matched with a bot with similar rating to yours (and it is still the case) which is what you are asking for. It was my intention to develop a few more lines of code so that the same applied to human play. However it is not as easy as it seems because of a few other parameters.

Firstly, lots of players want to play against other humans. Because we don't have a huge pool of players yet, restricting players matching by rating would make it even more difficult. And noone really wants that at this stage. When we have many more players, we can think about this option again. It would certainly raise other concerns (what if friends want to play together?) but probably nothing that cannot be solved by a programmer. And to finish on this, I may simply implement a "rating filter" when opening a table so that you can choose to play with a certain range of players. If I do, you'll have to use that filter every time you ask for a table though which may not be very practical.

Another important factor is that most of our games have an important part of luck. Which makes it no so easy for good players to "farm" beginners. You are actually the first player complaining about farming, but I can tell you that I read many times experienced players complaing about being matched with low ratings because they are afraid of losing a lot of points in one game. The rating system (ELO) is such that it is difficult to abuse the system. In other online games, I know that farming can be a big issue. But again, because most of our games have a big random element to them, a strong player will often be beaten by a beginner (that is not true for Keltis Or and Siberia Card though).

Finally, there are two solutions to your problem.
1) The best one it to practice in training mode until you feel ready to dive into online play.
2) You can also go to the inn and never open a table (=never request a game), only join existing tables. This way, you will only join players that have a rating that suits you.

I hope this answers your questions. Thanks for letting us know! It is important to us to read about your concerns. This helps us tremendously to improve the platform for our players. If you don't tell us, we many never know.

[Mike M.]

I'd have to say for me that I am extremely reluctant to sit down with a new player.  The games, as said, DO have a fair amount of luck involved, and therefore the 'more experienced' player can easily lose a lot of points due to luck of the draw, while the flip side in winning yields so few points. 

So on that note: Welcome new player, I am always happy to see people expanding thier gaming horizons.  And rest assured that most 'experienced' players will not 'newb farm' on this site.  Quite the contrary.

Happy Meeple-ing!

[Guest 131818]

We have been informed that a few players have had bad manners in the last few weeks...

Playing moves very slowly on purpose (generally when losing) to annoy the opponent is also extremely bad manners that we do not tolerate.

Nicolas Guibert.

It's wrong to assume someone is playing slowly, when losing, to annoy the opponent.  Maybe they have a horrible hand and can't figure out what in the world they are going to do with it.

I just went through a game like this.  It was a horrible experience.  One of these 6 dot black dice people joined my table, so it was particularly flustering and made it even harder for me to think. 

  I came in here to ask about it, and the first thing I see, is someone accusing a person who might be going through the same distressing thing I just went through, of trying to annoy the opponent   Of course a lower level person is likely to play slower than a higher ranked if they have a confusing hand and particularly if they are facing a formidable opponent!

It just seems like a pretty hostile view to take of newbies.  Why do you let these high rank people play against people who are much lower level?  Maybe it's bad manners on their part, not the newb's part.

[Jimmy V.]

Guest 131818,

First of all, thanks for taking the time to let us know your feelings! It is very much appreciated.

I can understand all of your concerns.

There is generally great sportmanship on Happy Meeple! It is very rare that people complain about each other. So even if I posted about bad losers, rest assured that it is a rare occurence. I just wanted to make sure that this does not become more frequent and tell everyone that bad behaviour would not be accepted.

Don't be too afraid of experienced players! They also have a lot to lose too (in terms of points) by playing against newbies and as you can read in this thread they sometimes don't want to play against newbies! Also, most of our games have a fair share of luck. So you can definitely win even if you are not as good as your "formidable" opponent. Don't be distressed!

This said, I understand your concern. It has been voiced by another guest earlier in this post. I can now see that matching a beginner with a black meeple can have negative effects. Maybe (as we are now bigger) it is time to figure out a better method of matching people together. I have to say that the problem is not straight forward. We want friends to be able to play together. If you are an experienced player and want to play with a newbie friend, how do you play together if we don't allow white meeple to play with black meeple? Of course there is a solution to every problem, but I am wary of complexifying the interface and the logics behind it.

Maybe other players have an idea on how to improve the matching system? Let us know if you do!

Have fun on Happy Meeple! Be assured that we want everyone to be happy. And again many thanks for voicing your concerns!

[Pouche H.]

In all honesty, i feel much like Mike M. posted.
Far from wanting to 'prey' upon new players, i actually don't look forward to seeing someone of a significantly lower level enter my game - and it isn't because i don't like them!

As was so perfectly pointed out, there is a ton of luck involved, and losing to a lower ranked player may result in a 15ish point rating loss, whereas beating that same opponent results in a mere 6ish point gain.
Additionally, lower rated players do indeed USUALLY play at a much slower rate, which can result in my losing interest.

So Guest 131818 and Guest 130293 , i'm hoping that your experience(s) are relatively isolated examples and not the norm.
Welcome.  Keep playing.  Whatever happens, don't be discouraged (most here are friendly!).  You'll get better, and faster.  This will fade into memory. 

[Guest 131818]

Well, my biggest concern was that slow play was being identified as being a hostile act, or bad behavior, (because the person was losing), when in reality, if the person is losing, they probably have a bad hand, and might be just desperately trying to figure out how to win a game with a very confusing hand. 

Now, a more experienced player might be faster to figure out a solution, or to just accept that the game will be lost, finish it up and move on.  But if you are inexperienced, you don't know this yet.  So you keep trying.

This said, I understand your concern. It has been voiced by another guest earlier in this post. I can now see that matching a beginner with a black meeple can have negative effects. Maybe (as we are now bigger) it is time to figure out a better method of matching people together. I have to say that the problem is not straight forward. We want friends to be able to play together. If you are an experienced player and want to play with a newbie friend, how do you play together if we don't allow white meeple to play with black meeple? Of course there is a solution to every problem, but I am wary of complexifying the interface and the logics behind it.

Maybe other players have an idea on how to improve the matching system? Let us know if you do!

Regarding this part about whether to try to match ranks or not - make it optional.

Make a check box, similar to the way people can choose to make a private table or not.   This way, both experienced people who don't want to risk losing a lot of points because they lost to a lower ranked person, and inexperienced players who are intimidated by high ranked players, can choose to only have games with people close to their own range.

If a person doesn't care one way or the other, they still have the option to have a completely open table.

That should make everyone happy.   

[Jimmy V.]

Guest,

I have experienced what you are talking about recently myself, so I fully know what you are talking about.

I could indeed add extra filters in the "open table" window. This has been planned for a long time. Since the inn was introduced really. But it has had less priority than other things unfortunately.

Have fun!

[Liallan G.]

Well, my biggest concern was that slow play was being identified as being a hostile act, or bad behavior, (because the person was losing), when in reality, if the person is losing, they probably have a bad hand, and might be just desperately trying to figure out how to win a game with a very confusing hand.

I don't think slow play was "being identified" as being for a specific reason, that is, that somehow it automatically means someone is doing it on purpose.  I think he was saying that slow play that IS done intentionally to be annoying is bad behavior. (And it would be.) 

a. When someone calls me it's a salesman and that's annoying.
b. Calls from salesmen are annoying.

(b) is not assuming all calls are from salesman, only that when they are, they are annoying.  I think he's saying (b).  The word "if" in front of it may have helped.

[Liallan G.]

I could indeed add extra filters in the "open table" window. This has been planned for a long time. Since the inn was introduced really. But it has had less priority than other things unfortunately.

Perhaps the priority level should go up?  Not trying to tell you what you should or should not do, and I certainly don't know what else is on your To Do list (which I'm sure is quite full).  I'm just judging by (1) the posts that are here, most of which seem negative towards being matched with "whoever," and (2) just knowing that lots of people on other gaming sites feel the same way.  The difference with the other sites is that they don't "match" you to anyone.  People just accept invites as they choose, and while filtering exists, there's also room for notes (for requests).

Yucata added a filter that allows you to choose a +/- level relative to your own rank, e.g. +/- 200 of me.  BGA has rank range names, like average, good, expert, and you can filter on that.  I think both methods need tweaked a bit.    I think I like Yucata's concept better.  Having a filter like 1101-1200, 1201-1299, etc. (which is what BGA's method amounts to) means if you're 1199 that could be a little screwy, so the +/- a range relative to yourself works better.  But they would have to be smaller ranges than Yucata, like +/- 50, 75, 100, etc.

I don't know how difficult that filter would be, or how difficult it would be to make it "open," like a player entering whatever they want, such as 1225 - 1310.  The nice thing about filter ranges, though, is that different people will have different ideas as to what constitute an "appropriate opponent," and it can be totally left open for personal invites.

If it's easier to let the system decide what range is appropriate for you, two possibilities to allow for personal invites is either just an option to turn it off for a game (or on, depending on default), or have it automatically turn off for personal invites.

Just as a funny note, I'm not sure what time these people are playing, but when I'm here there's never more than about 6 tables open and I've only once gotten matched with a human before the timer ran out and let me play with a bot.