Suggestion: Time Per Round Rating

[lancehoch]

There is a big problem with this idea. You do not know when people check their games. You could be playing the guy next door to you, but if you are playing a 2 player game, and he checks his games at 8 pm and you at 9 pm, there will be a 23 hour gap between turns. Does this mean that the player is necessarily slow? No, it does not. It just means that you check your games at different times.

[e_i_pi]

Another problem is, we all have to sleep at some stage. This isn't the sci-fi world of Eve Online, where everybody collects an unemployment pension and has a permanent ass-mark on their computer chair. We have lives here

In a nutshell, there would be too much variance due to outside factors that are out of people's control. The information it would yield would not have a terrible amount of confidence, and wouldn't really point to much.

[SayOw]

There is a big problem with this idea. You do not know when people check their games. You could be playing the guy next door to you, but if you are playing a 2 player game, and he checks his games at 8 pm and you at 9 pm, there will be a 23 hour gap between turns. Does this mean that the player is necessarily slow? No, it does not. It just means that you check your games at different times.

Question is moot...

No, it means you only check and play your games once a day, which is totally acceptable...

But why not denote the players that are able, willing and have exhibited the ability to play 2+ rounds per day and allow them to better connect to make the game and the community better?

[SayOw]

Another problem is, we all have to sleep at some stage. This isn't the sci-fi world of Eve Online, where everybody collects an unemployment pension and has a permanent ass-mark on their computer chair. We have lives here

In a nutshell, there would be too much variance due to outside factors that are out of people's control. The information it would yield would not have a terrible amount of confidence, and wouldn't really point to much.

I disagree...

It would just be the raw data from the game that keep tracks of how quickly you react to when it is your move...

I don't think it should be viewed as a "race" to get your turns in... but merely as a gauge to as how quickly you could expect someone to take their turn...

I don't think anyone has to explain their pattern or method of gameplay whether it be fast or not ... if you are good or bad, fast or slow, I think with a well developed community you will have no problems creating and having enjoyable games.

All this suggestion is, is calculating data that is easily obtained (I'm assuming) from normal game play and displaying it for other users to view... I don't know why anyone would be scared or ashamed to have this displayed if they enjoyed playing the game itself, which I think most everyone does...

[lancehoch]

But here is the thing. If you look at my example from before. Let's say you play at 8pm eastern US and I play at 9pm eastern US. I will only take 1 hour before my turns are up, you will take 23 hours. However, if you are playing your other neighbor who takes his turns at 7pm eastern US, then you will only take 1 hour to take your turns. The numbers you will get from this data will not really amount to anything because of the way people take their turns. In both of my examples above, you only took one turn per day, but in one game you averaged 23 hours to take your turn and in the other you averaged 1 hour.

[SayOw]

But here is the thing. If you look at my example from before. Let's say you play at 8pm eastern US and I play at 9pm eastern US. I will only take 1 hour before my turns are up, you will take 23 hours. However, if you are playing your other neighbor who takes his turns at 7pm eastern US, then you will only take 1 hour to take your turns. The numbers you will get from this data will not really amount to anything because of the way people take their turns. In both of my examples above, you only took one turn per day, but in one game you averaged 23 hours to take your turn and in the other you averaged 1 hour.

I have nothing to say to you anymore because you don't get it...

It doesn't matter if a person is on eastern, greenwhich or Australian time zones... when it is your turn to play the clock starts ticking... calculate the average from the time the clock starts ticking for your turn until you take your turn... assign a rating as to how fast you react to the time it is your turn and put it next to your game ratings ...

Time zones and as to when you take your turn are irrelevant... it's only a matter of how long you have waited to take your turn, that is all...

[cicero]

But here is the thing. If you look at my example from before. Let's say you play at 8pm eastern US and I play at 9pm eastern US. I will only take 1 hour before my turns are up, you will take 23 hours. However, if you are playing your other neighbor who takes his turns at 7pm eastern US, then you will only take 1 hour to take your turns. The numbers you will get from this data will not really amount to anything because of the way people take their turns. In both of my examples above, you only took one turn per day, but in one game you averaged 23 hours to take your turn and in the other you averaged 1 hour.

I have nothing to say to you anymore because you don't get it...

It doesn't matter if a person is on eastern, greenwhich or Australian time zones... when it is your turn to play the clock starts ticking... calculate the average from the time the clock starts ticking for your turn until you take your turn... assign a rating as to how fast you react to the time it is your turn and put it next to your game ratings ...

Time zones and as to when you take your turn are irrelevant... it's only a matter of how long you have waited to take your turn, that is all...

For what it's worth I believe lancehoch does get it.
In fact I was about to post and quote him as summing up the reasons why it doesn't work when you fastposted me Ow

Plenty of others have attempted make the same point previously when this has been suggested before.

Topic merged with the existing Show players average time to take turns.

Cicero

[SayOw]

After reading this thread, I am still trying to understand why it is bad to display a person's average time taken per round... could someone clarify why that will taint this game?

TYI

[lancehoch]

Because it does not mean anything. You are partially right. If someone checks their games every hour, then the average time will be low. However, if someone only checks their games once a day, you will not get all the information. I was using time zones just to explain it better. It works the same if people are in two different time zones but taking their turns one hour apart, but a lot of people have trouble understanding that if I take my turn at 9am eastern and someone takes their turn at 3pm in Britain, then they are taking their turn one hour after I am.

[SayOw]

Because it does not mean anything.

How doesn't it "not mean anything"? Your average time taken per round 'means' exactly what it states.

Again, what are the negatives for simply displaying your average time taken per round? You seem to think that by doing so would be bad for the game and yet I am still trying to comprehend why it is so bad for the game.

[e_i_pi]

Because it does not mean anything.

How doesn't it "not mean anything"? Your average time taken per round 'means' exactly what it states.

Again, what are the negatives for simply displaying your average time taken per round? You seem to think that by doing so would be bad for the game and yet I am still trying to comprehend why it is so bad for the game.

Because it takes time to implement, and there's far more important things to implement.

Personally, I don't think it's a negative thing, just not much point. It would be like displaying a players average colour in games. Doesn't really say that much.

[SayOw]

Because it does not mean anything.

How doesn't it "not mean anything"? Your average time taken per round 'means' exactly what it states.

Again, what are the negatives for simply displaying your average time taken per round? You seem to think that by doing so would be bad for the game and yet I am still trying to comprehend why it is so bad for the game.

Because it takes time to implement, and there's far more important things to implement.

Personally, I don't think it's a negative thing, just not much point. It would be like displaying a players average colour in games. Doesn't really say that much.

I understand the time to implement and if there are other issues that need more urgent attention, that is understandable with most any suggestion...

But there is a point to it, in the end... a person could very quickly and accurately see on average how quickly a person responds to their turn and then could roughly anticipate when their turn would likely occur next.

If the only negative to this idea is that it would take time to implement it then that is just a blanket excuse to pretty much dismiss any suggestion for no reason other than you don't want it in the first place.

[lancehoch]

But there is a point to it, in the end... a person could very quickly and accurately see on average how quickly a person responds to their turn and then could roughly anticipate when their turn would likely occur next.

This is the point I am trying to make. If you take very little time in one game, because of when the other players took their turns, that does not mean anything for the next game. If you are playing a 1v1 game as your first game, and all of your turns are taken one hour after the other player, then your average time will be 1 hour. If in your next game, another 1v1 game, you take all of your turns one hour before the other player, how did the previous game's average turn time of 1 hour affect this games average turn time of 23 hours?

[SayOw]

But there is a point to it, in the end... a person could very quickly and accurately see on average how quickly a person responds to their turn and then could roughly anticipate when their turn would likely occur next.

This is the point I am trying to make. If you take very little time in one game, because of when the other players took their turns, that does not mean anything for the next game. If you are playing a 1v1 game as your first game, and all of your turns are taken one hour after the other player, then your average time will be 1 hour. If in your next game, another 1v1 game, you take all of your turns one hour before the other player, how did the previous game's average turn time of 1 hour affect this games average turn time of 23 hours?

It all averages out...of course picking only 2 games with the most extreme scenarios for exaggeration may skew a person's average and is unlikely but possible...but the fact is that after a person plays a considerable amount of games, that average would begin to more accurately reflect a person's average time taken per round.

But again, what is so wrong with having it displayed? I am still trying to figure that one out...

[cicero]

But again, what is so wrong with having it displayed? I am still trying to figure that one out...

Because it does not mean anything.

How doesn't it "not mean anything"? Your average time taken per round 'means' exactly what it states.

I'd suggest reading some of my previous posts in this thread to see why even though "average time taken per round means exactly what it states", and I agree with you there, it still "does not mean anything".

If you like, and I'm being genuine here, post the times that you typically might check in at as a frequent player ... and we'll see what kind of averages arise from that ...

[hecter]

Because it does not mean anything.

How doesn't it "not mean anything"? Your average time taken per round 'means' exactly what it states.

Again, what are the negatives for simply displaying your average time taken per round? You seem to think that by doing so would be bad for the game and yet I am still trying to comprehend why it is so bad for the game.

Because it's stupid and pointless. Who cares how long somebody takes to make their turn? As long as they make it eventually. As it was said, it's not a race. As long as they take their turn. How do you know if they're going to take their turn? Well, by golly, we have a stat for that already!

[Mentos-]

To all of the people saying that it would be useless because it would just depend on when you check your games relative to the person before you:

Most people play enough games for the times between you and the person before you to even out. Even if the player before you checks at 9pm, then you check at 8pm, sometimes it will be the other way around. In the end, the time which someone checks will be almost irrelevent because it will even out like this. Since the time you check does not matter for the average time to take your turn, it all comes down to how often you check, and that is exactly the information people want to know to gauge someone's turn taking speed.

[hecter]

Well couldn't you just look at the persons "Last Active" thing on their profile? Then you could know exactly when they check (as long as their status isn't set to hidden).

[scottp]

hadn't checked in here in a while. wow, lance and cicero, you guys really just don't understand, do you?!

Because it's stupid and pointless. Who cares how long somebody takes to make their turn? As long as they make it eventually. As it was said, it's not a race. As long as they take their turn. How do you know if they're going to take their turn? Well, by golly, we have a stat for that already!

because if i play a 4 player game with 3 other guys who take several turns a day, we will get through several rounds a day. if even ONE of those guys is a once-a-day guy, we'll get thru one round per day. your "obvious" conclusion is actually quite wrong.

Lance, in your hypothetical example, your players who "score" 1 and 23 hours, respectively even though they both check once a day is certainly a possible anomaly. HOWEVER, over hundreds or thousands of games, the statistical certainty is that those two guys will wind up on the "short" end and the "long" end of that stick about equally. so their average will be around 12 hours.

two players who play exclusively 2 player games and check once a day will, in time, ABSOLUTELY GUARANTEED have an average time to take a turn of 12 hours. Period. It's the law of large numbers. The randomness drops away after many turns.

If I check in 6 times per day, my average time will be less than a guy who checks in once. If I could FIND players like me, who checked in more frequently, I would seek them out for games. We would play MORE rounds per day than ANY game with even a single player who takes his turns at a set time every day.

I am not criticizing that guy, but if you weren't so bull-headed, you'd understand why it would actually make my membership in this site more enjoyable, and thus the likelihood that I will re-subscribe increases. Several others here have expressed the same wish.

You are part of the "management" of this website. As an experienced business owner, one lesson I have learned is that you listen when a customer tells you how your product/service could be made more valuable. It may be too much trouble to implement the suggestion, but it's typically inadvisable to tell the customer his preferences are wrong. Especially when you're bad at math.

[Gypsys Kiss]

As far as I can tell this will only promote Americans playing Americans, Europeans playing Europeans and Australians going out in to the paddock and playing with sheep

Anyway, joking aside, I work in a factory. I dont have access to a PC during the day. I generally go to bed around 11pm and get to work for 8am. I dont turn my PC on in the morning so the earliest I will get to take my turns is 7pm depending on when I finish work, but it is usually later than that. I am on and off all evening. Quite often I log on and most of my games are down to a few hours left. So using this rating would class me as a slow turn taker. Why? Because I work in an enviroment with no internet access. That is why it is meaningless, unless of course you are trying to promote partisan gaming.

[scottp]

gypsy,

your situation is what it is. mine is what MINE is.

I never said I would ONLY join games with other "fast players", but that I would like to seek some out, sometimes. Having the data available to those who would CHOOSE to use it would not affect you in the slightest. You would ignore it, and you wouldn't notice that there were a few games out there that were up to round 7 on day 2.

It also doesn't matter what time zone you're in. I'm not expecting "real time" action, just for a game that will move along at a good clip. It's now 1000 in USA CST where I am. I think the UK is +6 from here, so it's 1600 GMT there. If I took a turn now, and some bloke took his turn when he got home from work at 1800 GMT, I might take my turn after a meeting at 2000 GMT (2 pm local) and he might take another turn before bed at 2200 GMT. Then he goes to bed. I take a turn after I get home from work (6pm local, 2400 GMT). He gets up at 0600 GMT and takes a turn before work. I get up at 6am local (1200 GMT) and take a turn. And so on...

If you can split the day into three 8 hour chunks and take a turn in each, then your average time to take a turn will be about 4 hours. If you can split it into four ~6 hour chunks (one a little longer than the others for sleep) then your average time to take a turn will be 3 hours.

You guys are bending over backwards to claim this won't be useful to anyone, when really the truth is you don't SEE it as being useful because you don't want it and wouldn't use it. Well Freestyle games aren't useful to me, but we have them. The new rating system is pretty worthless, but effort was expended on developing it. All we're asking for is READILY AVAILABLE data to be presented to those of use who WANT to use it. The rest of you will be unaffected. But I guess it's a bad idea since it wasn't YOUR idea?