Fixing Quitting in Games

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

I'm not going to say that a quitting a game without congratulating an opponent is the best show of sportsmanship, but unless I'm mistaken, the solution is quite simple.  Have quitters suffer the ELO loss that they would experience if they had lost the game.  Maybe I'm missing something, but to me this rather simple change would be for the better.  Could anyone point out any unforeseen problems with this?  Also, I'm honestly baffled that a loophole like this has existed for so long.  Is there something I'm overlooked or why have I not seen a solution like this before?  Is it primarily a technical issue?

[Stan`]

Well the main problem is how do you make the difference between

• A crash
• A disconnection
• Alt + F4
• The user shutting down the computer

 

From the player (who is not the host) all are the same the game ends and all is over the host cannot rejoin anyway while the player would have been able to. Enforcing hosts to have a good quality broadband is nice but not really feasible. Currently the only solution is to either host game when you don't trust the players, play only with players you trust or don't do rated games. The best solution IMHO would be to have some kind of hotseat where the game switches host to the last player online. Another would be to require all rated matches to be hosted with wfg which reauires a lot of resources aside from making a headless server.

You cannot also just trust the player sending you the result of the match (Else it would be easy to fake wins (just send a few dozen of matches wins) Also keep in mind the lobby is just for matchmaking it will just tell you the game is running it can't really tell who's winning.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

Those are definitely fair points, but even with those extenuating circumstances, I think that the option I've made works better regardless of those particular problems.  Aside from the game crashing, most of the other aspects are controllable to some extent by the player, and not differentiating may not be the most fair option, yet it would be equally fair to everyone.  The way I currently see the whole thing working is that it doesn't.  This option would make for a number of problems, but I think that the end result would be fixing a much larger issue.

In some MOBA games that live and breath on multiplayer, there are harsh penalties for going afk during a match regardless of the circumstances.  I don't like the implementation entirely, but it generally works and keeps trolls from being able to exploit the system.  0 A.D. might not rely on the same kind of model for its multiplayer scene, yet it still has its merits in my opinion.

[Stan`]

Maybe @Imarok and @elexis have a bigger understanding and can elaborate on this.

There have been a few discussions about it already though.

[Sundiata]

I'd say if someone quits a rated game without resigning, for whatever reason, there should be a 5min window or so, with timer, for that person to reconnect. If the person fails to reconnect, then the points should automatically go to the player still in-game. 

Having a decent connection is the responsibility of anyone playing a competitive multiplayer game. A tennis player can sprain his ankle during a match, preventing him from playing any further. But that doesn't mean the game becomes an automatic draw. 

[Sebastián Gómez]

I'd say it's pretty simple to fix: You quit or get a crash/disconnection, you lose the points.

After all, it's just a game.

Edited September 1, 2019 by Basshunter

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

8 hours ago, Stan` said:

Maybe @Imarok and @elexis have a bigger understanding and can elaborate on this.

There have been a few discussions about it already though.

Glad to know.  Obviously I stand by my position, but if there's a better plan in the works that might be a bit more on the just side, I'm all for it.  It came to mind that my simple solution may have been mentioned before, yet I never saw one.  It's not the first time I've overlooked something important.

[elexis]

On 9/1/2019 at 1:46 PM, Thorfinn the Shallow Minded said:

Have quitters suffer the ELO loss that they would experience if they had lost the game

Someone who leaves a rated 1v1 without resigning will be warned or banned for more or less time from the lobby.

The problem is not what to do with the information that someone left a game, but how to obtain it.

If I mention it in chat that you are left a rated game without providing any proof, you get people accusing each other incorrectly resulting in wrong bans.

The real problem lies in detecting when someone left.

If you trust the host, then the host can send the same packet and also cause others to be banned under his wish.

For example banning the opponent from within the game or by dropping the IP address communication, thats the same as the user becoming disconnected.

So the only solution that we have discovered in the past years is to have WFG host the game, then WFG can detect who disconnects, or replays being uploaded automatically and having a machine comparing. But the latter sounds like a workaround.

On 9/1/2019 at 1:46 PM, Thorfinn the Shallow Minded said:

I'm honestly baffled that a loophole like this has existed for so long

So implement that, one first needs to implement dedicated hosting (i.e hosting without rendering the game), which means having to rewrite the gamesetup to allow players to setup the game (instead of the host).

So its easily several months work if one wants to do it this way.

And the replay-comparison isn't really making it easier except for the gamesetup part, because a dedicated server that receives the simulation orders and compares them is almost the same as the dedicated host. And we want a dedicated host software anyhow. And we want players to be able to setup the game also anyhow (see success of the autociv mod, which has existed in other mods before as well). It will come, but it takes some time, and especially dedication to not work on any other projects for the time it takes to implement that.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

Okay.  Thanks for explaining some of the technicalities that prevent a more streamlined system.  It would be nice if there was an easier way to access that information for moderating purposes, but there are more pressing concerns than just the multiplayer scene I'm sure.