Growing the playerbase

[zenon550]

Should there be a request for current players to invite others, either directly or via a place like Discord or online forums? Hard to get team games it seems at the moment though the site is good (though I did notice a duplicate card bug in one game). Edit: Maybe with the suggestion that only places with nice/ethical/etc. people be "targeted", and also maybe with some referral codes or badging or similar to encourage/acknowledge those who succeed in getting others to sign up?

And another couple of suggestions which I can post in new threads if the admin thinks I should (or they can poll users on it if they find it viable, probably better than a thread), the first being allowing a randomize function in the game setup modes (either to balance out teams via rankings or pseudo-balance them via random placements), and the second to do something about AFK players, maybe a way to allow games that only show up for players with a good record of playing their games instead of AFK-ing.

And a third one I guess, a way for a losing person or team (maybe only in a 1v1 remaining) to surrender, or even to agree to a tie if things are seriously deadlocked and there is no viable way forward for a win.

 

[NewSheriffInTown]

One thing that will be rolled out in the next couple weeks is email-turn-notifications.

Now when it's a players turn, they will receive an email notification with a link back to the game. This should help new players who sign up and forget they joined a game.

Actually, it should probably help everyone who joined a game return and play their turn.

Stay tuned. We have it working, but it will take a couple weeks to make sure the rollout doesn't break the current website.

• So that should check #4 (do something to discourage people from abandoning games) off the list.
• And realistically, #6 (surrender button) is the most likely to be implemented at some point, not any time soon though.
• #1 is up to the players,
• and #2 (faster game signups) is on my to-do list, but it's near the bottom. There is a lot that goes above that.

 

[zenon550]

In some of my games I have seen players that are playing one game simply not play another, and from the very start (they were low rated and paired with low-rated players), meaning it was not an awareness issue. I can see one email per game start for those who have signed up and forgotten, but I'm thinking one or more emails per day for games that will show up on their homepage in any case would be annoying.

As for 1), a simply email with the suggestion seems like an OK idea, as there are certainly people who would do so if asked but not take the initiative, and there are a ton of multi-player games waiting for players (maybe people are afraid of facing stacked teams of 2K+ rated players, hence my 2 & 3 suggestions) with very few starting from what I've seen with myself on many games list but only about one per week actually getting enough players to start.

Regarding your list of to-do things, maybe a poll of users to see what they value (to be done first) would be good, and also help them keep invested in the site via seeing it grow on a regular basis?

Oh, one other glitch to report, it seems that a players rating in-game is copy/pasted from when they signed up for a game and not from when they started it, it would be nice to have the ratings relayed instead from when the game started IMO.

 

[JCUK]

The surrender function is something that people have been asking for for 10 years. When a new or player just leaves the game as they have no chance of winning you sometimes have to wait 15 or 20 minutes to finish the game. As a new player than be quite off putting. Other risk sites have a surrender function and also when a player missed 3 turns in a row that player automatically gets surrendered.

 

[T79boy]

1. Obviously agree with this, question is where to promote. Not used Discord but heard good things .
2. Randomise settings ? I believe (maybe i only speak for myself) that most people have a preference on the type of game they want i.e. fixed , singles , number of reinforcements etc .... with the filtering , its quite easy (apart from the fact "flat rate" filtering doesnt work ..lol) . Is this what you meant ?
3. Not sure what you mean here, do you mean balance in terms of how good a player is according to "score" ? taking myself as an example... my score maybe decent BUT i totally suck at some maps , so "balancing" according to my score on those maps wont give the desired result
4. I think that sheriff has addressed this above with the email notifications (@NewSheriffInTown I wonder if you took peoples cell/mobile numbers down if you could send them an SMS for their turn notification , obviously if they ticked a box to allow it)
5. Interesting concept (not sure if this has been talked about before), as there are a few games where there is just a stalemate and we wait for someone to get frustrated and do something rash which isnt great as they are ruining their chances in a game where they have invested many days/months.
6. This has definitely been spoken about before here and i think the main reason it wasnt implemented was due to points "farming" between friends/duplicate accounts. Although i can understand both sides of the argument.

Looking at the number of messages .. you must be new ... so welcome to the site

 

[zenon550]

1. Anywhere that "good people" seem to be in the majority would be OK to promote I think, blogs, certain reddit boards, forums, comment sections on videos, etc. all might work.

2. Not randomize setting, but rather randomize (or balance) teams. For example instead of a 6v6 game with two teams to sign up there would be a single field with a notice on top that the game is a 6v6 with teams assigned randomly or via balanced ratings. This would of course be an addition, not something forced on people who were looking to play with teammates, etc.

3. I would say by overall score, or maybe by individual score or team score depending on whether it was a individual game or a team game if the programmers wanted to add that in. I suppose one could put in map scores as well, though I think the score alone would be fine.

4. I think that an email would work if one wasn't currently playing a game here (otherwise the front page would inform them), though if one abandons games early on maybe some sort of "punishment" would work too. Related, one could also add in a ratings range of players (like in chess sites) so that a 1300 rated player could specify that only people in the 1100-1500 range for example would be able to see and sign up for the game.

5. Yes, unless there is some fear of collusion or something I think a tie game feature for stalemated positions would be a real improvement.

6. I can imagine that collusion and farming could be an issue (in various forms), though I would think that this could be checked for (with "stolen" ratings returned to losing players), and in any case this could happen as-is (on the lost game front) by one person rushing another to get quickly eliminated, though a simple surrender would be easier and classier as well I think.

I am indeed now to the site, thanks for the welcome. I am curious as to whether the site down for a number of years, or just not upgraded much and/or other issues that stymied its growth?

 

[once]

hi there zenon & welcome to the site. these are some nice suggestions.

re 2. - this is how it used to be done in the tourney engine (which hopefully returns soon), and i think this would be a great feature as long as it is optional. while i prefer being able to choose who i team with, i met some of my favourite players when i got randomly assigned to a team with them during a tournament. especially for players new to the site this could be helpful, and it would make sense to make this available outside of tournaments.

3. i think scores can be very misleading. nice to have options of course. but i do like the idea of having map scores, or maybe just stats that keep tabs on how well people do on certain maps.

5. atm players who agree that a stalemate has been reached can also abandon the game and wait for everyone to go awol. not exactly elegant, but it works. another option that is more common with bigger multiplayer games are sidegames, or the -1 rule. benefit: there is still going to be a winner, and after investing a certain amount of time & energy into a game, it could feel a bit anticlimactic to just call it stalemated and abandon the game. i also think that some of those endless games are occasionally won by mere stamina. and while i am among those that get bored quickly and avoid settings that usually lead to such games, i think that stamina deserves to be rewarded too? i worry a bit that a stalemate option could lead to games being prematurely abandoned.

 

[zenon550]

One point about "stacked" games and the slowness of them to fill up, I as I write this am on the waiting list for 36 team games (tending towards joining the more full ones IIRC), with only two of them starting in the last week (one being a 2v2) and maybe two other ones starting in the last few weeks or so. For anyone looking for team games - especially ones with relatively balanced teams so they have some chance at winning - and a site looking to attract players this seems like a bit of a disaster.

Also as you (once) mentioned, randomizing teams might help train communication and possibly foster friendships as there would be a big incentive to communicate/plan and help each other improve as the team doing better on that front would tend to have a big edge over an otherwise equal one that didn't.

Adding in map scores to a balance feature would be even better I suppose, though as a "quick" feature addition I think a straight ratings balance feature would do the job pretty well most of the time.