Player Slot and Game Census

[zoraster]

i'm not sure how many games Nacho is playing, but he'd be my first guess.

[Zachrulez]

i'm not sure how many games Nacho is playing, but he'd be my first guess.

Well my point is, would it necessarily be an exhaustive list?

I think once you've been established here long enough, you don't really need a limit. (At least not until you prove you do anyway.)

I mean I'm just saying that exempting people who clearly don't need a limit is probably a lot easier in practice than making changes to current limit policy.

[Mr. Flay]

The number who play 10+ at once has always been vanishingly small (as a percentage).

[callforjudgement]

What's the flake rate for 10+ players like? I remember at least two incidents of players flaking from 10 game simultaneously (although those tend to be pretty noticeable).

There's also the problem that even if people think they can handle large numbers of games, often they make things worse for the other players in those games because they can't focus anywhere near enough attention on them.

[AGar]

egosearch.

I have some input on the limits thing, but want to wait until I'm not drifting off to sleep to post it.

[zoraster]

The number who play 10+ at once has always been vanishingly small (as a percentage).

as a percentage of players or a percentage of player slots? because if you have a guy who is alive in 10, that's 1.5ish% of the total player slots, which isn't insignificant. Still, limits and what have you are crude at best measures for preventing site flaking having an outsized effect on the site.

[UberNinja]

Yeah but, some people play 7-10 games at a time quite successfully, and others struggle with even playing two simultaneous games.

I personally don't like playing more than 3 or 4 at once because I can't contribute well in that many games all at once. Obv, YMMV.

The answer to this problem is obviously to:
a) automate signups so we can measure how many games people are in
b) any time somebody is successfully in X games without being prodded/replaced (which are recorded in the system as well) their limit raises to X+1
c) there can be a limit of X+1's per year, so that you have to have a certain amount of time on site in order to advance

Just make sure to be pretty lenient at first and make it stricter as it's found out what does/doesn't work, instead of the other way around.

Disclaimer: This proposed solution requires Actual Development Work to be done.

[zoraster]

We can talk about what we'd do if we had automated sign ups, but it's a little like talking about what we'd do if we were billionaires.

[UberNinja]

You're right. Sigh.

[Zachrulez]

The main reason I talk about not limiting people who have been around for a set amount of time is that most of us don't actually need limits, as we set limits for ourselves in terms of what we can handle without the need for the site to do it for us.

I think limits should exist more for people that have demonstrated an ability to take on more than they can handle without the impulse control to keep themselves from doing it again. It should exist as a punishment, not as a policy. (Or for newer members, but not established ones that have long proven they don't need a limit.)

(As an example, there's no point limiting me to any amount of games because I have never played more than 2 at once for something like the last 2 years.)

[Mr. Flay]

The number who play 10+ at once has always been vanishingly small (as a percentage).

as a percentage of players or a percentage of player slots? because if you have a guy who is alive in 10, that's 1.5ish% of the total player slots, which isn't insignificant. Still, limits and what have you are crude at best measures for preventing site flaking having an outsized effect on the site.

As both you and cfj noticed, there are several ways of looking at player distribution. Even 1.5% is still small given that not every 10+ player flakes, of course. But we shouldn't encourage that behavior in unproven scummers.

[zoraster]

(As an example, there's no point limiting me to any amount of games because I have never played more than 2 at once for something like the last 2 years.)

That doesn't really seem true. If you only play 2 games, then the limit is no limit to you. If you change your mind and want to play a bunch, then maybe the limit stops you from doing something dumb. I don't think it's highly likely, but it doesn't say much about whether limits are good or bad.

[Zachrulez]

(As an example, there's no point limiting me to any amount of games because I have never played more than 2 at once for something like the last 2 years.)

That doesn't really seem true. If you only play 2 games, then the limit is no limit to you. If you change your mind and want to play a bunch, then maybe the limit stops you from doing something dumb. I don't think it's highly likely, but it doesn't say much about whether limits are good or bad.

You kinda make my point for me. Why do I need to be limited when I've shown the ability to know what I can handle?

(The fact that I

might

abuse not having a limit it a really paranoid stance to take really.

[Mr. Flay]

You're....not? As zorotter said, you'll never bump up against the limit. It's not about

you

.

[Zachrulez]

You're....not? As zorotter said, you'll never bump up against the limit. It's not about

you

.

I never said it was about me. The limit is probably never going to effect me, so I

don't care from a personal standpoint.

(From a policy one I do.)

It's about a policy that distrusts a large majority of players who clearly know how to set limits themselves. Policy should only exist for people who have proven they can't.

There may be people fully capable of handling a higher amount of games than the policy you currently have in effect. (And the limits currently in place currently have

no exceptions.

) That's my point here.

(BTW: Something doesn't have to personally effect me or ever have a chance to for me to have a stance on the issue. The fact that you're arguing that I shouldn't care because it doesn't effect me is alarmingly dismissive.)

[zoraster]

No. You made it about you when you used yourself as an example. So I responded in kind. Your premise was that because you don't play lots of games, you shouldn't have a limit on you. Which doesn't logically follow.

I think the basic problem, Zach, is you have a fundamentally different outlook on life than some others. This isn't the first time we've seen it. And it's that you view any regulation in order to protect the whole as unfair because it's a regulation on you, and you wouldn't abuse whatever it was.

[Mr. Flay]

a large majority of players who clearly know how to set limits themselves

[citation needed]

No one is saying that limits will stay where they are now (or grow smaller) when they become sitewide. In fact most serious proposals reward non-flaking by increasing the limits to nearly the stratosphere

for those who prove they can handle it

. You assuming that this is about distrust or condescension really is off the mark.

[Zachrulez]

a large majority of players who clearly know how to set limits themselves

[citation needed]

No one is saying that limits will stay where they are now (or grow smaller) when they become sitewide. In fact most serious proposals reward non-flaking by increasing the limits to nearly the stratosphere

for those who prove they can handle it

. You assuming that this is about distrust or condescension really is off the mark.

Yeah, but in practice nothing has actually changed has it?

The mini limit is still a rigid wall at 4 games, while large and open games have no limits.

It's the inconsistency that makes me question the need for a limit at all. That's all it is.

[Zachrulez]

No. You made it about you when you used yourself as an example. So I responded in kind. Your premise was that because you don't play lots of games, you shouldn't have a limit on you. Which doesn't logically follow.

I think the basic problem, Zach, is you have a fundamentally different outlook on life than some others. This isn't the first time we've seen it. And it's that you view any regulation in order to protect the whole as unfair because it's a regulation on you, and you wouldn't abuse whatever it was.

Let's not go here please. This gets a bit more personal than I'd ever like to get on an Internet forum.

[quadz08]

I agree with Zoraster.

[mastin2]

For the record, I agree with Zach pretty much 100%.

As for "But people can still join too many games!", well...

Do correct me if I'm wrong, but in the last year or so, I've been seeing progressively less and less players-who-are-in-many-games flaking/replacing out/neglecting any particular game. It still happens, yeah, but as a whole, MS.net seems to be wising up on this and players seem to be getting a better grasp of what they can or cannot handle.

This.

Those who are opposed...have you actually

been

playing games recently? I seriously ask this, because in my experience as a player (including hydras and alts, I probably am in--dead or alive--an average of 4-7 games at a time at the moment, across all the types, plus my spectating in several games I'm not in), I'm seeing what I describe. It's not an objective view. I don't have stats showing this, that people who play in a large number of games (say, 5+) are doing as I say. But from my subjective view, I've DEFINITELY noticed this trend. That people who play in more games, as a whole, are typically
-Not flaking.
-Not causing problems in the games they are in.
-Not taking on too large a MS workload.
-Able to keep playing in all their games when real-life stuff happens.
-Know their limits and restrict themselves.
-Do not replace out because of being in too many games. (If these players replace out, it is typically because they have an issue inside the game. And that could happen even if they had no other games.)
-Provide content on a daily (or almost-daily) basis.

Again. As I said, I keep on seeing that over and over again. "Sorry, I'm in too many games" is happening

all the time

in the queue. (I've read at least five of those types of posts in the last month. At least five. Probably more.)

The site meta constantly shifts. And in this case, we've changed to the point where, as a whole, we know where to stop.

If you can show me objectively that I'm wrong, then that's fine, but I'm telling you from my perspective what I've seen.

[zoraster]

I don't think it's that personal as it's evident in public comments quite frequently. But I didn't really mean to get into a protracted discussion about it. Just to point out that we come from very different starting points in the discussion. Recognizing that can help.

Anyway, I do agree that the 4-game limit is almost laughable in terms of effectiveness (7 games if you count micros). But it's not something that hurts anyone, really... except the listmods that have to deal with it.

I do think there's kind of an issue here where people say, "we should do things differently" and the response is "we will once we have automation!" Because automation is not just over the horizon to my knowledge, and, well, I'll let this guy sum it up:

we can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

P-edit: did you just "this" yourself, mastin?

[mastin2]

P-edit: did you just "this" yourself, mastin?

Flay asked for a citation.

My post provided one.

As I said. It's not objective; it's not concrete proof of what I'm saying. But it is not something which should be easily discarded and ignored.

[Zachrulez]

I don't think it's that personal as it's evident in public comments quite frequently. But I didn't really mean to get into a protracted discussion about it. Just to point out that we come from very different starting points in the discussion. Recognizing that can help.

If it helps to see the way your point came across to me... it's basically you dismissing me with the line. "You're disabled, I don't expect you to understand."

As it is, I've had to restrain myself and cool off before even replying to that post because it left me quite upset.

[zoraster]

I certainly didn't mean to imply anything about disability. If you are disabled, I was not aware of it. I don't even think I meant to be dismissive. But I do see us talking past each other, and I think the cause of that is that you're focused on whether your (for lack of a better word) rights are being violated, while others are concerned about whether the system as a whole can operate better.