sully800 wrote:A lot of the concerns revolve around this: Most people (save the society of cooks) generally don't like the play with new recruits because of the fear that they deadbeat more often and therefore make the game less enjoyable. The logic then goes that if all new recruits are put together in a game then a potential new player might get stuck with all deadbeats in the first game or two and be less likely to join the site.
I believe two more significant reasons are that a lost game against a cook due to a bad start results in a significant point loss, and that they are trying to avoid accusations of farming. (Deadbeating may be of more of a concern in non-speed games, but that is not what I primarily play.)
To get back to the main point of this thread, let me try to state my concerns another way, and hopefully get to what I feel is the crux of these changes being rejected, and why I feel strongly that it should be given a second look.
I've been told that the primary reason ideas like this have been rejected is that there is a fear that newer players would not be able to play with high ranking members because the high ranking members would only create games for themselves.
My response to this would be -
how does this differ from what is occurring now? High ranking players go and create private games requiring a secret high level password so they can play other players of their same rank. Only this is
worse than having an optional rank setting on games, because you can't use gamefinder effectively to find these games, it's non-obvious, requires a trip to the forums to find out how to do this, and isn't used consistently by everyone.
If you setup the rank limitations how I suggest in this post (
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=93624) then rank limits are optional on both the low
and high end. Here are the benefits I posted before (in my humble opinion):
Vermont wrote: * Players of various levels could actually start games for each other. Currently, they need to somehow learn there is a specific forum thread, learn a secret password, and hope someone has started a game. They can start one themselves but then it is only open to other players who are aware of this artificial, clunky, non-obvious process. What compelling reason is there to make people jump through these hoops? They are in effect going through these manual steps to play games with people somewhat near their rank.
* This would reduce farming accusations for the higher ranked players that want to add a public game.
* New players would be able to play other games against only other new players, if they prefer.
* Players would meet more new players. As it is, many players only play against other players that are aware of the special process for playing people your own level.
* Both settings are optional so you still keep all existing games the way they are.
* Game finder actually becomes useful again for these types of games. I can't tell you how often speed games are searched on and there is nothing from players other than the lowest ranks, since all the others are being done privately (since an option like this does not exist.)
Perhaps there is a good reason for not implementing a solution like this, but I have yet to hear one. The primary reason presented is to avoid an issue that is occurring already. Please let me know know what I am missing here, as I may just be misunderstanding something.
Thanks for taking the time to read this!