Invitation to game (or open challenge) as a URL

As a user of online-go I would like to be able to post a link in our discord chat as an invitation to a game.
I would like to define the game rules etc in the same way as I do when creating a challenge; but I would like to make it an “open” challenge and whomever clicks the link first get to play the game as my opponent.

This way, I can create a game, post it in the chat room (Discord) and wait for some other player to engage.
If they have an account, they could be prompted to log in first, and if not, to create an account.

This makes sense since we have players that play on many different servers but share a common discord chat. It would in my opinion make OGS a better candidate for being the server of choice.

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Similar proposal discussed here

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I think this would be extremely useful. Any idea how hard something like this might be to implement? Is this front-end or back-end work?

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I loved the idea back then and i still love it <3

I love how lichess allows users to create challenges via invite links. It takes just 2 clicks on their landing page to make a challenge for anyone who gets the link (or randomly manually types in the url, but again, they are not using ascending game id’s)

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I too think this would be a great idea. Not only for external or potential go players. But for the interior too.

Instead of challenging Anderson by having to find their username somewhere, or clicking a whole bunch of times… Perhaps simply having a link you can message a person may be easier.

But… Internal asside. Having this for external go players and as an easy way to introduce a website to wary friend, this goes a long way as an idea, to help solve those problems.

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I would propose even a “play as guest” function in the link, where the other player doesn’t need an account at all and can play this one game as temporary “guest35209525”

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Does this proposal have a Github issue? I hope so.

I have a recalcitrant parent who prefers chess :scream: and so I investigated lichess.com to see how easy it would be for us.

With no knowledge or experience of the site, It was absurdly easy to arrange and play a game without either of us bothering to set up accounts.

The user-friendliness was enviable. As a first-time visitor to lichess I was able to create the game, manually send the url using email and play. My opponent only needed to click on the link in the email and everything else was pretty obvious.

It seems to me that such a feature for OGS could significantly boost new users though perhaps after the current CV surge has subsided. :thinking:

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Yes.

I gave it a couple pokes to see if anything stirs up :slight_smile:

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Right? Such an easy way to play a random game of chess with someone!

…And since i dont that actively play chess, i dont even have an account on lichess.org, i can just use lichess without one. Would it be ok if bareback version of ogs could be used without regitering accounts?

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Presumably also helpful to avoid a lot of zombie accounts from people that tried a few games and gave up. Or play once in a blue moon and forget account details and just make a new each time (if that’s a thing)

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Those people need a password database. I don’t understand why everyone doesn’t use one. There’s really no excuse. Even if you’re 90 years old and don’t want to learn how to use a very user-friendly pwdb, you could take a notebook meant for journaling, and keep track in there, and open your hardcover Webster’s Dictionary to a random page and point randomly with your eyes closed somewhere to generate random words for Correct Horse Battery Staple style passwords. Even then you don’t have an excuse to not use some sort of pwdb. You can literally do it with physical implements if you absolutely insist.

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Would there be an undesired side effect with that of making it easier to sandbag? I’m not sure whether or not it would actually have a significant impact, though. Either way, I do agree it would be nice if one could send game invites to non-members via email, even if they had to create an account to accept (not like it’s hard to do, here).

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Well yeah, but is it really sandbagging if you play a game with someone who doesnt normally play go or is just about to have his/her first game? Of course those games would be unranked even if the sender is registered user, also prolly those id’s/urls should be generated differently than the current game urls.

Since i guess @anoek is the only one who can touch the back-end stuff, what are your thoughts about it? Is creating games by sending urls to non-users gonna happen someday?

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I don’t really have a strong opinion on whether or not it would be a problem. I’d be happy with requiring or not requiring sign-ups if it meant we could invite people without OGS accounts to a game.

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