Obviously, we’ve been talking all day. 
Correspondence games still timeout tho. 
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I read a bit then just stopped, and I don’t have anything worthwhile to contribute, so… this post is a tangential thing I just wanna say.
When I used to care a lot about rank, the game stopped being fun. When I played only for fun, then the game was enjoyable again. I completely understand the point of rank. I’m not saying we should just ignore it, but, to be so upset over a game… any game… feels wrong to me. It’s supposed to be enjoyable, not stressful right?
Anyway, tl;dr… In my heart, I want to only think that rank is meant to find balanced games, but I also got a lot of satisfaction from ranking up when I played. But stressing over rank isn’t worth it. The rank itself is worthwhile to pursue, but don’t let it consume you.
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Honestly my only real issue is the way that the points are said. I support the idea that sandbagger should be handled. Do I have a solution? Nope I mean sure I “think” that the sandbagger should just be banned (or given a second chance) and that the games that the “other” player invested time into should not be anulled.
But, what bothers me generally is the whole idea around it… “integrity of the rank system” there are far to many issues with the rank system to be talking about the few impacts that sandbaggers make. Even if we say they make a dent it doesn’t come anywhere near the issue of the other things that have impacted the rank system and why it looks so unstable.
There is also “There was no clear winner so it should be anulled” I have a hard time believing this is what people actually believe whole heartedly. Sure maybe for the argument sake and to stand up for the reason to fight off sand bagger. But, it is a “fact” that if a player runs out of time there is a winner and I think its crazy that it is used as a lalaland argument.
I would rather everyone just be frank and say “This is how we like to handle our sandbaggers and while we care about how our other player feels we value this decision more then the other.” making up a bunch of stuff to support a claim for how long the argument went on was crazy.
From what I gather from the discussion over time this is simply how you guys like to handle the sandbaggers and honestly there is nothing wrong with that even if only one mod thought this if more mods thought this then thats great more power to everyone. Just better to give it to everyone straight then beat around the bush.
And, “Well, they don’t win on time if we anull it” your entirely right and this defeats my statement of someone wins the game if the other loses on time and it counts as a result. But, this goes back to the it will probably discourage players to ask moderators for help. Hopefully it DOES NOT but it might.
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Fine, that sounds like a good idea. I will change it to: 3m + 20s upto 5m
Thanks,
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I am not arguing about anything. You brought up the issue of misc licks. While the majority are gracious enough some are not. I have arthritis in my fingers and hands. I have lost games bc the one click meant to put myself in a good position, the op knew it and ignored my request. I always accept undos. Simply bc if I win I don’t feel like I won bc someone’s fingers jump where did not mean to.
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I don’t follow, what do you mean?
I think the main thing that should be taken into account is that this user waited half an hour, assuming they’d get their rank. You could argue it’s up to the users to know the rules and the culture of the server in-and-out but that is not a reasonable expectation of users. It is, however, more than reasonable to assume you would win when your opponent leaves the game.
This game could be considered a measure of strength, in that one side had the commitment to see the game out while the other one didn’t. There are many cases on OGS where one side is winning the game but resign/timeout due to various reasons. Without identifying the resigning side as showing a pattern of sandbagging, annulling these games will only function to alienate users who lose ranks despite having shown that determined mental attitude for the rank. Commitment to the game, discipline and “stamina”(
) do matter in go.
I agree with the policy of game-throwers being warned but I think banning should come before annulling their thrown games. It is either that they do this with intent and should be banned or they do it because of a lack of commitment to the game which is a clear sign of weakness and should be reflected in their rank while they are still allowed on the server.
I’m sorry to say but the current decision reads like “we do not care about your time or how you choose to see ranks however we do care about our system/culture and your offenders’ rights”. The explanations don’t seem to differ either. I feel like there is a huge gap between how OGS team views “rank” and how the majority of the users view it.
I think this policy should be re-discussed and moreover, even if it is decided that the policy is working well and as intented, this case should be treated as an exception and similar cases should be treated with more caution by moderation, taking into account the wasted time of the player.
Honest users being able to feel like they can play without being affected by dirty/ignorant players easily triumphs a slight disturbance in ranks for me.
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It is just general not connected to what is being discussed. It is just that I remembered what happens when people misc lick and the reason why those things may happen… nervousness, physical disabilities, etc. Hence, in my opinion, it is kind to concede.
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The more I think about it, the more I feel like someone is putting their hand in my jar…
I was under the impression it was a corrective measure applied with reserve, but it seems that it happens a lot and people don’t even know it.
I don’t want to play a game and have someone decide at some point to covertly undo an agreed result because it doesn’t “look right” for that ranking system. (which is starting to get oppressive on the expense of the actual game)
Mods deciding what does and doesn’t look right based on personal interpretations opens doors that might better kept closed.
Even if you don’t see it like that, it might seem like that, and nobody wants that, right?
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What does this idiom mean? I’ve never heard such a thing
I’m probably mix&matching languages at this point, sorry…
Someone messing with my things basically.
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Skipped most of this thread to say “Man, I’m glad I’m not a moderator!!” 
These arguments are too hard, and the amount of faith that the moderation team will make the right call is sadly low…
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Personally I have faith in them and faith in the decision I would have never questioned it even. But, the points they made in this thread definitely raised some questions. I do not think they are wrong though it isn’t about faith because they didn’t handle the situation incorrectly.
They are correct that the sandbaggers do effect the rating system in some way even if some of us think it is not worth the anull. But, the players are not wrong either when making these decisions you have to expect that the player who spent the time waiting and tried even if his opponent did not are going to be upset and somewhat unsatisfied. They just have to pick what they value more and there isn’t a wrong decision or at least a factual wrong decision.
Like in my opinion it was handled “wrong” but not in the sense that they did it incorrectly. Just that I would have valued the player more then the impact the game had made because of a sandbagger.
Also just my overall opinion that the games simply shouldn’t be messed with for the result of the “serious” or “honest” player.
(and my most hated argument out of this thread 
“it isn’t a win if there is no result” there would have been a result if the time had played out.)
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I don’t want to attack OGS mods and I agree they deserve high praise for how they do their jobs.
But from how the discussion is going, I still feel there is a disconnect between
- sandbaggers/airbaggers are considered harmful to players’ experience, so OGS should annull their games (manually or automated)
and
- “undeserved” game results are considered harmful to the system, so OGS should annull those games (manually or automated)
Does 1 require 2, or does 2 require 1? Or are 1 and 2 both distinct OGS policies with no implied priority between them?
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I do believe this whole-heartedly.
As for running out of time: playing the first 34 moves in a couple of minutes, and then timing out while taking 27 minutes for move 35, that does not seem to be a case where somebody is sincerely taking their time to think about a move and then timing out by accident.
But we are valuing the player. It’s in everyone’s best interest to be ranked appropriately, right?
The problem I have in this discussion, is that it appears most people think annulling the game is a punishment for the player. The idea that it’s better to be declared the winner and raise in rank, even though the game result is not representative of the strength of the players.
If the basis is that ranking is used for equal matchmaking, then nobody should want to count a win that is not a reflection of playing strength, but of artificial other factors, like misclicks or accidental disconnection.
The idea that gaining rank is the goal, as opposed to actually improving in the game, even if achieving the goal of gaining rank happens not through playing strength, but through other means; it just seems very wrong to me.
When I’m running a race against somebody, and they either give up half way while being ahead of me, or they stumble and fall, then I wouldn’t feel like I’m the better runner. I’d feel there was no result.
I’m not sure if we ever measured what the majority thinks. Don’t forget that in this discussion, people who disagree with the current policy have far more incentive to join the discussion than people who don’t.
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Like I said I have a hard time believing it.
But, so far another thing that bothers me is again everything seems to be at the moderators convenience or what they think is reasonable. You think you are valueing the player. But, as a player I do not see myself as valued in this situation. If you read the comments of this thread the players of this thread do not believe they feel valued in this situation.
When snake mentions majority he means so far what people are saying on this thread. I will say that there is a clear difference of player vs moderator though here. I won’t say all but I haven’t read a comment so far from a player that sides with the decision entirely. Of course I haven’t seen a moderator either agree with the player side of things.
But you can’t say “We are valueing the player” if the player isn’t feeling valued. The problem with this argument again is that none of it makes sense and thats what bothers me. You value the player but the players readily available have seemed so far to disagree with the decision made “so far”.
It just seems like a bunch of topsy turby “ill just say stuff until im right” kind of thing hard to eel like what we are saying is valued if you aren’t valueing what the people who are “readily available” are saying. Obviously yes not every player has commented on this yet but if you think about it there has been a pretty decent chunk of players already made there opinions and comments and its definitely against the moderator popular opinion.
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The difficult thing is that I feel torn between two sides. Because we also get a lot of complaints about sandbaggers, and how we’re not doing enough against it (including from some of the people who in this thread now take the seemingly opposite opinion that games that are resigned by a player who was technically ahead, should not be annulled).
So on the one hand, people expect us to keep the ranking system “clean” of sandbaggers and other rank distortion, but on the other hand, people expect us to turn a blind eye to these individual cases. I don’t see why these are different.
Yes, but we’re measuring this within players who choose to spend their time giving their opinion about something they perceive the moderator team is doing wrong. You can’t simply state that this thread is a good representation of what an average player will think.
That’s not to say that I believe the majority would agree with me, it’s to say that we can’t measure the majority from the opinion of the 4 or 5 people who have a strong opinion in this thread.
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No actually this is what I wanted to hear and makes me feel a lot better. “I am torn between two sides”. My point argument wasn’t that the decision was wrong just that what we valued and saw happening as a result are 2 different things :-).
I worked for a company and managing its player-base was my job. It is never easy picking between 2 rights and no matter what decision you make someone is going to be upset and you should never expect both sides to be happy.
If this is the decision you guys decided on then it is the “RIGHT” decision. I just didn’t like the way you guys were portraying that decision in the thread. Guess I was being nitpicky
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Of course they can be wrong.
What I wanted to say with my post is that some replies where a bit edging towards the equivalent of “forum shouting” and they seemed to be getting worked up over the realisation that mods are not being infallible and all-knowing.
I am certainly not a proponent of “mod-armor”, but in almost twenty years of forum-dwelling, I have seen a lot of similar topics escalate and people exchanging harsh words while caught in the moment/flow.
So, maybe I should have just made a “keep calm and wait for more data” meme? Possibly. Just like the mods, I ain’t perfect either. 
@Runite
But you can’t say “We are valueing the player” if the player isn’t feeling valued.
Of course you can. I’ll give you an example:
My parents value(d) their children. However when we broke grandma’s lamp while playing football inside the house, we got shouted at. We didn’t feel valued at the time, I can tell you that, but noone could ever say that my parents didn’t value their children just because of that incident. 
At some other instances where we didn’t feel valued at the time, my parents were over-reacting, of course, and you could say they were illogical. It happens. You cannot be right all the time. Again, if you were to tell them that they do not value their children, just because they disagree with them, or they think they made something wrong, that is a bit too much, wouldn’t you agree?
So, yes, someone might not feel valued at one certain point in time, but actually be valued all the rest of the year. I would argue also that when someone disagrees with you, that does not mean that they do not value your opinion. Usually it is quite the contrary. If they really did not value your opinion, they’d just ignore you. Similarly, if people take time out of their day to discuss your viewpoint, then that, by default, gives practical respect and value to the arguments made.
P.S.
Another issue here is that OGS eventually might need some more mods. Most people would read threads like these and feel just like this:
Skipped most of this thread to say “Man, I’m glad I’m not a moderator!!”
I can’t say I disagree with that.
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I think that situation is completely different. But, my apologies as much as I want to explain the difference I can’t bring myself to do so as I am happy already with the result. Happy discussions and enjoy.
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