Yes! I am not surprised about that at all. 
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You must be new here 
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The new page looks great! A few suggestions:
- Maybe the headings should be centered? This just looks a bit lopsided:
- It could also stand to have more padding on the sides in general. The “Flexible” drop down and “Matchmaking” label are very far to the sides.
- This is a somewhat absurd spacing, between label and dropdown:
- In general, I wonder if the handicap option wouldn’t make more sense to place under the Human/Computer toggle? It logically fits to the “Opponent” category.
- Note also that the 3 other uses of that heading style denote a category of choices, whereas Handicap is a single choice; it’s a bit inconsistent, and makes my brain think “Play” is part of the Handicap category.
- Also needs padding on the bottom; it’s getting cut off on my screen:
- Like others have mentioned, I think it’d be cool to know how many players are live, and/or in a given setting combination.
- I’m wondering about the absolute rank choices in “Random Human” too; for new players it may not be obvious what to choose here, and seems like it’d be annoying to update when your rank changes.
- Finally; with these options, it’s not possible to make a custom game against a computer. Is that intentional? I’m guessing people use the Bots as a low-stakes way to experiment with new settings. I for one have been playing Private bot games recently.
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This double counting thingie seems to have been solved. The hourly tournament now starts counting down, when the half hourly tournament stops.
Thx!
Definitely liking the new layout. Some thoughts.
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I like the board size selector at the beginning. I think for a newer player, it’s nice to see.
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For the game clock, I like how the Flexible/Exact works. Would it be possible in the event of flexible and you select either item on the row, the entire row gets the blue border (still keep the ‘or’ that floats between the two buttons, but it would give a better visual indicator that both options are selected?
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I assume the left time is Fischer and Right side is Byo-Yomi. My initial thoughts when looking was I would either have (using 9x9 top row) “30s and then only 5s per move” or “30s and then 5 periods of 10s”. Would some sort of indicator (or hover over tooltip…though not sure how mobile would handle) be helpful here?
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I really have an issue with the ‘Random Human’ button. Like…thats exactly what it is, but it just feels…strange.
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I don’t like seeing the rank selector. One of the difficulties for me in wanting to do custom games is determining what the rank should be. I don’t want to pick something outside of my range, but I also don’t want to bully either. As a newer player I don’t know where that range should be. Especially in the Quick Match/Ranked, it should be up to the algorithm (equal opportunity for all players) to choose what that range is. If I want to specify a range, then I think Custom comes in. I could of course just leave it alone (and I presume that is what the algorithm is, whatever the default values are?) but seeing it and having the chance to alter it just feels like…tampering?
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I agree with the term/use Handicap. It is a term used pretty much everywhere but Go is a game in which a Handicap still provides a more level playing field than in other games so the connotation is different. Maybe a link to a small “What is Handicap in Go?” page or tooltip that explains how it works? “Adjusts starting stones and komi” isn’t helpful to someone new (where the change was aimed) but neither is explaining the depth and breadth since a newer player also lacks some context.
Overall I am liking the direction it is going and while it isn’t quite the Lichess “push a button and go” experience, there are more options to work with (board size, HC) that prevents that being exactly the same.
I appreciate all the time and work put into streamlining/optimizing this!
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no rank selection would lead to a lot of cancelled games
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I thought this initially but then realised that the thing about “flexible” is that you are saying you like one but don’t mind the other. I assume this is still reflected in the matching. I.e. if there are two possible matches that are otherwise equal you will match with the one that meets the blue highlight rather than the other. You would only match the other one if no blue matches are available.
That’s not immediately obvious though. (And I might be wrong!)
Can you elaborate on that? Presumably the automatch would still only pair nearby ranks. Rank selection could also be updated from absolute ranks to relative (e.g. +/- 3; which is how it is now anyway?) so it doesn’t need to be updated often or ever.
imagine kyu who got tired from lost-streak or dan who got tired from win-streak
its possible to set “from -9 to 0” or “from 0 to +9” now
if only symmetrical range would be available, they would just stop using automatch
or they would not stop and would emulate ability to choose rank of opponent by cancelling everyone who they not need now.
we already have problem of too many cancels vs [?] users
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Your personal asymmetric rank range restrictions because you want lots of easy/hard games use case is exactly the sort of thing custom game exists for. We should not complicate automatch to cope with every use case.
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if Auto-match would have too few abilities, Custom should be made to be much more clearly seen
That is a much more sensible argument to make (though I don’t think current size/placement of Custom Game is particularly bad), rather than banging on about putting all sorts of wacky settings only you want into automatch.
Just 9 buttons, no such thing as settings:
Need settings? press button №10
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I think that design has merit, though perhaps the icons replaced with a single word Blitz/Live/Correspondence as new users won’t be familiar with their meaning yet. It’s similar to lichess’s design which I posted earlier: Upcoming changes to the Play page and general time settings - #33 by Uberdude
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I too love lichess’s design, its simple and becomes very intuitive after few tries. They also have 3 separate sub-pages: quick games, correspondence, and custom games all on their own sections.
Maybe ogs would need to add another sub-page for rengo and divide the buttons according to the board size, but i could totally see that working.
When lots of information is provided and people are asked to make a choice, that feels like being asked to make an important decision on something serious.
Picking between 9x9 and 19x19 board, or between fast and fast-ish timesettings, shouldnt feel like big decicion. Simple design says “just go for it and have fun” ^^
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In the past only custom existed. But some people wished more simple interface. Auto-match was created, but it still has too many functions. Goal of “more simple design” not reached. To be truly simple only 9 buttons are needed. But with only 9 buttons OGS would become as stupid as mobile app. So there still has to be “custom” button with ALL original functionality. And custom should not become slow, so button has to be huge, so enough people click it.
It will make Custom great again and at the same time auto-match finally would be simple enough.
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I like it actually, with “blitz/live” as mention by @Uberdude.
Also, I’m sure this has been discussed already but is correspondence quick matching really a thing?..
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The more we talk the more I see it like this
There are multiple ways to get a game and automatch is one among others. It should be super simple and will provide a game , accepting a standard format.
Automatch is not so crucial for correspondance games. They have time to put an offer.
Maybe so just 2 buttons. Blitz and normal, all on 19x19, fisher time. If you want something else, go custom.
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I’ve tried it some times, got some good games but also few cancellations by people who just clicked the button to see what happens. My gut-feeling is that its not very common way to start corrs, but i dont have any data ://
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