I think the missing context is dragging out correspondence games while playing live games. I.e. having hundreds of correspondence games at once, which they could clearly be making moves on since they have time to play live games… so they are not unable to access ogs for some reason they are just choosing not to make moves in correspondence games. And also starting new correspondence games!
We are in agreement because my issue is not what you address.
I understand it might be what others are describing, but I’m starting to question my sanity because this feels like two different conversations.
Have you seen many players doing that? (I didn’t.)
And also keep adding new games with fast settings. Sign up in everything.
They end up hoarding games, turning on vacation the moment it fills up and keep everyone waiting.
Sometimes they get serial timeouts or resignations, because this time management is not realistic, and start all over again.
Ah I see (I think) - the complaint is that people are not choosing to prioritise correspondence games, which seems rude: “if you have time for all those other games, why are you delaying mine”?
And yet … isn’t it the case that they are playing the correspondence games within the time settings agreed? It’s curious that we find ourselves caring how they are spending the rest of their time.
So far the most practical solution I’ve read is the one I typed: a “no vacation” setting on games.
Then you could agree with your opponent about this - and have the same considerations apply to you.
Or would you find it OK for vacation to be used for one purpose (say - work) but not another (say - playing other games on OGS)?
If we did make a “no vacation” setting, the problems I predicted seem inevitable… “hey, we have too many serial timer outers…”
Have we already discussed “if you’re on vacation, then NO OGS moves will be processed”?
That’d be another approach: vacation is for vacation from OGS, only , not chosing which games to play.
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Makes me wonder if a rule ‘You can only sign up for a tournament that would increase your active tournament count to n if you haven’t timed out within the last n weeks.’ would help. Or something similar. But probably people will be able to test the boundaries or any kind of rule.
TBH I personally feel sorry for such players more than anything else. But I’m in the ‘I have no expectations about when a tournement will or should end’-camp anyway. That’s why I’m pretty relaxed about such annoying behaviour.
I’m totally in favour of adding a no vacation tournament feature, being fully aware that a) this would not solve you problem and b) I’d never sign up for one.
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Something tells me you haven’t read my other posts…
A I think it would and B I don’t sign up any more for long correspondence, to each their own. 
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It’s a long thread … but I wasn’t addressing you in particular, rather “us”.
I should write “we” where I wrote “you”.
I saw that you said that you don’t mind vacation for some purposes but you do mind for others: is that a shared view? How can we have features that control what people use vacation for?
I’ve suggested one way: make it not possible to submit any turns while on vacation. I imagine that’d be met with howls of outrage 
But actually, should we explore this in more detail? We have “pause” for agreed short term per-game pauses … maybe vacation really should be vacation from all games?
I’m against that
I’ll give you a scenario, tell me how you see it:
Fast tournaments 1-5 are posted. Fast challenges 6-10 are posted. All start today. All with let’s say 1d/move.
Player 1 on vacation takes all of the above. Makes their first move when their vacation ends, in two weeks. In those 2 weeks, they play about 50 live games.
Wouldn’t you say it’s disrespectful to take a game open to everyone, when they have no intention of playing it? There will be other tournaments and other challenges when they get back. Especially when this is chronic behavior and their 100s of corr games sit there, abandoned in vacation mode.
It’s not illegal, I’m not suggesting capital punishment here, but I find the “I’ll do whatever I want” attitude disrespectful, what can I say.
I think vacation per tournament makes more sense.
It is a more niche pool of players. If I post a no vacation tournament, I’d want the players to play with that setting for that specific tournament. It’s a fun setting that many of us enjoy (I’d guess, I’ve seen it enough). However, I wouldn’t want to impose on them to not use vacation altogether (which is what we currently have to do).
Malicious players will do malicious things no matter the settings.
The rest of us should be able to enjoy playing without feeling we are 9 again and have to do our verb conjugation drills by bed time or else.
I don’t mind slow games and I usually exhaust my time (I take 6 days when I have 6 days), but at the same time I avoid fast games and never play blitz.
For me personally, it would be unrealistic to choose fast games because my schedule is all over the place and I like overthinking moves. I understand that other people can play in a regular way and that they are annoyed if I take my full time. Well, the settings were visible and we both accepted them.
For individual games, there are already enough settings.
For tournaments, it should be set per tournament. If I want fast games, I simply won’t subscribe to slow games. If I subscribe to slow games, then there is a chance they will be … slow to the point of crawling.
In tournaments boasting fast games, there should be a setting that keeps fast games fast. ‘‘No vacation’’ per specific tournament would be a good idea. If I timed out, I timed out.
However, if ‘‘no vacation’’ is extended horizontally, or in suffocating conditions, I’d probably wouldn’t play at all because it would be too restricting. It’s not that I’m competing in the Olympics and it’s my sole goal and obligation!
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I do too.
I tend to assume that if something bothers someone enough to post about it, then we need to explore solutions, but if agreeing is enough then hey - we agree
So, about that scenario, don’t you think it’s annoying enough to warrant a solution exploration?
I don’t like players who artificially change agreed fast settings into slow settings. I’d say it’s behavior that should somehow be addressed.
If it’s of zero priority, I’ll survive.
The solution for tournaments is already available: put “no vacation” in the rules.
It’s not easily implemented or checked, though.
Should a TD daily check 50 games?
I understand this is zero priority and will never happen, but let’s not pretend a solution is in place.
I disagree with you on this one: a solution is in place and endorsed.
Rather than saying “you are not allowed to tell people they are not allowed to use their vacation”, the rule for TDs is that they are allowed to enforce this IF they have it in the rules prior to tourney start.
And while it’s not policed proactively, anyone can report instance of “on vacation in tournament inappropriately” to the TD to have it enforced.
It’s not a automatic solution, but it is a solution.
What if players were unable to accept open challenges while on vacation? There shouldn’t be too much backlash since players can still create their own challenges or accept direct challenges, and I believe it goes a long way to addressing the half of your concern that doesn’t yet have any solution (apart from cancelling and re-listing)
IINM it should be fairly easy to implement too 
I don’t know, on one hand I find the specific situation very annoying, on the other hand implementating any measures seems to create more problems.
If an open challenge is 2week/move for example, it’s a slow game anyway. I don’t post those, but if I play them I expect a game to play a couple of years, maybe 5. Even in my fast challenges, inevitably either me or my opponent will go on vacation at some point, that’s expected. Many people don’t care if their opponent will be on vacation for the foreseeable future, so why add a restriction they don’t find necessary?
Even in the tournaments I usually post (not often), I’m OK with vacation, just not pausing.
I would want some stressful ones, but I’m not posting them because I can’t ask a player to not go on vacation on the whole of OGS just for this one tournament.
Also, in individual challenges you can always cancel if the player doesn’t respond in a fast game.
It’s time for the cockpit meme, but I think a tournament toggle would do it. The games are too many to check, some people don’t want to create problems so they don’t report when their opponent goes on vacation etc. And I wouldn’t want to exclude players on vacation, just that for the specific games the clock keeps running.
tl;dr I would expect (no idea) that it would be easier for certain games just run the clock than try to manage who can accept what. I think it’s fairer and less disruptive, but I don’t know how easy it is to implement.
So, everyone can accept everything, but they know beforehand this game clock overrides vacation.
To begin with my position, I believe that abuse of vacation time is disrespectful at best and is minor cheating at worst. As usual in the Forums, we have had to go around the block many times to arrive at a couple good ideas: (1) prohibit all moves while on vacation, and/or (2) prohibit acceptance of new games (and I would add: creation of new games) while on vacation. I call these good because they address the problem directly and effectively while preserving the meaning and value of vacation.
Failing all else, we already have a good, though not perfect, solution. If someone is annoying, for whatever reason, one can block them.