Re-evaluate inactivity timers

D

Deep_Squid

Member
I can't imagine anyone thinks that showing up 14 minutes late to a match should be penalty-free except the painfully slow multiqueuers who abuse the timer. As discussed in discord, the last time these numbers were looked at was during a different era of broadband internet proliferation. It's such an enormous hindrance to so many players' experience.
 
Upvote -6 Downvote
T

TaJoordan

Member
I think league timers are 5 min? I dont mind reducing those follow your heart.

Premier events are 8 hour commitments often and i appreciate the 14-15 min afforded for times I run out to grab food between rounds after a quick win.

These event rounds goto 50 min regardless constantly, I think shortening the inactivity timer is a huge miss that creates more feel-bads without any real benefit.

players playing magic is good, this seems like a no brainer. if you want free wins angle shoot in paper
 
M

MTGO_TonyM

Developer
TaJoordan said:
I think league timers are 5 min? I dont mind reducing those follow your heart.

Premier events are 8 hour commitments often and i appreciate the 14-15 min afforded for times I run out to grab food between rounds after a quick win.

These event rounds goto 50 min regardless constantly, I think shortening the inactivity timer is a huge miss that creates more feel-bads without any real benefit.

players playing magic is good, this seems like a no brainer. if you want free wins angle shoot in paper
Click to expand...
To clarify, the issue isn't having enough time between rounds after winning quickly, it's the amount of time into a round before you lose and are dropped if you don't take any action (whether through disconnection or other reasons).

Previously, we've wanted to err on the side of saving players who become disconnected from being dropped from a large event.

This philosophy is shifting due to the overall improvement of both computer hardware and internet connections over the last several years.

Looking at it through the quality-of-life lens of the player who's actively participating ...
 
B

Bryan

MTGO Regular
If it's casual and there's nothing on the line I don't see a reason it couldn't be 1-2 minutes. I've played my share of Commander games and 90% of the time when someone loses connection they don't bother to come back, leaving the other 3 people sitting there, waiting.

It would be even better if the other players got a prompt asking to boot the player when they lose connection. Often times it's used to spite the others at the table.
 
Neo001992

Neo001992

Community Team
Bryan said:
If it's casual and there's nothing on the line I don't see a reason it couldn't be 1-2 minutes. I've played my share of Commander games and 90% of the time when someone loses connection they don't bother to come back, leaving the other 3 people sitting there, waiting.

It would be even better if the other players got a prompt asking to boot the player when they lose connection. Often times it's used to spite the others at the table.
Click to expand...
MTGO_TonyM said:
Current Timers
-5 Mins Casual
-8 Mins League
-15 Mins Scheduled Events

Proposed
-3 or 4 Mins Casual
-5 Mins League
-10 Mins Scheduled Events
Click to expand...

Speaking from the perspective of mainly a commander player who lives in an area where bad weather can cause power surges just long enough to make electronics restart I would be strongly against lowering the 5 minute timer of casual games because I usually get back up and running as the inactivity timer is going into it's last 60 seconds. It would make playing modo a non option any time the weather is less than perfect on top of trying to make everyone's schedules line up for game nights.
 
GwennieMacrae

GwennieMacrae

MTGO Regular
I soooooo feel this. Players intentionally timing out when they don't like what's played is something I've been dealing with for literally years now.

At very least specifically in regards to clearly intentional time outs rather then someone just having a bad connection. I would love if we finally gave players some kinda penalty for intentional time outs. I totes understand MTGO doesn't wanna do anything to harsh and neither would I but at least something like making it so they can't start/join a game for an hour or something, alongside a lil pop up warning that let them know that there's now penalties for doing that.

I would hope that once players knew they can't just always time out in frustration without repercussion that it might not be as much of an issue. Heck, as is often the case literally as I'm typing this thread out I'm currently in a game where someone is intentionally timing out. And lol I started this post before the game.
 
T

TaJoordan

Member
I would like to emphasize that the Premier Event timer being 15 minutes is very nice. You can make casual stuff as short as possible but Premier Events require large blocks of time and sometimes family needs help, etc. Lower inactivity timers in large events just creates more issues.
 
M

MTGO_TonyM

Developer
Bryan said:
If it's casual and there's nothing on the line I don't see a reason it couldn't be 1-2 minutes. I've played my share of Commander games and 90% of the time when someone loses connection they don't bother to come back, leaving the other 3 people sitting there, waiting.

It would be even better if the other players got a prompt asking to boot the player when they lose connection. Often times it's used to spite the others at the table.
Click to expand...
An eject command already exists to handle situations like this
 
B

Bryan

MTGO Regular
MTGO_TonyM said:
An eject command already exists to handle situations like this
Click to expand...
It's incredibly janky. It requires knowing it exists, typing the name exact (case sensitive) and the game log throws an error when you do.

Improve it by prompting players like I mentioned. I've brought this up before but right clicking on the player's avatar should give an eject option.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top