Now I get to play on IGS :-)

[Kirby]

...
When looking at these criteria, I would say the KGS system works quite well. ...

It's interesting that I guessed the conclusion of your post before I read it.

I'm just kidding, though. I agree that a lot of the debate may be due to emotional aspects.

[Li Kao]

When I look at my unfinished game list I see 6 of them. And some of them might even have been left by me due to wlan failure.
Afaik the list lasts 6 Months(~600 games for me), which means that in about 1% of my games the opponent escaped and did not get a forfeit yet.
So I don't think there is an escaper problem on kgs.

[CarlJung]

I like how wms liked the above post

[SpongeBob]

I agree that a lot of the debate may be due to emotional aspects.

I fully agree. For me, this is purely an emotional issue. When I play Go, emotions are involved. When I win the game the game, this feels really good. If I loose the game, it hurts. (Some Go player had a T-shirt with 'If you can't stand the pain, don't play the game.' on it - have to get one for me )

And, guess what, if somebody escapes on me, I get angry. If he stays on the server and happily starts a new game while I wait for him to return, this makes me even more angry. He leaves the game to avoid the loss and the system allows him to do that. If the system wouldn't, him leaving the game would be essentially the same as a resignation.

There is a reason that the KGS system is so 'unique'.

[xDragon]

And, guess what, if somebody escapes on me, I get angry. If he stays on the server and happily starts a new game while I wait for him to return, this makes me even more angry. He leaves the game to avoid the loss and the system allows him to do that. If the system wouldn't, him leaving the game would be essentially the same as a resignation.

There is a reason that the KGS system is so 'unique'.

the admins have actually told me that they think the player has the right to leave the game if they dont want to finish it. so theyre telling me i have the right to escape if i want to.

its part of the reason why i wont ever support KGS until something is done about the system. yes i have KGS+ but its only a consequence of being in the insei league. i think KGS is a good server but the admins do need to wake up and listen (no matter what they tell you, they dont)

[oren]

i think KGS is a good server but the admins do need to wake up and listen (no matter what they tell you, they dont)

They listen. They just don't agree with you.

[xDragon]

i think KGS is a good server but the admins do need to wake up and listen (no matter what they tell you, they dont)

They listen. They just don't agree with you.

if by listen, you mean make condescending comments and pretending they care about your opinion, then sure.

[Dusk Eagle]

Sounds to me more like they don't care about your opinion at all, xDragon. What makes you think they're pretending to?

[xDragon]

Sounds to me more like they don't care about your opinion at all, xDragon. What makes you think they're pretending to?

one would assume that if they act like they care about the opinion about those who play on their server, then they should.

[Marcus]

To be clear, I don't consider the escapers to be a major problem ... just a minor annoyance.

My issue was with the previous comment that a player would refuse a challenge if the opponent had x number of italic games in his game list. I have been frustrated by this in the past, where I have been escaped on several games in a row (it happens, and is annoying, but I can deal), then my challenges start to get refused because I have a set of italic games in my list.

Makes it hard to get a game ... so I've started using Automatch. Good enough for me. I have a workaround ... I just want those who say "too bad" to be aware that those of us who do try to finish every game and still meet with what could be considered an unlucky streak of escapers challenging do exist, and probably in more numbers than you'd believe.

I don't have a solution. In fact, I think the KGS setup is quite nice, allowing for minimal annoyance to cloud some nice, casual games. Nothing to get worked up at.

Also, I'm posting long responses because I'm waiting for my Malkovich Games to continue.

[Tyson2011]

personally i think they should make a way so the window cannot be closed without the game ending in some way (the game actually being done, or one party resigning)

would this solve the escaping problem? the only way to escape i can think of would be to disconnect from ones internet to exit the game....which many people would find to be too big of a hassle

[Li Kao]

personally i think they should make a way so the window cannot be closed without the game ending in some way (the game actually being done, or one party resigning)

would this solve the escaping problem? the only way to escape i can think of would be to disconnect from ones internet to exit the game....which many people would find to be too big of a hassle

It doesn't help much. You can still use the task manager to simply terminate the kgs client. Which is indistinguishable from a client crash(Crashes are not uncommon for me). I've used this trick on single player games with a Save-On-Exit system, and I doubt an evil escaper would not use this.

Personally I'd prefer a system where the escapee has a few minutes to come back. Once that time has passed without him trying to resume the game, the opponent can demand a win(pressing some button).

But IMO there are a lot of things on KGS which are far more annoying than escapers. A better handling of packet loss(faster resend) and faster detection of disconnects are pretty high on my list. This might even reduce the number of involuntary escapes/losses on time.

[Mef]

...
When looking at these criteria, I would say the KGS system works quite well. ...

It's interesting that I guessed the conclusion of your post before I read it.

I'm just kidding, though. I agree that a lot of the debate may be due to emotional aspects.

It's equally interesting that right before I clicked "submit" on my post, I guessed it would garner a one-line response to a one-line quote snipped from it (=

[Kirby]

...
When looking at these criteria, I would say the KGS system works quite well. ...

It's interesting that I guessed the conclusion of your post before I read it.

I'm just kidding, though. I agree that a lot of the debate may be due to emotional aspects.

It's equally interesting that right before I clicked "submit" on my post, I guessed it would garner a one-line response to a one-line quote snipped from it (=

As I said, I'm just kidding with you. I'm also curious if there exists any admin on KGS that dislikes the KGS escaping system... But I don't want to get into some heated argument about this.

As I've already stated, the escaping system on KGS is not a big deal to me, and I don't think that it's worth arguing about. As you've already stated, sometimes people just have to agree to disagree, and that differences in opinion are inevitable. I was just pointing out that, to me, it's kind of obvious what a KGS admin's opinion about the system is, so I'm not as convinced of a particular argument when it comes from somebody from within the system.

I guess I could come up with analogy. I might be interested in buying a TV. A Sony TV salesman might have a bunch of points that all indicate the reasons that I should by a Sony TV, and not an Acer TV. Of course he points out all of the good aspects of the Sony brand because he works for Sony. It would be much more convincing to me if his same points were brought up by a third party that didn't work for the TV store, because I wouldn't think that they were trying to sell me something, leaving out the negative aspects of Sony TVs...

But using this analogy, I don't really care what kind of a TV I have - Sony or Acer. Both TVs work fine to me, so I'm not really trying to argue for or against Sony. I'm just saying that a Sony salesman will, of course, give me all of the reasons that I should by a Sony TV.

So in this example, I'm not upset about the KGS escaping system. I'm OK with it. I like other servers' systems, too (maybe I prefer the timeout system slightly better). They both work fine to me. Some users have a difference in opinion about the best method of dealing with escapers. I'm just pointing out that the opinion of a KGS admin is already obvious, since they are a part of the system.

Of course, you are just as free as anybody else to express your opinions and thoughts. I just think that I can guess what they are beforehand when they come to matters dealing with KGS

[Redundant]

...
When looking at these criteria, I would say the KGS system works quite well. ...

I accept that the KGS system works in most cases, However, it might not be the best possible system (I'm assuming that wms wants KGS to be the best server around). I'm wondering how you feel that the policies on other servers are worse then the KGS system in respect to the criteria you mentioned.