Life In 19x19

Hi all,
The most infuriating time to drop your internet connection is not when you're just about to win a game, even if it's the game that would promote you or end a losing streak.

The worst moment of all to lost connection is when you've played very badly, and have been righteously beaten, and your final attempt to complicate the game has just failed. Then you look like an escaper, and even if you come back, resign and apologise profusely to the other party, it makes it look like you left the game in a fit of pique, only to come back upon realising your childishness.

Which is to say, I don't like it very much when that happens. Or can anybody offer an even more maddening scenario!

You know, something just came to my mind after my opponent forfeited a game by leaving rather early.

I wasn't able to tell if he is a chronic escaper (or just somebody who hasn't realised that quitting is not the same as resigning), or somebody who disconnects a lot.

And I was thinking, what if he really disconnects a lot. Would the current system actually be in his favour? Ten unfinished games can accumulate quickly, as opponents are not required to wait a certain amount of time, and few people are interested in resuming old games.

So in effect, the system:

- Can make honest disconnects look like an escape, even if you are back after a few minutes.

- Can turn all of your disconnects into forfeits if your connection is extremely unstable, even if you are never gone for more than a couple of minutes.

- Also can be abused by actual escapers.

This is not a conclusive thought, but looks like improvements are very possible either way. And a timeout system is not just punishing people on weak connections, it can also work in their favour.

Anyway, I apologise for making this about KGS policies again, it's just that your "most infuriating time" could only have happened as it is on KGS.


As for me, I would say the most infuriating time is when I am in the middle of a discussion or analysis. Because I know that whatever was said after my disconnect is likely to be lost forever.

yeah, I don't play much online anymore, but lately I can't even watch a game or carry on a decent conversation because I keep getting disconnected every few minutes.

my wireless router got fried recently with a brief power surge that even knocked out QWest's DSL services for 4+ hours. every since then, my router reboots itself every 40 minutes.

People leaving early in the game for no apparent reason is quite perplexing.

W+F doesn't necessarily mean an escaper, though; I believe automatch games are forfeited if someone leaves at the beginning.

And I don't think it's a connection problem, because when someone forfeits an automatch game to me they are frequently the very next person I automatch with, mere seconds after they close their window. It's very puzzling.

jts wrote:People leaving early in the game for no apparent reason is quite perplexing.

W+F doesn't necessarily mean an escaper, though; I believe automatch games are forfeited if someone leaves at the beginning.

And I don't think it's a connection problem, because when someone forfeits an automatch game to me they are frequently the very next person I automatch with, mere seconds after they close their window. It's very puzzling.

I did this last month because I was playing on a new computer, whose java promptly crashed upon my first move.

Tami wrote:
Or can anybody offer an even more maddening scenario!

Hmmm. How about, your opponent was chatty, and just said, "By the way, I'm _______."

(Fill in with gay, black, Islamic, 104 years old, born again, the ghost of a Heian Go instructor, or anything else that might make a totally obnoxious jerk or bigot leave without a word.)

My landlord recently gave me an air conditioner which unfortunately blew the fuses in the apartment several times. I was so scared of getting disconnected during a game while I went to change the fuse that I never ran it while playing on the computer, though it was in the 90's and muggy as a sauna. (I still don't like to risk it, even though my landlord let me put a bigger fuse in, because burning down the apartment would disrupt my game even worse than a blown fuse.)

I had a particularly irritating/humorous one today.

I played a lousy game that I had no business winning, and when it comes time to score, we have a dispute about the status of one of the groups which draws out the misery even more. However, it turned out that after that got resolved, I had actually won the game by exactly half a point! (Don't tell me that this should be a lesson on the importance of counting during the game. I was trying to count during the game, but usually do it by half-counting, and couldn't figure a way to get to 181, only getting up somewhere in the 170s. Apparently I was wrong. )

Just as I was pressing "Done" -- my computer crashes and I have to reboot. By the time my computer finishes starting back up, my opponent has gone on to another game. I don't blame him, but really, who would quit a game they'd just won?