Code of Conduct recommendation for PA players

Many players will join a game in the lobby. ready and launch then leave. This conduct puts the other players at a disadvantage. I understand there are technical issues. But many players and don't even try to reconnect or they decide to leave mid game or the make the comment that I'm lagging then just leave.

I would like to make the following recommendation.
1st time freebie
2nd time unable join lobbies for 30 minutes
3rd 4 hours
4th ban for the day.

Sorry, just realized I posted in the wrong section of the forum, admins, please move this thread to the correct area. Thank you.

I disagree. As you mentioned it's not always the fault of the player who leaves. Sometimes lagging can then lead to a disconnect, not the player quitting. This is just something people will have to live with in a truly global game in a world where internet isn't always consistent and servers are often overloaded.

I agree Scottjames... I had this happen in nearly every game... people leaving in the beginning, people leaving because their tanks got a scratch and so forth.

@darac, if there is a technical problem, I have them sometimes myself, but I reconnect... and mostly everything is fine again... most people don't even try to do so... that is very annoying.

I personally would like something in the player stats, so if there is a player leaving game very often prematurely, it should be shown in his stats to be a deserter, then his team mates or the host can think twice about playing with him in the first place.

I've stopped counting how often I couldn't reconnect to games that I "abandoned" due to my client crashing. With OP's system I'd probably be permabanned. No thanks.

Then there's this nasty thing called real life getting in the way. Neighbour needs something? Your toddler has a nasty surprise? Phone rings and, no, you can't call back later? Too bad, no more PA if it's been a busy day.

Even the most draconic forms of punishment won't stop or discourage lazy players, or the impatient, or dedicated griefers and trolls. What they do accomplish is ruining the experience for legit players with technical issues or a busy RL.

I've tried to reconnect to many disconnected games and it simply doesn't work sometimes. I'm sure from the perspective of players in the it wouldn't even look like I've tried to reconnect... I'm sorry, but this system would simply hurt an already small active community.

However, I wouldn't mind some sort of stat that shows a % of the last 20 games left before conclusion.... but this could also be open to griefer to exploit. imagine being on a shared army game and someone hops their commander from planet to planet when you have no chance of winning. Would you be punished for leaving even though the game is clearly over?

Real life is not a problem, hence the OP mentioned a timeout after 2 disconnects... everyone has an emergency sometimes, but not all the time? If you have to leave every game after 5 min, something is wrong.

I do see sometimes people trying to reconnect and that is all I need to see and all is good... too often people do leave on purpose crippling the game, not fair to their own nor the other team. This simply happens far too often.

Other online games do something against it and I suggest that this should be the case for PA as well, in what form, no idea. I personally would like to see a stat if the player that joined is a notorious disconnecter.

Moving this thread to General Discussion. Carry on

Thank You Raven for the assist.

You gents make some interesting points. BUT! I've rarely seen a situation i couldn't reconnect too. If your having to reconnect so often I'd say you have ISP issue's or PC issues' I'm willing to wager Uber keeps track of all there technical issues. I'm should there dealing with them accordingly. BUT! you need to draw the line on unacceptable behavior. Racist comments and cussing players out is poor sportsmanship. There are many ideas to help this along. Keeping people from disconnecting all the time. And yes they will get the hint. UBER put the code out at the beginning in the Alpha stage. Its a good code but there must be ways to enforce it or its just words. And just for the record in REAL world Shwyz people are held accountable. It happens one way or another. If you have a small child then you should be watching your child not playing games. If the phone rings.. Let it go to voice mail. After all legit players won't be punished for technical issues. Because like i said i'm sure that's being watched so it can be fixed.

This is not counter strike, i don't think a casual RTS game should ban for rage quitting.

I don't think bans for quitting should be implemented. What if the player decides to destroy all of their teams commanders to circumvent a penalty anyway?

And my biggest worry; the game still has significant bugs. Recently, pathing bugs have ruined games for me, causing such problems as a long, unpassable, invisible barrier that units get stuck on if I send them across it. When this happens at or around my spawn in a 1v1, I will notify the other player before disconnecting. Thankfully this has not happened to me in a team game as of yet, but without shared armies I have a feeling I would do the same if that situation arose.
(here is an example of the bug in question; in an FFA, red spawned on the bugged line, their commander and fabbers were stuck very early on. The lines formed by units show where units get stuck; they will not accept move commands of any kind.)

Anyway, I don't support a rule like this because:
1. Players will cause more damage trying to circumvent it
2. The game isn't finished, and game-ruining bugs can still pop up

LOL style?

are they having technically difficulties? I see this so often. People join, ready up, we launch, 30 sec into the game they disconnect and never try to reconnect.
Why?

Did you completely read the post. Or did you misunderstand. If so ask please. You address theses issues before the game is polished and released so you don't lose others. All i'm saying is it needs to be addressed. OR it will keep happening bugs or not. It will ruin the gaming for current and future players. Some form of action needs to done. And I addressed the Technical issues.

My client booted me from a match I hosted the other day, with no warning or performance issues prior.. I tried to reconnect and I couldn't. Sometimes games also drop for no [perceptible] reason. And being in Australia, I only play on the AU servers; I'll ocasionally get an opponent from the US or EU, and most of the time they quit due to unplayable lag (or the game crashes - that's happened a few times too).

If any of these scenarios resulted in penalties, I'd be pretty annoyed.

Yes.

You addressed technical issues by saying:

Which is completely inadequate, and ignores the issue of potentially game-breaking bugs that are not related to a user's connection. If pathing is broken, reconnecting isn't going to solve any problems. I am going to leave the game if I can't move my commander or fabbers at the 2 minute mark, and I do not expect to be penalized because of it.
So long as there could be bugs like this in the game, a system like this should not be implemented. You did not adequately address the issue of bugs, and even on the issue of connectivity, it is possible for players to be disconnected without receiving a reconnect prompt.

I've also brought up concerns that the system is easily circumvented by suiciding commanders. As far as the game is concerned, this is a loss, not abandoning.

I also don't think it's fair to bring strikes against players for quitting games for a few other reasons on top of those already mentioned:

• As was previously mentioned, game-breaking bugs.
• As was previously mentioned, commander suicide is considered a loss, not an abandonment.
• If your team is missing a player due to a pre-game or early disconnect. When a 2v2 becomes a 2v1, should you be penalized for exiting to re-host a different game?
• If your teammate goes afk, but does not disconnect. Again, the game is effectively a 2v1 at this point.
• If your opponent/s go/es afk at some point. I don't like sticking around for 1v0's either.
• If teams are clearly imbalanced, due to a very new player / new players in a team match. Let's say your teammate doesn't know the basics of the game in a 2v2 against competent players, and they build an air factory and then continually build air fabbers and get them to assist the factory, doing nothing more than building a few mex with their commander, and refusing to do otherwise . 4 minutes in and all they have are air fabbers, which then get destroyed by a wave of fighters... it's clear this won't be a fun experience for you.
• If a game stalemates or gets to a point where gameplay is no longer fun (late game orbital ), and everyone collectively decides to leave. Are they all penalized?
• If players agree to a re-host due to map problems / imbalance
• If someone's connection goes out long enough that they do not have the opportunity to re-join

I've had all but the last one happen to me (I don't usually have connection problems, but others might).
The thing is, public games shouldn't penalize you for these problems, and they're susceptible to all of them. You can't differentiate between valid or invalid disconnects.
That's why I think public lobbies should not enforce this kind of rule. It would do far more harm than good. I'd suggest playing with people you know (or meeting people to play with) if you get problems with disconnecting teammates.

@edwood: Plenty of games have "leaver stats". In 99% of all cases, noone cares. From the original StarCraft to Battlefield 3 & 4, plenty of UI space was wasted for displaying the number and percentage of abandoned games ... and noone was any wiser.

@scottjames: Sorry, but that only works if you're living in a cave. Sometimes you simply have to get the phone - you know, important contacts, maintaining social relations, etc. And watching a toddler (do you have kids? I do, so I have some understanding of what it's like) doesn't automatically mean that you're hovering over your child 24/7, even when at home.

@edwood, @scottjames:

Imagine this scenario: You've got a day off. It's some random day of the work week - say, monday. You're ecstatic because you have some hours for yourself to play PA.

- You're in the middle of a match - oh, phone rings, your employer / landlord / spouse needs some important data that you have to get up and search some folders for
- You settle down. Oh, the door bell, your elderly neighbour needs something out of their storage cellar they can't access due to age and sickness. Off you are.
- You settle down again. Your kid, despite just having gotten fresh diapers and a bottle, is suddenly crying again instead of sleeping for 2-4 hours as usual. You get up and see what's the issue.

And now you're banned for 4 hours. Just for having some average real life. And those aren't exotic examples, those are things I frequently experience when at home. I'll gladly say it again: Leaver stats are pointless. And punishing "leavers" usually just hurts people who have legitimate reasons to abandon a game, or who are experiencing technical issues.

I'd love to finish two games without bugs or crashes. That'd be great.

As it is, i've started games, and had the whole UI lock up -- unable to type/chat, unable to select anything or do anything, unable to do jack-all -- but the mouse is still captive and i'm still connected. I have to alt-tab, force quit, wait 3 minutes, restart Steam, restart PA, it's about 2-4 minutes whole cycle. Not usually worth the trouble.

I'd love to explain it to my opp, but see point #1, unable to type or chat. I bang on the keyboard like a raging monkey, hoping some magic combination will make it work.

It's maybe the most frustrating thing in the world, and i try and apologize to my opponent afterward, assuming i can 1. relaunch the game 2. send them a friend request and 3. start a chat where i apologize for.... what exactly? For the broken game?

I'd really like to like this game and play it, i really would. I'd also really like to think people don't think i'm a huge jerk for wasting their time, but the impotent rage i feel when the UI locks up -- i don't want to apologize for it. It makes me angry. It makes me angry when i hear about 1.0 being "soon" and i can't play two games without it crashing.

[devolves into profanity]

Anyway, sorry @scottjames if that happened to you. It must be frustrating.

That's a massive overreaction. It's not that big of a deal.

There's only one situation where I could see some sort of punishment being viable in these situations: if PA has both a competitive pool and a casual pool.

Competitive players can play in ranked matchmaking matches with one another, and are penalised for leaving the game early with time bars and ladder penalties.

Casual games are not ranked and have no such penalties apply, and use a traditional lobby system as we have now.

But what if brian's microwave catches fire and he has to abandon the match to fix it!?