I think you're getting further and further away from the point of the thread, Diabolicus, as well as creating more and more "what if" situations, so this will be my last post on the example.

As of Friday morning at 12:00:01 AM, the game is waiting on Players A, B, and C to take their turns.

**A** has 104 hours time-to-boot, and is assumed to be offline for minimum 72 hours.

**B** has 40 hours time-to-boot, and it is unknown when they will be online.

**C** has 41 hours time-to-boot, and is also unknown.

**D** (being any other players in the game) all take their turn on average in less than **A**'s 4 hours, and are online throughout the weekend.

**D** is fed up with the lengthy waiting for **B** and **C** to take their turns, and his/her/their only opportunity to boot **B** and **C** is over the weekend.

Scenario 1 - With current boot methods, **D** can go to the game Saturday evening or anytime on Sunday, boot **B** and **C**, and live with the fact that **A** is using the banked boot times as intended, and does take his or her turns in a timely matter during the week. **D** being the most active group (or player) also has the potential to decide to only boot one of **B** or **C**, or neither, depending on the benefits of booting each one.

Scenario 2 - With your suggestion, **D**, the most active group, must in all cases wait for **A** to take his or her turn before being able to decide whether or not to boot **B** and/or **C**. This means that **A** can, in effect, maintain complete control over the booting fate of **B** and **C** with complete ignorance of **D**'s opinion, who has now been waiting on 3 players for 72 hours and counting.

In a game where "D" doesn't exist, that wouldn't matter. Except, if "D" doesn't exist, **A** has still earned the right to take longer over the weekend than **B** and **C**, and is in the position where he or she either logs on over the weekend to boot both players and win instantly, or chooses not to and either takes the turns with the slow-paced game, or surrenders and joins one with a different pace.

In a game where "D" *does* exist, **D** loses the ability to boot **B** and **C** even though **D** is the most active player, and should have the right to first decision on boots. Furthermore, **D** has absolutely no ability to regain control over the booting of **B** and **C**.

**D** can potentially gain more banked boot time than **A**, but no matter what, **A**'s time still prevents **D** from booting **B** or **C**. The only benefit **D** gets by having more banked boot time than **A** is that **D** can prevent **A** from selectively booting **B** or **C**.

Although that's a fair advantage, it's much *less* fair than **A** being able to freely boot or prevent the booting of **B** and **C**, given than **D** has the healthiest record in terms of average speed.

**B** and **C** get to leech off **A**'s banked boot time, and the player lacking enough interest in the game to log in for 3 days every weekend gains most of the booting power, while the committed **D** is left worrying about what tricks **A** will play with the booting. I really don't see any fairness at all there.

Apologies for the excessively long post, and for any errors I made, and I remind you that I won't continue discussing this example.

You've spent a lot of time talking about the "tricks" that A might pull with the booting, but that would be easily solved by the method suggested already. Allow no tricks at all, just boot everyone or boot no one.

I understand your point about people on vacation saving everyone else who might continue to slow down the game. I'd say that if they continue to go beyond the game settings, then they can be booted later. If they don't continue going over the game settings, then there is no problem anymore.

If the game is 2 days boot, and they don't go over 2 days, then there isn't a problem. Even if they take it up to 1 day and 23 hours each and every time, that's what the settings are at. It's annoying, but that's the settings you agreed to. If they are playing banking boot, then those players simply won't have much/any to cover when they go beyond two days.

If they consistently get close to 2 days, then chances are they will eventually go over and someone can boot them.

My only objection is when both teams have players who are doing that, but only one gets booted.

Some players apparently believe the ability to boot other players from the game was implemented just to help them with their personal vendettas. Personally, I believe booting should only be possible when it gets an otherwise stuck game going again.
Booting only one player when 2 or more are hold up the game is a cheap way of getting an advantage and the cause of 90% of the spam posts on these forums. Having the boot command kick ALL overdue players at once like a manually triggered auto-boot, as the topic starter suggested, would be a very elegant solution to the problem. I fail to see any downside to this.
Special case Vacation mode: it prevents any game from advancing. So logically booting during a vacation will NEVER speed up the game and should therefore be disabled during that time. Players who already are in overtime in any of their games must consequentially not be allowed to switch to vacation mode before they submit a turn in all games they are overdue. This would stop all potential abuse coming from there.
As for banking boot times: booting as long as all others who are still within their boot times haven't even submitted their turn might be good for sore egoes, but otherwise does nothing but unnecessarily imbalance the game. You want faster games, join lower boot times, don't expect players on a 2 day boot game meet your 4 hrs average response time. Some of us have to sleep, others have to work. Some even have a life beyond Warlight :-)

Diabolicus, your proposed reforms are already possible under the current settings. If you personally don't like the direct boot, you are entirely free to create games that do not have it, and to only join games that do not use it. After all, boot times and methods are the one setting that's actually displayed on the open games page *before* you click on the game, for this very reason.

Duke, you're making an artificial distinction between the rules that you like and the rules that you don't. The rules about boot times are fundamentally no different than the rules about getting bonuses or the rules about luck percentage or any other rule. They're all rules which define how the game is played. In fact, the **only** difference is that boot times and methods can be changed by whoever is setting up the game, negating any objection to them. You are *always* free to set up your own game with whatever boot time rules you prefer. If you don't like particular boot time rules, don't join games that use those rules.

I think you've also missed the point of emoose's example. These "tricks" that A might pull are entirely legitimate within the game structure, and I think emoose rather convincingly argued why that should be the case. It's fine if you disagree, but again, that's why you have the option to change the boot time rules when you create a game.

reading this discussion, I see people point out points, then I see counter points to those points, and then the original people say something different which agrees with the counter point, making it seem like that was their original point..

Perrin, good to know I'm not the only one thinking that...

reddleman: Andrew Jackson and I were not complaining about getting booted, he even specifically mentioned that in his first sentence. We were merely pointing out that the current booting system under certain circumstances can be abused, and that it would be very simple to fix this.

I think we can all agree that the purpose of booting is to give players the ability to get a stuck game going again. The purpose of booting is NOT to punish individual players/teams and give others a cheap advantage.

Auto-boot is a fair setting, as it treats all offenders equally, everyone who exceeds the time limit gets booted. It's only downside is that it always boots, regardless of whether or not all other players are willing to wait a bit longer or not. It is not flexible.

Direct boot on the other hand is flexible as it allows the time limit to be extended if all players agree to that, but it is also a biased setting, as the person who decides to boot gets to chose whether or not to boot ALL overdue players or just SOME.

A new boot option as described above would solve both those issues and combine the fairness of auto-boot with the flexibility of direct boot. That is what we were advocating, and ,contrary to what you wrote, it is not yet possible under the current settings.

It is highly possible..
use direct boot.. and play with people with souls.. /waits

There is still no reason to change the current Direct Boot.

When you join a game with Direct Boot, you do so with the knowledge that Direct Boot can be abused for personal gains. When you join a game with Auto Boot, you do so with the knowledge that there is no forgiveness to the boot times regardless of what the players in the game think.

If you are so intent on changing Direct Boot so that it can't be abused, why not instead change Auto Boot so that a player can request "forgiveness" time which the other players in the game can vote to approve? This essentially achieves the same result, and is a less major change than the one proposed for Direct Boot. Except, this function already exists in the form of Vacation Mode and the decision for each game as to whether or not Vacation Mode is honored.

Direct Boot is not perfect. Auto Boot is not perfect. However, neither one is actually flawed, because no one is forcing you to use either of them.

You are saying Direct Boot is unfair and doesn't accomplish what booting is meant to achieve, yet you refuse to use the method of booting designed to eliminate that. Once again, I would support this as an addition to the current booting options (though I'm unlikely to ever use it myself), but not as a replacement for an existing boot option.

You bring a lot of defensive arguments here ("Don't use it if you don't like it" etc.), yet you haven't given a single valid explanation as to why booting only SOME overdue players is in any way better for the collective gaming experience than booting ALL overdue players?
Except of course, that booting only the opposing team might give you an easy advantage.

I'm wondering if anyone in this discussion is actually opposing the idea of making it a new boot option.. or perhaps even something as simple as a checkbox \*make DB's be for all unsubmitted players*

Because Auto Boot achieves that fairness.

^ @ Diabolicus

Again, you are avoiding a straight answer :-)

Diabolicus, I know you're not complaining about getting booted yourself, but you are complaining about what you see as abuses of a particular setting. Not only are there people who don't agree that these actually are abuses, but you can easily avoid these abuses using existing settings.

You say auto-boot is fair and direct boot is flexible, but you ignore vote-to-boot. That's both fair and flexible, and easily solves the abuses you're worried about. And as emoose says, with vacation mode, auto-boot becomes both fair and flexible as well.

I would also point out that you haven't yet given "a single valid explanation" as to why a brand new setting is needed when the goals you want to accomplish can be easily accomplished with existing settings. Emoose's answer was as straight as it could be.

@ Diabolicus:

(reddleman's post answers quite well, but I'll post this anyways)

Not really; you are demanding a compromise between two booting options at the cost of one of those booting options.

You are unwilling to accept that:

- Each player has an equal opportunity to only create or join games where they approve of the boot settings.

- Each player has an equal opportunity to take their turn before they reach the boot timer, thereby avoiding the possibility of booting in the first place.

- Each player or team has equal opportunity to boot players who go over the boot timer. Although it can be argued that it's not always possible to be online to take this opportunity, every player in every game is faced with that same issue; not being online to boot someone or choosing not to boot all players that are over the boot time when that time comes does not make your case special.

You also seem to be unwilling to accept that most of the people arguing against you seem to be at the very least *not against* adding it as an additional boot option, which is basically saying that you're only here to rage about Direct Boot, rather than actually contribute to the foundation of the idea presented by the OP.

No, I cannot make a valid argument as to why this idea is not improving the collective gaming experience here, because there is no true definition for the collective gaming experience. In any game, each person plays his or her own way, enjoys the things that they as a specific person enjoy, and dislike the things that they as a specific person dislike. You also can provide no legitimate argument that this is would improve the collective gaming experience, because you are a single player, and no one has elected you to represent the majority of the player base.

If any single person had the ability to legitimately decide what is best for the game in terms of the enjoyment of each individual player as well as the overall growth of the player base, to the extent that at all times the minimum majority of players continues to enjoy playing the game, there would be no real need for anything which gives players the opportunity for feedback, including most aspects of this forum. The reason that any feedback methods exist is so that the entire player base has the opportunity to contribute their opinion regarding what the "collective gaming experience" should be.

And before you say that my answer is not definitive: that's kind of the point.

I have to admit I am confused by the stance that booting rules are part of the game rules and the same as something as necessary and basic as offensive kill rates and territory bonuses.

Clearly they are rules put into the game, but they are there to prevent problems that arise from multiple people joining the same game with different schedules. Ideally, and I hope you can agree with this, no one would ever get booted.

The game is all about placing and moving armies. Booting is what happens when the game cannot function without it. Booting has absolutely nothing to do with how the game is designed to run. Booting exists for when the game cannot be played otherwise.

If it's not part of the strategy game then any argument for booting selective players seems to fall flat. I'd love to hear an argument for why it should be, rather than just stating it is.

Can anyone give me an argument for why booting should be considered the same as bonuses for territories? If that's the case, then a valid strategy should be to stall the game until someone goes over the time limit at night, and then boot them. No one should ever vote to end after a first turn boot/surrender, and so on.

Noone is raging about anything, emoose, I think we are having a civilized discussion here, so let's keep it that way.

To sum it up: an improvement to the way direct boot currently works was proposed. Some agreed, others disagreed. So far so good. But those of you who rejected the idea have - in my eyes - not given a plausible explanation why exactly the current system is superior to the new proposal. What exactly - in your opinion - would be the downside of - in case of multiple players being bootable - booting them all at once, as soon as someone pulled the trigger? Or to ask the other way round: What advantage do you gain from booting only some out of many, instead of booting them all? The game would still be stuck?

Actually I don't really care if this was implemented as a completely new boot option or as an alteration of the existing direct boot, I just cannot see the disadvantage that would result from it?
Cases where only one player is over the boot limit would even remain completely untouched by the change, you still can boot as much as you like as soon as you can. Only cases where more than one player is bootable were different - in those cases people would think twice before they hit the boot button, if it would mean to boot players from their own team as well? And forcing people to think twice before they spoil everyones fun with an inconsiderate boot sure cannot be a bad thing?

Maybe I can make my line of thinking a bit clearer:

Thesis 1:
A game where players get booted usually gets imbalanced and tends to end sooner. Often this is frustrating for all players and teams, no matter if they are losing or winning, because either you are now one player down and lose because you are outnumbered, or you win too easily and your victory is worth less because you had an advantage. The fewer players get booted, the better for the overall gaming experience.

Thesis 2:
Booting should serve only one purpose: Let an otherwise stuck game continue. Booting just to get rid off inconvenient adversaries and to gain an advantage in game is not the intended use of the booting system.

Thesis 3:
Booting should rather be an "ultima ratio" rather than a first reflex. Booting should only be possible if the turn actually advances after booting the player in question.

Thesis 4:
In cases where multiple players are bootable, booting only one player will not advance the game. It is unnecessary because the game won't advance, unless ALL overdue players get booted.
Same for vacations: If a player is on vacation, booting is unnecessary, the game won't advance.

@ Ben, although it's in response to another post, we're kind of getting further from the point again.

For "Booting exists for when the game cannot be played otherwise," I disagree. Why? Define "cannot be played otherwise". Any game can be played. A game that has been inactive for 2 years can suddenly have inactive participants return to the game and finish it, which still technically qualifies as playing the game. Vote-to-boot and Direct Boot exist so that players who take their turn in a timely manner (defined as being within the boot timer, regardless of the specifics) can decide whether or not to boot players who aren't taking their turns, as well as which players to boot. Auto Boot exists so that any player who exceeds the set boot time is booted without bias.

I can't give you an argument for why booting is the same as bonuses for territories, because I don't really agree with it myself. Game mechanics and Boot mechanics are two different things. The only relation I can find between the two is that they're both factors in the outcome of a game.

I don't fully understand what you're trying to say with the 4th paragraph, but I think it ties into the last one, so hopefully this answers it as well:

Technically, stalling a game to put someone over the boot time *is* a valid strategy. As mentioned in previous posts, when you join a game you agree to the boot settings. If you are unable to keep your turns within the boot limit, getting booted is more your own fault than the fault of the person booting you. Yes, this can be considered abuse, but if you feel that someone is abusing the system in such a way, you have the ability to blacklist them to avoid having them do the same thing to you in the future.

Since I've answered your post to the best of my ability, I really don't see how any of that is relevant to the "issue" of selective booting.

---

@ Diabolicus

Actually I don't think I've said that there is a "downside" to the proposed change to Direct boot. My point once again is that each player has equal opportunity to take advantage of the way it works, as well as having equal opportunity to *avoid* letting it be taken advantage of. You snooze you lose, and I think that's an important part of the game in many ways.

Once again, Auto Boot exists so that there is a booting option where bias is completely removed from the equation. Let's take Auto Boot and put it into your theses:

Thesis 1 - Any player who goes over the boot time gets instantly booted. Although this is unfortunate in some cases where a person is known to be away over the boot timer, it does give you the knowledge that no one is being booted solely for someone's personal gain, which means you can enjoy the game with the remaining players more thoroughly. In the case of multi-day games, you can also choose to allow vacations to be honored, which gives all players some leniency if there will be a known absence.

Thesis 2 - *Any* player who goes over the boot limit is instantly booted. If every player is playing with boot limits that are within their playability, this can under no circumstances be abused for the benefit of a single player. If the boot limit is not within one person's playability, the blame rests with them for joining in the first place. Once again, in the case of multi-day games, you can choose to honor vacations, which gives players more leniency if they know they won't make the boot timer.

Thesis 3/4 (these are the same concept, not sure why you doubled it) - This goes back to what I said in earlier posts. Looking at a single turn, it is absolutely unhelpful for one player to get booted while another has yet to reach their boot timer. However, whether it's because of banked boot time or vacation mode, all players have equal opportunity to avoid getting booted. It would be extremely unfair if people who don't make effective use of the methods for avoiding getting booted are allowed to benefit from a single player who using those methods as intended. Again, this also means the control of booting the less reliable players is in the hands of a single player, which means Auto Boot is no longer Auto Boot, but a crude form of Direct Boot that can be easily abused for personal gain.

---

The reason multiple booting options exist is specifically *because* no single method is perfect, and players can decide which method is *most* suited to the way they want the game to be played. You are taking the booting method which you obviously dislike the most and are saying it should be changed.

Once again, I ask you this:

If you are proposing "Boot All" in place of Direct Boot, why not instead or also advocate for Auto Boot having a way to provide more leniency, since that would achieve an equal end result with a less dramatic change to any existing boot method?

Arrow's Impossibility Theorem FTW!

Duke, after some thought, I would be willing to accept that boot times and methods are distinct from the most fundamental rules of the game to the extent that they are settings that can be changed by the game's host. There are fundamental rules even members cannot change: you must deploy all your armies to territories, armies can only move between connected territories, etc. On the other hand, kill rates, territory bonuses, boot times and boot methods are less fundamental since they can all be changed in settings.

My belief that these settings are functionally equivalent is based on Fizzer's oft-quoted statement that it is impossible to cheat in multiplayer. *Any* option presented in the game interface is a legitimate option to take, otherwise it wouldn't be in the game interface. IIRC, this is also stated in the wiki. I may not *like* when you boot me any more than I like when you invade my bonus, but why is one more legitimate than the other? Especially when I can easily prevent myself from being booted just by taking my turns on time, whereas preventing you from breaking my bonus will be more difficult.

You have chosen a playing style that does not use all of the options in the game interface, and that's fine. So have I, as have all non-members by default, as have all players who usually play either RT or MD and not the other, as have all players who avoid certain maps, or who avoid team games, etc. There's nothing wrong with any of that, but the fact is other people have chosen other playing styles. Their styles and preferred settings are just as valid as yours. One of the great things about Warlight is that there's such a vast range of customizability! Everyone is free to play with their own style.

On a sidenote, I would point out that I'm not arguing *for* the booting of selective players, and I'm not saying I'd do that myself. I've only been in such a situation once, in a 3v3. Before either player was booted, we agreed in chat that if one came back and the other didn't, we'd all vote to end. In a similar situation, I'd do the same thing again. What I am arguing is that selective booting isn't necessarily an "abuse" just because some think it is; and even if it is, existing settings can prevent such abuse.