Not sure if this is the right place to suggest game changes.

But since cheap booting especially in real time games is so irritating, I thought this might help:

To make in the settings of the game how many times a player is allowed to exceed the maximum time, essentially an extra life.

For example: 2 min max, 5 min auto, with allowing 1 life to exceed the max (this could be changed to multiple "lives")

A player can exceed the max once, if they reach the autoboot they will be eliminated of course, but for their 1st offence they will not be allowed to be kicked out. Once the have used their "life" they are open to be booted by any player.

....................

I personally hate repeat offenders that exceed the maximum, but having players booted early really sucks (normally for connection loss) and I think this idea goes some way to make it more acceptable.

Has this been suggested before? Anyone like it?

It's called bank boot times, and it's already there.

this isn't precisely like banking boot time..

I had to double check banking boot times, but no it isnt anything like banking boot times.

My idea is very arbitrary, in that it only allows a set amount of instances where a player can exceed the maximum allowed with no reward for quick play.

My idea would allow a player to set the amount of lives each player is given. 1 life would allow the maximu time to be exceed once and the next time it is exceeded then he/she can be booted.
It allows the opportunity for players with bad connections to survive without extending the length of game play.

Any clearer?

I think the "extra life" would be most usefull in real time, MD Boot limit should not be a problem.

I think it would only be practical in real time. I am a fan of 2 min games, but they come with risk, and extra life(s) would alleviate the issue with trigger happy booters :-)

So your idea is that the first time someone exceeds the boot time they lose their extra life, and become bootable if they do it again? What about a game without an autoboot, do they get to hold up a game forever on the first time they go over boot time?

I must say this is epic idea. I totally approve.

How do I see this:

All players have some extra lives, let it be for example 3 extra lives. If a player exceeds the booting time, he is losing a 'life' and can be booted in for example double the boot time.

FOR EXAMPLE:

Game is set on 1 day boot. Player is not moving from 1 day 1 minute. He loses one of his 3 lives. He has only 2 now. He cannot be booted by anyone in 1 day 1 minute, BUT he will become bootable after 2 days (doble the boottime).

It can be different, it depends of the settings. Can be 1 day, can be 5 minute, can be 2 minutes. Player can be bootable once he crosses doble the boottime, or 1/2 boottime or even 5 boottimes. Amount of lives also would depend on the settings.

One again I approve, good idea REBOJONES!

@ The Duke of Ben, yes once the player exceeds the maximum turn time the lose a life, once all lives (or life) is lost then the player is able to be booted by anyone. As for no autoboot time, I wasn't trying to suggest something too complex (as to how complex it would be dependent on Fizzer and the parameters within the warlight structure), I would think if someone wants to set no autoboot time then there seems no point to this system.

My reasoning behind the idea is that I play 99% of games with 2min and 5 min auto. These games get ruined reasonably regularly by players getting booted early or at any point during the game if they exceed 2 minutes once. I personally don't boot anyone the 1st time they go over 2 mins, but if someone is constantly delaying the game I will boot them with a warning. This idea just allows people to experience a small delay (the doorbell, the phone, the toilet, internet connection, kids) and be able to play on. But regular delays can be punished, which I think is fair on all parties.

@Furious Lukasz, thanks for the compliment. The idea could include having the player bootable after double the boot time or by a set time, I think whichever or whatever is easier for Fizzer to implement (presuming that this idea is possible)

Love playing this game and I hope something like this idea could be incorporated into the game play, it would IMHO reduce the amount of posts on the forum for blacklisting booters :-)

Nice Idea, Rebojones, have you considered posting this idea on the [Uservoice forum?](http://warlight.uservoice.com/forums/77051-warlight-features) It would be a good addition to Warlight. Another Idea with this could be to take over the AI that replaces you after you come back and realized you've been booted? Say you've regained connection, and have been booted, you can take over from where you AI has left off. Another variation of this is for Teammates to take over your orders if you never return... :D I think the lives are a great idea btw.

Perrin wrote:
|> this isn't precisely like banking boot time..

No it isn't, but it tries to solve (roughly) the same problem. So if we have *a* solution already, does it make sense to come up with an alternative solution? Running two solutions in parallel might get messy (not just on the implementation / coding side, but also when people don't understand how things work).

---

Think very carefully about whether you want the number of lives remaining to be visible to other players.
*Pro:* invisible number of lives remaining might be frustrating.
*Con:* if people can see how many lives are left, they are far more likely to boot on the buzzer, to burn through other people's lives as quickly as possible, because they want to to be able to "really" boot them as quickly as possible, largely defeating the purpose.

How about this:

- When someone goes over the (normal) boot time, they can be "booted".
- If they have no lives left at that moment, they are actually removed from the game.
- If thet have a life left, they lose one and the boot timer is reset *to the moment the "boot" happened*.
- This deliberately allows people to lose multiple lives on a single turn, so even without an autoboot (which boots irrespective of lives left), if they completely go away they can still be removed. It also penalises taking excessively long (if you can only lose a single life per turn, after losing it, there's absolutely no incentive left to hurry up at all).
- It's fairly easy to implement.

Thanks Major Risk, posted on uservoice forum, I didn't know it existed!

This is what I have posted in uservoice and probably better explains what I was meaning than the original post:

**Extra Lives**

Within the settings of each game the user will be able to allocate all players extra lives. Extra lives allow players to exceed the direct boot time but not the Autoboot time.

It works in this way:
e.g.
Game settings: 2 min direct boot and 5 min autoboot - 1 extra life to each player
Player A exceeds the 2 mins for the 1st move - automatically he uses his extra life and cannot be booted until autoboot.
Player A exceeds 2 mins again and now all players can boot him from 2 mins onwards or wait for autoboot.

The amount of extra lives can be any amount as deemed by the creator and effectively allows players one or more opportunities to survive being disconnected to warlight or any other issue that will not allow him/her to complete the move in time.

This will help reduce the issue of insta-booters in realtime games especially shorter versions. Obvously it is only a short term fix from being booted, so allows games to flow quickly but protects players from acts of God :-) yet keeps the idea of real time games be completed within a certain time.

If there is no autoboot time, then extra lives cannot be allocated (unless Fizzer or someone else has a better idea).

I don't see any use for this in Multi Day games, only for real time.

So get on the uservoice forum and get voting :D

RvW, I wasnt trying to fix anything close to Banking times, which I personally don't use as I prefer games to go quicker and not slower.

The intention of the idea, which I more correctly worded on the uservoice forum ,is pretty much what you have stated in your post.

Clarification for my version:

Players don't lose a life *until* someone clicks "boot".

I don't see a reason to lose lives "on the buzzer"; being booted (and, by extension, losing a life) is a penalty for going over the boot time without a valid reason (the meaning of "valid" being determined by the other players). So you shouldn't lose a life until someone thinks you deserve it.

---

As an aside, I still think this idea in general would only complicate matters, without really improving the current solution (boot times) much. However, if people still want to vote for it, let's try to make the proposal as good as possible.

I would agree that lives shouldn't be taken unless they are actually \*booted* however there is the problem of people having itchy fingers... Imho, this would work awesomely with autoboot as there would be no reward for itchy fingers, while still giving some exception for unexpected behavior \*connection loss, irl issues, etc.*

I guess it would depend on settings. Lives taken automatically or when someone clicks 'boot' :)

RvW and Perrin, I agree with Furious Lukasz that it should be optional as to whether someone has to click "boot" for a player to lose one of their lives or it can be automatic.

I would personally play with automatic settings, as that way no emotion or personality can come into it. As there are many arguments when someone is insta-booted as it stands now, I see the same thing happening by clicking to remove someone's extra life.


Here is the link to [uservoice](http://warlight.uservoice.com/forums/77051-warlight-features/suggestions/2838461-extra-lives-to-avoid-early-booting-), I wrote this up yesterday shortly after it was suggested by Major Risk and prior to further discussions.

|> I agree (..) it should be optional as to whether someone has to click "boot" for a player to lose one of their lives or it can be automatic.

Careful, don't stack to many options on top of each other; wading through three pages of settings just related to booting every time you create a game would kinda suck...

|> As there are many arguments when someone is insta-booted as it stands now, I see the same thing happening by clicking to remove someone's extra life.

Wait, losing an extra life already *is* the safety net for a (supposedly) rare condition, so losing it means *it worked*; you weren't booted.
(Of course you're right though, people will argue / fight / whine / complain over "undeservedly" losing a life, merely moving the issue from one place ("why did you boot me!?") to another ("why did you take a life!?"), effectively not solving anything at all. One of the reasons I'm not very enthusiastic about this idea...)

Have you ever tried USING banking boot times ?
BBT basically means you can not be booted when going over the boot time IF you played fast before.
With BBT ~10% you can also decrease the standard boot-time with ~20%, (very depending on the number of players in the game though) and it is more adaptable for longer games, since BBT stacks up while you would give the extra lives at the beginning of the game, and it is hard to predict at the beginning how long a game would last.
(Say you give everyone two lives, only the game lasts ~9 turns, and you play with 6 ppl, the game could be stalled by someone EVERY turn, while the game could also last ~70-80 turns, and a few people could be running out of lives before turn 20)
now giving an extra life every ~10 turns would be better in this case, don't you agree ? Only the extra time given would be preset with your idea, while with BBT it would depend on whether the player that uses his extra time played fast before or stalled just till boot-times.
Not saying your idea is crap, but BBT is just better.

banking boot times are terrible. it doesnt make a difference on the first turn (which is often the one that takes the longest in real-time), and by about turn 10 if someone disappears you might have to wait a week/15 minutes rt to boot them. what that results in is games moving at a glacial pace, because people know they have a lot of time to make their move in.

this would work a lot better, because there would still be an imperative to move within the specified boot time, but it would forgive players if they had to take extra time in an occasional move (for example, if they join an rt game, do something else while others join, and dont realise that the game had started for a few minutes).

+1 to an extra life every ten turns, with a maximum of two lives maybe.