Mon Mar 05, 2012 10:59 am
Tournament suggestions
As follows:
1) Change the green arrow button on the home/tournament page (start page). As it stands now I perceive the arrow as saying "go to tournament" instead of "enter tournament, and I suspect others have also seen it the same way and entered tournaments that they have not actually wanted to play.
Some suggested changes would be to a) have a confirmation box pop-up (eg: "are you sure you want to enter this tournament"), to have a label on top (eg: "Enter"), or to have the green box simply direct the user to the tournament page where they can choose to enter or not enter as they see fit.
2) Allow users to withdraw from tournaments (i.e. un-enter) before the tournament starts. I assume this is not in place now because a system does not exist to withdraw cubits from users who don't actually play the tournaments? Either way, people can get called away unexpectedly before a tournament starts, and having them entered but not playing is a bummer for those who are already in but want to play actual opponents, or for those who would like to enter but cannot due to a full tourney (including some non-players).
3) Automatically withdraw people from tournaments who miss 2 or 3 straight games, again with a loss of cubits (assuming this is possible) for those who miss these games from the very start.
4) Run an algorithm to flag sandbaggers automatically and deal with them accordingly. A quick check for example might be to see if someone 200pts or less under the top players is regularly winning or placing high in tournaments for example. Related, consider modifying the ratings of those who are clearly playing above their tournament rating level (on a monthly basis perhaps), along with a clarification on the rules re. sandbagging.
5) Flatten the payment system for those (large) tournaments paying out for only the top 3 places (This might be just a personal preference, but I would rather get some cubits for 4-10th or so and I suspect others feel the same.)
6) Fix the "i" buttons (they currently do not display information, at least not for me (apple/firefox). Related, explain what tiebreak: "chesscube" means, the number 16.89 or whatnot is not exactly clear to myself or others I have asked.
7) Increase the starting time differential between lower and higher rated players. As it stands now it is a very minor issue for higher rated players, more of a difference would make tournaments a lot more competitive, and more fun for lower rated opponents.
That said, the tournaments are indeed quite fun, kudos for the implementation of this idea and the various payouts (leaderboards, hourly, weekly, monthly, etc.) which are a nice incentive.
Having some 960 tournaments would be nice too, 2-3 mins instead of 1 though, as 1 min is pretty brutal for non-expert players who are not used to the different board setup.
1) Change the green arrow button on the home/tournament page (start page). As it stands now I perceive the arrow as saying "go to tournament" instead of "enter tournament, and I suspect others have also seen it the same way and entered tournaments that they have not actually wanted to play.
Some suggested changes would be to a) have a confirmation box pop-up (eg: "are you sure you want to enter this tournament"), to have a label on top (eg: "Enter"), or to have the green box simply direct the user to the tournament page where they can choose to enter or not enter as they see fit.
2) Allow users to withdraw from tournaments (i.e. un-enter) before the tournament starts. I assume this is not in place now because a system does not exist to withdraw cubits from users who don't actually play the tournaments? Either way, people can get called away unexpectedly before a tournament starts, and having them entered but not playing is a bummer for those who are already in but want to play actual opponents, or for those who would like to enter but cannot due to a full tourney (including some non-players).
3) Automatically withdraw people from tournaments who miss 2 or 3 straight games, again with a loss of cubits (assuming this is possible) for those who miss these games from the very start.
4) Run an algorithm to flag sandbaggers automatically and deal with them accordingly. A quick check for example might be to see if someone 200pts or less under the top players is regularly winning or placing high in tournaments for example. Related, consider modifying the ratings of those who are clearly playing above their tournament rating level (on a monthly basis perhaps), along with a clarification on the rules re. sandbagging.
5) Flatten the payment system for those (large) tournaments paying out for only the top 3 places (This might be just a personal preference, but I would rather get some cubits for 4-10th or so and I suspect others feel the same.)
6) Fix the "i" buttons (they currently do not display information, at least not for me (apple/firefox). Related, explain what tiebreak: "chesscube" means, the number 16.89 or whatnot is not exactly clear to myself or others I have asked.
7) Increase the starting time differential between lower and higher rated players. As it stands now it is a very minor issue for higher rated players, more of a difference would make tournaments a lot more competitive, and more fun for lower rated opponents.
That said, the tournaments are indeed quite fun, kudos for the implementation of this idea and the various payouts (leaderboards, hourly, weekly, monthly, etc.) which are a nice incentive.
Having some 960 tournaments would be nice too, 2-3 mins instead of 1 though, as 1 min is pretty brutal for non-expert players who are not used to the different board setup.
