We will have a vacations feature of some sort live on the site by 15 December. You heard it here first. :-)
Here's what we're working on:
When you're on holiday (vacation), your non-tournament games don't time out even if you go past the time limit. (We may also allow the person sending the invite to specify whether the game allows vacations or not, for the hard-core players.)
Some tournaments will allow vacations, other tournaments will not. This will be clearly marked on the tournament, alongside the time limits. The ones that do will work like non-tournament games. The ones that don't will completely ignore vacations and will time you out if you don't make moves within the tournament parameters.
You get up to four vacations a year.
You get up to 30 days of vacation each year to spread across those four vacations. So for instance, you can take a big 21-day break and then three 3-day mini-breaks (but you can't take ten separate 3-day breaks).
Vacations are accrued quarterly; new accounts start with two vacations and then get another every three months from the date of joining.
Vacation time is accrued monthly; new accounts start with 15 days and then get 2.5 days every month from their date of joining.
You cannot accrue more than more than four vacations or more than 30 days of vacation time; the excess will simply be lost.
You can schedule vacations in advance that kick in automatically. You'll be able to schedule reminders to be sent to you in advance.
You don't have to schedule the vacation in advance; you can start a vacation at any time (provided you have vacations and days left).
You can end an active vacation early, or extend it (provided you have enough days).
If you're on vacation when you log in, the site will ask you whether to end the vacation right then.
You can optionally have an "automatic" vacation kick in if you're about to time out in a game (provided you have vacations and days left). Note that this will consume one of your four yearly vacations. The default setting will be that this is turned off; if you want it, you'll have to turn it on.
You can make moves in your games while you're on vacation, it's just that you don't have to. So if you find an internet cafe mid-vacation and you want to drop by, you can.
When you're on vacation and it's your turn, your games will show up on a separate list on your opponents' game pages: "Their Turn - On Vacation".
When you're on vacation and it's your opponent's turn, they must make their move within the time limits; the vacation only applies to you, not to your opponent.
The vacation scheduling page will try to make all of this as clear as possible.
I've based this on my experience of running the site the last three and a half years, my experience as a player on the site, international holiday conventions, work experience (e.g., how vacation works at the various companies I've worked for), and discussions with some other trusted advisors, but I'd be interested in your feedback -- is 30 days too much time, or too little? Is four vacations a year too many, or too few? As always in the discussion, please try to be as clear about your position as possible and don't denigrate other peoples' positions, even if you disagree with them. -- T.J. Crowder First Primate Pocket-Monkey.com
Well TJ I could have done with this being in effect yesterday but what the heck, YES!! it is a good thing and 30days is enough for the year Good Luck and I look forward to this coming.
posted by spock (Leonard Shatner) on 11/25 at 09:11
Sounds good except that I would like it broken down by days as a week at a time,but it should be an 8 day period to accomodate all the time zones since the counter would be basing it on one time zone. So my plan would be 32 days for a year as 4 - 8 day periods as an option.
I agree with this idea. Not all people can take vacations at same time and many distributed their vacations days throughout the year, in various periods.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9489 Replies: 0
posted by robin (Happy Johns other half x) on 11/25 at 11:14
I Think vacation time should not be included in tournaments. I myself when i know i am taking a vacation refrain from getting into fast tournaments. Most of my regular matches are 7 days and if i will be gone longer i kindly ask my opponent to extend the time limit which has always been granted. Its called scheduling, self control and self discipline people. Give it a shot!! A RESOUNDING NO TO VACATIONS!!!!!!
I agree but think about this,my father just passed on and no way can you plan for that so it would done some good in a case like that but knowing me I would not have did it for your minds goes blank in a case like that............
Well, as I said, we'll have tournaments that do support timeouts and ones that don't. It sounds as though you'll want to join the ones that don't.
I myself when i know i am taking a vacation refrain from getting into fast tournaments...Its called scheduling, self control and self discipline people.
You have no control whatsoever over when the next round of the tournament starts. So you win your section in Round 1, but other sections are still being decided, you go on holiday, and the final section of Round 1 gets decided and Round 2 starts while you're gone. That's not something you can schedule; it has nothing to do with "self discipline".
Remember, folks, even UltraFast tournaments are likely to take months -- even a year or more -- to finish. Lots of things in life can come up in that kind of time. People schedule weddings you didn't know about, people you care about get ill and you go to help them get better, etc., etc.
We'll have tourneys for those who don't want tourneys to allow vacations; personally, I strongly suspect that vacations won't make tourneys last longer by any appreciable amount. What will speed up tournies is us dealing with the problem of "moot games" holding things up, which is also on our list. :-) -- T.J. Crowder First Primate Pocket-Monkey.com
It looks as if the yes will have it . Hopefully there will be tourneys with no vacation options. Those will be the ones I will surely play.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9528 Replies: 0
posted by williwallo (WiLLiWaLLo) on 11/26 at 21:10
I couldn't have said it better. Totally agree. I've had a very bad experience with it last summer when I've lost many of my games, lots of them were tournaments started in January, February, and March... This feature would encourage me to join new tournies From Jan to June without being afraid to loss a massive number of games during my summer holidays.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9546 Replies: 0
posted by Dr Feelgood (Dr Feelgood) on 11/28 at 01:08
T.J. (T.J. Crowder) wrote:
What will speed up tournies is us dealing with the problem of "moot games" holding things up, which is also on our list.
Think it's going to turn out to be a nightmare TJ. Didn't look before sending this but I'll bet there are tournaments that are months old or older that are not finished... like you said... self control and self discipline and prior planning?????
Great site love playing here... won't enter tournament though... takes to long to play...
like I said, pretty bad to lose a tourny by being an hour late from an out of town funeral, looks like you have been one with no family deaths to deal with & don't know what it would be like to happen to lose a spouse or a mother
I'd be in favor of a vacation option for virtually all games. Other than for "UltraFast" tournaments, it seems that the impact even on the pace of tournament games would be minimal.
Right now, planned and unplanned vacations DO have a major impact on tournaments (and non-tournament games). It's obviously a drag when my games time out when I can't get to a computer for a week or so. But it's also a drag for me when that happens to my opponents. I usually would like to see how the game would turn out! (It's not much fun to win thanks to the Gorilla.)
I think TJ's model of a straight 30 days spread over 4 vacations is probably the best one, but I might also suggest a compromise. What if the tournament model (in which you can accumulate grace time up to some hard limit) were applied to all games? Players who take turns quickly during most of the year could be rewarded with MORE vacation time than those who play more slowly. Either way, I think it's a great idea.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9514 Replies: 0
posted by Lindap957 (Linda G. Parker) on 11/25 at 23:47
Sounds like a great idea. Have been wondering when this site would implement this kind of program. I think that this is the only site that I play at that does not have it but glad to see that it is now becoming available.
I like the idea of a vacation feature, but don't like the idea of having non-vacation vs. vacation tourneys. This will fragment the set of tourney players, and I prefer tourneys with more players rather than fewer.
Certain "tastes" deserve separate tourneys, such as cube vs. no-cube, but I don't feel that this one merits separate tourneys. Sounds like the no-vacation tourneys will get about 10 players, which isn't a very good tourney IMHO. Is that what you "no-vacation" people want to play?
posted by snowangel (sonja mater) on 11/27 at 00:14
I could have used this in October. Glad to hear that it will be available for my next vacation.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9536 Replies: 0
posted by RedBaron (Will C. Crowder) on 11/27 at 01:53
FWIW :-), I like everything here. Initially, I was going to comment against the "automatic" vacation feature, but now I've come around to it: It uses up one of your four "vacations" so timing out is still something to avoid. My concern was that the "automatic" feature would be abused, but the fact that that uses up one of four vacation slots alleviates that concern.
Will
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9545 Replies: 0
posted by daisyheadmaisy (daisyheadmaisy) on 11/27 at 23:47
I think that your plan is a great one T.J. Thank you.
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9560 Replies: 0
posted by Living4Jesus (Karen White) on 11/29 at 06:52
I think the vacation feature is a great Idea and will be glad to see it happen. Thanks.
Overall, I think the idea to have some "days off" (vacation you call it) without being penalized by a game loss is a good idea!!!
I'm not sure 30 days is necessary though! Nor do I think there should be so many restrictions as to how many days are allowed to be used at any one time. I would like to be able to use just a few days (2 or 3 for example) at a time when necessary. Using a whole week at once when I don't need that many days off would be a waste of time that could be used at a later date.
I do not get a vacation, but I have some surgery coming up soon and could use a buffer of a few days while I am in the hospital. I think each member should be able to select how and when they want to use their days with no restrictions EXCEPT for special "NO VACATION TOURNAMENTS" for fast players only. That is all that should be needed for the die-hards I would think?!
Other than that I think we already have the proper time controls in effect to handle any planned absences here at Pocket-Monkey. We even have the option to change the time limit in mid-game if necessary, so I don't feel we need 30 days of "vacation" time per year. I think 15 days would be enough so that games are not held up unnecessarily.
My thought is that it is best to keep things as simple as possible for everyone's sake, but particularly for you T.J. Trying to keep too many "rules" about vacation time could well result in a major headache for you. I'm all in favor of time off being available to our members, but I think each player should be able to take their days off whenever they want to. When they're gone.... THEY'RE GONE! End of vacation time for the year - PERIOD! This is just my own opinion. I'm sure others will have their thoughts on the subject too.
Thanks for letting me put in my 2 cents worth on the topic though! 8^)
HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO EVERYONE!!!
Aurora
Re: Vacations Feature
Message #9589 Replies: 0
posted by petr.pavel (Petr 'PePa' Pavel) on 12/03 at 09:52
I don't like loosing a game because of timing out and I don't like wining a game thanks only to Gorilla either. On the other hand, hey, it's just a game. If it ends unexpectedly so what? Start another one.
I agree that vacation is a good feature because you cannot really plan for tourneys, not even for the first round.
Mind you, we don't speak about real vacations only - planned journeys away from your computer. A big part of the players here are having some kind of a health problem (e.g. due to their age) and that is one of the reasons they play here, instead of going out bungee jumping. This is my observation only, no official stats. These players have thus a higher chance of being unable to play unexpectedly (not feeling well, their friends not feeling well). Players who haven't gone through a situation like this should try to empathize.
My concerns are: how to set the rules so that they aren't (a) easily abuseable (b) too complicated. I agree with the idea behind T.J.'s specification but I'm afraid that it may be a little bit too complex. It almost reminds me of a law system in my country. Politicians are trying to describe every possible situation they want to protect us against but of course, people are always more "creative" and find a gap they can abuse. In lawmaking, the oposite way is to define a short general rule and let the judges decide. I don't know though, how to apply this to the vacation rules here on Pocket-Monkey.
I'm afraid of fragmenting tourneys too (with vacation/no vacation). Some tourneys don't have enough players already. A "solution" to this might be to lower the number of players required to play.
I don't know if 30 days will be enough for the French - they're always a step ahead in negotiating shorter working hours and longer vacations ;-)
As always, thanks T.J. for being so democratic. PePa
If you hit the Back and Forward buttons in your browser after posting, you might end up sending your post more than once. Your browser should warn you in advance saying you're about to send "post data" again.
if you want to use the days fine , if you are against vacations don't use the days given to you.
another suggestion , why not give the set number of days, and let players use them as they like , but when you use all 30 days up you are out . they don't replace until exactly 1 yr from the date the day was used.
posted by williwallo (WiLLiWaLLo) on 11/26 at 21:27
I think that this is little restriction further than original TJ proposal.
Suppose you do the way you propose, then It depends on the date you're starting to count. That is the "increasing" amount. For example: suppose you extinguish your number of days on a whole just with a month of vacation. You aren't given more days until one year later, because otherwise you would be able to get more than 30 days before a year.
But then, all should be ready for you to get your yearly 'August' vacation month, for example. With your system that wouldn't be possible (You would have to get your vacs. on August, Sept, Oct, a later month every year) (quite unfair for my work for instance).
With TJ system, I get my 'august' vacation, then my account is full for next 'august' vacation.
I am very much in favour of vacation allowances. It is obvious that a lot of thought has gone into this feature and deserves support. I for one would enter into more tourny's if I knew that they would not be timed out whilst away. Especially, as often happens, something crops up unexpectedly.
I am in favor of the vacations too, but think it should be for all of the holidays...i lost some tournament games over the thanksgiving holiday...and I only was late by a few hours....took longer than we thought to drive!! I vote yes for this feature.
If you get into this holiday or that you get people from all over the world clamouring for their own country's national holidays. Do you in America want to sit around and wait while I celebrate Australia Day or the Queens Birthday Long Weekend? I certainly don't want to sit here and wait while you feast on turkey because to me it is just a regular day! With the proposed system you could schedule your Thanksgiving and I could schedule my Australia day and neither of us has a problem. I say the system suggested already is a good one.
I am in favor of the vacations too, but think it should be for all of the holidays...
That's kind of the idea -- as TarantinoFan sort of said, by putting a user's holidays under their individual control, Americans can take American holidays off, Brits can take UK holidays off, Aussies can take Aussie holidays off, Indians can take Indian holidays off, etc., etc., rather than our declaring a site-wide "timeout holiday" at certain times of year as we've done (somewhat uncomfortably) in the past. The goal is a fairer system, and one which also makes it easier for people to take non-governmental holidays (e.g., "summer vacations" and the like). -- T.J. Crowder First Primate Pocket-Monkey.com
I think the suggestion about players from different countries being able to set vacation days is a great one, but would these be deducted from the 30 vacation days provided in a year? I myself have never used vacation days, and have played those that do, it has never been a problem for me - bring them on I say :)
I think the suggestion about players from different countries being able to set vacation days is a great one, but would these be deducted from the 30 vacation days provided in a year?
Yup, that's the idea. We figure 30 days should just about cover it. :-) -- T.J. Crowder First Primate Pocket-Monkey.com
posted by pint of beer (john shields) on 11/29 at 18:18
just been away a week myself, lucky for me my son has been keeping my games running. i would have put in a 7 day vacation and come back to all my games. so go for it worth it to game players who do like to win or lose playing the games rather then with timeouts (also draw in some games). the tournies s that you could easy put on the no vaction list would be the standard ones. you can build up a fair amount of time on them to stop you timing out. Ultra games would need the vaction feature though as not enough time can not be accrued. long vacations like 3 weeks would make most tournie games unmanageable though so the games you wish to keep going would not get the same protection. may be easier to say all games for the period the player wishes for the vacation should be allowed to be free from timing out.
just another voice here but good going!!! as i was in hospital for few days, was lucky to have a friend bring her laptop to me to make the moves. win or lose, i have fun here. but the time for holiday times sound good. I only make games less than 7 days when i know i'm going to be here, but then one never knows about pop ups,lol. good news!
I myself support the vacation option 100% in regular games and tournies. My concern is that the games i play (checkers, kings, strategy...)barely ever get enough players in them to have a tourney at all. Maybe more people would play the tourneys with the vacation option....but i'd hate to lose any players because of it.
Yes, the player gopats makes that point above as well, a concern that breaking the tournies up into even more options could have a negative effect on individual tournies. We'll have to see how it goes and deal with what comes. :-) -- T.J. Crowder First Primate Pocket-Monkey.com
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