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[eliegel34]

After recent Dark Ages games IRL I wanted to play some online.  I thought I'd give Goko a chance.  I have similar complaints to many others, but there are only 2 things that I care about at all.  They are correct implementation of the rules and interface, and a reasonable match making system. 

OK, so I hate to be blunt, but Dominion has rules, and if you intend to sell it to people, you should have them right!  The Interface should also work.  I still have trouble with Chrome crashing, and in a recent game I played Band of Misfits was not displayed properly.  It is just a blank gray spot where the card would be.  I was very confused when the computer asked me what I wanted to trash to a Knight attack: a Laboratory or an empty gray card.

The match making system is REALLY important to me.  I play dominion to play with other players of a reasonable skill level.  I'm currently level 40, and typically set isotropic to +/- 20 levels, but am fine playing with anyone above 5.  I'm just looking for someone I can have an interesting game with.  On Goko, I play on the "Pro" leaderboard.  Without any system set up for match making of equal skilled opponents I usually host a game and play with who ever joins.  This is much slower than some sort of auto match system, but I'm more concerned with finding some one of equal skill.  I played 5 games on Goko today, and 3 of them players left half way into the game because it was so lopsided.  I'm fine with resigning, but i would like my games to be competitive.

Here is a log to one of the saddest games of Dominion I've ever played.  I felt bad during the whole game, and was sorta glad they left so i didn't have to drag it out.  I'm not trying to make fun of the person I played, just trying to state that we shouldn't be playing.  We were all new at sometime, and its fun to learn the game, but not against someone who is 40 levels above you.  On a related note, I would advise against Rats/Chapel as an opening. 

http://dominionlogs.goko.com//20121216/log.50775a4a0cf28ed55d9d6fd3.1355727003701.txt

[ipofanes]

Sort of OT, and disclaimer: I am not intending to play on Goko at all so I should not care.

But this part of the log sounds, er, ambiguous.

eliegel - plays Ghost Ship
guest5713 - discards Rats
guest5713 - discards Rats

I trust that Goko doesn't handle Ghost Ship like that.

[DStu]

Why? You have to 'discard' 2 cards for Ghost Ship, these were 2 Rats this time...

[kn1tt3r]

Why? You have to 'discard' 2 cards for Ghost Ship, these were 2 Rats this time...

You don't discard actually. You put on top of your discard draw pile.

[ipofanes]

Draw pile. There is no "top" in the discard pile as of now.

[DStu]

Why? You have to 'discard' 2 cards for Ghost Ship, these were 2 Rats this time...

You don't discard actually. You put on top of your discard pile.

That's what I meant with " 'discard' ". Goko's log say "discard".

[kn1tt3r]

Draw pile. There is no "top" in the discard pile as of now.

Of course, sry.

[werothegreat]

I do agree some matchmaking needs to be implemented, but until then, you could put something like "High Rank only please" in your game title.

[Drab Emordnilap]

If you discard a Tunnel to a Ghost Ship on Goko, does it let you reveal it?

[LastFootnote]

If you discard a Tunnel to a Ghost Ship on Goko, does it let you reveal it?

Hinterlands isn't out yet. Ask again in late February.

[Donald X.]

Hinterlands isn't out yet. Ask again in late February.

I've playtested the first half of Hinterlands (not the half with Tunnel).

[LastFootnote]

Hinterlands isn't out yet. Ask again in late February.

I've playtested the first half of Hinterlands (not the half with Tunnel).

Well, I wasn't trying to be snide. Late February just seems like a realistic guess, what with the holidays, etc.

EDIT: Also, I was factoring in time for them fixing how on-buy and on-gain effects work. If they don't fix and test that, I could easily see all of Hinterlands being out in January.

[Donald X.]

EDIT: Also, I was factoring in time for them fixing how on-buy and on-gain effects work. If they don't fix and test that, I could easily see all of Hinterlands being out in January.

In the private version, when I buy Mint with Royal Seal in play, it trashes my treasures and I don't get to use Royal Seal. When I buy a VP card with Hoard in play, I gain the Gold, can Royal Seal it, and then gain the VP card (and can Royal Seal it).

[LastFootnote]

EDIT: Also, I was factoring in time for them fixing how on-buy and on-gain effects work. If they don't fix and test that, I could easily see all of Hinterlands being out in January.

In the private version, when I buy Mint with Royal Seal in play, it trashes my treasures and I don't get to use Royal Seal. When I buy a VP card with Hoard in play, I gain the Gold, can Royal Seal it, and then gain the VP card (and can Royal Seal it).

Nice! That's very good news.

[Beyond Awesome]

After recent Dark Ages games IRL I wanted to play some online.  I thought I'd give Goko a chance.  I have similar complaints to many others, but there are only 2 things that I care about at all.  They are correct implementation of the rules and interface, and a reasonable match making system. 

OK, so I hate to be blunt, but Dominion has rules, and if you intend to sell it to people, you should have them right!  The Interface should also work.  I still have trouble with Chrome crashing, and in a recent game I played Band of Misfits was not displayed properly.  It is just a blank gray spot where the card would be.  I was very confused when the computer asked me what I wanted to trash to a Knight attack: a Laboratory or an empty gray card.

The match making system is REALLY important to me.  I play dominion to play with other players of a reasonable skill level.  I'm currently level 40, and typically set isotropic to +/- 20 levels, but am fine playing with anyone above 5.  I'm just looking for someone I can have an interesting game with.  On Goko, I play on the "Pro" leaderboard.  Without any system set up for match making of equal skilled opponents I usually host a game and play with who ever joins.  This is much slower than some sort of auto match system, but I'm more concerned with finding some one of equal skill.  I played 5 games on Goko today, and 3 of them players left half way into the game because it was so lopsided.  I'm fine with resigning, but i would like my games to be competitive.

Here is a log to one of the saddest games of Dominion I've ever played.  I felt bad during the whole game, and was sorta glad they left so i didn't have to drag it out.  I'm not trying to make fun of the person I played, just trying to state that we shouldn't be playing.  We were all new at sometime, and its fun to learn the game, but not against someone who is 40 levels above you.  On a related note, I would advise against Rats/Chapel as an opening. 

http://dominionlogs.goko.com//20121216/log.50775a4a0cf28ed55d9d6fd3.1355727003701.txt

The Band of Misfits bug was fixed rather quickly. They just released Cornucopia and a few bugs popped up. Preferably, there would be no bugs at all, but they did fix most of the ones that popped up at a reasonable pace, but you do have a point. And, yes, there are still a few bugs left, but remember this is still technically a beta.

I do agree with you on matchmaking. My advice is to use the Getsatisfaction forum for Goko and tell them what you want and why. They do listen and actually respond to people's concerns in a reasonable fashion. At some point, I really do hope to see better matchmaking. I am pretty sure this is something they are aware of. The unfortunate thing about Goko is that there are a lot of beginners. I guess it is good for Dominion, but bad for us. Many people on there have never heard of iso before.

[ftl]

It wouldn't be unfortunate if there were reasonable matchmaking, honestly. Lots of beginners is good, but not if it means that high-level people can't find each other to play each other.

[bedlam]

At the beginning of iso i'm sure there was very poor matchmaking. These sort of things take time to develop. I know it is on their list and it will come eventually. Personally i would like the cards implemented correctly first. I can wait for the matchmaking.

[Kirian]

At the beginning of iso i'm sure there was very poor matchmaking. These sort of things take time to develop. I know it is on their list and it will come eventually. Personally i would like the cards implemented correctly first. I can wait for the matchmaking.

Actually, at the beginning of Iso there was no matchmaking, nor ratings.

[qmech]

Expanding on Iso in the early days: it was easy enough to find matches because you could advertise availability in your status, and it was quick and easy to propose and accept/decline invitations.  Whenever I peek at Goko people seem to be fragmented into 10 different rooms, and creating a game is moderately involved.

[Kirian]

Expanding on Iso in the early days: it was easy enough to find matches because you could advertise availability in your status, and it was quick and easy to propose and accept/decline invitations.  Whenever I peek at Goko people seem to be fragmented into 10 different rooms, and creating a game is moderately involved.

There is that.  In the early days of Iso, the process was:

1. Click checkbox(es) for opponent(s).
2. Click "Propose."
3. Wait for replies.

Current Goko is:

1. Click "Create Game."
2. Wait for cards to load, or choose "Pro Play."
3. Click "Create Game."
4. Wait for people to join.
5. Start the game.

----

Also, even in the beginning Iso would keep your settings from game to game (though not across separate logins).

[Toskk]

I've been complaining about the ratings aspect of a match-making feature for some time now, however sadly without much in the way of a response. We know that an auto-match feature is in the works (hopefully at least reasonably similar to the one used on Isotropic), however hand in hand with an auto-match feature to pair players with 'similar' ratings up is ensuring that said 'similar' ratings actually mean something.. something which I have been concerned about for some time. Basically, the rating system Goko implemented is very bad. First, it does not appear to increase in accuracy of ratings (in any reasonable fashion) as number of matches increases (if anything, the system gets less and less accurate as number of matches increases). Second, the K-factor (or whatever mechanism they use to calculate points won/lost) they chose is *much* too high.. ratings fluctuate wildly (part of the inaccuracy of #1), which may be partly related to; third, the 0-10000 point rating scale is too large (no other game or sport uses a rating system of anything remotely like that interval). Fourth, the developers seem to be treating the rating system like a point accumulation system rather than a rating system. As an example, when the rating system recently broke (it temporarily reverted players to zero rating after any match), the developers awarded all affected players a 'free' 300-rating-point bonus, over-inflating ratings and adding more total points into the overall point 'pool', further decreasing the accuracy of the system.

I've previously suggested that the developers look more carefully at rating systems like TrueSkill and Elo (particularly how Elo was applied to games of combined luck and skill like Backgammon), or if their intention is to have their rating system be a progression-like point accumulation system (i.e. a system of levels, where players always feel like they can make upward progress) that they should do that instead, but so far we haven't heard any response other than 'auto-matching will fix our rating system problems'.

As a note, in case anyone is going to suggest Goko just use TrueSkill, it may be relevant to note that TrueSkill is not free for commercial developers (it is a proprietary system owned by Microsoft), which is probably the reason they didn't use it.

[Kirian]

As a note, in case anyone is going to suggest Goko just use TrueSkill, it may be relevant to note that TrueSkill is not free for commercial developers (it is a proprietary system owned by Microsoft), which is probably the reason they didn't use it.

While this is technically true, enough of the math of it is known that Dougz could implement something that comes within ~10% of it.  And I know he has worked with Goko, which suggests they could, at the very least, get his equations.  That said, one major complaint about Goko has been the lack of transparency on the ranking system.

[werothegreat]

Here's an example of a need for good matchmaking:



I checked the ranking of the opponent beforehand - they were in the 4000's, so they should be reasonably adept at Dominion.  But he completely ignored Goons, focusing on Cities instead, allowing me to absolutely pummel him, eventually acquiring 112 points.  I'm not saying I'm the best Dominion player, but I should at least get an opponent who would give me some sort of contest.

That said, anyone on here who's interested in a recorded game, PM me, and we'll set up a time.

[ftl]

the 0-10000 point rating scale is too large (no other game or sport uses a rating system of anything remotely like that interval).

OK, so I agree with your other points, but what does the scale matter? I mean, would it be a better rating system if it only displayed the first three digits of that number making it a "0-100" rating scale instead? I bet internally it's always a floating-point number anyway, it's not like isotropic is storing them as integers!

[Beyond Awesome]

the 0-10000 point rating scale is too large (no other game or sport uses a rating system of anything remotely like that interval).

OK, so I agree with your other points, but what does the scale matter? I mean, would it be a better rating system if it only displayed the first three digits of that number making it a "0-100" rating scale instead? I bet internally it's always a floating-point number anyway, it's not like isotropic is storing them as integers!

Yah. I don't think the scale truly matters that much. But, the wild fluctuations in rating and then followed up by inability to gain almost any points after playing 500+ games becomes frustrating. Oh well.