Multiplayer Quitting in VI

[VainApocalypse]

One of the biggest problems with multiplayer in V (apart from connectivity issues, crashes, exploits, UI) has been how difficult it is to keep people in the game. Usually someone quits because of a bad start. Then someone quits after missing The Great Library. Then someone quits after the first war. By turn 40, it's just you and the host.

Do you think (or hope) that VI does something to curtail this behavior? It might take a more holistic multiplayer experience, complete with rankings and rewards that may be forfeit for leavers. It might even take preventing leavers from rejoining a game for a couple hours after quitting. These incentives work in MOBAs, so they should work to some extent here.

Given that we haven't heard much about the multiplayer, they might be going this route -- or they might not. What do you think?

 

[stealth_nsk]

I don't think we'll see something like this on release. Putting priorities based on how people play the game, Civilization is generally single-player game. The second priority is MP with friends where it's important to keep game stable, but quitting isn't a problem at all. Competitive multiplayer is the least priority game mode for Civilization.

Maybe we could expect some rankings, etc. later.

 

[stiiknafuulia]

Their silence about multiplayer is very worrying, imo. The only things we know about it is that it exists, and that there are some sort of shorter game-modes included (correct me if I'm wrong and have missed a great multiplayer-reveal). Given this, I doubt there's any special features like this included at release. We can only hope for patches later on; and ofc custom, player-made 'No Quitters' groups (as exist in Civ V).

 

[Acken]

Well they are silent on a lot of things which is indeed worrisome at this stage.

 

[CivCube]

They quit because the time sink is too much even on quick speed.

 

[VainApocalypse]

They quit because the time sink is too much even on quick speed.

That's part of the issue, but there's also the fact that there's no barrier to reentering a better game. Why play 7 hours in a game that you know you'll lose if you can jump ship at 40 minutes and start over in a game that you might win?

In general, I think Civ players are moderately tolerant of long play times, but they're not tolerant of wasting time on a bad experiences.

 

[VainApocalypse]

I don't think we'll see something like this on release. Putting priorities based on how people play the game, Civilization is generally single-player game. The second priority is MP with friends where it's important to keep game stable, but quitting isn't a problem at all. Competitive multiplayer is the least priority game mode for Civilization.

Maybe we could expect some rankings, etc. later.

I suspect you're right. That said, something as simple as a time-out penalty for leaving a game would be easy to implement and would dramatically cut down on people who just serially join games looking for great starts.

 

[ProMeTheus112]

I'm bit worried about the silence too, about this, mid/end game, etc. Haven't seen a proper game being played with more towns, even if just as some example screenshots or something. Hoping the game will be complete when it comes out, and well polished.

 

[skyclad]

I suspect you're right. That said, something as simple as a time-out penalty for leaving a game would be easy to implement and would dramatically cut down on people who just serially join games looking for great starts.

Agreed it seems like a nice compromise. I feel for you guys trying to play random civ games! Must be hard to get a good experience for a whole game.

 

[stealth_nsk]

I'm bit worried about the silence too, about this, mid/end game, etc. Haven't seen a proper game being played with more towns, even if just as some example screenshots or something. Hoping the game will be complete when it comes out, and well polished.

Preparing a demo version to show is a significant piece of work, especially if some information needs to be hidden. It looks like Civ developers try not to spend resources on making it. The only full preview version was from June and the versions shown by devs were quite unprepared - see the famous leak. So that's understandable.

What I don't understand is why in 1 month before release developers still didn't shown 4 civs (and presumably 1 additional leader) and didn't just make press preview version. If it would be about press version not ready that would explain the second part, but not first. It looks like civilization reveals follow marketing plan made months ago, so it's not about game being ready.

 

[Atlas627]

The issue arises from Civ being a game about snowball. Because the only victory condition is a check to see who is winning at the end of the game, the only point of winning at any other time is if it helps you win at the end of the game. This means snowballing, which means that if you aren't close to winning you stand no chance of catching up.

Change the way victory is calculated to care about various moments in the game, and you can add in catchup mechanics without completely removing all incentive to be winning earlier in the game.

I already have a mod in mind to do this for Civ6 when it is released. If anyone wants to help brainstorm ideas, I have a thread over in the Mod subforum called "Stand the Test of Time". Come on over!

 

[stealth_nsk]

The issue arises from Civ being a game about snowball. Because the only victory condition is a check to see who is winning at the end of the game, the only point of winning at any other time is if it helps you win at the end of the game. This means snowballing, which means that if you aren't close to winning you stand no chance of catching up.

Overall yes, that's correct, but:

1. There are still some possibilities to win/loose even if you're somehow behind.

2. Some degree of snowballing is normal for a single-player game like Civ. Improving multiplayer at the cost of single-player experience would be bad.

 

[anandus]

I don't think we'll see something like this on release. Putting priorities based on how people play the game, Civilization is generally single-player game. The second priority is MP with friends where it's important to keep game stable, but quitting isn't a problem at all. Competitive multiplayer is the least priority game mode for Civilization.

Maybe we could expect some rankings, etc. later.

Although I suspect the game indeed probably is more played as a singleplayer game than a multiplayer game, I wonder with the ratio is. Is it 25% of the hours played multiplay and 75% singleplayer or is it more 50/50?
Personally I only know multiplayer players (my friends, etc.), but when you look at the forum it tends to lean more to singleplayer players.
The (expected) ratio should guide the amount of resources devoted to each game-style. If it's only 25% multiplayer games, then it's fair to devote more resources to singleplayer, but if it's more like 50/50, or a majority of multiplayer games, then more effort should be put in the multiplayer side of the game.
(Of course 90+ percent of the resources go to commong ground, but I mean singleplayer-only (eg leaderheads) of multiplayer-only (eg lobby) aspects of the game).

 

[ProMeTheus112]

I would guess it's >90% single player games played?

 

[stealth_nsk]

The (expected) ratio should guide the amount of resources devoted to each game-style.

There could be a lot of variables. For example, if developers feel they don't have resources to make all modes finished, it's better to put maximum efforts to most popular mode to have it finished by release and implement the rest of the modes in patches. In Civ3 "Play the World" was even an expansion.

 

[Atlas627]

Overall yes, that's correct, but:

1. There are still some possibilities to win/loose even if you're somehow behind.

2. Some degree of snowballing is normal for a single-player game like Civ. Improving multiplayer at the cost of single-player experience would be bad.

Regarding point 1: of course. The opponent can make mistakes you don't make, and there may be game mechanics that unlock that you are in a better position to use by being ahead in some other category.

Regarding point 2: It would not be at the cost of the single player experience. How many people finish games that they have no chance of winning, even in single player? How many players quit games when they know they have snowballed far enough that the AI has no chance?

It is an improvement overall.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Regarding point 1: of course. The opponent can make mistakes you don't make, and there may be game mechanics that unlock that you are in a better position to use by being ahead in some other category.

I'm speaking about a bit different thing. Civilization is not a race with only 1 dimension. You have science, culture, territory, military, religion, trade, wonders and so on. If you're behind in all those parameters, that's really bad, but usually different players are better in different areas.

Regarding point 2: It would not be at the cost of the single player experience. How many people finish games that they have no chance of winning, even in single player? How many players quit games when they know they have snowballed far enough that the AI has no chance?

Zero snowballing effect means no actions before the last turn matter. So, some reasonable degree of snowballing is needed, so the better you perform at the beginning, the easier ending should be for you.

 

[Tabarnak]

I would guess it's >90% single player games played?

It's approximatively 15% MP and 85% SP but the MP community is more ''dynamic''(team speak, NQ group with large field of players) there is more activity ''per player'' than SP(average of hours played is probably higher and streaming is much popular among MP games).

It's certainly not insignifiant and all good MP games should at least have a good mp support imho.

 

[Atlas627]

I'm speaking about a bit different thing. Civilization is not a race with only 1 dimension. You have science, culture, territory, military, religion, trade, wonders and so on. If you're behind in all those parameters, that's really bad, but usually different players are better in different areas.

That's what I said as well. "by being ahead in some other category" is literally what you're describing.

Zero snowballing effect means no actions before the last turn matter. So, some reasonable degree of snowballing is needed, so the better you perform at the beginning, the easier ending should be for you.

1) I never said remove 100% of snowballing. I said create some catchup. Together, there is ebb and flow.

2) If winning early is worth victory points of some sort, then it has value without HAVING to translate into winning late. You're still thinking in terms of only checking who is winning at the end of the game. If you only check who is winning at the end, then yes you NEED snowballing or there is no reason to be winning at any other point. That is literally what I said.

 

[Ryika]

I highly doubt there's a reasonable way to make public "Full play-through"-multiplayer with random people work. There's no penalty you can invent that makes people sit through another hour of a game that is already lost anyway, have them click the end turn button as a force that has no real influence on anything anymore... except for maybe locking them out of multiplayer for days, which is ridiculous in itself.

I'd much rather have them make sure the new, shorter gamemode is fun for public multiplayer with randoms and leave full play-through-mode for organized groups.