Lol, I'll admit discrimination isn't exactly the word I was looking for. But anyone who knows what discrimination means gets what I mean.

You're great value, Portgleep - love it!

Perhaps I need to create a "poor people assistance" squad, which will appear at the doors of "poor people" and help them cheat more effectively.

I'll get right on it.

Terry, I really don't think that portgleep meant to say that FT was discriminatory.

I believe he was still responding to Anton, and trying to say that onerous time penalties would hurt people who are slow, but not because they Google... just because they have real-life issues that make them slow.

Okay, so we all must have the same computer speed, server speed, instant recall ability, click-speed etc. And at the end of the game, we are all tied with the same score. Yippee!

You can't please everyone all the time. Not every game is going to be 100% 'fair' to everyone, nor should every game be... they'd get awfully monotonous if the structure and rules were the same for every game on site. Some games have huge time penalties, others have none. Some games require a lot of typing, some more scrolling. Find the ones that work for you and your situation and play them. That doesn't mean don't try the other ones, but just realize it's not likely that you're going to win all of them. Most people are NOT going to win every badge on the site, ever. Or at least definitely not in the first couple of years they're a member. Maybe this time next year you'll have a faster computer/internet connection and can make a real play for some of the speed badges. Or maybe you'll have developed carpal tunnel and will be slower, who knows! Just have fun! There's definitely something on the site for everyone.

What I have never understood is how some people believe they have a "right" to win every game on FunTrivia, and that if it's not possible for them to come 1st in something that something must be broken.

Like life, there are some things on FunTrivia that you will never have any chance of winning. It's all about playing to your strengths, avoiding your weaknesses. Me personally? I probably couldn't win most of our games. I just don't play much trivia nor do I retain much. That's life.

The central design goal is that knowledge should beat googling in ANY game. If you have the knowledge, you shouldn't be beatable by someone with less knowledge who is googling. Perhaps that's a little slimmer in some games than others, but this is our goal.

If you are not winning and don't know the knowledge, then you have no right to complain about not winning.

Hooray!


See, my plan is to write enough questions where I don't need to memorize other peoples'. One day, all of the questions in the hourlies will be mine and no one will stop me! BWA HA HA!

There are games (and badges/badgelets) that I 'know' I will never get, but every so often, I get one I would never really want to be no. 1, even though that is what I am trying to be

Let's face it, everyone comes here to FT for different reasons. Some come to learn a little each day by taking a quiz or two. Some come to play FT games like they are a type of arcade game. Others come for a mixture of both. That's me. I enjoy adding to my knowledge, but I enjoy the competition against others, some who are half my age, in the hourly games. I applaud the many who can complete PoC in under 14 seconds. That's my rare best. I play WtS topics that I know well and disregard topics like TV that hold no interest for me.
If I can beat one of the best in a certain game, I take that as a victory. But I accept my many 11th place finishes as par for the course. I look for any edge I can to stay close to the leaders, but I don't expect to win every game. I may google, or refer to an info card that I wrote to help me remember some fact or spelling demon or whatever. For me to compete against the photographic brains on FT takes a bit of strategy. This is not steroids, it's strategy to compete in the GAMES. That's what they are. If you just want to learn things, stay with the quizzes. Otherwise, bring your best to the games.

Hmmmmmmmmm. Steroids. Now there is an avenue I have not yet explored! Watch out!

I am editing this from what I said earlier.

Daryl, you, me and Alex have competed very hard in the past against each other in FMI. I never have recalled it EVER being about methodology. It was always about making the fewest mistakes and typing as accurate and as fast as we could...and beating the robots!

...and getting rid of those devil Phantom and Les Mis questions! Ugh! lol

Exactly. I'm not disputing your stance. I'm saying 'do what you have to do' to compete. But NO steroids!

Criss-cross there. I edited while you were responding. I didn't real it all in full Daryl. My bad. I had to be there for my fam.

I am ALL about the flaxseed oil though! lol

"Flaxseed oil--it makes the cranium big!"

That should be right up there with the "Milk--It does the body good" ads! HA!

lol at Kyle.. there's the spirit!

Sigh on the rest. I'm never going to win certain games, because I'm slow. Not slow as in stupid, just a slow reader and a terrible decision maker lol. I don't blame the games, or their setup, or my arthritis or my internet connection. I don't think it's "unfair" that many people are more skilled than I am at whatever it takes to get the job done. If I don't win something it's entirely MY fault. I'm not a good "googler" either, and if anyone is using wiki lately, they are crazy since with the new "ads" asking for financial support, the site takes about an extra 45 seconds to fully load!

I've played competitive soccer for 15 years now. I've scored one goal (as a goalie) 12 as a sweeper and 15 as a midfielder. Not bad for an old f-art, but does that mean I think I have the "right" to go to the Olympics and win gold? Get real lol.

I'm just here for the fun, am happy (and continually surprised) to get whatever badges come along. And because I'm here for the fun, am getting really really tired of people who can't find anything better to do than complain about minor details and who can't seem to appreciate what a great "gift" we have been given here.

Thankfully 98% of the folks here are not in that category (even though it may SEEM like more since the squeaky wheel is usually the loudest lol). Perhaps the people who ARE perfectly happy with the site should speak up more in public and the people who have "gripes" with certain others could conduct their "differences of opinion" in PM's.

Apologies, as usual, for going on so long that nobody reads it lol

I sure hope you're not talking about me. Cause I completely agree with almost everything people have said. I don't complain about the games being to hard or whatever either. I have no chance of beating so many of the FTs - especially because of my age. Just saying that I think we should try to stop Googling as much as possible, for a few reasons including that only some have the privilege of being able to Google.

I'm testing an interesting cheat-prevent modification...

What are the top 5 games where googling is an issue, in your opinions?

Obviously not Piece-of-Cake - the questions are quite easy there, so that game is more about speed than needing to look up answers.

Definitely word wizard, because its so easy to look up.

Terry, your encyclopedia block works fine

One step of many to come.

It may be working TOO well at the moment. I have played nothing whatsoever in the last 7 hours due to sleep and see only blank pages.

As to your question which games need protection the most, here's my list:

Word Wizard, Smartest, Expert, Piece of Cake, Who am I, Hourly Mixed, New Question should all have full protection - whatever you can think of.

Daily, World Quiz, Pot of Gold, Fill Me In, Knockout, Global Challenge, Gold Madness, Mind Melt - all of these seem to be working well and complaint-free with the current "controlled by time penalty" setup. Maybe increase the time penalty on Knockout to 2/sec and revise the penalty structure a bit on the GC to better cope with its scoring model based on 100s, but all of these could IMO remain under the existing rules.

Obscurity, Team Heroes, Team v Team - should be explicitly allowing/encouraging research. In Obscurity, we have the researcher badge and in the team games, encouraging people to play well for their team should be key.

As to your question which games need protection the most, here's my list:

Word Wizard, Smartest, Expert, Piece of Cake, Who am I, Hourly Mixed, New Question should all have full protection - whatever you can think of.

Daily, World Quiz, Pot of Gold, Fill Me In, Knockout, Global Challenge, Gold Madness, Mind Melt - all of these seem to be working well and complaint-free with the current "controlled by time penalty" setup. Maybe increase the time penalty on Knockout to 2/sec and revise the penalty structure a bit on the GC to better cope with its scoring model based on 100s, but all of these could IMO remain under the existing rules.

Obscurity, Team Heroes, Team v Team - should be explicitly allowing/encouraging research. In Obscurity, we have the researcher badge and in the team games, encouraging people to play well for their team should be key.

[/quote]

One problem with that is most of the games have a team element now, it's not just TvT and Heroes anymore.

And while I have everyone's attention: Could we have an official, sticky "Propose a challenge" thread? As it is right now, we often see new badge ideas taking over a thread or a good idea stuck on page 7 of something else.

I'd volunteer to moderate / maintain such a thread if it were created.

cubs, I know that. However, there is a severe difference between the two games actually labeled "team" and the rest of the bunch and that is that for the two "team" games, there is no individual competition. There are only the achievement badges and the ones based on team points. The incentive to play well on these games solely comes from helping your team.

On the other games, the team points are a side effect of individual play. These games are not so much decided by a joint team effort, but by the number of individual players in the top ranks. The team score is a nice side statistic, but at the end of the next month, it is forgotten.

So I would say there is still quite a difference and that should be reflected in the rules - the two team games are about participating and giving your best for a common cause, the individual games with a team score are just that and when you win those, it's usually "yay, I won", not "Whee, I just scored a 200 for the team".

Wes

As far as I'm concerned, and I don't think I'm alone, I only play some of the hourlies for the sake of the points my team gets... and I usually go on playing them until I've got a score that I think will get reasonable points for the team, not 200 necessarily but as good as I can manage, given that I'm not a fast player. If I get a good score in the first game I play that's good enough and I don't play any more during the day but if I don't, then I go on playing.

I am getting fed up, again, with the constant paranoia that assumes that people with slow times must be googling and calls for the imposition of yet more penalties based on time. Sure, it's fine to block the encyclopaedia - the idea that using Google presents you with the answer provided on the same site that's setting the question is a bit odd, lol - but please, can't we just get off the "they must be googling" bandwagon? There are clearly a lot of people with slow times who don't google, and some with fast times who do, so lumping all slow players into the same pot won't solve the problem. Assuming it is a problem in the first place. And making things so bad for slow players that they can't ever win will simply drive people away.

Some people are so desperate to win the same games time and time again that they want to introduce every penalty and preventative device they can think of; I don't think that makes them any better than people who google.

On the subject of the new badges, particularly the Legendary Champion, whilst it is open to non-GMs I fear it is all but out of reach. I already have the 7 required monthly badges, but I am only at level 105. The 20 more levels required would take many years to complete now. Points bonuses get further apart at higher levels and I seem to average about 1 million points per year. The remaining badges (including the elusive duck and editor's picks) would require authoring many quizzes, volunteering and leaving my team and becoming a leader, many of which I don't have the time nor the inclination to pursue. Someone with better actuarial skills than mine could probably tell me if I would ever achieve it in my lifetime.

Likewise the Challenge Crusher (and its big brother) is open to non-GMs, but as most mini challenges are GM only it isn't possible to attain.

I applaud Terry's work and continued innovation with new badges and challenges, but having a "carrot on a stick" that is unobtainable is a bit demoralising.

May I suggest that they are made GM only and then they are not taunting the non-GMs.
(Of course any lapsed GM with a cache of badges could attain these).

Mark

Me too. I'd especially hate to see increased time penalties on Knockout where I quite often lose on day one despite getting all questions correct, but in 100+ seconds (without using Google, I might add). It's one of the few games I play on a regular basis any longer.

Sometimes it's just plain, ol', crippling indecisiveness. :p

(Repost:) Terry, it seems your Encyclopedia block works too well. I can't view it (all topic pages come up entirely blank) even while not playing any games or quizzes. Shouldn't a submit reset the block?