Waitlist manager needs to track AFK pilots

[Josh Cox 0]

So firstly I'd like to say that I do understand and agree that the waitlist manager makes joining fleets more fair as it enforces as first-come first-serve system.

However, what I don't agree with is the fact that it is enabling people to essentially not be ready to play the game and this makes in unfair for people who are patiently sitting at their computers intending to play the game " right now" (but perhaps browsing the web or watching YouTube or something off to the side to kill a little time, but still at the computer). The common counter-argument to this is that if someone is AFK the next person on the list gets the invite and while true, I think it's unfair that somebody who's been AFK almost the entire time gets into fleet while the guy after them that's been waiting nearly as long at his computer the entire time has to wait an extra 15 min to 30 min (up to even an hour on particularly bad days), depending on the time of day, how busy fleet it, and how often people are leaving fleet.

For example, one of my first exceptionally long waits I ended up going out for lunch with my wife and doing some shopping (because I anticipated a long wait), and the gong sounded as I was getting out of my car in the driveway when I got back home. Contrast this a recent experience where I was at my computer for almost 3 hours waiting to get into a fleet because I first signed up the longest guy there had only been there just over an hour. At-keyboard-for-3-hours me thinks it's completely unacceptable that AFK-me gets priority because AFK-me never intended to play the game when I first jumped on the waitlist and it's my opinion that when you start playing Eve (or anything other game really), you should be there to play right now, not 3 hours from now.

To this end, I propose that a captcha, relatively simply math problem presented in picture form, or some other system that's not easily gamed by bots to check for AFK pilots every 10 min (give or take) and, if failing to complete the problem with a couple minutes, AFK pilots be cycled to the bottom of their respective queues. This would still maintain the first-come, first-serve principle but would also encourage people who are ready to fly right away to stick around and discourage people who are taking advantage of the system by queuing up when they're not really ready to play.

TL;DR: Rewarding an AFK play style is just as bad as only picking people with the shiniest fits, let's fix this.

[Lorthans 0]

Personally, I'm against it. The whole point of the waitlist is that people can do other stuff while they wait. It's not a bug, it's a feature.

 

[Josh Cox 0]

17 minutes ago, Lorthans said:

Personally, I'm against it. The whole point of the waitlist is that people can do other stuff while they wait. It's not a bug, it's a feature.

 

I thought the point of the waitlist was to create a first-come, first-serve system, not add yet another AFK playstyle.

[Foshkey 49]

I'm happy to get some insight from those who use the waitlist regularly.

I think I can help out here just giving some insight from an FC point of view. Fleet invites already have a 60-second expiration timer. If that timer expires, I move on to the next guy and the AFKer gets a tick next to his name. I'll invite again next time I need to recruit more people. After 3 ticks, I remove them from the waitlist.

That's just what I do. Official guidline with the FCs (which I'm still in line with) is "If a pilot fails to accept an invite move down the WL and keep inviting after 15 minutes or 2 sites where spots open up, whatever is longer, you can remove the pilot from the waitlist."

This doesn't necessarily directly counteract your point here, but it's how we combat AFKers at the time of the invite. We don't have anything for those simply waiting on the waitlist.

Opinion-wise, I don't think we should enforce anything in regards of what people are doing while on the waitlist. As far as FCs are concerned, we only want you there when we send an invite your way. Sure, I agree that AFK-you is probably being unjustly rewarded and unfair to those who have been actively at their machines, but the basis of this waitlist is in our rule of first come first serve, not necessarily serving those who are active.

[Josh Cox 0]

I appreciate the response from the perspective of an FC, Foshkey.

I do agree with the basis of the waitlist as you've stated, although I think adhereing to the strict first-come, first-serve system is detrimental to the community. Having spent a half-decent amount of time in the WTM public channel (both while waiting and while doing other activities and just chiming in now and then), I don't recall nearly as many complaints in the X-up days from people not being quick enough when the lines were posted or about wait times versus seeing complaints almost every time I'm in the public channel for more than 20 min about the waitlist as it's set up now.

From what I understand, the waitlist was created for people that were consistently too slow to X-up under the old system. These people are active players, as they were trying (and failing) to X-up in time. Adding some sort of anti-AFK behaviour to the waitlist would do nothing to hurt the people too slow to X-up (and we've all probably been there, I know I have a few times) while deterring people from taking advantage of the waitlist system, people who would have other not flown with the fleet until a few hours after the joined the waitlist anyways because they wouldn't be able to X-up until then under the old system.

Since I see that you feel the same way I do about the whole fairness aspect of it, perhaps other FC's do as well and maybe it's something you could bring up to WTM leadership since I'm not really in a position to do so.

Edited May 23, 2016 by Josh Cox

[Foshkey 49]

You have a well-structured argument. I'll see what I can do if other Commanders and the Council aren't already taking notice of this post.

And to add to your point, the waitlist manager was mainly created as a tool for FCs managing the fleet. Already, we're seeing the benefits of the tool, from easier management to more efficient run times because of it. For that reason alone, I don't think it's going away at all, but we absolutely do welcome feedback.

Edited May 23, 2016 by Foshkey

[Henri Marteau 0]

I don't think at all you should limit what people are able to do while they spend time on the waitlist. I don't think it's more fair to change it that way, just more beneficial to people actually sitting in front of Eve/their computer. In my eyes, putting that above spending the wait time with something else is not fairness. Don't get me wrong, I saw the waitlist today for example and know it can suck, but just because you're in the group of people that chooses to spend their waiting time looking at the screen doesn't mean at all you should punish people not doing so. Because that's what it is, and the current system is not rewarding an afk spending of the time, but simply doesn't punish it. You want afk people punished and not afk people indirectly rewarded.

[Skyler Scar 27]

I can understand the concern here and I see the issue from both sides. Believe me, doing fleet comp with pilots who are afk can be a bit annoying. However, this WL was designed to allow just that. The "old" line system rewarded those actively sitting at their PC because they X'd up first under a line. Others might sit and wait for hours on hours waiting to be able to "hit enter first" while someone else was on for 5 mins and got in first. This WL system was designed to alleviate this problem by providing a true first come first serve system. We are currently in the process of standardizing the WL for purposes of training our Training FCs. We are aware of these issues and are working on solutions to this aspect of the WL that you are describing. On behalf of the council I would like to thank you for your patience as we work out all the kinks with the system.

[Lorthans 0]

Disclaimer: I might have no idea what I'm talking about. That said:

I think this whole issue (people being AFK on waitlists) is a symptom, not a root cause. The actual issue is that, for whatever reasons, the wait times can get really long. If the wait was 20 minutes, people would be less likely to go AFK while waiting, and if some did, it wouldn't be a big deal. Because it's much more likely to be three hours, though, almost everyone is going to do something else, and that something else might well not even be in the game, let alone on the same character they've queued with.

Which means this kinda resolves to a known problem: We have (a lot) more people who want to fly in fleet than there is room for. 

[Skyler Scar 27]

1 hour ago, Lorthans said:

We have (a lot) more people who want to fly in fleet than there is room for. 

Yes this WL manager has allowed us to really see how many people actually want to fly and allows us to start 2nd fleets (VG, AS, HQ) more often than we could before we had this tool.

[jdread 2]

I thought all fc's did the 3 missed invites and your kicked thing. Anyways, maybe it should be 1 missed invite nothing happens, 2 missed invites and your sent to the bottom of the queue and 3 missed invites gets you kicked from the list

[Josh Cox 0]

Thanks for discussion folks. I'd just like to iterate again that I do support the waitlist and I'm glad it's helping fleet comp and what not, I just think it needs to be tweaked.

To cover a couple similar arguments, the waitlist does provide a first-come first-serve basis, but the reality of how I think it's being used by a lot of people (myself) is that it's being used as a "first to come and put my name on a list" rather than a "first to come ready to fly basis". The only thing that was really unfair about the old X-up method was that someone consistently fast could get into fleet after 20 min whereas someone consistently slow would be waiting forever, and we still had rules such as "don't X-up until you're at most 3 jumps out", which, to me, implied wanting active participants rather than those X-ing-up for later. And with the old method, if you were significantly far out you got put in AFK squad until someone dropped and there was space for you at best, or just flat out told not to try until you were at the focus (which was done most of the time IIRC). I'd like to see a similar emphasis put on active participants with this new waitlist manager.

[Paledan 1]

Every system can, and will, be gamed.

I'd much rather people took advantage of the existing WL system e.g. enter the WL when they're not ready because they know they'll need over an hour to be in position, meanwhile hauling their stuff to the incursion system, than have the ADHD clickfest where the first person who types an x that the FC can click on (so not automatically the first to x up, if the chat window scrolls up fast enough) gets an invite.

As Skyler Scar wrote, that also allows for forming other fleets because we know exactly who is waiting with what ships. I once spent a couple of hours doing Vanguards, which wasn't as good ISK as doing HQs but beat waiting for the gong for two hours, so even though there were people who'd rather not join the VG fleet and wait for a spot in HQ, I thought that was nice.

[Izumi Uchiya MD 214]

One benefit of the manager is not having to stare at WTM Local waiting for a line. When I flew a sniper boat, I left my fit pasted and ready to X whenever the line came up. I hardly talked in there, just in case I missed the chance to X first. You would get 20 people Xing up in every possible ship type when the FC asked for a single thing. This contributed to fatigue and burnout on both fleet member and FC sides. I spent multiple hours getting poached when slots opened up, because somebody was faster to hit enter than me. The WL manager is intended to prevent this frankly awful experience.

In the new system, I can X-up, then hop on Netflix or do some work until my place is ready. With proper use, pilots not ready to go when their number is called get bumped in favor of those who are ready to go. It is true that this has the side effect of longer lines, as people do not need to suffer the grind of being first to X under the line. Good news on that front, as others have said, is we run more fleets now than ever before, thanks to more numbers. I consider the current iteration already a success, but be assured the FC core is happy to make adjustments as good ideas come in. (a repeating 10 minute captcha sounds like an awful grind to me)

Edit: almost missed this: " Rewarding an AFK play style is just as bad as only picking people with the shiniest fits, let's fix this. "  I strongly disagree with the equality suggested here. There is no reward given for being AFK vs waiting to be ready; indeed, if you leave for too long you get dumped.

Edited June 5, 2016 by Izumi Uchiya