Because even if I have you on block, you can still be included in a tournament where the criteria is to invite the top 50 players in a game type. Although you might be blocked, it doesn't mean that you should be excluded from the top 50 of a game type, objectively, that is....

emmett:
but the fault lies in the system where you can invite me to a tournament and i dont have the right to reply when i want to refuse

I see. But an invitation doesn't have to be refused. It only has, at worst, to be ignored.

I couldn't resist making a list of how many active users there are as percentage of the registered users, broken down by language.

         Danish: 77.78%
        Finnish: 53.85%
      Norwegian: 53.33%
      Bulgarian: 37.50%
         German: 19.12%
         Slovak: 17.28%
      Esperanto: 16.67%
        Swedish: 15.03%
         French: 11.64%
          Dutch: 11.04%
          Czech: 10.36%
        Russian:  9.68%
        Italian:  9.66%
        English:  9.34%
        Spanish:  8.19%
       Estonian:  6.73%
     Portuguese:  5.87%
        Chinese:  4.23%
       Romanian:  3.98%
        Turkish:  3.26%
          Total:  8.62%

AbigailII: What is your definition of "active" user - played in the last X days? - where X is what? (just out of curiosity)

coan.net: Last 7 days, as is shown by default on the new languages page.

AbigailII: Oh, OK. I don't see that page since I use my own .css file. I thought it might have been something by going through the players list page or something.

Fencer: Instead of making new links on the main pages (which I hide by default) - why not put pages like that in Statistics or somewhere that it will (1) be out of the way and (2) be able to find to look at without having to change the type of page a person has.

coan.net: Actually ignore my some-what request below - found a link under "Information" - "Languages".

... I'm still not use to the list being re-organized yet.

AbigailII: I guess I should learn Danish and make it the main BrainKing language platform.

AbigailII: Could someone please explain to a laymen what exactly these statistics show? Its kind of confusing to me, thanks!

Family Man: It says that 9.34% of the registered users that use English as their default language where active in the last 7 days. And 11.64% of the user that use French as their default language, etc.

AbigailII: Okay, thanks, thats kind of what i thought.

It seems at first glance to tell us something more than it really does. For example, Fencers comment about making this a Danish language site (I now he was only jesting) because at first glance it seems like these statistics show a lot of Danish speaking users. But in reality, if there are only 4 dutch speakers registered ever, and 3 of them have logged on in the past 7 days, then you will get a 75% statistic in your calculations.

So it is likely that a language with many many registered users, English, will have a better chance at a lower percentage than one with only a few registered users, correct?

So if you have 10000 registered English speakers, and 1000 of them have logged on in the past week, you will have a 10% calculation for English, and using the example above, you can have 3 users log on for a 75% calculation, so these stats dont really tell us anything about the most common language or anything that would cause fencer to switch the main language of this site, or anything like that!

I have noticed that on a persons profile it shows a link to other names they have had on this site. But it doesnt seem to be there for everyone. Is this something that only tracks name changes since this was implemented or how exactly does this feature work?

Thursday, April 26th was the day that Fencer decided to list former user names on Profile pages. Any changes before that date were not listed.

emmett: Thanks, I missed that one!

Fencer:

[Quote mode]:

Regarding the third party banner ads which occasionally appear on BrainKing, it seems that the problem of bad advertising partners is more important than it seemed to be. In order to protect the BrainKing users from any possible threats of this kind, I have made the final decision to remove all advertisements which are not under our full control from all BrainKing pages tomorrow, instead of the end of this month. It really makes no sense to keep them, since they bring much more disadvantages than advantages (if any).

[/Quote mode]

Nice one, Fencer! This will be good for the site, annoying ads (pop up type or something like that) can sometimes scare people away instead of keep them at BK and read the ad.

AbigailII: hey???
im Welsh and i know a few more very active players here are Welsh too??
we dont speak Welsh but are from Wales so where do we figure in the list?

Tulip: what language do you use the site in? That's your answer
Or you can always translate the site to welsh if you want to be on a group of your own

I hope you can understand what i mean by this.
As you may of noticed i have timed out on alot of games due to working away from home.
The point is a lot of games or multi-games started then that have not timed out, but because of the time outs, i am now playing a lot of the top players in Ataxx, Assimilation etc..... having a high BKR when we started, but now mine is down in the hundreds.
I feel bad about timing out but could not help it as i had to work, but i feel worse for the players i am playing.
Basically, the games as when they were started what ever the outcome, the effect would have been 0-50 BKR, but now because of timeouts if i win i take up to 200 BKR of the top players, which thinking about it is not right or very fair.
Maybe if the system could take the ratings as from the game start but then changes in BKR would take a while from other games finished unless they could be frozen for each game. The only other idea i could think of was that timed out games would not effect BKR ratings at all.
I am just trying to think of idea to stop the top players losing a lot of there hard earned BKR.
Suppose i could resign all started games

pauloaguia: i wouldnt understand a Welsh board,i speak English

I am sure this has been discussed before... but i was under the impression that an auto pass feature would only make a move in a game ( I am thinking about backgammon) when there are no rolls of the dice that could create any moves???? It makes no sense the way it currently is implemented, to me.

Family Man: If the sense of autopass is to speed up the game by allowing it to go on without having to wait for the opponent to make stupid "I pass" clicks, then it makes perfect sense that autopass is triggered when the dices you are going to roll don't give you any move.
Actually it would also make sense that "autopass" is triggered when you have only one legal move, since you will end up making this move anyway. This is what some people called "autoplay", and I have yet to understand why it was not implemented along with autopass.

nabla: I dont like the idea of my dice being rolled straight away after my opponents turn, although I guess it doesnt really matter.

My question is this always the case, the dice being rolled immediately after a turn is played by the other player? So, for example, I can make a move and stay here and see my opponents next roll already made?

Family Man: no, the dice are rolled when you click on your game or click on roll dice in multi-point games

Vikings: Except in auto pass games, thats why i dont like the idea of it much, except where no roll can create a legal move.

Family Man: I understand. But maybe this come from the illusion of having real dices rolling when one clicks "roll dices". I like to see the pseudo-random dice generator as if every roll on Brainking had already been rolled before Brainking even existed, but nobody can know what they are until they are disclosed in a game. But that is kind of an abstract difference anyway.

Family Man: as i undeerstand it, the version of autopass that is implemented here only passes the move automatically when there is no possible roll of the dice which will give a legal move

the dice dont have to rolled to determine this

as i understand, the dice on brainking are rolled when the player who is about to make the move goes to the game page/board (so its not rolled straight after the opponent made the move)

i think fencer posted something like that before .. most sites use prerolled dice (or even have a whole series of rolls rolled in advance already) .. but brainking rolls the dice when the person who is about to move opens the gameboard

(personally i dont think it makes any difference though as long as the random generator is ok)

Hrqls: No, he is right. I got some games sent back to me when my opponent didn't have the right dices to enter the game, although I did not have a full board.
But I agree with you that it makes no difference :-)

nabla: i stand corrected

this move was an autopass for me

i could have easily rolled some dice to escape ... but brainking already knew i would roll 6+5 and therefore made the autopass for me

it seems that the dice are rolled before i view the board (i guess they are rolled after my opponent made her move ?)

personally i like this as it leads to more autopasses than would be the case when the game would only autopass with a filled board

Autopass seems to be the greatest invention ever. I'd like to not only offer a draw, but as well to offer a lost in gammon, but not elementary, out of 100 games LOL

Can anyone tell me what that little thing is flashing on my main page next to 'paid membership'

oldhamgirl: Click it!

well thank you, why didnt I think of doing that lol
Thanks

oldhamgirl: It's the auction of the R&D laptop, along with A BLACK ROOK MEMBERSHIP!!

joshi tm: thanks I saw it now, not for me though :)
Thanks

oldhamgirl:  You must not have been online the month of April. that thing flashed daily

lol well I had seen it before but ignored it :)

 oldhamgirl:  Oh too bad ( it was explained in the daily blog that appears at the top of your main page) You might have gotten a deal on membership. Fencer was giving away lots of specials in April. Every time the bulb showed up you could renew your membership and get a few 3 months, 6 months or year! Lots of folks took advantage of that one!   Two years for the price of one is a great deal.

About Fencer's laptop (it would be a very interisting buy, BTW), I wonder... should it have Internet Explore installed? Eheheheh... what are your bets, people?

ROSE: Looked like I missed out on that then as I did see something flashing against my name once but just ignored it, ah well, never mind

Fencer: What would you say you would like this extension to do.
Presumably run on the status-bar, obviously it will log itself into a person account once set with the relevant details.
It will display number of games / ponds waiting, time till next game times out & any invites waiting.
Anything else to start with? maybe messages in box ?
I guess once logged in it can display anything hmmmmm
I will give it a go, i downloaded the Firefox extension stuff and tried months ago when hexkid was still here. Give me something to pass my time

Thanks Fencer for the setting to turn of fellowship invitations. While that code is still fresh in your memory, could you also add a "don't invite me for tournaments" setting? ;-)

AbigailII: Is there anything you want to be invited to?

Fencer: Well, a candlelight dinner in a good restaurant, or the opera would be considered.

But as for things here, I can't think of any. I've never seen the point of fellowships (as far as I understand them, the only thing they allow you to do you cannot do otherwise on Brainking is team tournaments - but I don't fancy playing them). As for tournaments and games, if I want to play more tournaments or games, I do know how the 'Tournaments', 'Waiting games' and 'New game' pages work. No need to invite me.

Here is a new one I havent heard about.

In an auto pass backgammon game both my opponent and myself could not make a move on consecutive turns. He auto passed back to me, but I did not auto pass back to him, I had to click to pass my next turn?

is this a bug or is it planned to not auto pass every time in an auto pass game?

Family Man: Do you have a game number, because theoretically, this is impossible.

joshi tm: Are you saying it is impossible for both players to have to pass?

If so, it is possible.

Lets say I have 2 men on my bar, and I'm able to bring 1 man out - which puts my opponents pieces on the bar - now both of us have a piece on the bar that may be trapped for a few turns.

coan.net: doesn't the auto pass here work only when there is no possible move to make? regardless of the dice? in which case it is impossible for both players to have to pass because rolling the dice is the possible move

coan.net: Forgot about that. But a BG game will ever end.