Turn time limit roll over option

[Chazar]

An option during game setup, that allows a player to use the time remaining on his next turn, to a maximum of twice the limit. I.e. remaining minute may roll over to the next turn of that player.

In effect, a 24 hour turn time limit is then still a 24 hour turn time limit on average. However, it is an incentive to finish one´s turn early, since the time is added to the next turn. So whenever one knows that time will be short the next day, one can hurry up the turn before to make up for the future delay.

Notice that this option actually speeds up gameplay:
I find myself often in this situation: during the week, I have no trouble with a 24 time limit. On Saturday morning it is my turn, I have 24 hours to move. So I make my move, but I do not hit end turn yet, because I know that I will have no time to do my move on Sunday. So even though my turn is fully done, I delay everyone just in case the other happen to be all online and quickly do their turns on that Saturday. Sometimes that happens, sometimes it does not. The only current option to avoid a real stale turn for certain is just to not press the end turn button.

With my suggestion, doing my Saturday turn very quickly, say with 22 hours left, then gives me 46 hours, allowing me to skip Sunday. However, maybe I do find the time and can move on Sunday, so nothing is lost at all. With the current system I cannot do this unless I am certain that I will be able to make my move.

[hungrytales]

Seems like a great idea (provided it's not overly complicated to implement).

[Moonknight]

Rollover minutes! haha, great idea...

[SnotlinG]

This was something that was planned even from the first beta, but somehow it got lost in the code on the way...
I think we will try to implement something like this soon. Good idea/reminder!

[KGB]

I asked for this exact same option in list of suggestions for Gold Members. I wanted to be able to bank up to 5 days worth of time because like you, I am often away on weekends or the occasional overnight business trip.

KGB

[LPhillips]

2x the limit is a pretty reasonable proposal. Would it be a turn-by turn basis, and not cumulative? Should one have 2x the time each turn, because he has made his turns 10-15 times in a row with a few hours to spare each time? It might become a problem.

"I have 36 hours to do this 24-hour turn. I complete the turn in 26 hours, and next round I have 34 hours, right?"

What do you think? It gets a bit technical after some consideration. I'd vote for this equation:

[Time Rollover]=([Turn limit]-[Time taken]), if ([Time Rollover]>zero)

So if you have 24+12 hours to do this turn, and you do it in 22, you will have 24+2 hours to do your next turn (not 24+14). If you do it in 28, you have 24 hours to do the next turn (not 24-4).

[Chazar]

Well, I imagined something simple, like:

1. Add one more numeric value stored for each player (e.g. just like the gold treasury)
2. At the end of the turn, store the number of minutes left for the player.
3. Apply a cap, e.g. that number cannot be greater than the turn time limit (e.g. for 24 hours, max i s 24*60)
[time tollover]=max([turn limit], [time remaining])
4. Once the turn starts, when income is computed, add the stored number to the current time time limit.

Well, anyway, it appears SnotlinG and piranha don't need our coding advices, they seem rather capable all by themselves.

So with a 24hour limit, if I finish my turn after 6 hours, then my next turn has 24+18=32hours. If I then do my turn in 7 hours, I have 32-7=25 left, due to the cap at 24, I have the full 48 for my next turn. This does not change until I need more than 24 hours. Then, if I need 45 hours, I still get 27 hours for the next turn.

Anyway, my point was to give an incentive to hit the "end turn" button early. At the moment, I often have an incentive to hit it as late as possible, which is bad.

[LPhillips]

Anyway, my point was to give an incentive to hit the "end turn" button early. At the moment, I often have an incentive to hit it as late as possible, which is bad.

This is understood. And you're right.

The rest, I'm afraid, is complete nonsense to my mind. If you finish your turn in more than the turn limit (say 25 hours in our example) then you should get zero rollover. There's no reward for a late finish. My code and suggestion is, in fact, a bit simpler to initiate and to understand at the player end than a cumulative system. The main advantage to one-turn-only rollover is its absolute simplicity and the complete lack of room for any misunderstanding or error.

A purely cumulative system is unacceptable for two reasons: it provides less incentive than ever for finishing your turn on time, because your cushion continues to build every time you end a turn, even if it's 5 minutes early. Actually needing the rollover from the current turn is a huge incentive to finish it asap. The second reason is that it allows players to be late, even repeatedly, and still have extended turn limits.

I see two reasonable alternatives, neither of which is as simple.
1) Rollover from previous turns is calculated separately, then reduced (say by half) before adding the new turn's rollover.
2) If [current turn's rollover]<=zero, then [total rollover bonus]=zero.

The first allows you to build some previous cushion, but makes the time in which you finish the current turn most important of all, eliminating the first objection to a purely cumulative system. It also is a little more forgiving than the second alternative, in case you should have a couple of slightly late turns in a row.

#1 is my favorite option, but I skipped it in the first post in favor of the truly simple option, which is very easy to understand at the player's end: one-turn rollover only.

[bengute]

I"m in favor of simple or easy to understand solution.

Example one, take half of the time on the clock and add it to your next turn.

So if you finish your first turn instantly you'll get 12 hours and will have 36 for your next turn. Finish instantly again and you'll have 42 hours to go. But even if you still finish instantly you'll have 45 hours. Finish perfectly again and you'll have 46.5 hours.

But since 46.5 hours isn't enough if you can't get on the whole weekend, you can do example two, take 65% of the time on the clock and add it to your next turn.

So assuming perfect turns again

24 * .65 = 15.6+24=39.6

39.6 * .65 = 25.74+24=49.74

49.74 * .65 = 32.33+24=56.33

56.33 * .65 = 36.62=24=60.62

60.62 * .65 = 39.40+24=63.4

The problem with this kind of system is that if you don't take your turns fairly fast, you can't really build up enough time.

So I think the best way to do it is to have a save time function. Where every turn you take a quarter of the time left over and save it'. This saved time maxes out at twice the normal time limit. When the normal time for the turn limit runs out, it automatically starts using your saved time. When your saved time runs out your turn ends.

[KGB]

You need to be able to bank more than 2X the number of hours in a game turn. Going from 24 hrs to 48 hrs is nice but isn't that helpful.

Why not just add all the unused hours from your game turn into a pool that can go as high as 96 hrs (4 days since max time is 5 days). Once you exceed your turn limit you start drawing down the hours. When they reach 0 the turn passes to the next player. If you finish before the bank = 0 then you keep the rest in the bank. That's as simple as it gets:

Example: 24 hr turn limit game.
Turn 1 - I use 12 hrs. Bank now = 12 hrs
Turn 2 - I use 20 hrs. Bank now = 16 hrs
Turn 3 - I use 10 hrs. Bank now = 30 hrs
Turn 4 - I use 14 hrs. Bank now = 40 hrs
Turn 5 - I use 36 hrs. Bank now = 28 hrs
Turn 6 - I use 20 hrs. Bank now = 32 hrs

KGB