[SUGGESTION] Fix the (not) voting problem.

Hi!

I've got a simple idea to fix the problem with not-voting players who don't know that their keyboard has keys labeled F1 and F2.

< Ignore those players >

Main idea is to remove the threshold. Players will want to vote if they notice something might be done without them. But if they don't vote - that's not a problem anymore, because they're not blocking changes anymore.

It's simple: you raise a vote, you're waiting. If no one is against, your vote succeeds in 15 seconds. If more or equal amount of votes is against the vote raised - it is rejected.

If no one voted - every vote is automatically accepted (no one cares, so why not?)

Also every players should see a little (down)counter showing that he has 15..14...13 seconds to stop or support a vote. Also the status of the vote should be displayed, so players know if the vote is going to be accepted or rejected based on actual votes (and that would additionally motive them to vote).

Those who don't care about voting shoudn't be taken into consideration.

A bigger timeout should be applied for votes for kick and kickban as they are more important and we don't want to let people hurt others for no reason (most of the times - there is a reason for kickban).

I'd suggest the exceptionally long timeout of 30 seconds for kickban votes.

Also: remove the unused "vote abstain" option. If people don't vote - they abstain, don't they?

What do you think?

Thought there was already a setting that just went by the votes not the players, I know its up to the server owners to change the setting but I think it already exist.

http://forums.xonotic.org/showthread.php?tid=631 .
It's much better now already.

Mirio: What do you mean? Does it work this way in Xonotic already? Looks like you came up with the same idea before me

Allowing a vote to go through too easily may be a very bad idea, see Tremulous, where people randomly get kicked for no good reason. Chat is too active, nobody can see what the vote is about or any discussion for it, and people tend to press F1 to just get rid of the vote prompt.

Result: I got kicked for "aimbotting" multiple times,
- as alien, Dretch (what good would an aimbot do a Dretch anyway)
- with having 1 or even no frag at all
- i.e. while totally sucking
- without having any aimbot at all

What we have implemented now, though, is the same idea, but safer:

a vote succeeds if we have EITHER a relative >=2/3 majority of voting players, OR an absolute >1/2 majority of all players.

As for what "abstain" does: it removes you from the pool of "total" voters for calculation of the total majority, too.

So if there are 10 players:

6 vote for, 4 against: accepted by >1/2 total majority
5 vote for, 4 against: rejected (no >1/2 total majority, no >=2/3 voters majority)
5 vote for, 4 against, 1 abstains: accepted (>1/2 total majority)
3 vote for, 2 against: rejected (no >1/2 total majority, no >=2/3 relative majority)
3 vote for, 2 against, 5 abstain: accepted (>1/2 total majority)
2 vote for, 1 against: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority
1 vote for, 0 against: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority
1 vote for, 0 against, 8 abstain: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority

This is a small difference to politics BTW - in politics, an abstention tends to be a vote against BOTH yes and no. If enough people

In Xonotic, though, abstention means "count me as absent", as opposed as ignoring the vote, which counts as a "no" regarding the absolute majority requirement, and as an abstention regarding the relative majority requirement. The rationale for this is to block malicious votes: if someone actively "abstains", he has read the vote and signified that he does not care. Thus, he has stated his opinion, and agreed to the fact that he will not be counted. Someone who did not abstain explicitly, however, has not stated that, and thus should not allow easy votes!

Imagine this:

2 teams, Red vs Blue
Red: 3 trolls, 2 normal players
Blue: 5 normal players

The trolls start a kick vote against one of Blue's players. Typical outcome:

Red: 3 trolls vote for the proposal. 2 do not respond to the vote.
Blue: victim, and one team mate, vote against the proposal. Rest does not respond.

3:2, player should not be kicked.

Basically, this means: in this typical situation, it suffices for blue to have ONE sensible voter, other than the victim!

However, for non abusive votes, a 2/3 majority among the voters is easy to get... so this is not a hindrance.

Well, this seems to be a better option, but as for the abstain option:

I have never used it because it has no default hotkey and I don't know how to launch it from console.

I see that not voting and voting as "abstain" is a different thing, but I think it boils down to "yes/no/don't-care" choice. And we have two ways of selecting the third option (by not voting at all and by voting for absention).

I personally feel it's stupid to have to waste my time trying to find the "abstain" option while I can just ignore the vote. And I would want that (non-)action to be counted this way.

With only 1/2 relative votes + automatic vote accepting if no one voted):

Total of 10 players, the one who raised the vote is not counted:

If 2 voted for, 3 against and 4 didn't vote - the vote is rejected.
If 3 voted for, 2 against and 4 didn't vote - the vote is accepted.
If 9 didn't vote - the vote is accepted.

Just a thought. This might be also a bit less trollproof, but trolls need to be recognized and kicked so we need to make players care and take actions against trolls. If trolls outnumber regular players - only the admin can save the server... Making the voting system trollproof could also make it useless for regular (but not active) players. Maybe I'm not an expert

I actually agree with Unfa most people won't vote at all if they want to abstain, stopping and taking action JUST to abstain is just out of the question. People who don't vote should count as yes for both votes like in politics (he just didn't care). This way you actually encourage people to vote, as for the trolls well they will be a problem anyways, imagine a team with 4 trolls in your case they could also win, or two teams with two trolls each, again easy win. Or they spam press f1 somebody will bite. If a vote was call and we have 3 yes and 2 no + 5 abstain, then the vote should pass. OFC some votes are not as important as others, ie map changing vs player kicking, the second one is more grave(remove a player from the game) and would fit your voting style better, while the first one(keep all players playing, change map, continue game) fits the political one better.

well, people who abstains shouldn't count as positive vote.
Concrete example: when kick vcall comes up and I don't know what is it about (because I was not enough close to the "problem" to notice it), then the wiser vote is to abstain, and this vote shoudn't be interpreted as yes, to not kick a potential innocent.

An idea could be to introduce some different rules for different vcall types.

It also should not be interpreted as no, your choice in abstaining, IF a vote was called for kicking you don't know what it's about or are not close to the problem vote no since that guy did nothing to bother you, abstaining means ignoring the problem either way and it's bad either way. Anyways the suggestion isn't to interpret it as a yes, it's to interpret it as BOTH a yes and a no.

The voting system as seen on the Nexuiz *UFB servers, for example, is fine, my objections have already been addressed by divVerent. What bugs me is vote-spamming. The voting options should either be moved out of the way or the game should be paused during voting.

Back to div's prose:

a vote succeeds if we have EITHER a relative >=2/3 majority of voting players, OR an absolute >1/2 majority of all players.
...
So if there are 10 players:
...
1 vote for, 0 against, 8 abstain: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority

this last case is unacceptable.
The problem with the the >=2/3 relative majority priniciple comes from the fact that 2/3 of voters may not be representative of the total player set.

Maybe it's worth to get back to the initial goal of a vote: we want 2 things:
1) a democratic consensus
2) to be sure that this consensus has somewhat representative

1) is fullfilled by a (relative) 1/2 majority of voters set.
2) is fullfilled when voters exceed X% of the total number of players. X could be 66, 75, or whatever.

1 vote for, 0 against, 8 abstain: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority

unacceptable.

Why unacceptable? 8 players didn't give a fish. So why anyone but them should be sorry? I think this is fair. And encourages players to vote.

As for counting not voting as yes - um. Not really. I mean that not voting players should be kept away from the calculation scope.

If I'm thinking correct the relative 2/3 works like this:

2 votes for, 1 against, 7 didn't vote means:

3 people care - 2/3 of these people voted for. Accept vote.

1 votes for, 2 against, 7 didn't vote means:

3 people care - 2/3 of these people voted against. Reject vote.

10 didn't vote - one player (who raised the vote) supports the idea, no one's against - accept the vote.

I'd be cool with that.

It had been discussed in the old topic and its fine now. Try it first before you judge.

1 vote for, 0 against, 8 abstain: accepted by >=2/3 relative majority

unacceptable.

Why unacceptable? 8 players didn't give a fish. So why anyone but them should be sorry? I think this is fair. And encourages players to vote.

It is correct, e.g. in elections it would be the same result. If you don't leave your vote you should not moan later (100% for 'Yes-Party' in this case).


Don't you have 2 yes votes in this example anyway (guy who started the vote?)

It is correct, e.g. in elections it would be the same result. If you don't leave your vote you should not moan later (100% for 'Yes-Party' in this case).

Cool

Don't you have 2 yes votes in this example anyway (guy who started the vote?)

Um. That's a problem. Should we count the votecaster as a +1 or not? It could simplify things. Maybe that's a good idea. I can't think of anything againts it. And that would show why if no one voted the vote was still accepted. Because it already had 1 vote for

i vote for..... um.... WHERE AM I?............


T

:^

Why unacceptable? 8 players didn't give a fish. So why anyone but them should be sorry? I think this is fair. And encourages players to vote.

because then, this will force everybody to vote at each vote, even for silly vcalls like player A tries to kick a player B he doesn't get along with.
Personnaly, when i'm into the action, i often don't notice that a vcall has been called...
And, as opposed to politics votes, vcalls could occur several times per game. Check UFB servers for example.

In any case, when it come to kick someone (where there could be a lot of abstention), a substancial fraction of the overall players has to be active for the kick to be accpeted. Otherwise, the kick should be rejected.

Well if you realize that player A is wrong, you can just vote against and it will block the vote. As it needs 2/3 among voting players to agree, and with one vote against it'll be 1/2.

Personally I always see that a vcall was made. And I think that most players who play this game for more that 6 months (and are familiar with the hud) also do.

I know it's a bit radical, but I think letting others block you by doing nothing is a bit daunting. It's sometimes really hard (or impossible) to make a simple vote get accepted on a server full of newbies.

And this is (mostly) what I'd like to stop.

Well if you realize that player A is wrong, you can just vote against and it will block the vote. As it needs 2/3 among voting players to agree, and with one vote against it'll be 1/2.

but most of the time, you don't have any clue who is wrong.

I know it's a bit radical, but I think letting others block you by doing nothing is a bit daunting. It's sometimes really hard (or impossible) to make a simple vote get accepted on a server full of newbies.

I got the point. But it seems that you try to solve this newbie problem (which is an interface based problem) by modifying the vote rule itself.

I got the point. But it seems that you try to solve this newbie problem (which is an interface based problem) by modifying the vote rule itself.

Indeed. Because I think it's not only caused by the interface. I think it's also the don't vote - abstain similarity and general laziness / not giving a flip.

My solution is based on a belief that most players do see that voting occurs, but they don't care at all.

I found Nexuiz's voting interface big enough to see all the vcalls going on, the one in Xonotic is bigger and the problems ceases to exist when it comes to interface (just in my feel OFC).

The way vcalls are solved will have impact on players behaviour, it can leave lazy players doing nothing (and blocking all actions) or it can leave them out of the scope and make then at least not blocking others. What's more: it might make them want to vote too.

I think at the beginning it would lead to a little flood of happy trolls trying to kick everyone, trying to make no one care (and accept their vcall) but I think those will quickly get recognized and players who think will fight trolls (and the new vote system would also let them do it more effectively).

I got the point. But it seems that you try to solve this newbie problem (which is an interface based problem) by modifying the vote rule itself.

Indeed. Because I think it's not only caused by the interface. I think it's also the don't vote - abstain similarity and general laziness / not giving a flip.

My solution is based on a belief that most players do see that voting occurs, but they don't care at all.

Not always, I've seen people not vote because they didn't want the vote to pass.
And I must say that that is the most logical thing to do (but not the most fair). If you don't want the vote to pass it is better not to vote at all then to vote no. Thus if everyone knows how the voting system works (and if they don't give a crap what others think about them) then nobody will ever vote non because it doesn't make sense to do so.

(...) Thus if everyone knows how the voting system works (and if they don't give a crap what others think about them) then nobody will ever vote non because it doesn't make sense to do so.

I didn't know that! Sounds like a strong argument pro.

I got the point. But it seems that you try to solve this newbie problem (which is an interface based problem) by modifying the vote rule itself.

Indeed. Because I think it's not only caused by the interface. I think it's also the don't vote - abstain similarity and general laziness / not giving a flip.

My solution is based on a belief that most players do see that voting occurs, but they don't care at all.

Not always, I've seen people not vote because they didn't want the vote to pass.
And I must say that that is the most logical thing to do (but not the most fair). If you don't want the vote to pass it is better not to vote at all then to vote no. Thus if everyone knows how the voting system works (and if they don't give a crap what others think about them) then nobody will ever vote non because it doesn't make sense to do so.

How does in ANY case voting no make the vote more likely to pass than to not vote at all?

Also... in MOST cases (from experience), 2/3 majority of the voters, or 1/2 majority of the voters, does the same thing. It's only trollvotes where it really makes a difference.

In the typical ingame votes (kicks, map changes), the vote result tends to be like 3:0 or 4:1 anyway (from like 10 players).

How does in ANY case voting no make the vote more likely to pass than to not vote at all?

Hmm, thinking about it, I guess I was wrong... sorry
Unless you voting no makes someone else vote yes.