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        Arimaa >> General Discussion >> Has anyone just given up on playing blitz games?
        
(Message started by: speek on Jul 16^th, 2010, 6:12am)

Title: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz games?
Post by speek on Jul 16^th, 2010, 6:12am

I find it takes at least 10 seconds just to clicky-clicky on four little arrows to make my move. There is no time for thinking. It's not fun in the least.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by rbarreira on Jul 16^th, 2010, 7:35am

I'm sure many people gave up blitz, but on the other hand several people can play lightning games (8 seconds per move instead of 15 as in blitz). At least against Bomb which is a predictable bot for many here...

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by speek on Jul 16^th, 2010, 8:15am

I'm just frustrated because I want to beat all the bots, but I don't think my manual dexterity is up to the task of bots that only play blitz. I guess I don't understand why a bot is attached to a certain time control.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by rbarreira on Jul 16^th, 2010, 8:20am

There is a greater variety of bot/time control combinations in this page:

http://arimaa.com/arimaa/bots/index.cgi

You start a bot up from there, then sit on the table which should appear in the gameroom pretty soon.

Of course this doesn't help if your objective is to complete the bot ladder.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by Fritzlein on Jul 16^th, 2010, 8:43am

on 07/16/10 at 08:15:02, speek wrote:

Don't worry about beating all the bots. The ladder is the way it is due to popular demand. In the old days the ladder had "CC" bots that thought for two minutes per move, and in the really old days there were no blitz bots. 30 seconds per move was formerly the fastest available time control. It turned out, however, that many people skipped the top of the bot ladder because they didn't want to play as slow as two minutes per move. They got bored from thinking that long. Indeed, even against the P1 and P2 bots when players had a full two minutes to think, they moved at blitz speed anyway, unnecessarily reducing the quality of their own moves, because they desired fast action. There was an outcry for faster time controls.

That's all well and good. I'm glad Omar changed the ladder to be more popular. But don't let that pressure you to be like the majority. There's no value judgment implied here; you are different from the masses and that is what it is.

on 07/16/10 at 06:12:06, speek wrote:

I find it takes at least 10 seconds just to clicky-clicky on four little arrows to make my move. There is no time for thinking. It's not fun in the least.

I recommend that you give up blitz. Many have done so before you. If you look at my last 100 games, you will find exactly two blitz games, one of which I lost on time due to an interface freeze. I would not have played blitz even those two times except that it was the only opportunity I had to play the latest version of GnoBot, and I was curious.

Some people get off on the thrill of intense time pressure. I don't. I lead a full Arimaa existence without ever playing at blitz speed. I don't lay awake nights regretting the heart-pounding adrenaline I am not feeling. Don't bother, don't be upset, just play time controls you enjoy and are comfortable with. You're truly not missing anything.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by speek on Jul 16^th, 2010, 9:37am

Yes, this is the conclusion I have come to. It's just that someone put a mountain there for me to climb, and I can't resist! Oh well. :-)

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by Eltripas on Jul 16^th, 2010, 10:09am

I have fun playing blitz and lightning games (8s) even more than 2 min games, I don't know why you spend so much time (10s) clicking on the pieces I spend like 6s, maybe you are using the client on the slowest speed, here I put some suggestions I already gave about this topic:

Have a predefined strategy before you start the game, like if you are going to play a home game just pulling pieces to your side then play for that or if you are going to do a HE attack then play for that, etc.
If you are in a difficult situation and where you can't see progress and time is running out just make a safe move: check for hanging pieces, check for possible frames and overprotect your traps.
Use the V2 client at S3 speed, is the fastest client it saves like a second per turn, it is not much for "fast" games but it is good for blitz and specially precious for lightning.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by speek on Jul 16^th, 2010, 11:42am

I am just pretty slow in general. Old and curmudgeonly and all that :-)

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by FireBorn on Jul 16^th, 2010, 12:22pm

Also, i hear expert mode helps with speed, but i havent tried it

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by RonWeasley on Jul 18^th, 2010, 3:42pm

on 07/16/10 at 11:42:57, speek wrote:

I am just pretty slow in general. Old and curmudgeonly and all that :-)

You are not slower than me. No one is slower than me. I've played a few "Fast" bots and could barely keep up.

I. Am. The. Slowest!
Bwa. Ha. Haaaaa!

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by omar on Jul 21^st, 2010, 1:05pm

Have you tried increasing the animation speed in the client. I've found that shaving a second or two off the animation speed when the opponents move is shown helps me quite a bit.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by speek on Jul 21^st, 2010, 9:34pm

It's no biggie. I just have a hard time with hitting small targets with the mouse quickly. Encroaching Parkinson's probably :-/

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by starjots on Jul 26^th, 2010, 10:09pm

on 07/16/10 at 11:42:57, speek wrote:

I am just pretty slow in general. Old and curmudgeonly and all that :-)

Haha, I know what you mean... blitz games to me are 'make a random move and watch the reserve time go down'

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by Weirdo87 on Aug 22^nd, 2010, 2:48am

Hell, I've given up all game speeds but postal.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by speek on Aug 22^nd, 2010, 1:31pm

Yeah, me too. One way or another, live games just don't work for me.

Title: Re: Has anyone just given up on playing blitz game
Post by Hippo on Aug 22^nd, 2010, 3:00pm

Currently I play postals, blitz games against bots and 45s / 60s games against humans ... playing blitz games on touchpad without perfect connection is almost impossible, playing with mouse with good connection is rather OK ...