In my experience with extends, most players (in a press game) will ready their orders to for when the player who needed the extend returns - but not all the time. IMO a 2/3 majority works well in full-press, with recourse to the mod-forum for a case-by-case basis.

In gunboats on the other hand, many extensions don't get granted. I think that a 1/2 majority vote for an extend would work well in gunboats.

I second kaner's proposal.

Also, I'd update the help section. Rule #5 doesn't even mention the extend.
And in "feature" it could be explained better:
"If 2/3 of the active players vote Extend the the current phase will be extended by 4 days. You can extend the same phase more than once to push the process-date back even further."
It doesn't says why this feature was released, it doesn't explain how it works (I saw players ask for it, FINALIZE their orders!, and NMR the next phase because the game extension lasted a few hours until the last one finalized) and basically doesn't encourage it.

Maybe there can be an option to vary the extend time based on how long said person would be away...

@DC: That is not possible with the current code, sorry. Also in a gunboat you can't tell the others how long you would be away. That's why I introduced a phase-extend instead of a timed pause. Once everybody is back everybody can just "Ready" his orders to proceed unrelated to the fixed 4-day extend.

I concur with the rules being updated. I've been in games where people have tried to get extends and I have had to go to the mods about it because of people refusing to extend. And then there's been massive arguments in global over whether the extend function is there to give players a choice on whether to grant the request or there to make the Mod's lives easier.

If the rules were updated to say that 'The extend and pause buttons are in place to allow players to prevent NMRs without having to go to the Mods to do so. They are not there to allow players to decide whether or not to grant the request. If players will not vote, you are entitled to go to the Mod-Forum and ask for the extend, with your reason for doing so, there.' or something along those lines, it would prevent a lot of confusion about what the extend-button is meant for.

I also agree that 2/3 is good for a FP or PPO game. I don't play enough gunboats to know how many players usually vote extend in them.

I think that the rules about Extends should indeed be updated as suggested by Captainmeme.
A new phrasing like the one he has proposed would make things perfectly clear.

Indeed, although I had read the rule, I hadn't understood the point of it !
For me, the sentence "The Pause/Unpause feature is not a diplomatic tool" meant that a player could not offer something in exchange of a vote. Like, "If you (don't) vote "Extend", then such or such thing will (not) happen in the game.".

After, all these talks about "Extend" votes, I now have understood that an Extend should be granted. But to me, the rules were not clear.

I would please like to add that I would appreciate very much that a player gives a reason explaining why he is asking an Extend. That reason could of course be a lie but it would present 2 obvious advantages :
1° It is much more courteous.
2° It makes sure that an Extend is really asked and that the vote is not a misclick.

Well, maybe the earth just tipped off its axis or something, but I actually agree with Retillion on this. He says, "I would please like to add that I would appreciate very much that a player gives a reason explaining why he is asking an Extend. That reason could of course be a lie but it would present 2 obvious advantages :
1° It is much more courteous.
2° It makes sure that an Extend is really asked and that the vote is not a misclick. "

Its my opinion that the extends and pauses have been so generously granted by fellow players and moderators that they have come to be included in players' diplomatic arsenals as weaposn to employ unders certain circumsatnces, just as is done with the 'save' feature during retreat and build phases is being used for such purposes.

Asking a player to give a reason, as Retillion suggests is more courteous to all involved, and presented a better platform for the others involved to take a decision on the request. And in the event that the player is exploiting the situation, forces him to come up with a lie to back the story up. Since no one really wants to be caught in such a lie, I suggest that this will reduce the number of extend/pause abuse cases to a neglible number. And it also avoids the unfortunate extend being granted for a misclick.

Well, said, Retillion.

So, expanding on what I think Ruffhaus and Retillion are hinting at but didn't exactly outright say...

It sounds like it would be much desired if the player clicking the extend vote the first time (for a given extend) be required to enter a reason for the extend into some dialog box or something that then gets posted to the global tab (there's a potential for abuse in gunboat games here, so I'm not entirely sure its a good idea in that it could, if abused too often, cause more work for the mods in gunboat games).

However, for other players having to guess between an 'accidental' extend and an 'unxplained but desired' extend, there would no longer be any confusion.

I don't know whether this is possible to enforce a reason for the extend in the code for the extend button (maybe pause as well?) but just wanted to toss out this idea as the logical extension of what Ruffhaus and Retillion were driving towards.

Otherwise, it will be incumbent on the community to demand explanations for why extends are being requested in order to extract the desired behavior from the majority of players. Obviously once explanations are given, extends should be granted in most cases when clear that the request is for the desired purpose of avoiding NMR's.

Regardless, explanations are a must before the rest of us can make that informed vote.

Perhaps some of you has missed from where this discussion comes.
A few minutes before opening this thread, Oli posted on this threadID=39924.

I hadn't missed that.

Well, perhaps we missed it (this is what was posted in essence: "The idea of the extend is meant to prevent NRMs and spoil the game. Using this as a diplomatic tool is not an option. That's why the mods usually extend games on request. The 3/4-majority is just introduced, so a few minor powers couldn't abuse the system to take a game on hostage indefinitely (and cause more work for the mods again). Using 2/3-majority worked quite well, but I'm willing to change this to something else (1/2 for example, or at least 3 players) if we want to experiment with this option."). Unfortunately is is factually incorrect.

The draw and extend features are absolutely being used as diplomatic options, and you know this to be so, because you were most recently involved in an example of it. And that sadly is not an isolated case. Games are being taken hostage by players not getting their way or performing poorly. One of the easier ways to kill a Diplomacy game is to drag it on to the point where players lose interest. Excessive delays sap interest, enthusiasm, and momentum in games, and lead to players voting for draws that they might not have before complacency sets in.

Reducing the number of players necessary to get an extension or pause vote is the worst thing that you guys could do. It's already far too easy for games to be exploited and occurs far too often.

The game system has numerous methods established to avoid NMRs. The extend and pause features are only part of this. The games have NMR and CD settings when created.

Why is it the the moderators seem to think that it's wise to lean towards the behavior who cannot be bothered to play responsibily and ethically, and punish those of us who faithfully submit orders and wish to play uninterrupted games? This matter is coming up for discussionbecause the moderators are routinuely overruling the extend and pause votes at their arbitrary discretion. And on first glance you might think that this is a good thing, but in cases of real tragedy and emergency, no interventions are made. Instead three week extensions to accomodate a players's winter vacation, spring break, or sumer safari seem to be getting plenty of sympathy from the moderators while death and disaster are ignored and leaft to a vote. What's going on here makes no sense, and cloaking he behavior of game-stallers in the name of NMR prevention demonstrates a very poor perception of what is going on within the community.

So far not one of the most outspoken advocates of extension on demand policy (Oliver, Guaroz, Decima, etc.) has been able to address why it is unreasonable for the requests for delays be accompanied by a published cause/need/reason as advocated by some of us who have noticed these disturbing trends. Retillion has illustrated eloquently why providing a reason will win sympathy from the involved and affected players, and how it will help prevent fraud. Surely if Retillion and I can agree on any issue, it bears a longer look than you chaps have given it.

I agree with Kaner that Gunboats should have 1/2 for the extension. At 2/3 they are never given and some times votes don't even reach half. This causes a lot of NMRs on gunboat games that ruin everything

In my opinion, four days works perfectly, because people generally hit 'ready' in that time (at least in the games I've played). As for the 2/3, I like this number for most games. Sometimes there can be difficulties in the larger maps and, as mentioned, gunboats. If it is going to be lowered, I think half would be too much. I would prefer something closer to 3/5.

Extend is a nice enhancement to Pause, and helps curtail some of the abuse with Pause. The 2/3 majority and four-day extension both seem about right. I don't play a lot of games at once, and so have not played that many games since Extend was first implemented. I also play only full press games. But from what I have seen, players generally do not ready their orders and the full four days is almost always the case. Just after Pauses and Extends have been granted, most of the other players also do not ready their orders until the end of the Pause or Extend, even if the original phase was about to end. This in turn prolongs things when the player asking for the Pause or Extend comes back earlier and the game could have proceeded. Sometimes too, each delay feeds upon the previous one, making it easier for players to lose track of the game, NMR, CD, kill enthusiasm, kill momentum, or try to kill the game altogether.

The Extend feature is nothing else than a “soft-Pause” feature.

There’s no need for unanimity and the delay is a fixed and reasonable period of time. Ultimately, the reason why the developers created the Extend feature is to overcome the resistance of people with ideas similar to Ruffhaus regarding granting Pauses. This happened exactly one year ago.

Unfortunately, reading some declarations, this effort seems not enough, though.

My opinion regarding the feature is that it’s ok this way. What I find imperfect nowadays are two related aspects:

One) the way it works is not described enough: while it is clear to me and to any other v-dip “seasoned”, I’m sure that it is not clear to the majority of the new users.

Two) it is not clear how the administrator of the website and the mods expect us to use the Extend feature. A clear written indication would avoid unnecessary discussion inside and outside the game and would probably relieve Oliver&co from some work.

I have already talked enough on the previous threadID=39924 regarding the extend issue. And certainly I agree with everything is written in the looooong but eloquent post from Guaroz.
If you Oliver think that I misunderstood the way we users are expected to use the Extend feature, feel free to write it here and I will change my attitudes at once.

Else, information and education across the community: this is all the Extend feature needs.

I agree that the feature works fine. It could stand some clarification(as others have said) but other than that I think it is enough.
Also- I think Guaroz said it best about the extend/pause shouldn't require a reason behind it...

A good idea might be to vary the time extended based on the time/phase of the game. I think it follows that a person playing a 2-day per phase game would like a longer extend than someone playing a 12-hour per phase game. If it was possible to code, you could try to make the extend like, 3 or 4 times the phase length.

Thanks butter, but Guaroz went further. My post on threadID=39924 was so "looooong" because, after explained what you said, I had to explain why it's 'refusing to vote for a extend/pause' that requires a (very good) reason behind it.

Bumping this.
Maybe a bit off topic, but since the occurrence of vote misclick has been mentioned…
I recognize that misclick can be an issue, in particular using touchpad devices, when the human intends to command “scroll” and the machine understands “click”.
In this case the vote is immediately issued and, even if the vote can be deleted afterwards, it can lead to misinterpretations among the opponents and/or unnecessary in-game discussions.

Would it be better to add a check window, kind of:
“Are you sure you want to vote Draw?”
Or
“Are you sure you want to vote Pause?”
And so on.

This way we could prevent any vote misclick, at the cost of 1 further click each vote.

Would you like to extend the check window to all the 'vote' buttons?

That's not a bad idea.

I'd also implement the feature that clears all extend votes after 5 phases:
"GameMaster: Extend-request didn't reach 2/3 majority. All extend-votes cleared."
to the Pause vote too.

In every Gunboat I play there's someone who keeps his pause-vote on for months. They probably forget it or something. But the issue is that if tomorrow someone else needs a pause and vote for it, nobody would notice it because there would be no GM's post on Global. And even if someone noticed it, it would be hard to say whether he's asking for himself or he's just seconding the previous voter.
If a pause vote doesn't pass within a few days, what's the use in keeping it on forever?

@kaner
Yes, I would.

Getting an extend on a gunboat game is too hard in it's current state. I've been playing a gunboat where one of the players seems to have had some problems, he tried to ask for an extend three times in a roll and most of the other players just didn't respect that, which kinda spoiled the game. So, yes- something lower than 3/4s for the extend to pass could be a lot better.

How interesting ! I was going to start a new thread today about a new feature :

“Are you sure you want to vote Draw ?”

The above mentioned reasons for a confirmation of a vote are of course good but I would like to add another reason :

I have found myself twice - so far - in a game where each of my opponents had voted "Draw" and when I was trying to make a solo victory. I was always VERY stressed about the possibility of a misclick on the "Draw" button.

We have this for the Concede button, it should be very easy to add this to the Draw-Button too....

Thank you very much, Oli :)