AFK Players

[Boopsie]

What to do about them? is there anything to do?  Lately I've been seeing more and more, although I'm

not sure why people afk. Played a game couple days ago and a battleship and a cruiser just stayed in the same spot for the entire game. That is a huge amount of firepower to lose. It's very frustrating.

 

Not talking about people who load in late. These guys never move at all. I just don't understand why people afk. I see no advantage to it.  Maybe you guys can explain it me.

[Billy_Sastard]

Ever had your computer crash all of a sudden? For seemingly no reason at all? While you were right in the middle of something? 

 

Now you understand AFKs a little better.

[ValkyrWarframe]

I sometimes lose connection to the server while loading.  Takes me 5-10 minutes to reconnect.

[Highblooded]

We are not supposed to be bugged by it or its WGs bad servers, blah blah blah. I run a total potato computer, have fairly capable internet and have not loaded later than 40 seconds in(1st game of the day usually) and have crashed to desktop only once(and was back in before a few minutes went by). I hate that it is an issue as there is an average of one in every game I play(so 5% AFK rate). Some games there has been 3 on my team(some wake up 3 minutes into the game) it is crippling. You don't go play basketball and walk off the court to watch facebook. Personal belief is that it is all these folks are running laptops, WiFi and watching movies.

[alanbay]

hi guys. that can be frustrating if  your in rank, or team battles . but  in random it seem to happen more so .   so if I may.   just play your game. don't depend on others  and  try and support others but never depend on them. you may find  youll have more fun, and  have better exciting battles . thank you for letting me post  be well .

[CylonRed]

AFKs can be for many reasons but Life, the Universe, and Everything can intervene.  I have had a couple of crashes and I never knew you could get back in the game so I never tried till recently.  The other day I Alt-Tabbed out of the game to make sure I suspended BOINC and the game closed.  No error, no popup, no warning - it just disappeared.  Was able to get back in but outside of the connection dying and if that is detectable programmatically - I don't know if anything can be done about it.  Both sides in any given match may have to deal with it and it sucks but I am not sure if punishing all AFKs is good and warranted.

[DQCraze]

Ya, my ibuki kept crashing so much i just sold it.  I used to get mad at afkrs, but just now after the new update, my game loaded then crash to desktop 3 times so i had to uninstall and reinstall.   Hope it works now.

[JCC45]

Also, in addition to game crashes, Real Life is more important than a Game.

 

Some people will come to understand that once they get one.

[Pirabee]

I'm sure you've heard excuses like mine before, but it doesn't make it any less valid. I play from Africa and at the best of time my pings and FPS are what any of you guys in the west would [edited]and bitterly complain about. In any one night, I can experience three or more disconnections not to mention lags so bad I seriously consider logging off. But if you're in the middle of a battle you'll only grit your teeth and take the worst of it. Its cos of my love of the game that I keep trucking, you see.

 

Pirabee

[Simuo]

 

There is almost no incentive of AFK. The AFK player gets almost zero credit/XP. Their AA may shoot down a plane, or their secondary gun would make some damage, but nothing close to compensate the repair loss. And their win rate won't be boosted neither.

 

I had a few AFK times - All the sudden I can't control my ship nor shoot my guns, after a few seconds the system flash back to the log-on screen. And it takes a couple of minutes (sometimes never) coming back to play. I found my self cursing my AFK way more than when I saw someone else AFK.

 

So I'd say leave AFK there and play your ship. He probably suffer more than you do, and it's probably not his fault. This is just a game after all.

 

Side note: AFK ships can still be useful. Today I had a game that the enemy CV stay close to an AFK mogami to gain AA coverage.

 

[The_redReiter]

I'm not 100% sure of this but pretty sure:

 

At game start...If the player is truly afk, when they load into the game, their rear turrets will move to one side or the other. On the other hand, if they have not loaded in, their front turrets face forward and the rear turrets remain facing rear until they are loaded in.

 

rR

[toinkove]

What to do about them? is there anything to do?  Lately I've been seeing more and more, although I'm

not sure why people afk. Played a game couple days ago and a battleship and a cruiser just stayed in the same spot for the entire game. That is a huge amount of firepower to lose. It's very frustrating.

 

Not talking about people who load in late. These guys never move at all. I just don't understand why people afk. I see no advantage to it.  Maybe you guys can explain it me.

 

it has become much more frequent in the past few months but hasn't yet crippled the game in my estimation. Should we start seeing 4-5 AFK's per game then I believe wargmaming will start doing something about it. Unfortunately single isolated incidents of players going AFK can not be avoided (and there should be an "acceptable" rate at which a player goes AFK since sometimes things just happen). But if individual players have a pattern of going AFK and it starts to adversely affect the games, I think you can bet wargaming will address it!  

[JammedHam]

I have a slow connection to the server, I have randomly appeared int he game on fire, and crashed on load up. I've gotten back lash about it but seriously it's only a game. I understand it is important, but life is the utmost king when it comes to this kind of stuff. The people who seem to be not moving are subject to life, but some are just scumbags looking to avoid the grind. Like the Omaha I Citadelled 3 times for him to try to fire at me after not moving the whole game.   

[Ghost_Raven75]

Nothing worse then having nature call in the middle of a battle.  I'm guilty of being AFK once but its not like it's intentional.  i think for the most part the AFKs we see are just that, something happened to pull them away from their computer.

[Gene_Inari]

People don't get pulled away in the time it takes to hit battle and the singular minute it takes to get into a middle-tier match and be gone for a full 20 minutes this often. It's people not ever loading in because the game's file structure is assbackwards and cripping everyone not on a SSD.

[toinkove]

Nothing worse then having nature call in the middle of a battle.  I'm guilty of being AFK once but its not like it's intentional.  i think for the most part the AFKs we see are just that, something happened to pull them away from their computer.

 

yes I would hope most would understand the players who, let's say 1 in every 50 battles, has a disconnection or real emergency that forces them to be "AFK". Truth be told I'm not entirely sure how much of AFK's are isolated incidents and how many are repeat offenders who AFK 1 out of every 3,5 or 10 battles. Right now it's not a major issue, but if we do ever start seeing 4-5 AFK players per game, and if the player base starts to complain about it then, wargaming will do something about it just like they did with all the complaints over draws.

[War_Maggot]

Let's be realistic: there is an AFK in about every other random game. It isn't a disconnection, it isn't long load-in. It only happens at low tier, because people use bots or macros to load into a game and pike credits. It can be easily addressed.

[MnemonScarlet]

I'm not 100% sure of this but pretty sure:

 

 

At game start...If the player is truly afk, when they load into the game, their rear turrets will move to one side or the other. On the other hand, if they have not loaded in, their front turrets face forward and the rear turrets remain facing rear until they are loaded in.

 

 

rR

 

If the turrets are centerline, WoWS' suboptimal client probably screwed them. Otherwise, just report them as bots which also works for AFK. If it's just a couple instances of being AFK they shouldn't get punished, but if its habitual/botting all the reports they'll accrue will catch up to them.

[Natsu7]

in real naval battles somebody always took over when the commander was busy or absent. my suggestion for wows creators

is for afk ships to go into automatic bot takeover.  this would help especially if player got knock out of game by server. no

player should be penalized for that. afk players who is distracted from game should have bot take over when they been away

for less than a minute. if or when they return there should be a way for a player to disengage automatic and get back in the

game. afk often jeopardizes fair play in the game that gives opposing side a winning edge.

[JCC45]

Recognizing that sometimes I have no option but to go AFK I have developed two strategies... one for Cruisers and one for DDs.

 

If I am in a DD I will immediately suicide YOLO as fast as I can towards where I think the Opfor is.  That way I can at least spot for my team and maybe get a little torp damage in before I am eliminated.

 

If I am in a cruiser (usually a Cleveland) I will make a bee-line for the nearest carrier and, when I am about 5 km away, between the carrier and the Opfor, I will set half speed and put it into a slow, constant turn.  That way at least the carrier can get some anti-air defence while I am away.  I also let the carrier know what I am doing.

[Skern]

Also, in addition to game crashes, Real Life is more important than a Game.

 

Some people will come to understand that once they get one.

 

Very well said.  I could not agree more.

[anonym_xgAO60ZDNRAq]

Ok, crashes happen, disconnections happen but this doesn't explain all the AFKs. While I see a lot of AFKs at the start of the game I rarely see a player stop playing mid-game, when it does happen the player nearly always gets back in.

I have had plenty of games where a person AFKs or dies in the first minute but we still went onto win.

It gets more difficult when it is 2-3 afks per game.

The other thing to remember is AFKers are on the enemy team as well thus giving you an advantag,e so things will balance themselves out over a number of games

 

[SeaGladius]

I've loaded into a game before only to have the baby wake up and start crying. After changing his diaper and/or feeding him, and/or handing him off to Mommy, I may make it back to the game before being killed. Real life does happen.

 

You can't make a bot take over for an AFK player though. If the player comes back, do they get XP for things the bot did? That would only encourage more bots, since they could now get useful XP and credits by going AFK.

[Tulisang]

Many years ago at an arcade there was a kid playing Asteroids.  Then his sister came up yelling at him that it was time to go.  Another kid who was passing by sees the kid leave.  He then takes control over the game and scored high enough to get his three initials in the top ten (or was it twelve?) leader board.  Now perhaps, and this may be a l'il too far fetched, that say after a time-out period or time-lapse parameter is met that boat, or hull will then be rendered open to boarding.  Perhaps a stand-by queue (akin to Team play/formation) or feature can be dev'd for any captain with the same earned hull take over with their own Captain skill sets, ship XP, modification, etc.?  Ah.  Prolly not.

 

[WhiteRecon]

I've loaded into a game before only to have the baby wake up and start crying. After changing his diaper and/or feeding him, and/or handing him off to Mommy, I may make it back to the game before being killed. Real life does happen.

 

You can't make a bot take over for an AFK player though. If the player comes back, do they get XP for things the bot did? That would only encourage more bots, since they could now get useful XP and credits by going AFK.

 

What?  What forum am I in?  That kid will never stop crapping in their pants if you just keep cleaning up after them!  Get back on caps dammit.  Kids need to be taught that winning takes commitment.