An actual case of collusion in FFA?

Even though about 99% of collusion accusations are unfounded, made by players who do not understand the metagaming aspects of FFA,  there is still a point where it is simply too much. I think,  and other observers also,  that in this game, blue/green 's play constitute a breach of the rules.  This type of teaming goes in our opinion, beyond what is/should be tolerated in FFA.

https://www.chess.com/4-player-chess?g=379049

What do you guys think?   How would you describe the way this game differs from other games where players team up but yet do it in a way that is not against the rules?  How it differs from a game like this one : https://www.chess.com/4-player-chess?g=372701   where I definately cooperated with green but still with respect for the fact that he could turn against me at anytime? 

You never know who can betray you..

These idiotic people ruin fun for others..

I don't think teaming is very necessary in FFA.

Sometimes little corporation is fine in FFA. Too much leads to break of rules :/

Here in the 1st case, they are doing too much of teaming and they still continued it to the end.

Here in the 2nd case, you did teaming, but you didn't continued to the end.

@username_noob   In high rated games  ( 1650+)     situational teaming is in fact necessary,  because players will not make obvious blunders.  They will defend their position skillfully,  and it is generally impossible to launch an attack by yourself on a player  without trading or sacrificing material and in the process ruining your position.  But if you cooperate  you can destroy one of the players with minimum material investment, and hence without hurting your own chance at winning the 3 player game that will follow.

It's simple GAME THEORY in its natural basic form. You can not legislate against alliances as long as the game is made with the current degrees of liberty to choose. Further attempts to claim justice in this game have great entertainment value.

Oh ok. Sorry, I don't know that because I don't play FFA.

First time I report a game for over limit cooperation.

The main difference between "collusion" (the illegal aspect of cooperation) and "teaming" (the legal aspect of cooperation), is that collusion is playing with the KNOWLEDGE that you have full cooperation from your opposite while teaming is playing and TRUSTING that your opposite has seen the same mutual benefits that you have from a particular course of action. 

For example, when opposites run Queen pawns to the centre, the understanding is that if you both ignore each other you can both promote. This is advantageous to you both as generally speaking the players on either side of you are bigger threats early on and if your opposite falls early, you often struggle. So even though, usually, capturing a queen for a pawn would be the right move, if you capture you both end up with no promotion, no development and one less pawn each. Advantage then falls to the other two players who have been developing. 

The game demonstrates collusion to me, as no one would sensibly make some of those moves unless they KNEW their opposites intentions. 

thank you mccp1987, 

that seems like a good way to put it: trust vs knowledge.  

Although you can trust someone so much that you basically know how he will react; trust and knowlege can overlapse.  sometimes it's obvious,   but there are grey areas.

Wow. At first I thought "this cannot be real, is BILL acussing others of 'collusion'?", but the match you quote has to be one of the most extreme cases I've seen; up there with those players that some months ago were top of the leaderboard.

As I see it, the problem with those cases is that they take an unfair advantage against other players, winning not because of their skill but because of a different understanding of the rules. At the same time, it makes FFA indistinguishable from teams. In the end, one has to ask Progenitor and Oleg why don't they don't simply play in that modality.

I feel strongly that Oleg's rating should be wiped to starting point, and I will be quite upset if this doesn't happen...

I also reported this game... way too blatant. Sorry Oleg.

I don't see a way out of this teaming dilemma. Do you have to take free pieces? Are you not allowed to help one player, but not another? Is "poor sportsmanship" against the rules?

A player can play any move he wants to play, or not?

What rules do we have? pre-teaming is forbidden, and using the chat.

"there is still a point where it is simply too much" where do you draw the line?

don't get me wrong, i don't like it either. but i have to ask: which rule did oleg violate?

i think we desperately need rule changes. but not ones where moderators most make near impossible decisions as to what was ok teaming and what wasn't. it will never be fair, nor enforcable.

I'm thinking of rule changes like: promoted queens are worth 9 points, and checkmate is worth 50. there have been a few suggestions already (anonymous, 9th rank promotion come to mind)

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There will never be a clear cut way of telling...  But moderators will not have to make 'near impossible decisions' either.   There will always be grey zones,  which will have to be tolerated.   But in my opinion,  games like this one, which stand out as a clear example of what no one wants to see in FFA, should lead to at least a warning. 

In any case,   the admins who will have to make decisions about what constitutes collusion will have to be very strong FFA players,  because  you have to possess a very good understanding of FFA strategy in order to determine what constitutes  good moves and what constitues something no one in their right mind could play. 

How can you tell  'pre' teaming from teaming anyway?   How is that enforcable?   How do you know players havent talked with each other and pre-teamed in the previous game?   It sure looks like they did.

The game in question is indistinguishable from pretemaing, if it isn't.   where do the players find the confidence to leave pieces hanging like this for 10+ moves? it  makes no sens at all. Oleg is evenknow  for attacking his opposite at times,  which is pretty odd.

Right from the start onmove 3 he plays with great confidence in blue, then the whole game goes on  where both players seem to have perfect confidence that the other will never capture anything from them. And the never make any attempt at attacking each others in the whole game, even when it becomes clear they are going to win.

If this can be allowed,then pre-teaming has to also be allowed, because it's the same thing

I agree with Bill 100%, it looks very much like they agreed before the game...and yes, I think that hanging pieces for an absurd number of moves and basically using the other player's pieces as defenders is just blatant; while that happens on occasion and there's nothing wrong with it here and there, I think there's something wrong when it is going on the whole game. Basically, I think it goes too far when the whole game cannot be distinguished for how they WOULD have played had they agreed to team beforehand...

To be fair, given my interactions with Oleg, I don't suspect that he is the type of person to team. I felt kind of bad for reporting this, but it seems like I had to. What I mean to say is I that I trust him, given his history here. In general, a community built around suspicion of others is generally toxic too, I may add. Kind of sad that this is what a friendly game is coming too.

In the game #379049 two players teamed-up from move three: @Oleg_Barantsev and @Progredior. Why are you mentioning only one of them? The case for teaming is crystal clear, the rules were broken. These players should not be allowed to play FFA together again.