FFA collusion and intentional teaming.

I used to play 4 player chess daily, religiously and I loved it. 

But I have reduced it to once a week now, because of how bad ffa can be. People don't say anything during game, but many choose to intentionally team.

This time around, I got this guy against me who after the game bragged about how he helped yellow win the game. His own admission about it is reflection of what goes on very commonly. 

I do understand that sometimes the games turn out to be in a way that you may feel unfair, but this is different. The guy says "I'm glad I could win that game for you". Is this not against FFA? The guy isn't playing solo/fair but is playing to get other (opposite) to win. 

Please let me know if I am wrong here. If so, I will admit that I have no clue about 4 player chess and never play again. 

But if I am right, please kindly add my rating points back or at least ban this user from FFA.

In addition, if you view the game,  throughout the game, I maintained a solid defense and eventually gave in to them just trading points and not taking each other's queens

1600s are even worse. A lot of unskilled players in the leaderboard. That shouldn't affect anyone who is a 4pc FFA master class UNLESS games like this happen and all you can do is block players who do the same (toxic play). This game is a great example, I guess players nowadays are too kind to block someone and because of that unskilled players get a lot of rank by teaming. Also these players only play just to bring someone down.Today 1750 player make such mistakes it's laughable. No team, no win. Pathetic.

i agree, FFA smells really bad

that is why i like teams variant better and i only play casual in ffa 

There's a solution to this type of behaviour: play solo.

Some players say "honor", like you shouldn´t go against a player that helped you (g.e., saved you from being mated), yet helping someone to win is really overpushing that "honor". That may prevent any major "betrayal" as gratitude, but don´t just help all the way. At best, we´ll try to reach a balanced 2 players endgame, and may the best win

solo is not the solution, solo is the problem, now people thinks solo is the real ffa, and ffa its just team

FFA had been "teams-light" for ages now, even before Solo was first introduced. People are just perfecting their "teaming" strategies over time.

1550+ wta system was perfect

Solo is the natural evolution, though FFA (imo anyways) is ever a "should" for beginners that just attack the first player that comes within range regardless if that ups their winning chances or even if that right away gives the victory to some other player. 1550+, 1600+, 1650+,

Even in solo among skilled and experienced players you can expect very friendly-opposite in the 4 players stage, because attacking the opposite (common among begginers) or even just cashing the blunders of the opposite heavily imbalances the game in favor of the other axis. I use you as meat shield  It´s the 3 players stage that makes all the difference, in theory, as many players enter solo with the FFA mindset or are so gold-hearted that can´t break alliances.

The FFA recently became a teaming paradise and I agree that there are 15xx to 17xx players that play so poorly but somehow they got this rating through teaming.

Solo is better but still not good enough since attacking the opposite is not a good idea while there are still 4 players remaining and at the same time there is no incentive for not finishing on 4th place.

Let's face it ... we need a system where once we have 3 players left, any remaining teaming should be against the player. I would vote for +3 -0.5 -0.5 -2. In this case, the remaining opposite players cannot afford to keep the teaming because even if they kick out the side player, one of them will get the same rating change for finishing second. I know that the chances go up from 1/3 to 1/2 if the side player is out but still, a good player may estimate the quality of their remaining pieces and see if they have any chance after they stay on 1:1.

World championship is in SOLO! Not in ffa! With a reason!

world championship is casual

lol 

Thats Why I Hate Teamers!!!

to anyone who gets second because they teamed with their opposite when they could have gotten first: 

THERE IS A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE FOUR PLAYER PHASE AND THE THREE PLAYER PHASE: 

four player phase: it is much easier for the side players to attack you and it is much easier for you to attack the sides, which makes both sides your worst enemies. the opposite has the same enemies as you and the sides both think of you and your opposite as their worst enemies. this means that teaming with your opposite is good strategy. 

three player phase: you teamed with your opposite earlier because you don't want to be the sandwiched player. the sandwiched player is at disadvantage and is very likely to get third anyway even if you do attack your opposite. 

can everyone just shut up about the "honor" thing. if teaming means honor, then honor is just something tryhard trash players do to raise a rating that is nothing more than a meaningless number while the rest of us are just trying to have fun playing a dumb game. 

I'm leaning toward 1/1 and 1/2 games to avoid cheating, but it's not foolproof as I just lost to an obvious team. Still, it seems a lot less common in bullet, presumably because it's harder to coordinate effectively when under time pressure.

@Laris95
> No team, no win. Pathetic.

Nope, it's standard game theory. Pathetic is refusing to cooperate / search for alliances in a multiplayer game. 

Have you seen the movie Hunger Games?