Getting Matched up with Blocked Opponents

I just played a free-for-all game with an opponent that I blocked. I blocked them specifically to avoid this happening. What's the purpose of blocking someone if you can still be matched up with them in a game?

Please fix this if possible! Thanks in advance, chess.com!

Can you block someone in team chess? I didn't think that was implemented. yet.

I'd be happy to block in either team or FFA. Some players' bad habits would be nice to avoid.

I didn't block them through the game, by the way. I blocked them by going to their profile page and clicking the block button. Still, wouldn't you assume that this would prevent a matchup with them?

One would hope... but I think blocking just has to do with messaging etc.

Blocking currently does not affect 4 player chess. The pool of players is not that big, so if blocking affects your pairings, then you could manipulate your pairings, like avoiding all the top players.

At least that is the current reasoning why it is not prioritized.

But we can already manipulate our pairings, by using the "Preferred Matchmaker Rating Range" setting. Everyone can avoid the top players this way.

Very true @Skeptomilos

idk, blocking is not a big deal to me, that was just something mentioned in an internal discussion some time ago. Maybe it is worth discussing again? Do you think it is important to prevent pairings with the blocked list and do you not consider it abuse to block a lot of people to affect your pairings? I'm not sure how to feel if players start blocking because they don't like a particular play style.

This game is meant to be fun. If a playing style spoils the fun, I think that the players should have a way to avoid it.

@Martin0, do you have other reasons against (in addition to "avoiding all the top players")? If "avoiding all the top players" is the only reason then just make the top players unavoidable. (Top 20? Top 50? Top 100?)

In most areas 'avoiding the top players' is not even an issue. We sign up for tournaments, often, that are within a certain range... not open tournaments.
The way I would like to use blocking would be to avoid people who, for example, instantly resign. Or who use foul language constantly in the chat. It is not 'playing style' or 'top players', but rude, obnoxious players that I wish to 'block'.

As mentioned above, avoiding top players is already an option in the regular variant (restricting rating range is an option in this variant too but the matching system doesn't always seem to pay attention to it). And there really is no benefit in avoiding top players in terms of rating. 

It is, however, very important for the community to be able to avoid rude and obnoxious players, as VAOhlman mentions. This improves the experience for everyone.

Anyway, intuitively, you would think blocking someone would exclude them from your pool of potential opponents.

I think I agree with you guys. You should not be able to get paired with blocked players or receive an invite to play as a team with a blocked player. I mentioned the blocked list as a minor point in a discussion and after getting a response that it could get abused, I didn't keep arguing. I'll raise the question again sometime after vacation ends with this forum in mind.

Happy new year everyone!

Thanks, Martin0! Happy new year

I don't play teams but agree that blocking makes more sense there.

However, I do play FFA and since there is no where to experiment, I like to try out new ideas or lines in live games.  Sometimes they work many times they don't.  It doesn't bother me since I don't take this game as personal as many other players.  Every skill level of player can make a blunder too.  There is just so many variables that can change in a wink of an eye, that I think it would be wrong to block someone on their perceived playing style.  Especially with so few players and the game so new.  

Happy New Year.

There actually is somewhere to experiment now. It's really cool.
http://www.smartbridge6.nine.ch/.4pcp/

Just to recap, here are some very good reasons that blocking someone should prevent you from being matched up with them in a game:

• Avoiding a player's obnoxious and offensive language
• Avoiding players who immediately resign and/or abandon games
• Avoiding players who tend to team up together. This just happened to me in a FFA game. The players to my left and to my right colluded the whole game unjustly. This is a problem since the pool of players is small so it is likely for you to be matched up with a friend.

Here are counter-points to reasons we may have for still including players you blocked in the pool of your potential opponents:

• You can avoid top players. Counter-point: you can already avoid top players by customizing the rating range. Furthermore, the way the rating system works, you do not have an advantage by only playing low ranked players, as eventually the amount of points you gain will be very small. If not playing top rated players were an advantage, chess organizations would force players to all play players of the same difficulty. This obviously isn't the case.
• You gain an advantage by avoiding playing styles that you don't like. Counter-point: we are able to do this in all versions of the regular variant, and this has not been abused. We can resign live and correspondence games if we review the player's games and find a style we don't like. 

Lastly, I'd like to add that avoiding players that take advantage of the system, either via the chat or via cheating, will create a more positive 4-player chess community. By implementing this change, in the long run you will benefit from fewer complaints in the forum. This is a legitimate solution to many of the complaints on the forum. By letting people know they can block players they want to avoid, the community will automatically banish the abusers. 

We will respect blocking in the future.