@Josh ...
Ok, now I REALLY don't understand what's going on either with the rules or the thresholds or this now similar issue I mentioned above...

I was playing a Double Deck partners game and at around 11:20 AM C.S.T. the game app contradicted itself or I just don't get it...lol. This dialog box I mentioned before regarding it just popping up unwelcomed and my opinion uncalled for if we don't have control of it...only exists in the Double Deck pinochle games! That's why I never saw it before because until a few days ago I exclusively played Single Deck pinochle.

Well, it reared its ugly head again and it made a decision for my partner and I we had no say in and then announced this decision like we were on board with it and chose this action. The action it took was:
"Player X and Player Y have Surrendered the bid (or hand...I don't rightly remember since it disappeared quickly like before)".

Well, I wasn't consulted and I didn't get a chance to calculate out my chances of making the bid that was still mathematically and reasonably reachable!!! Please let me explain via two (2) actual game conditions that happened as best as I can remember...

Game Condition #1:
I won the bid somewhere between 60 and 70 points...I don't exactly remember but for calculating the situation let's call it 60 point bid. The shuffling algorithm is not real friendly lately and rather tight so we only mustered up 35 meld leaving a balance of 25 points needed to make bid. Well, in Double Deck pinochle the total available trick points is 50 each round as the books are collected up to the last card thrown. Needing 25 of the available total 50 is quite reachable especially since it is only a 50% share. Well not in this round could we even try since this quick-draw dialog box popped up saying we surrendered the hand even though we didn't and never had the chance to make our own decision.

Game Condition #2:
Basically same setup as #1 in that we won the bid but our chance were even worse. We really got stuck with the bid and I think it was around the 60s.

I know we needed 35 more points out of the table trick points to make our bid and I felt we were doomed. I remember it was a higher amount than the forced "surrender" hand...
BUT guess what? No pop-up dialog box claiming a false surrender. No message that flashed past almost too fast to read. The game let us play on through needing 35 out of 50 available trick points and we got clobbered...lol. Our hands were weak of power. But we played it and made the decision on our own to stay in playing it with nothing making false claims of what my partner and I decided in this condition.

So in Summary:
1) How could the game decide for the players what is playable and what is not especially if it is mathematically reachable? If it wasn't then there should be a stop to move on so time and game play isn't wasted on something unachievable.

2) If there is a checks and balances in the Double Deck areas then why isn't it user friendly to interact with bid winner via asking if we should proceed...not some false verbiage that we surrendered like we even knew about it?

3) And if we could get it working right and interacting with the bid team then how come we don't have this in the Single Deck areas?

4) How and why did it cancel out my hand that was frankly makeable needing 25 of 50 trick points yet it let us play a worse hand needing 35 of 50 trick points?

5) When considering my message posted earlier just before this one about the similar issues...why did the game app falsely "surrender" our hand in that other game ESPECIALLY when my partner had Double 4-of-a-kind Queens for 60 meld points? That was more odd than the two contradictory conditions I listed above.

Please let me know if I saw all of this or that I truly am older than I admit to and had a stroke or something....LOL
Thanks Josh for all you do!
M.O.B.

@Mike-Ox-Big sounds like a bug. The automatic surrender should only apply when it's 100% impossible to meet the bid, meaning total melds plus 100% of tricks (either 25 or 50 depending on how many decks). The other case would be if you don't have a trump marriage in double deck, as "must have trump marriage" is the default setting for double deck.. However, the message should tell you if this is the reason.

I know there were some bugs today that broke surrender and take the rest from working correctly. I am wondering if that was related. Was trying to fix something else and accidentally broke this, but should be working again now.

I'll be doing some more testing to see if this happens again.

Thanks for the expeditious reply, @Josh.
I don't rightly remember if we didn't have a trump suit marriage or not. BTW, I know it is an option in the settings but didn't think they all work. This rule doesn't apply over in Single Deck so my mind isn't geared yet to automatically check for it. Are we leary that if we applied it to Single Deck arenas that bidding scores would be even lower than what the average winning bid number probably is!or that there would be a fair amount of busts and missed bids even before a card is thrown? Would definitely need that "Surrender" dialog box over in Single if bid marriage was required...

I also noticed that the hierarchy of cards being played for a particular suit during a trick can be played out of order. That is not typical for pinochle no matter how many decks. Makes a huge difference in smoking out the opponent's cards especially trump suit. I may make dozens of players mad but can this rule be fixed and applied? Some players correctly throw the higher card anyway even though they have the ability to cheat it.

Thanks Josh and enjoy the rest of the weekend.
M.O.B.

@Josh,
I just got bounced out of another game with a high profile record player as my opponent named Gail...!!!

This is unfair and any work that I do on my rating or my record is meaningless especially with the heavy penalties you inflict.

I just got bounced and did nothing to deserve a dialog box of something about:
"Trouble Connecting to Server. Please Try Again" and then BAM...!!! ..I get hit with a huge deduction of 20 or 25 points off my Rating!!!! WTH? And I take another hit in the loss column I did not earn.

Now showing me at 20.....20!! Abandons and I admit to along with owning only maybe 12 or 13 of those. And half of what I admit and take ownership of were to stop the undo pain some of us have to endure as the real future expert tables develop. So like I mention before...you are correct in saying that players are tired and hurt from many players quitting games. Well, some of us get hurt for those other reasons I mentioned before but we get penalized either for quitting or staying & losing resulting in a hit to your rating AND your record....ouch.

Previously it was kinder to us to get out of game resulting in less stress, renewed spirit again for the game (spirit recently stomped on for every card blunder), small rating reduction...

Now it's a Catch 22...lol
Either take a rating hit AND loss to get out of what can sometimes be horrible...Or...Stay in and endure the difficult situation which most often ends in a loss and rating reduction.

So, Josh, I have been stuck in a Rating rut between the 1540s to the 1570s and at the whim of Server drops, players playing at the "Expert Table" because they suffer from "Delusions Of Grandeur"...lol...or any one of a few glitched in the app that you are working on.

In all fairness and giving me the benefit of the doubt, along with me at least being honest to admit to my FAIR share, could you please credit back my Rating points lost from approx. 35% to 40% of my advertised "Abandoned" game numbers (40% of 20 currently accused of abandoning equals 8 games)? Obviously, the Loss column should be reduced accordingly. Please keep in mind that the 7 or 8 games which are in error charged against me should be weighted, as well. For example that tonight's "Server Unavailable" nonsense which should not be aty expense was weighted very heavily with at least a 20 point Rating reduction that should be repaired back.

Thank you in advance for your help, @Josh.
M.O.B.

@Josh,
Please look this up and it occurred just now at approximately 1:50 p.m. on Thursday June 20th. My partner and I are playing along just fine and winning handsomely put it mildly and our score is 493 in expert double deck so we only need seven more points. We are all four players bidding on the last hand and all of a sudden a dialogue box comes up stating sorry blah blah blah and it drops us out of the game. This is getting to be a very tiresome and old issue. Can you look up and find out why this one happened and if someone was quitting and the robot was coming in glitch or if there was a different new issue?

Also, I know you might not agree with me or like how I put this but I think the shuffling algorithm is broken again. I base this comment on purely knowledge and schooling regarding statistics and the law of averages. I find it unlikely playing double deck pinochle that for approximately 40 to 50 hands now as I loosely keep track to almost completely be void of marriages to be able to bid on a suit and obviously family runs or even four of a kind. In other words, my delf hands have been hideous and really can I bid on cards that are supposed to be shuffled on a 60 card deck not being able to come up with any reasonable meld. I have even had hands where I have ended up with a suit only having one card or maybe two and this is out of a 60 card deck supposedly being randomly shuffled. Now I understand in the law of averages we have to have extremes but these extremes have to even out. There is no argument there about they have to even out so if I end up with hands that resemble what I stated above then I should have opposing hands that are opposite in nature. In other words if I have hands that only have one or two cards of a suit in a 60 card deck that was shuffled then we should be seeing hands with suits that have 18 or 19 cards out of the 20 available. I am not trying to be picky or ultra even with regards to random shuffling but just based on what I am seeing lately with regards to the shuffling I cannot comment to it being within the law of averages. Whatever's happening is making it just not any fun anymore especially when you can't bid on anything and I am stretching hands into needing 35 of the 50 available meld and double deck or 18 to 20 I'll be available 25 and single deck. I can't do this every time and don't want to since I've worked hard to get at an 86% win rate. Honestly, I think there is something wrong with the shuffling algorithm lately and it doesn't matter what table you sit down at so at least I know it's systemic. Thanks for hearing me out and please see why we were bounced out of that recent game. By the way, that is starting to happen more frequently as well.

@Josh,
At approx 1:50 PM today I wrote that the game gave another one of those sorry blah blah blah warnings and then proceeded to and drop us out of the game. Well, now at 6:30 p.m. I write to you that it has happened two more times with the same dialog box popping up. I took a screenshot this time and will attach it so that you know what it says. The worst part of this, besides playing along and having a good game but possibly having a tarnished image if others think that you are quitting, is that I have now noticed the app unfairly quits you with a loss and reduction in rating. I know this for fact because I should have passed by 1700 in rating by now but keep on falling short because of unjust losses happening because of the game crashing. Attached is the screenshot of whatever is going on. Somehow I have taken another three losses that are not my fault which is just wrong. If it is my fault because of a bad internet connection then let me know but according to this dialog box it is stating that it is not me and it is the game.

If for some reason it is my connection then I need to know because it is making it appear that I am quitting on people while we are winning the game which is most bizarre.
Thanks,
M.O.B.

@Mike-Ox-Big Thanks for the screenshot and details. I was able to confirm both these game errors in the logs. This is an issue that I see happen in about 1% of the games where one of the players fails to acknowledge the start of the next trick and causes the game to freeze and crash. I haven't been able to replicate it so I don't fully understand what causes it or how to recover from it but I am planning to rework the way this works to make the process more seamless. I removed the penalties since I was able to confirm this was an error. Hope to figure this issue out soon. Thanks again for the details.

@Josh,
Hello...been a little while.
And that is part of the FYI that I wanted to post for you to just let you know....

I figured you had solved the gremlin in the app that would drop all the players with no stated reason in the dialog box that pops up after a looonnnggg wait. Another screenshot of the dialog box is attached for continuity.

At approx 3:40 AM CST a game that was going along fine and was pretty much tied in score got the mysterious dump.

No apparent reason I could see why someone would be quitting at that point since game wasn't even halfway through and was about tied...but you'll be able to tell.

Just giving you info.
Thanks,
M.O.B.

@Josh,
Just happened at approx 3:30 PM CST today at the moment I believe when the dialog box should have come up for me throwing my 5th to last trump card wherein I have the rest of the tricks and app should state that while collecting all cards. It really was right at about the right moment after I threw that trump card that the game would acknowledge I had the rest since I was only one with trump suit left.

We were up approx 270ish to 110ish... maybe someone quitting at same time as dialog box I described above? Just guessing...

Please let me know if you found anything on the other one I reported a couple days ago or this one. Please credit back my rank points and subtract out a couple of quits too.

As before I have attached a screenshot of dialog box.
Thanks Josh,
M.O.B.

@Josh,
Just now at approx 3:37 PM CST the game ended for no apparent reason. Attached is the screenshot.

Also, a couple days ago I quit a game for a very valid reason in that everyone passed on bid so the bid went to me while we were competing for the bid. BUT... the bidding dialog box stays up in front of the dialog box asking to pick your trump suit. It wouldn't go away and when I clicked on the most forefront dialog box (bidding) it increased the bid amount for bid already given to me and waiting for me to pick trump suit. I kept trying to click on the bid box to get it to go away since I was being counted down on a timer like I was just sitting there...!!! Well, since I was stuck and had tapped the stuck bid box it accrued to a bid of 90 from my win of I think it was 60 or 65 (double deck obviously). Well, the hand wasn't a 65 let alone a 90. I would have made the 65 through the addition of trick points but why should I go down on this bizarre dialog box battle?

Please credit back my Rank points for these app errors and subtract out at least the one quit for the glitch game end. The other game I admit quitting but my rank shouldn't suffer from being stuck in that bizarre new glitch.

Thanks Josh

@Josh...arrggghhh!!! @#&$*!
At approx 9:37 PM CST I was in a game with @Myongpun for only the second time as my opponent and the damn set very drop happens AGAIN to me playing the same high rating, high record player. What is going on here?

I can and will deal with it if people get mad at me or I get some kind of reputation for someone that quits or drops out of a game for some reason. But these random drops I'm making me look like a fool and scared to play especially now for a second time against this great player that is at the top of our leaderboard!

@Myongpun, I am not running away or quitting on playing you. I cannot believe that this has happened again!!!

@Josh,
Please credit me back my Rating points lost, subtract out the loss from my record and subtract out from the "Quitter" score number.

I'm just today I have three UNEARNED losses along with a chunk of ratings gone and skyrocketing on the Quitter score card. Please help me.
Thanks,
M.O.B.

yes almost on a daily basis it seems like. Just happened AGAINN uggggg score 117 to 58 we were in the lead almost done and sorry SERVER ERROR. i was charged with a loss and penalty. Getting so frustrated with this happening so often

Wow, @Terber. I wonder where you are at that you are a couple hours into July 12th already yet I still have an hour left in July 11th...LOL

I don't know if you saw a recent posting by @Josh but he stated that they brought the server down temporarily to do some remedial fixes which I think involved the issues you and I have written about. Since Josh's posting regarding that subject I have not seen those errors happen yet but I'm seeing a brand new one which is bizarre.

@Josh,
I have a new one for you. Three times tonight at random intervals with random parameters I saw the game allow the player who won the book (trick) find visually sweeping those cards toward that players position which makes sense since I witnessed that player did have the appropriate high card or Trump card. But what is bizarre is that the player did not get the next turn or to throw the next card. The turn went to someone else for some reason. Unless there is a rule I don't know about I don't know why this is happening.

Could you acknowledge this posting regarding this new glitch along with my last three postings requesting adjustments to my rating, win loss record, and game dropping penalty number? I haven't heard back from you lately but I know you have been busy rolling out that remedial fix.

Thanks Josh and good luck Terber

Looking into this...