haha, maybe better players are taking all that time because they have hired consultants. For sure it is never because they are hoarding their ladder positions.

I beleive at somepoint someone suggested a realtime ladder. Caveat that the logistics are nigh impossible - still a nice thought for the imaptient and the ADD. Count me in.

I'd like to propose HHH as the studliest of ladder players. That mofo plays five games, always takes his turn, bows out when he's losing even if its against someone with 984, and thus his #5 is no squatting and all skill.

Sometimes you can't tell if somebody is "Ladder squatting" or not. I imagine I confuse the hell out a quick opponent. I go through waves when I can play a lot, and waves when I can't. So sometimes against a quick opponent I can play 10 moves a day. Sometimes I can play 3 moves a week. But for me it has nothing to do with my position on the ladder and everything to do with stuff in real life. And like most everybody else I take longer and play slower when I am losing. But yes, purposeful ladder manipulation does bug me.

I've played some games against Math Wolf recently, and he informed up front that he was likely to play infrequently and approach the boot timer. This has not bothered me at all, for several reasons.

1) He told me up front, so there's no guesswork. I can also increase my number of ladder games to compensate, if I want to.

2) He plays two turns when he plays one, so as to stall the least he can on his schedule.

3) He plays the same speed whether he is winning or losing, and is not trying to manipulate his scores.

On the other hand, I've played games where my opponent plays quickly until he hits a losing situation. But, he only slows down in our game, while posting on the forums, playing his other games, and making it clear that he's avoiding our game. Playing the min number of turns (1 per three days, rather than 2 per three days as per Math Wolf above) and refusing to surrender in an obviously losing situation really gets to me. If you also don't talk to me in chat about it, that's just making things worse.

I appreciate Diabolicus coming here and explaining what he was doing, because it's up front. And yeah, I know it sucks to be losing to someone rated lower than you, but that's how things work. HHH is a very good example of how to do things, and you can see the games where he surrendered to people rated way less than him, where stalling could get him back to first place.

Tell me more about those consultants Sheriff, you got me interested :)

To the point tough: I far from the fast player around (and I suck at realtime), and will occasionally wait a day or so before I play my next turn if a game is tricky, so I've got time to think of alternatives.

I have to agree with the overall sentiment in this thread: slowing down a clearly lost game just to maintain you ladder rank is kind of a low thing to do.