1. 4pouncers November 1, 2008, 6:43 am 32/30 106.66% 791.9 sec. 253.2 pts. 8103

[smoochie222]

Here we go again

[4pouncers]

Hi! I'm 4pouncers. Can someone explain the weird stats? Obviously, I'm new here and still learning how to deal with different browser quirks, etc.

Since I'm in Honolulu, I wasn't fully aware that October's competition had ended (6:00pm doesn't feel anything like midnight!). It was about 6:20pm when it dawned on me that it was already Nov. 1 EST. So, I stopped playing and saw that my number of games played had reset (i.e. 2 /2). That seemed to make sense as it was the start of a new month/competition.

Thinking that October was "closed" and no longer being tallied (i.e. complete history), I went back to my recent games and solved the 5 that hadn't been solved just to do it. That's when I noticed the wacky numbers.

Is this usual? Does that mean that we can't ever go back and "retry" if the competition has just ended, even though the puzzles still appear in our recent games? How long does it take for the competion to be completely closed, if it ever is? Thanks for any info. Even though my stats are back to "normal", I'm still confused.

[maradnu]

4pouncers

The following is my surmise, based on what I've seen. Perhaps the admin can clarify or confirm.

You can retry, even if the monthly competition has ended, but those puzzles will not count for the closed month. Once you hit the midnight EST time, no further completions will count for the old month. If you were in the middle of a puzzle at midnight, that is counted as a missed puzzle for the old month. That may seem unfair, but otherwise someone could open a bunch of browser windows and complete a bunch of puzzles after the "end" and perhaps end in a higher position in the rankings than they should.

Next question comes on how should those puzzles be counted for the next month. It is not really fair to show someone with over 100% even if they were charged with the open puzzle last month and credited for its completion this month. Again, you could have someone game the system, completing far fewer puzzles, but ending over 100% by spanning months and knocking someone out of first on accuracy who really deserved it.

No easy answers on how best to score the competition, but at least some attempt to be fair to all.

[4pouncers]

Thanks for the info. Makes sense for fairplay. Would be nice to have the option of retrying unsolved puzzles without having them included in either the old or new month (i.e. "stat less"). Not interested in cheating, but definitely interested in having the option of going back & finishing what I started. Several puzzles became "unsolved" and showed thousands of seconds played when the Check It button was not selectable. Again, various browser issues....

[maradnu]

Well we got another one

jerseymom November 3, 2008, 3:21 pm 224/223 100.44%

[4pouncers]

How does this happen if we're already 3 days into the new month?

[maradnu]

Another one

Glitches with the software on the site.