World of Card Games

Last night, I attended my second live, in-person card game event. It's been over a month since my last event, so it's about time.

These games last much longer than an online game. I arrived at 7, left at 9:30, and only had time for one game of Spades. There's no timer at the table, and people are talking and eating... That makes a difference.

My partner and I managed to win the game! It was touch-and-go for a while. I got set when bidding nil; I had a decent hand for a nil bid, but had too many medium-value cards in the clubs suit. Our luck turned later in the game. We were able to set our opponents, and then my partner managed to pull off a nil bid when she was holding the King of Spades! A desperate ploy! Fortunately, I was holding the Ace, and was able to cover her. This nil put us ahead, and undoubtedly won us the game.

These events are a lot of fun... I highly recommend that you get out and play some card games, if you can. Meetup is a great resource for finding card game groups. If you don't have the time, or can't get out, head on over to World of Card Games for the next best thing.

To celebrate St. Patrick's Day, 5 new avatars have been added to World of Card Games... Enjoy!

Hi all - just a note that the site is down at the moment (7:07 PM EST). There appears to be a rather severe problem at my host. I can't even contact them, since they're offline. I'll let you know asap what's up.

Edit: the site's back up as of 7:22 PM EST. I hope it stays that way! My host said they had an issue with an "edge router."

It has been almost a month since the "replace robots" feature was introduced to World of Card Games, only to be removed when a bug was uncovered. Today this feature was reintroduced. I think the bug has been fixed... Give it a try! And please let me know if you experience any issues with this new feature. For more info about how it works, visit the "replace robots" blog post.

[Edit Feb 14 2014: another bug occurred on the same day which caused serious problems, so the replace robots feature has been removed once again. I'll be working to fix it, and it should return in the future.]

There are three new avatars at World of Card Games. Wishing you an early Happy Valentine's Day!

Some players at World of Card Games get frustrated with new users of the site. What do I mean by a "new user"? That's a person who has never visited the site before, or someone who has only played a game or two at the site. They are probably still learning the ropes. They might play poorly, or leave a game quickly because they don't understand what they should do. That can annoy more experienced users, who just want to get on with their game.

Up until now there was not much you could do about this. There's always been an option to play with "Registered Players Only". However, this excludes a lot of unregistered players (Guests) who have been playing card games at the site for a long time, and who just haven't bothered to register. And it includes very new registered users who may have the same issues as an unregistered new user.

Today, I added a new feature which should help with this problem. Experienced users may now choose to exclude new users from their tables. You will find this new setting under the Options panel (screenshot below).

exclude new users option

The option is not checked, by default - to use it, you will have to edit your options.

In addition, newer users are now indicated by the color of their name - it's shown in yellow (the default color for names is white):

new users have yellow name tags

If you see someone with a yellow nametag, the person hasn't been playing at the site for very long. They might be fine players, but they might also act a little confused. It's just a little warning that you might see unexpected behavior.

There's nothing wrong with being a new user; everyone was a new user at one point! But if you're not the patient sort, you probably will want to choose the "Exclude New Users" option. It might save you some frustration.

Finally, remember that you can always exclude specific players in a more fine-tuned way by using the "dislike players" icon. Disliking a player means you won't be seated with them again.

Hi everyone! This is a public service announcement :)

Please let me know about bugs or issues. I love to get bug reports! (This may seem strange - but how else will I know what's wrong?)

I do know that there are some problems with the site, in particular the fact that it "freezes" sometimes. I've been trying to get a handle on that, without success so far. But if it happens to you, it's useful if you notify me - it will give me an idea how often it occurs. And if you can give me any details about the computer or device that you use to play with, all the better.

If you've reported an issue, and it hasn't been fixed yet - my apologies! I have to prioritize bug fixes, and can't always fix something very quickly.

If you report something more than once, don't worry! I don't consider this nagging. It's nice to know that people care enough about World of Card Games to really want the bug fixed.

You can contact me at marya@worldofcardgames.com