I quite like that inactive players are removed from the leader board to make it easier to see who’s left, but why do quitters remain there? They’re all AI so why treat them differently?
Ideally it would be great to have the option to filter all players and active players so you can see how many stars the AI players have at a glance.
I second that. I survived until last in a game, where the big powers quit after I frustrated them with resistance - yet I ended up fourth, with two quitters ahead of me.
Because you can still place if you quit. If a quitter is in second place when the game ends they will get second place. An AFKer cannot place no matter how many stars they get.
To echo what Jay said, in mega-games, it often will become somewhat clear who is going to win-place-show … so if all players are agreeable, rather than do a slog for a few more weeks, it’s simply a matter of lining up the agreed upon finishers in order on the leaderboard, and then everyone quits, allowing the winner to claim the game, but the other players to “win” their positions even though they quit.
@pacoelayudante So you state that I should not play out losing positions but rather quit early to make it easier for players with a slight edge?
@JayKyburz Yes, so I gather. But why is that so? In most games I played people quit in quite playable positions, just because they felt the tide had turned against them.
I try to play losing positions to the end - why have an incentive to quitters?
No, I did not state that.
Maybe I was a little elusive, I will try to explain myself better:
I think the rule works so a player who plays purely defensive can’t win over a player that has more stars and decides to quit because it grow tired or bored, and, if it does happens in a situation where the defensive player is not too far behind, then he can keep playing to get the stars needed to be a winner.
Also, I really don’t think it’s an incentive to quitters, quitting hardly makes you be in a higher position than you, by actually playing, reached. It’s unusual.
And, in terms of incentives, ¿wouldn’t be frustrating for a player that quits having a good score, but unable to keep playing for some reason (like getting bored maybe), to end up with less points than a player with low score but able to keep playing? And that’s what I mean with frustration as a winning strategy. ¿What if I decide to keep logging in on a game that’s super lost for me, but maybe I score because most of everybody else just quit, even when they might have lots of more stars than me?
Ok, this thread has gone in a totally different direction to what I intended!
I was leading up to the fact that in some cases you can’t see those AFK players at all after they’re removed. In a game I’m currently in; a Dark Galaxy with 10 players (so there’s no graphical player display across the top of the GUI) we’ve had a few AFKers and as far I can see I have no way clicking on those players after they’ve been removed from the leader board. This means I can’t trade tech with those AI, or even see how many stars / ships etc. they have. I think in an 8 player game I can still click on the AFKer’s avatar on the top of the GUI.
Oh right, didn;t think of that case.
H key to bring up your own empire summary and arrow key to cycle to them perhaps.
I’d like to see all players in the Leaderboard list, even AFK. Besides their names and pictures, there is the valuable information on how many stars do they still possess.
What about the compromisse to list the AFKs in different color, or just last in the Leaderboard list? Why do I think, that it was like that before?
Thanks - yes ‘H’ then the arrow keys did the trick.
Yes - putting them at the bottom of the leaderboard below KO’d players could work. I like that idea.
A route around this issue is to send them a message, then click on your message tab and click the empire link in the “to” part of the message.
Thanks Ross, although I think it’s probably easier to just press H & arrow key a few times =)
Well, yeah, that is easier, but I invented my own way. 
I like the suggestion of putting them at the bottom of the leaderboard.
Just to add another point to this - the AFKers also don’t appear in the Game Over leaderboard screen so we can’t see their true identities which doesn’t seem fair.
Yeah it would be good to be able to get an idea of who the serial AFK’ers are.
Ya, I hate this, because a lot of the cheating alt-ers just let there alts go afk when they are no longer needed for the cheated win, and you can’t ever see what the account names were.