On Board Game Arena you are playing "live" (real time). That means you have an allotted delay to play your moves.

Most of the time, your initial delay at the beginning of a game is 3 minutes. During each turn, or on specific occasions, you get an additional delay. If you have no more time to play, you will get a penalty and can become eligible to be expelled from the game.

Time to think

Your allotted time to think is displayed on the right of your player's name. When it's your turn to play, this time is also displayed at the top of the web page.

Game speed

Table administrator can make a choice between 4 game speed profile:

• Fast
• Normal
• Slow
• Without time limit

The additional amount of time credited each turn depends on chosen game speed profile. Be careful to check game speed before game start to adapt your timing.

Note: playing without time limit is strongly discouraged, except if you are playing with friends or to discover a new game. Remember that without time limit, you can't expel a player that stops playing.

Running out of time

As soon as you run out of time, you get a clock penalty.

If you go over your alloted time by more than 3/4/5 minutes (depending on game speed), any opponent can expel you from the game. Of course, it is strongly advised not to run out of time ...

Move time limit

In addition to your classical time to think, you have a limited time alloted for each move.

When it's your turn to play, a red bar appears on top of the web page. It symbolized the remaining time limit for this move. The amount of time depends on game speed. If you go over this limit, you become eligible to be expelled from the game.

"My opponent is too slow"

Each of us has different expectations on game speed. Please remember that as soon as a table has been set up at a given game speed, each player is allowed to use all his allotted time to think. If you want to play fast, set up or join table with "fast" mode only, but don't force an opponent to play when he has the right to do so.

"I would like to think a little"

If you are in a critical step of the game and want to take some time to think, you can click on the link "I would like to think a little" on the top right of the page.

Thus, your opponents will receive a message and won't be thinking you are away from keyboard.

Clicking on this link is not mandatory, but we encourage its use for courtesy.