Player of the year 2023 vote

[Turnabout]

I found really fun how nasty people started to act nicely just to win the prize .

[culichi]

well it has some pretty nifty prizes hehe i might even hug muolke if it got me that wolf mount

[+Colibri]

Results posted in the original post.

Rankings of the vote
The vote stone has closed and we have our rankings!

A foonote for whoever might have noticed that Nmrd had 55 votes, and it's now down to 53. There were 2 players that I have disqualified from the vote, but it doesn't really change anything. Nmrd still came in a close second, and although I have disqualified these 2 votes, there is still indication that these could be legit players who came in (perhaps on invitation) and then didn't stay to play for long.

[Praise]

Congratulations to all the winners! All well deserved!

[Johnny Warren]

Congrats Zalia, very well deserved. The average account age of the voters for the top 5 was an interesting stat to add.

[Lach]

Congratulations Zalia, Nmrd, & Seventh Stone. Not to meantion the runners up I know yall have done alot for the shard the past 10 to 15+ years.

[Johnny Warren]

OK, I did not want to muddy the waters during the vote, but, in my opinion, this competition is a bit weird and dodgy and there are a few ways it could be made more valid.

I would suggest the following:

1) Fix the rewards. Remove the ability to break game mechanics by gating to fel, that's (in my opinion) a no-brainer, this mechanic is awful and advantages a couple of people hugely. Make all the special mounts temporary or better yet remove them entirely. I would prefer to see the winner get 5 titan's hammers than completely unobtainable, never-auctioned mounts. IMO, the key to the realm would suffice as a reward for the whole thing.

2) Players who have less than 100 days of logins during the year in question are ineligible. Again, a no-brainer. If you didn't play during the year, you can't be player of the year.

3) Account age must be over 6 months old to vote. Removes the ability for people to buy out noobs votes for cheap and people spamming dodgy accounts to vote.

4) Additional votes for older players. This one is contentious, and I could be persuaded it is a bad idea. But I think if you are 5 years old you should have 2 votes. 10+ years earns you 3 votes. I think there should be some reward for showing loyalty to the server. You have also seen the highs and lows, seen good players and bad players and have a more nuanced understanding of the community than a 1 year old.

5) Guild votes are halved. If you vote for someone in your guild it counts as half a vote. Again, contentious, and I can see arguments why this is a bad idea. But let's be real here. I mean no disrespect to anyone, but the guild leaders of the 2 biggest guilds have been top performers each year. Maybe it's a reward for putting in the effort to run a guild, but if it's a default vote for your guild leader, irrespective of their contribution to the shard and irrespective of the fact there might be far more deserving participants, are you really voting for the player of the year, or just trying to help your guildmaster get a legup?

6) Players who have served Jail time in the year are ineligible. Again, a no-brainer. You cheat and break server rules, you can't be player of the year. This could also be expanded so that if you have served jail time you cannot vote in the competition either. I have always had a very strong anti-cheating stance here. This is a simple way to passively enforce the rules. To be fair policing of the server is very weak these days and punishments, even for large infractions, are very minor. This is a way to have a simple punishment that runs year round and would deter cheating.

If the nerfing of the rewards was implemented, the rest of the points are not needed. But as long as there are extremely overpowered rewards that you cannot obtain in any other manner, then the competition needs to be made more valid.

I would love to see some discussion about this prior to next year's competition as the way it stands it's a rather invalid, weird popularity competition with super-powerful, unobtainable rewards.

[Zalia]

I love my Wolfy steed, but I would happily trade the gate-opening in Fel thing for a BOD recycling box. ;D

[Wil]

6) Players who have served Jail time in the year are ineligible.

In the +Nyx era, players served jail time for causes that were, shall we say, questionable. You're not wrong, but there should probably be a cooldown.

[Lach]

OK, I did not want to muddy the waters during the vote, but, in my opinion, this competition is a bit weird and dodgy and there are a few ways it could be made more valid.

I would suggest the following:

1) Fix the rewards. Remove the ability to break game mechanics by gating to fel, that's (in my opinion) a no-brainer, this mechanic is awful and advantages a couple of people hugely. Make all the special mounts temporary or better yet remove them entirely. I would prefer to see the winner get 5 titan's hammers than completely unobtainable, never-auctioned mounts. IMO, the key to the realm would suffice as a reward for the whole thing.

2) Players who have less than 100 days of logins during the year in question are ineligible. Again, a no-brainer. If you didn't play during the year, you can't be player of the year.

3) Account age must be over 6 months old to vote. Removes the ability for people to buy out noobs votes for cheap and people spamming dodgy accounts to vote.

4) Additional votes for older players. This one is contentious, and I could be persuaded it is a bad idea. But I think if you are 5 years old you should have 2 votes. 10+ years earns you 3 votes. I think there should be some reward for showing loyalty to the server. You have also seen the highs and lows, seen good players and bad players and have a more nuanced understanding of the community than a 1 year old.

5) Guild votes are halved. If you vote for someone in your guild it counts as half a vote. Again, contentious, and I can see arguments why this is a bad idea. But let's be real here. I mean no disrespect to anyone, but the guild leaders of the 2 biggest guilds have been top performers each year. Maybe it's a reward for putting in the effort to run a guild, but if it's a default vote for your guild leader, irrespective of their contribution to the shard and irrespective of the fact there might be far more deserving participants, are you really voting for the player of the year, or just trying to help your guildmaster get a legup?

6) Players who have served Jail time in the year are ineligible. Again, a no-brainer. You cheat and break server rules, you can't be player of the year. This could also be expanded so that if you have served jail time you cannot vote in the competition either. I have always had a very strong anti-cheating stance here. This is a simple way to passively enforce the rules. To be fair policing of the server is very weak these days and punishments, even for large infractions, are very minor. This is a way to have a simple punishment that runs year round and would deter cheating.

If the nerfing of the rewards was implemented, the rest of the points are not needed. But as long as there are extremely overpowered rewards that you cannot obtain in any other manner, then the competition needs to be made more valid.

I would love to see some discussion about this prior to next year's competition as the way it stands it's a rather invalid, weird popularity competition with super-powerful, unobtainable rewards.

I see what your saying about jail time as well as guild members voting. I feel like maybe the half a point is a good idea. Then I also feel that while it sucks that guild leaders get alot of votes if they do alot for the guild the run and shard they deserve it.. Then we got the disqualification program maybe something more. Leniate like a 3 strikes and your out rule not just a one time thing ya know. As far as rewards go I feel like & have brought up with +C that the drops have become very rare to get and it makes it kinda of unfair and a turn off or discouragement for new players. I personally hate paying millions of gold for something that I should be able to spend 8 to 12 hours of game time to get. Also I don't feel as if the rewards are out of this world unfair, I do like the fact that it gives new players a chance to get into fel but maybe like a 6 month or 1 year cut off for people that can use it. Because let's face it if you been playing a year you should know lol. That's just my outlook on it.

[Yuki]

Lets not overcomplicate or dramatize something that should just be a fun way to show people who have done good for the shard our appreciation.

I guess I don't see how the fel gate could be game breaking but I would say that the problem fixes itself since I don't see the people who win as ones who would abuse it.

+C is already disqualifying votes from new accounts that don't stick around, all the other votes are from actual players and creating rules to make some votes matter more than others is pretty demeaning. I live in America where democracy is a big part of our identity so I guess I have strong feelings that each vote should be equal and not assigned value based on tenure or contribution.

[Lach]

Lets not overcomplicate or dramatize something that should just be a fun way to show people who have done good for the shard our appreciation.

I guess I don't see how the fel gate could be game breaking but I would say that the problem fixes itself since I don't see the people who win as ones who would abuse it.

+C is already disqualifying votes from new accounts that don't stick around, all the other votes are from actual players and creating rules to make some votes matter more than others is pretty demeaning. I live in America where democracy is a big part of our identity so I guess I have strong feelings that each vote should be equal and not assigned value based on tenure or contribution.

I'm from America as well and I see your point let's not involve politics in a video game we play for fun LOL.

[culichi]

im 100% for 2 & 6. seems to me that this contest was geared to guilds because of the portal thingie which is cool but there should be an expiration date on it or it will eventually just become a toy for one player. guilds die off pretty regularly even the biggest guilds so having no expiration date on the thingie seems like a bad idea eventually. mounts and key to the realm seems cool to me special prizes for a special contest.
i know you were all waiting to hear my opinion on this im sorry i took so long to post it.

[Lach]

I have removed the offtopic posts.

If someone's breaking rules enough to make a menace of themselves, they're likely not going to get enough votes to win anyway. I think the problem will pretty much just sort itself out without any intervention from staff.

Well it can (theoretically) be a problem if someone is always keeping on the side of the law, doesn't jailed, is still well-liked among players, but also causes a lot of drama.

/wave

LOL @ the /Wave

[Geriatric]

I live in America where democracy is a big part of our identity so I guess I have strong feelings that each vote should be equal and not assigned value based on tenure or contribution.

america is not a democracy, its a constitutional republic
when it comes to voting for senators, each state gets 2 senators
so the voting power of an individual from wyoming is much more powerful than the voting power of someone from california
could also delve into the arguments on the electoral college as well

but it's to stop mob rule

and i only bring this up because of johnny warrens argument about big guilds stacking votes for their guildmaster rather than stepping back and looking at who has contributed most to the server and community as a whole
not just done the most for their own guild

i dont actually know who won but i heard zalia and nmrd were the two big contenders?
personally i've never had any interaction with nmrd, but zalia keeping the MAD taming island going
try and find someone who hasnt trained animal taming/lore/vet
that area is a huge service to this server and community