Age Restriction on Voting Stones

[timthree]

How about leaving it like it is? I LIKE seeing Excelsior at the top everytime I vote. It wasn't that way before the 1 ED. And 50k a day is really a game changer? Really?

[azrok]

As a new player(still less than 21 days old yet) I can say that the money from voting is completely not needed. I'm kinda on the nerdy side of a player, so before even starting playing here I had already read a lot of the wiki on what to do as a new player. Did that rat quest back to back in the beginning, sold the organics on [exex, participated on the newb champ every time I could, even with just a little magery and spirit speak to do a little damage. Got my first small house and first mule with 1k hp and 900 str. And then I found out about the voting reward.

After finding out about the voting reward it all got even easier. But I was voting solely because of the money. And I still feel compeled to vote just because of the reward. It is just too good to pass. But it's not needed at all. If I didn't have the voting reward I could just continue doing the rat quest(which I completely stopped doing) for some money, and It would just take a couple days or maybe a little more, to get to the same point I got because of the voting.

The reward is nice, but it's not needed at all. What is needed is, maybe, a better way to direct new players into the new player stuff that we can do. I knew about it because I spent a lot of time reading the wiki, but I think that not many people do that.

Oh, and the newb champ has way too much HP. Why is it that the champ that is intended for new players has more HP than a champ out somewhere in felucca that only more experienced players dare to go? Even killing the 6 gauntlet bosses is faster than killing a single MoA.

[tiggerjlk]

The option to sell the ED for some quick cash is good, if you need the cash, but in the long run, keeping the ED is far more valuable.
After you play for awhile, you are going to want a relayer, or a bag of holding, etc. Those will need to be purchased using ED's. At that point, the ED is worth more than gold. You will then find yourself buying ED's, when you could have just kept the free one you received every day.
When I first started playing, I donated for a 100 ED's, sold them for a lot of gold. Now I wish I would have just kept the ED's.

[onemoregenius]

A raffle sounds like a jolly good idea. It would even be cool if the tickets were transferable so that if a player wasn't interested in the raffle, per se, they could sell them for cash to other players or on exex. The value of the raffle reward would have to exceed the money gained if they just sold them though.

[Melkor]

Personally I think it's the younger players that are voting the most. I vote when I'm board at work because I like the shard. I don't vote everyday. I'm stingy with my real life time and 50k isn't a motivator for me. Actually I'd be more interested in the deco. But that's not my point. I don't think I'm the only "vet" who isn't taking advantage of the offer. If we disallow young players I think that would have a big effect on our voting scores.

[Wil]

How about leaving it like it is? I LIKE seeing Excelsior at the top everytime I vote. It wasn't that way before the 1 ED. And 50k a day is really a game changer? Really?

After you've been here a few months? No, not a game changer. Pluck more from your bee hives.

As a brand new player? Yeah, it's a game changer. If you figure it out, it means you can buy your team of high-level mules on day 3 or 4 and then wipe the floor with the newbie champ that's readily available since only new players can get in.

Some folks think that's a bad thing. Here's what I think: it doesn't matter whether you reach that point on day 4 or day 40. You'll either find the many -sustainably- fun things to do here or you won't. If you don't, if you're one of the ones that'll choose to leave, what difference if it's week two or week six?

I think the vote stone is fine the way it is. I vote. Not every day but more than a few times a week. It consumes less of my time just to donate (which I've also done) but I figure what the hey. And like you I do get a kick out of seeing Excelsior at the top.

Would I vote without a bonus or with a useless bonus? Rarely. The captchas are a pain. Especially the curvy words and the image picker that insists on scrolling the window just before I click. What's with that?

It's not that I don't believe in the shard. Quite the opposite. I don't believe in the vote systems. I didn't find the shard by looking at votes. For better or for worse votes are just a contest for who gives the best reward. That's how the vote sites are stacked. When I was looking for a new shard to play, I deliberately ignored votes and looked at the number of players online. Folks also vote with their feet, and those votes are more reliable.

Regards,
Wil

[Pariah]

azrok, welcome to the shard! You've no idea how much you made my day with your post. I approached UOEX the same way you did and I think i stayed because of it. I've been here nearly three years and over the last month, it seems like I've lost my mojo. I've gotten into it with 2 newer players on separate occasions and I've started to wonder if it's just me (1 was, 1 wasn't in my view). Perhaps I'm getting prickly in my old (account) age. It's so refreshing to see someone who came here, studied up, and is making the most out of it. Please invite any others like you here as well. We need more of your type of player. This brings me to my next point. The voting reward is to move UOEX to the top of the list on the respective sites. Why? So that more people join, the shard grows, the economy grows, and all of us benefit. As a result, I think incentivizing voting is great. I don't think 1 ED is as groundbreaking as some are making it out to be. IMO, certain Mistvale rewards are far more incentive for a new player to stay than 1 ED. Some of those items go for several hundred EDs. Replacing it with even a unique deco reward of some type only appeals to a certain type of player. I absolutely love +Nyx, but her affinity for deco is lost on someone like me. I keep most of her rewards in a chest in my house. I don't part with them solely because they are from her and I would feel guilty, like I somehow betrayed her (I realize this is nonsense, no need to point it out) and it would show a lack of appreciation for her work. Ok, back on topic, stay with me. The reason EDs work as a voting incentive is BECAUSE they are UNIVERSAL. New players need EDs, old players need EDs, skinny players need EDs, rotund players need EDs. I vote, when I remember and it's because I love the shard...and I want that ED. I don't do it everyday, but when I remember. If you switch this to a deco item or raffle, newer players won't vote as much, vets will vote only until they have all the said deco/raffle items, and the shard doesn't attract as many players due to lack of votes.

TL;DR-EDs are good for all players and I have a strange semi-creepy affinity for +Nyx (sorry +V, but if you start handing out treats I could be persuaded to direct some of that your way)...

[azrok]

Hey Pariah Yeah I already brought someone like-minded to the shard. My rl friend WNIGHTMARE, that I'm usually playing with.

And yeah, while I agree that the ED reward is not needed for a new player and could do well without it, removing it would certainly kill the voting numbers. No amount of no-gold reward would keep players voting. Removing it could potentialy harm the economy, because it keeps a good income of new ED in the game, which in turn moves gold around, keeping gold valuable.

[+Nyx]

I absolutely love +Nyx, but her affinity for deco is lost on someone like me. I keep most of her rewards in a chest in my house. I don't part with them solely because they are from her and I would feel guilty, like I somehow betrayed her (I realize this is nonsense, no need to point it out) and it would show a lack of appreciation for her work.

Oh, how you make me chuckle.

Still chuckling.

Okay, I think I'm done now.

If you switch this to a deco item or raffle, newer players won't vote as much, vets will vote only until they have all the said deco/raffle items, and the shard doesn't attract as many players due to lack of votes.

TL;DR-EDs are good for all players and I have a strange semi-creepy affinity for +Nyx (sorry +V, but if you start handing out treats I could be persuaded to direct some of that your way)...

What if the raffle was solely for ED? Similar to our trinsic raffle tables, 2 of those have a portion of ED in their rotation. What if the voting raffle was only for ED? Or perhaps had a rotation of ED, gold, and tokens?

What if the voter could choose whether they wanted the raffle ticket or a random prize from the deco rotation?

[HeltonSantana]

Agreed with Pariah and Wil!

[Devlin]

I like the raffle idea. It gives people incentive, but doesn't necessarily reward them for their actions. People are going to need some reason to vote, aside from the aesthetics of having the shard being ranked number one.

[azrok]

I don't really like the raffle idea. It is cool for other things, but not as a incentive to vote. I think some people may try a couple times, not win, get frustrated and quit doing it/complain.

Something along the lines of a scratchcard would be more fun. You get one, you may win a check for tokens, a small amount of gold, you can still have a chance for a ED, something along these lines. With something along these lines, everyone can have the feeling that they can win. With a raffle you might have a couple of winners, but most of the people would just lose.

[+Nyx]

Yeah, that's why I was thinking perhaps a choice between a raffle ticket (which if won would net the winner a lot more than the 7 ed one could get for a week of voting), or another random item - I like your scratch card idea, it'd add another level of fun to the matter of voting. Giving the option makes a larger portion of players happy. Some would prefer the raffle with its chance of winning a bigger prize, some would prefer a guaranteed, albeit smaller reward. Both would improve the issues that have been arising from the 1ED/day voting reward, and neither would harm the shard economy.

[Pariah]

My only concern is providing "less" of an incentive to vote. I think we should be discussing how to increase votes. Let us not forget, more players helps all of us (tried selling any big ticket items lately?). The ED reward is instant gratification. I just worry that a raffle or changing the reward removes some of the incentive. If, as +Nyx suggests, we could do something like a scratch ticket or what not where a player gets a shot at a reward right away, it could quell some of that. Perhaps if the reward was large enough, it might even convince some of the winners to stay longer. I do think the perspective should be working backward from "People will vote for 1 ED, what can we give them of equal or greater value to continue voting." Stating the system isn't working because it's actually getting people to vote (the whole point of an incentive) just isn't valid to me. Why is it too much? You can vote just as any new player can and receive the same reward. Is it a back in my day thing? In which case, I would cite Mistvale and many other improvements that help newer players as a positive example for attracting and retaining players. Keep in mind that I'm the crotchety (can you be crotchety in your early 30s?) old man that took a newb to task over asking a codex question in world chat so I don't think I'm biased toward the nooblets...

[+Nyx]

Since the implementation of the voting reward, we've had a lot more folks voting, yes. And to some extent that's good for the shard. But, on the other hand, we're also seeing a -lot- more of this entitlement and attitude problems in relation to the voting rewards. Folks crawl up our backsides whenever the other sites are down. A lot of the time they're polite about it, but a lot of the time they aren't. We get accused of cheating people out of it, of deceiving people to manipulate them into voting 'for nothing', and so on. It's just disgusting. So, there's that issue and all that that includes - it's frustrating and irritating as heck for the staffers having to deal with that nonsense, the mentality itself is a problem that then causes problems elsewhere on the shard. It also, in many ways, devalues the ED in terms of how one feels about earning it. Yes it's one per person per day, but it gives newer players the idea that they are entitled to easy ED, and that the value of ED in the eyes of the staff is just a few button clicks.

The reasoning that "all shards give incentives so we have to as well" is just bunk imo. Two wrongs don't make a right. Yes, we want to be competetive, and yes it's great to have uoex at #1 for the voting sites. But just because every bunch of no-talent doofi running their shards are doing this lazy way of getting people to vote doesn't mean that we have to, too. I'd much rather put the combined creativity of the staff and players to good use to come up with a system that rewards the players appropriately and incentivizes them, but doesn't cause as many problems for everyone involved.

We don't like to 'nerf' things, but the 1ED was an introductory thing that became more permanent, it doesn't have to stay that way, and it shouldn't stay that way if it's going to give people yet another reason to ream the staff or act uppity, or to diminish the weight of ED in the economy. I believe strongly that UOEX is better than just paying people to vote for the shard, and sinking to the level of the other shards by bribing people to do it is, imo, not the standard we should set for ourselves or the shard.