Excelsior

Since +Colibri has saw it fit to expect the deadline I have a suggestion, each week change out or add to what the donation bonus item is or can be selected. I have been on staff where shards are run by donation and know it only is a select few that donate on a usual basis. So with the donation bonus being available for 5 weeks, why not add something to do it so those of that donated today might consider donating again to get some nice little trinket.

Anyways, just an idea to perhaps further increase the funding for a shard I enjoy playing on.

I just released I need to learn dates, there isn't a few weeks of this.. Still may be a good idea to raise funds for the shard

Well...really the donation bonus is in addition to the stuff you already get for donating. I guess I don't completely understand what you mean, but I'm taking it as you saying that there should always be a donation bonus, such as a teleporter or enchanted runebook or what-have-you. But I mean...you already get to choose from a pretty big list of rewards for donating, so the bonus is just an attempt to increase donations for a short time, maybe when donations are slow. If the additional bonus became a constant thing, its effect on increasing donations would negate itself, wouldn't it?

Like I said, I had the time frame all screwed up and thought when it was extended it would go on for weeks rather then what really happened was just added a few days. I do agree that a bonus always, might take away from donations after a period of time.

I think over the long run though a few things should be added to the list that only those who actually donate can purchase, rather then just having the eds. I would also like to see something where the total of your donations perhaps allows you to select from a small list as well, could be something you are able to purchase or just a bonus.

Also for bonus items, I am not talking something as huge as a world teleporter in your backpack either. Could be something as simple as adding a few points to an ability of a weapon or armor. Just something for say every 250 dollars (or whatever is decided) total that you donate perhaps.


Keep in mind, these are just my opinions and ideas. So completely worthless

I like the idea of a long term donations bonus and I think that the higher end 600ED stuff was kind of meant for that. However that would create an additional bookeeping chore to +Colibri's long list of stuff that he has to do and add an additional level of complexity that is unneeded. Especially when you have families that play like mine. Do you just credit the main account for all of it or each account individually or credit all the accounts the total..... makes it too complex IMO. I think the current system is good as stands for now. I like one time short term bonuses like the teleporters.

Gawd. I saw someone again tonight ask 250 Ed's for the bonus personal teleporter. Someone buys 300 Ed's for 30$, gets 3 dye tub, and sells his bonus item, for a total of 550 Ed's + 3 dye tubs for 30$. Thoses Ed's are worth 25 million gold+, not to mention the dye tubs. It is supposed to be a DONATION, wich spells giving without hoping nothing in return. A power player that plays 8 hours per day will require a full month to get the same amount of gold. Meanwhile, the staff monitors every single activity that can give decent amount of gold in game and nerfs the bezooki out of it. Just think about the changes made to the champ spawns, the mage inquis quest, the balrons, the fact that the harrower has disappeared and whatever I am not thinking of. I am disgusted by what this shard is becoming. The word is "we will nerf whatever you do to make a decent amount of gold in game and we will keep on making the "donators" instantly rich. Again, I am asking the staff to make it that the donations remains what they are supposed to be: donations, and that no advantage shall be giving to the donators, other that recognition of their effort by placing a donator statue in a "hall of donators". Again, yesterday, someone was selling 60 Dye tubs. That is 600$ in one donation, that is 6600 ED'S, that is more than 300 millions. With such gold input in the shard, the gold hardly earned by the players who don't/can't donate is worth less and less, while the staffers make it harder and harder for them to earn that gold. I am sincerly considering of reporting this situation to EA, with all the details that I know concerning this profit machine that our dear server has become.

I am just pissed at this situation where the donators have been filled with so much advantages that they push their '"greediness" to the point of wanting even more bonuses.

Have a great day all

A quick theory on how the currencies work. Gold is obtainable from many places in the game, and can be spent in many places as well. Tokens are obtainable from monsters and bods, and spendable only on the token stone. Elven notes are a thing obtainable and spendable in places related to the ML expansion. ED is something that is linked mostly with giving direct help to the shard, plus for example as we give ED at events, that's since you yourself made a part in making that event exciting (an event wouldn't be any fun without any people in there). And it can be spent on the stone or with playerservices.

There isn't a direct way to convert ED to gold and vice versa. It's because ED are in a way monitored about where they are given out, where as gold is obtainable in so many ways, it's not possible to monitor. The ED were made mainly so that people who can't donate can also obtain the highest rewards. Although you could probably make an agreement with someone, let's say they would donate and would get a spellchanneling deed, and then they would trade the SC deed for gold. And although you could done the same to get a bag of holding, it's much harder to get someone who is willing to make such a trade. That's why there's ED, you can buy smaller amounts from different players and obtain even the higher rewards.

As for the ED going up in price, again that's partially because of the gold inflation, and gold actually going down in value, where the ED probably stays the same.
About nerfing things in game, from the logs which are used for debugging issues that come up every now and then when you turn in a gem, i saw that there's a lot of those going out every day, and since making the drop chances even lower wasn't an option (it's already pretty low and frequently we get a help request to check whether it's broken or not), i have simply made it so that it's limited per account. GoCs aren't listed as a donation reward item, so this doesn't have any effect.
The harrower scrolls however, well if you knew how much fuss was there every week when it spawned and people fighting about who will get it, people stealing the white skull from the body, and so on, i have decided to take it down till it can be reconfigured. What i will do is make the harrower drop half as much as it does now, but make two or three champ spawns that will go off at the same time, making more people be able to get the skull. But the system needs to be reconfigured since it's going to be a mess if i just put up the 2 Oaks champ altars.

As for the world teleporter, several people asked me where to get it, i said we have had a bonus in august last year, and we also sell them in auctions from time to time. They asked if such a bonus could be put up again. The bonus should be up in around the 2nd half of april but i didn't get to it until mid may.
If someone has 250ed and sees the offer from someone selling the world teleporter for 250ed, well that's up to them to decide whether it's worth it or not.

Oh and about the unitubs, the only functionality they have is to make things shinier, which makes them a perfect reward. An idea about making druid spellbooks and spellchanneling deeds to be on the gold stone has been brought forward, and it will be put up there (or possibly the token stone).

nice i like the spellchanneling deed being on a stone...how about empty bottle too? maybe tone down the price per honey sell. 420 per honey is a little high. easy to change the scripts too. of course people will get mad about that but really how hard is it to raise bees. i have 10 hives @ 100k each hive, and i make about 1.2 mil a month at the minimum. little too easy with razor.

also, every container i get from the collector says this is not your container, (after i just got it) then i try to add something to it and i get the message "you can not add blah so soon" this has been going on for about a month now.

this is what i've tried.

getting a new container...
putting that container in a different container in my bank and closing it out. logging out then back in putting container into backpack and adding the item. still no go.

getting new items for the lesser gems and trying to add that to the container. still no go.

tried adding a lesser gem into the gem container. will not allow me. says i can't add so soon even though it was about 3 weeks ago.

so can't get items to make lesser gems, and can't add the lesser gems i have already to gem container. grrrr weird.

Sometimes it just baffles me how you can always find some one to hate something. First let me state, not everyone sells eds the only eds I have sold (110) to friends of our guild to help them out for things they want. In any system, those that donate get advantages. I donate over 60k a year to my community and you think I do not get special favors or consideration when I wish to do things? Let me give you an example, the house next to mine was taken down and the bank manager called me and gave me first shot at buying the property before it went to auction because I am involved in several of their food drives. Lets not forget I also get to take advantage of several tax breaks because I donate as well. This is called life..

I wonder how would the server be supported if it was just people donating based solely on generosity but as I said, keep in mind as I said my opinion is worthless

Good thread is good!

Well first I would like to apologize (yes again, i know!) about the tone of my previous post. My blood tends to boil easily when I dislike a situation. I know for a fact that every changes made by Colibri are well thought about and contribute to put a balance in how gold can be obtained in the game. Bee hives, champ spawns, mage inquisition quest and Balrons have all been tone down in a significant way. I am not sure but I beleive the breeding system has been looked in as well. I think that if we dont include the Ed currency, thoses changes brought a better balance and contributes at keeping the inflation to a resonnable level.

For me, the Ed currency is a major flaw in our economy. Some people have the chance to do very well in their real life money wise and therefore can contribute for amounts like 600$ to the shard, while others can't even think about opening a paypal account as they have no bank acccount or credit card (students still living at their parents, unemployed, etc.). As a member of the community, I want every player to have an equal importance and chance on this shard. What I am witnessing, is that some players, putting little to no effort in the game, can obtain advantages that even a very active player of the community can't dream to obtain. Even if there is no direct way to convert Ed's to gold, everyone will agree that it takes seconds to sell them at the going price (40-50k per). Granted I have no precise numbers, I am quite sure that the Ed's and the bonuses attached to them injects billions of gold every month in our economy. Therfore, the gold earned by actually be playing on the shard is worth less and less. I mentionned in a earlier post that some very successefull free servers (averaging 300+ online at any time) accepts donations, but without any advantage given in return. Here is what is written on their donation page:

"No one is obligated or will receive any type of reward in-game for donating to the shard, and all revenue goes to cover hosting costs and advertising.

There's no minimum donation, anything helps a lot. We very much appreciate your donation. This helps keep us going!"

Maybe you understand better what triggered me when I red this post asking for even more bonuses over the actuall reward...

I hope that this explains better my point of view, in a less agressive way.

Sincerly,

Polar Bear

Well, I don't think anyone that donates will end up with an unfair advantage with people that can't. When you get to the point you can make mass gold in game with little trouble, you can afford to buy the ED from the people that can afford to donate, but maybe have little game time to play and would rather use their time in other ways than earning gold. I have gear that is ranked amongst the best on the shard. I have only been able to afford to donate once for $60. I would love to be able to contribute more to the shard I love to play on, but I'm afraid the bill collectors and ex-wife takes precedence over donations. My point being is that you can donate and take the shortcut to elite gear, but in the end, even a poor boy like me can have the best gear also.

Calan

About the billions of gold injected into the economy, that was what i wanted to explain in the previous post. With donations, you get ED, which can be used on mostly stuff that are more or less luxurious in nature.

It would be a different thing if you could pick a 1mil gold check as reward - it is this what would add gold to the economy. If gold was listed as a reward, perhaps more people would pick that instead of selling their ED, making them even harder to come by (gold would be generated by the system, and would not be coming from people's banks). So if there are billions of gold coming in, it's from people farming it, so that they can buy ED from others, so they can get those higher rewards.

I am not arguing that it's impossible to keep up with good stuff when you can't donate. You and me are both power players that can't donate, yet we have some very good gear. I am talking about a community where all should have the same opportunities. You and me, playing several hours per day and being performant at the game, we do manage to buy players Ed's and have the opportunity to have decent gear. But I don't agree with the argument that it's ok for a player to buy his ingame wealth because he might not have the time to play. What happens to the player who doesn't have much time to play and neither the money to buy Ed's?

I was thinking about it and did you know that on EA servers, you can buy an advanced character token for 10$. What is the difference between that offer and the way things are ran here? Well, the advanced token will give you 5-7 skills at 85. This is not an unfair advantage towards the other players because it is easy to train thoses skills without the token. Other tokens are for stuff that doesn't enhance your characters possibility too: transfer token, name change token, etc. Here, it is possible to have all your skills to 120 without ever training one minute. On one side, it is clear that you BUY a product, and even there, it's nothing to give you a huge advantage over the players not purchasing the product. Here, it is clearly a false allegation when the word donation is used, as in the vast majority of the times, it is clearly a transaction with the objective of giving a boost to the "donators" account.

To sum it all up (and that is only my opinion, I do not hold the monopoly on the truth) donations are necessary on a free game server. I beleive that it can be ok to give an incentive to motivate the players to donate. I beleive that the incentive are way out of whack on UOEX. I beleive that the Ed's and the bonuses contribute to most of the inflation on the server, disadvantaging even more the players who are unable to donate. And finally, and that is the most important point, I beleive that it is a lie to talk about donations when it is clearly a transaction implying money for services that are expected to be given. From my point of view, buying your way to prosperity ingame with rl cash out of the game is like using a cheat code in a video game.

+Colibri wrote:About the billions of gold injected into the economy, that was what i wanted to explain in the previous post. With donations, you get ED, which can be used on mostly stuff that are more or less luxurious in nature.

It would be a different thing if you could pick a 1mil gold check as reward - it is this what would add gold to the economy. If gold was listed as a reward, perhaps more people would pick that instead of selling their ED, making them even harder to come by (gold would be generated by the system, and would not be coming from people's banks). So if there are billions of gold coming in, it's from people farming it, so that they can buy ED from others, so they can get those higher rewards.

I have been able to buy more than 3000 Ed'S from players since i first started playing. I see the unitubs for sale all the time. Alot of druid books pass to other hands too. Now the peronal teleporters. The special runebooks... It is obvious that thousands of Eds and tons of unitubs are sold for uo gold every month.

Then again, it's a free world. If the majority of the players are happy with how it is, it's all good for me. Just presenting things from my point of view