TOPIC: Best Plans for acquiring full runs

All,

I realize that helping me with this may actually work against your own interests, but I am trying to coordinate acquiring a couple of full runs for my extra large group that is planning to make it back to GenCon for the 50th anniversary.

We have several people who are already registered and making their wish lists.

I would appreciate some advice on how best to prepare for the instant that we can hit submit on our wishlists, which I assume needs to be done as close to noon eastern as possible, correct?

Would it be best to put the same runs into all of our carts and hope that one of us gets them, or would it be better to put different runs at different times in, to give us a (at least theoretically) better chance of getting something?

Is it better to buy tickets all for yourself, or to use your friend's accounts as well? I suspect you want it all for you, particularly if a friend is also trying to get tickets, but just wanted to be sure.

I really appreciate any help the community can provide.

Thanks!

I will answer this on Monday...sorry.

Here is how it appears to work:

1. Your Gen Con wish list is limited to 50 items.

2. Wish lists are processed in some basically random order, and entire wishlist is processed at once.

3. When a wishlist is processed it moves from the first priority to the last, and for each item checks:

* Is the required availability left in the event?
* Is this event conflicting with any events already in the cart?

If the answer to those questions are "yes" and "no" it is added to your cart, otherwise it is not.


This means you can follow this procedure to get your runs. This has never failed me:

1. Figure out what runs time you want, maybe have a 2 hours of flexibility on the start time.

2. For every dungeon run in that 2 hour window, add them all to your wishlist.

* For each run, select that you want all 10 slots, and that it shouldn't add any to your cart if it can't get all 10.

3. That's it.

When your wishlist is processed, if any run in that 2 hour block has all 10, you'll get it.


All that really matters is who is close to the front of the wishlist processing line, so you can just have all your friends try to get the same runs (assuming you set it up so they get all 10 slots, and so that you have non-overlapping runs for the desired times).

Wade Schwendemann wrote: All,

I realize that helping me with this may actually work against your own interests,

While there's a slim possibility that you want the exact same dungeon that I want, it's also in my interests to see people get slots together with their friends, so they have a good time and TD continues to grow.
So I'll provide what assistance I can ; )

I would appreciate some advice on how best to prepare for the instant that we can hit submit on our wishlists, which I assume needs to be done as close to noon eastern as possible, correct?

Yes. Where "as close as possible" means "you hit that submit button the very *second* it hits noon."
If you can, anticipate when it's about to hit noon and start your finger on its downward motion to click the button a micro-second before that! Because 10,000 people are all gonna be hitting that button at noon, and if the system locks up under the pressure (which it does. It always does) then you might end up with the page going non-responsive, or a "bad socket / no socket available" error, or it might just crash you page.

It's gotten better in recent years - the system used to get locked up for *hours* and you had no idea if your request was even submitted. Now, once you've managed to get into the queue, it gives you a queue number, and you can watch it slowly count down, rather than spending your time button mashing and hoping one of your requests gets through.

Note: If you an have all your friends online at noon, and all submit at the same time, it increases the odds that *someone* will get a half-decent queue number.

And for reference, a number in the low 4 digits is actually a pretty good queue number.

Would it be best to put the same runs into all of our carts and hope that one of us gets them, or would it be better to put different runs at different times in, to give us a (at least theoretically) better chance of getting something?

As answered above: Duplication is better.

Put as many runs in as you can (within your 50-event limit). Overlap lots of things, since you don't have to worry about getting the 7:24 run if you successfully got the 7:12 run into your cart.

Get your friends to load all the same events, and if one of them gets the 7:12 event in their cart, and you get the 7:24 event in your cart, you can talk to each other about who should drop their run, so you don't buy duplicates.

Is it better to buy tickets all for yourself, or to use your friend's accounts as well? I suspect you want it all for you, particularly if a friend is also trying to get tickets, but just wanted to be sure.

Yep! Wishlist one ticket for "Myself" and then "one more for myself" 9 times, and click the "only get tickets if ALL are available" button. Otherwise your friend successfully getting a random event could block you out of an entire run.

I really appreciate any help the community can provide.

Thanks!

I hope the advice so far has been helpful.

Other quick hints & tips:

* If you need to do a reboot, or install updates, do it the night before. I've heard of people's computers choosing to randomly start downloading updates in the middle of registration, and it screws up all your plans.

* Close unnecessary programs and browser windows before noon.

* Make sure you know exactly when "noon Eastern" is for you. I realize most people are probably looking at the countdown timer and know it down to the second... but every year you still get a few people who show up an hour late to registration, and curse their clocks.

* Discuss with your friends before hand how you will coordinate once you've got your runs into your cart.

* Make sure you have your Credit Card handy to pay.

* Make sure you have the phone number for your credit card company handy, too. Sometimes you go to pay for things and the entire purchase is declined because Mastercard goes, "Woah! What are you spending $1200 on on a Sunday morning, from a company that isn't even in your state!?" and flags it as potential fraud. You may have to phone in to get the purchase cleared.

*If you don't get the runs you want, DON'T PANIC. Just re-submit your wishlist.

Often people (who are coordinating with their friends, just like you are) will throw whole runs back into the system, and 10 tickets will magically appear, where they were not available 15 minutes ago. This will go on for hours.

*Sometimes people will post on the forums that they have a full slot in their cart that they are about to toss back into the system, and you can coordinate with them to pick it up right as they drop it... especially if you both wait a couple hours, so the initial mad rush has died down.

Good luck!

I have a couple of friends assisting for our group, and we're trying to put different times in our cart, that seemed the best strategy to us.

If your windows of time for runs is pretty narrow, maybe duplicating the times in the runs would work better.

My strategy - pick fights with all your friends. Start now, with the goal of making up next week. Assuming one of them gets a run or two, on Monday just say "sorry I was a jerk. Got a ticket for me?"

Any humiliation is worth avoiding the hell that is RUBI on Sunday afternoon.

This same tactic can save you a fortune on Valentines flowers and birthday/Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwansa gifts.

Magic, the blacker the better.
Sacrifice a token and a dice at the very least.


Otherwise there's been good advice above, but still learn voodoo as a backup.

I cheat the system...

Go to work and use the super Cray computer
Log on to 22 accounts
Use kids from all around clicking at 1155 - anyone that stops clicking loses their dinner!

Bam get the runs I want...

Seriously just build your wish list stage the times so they do not conflict and just go!

Slightly off topic, but very curious - does anyone here know why GenCon doesn't let everyone submit their wish lists ahead of time, up to some predetermined cutoff, and then internally mix it up, select queue randomly, process through wish lists, and spit out results at some also-predetermined date? I am not terribly technically inclined, but it seems like that would accomplish a similar end while avoiding the mass spike in demand on their servers. Folks would still get on at date #2, after initial results have come out, but theoretically demand would be a bit lower.

It would also allow them to process through Wish Lists across the attendee pool...that is, if I'm 1097 in queue and you are 1098 in queue, it looks at my #1 slot, then at your #1 slot, then at 1099's #1 slot, etc., then circles back to 1's #2 slot. Would give more attendees a chance at queue satisfaction for their highest priorities, though I'm sure there are myriad complications I'm oblivious to.

Tsaelyn wrote: Slightly off topic, but very curious - does anyone here know why GenCon doesn't let everyone submit their wish lists ahead of time, up to some predetermined cutoff, and then internally mix it up, select queue randomly, process through wish lists, and spit out results at some also-predetermined date? I am not terribly technically inclined, but it seems like that would accomplish a similar end while avoiding the mass spike in demand on their servers. Folks would still get on at date #2, after initial results have come out, but theoretically demand would be a bit lower.

It would also allow them to process through Wish Lists across the attendee pool...that is, if I'm 1097 in queue and you are 1098 in queue, it looks at my #1 slot, then at your #1 slot, then at 1099's #1 slot, etc., then circles back to 1's #2 slot. Would give more attendees a chance at queue satisfaction for their highest priorities, though I'm sure there are myriad complications I'm oblivious to.

For as much as a random processing seems to be the way the many things are going in the future, I personally, prefer the old fashion way of sitting there, waiting for the exact instant that things go active, and clicking the button. Personally I think the people who are willing to sit there fully prepared and ready to go deserve to have a chance to be first in line. When your randomness things, that is all completely taken away personally I think the people who are willing to sit there fully prepared and ready to go deserve to have a chance to be first in line. When you randomize things, that is all completely taken away, and it is truly "anything goes" - that said, there is no one solution that will make everyone happy.

Grekel! wrote:

Tsaelyn wrote: Slightly off topic, but very curious - does anyone here know why GenCon doesn't let everyone submit their wish lists ahead of time, up to some predetermined cutoff, and then internally mix it up, select queue randomly, process through wish lists, and spit out results at some also-predetermined date? I am not terribly technically inclined, but it seems like that would accomplish a similar end while avoiding the mass spike in demand on their servers. Folks would still get on at date #2, after initial results have come out, but theoretically demand would be a bit lower.

It would also allow them to process through Wish Lists across the attendee pool...that is, if I'm 1097 in queue and you are 1098 in queue, it looks at my #1 slot, then at your #1 slot, then at 1099's #1 slot, etc., then circles back to 1's #2 slot. Would give more attendees a chance at queue satisfaction for their highest priorities, though I'm sure there are myriad complications I'm oblivious to.

For as much as a random processing seems to be the way the many things are going in the future, I personally, prefer the old fashion way of sitting there, waiting for the exact instant that things go active, and clicking the button. Personally I think the people who are willing to sit there fully prepared and ready to go deserve to have a chance to be first in line. When your randomness things, that is all completely taken away personally I think the people who are willing to sit there fully prepared and ready to go deserve to have a chance to be first in line. When you randomize things, that is all completely taken away, and it is truly "anything goes" - that said, there is no one solution that will make everyone happy.

Without randomness though advantage would go to those sitting closest to the server. Yes we are talking about fractions of seconds but when you are competing against tens of thousands of people fractions of seconds matter.

What probably happens is the system takes all the submissions in the first five seconds or so and randomizes the order. I've noticed that it takes a noticeable amount of time to even give me a position in the queue.