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TOPIC: Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON?

Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #13

Okay. Here.

Premise: there's no point in addressing the symptoms because gamers game. They'll always find a way around any rules you make, no matter how draconian and complex. You have to address the root. The root is, the loot is worth more than the ticket.

Solution 1: don't change a thing about ghosts/mules/token lending. Have two sets of treasure. When you leave the dungeon, each player draws three from the base box. It contains a mix just like today. They get chips for the bonus TE loot, which they draw from boxes in the lobby.

The base boxes have about three chips per ticket sold. Add a little more in case of spillage, but not many.

Then you can raise the loot cap as high as you want. Make it 20, 50, 1000 for all I care. Just adjust the loot mix in the TE boxes to compensate for the higher cap, with more uncommons and fewer UR/relics/trophies. Just make it so the expected value of the loot isn't a lot higher than the ticket price.

Doesn't penalize new players, doesn't ban ghosting or farming or mules. You can even allow farming at GHC with its lower ticket price by watering down the TE boxes enough, but you don't have a massive incentive for people to scoop up every unsold ticket either.

I'm some sure some people will find a dozen reasons to hate it, but if you're honest it doesn't totally suck, either.

Edit: I'm sorry, I have a lot of anger in general this month. And yes, this topic frustrates me, especially when some people act like there was no warning

"Ceci n'est pas une pipe" - Magritte
Last edit: by Brad Mortensen.
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #14

Brad Mortensen wrote: Okay. Here.

Premise: there's no point in addressing the symptoms because gamers game. They'll always find a way around any rules you make, no matter how draconian and complex. You have to address the root. The root is, the loot is worth more than the ticket.

Solution 1: don't change a thing about ghosts/mules/token lending. Have two sets of treasure. When you leave the dungeon, each player draws three from the base box. It contains a mix just like today. They get chips for the bonus TE loot, which they draw from boxes in the lobby.

The base boxes have about three chips per ticket sold. Add a little more in case of spillage, but not many.

Then you can raise the loot cap as high as you want. Make it 20, 50, 1000 for all I care. Just adjust the loot mix in the TE boxes to compensate for the higher cap, with more uncommons and fewer UR/relics/trophies. Just make it so the expected value of the loot isn't a lot higher than the ticket price.

Doesn't penalize new players, doesn't ban ghosting or farming or mules. You can even allow farming at GHC with its lower ticket price by watering down the TE boxes enough, but you don't have a massive incentive for people to scoop up every unsold ticket either.

I'm some sure some people will find a dozen reasons to hate it, but if you're honest it doesn't totally suck, either.

Edit: I'm sorry, I have a lot of anger in general this month. And yes, this topic frustrates me, especially when some people act like there was no warning


Hi Brad,

Jeff did mention that if this doesn't work, he might have to dilute the treasure in the treasure boxes. If he has to, this would be a good solution to make sure that newer players still got a decent chance at a good token pull.

The only trick would be to make sure there weren't mix-ups in which boxes to pull. When we had Treasure Map boxes, there were lots of instances where people pulled from the wrong boxes. I'll bet there would be some people with a lot of TE tokens trying to get the Volunteers to let them draw from the wrong box, or maybe honest mistakes from the Volunteers.

But, maybe that could be solved by training for the volunteers, and maybe signage like putting on all sides of the initial box something like "Initial 3 Token Pulls" and the other box would have "Treasure Enhance Tokens Pulls" or something.

Thanks,
Mike
The topic has been locked.

Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #15

Mike Steele wrote:

Brad Mortensen wrote: Okay. Here.

Premise: there's no point in addressing the symptoms because gamers game. They'll always find a way around any rules you make, no matter how draconian and complex. You have to address the root. The root is, the loot is worth more than the ticket.

Solution 1: don't change a thing about ghosts/mules/token lending. Have two sets of treasure. When you leave the dungeon, each player draws three from the base box. It contains a mix just like today. They get chips for the bonus TE loot, which they draw from boxes in the lobby.

The base boxes have about three chips per ticket sold. Add a little more in case of spillage, but not many.

Then you can raise the loot cap as high as you want. Make it 20, 50, 1000 for all I care. Just adjust the loot mix in the TE boxes to compensate for the higher cap, with more uncommons and fewer UR/relics/trophies. Just make it so the expected value of the loot isn't a lot higher than the ticket price.

Doesn't penalize new players, doesn't ban ghosting or farming or mules. You can even allow farming at GHC with its lower ticket price by watering down the TE boxes enough, but you don't have a massive incentive for people to scoop up every unsold ticket either.

I'm some sure some people will find a dozen reasons to hate it, but if you're honest it doesn't totally suck, either.

Edit: I'm sorry, I have a lot of anger in general this month. And yes, this topic frustrates me, especially when some people act like there was no warning


Hi Brad,

Jeff did mention that if this doesn't work, he might have to dilute the treasure in the treasure boxes. If he has to, this would be a good solution to make sure that newer players still got a decent chance at a good token pull.

The only trick would be to make sure there weren't mix-ups in which boxes to pull. When we had Treasure Map boxes, there were lots of instances where people pulled from the wrong boxes. I'll bet there would be some people with a lot of TE tokens trying to get the Volunteers to let them draw from the wrong box, or maybe honest mistakes from the Volunteers.

But, maybe that could be solved by training for the volunteers, and maybe signage like putting on all sides of the initial box something like "Initial 3 Token Pulls" and the other box would have "Treasure Enhance Tokens Pulls" or something.

Thanks,
Mike


Thats sounds more actually doable then other schemes. Plus gives a way to modify if dilution needs to happen.

I would like to see an outright cap and make it stick, something to factor in the IS's coming, I've also asked for and would like to see the CoA permanent available. Just make whatever URTE in print worth a point and modify trade goods accordingly. It doesn't cheaping the CoA but it makes it available as a path that if new players want to work on it they can. Not all of us drop $XXXX on tokens right from the get go.

On ghosting, would really like a clear issue declaration from Jeff or Druegar. None of us want to limit tickets that can be used by other players. On the other hand most of us have been there a person short on a pre organized run at the last minute. Especially those of us who play hardcore/nightmare.
We're all the kind of people who enjoy the game on a "meta" level. We like talking about the game year-round. We buy tokens. We enjoy crafting. We get together during the off-season if we can. We are a very skewed demographic that way. -Raven

My trade thread:
truedungeon.com/forum?view=topic&catid=61&id=248097#315668 Matt's Humble Trade
The topic has been locked.

Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #16

Mike Steele wrote:

Brad Mortensen wrote: Okay. Here.

Premise: there's no point in addressing the symptoms because gamers game. They'll always find a way around any rules you make, no matter how draconian and complex. You have to address the root. The root is, the loot is worth more than the ticket.

Solution 1: don't change a thing about ghosts/mules/token lending. Have two sets of treasure. When you leave the dungeon, each player draws three from the base box. It contains a mix just like today. They get chips for the bonus TE loot, which they draw from boxes in the lobby.

The base boxes have about three chips per ticket sold. Add a little more in case of spillage, but not many.

Then you can raise the loot cap as high as you want. Make it 20, 50, 1000 for all I care. Just adjust the loot mix in the TE boxes to compensate for the higher cap, with more uncommons and fewer UR/relics/trophies. Just make it so the expected value of the loot isn't a lot higher than the ticket price.

Doesn't penalize new players, doesn't ban ghosting or farming or mules. You can even allow farming at GHC with its lower ticket price by watering down the TE boxes enough, but you don't have a massive incentive for people to scoop up every unsold ticket either.

I'm some sure some people will find a dozen reasons to hate it, but if you're honest it doesn't totally suck, either.

Edit: I'm sorry, I have a lot of anger in general this month. And yes, this topic frustrates me, especially when some people act like there was no warning


Hi Brad,

Jeff did mention that if this doesn't work, he might have to dilute the treasure in the treasure boxes. If he has to, this would be a good solution to make sure that newer players still got a decent chance at a good token pull.

The only trick would be to make sure there weren't mix-ups in which boxes to pull. When we had Treasure Map boxes, there were lots of instances where people pulled from the wrong boxes. I'll bet there would be some people with a lot of TE tokens trying to get the Volunteers to let them draw from the wrong box, or maybe honest mistakes from the Volunteers.

But, maybe that could be solved by training for the volunteers, and maybe signage like putting on all sides of the initial box something like "Initial 3 Token Pulls" and the other box would have "Treasure Enhance Tokens Pulls" or something.

Thanks,
Mike


Good builds, Mike.

I think the TE box should be in a totally different room. Lobby vs epilogue.

Yeah, I'd prefer that any dilution that happens not affect newbies. They shouldn't be punished. Any impact should be absorbed by the URTE community.

And, even if newbies did borrow a CoA, they're more likely to actually wear the greens than those of use who toss them straight in the transmute pile.

It would require some training, but I don't think much work, and I think it would generate the least overall angst.

P.S. sorry I was being a jerk. Gotta get my tact filter replaced.

"Ceci n'est pas une pipe" - Magritte
Last edit: by Brad Mortensen.
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #17

Brad Mortensen wrote: Here we go again.

We could have avoided this issue completely by not printing ISSN. So this is on all you people who said unlimited loot caps was good for the game.


Do you really think we wouldn't be having this conversation if the loot cap was 17 instead of 19?


I think this is is "on" the people who are renting their TEs to multiple groups at a time, after being asked not to.
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #18

Mike Steele wrote:
It would also free up tickets for actual players. I'm guessing True Dungeon will be another quick sellout at GENCON. Every ticket used for ghosting is a ticket an actual person can't use.


While TD sells out every year, anyone who is on the ball and wants a ticket gets one.

It doesn't sell out until days after the event registration goes live.

I think it's more likely that no allowing ghosting will create negative impacts than positive ones:

a. Groups of tokenaholics who like to run with less than 10. Today they can sort of offset the cost of that with ghosting. Remove the ability to ghost and they may begin to run with just their group of, say, 6 and 4 strangers. Then problems around difficulty levels and balance come up.

b. It may actually lead to a lack of a sell out. Removing ghosting treasure will certainly reduce demand. As pointed out above, TD doesn't sell out in the first 24 hours. Reduce demand implies the possibility of reduced sales - unless there is more unmet demand than the ghost reduction, and TD will lose revenue.


I could get behind a no ghosting treasure rule at a given venue once one of a few conditions pertain:

* It seems likely to sell out in the first 24 hours / during a preorder period without such a rule
* Some non-trivial fraction of all slots (say, more than 5%) are (or are anticipated to be ghosted)


Otherwise it seems like a change that will not necessarily lead to an improved game experience.
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #19

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Brad Mortensen wrote: Here we go again.

We could have avoided this issue completely by not printing ISSN. So this is on all you people who said unlimited loot caps was good for the game.


Do you really think we wouldn't be having this conversation if the loot cap was 17 instead of 19?


I think this is is "on" the people who are renting their TEs to multiple groups at a time, after being asked not to.


Matthew, I agree with this, I think we hit the tipping point before the ISSN was printed. The fact that Jeff pretty generously gave us a much richer mix in the treasure boxes this year is I think driving a lot of this behavior, but it might have even happened if the treasure box mix hadn't been improved. And I hope that we're able to alter that behavior before Jeff has to reduce the mix in the treasure boxes.

I feel pretty confident that we'll have a total sellout at True Dungeon at GENCON this year even if we disallow Ghost Players getting Treasure Coins. And Jeff might actually prefer it if there were tickets available for a few weeks, as those are more likely to be sold to new players.
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #20

Matthew Hayward wrote:

Brad Mortensen wrote: Here we go again.

We could have avoided this issue completely by not printing ISSN. So this is on all you people who said unlimited loot caps was good for the game.


Do you really think we wouldn't be having this conversation if the loot cap was 17 instead of 19?


I think this is is "on" the people who are renting their TEs to multiple groups at a time, after being asked not to.


There are two parts. The token-in-more-than-one-place scam was certainly one part that everyone agrees needed to be stopped. Creating tokens out of thin air is counterfeiting, no matter how you do it. And yes, it had nothing to do with ISSN, although ISSN did make it slightly more tempting, if that's the kind of person you are.

Warning - adult joke ahead:

www.jokeindex.com/joke.asp?Joke=3410

"Ceci n'est pas une pipe" - Magritte
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #21

In all of the recent threads related to URTEs there have been a lot of solutions in search of problems.


Until the problem is defined for us, we are mostly creating complexity without knowing whether it is actually solving a real problem.
D&D teaches all the important lessons in life - the low blow, the cheap shot, the back stab, the double cross. - Jerry Marsischky

Let them trap us. We have our swords. - Elric of Melnibone.

You try to get them to play the game, but all they want to do is play the rules. - Ardak Kumerian

I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend - Faramir
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #22

Harlax wrote: In all of the recent threads related to URTEs there have been a lot of solutions in search of problems.


Until the problem is defined for us, we are mostly creating complexity without knowing whether it is actually solving a real problem.


This was in Jeff's post on TE Tokens, I think it's a pretty good problem definition:

"We feel these measures are necessary to keep the token distribution in the treasure generators at current levels of value. If we cannot curb the abuse of TEs, then we will be forced to dilute the value of the tokens in the treasure generators. I don't think anyone wants that to happen.

In an effort to reduce fraud and abuse, we will be implementing the following policies with regard to treasure enhancing (TE) tokens:"
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Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #23

Mike Steele wrote:

Harlax wrote: In all of the recent threads related to URTEs there have been a lot of solutions in search of problems.


Until the problem is defined for us, we are mostly creating complexity without knowing whether it is actually solving a real problem.


This was in Jeff's post on TE Tokens, I think it's a pretty good problem definition:

"We feel these measures are necessary to keep the token distribution in the treasure generators at current levels of value. If we cannot curb the abuse of TEs, then we will be forced to dilute the value of the tokens in the treasure generators. I don't think anyone wants that to happen.

In an effort to reduce fraud and abuse, we will be implementing the following policies with regard to treasure enhancing (TE) tokens:"


Which raises the issue of ghosting not at all.
D&D teaches all the important lessons in life - the low blow, the cheap shot, the back stab, the double cross. - Jerry Marsischky

Let them trap us. We have our swords. - Elric of Melnibone.

You try to get them to play the game, but all they want to do is play the rules. - Ardak Kumerian

I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend - Faramir
The topic has been locked.

Should Ghosting be allowed at GENCON? 6 years 10 months ago #24

Harlax wrote:

Mike Steele wrote:

Harlax wrote: In all of the recent threads related to URTEs there have been a lot of solutions in search of problems.


Until the problem is defined for us, we are mostly creating complexity without knowing whether it is actually solving a real problem.


This was in Jeff's post on TE Tokens, I think it's a pretty good problem definition:

"We feel these measures are necessary to keep the token distribution in the treasure generators at current levels of value. If we cannot curb the abuse of TEs, then we will be forced to dilute the value of the tokens in the treasure generators. I don't think anyone wants that to happen.

In an effort to reduce fraud and abuse, we will be implementing the following policies with regard to treasure enhancing (TE) tokens:"


Which raises the issue of ghosting not at all.


Unless Jeff also thinks that buying out runs to get Treasure Tokens (up to 181 Treasure Coins per run) is abuse. Only he knows at this point. He could implement a solution like at TDC, come up with some other solution, or maybe he's OK with it at GENCON and won't address it at all.
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