There were some things I noticed this Luminaire that hadn't really occurred to me in the past (I've been much more active this December than past years). I've decided to put together a list of the things I personally noticed that could possibly be improved in time for Luminaire next year that would greatly improve the whole experience. I would love some input, or even some other things you have noticed. I do realize that some of these ideas might have been hashed out in other threads, but I think that I also have some new ones and that I'd like to keep all of my ideas in one themed thread even if others have thought of them before.

Update: Edited to fix some things and put a space between all the pings so they didn't re-ping.

I said this on another board, but I'll say it here: I think MM would be better if you were required to put in at least one item to even be able to participate. Heck, maybe it can even work a bit like the Gift Exchange, where the value of the gifts are exchanged within a range. (For example, if your item was worth 1 million, you'd be paired with someone in the, say, 750K to 1.25 million range.)

There's no guarantee that the other person won't immediately turn to sending sporks, but at least you'd be guaranteed one item.

IRL, the whole idea behind a Secret Santa is that everyone gets something, so I can't imagine that if you truly want to participate, it would be bothersome to put in your item right away. It's pointless to do a MM exchange if no exchanging is happening.

@ Moin The only thing I really disagree with is your suggestions under mysterious melody. For the limit, many people will just select the 1 mill option in hopes of getting better stuff. Hardly anyone would select the lower ones. And as for the themed gifts, there are always threads up for "gift the user above" etc, just use those threads and get items off of their wishlist. I personally like how simple Mysterious Melody is now. I feel that making it way more complicated will discourage others from using it.

EDIT

I completely agree with this, and I was actually thinking of this as I was typing my reply above. If any changes would be made to MM, this should be it.

I think buying an item be it 10-100k to automatically allow you in mm might work. That way you are assured to get something similar in return. Realizing their name is anon has apparently made mm a big problem, listing their online name will just promote hard feelings. Having to pick some automatic gift will at least assure someone gets one if mm is even offered for next times. Seems like there is more complaints on that then anything.

Hmm, that definitely might help. A lot of us do start with smaller items just to test the waters and see if the other person will actually respond...but maybe having to give up an item to start with would help with a lot of the problems to begin with. Still doesn't guarantee you'll get someone active, but at least you'd get something.

That's a fair point too. Maybe tie it in with what twocents said and make them give up an item worth at least that much to select that option? There'd still be no guarantees, but if I sent a second 1m item and they never responded, it's not like I'd keep sending more.

Wow, I love your suggestions and I really admire how much thought you put into this. I've been thinking of the "You have this item!" in Wishlists for a while, and (though I have no idea how easy it would be for them to change it) your 'checklist' idea would be really useful if implemented~ And the other suggestions have really valid points as well!

I'm just not sure about the 'holiday wrapping paper' part... Recently, when I was sending gifts to friends, I wrapped them all on 'random' -- and ended up having one of them wrapped in an orange morostide paper. XD While it was annoying, I personally think I kinda deserved it for risking on the random option. After all, I could have just paid a little more if I didn't want to take the risk of sending Luminaire gifts in wrappings that didn't fit! If your suggestion were to be implemented in this case, I bet very few people would feel the need to actually choose the wrapping... and there would be very little use for the high-priced option. :B

Anyway~ I really hope the staff read through your suggestions with kind eyes! :D Great job there!

Yes, an entry fee of some kind might help.

Awh, thank you for the compliments!

I honestly never even noticed the "You have this item!" issue until this year. It might have come up a few times before, but was never really a huge bother to me until I started hanging out on all the Lumi threads.

As for the paper, I saw someone suggest a tiered system a while back. Basically boring solid-color wraps would be the 1k random selection, the prettier ones would be slightly more, etc. I'm sure its kicking around this forum somewhere but it was a nice idea. My issue with trying to tell myself that I deserved it for selecting the random option is that sometimes the items I put in the box just aren't even worth paying 7.5k for wrapping paper but I'd still like the wrapping to not be completely irrelevant. I also feel like there are a legitimate number of people who are more OCD than me who would still pay the higher amount to coordinate their gifts with the wrapping (Even I am guilty of doing that sometimes. If it's a round item, I probably won't put it in one of the rectangular boxes that the bottom row of wraps create haha)

I really like ' suggestion. This is the first year I really didn't bother at ALL with MM because I've had increasing numbers of times where I get paired p with someone who sends absolutely nothing. I mean, getting "junky" items like sporks or leftover garbage from the valentines zombie plot is irritating, but sending absolutely nothing at all just defeats the point of MM. I gave it a shot and did MM one day this whole month and that day I sent a few things and got nothing in return. At this point I sometimes wonder if it's not better to do away with MM all together.

love the idea of anonymous boxes under the tree, they could be labeled as "from melody" or something too

The only thing I have an opinion on is the gift box showing instead of the wrap. But that is all new, so there might still be room for improvements. The page needs a better design overall, but I do like t hat we have a gift wrapper to do it for us. I imagine there will be new things coming to that page, but it'll certainly be on the list of 8000 things that need some attention.

The MM price categories came up because of me. I'm fairly new to the site as this December was the first time I've played seriously. I clicked MM not knowing what it was but being quite interested. And somehow, I got an active gifter! All was good at the beginning, as they started with cheap items like wizard tokens or ornament boxes, but they rapidly descended into larger and larger items and I began to panic. I think at that point my total bank account was worth like 5m, so the best I could do was slowly gift over all of my quest rewards for the day and hope it was enough >.> It was an awkward situation for me because although I wanted to be evenly matched and participate, as a new/poor player I didn't feel like I could. I agree that a price range may be problematic, many may choose a higher bracket hoping for something better, but at the same time I think that some compromise would be really helpful. I like the idea of having to put in at least one item to start and being matched based off of its price.

I really like the gift box ideas, especially with making them larger and showing the actual box. Setting a 'send date' would be nice if you wouldn't be able to come online during a special occasion but have friends who do.

I'm definitely supportive of omitting inactive accounts from the wishlist search, that might remove some of the 'clutter', so to speak.

And I agree with the ability to anonymously place a gift under someone's tree. I certainly felt the need to gift back when someone gave me something amazing this year, and not everyone is comfortable with receiving something in return for their kindness.

As for the mysterious melody, I actually don't participate in that at all anymore, so I can't really critique or agree with your ideas for that? Since it doesn't really affect me?

Thanks for the ping though. ^^

Yes to anon gifts under the tree. I'd be more willing to do some silly themes for some random users this way. I always feel like I'm being annoying when I spam gift them a theme and a lot of the items are really cheap. With them knowing who gave what to them I feel like I need to stick to WL only and that kills my gift giving mood.

Also, I want the Gift Exchange to be promoted more. I love using it but usually end up having to stop because no one else is using it. It's really annoying after the two day limit getting every item I put in back. The only things I put in and get stuff back are the really cheap items, sometimes. I have a feeling some users might not understand how it works as after a couple of cheap item exchanges I never see that user back in there.

I always used to say to those who get fed up with MM to use the exchange. As long as others use it you're going to get something back around the same price of your item. Now it's really not worth it to tell them.

I don't support ANY of these suggestions.

The thing about Mysteriuos Melody? It's mysterious! It's fun! If you just wanna exchange gifts for laughs, that is what it is. It's for laughs, so if there's a dud, then that's what you got, lol try again. Since it's for laughs, it doesn't matter if you can reciprocate, price-wise. If you don't understand this, or don't find it all that fun, and you really do care about what you get (which is REALLY what the OP suggestion is about) start a thread in Chit Chat or somewhere, or do it within your cult or with a fellow cult member.

If you want to gift someone anonymously, use the Gift Wrapping center, not the tree. If you don't want a certain holiday paper, then you don't really want Random, do you? Pay for a specific paperl

I see many not-so-active players with hardly anything under their tree. Allowing many gifts in one box would be mean. It isn't actually harmful to see lots of prezzies under your tree even if they're small, you don't know that and anticipation is part of the fun. Making people do it one at a time prevents gift-spamming. If it's too much trouble for you to put an item there one-by-one, maybe your recipient doesn't want to deal with those items that are too pesky to give, either. It's the thought that counts, so do some thinking about how much labor you want to do ahead of time.

First off, I respect that you have a different opinion about everything listed. But you seemed to have made a lot of assumptions about my intentions that I don't like. So this post is going to be longer than my response to everyone else and hopefully you'll realize that's just me having to defend my own opinions instead of a desire to change your mind.

That's what I'm REALLY about? Really? Where in any part of my original post did I say anything about wanting partners that can reciprocate price-wise? Nowhere. If you are referring to the optional gift limits idea, refer to post 11, where Julia explains her viewpoint on this. Others have already pointed out how the idea could be abused, so maybe its not the best solution. I admit that. But this in no way had anything to do with receiving expensive gifts. I honestly don't care what I get back from my MM (thanks for outright judging me without trying to understand the intentions first -.-). The fun in it for me is when they are an ACTIVE MM who will send me something back. Period. Now for me, active does not mean "OMG they're sending me items worth 1m all the time!". No. Active = if I send a few items, they send something back. If I send stuff, and I'm getting no response whatsoever, they've wasted a day for me, and THAT is the main thing we are trying to find a solution for here because I'm not the only person bothered by it.

Obviously I don't agree about the paper, but it seems like that's something that we're going to have to agree to disagree on. It would seem that you care significantly less about what kind of paper you get from the random button, which is fine. I realize that I haven't elaborated much in my original post, so I'm just going to say this: If I'm sending some things from their wishlist that are barely worth more than 7.5k, I don't feel like it is a gift that justifies spending 7.5k on a paper that they will never see again. So yes, sometimes I like the random option, but I don't like that holiday wraps (that aren't relevant to the current holiday) are included.

"If it's too much trouble for you to put an item there one-by-one, maybe your recipient doesn't want to deal with those items that are too pesky to give, either." And if it's on their wishlist?? I wouldn't consider those items that the recipient doesn't want to deal with. Which is what I was referring to. Things like humming power crystals, vesnali tokens, and various currencies that otherwise have no way to send in bulk like wizard tokens do. Things that I would never send unless they were specifically on that person's wishlist in an "Always Needed" type of category.

But you did mention Julia in your OP, and I thought it reasonable you had some sympathy for her. My mistake. About the wasted day, there are a number of features of this site one can only do once per day, and one doesn't always get something one might consider fun from them.

As you said, wraps are only seen momentarily. That is my point, really. If you gave me something that was worth 7.5K, I'd be delighted even if it came in poop wrapping paper. If I was Wishing for HPCs or scratchcards, you could set up a Trade and put well wishes in the notes to it that would matter more than any wrapping paper or christmas tree box. The prices for wrapping paper are meant to remove sP from the economy, and the papers as they are already exist as drawings and icons on the site.

So... what's the problem with removing the holiday ones from the random setting? Like you said, giftwrap serves a purpose and if it makes sense, which is does, because most people on the site would not want to send a Luminaire gift in Morostide wrapping paper if they could help it, why is that a nonsense suggestion? Sometimes I feel like you argue with change just for the sake of argument. Why should I have to set up a trade if I could send it in a giftbox, which is the point of giftboxes? And actually, wraps are not only seen momentarily anymore. They stay forever in the new Gift Center. And matching wrap is important to some people.

As for Mysterious Melody, it sucks when you join and your partner doesn't even send you one item. Even if you get one cheap item, that's way better than literally no response. If there is a solution to keep people from signing up for Mysterious Melody just to get free stuff and not actually participate in the process, why shouldn't we make that change?

Are there any other features that are once daily and rely on someone else? (I'm not as active as I could be, so I'm not actually sure.) I can think of various once-daily things that are my own fault if I forget or choose not to do them, but I can't think of anything else aside from MM that relies on a second person's whims.

As for using trades, I don't feel like that is really what trades are for (and even if it was, the vast majority of my gifting is done anonymously so trades don't work for me personally). I think that instead of spamming up the trades with something that is meant as a gift instead of a trade, It would be better to modify the gifting system that is already in place to better support situations like that. I also feel like using trades for that purpose is a little bit awkward. "Oh hey I'm just going to send over your gifts in an area where you could add some money". I can't see myself ever doing that. Maybe I'm over-thinking that, though.

Wow, I had already forgotten that the changes meant that giftboxes are now viewable forever. Ew, one of my sent gifts was a Morostide wrap yesterday, too. Blah. >.<

I keep seeing you all over the place lately. But anyways I actually took the time to read this and I like every single thing you suggested :) maybe some of these will be impleted next year.

i like alot of the ideas hopefully some will be used next year.