Forum Point Scarcity For Some
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I made a suggestion topic about increasing the drop rate because I thought they were scarce for everyone. The person who posted in my topic wondered if the drop rate might have been changed so it's different for different groups of users. They said they got 50 forum points over the course of Masquerade. I got two or three during the first couple of days and there's been none since then. I made a lot of posts for dances in the Masquerade forum during the course of the holiday and have been posting in other forums as well over the past weeks.
If users have been put into groups with different drop rates it's very unfair when some items in the Forum shop cost 25 points. Posting in forums is one of the hardest activities on the site for shy people, too, so it's even more unfair on them if they are in the 'scarce' group.
[tot=Ciannwn]
Like I posted on your suggestion thread, we haven't messed with the drop rates for forum points. :) We also don't have them split into groups where people have different chances.
- Something must be going wrong when one person can get 50 forum points during Masquerade and I haven't had any for weeks even though I've been making a lot of posts, especially during Masquerade.
Why can't it be a system like Quest Points where there's one Forum Point for a set number of posts?
[tot=Ciannwn]
Forum points are like random events, you have a particular chance at getting one with every post but there is no guarantee you'll get one. Sometimes luck is on your side, sometimes it isn't. Forum points are meant to be on the rarer side, that's why they don't go out as often. We have the forum ticket item in the forum shop specifically so people who don't post much (or don't like posting) can buy the tickets from user shops. I end up gifting mine to users quite often!
[edit]
You got a forum point while making a post! Check out the shop here!
wow the irony of me getting one from this board haha
- OK,. so I'm just very unlucky. It still seems odd to me, though, that one person can get 50 forum points during a holiday when others don't see a forum point for weeks. This is why I think it would be fairer on everyone if it was a point for every 100 posts or something. People could still sell the tickets to people who don't like posting.
[tot=Ciannwn]
Okay, but did you take into consideration how many posts they did versus you during the event? Each post has a chance at a ticket, so if you're posting a lot then you have more opportunities to get points. The odds of getting one per post don't change, but you're helping yourself out by posting more if that makes sense?
Again, it's like random events. For example, one random event you could have like a 1/20 chance of getting it per page. If you visit more pages, you're helping yourself out to get an event. It's why some people were sad about the change for shops/vending being more streamlined because they lost out on page views and were less likely to find floating items during events or get a random event.
. I made a similar number of posts in the dance forum every day during Masquerade. It just seems odd to me that I got two or three forum points on the first couple of days and nothing after that. As I said earlier, I was posting every day in other topics during this period and have done that since the end of Masquerade as well.
I'm obviously very unlucky. :(
[tot=Ciannwn]
RNG is like that, sometimes you're lucky, sometimes your not.
If I have claimed a Dance from you and do not immediately Dance I will get back to you.
Always Buying:
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I finally got a forum point. I dread to think how many more posts in the games forum I have to make before I get another. :)
[tot=Ciannwn]
Personally, I think there's something screwy in the programming because when it comes to forum points and random events, I hardly get ANY. Ever. I mostly get that stupid pie random event, and I've gotten tempest maaaaybe three times? In total since she's appeared?
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Ironically, I too got a forum point for posting this hah
^I'm with . Call me crazy, but my account barely sees random events. It could totally be luck, but it's always seemed odd to me. Once in a while I get the polar bear one, but that's about it.
Random events are all competeing against each other, and some have a higher chance of happening than others (like the pie event is a higher chance than the SBQ invite I think). A few months ago, I actually increased the chances of a lot of them, because some were ridiculously rare. It's still a matter of math though with each page view has a chance at a page view. You could be very lucky and the math gods decide they love you or just be very unlucky for a bit. Like I said above, the more you move around the site the like more opportunities you create to get those random events etc, it doesn't increase the actual odds of a particular event.
A Random Number Generator depends solely on chance. It's the same in games where there's a chance that a weapon upgrade may fail or if you were to put money into toy capsule vending machine. You might get what you want, or you might not.
It's like if you were to flip a quarter a number of times and your goal is for it to land on heads as many times as you can. Ignoring random variables, you only have a 1/2 chance of it landing on heads. So if you were to flip it 10 times, each flip still has that 1/2 chance to land on tails.
RNG is essentially the same concept, just with far different and widely varying percentages of that particular event happening. I went a large period of time without getting Subq invites and I browse the site a lot. Likewise with other random events, you can't change the CHANCE it happens, but you can INCREASE the chance that event happens by keep posting or browsing the site or w/e.
Just because a person seemed to have gotten more forum points or invites or w/e than you just means that their metaphorical quarter landed on heads and yours landed on tails. You may not have gotten what you want, but you can still flip that coin again and try again.
I personally got dozens of forum points over Masquerade and am not really complaining, but I think a more "guaranteed" way to get them would be really nice. Not sure what a good way would be (I mean, obviously you can buy them off other users already, but it's expensive and kind of annoying to have to part with your sP just because someone else gets lucky when you don't), but I'd like to see it.
It is natural to get frustrated, but this sort of thing gets brought up a lot and it's always the same answer. There's not much really that you or staff members can do to improve your luck, if you technically already have the same odds as anyone else to get an RE or a forum point.
The thing is though if we made it like quest points where you get them every x points then it's just like quest points. We purposely have currencies be a bit different so that you aren't doing the exact same thing for everything (yes I realize this is quests vs posting but still the idea is the same). We have the forum ticket in the forum shop for those that don't want to post/don't have much luck/etc, so they can buy it from users hops and be able to turn them in for points. You're guaranteed to get a point that way ;)
does a good job explaining RNG. It's understandable to feel upset when you see someone else getting more points when you're doing the same thing, but you can't expect the results to be the same for every user. That's just not how math for random number generators work.
Just to reiterate something I've posted around a lot, we're not going to be retiring items out of the Forum Shop anytime soon. If we do, we'll be giving you guys plenty of heads up. So you have time to gather up those points to get what you want! :)
<p>I personally got dozens of forum points over Masquerade and am not really complaining, but I think a more "guaranteed" way to get them would be really nice. Not sure what a good way would be (I mean, obviously you can buy them off other users already, but it&;s expensive and kind of annoying to have to part with your sP just because someone else gets lucky when you don&;t), but I&;d like to see it.
So what would a good way to guarantee them without devaluing them? Isn't that just buying them? If people want forum points, chat with people on the forums. It may take awhile, but you'll eventually get them. The items aren't going anywhere any time soon, save up. If they are made too common or devalued too much, the value of the items go to essentially free, which defeats the purpose of having a unique currency in the first place.
comparing this to bad luck with "coin tosses" isn't very accurate aside from both being random, because in this case, it's a 10 or 20 sided coin (don't know the exact odds) so if people are making 3 posts and expect to land heads on a coin with 19 tails on it, they're going to be disappointed.
so say the odds are 1 in 20 for a forum point and you make 3 posts. each post has a 5% chance of giving you a forum point, but that doesn't mean you have a 15% chance of getting a forum point in each one. the math (1-.95^3) = 0.142625 = 14.2625%
say you make 20 posts (1-.95^20) = ~ 64% so even if the odds are 1/20, you still only have a 64% chance of getting a forum point in 20 posts.
I think gives a good explanation, but quest points and forum points aren't the same.
For one, if you're guaranteed a forum point after a certain number of posts as stated that's also going to de-value them quite a bit. Forum points were supposed to be a rarer form of point so making them more common, easier to obtain de-values their higher rarity.
@ Amber @ kbbob I guess this is just another case of my priorities being different: I honestly don't care about things "keeping value", and the idea of forced rarity can't die a quick enough death for me. I'd prefer that everyone have a decent, equal shot at being able to buy the items they want via their own site experience than having to rely on purchasing currency from people with better luck/more time to spend on the site. (Obviously, if that's the way someone prefers to get their forum points, than fine, but I can't imagine most people want to shell out twenty million bucks to get one item when it could be free if the RNG would be slightly more favourable.)
[edit] l o l guess who else just got a forum point on this board
They do, everything is fair and equal, but everyone doesn't post the same amount. That ultimately decides how many points a person has.
Forum points are meant to be on the rarer side. If everyone is able to get all they need, they wouldn't be rare? Thus their value would be really low