I agree with the people who said '60' as a cap. If you reduce the entry cost of games, at least align it with the common new game price. That makes these games distinct.
Comment has been collapsed.
My two cents:
As a frequent site visitor (~75% of the sites I visit in my browser are sg related), after the point change I have noticed a huge loss in points - as was expected. Where I could probably enter too many giveaways before, I now find myself holding onto my points for better days. I'm doing practically no "getting group giveaway to 5 entries"-entries now, basically all I enter is my public wishlist, puzzles (if I can afford it), and some trains or group giveaways.
While I can recognize that this was an intended change, I will welcome the increase to 6 points per quarter of an hour, I'd even be so bold as suggest 7 points per quarter to further reward those like me who are in and out of here constantly during the day.
I can concede the 400 cap, since I don't think I've even reached 400 since the changes (maybe once).
I must object to the 100P limit, but I agree that 50P was too low. In the current 5 points per quarter system, 100P is way too costly, but I cannot comment on how such a slight increase as 6 or 7 points per quarter would feel. I will, however, suggest a compromise of 75P as max, which feels reasonable as a proportional change (5 to 6 per quarter, thus 50 to 60 max) of 60P would feel insignificant while, like I stated above, 100P would feel way too steep.
The 100P cap is fine on normal days, while there isn't many 100P giveaways to speak of, but once a bundle hits with some 100P giveaways it becomes way near impossible to enter more than a few of them, thus to win one of them you either have to be extremely lucky or take time to analyze which giveaways will give you the greatest chance by constantly refreshing to see live entries.
Comment has been collapsed.
+1 for faster generation, neutral on lowering the cap and the poll of 50 to 100 just tipped over to keeping it 50. :)
Comment has been collapsed.
I don't care about the 50/100P cap as I don't enter "those" giveaways, but the other changes are understandable (though it's not something I would vote for - I would rather keep the current system without those "tweaks").
Comment has been collapsed.
I vote for keeping it the way it is and giving a month instead of a week.
Comment has been collapsed.
cg, it's good that you want to experiment, but I believe the system is quite okay now and what you are suggesting will just completely mess it.
So:
Switching from 5P to 6P every 15 minutes.
I'm pretty much okay with the current system. It still gives some good chances per day, still, the first sale will show what this system is good for.
Decreasing the point cap from 500P to 400P.
And now you just want to give lower chances to everyone except for bots and users that use giveaways as "points storage". So, you're basically showing the green light to those with who you were supposed to fight with. "Nice" move.
Switching the maximum number of points to enter a single giveaway back to 100P instead of 50P.
Not cool. So, I though you lowered the cap to somehow balance the limited points generation.
Actually, I think you should just leave it as it is and check how everything gonna change with the new system. Whether the chances of winning something in average increased or decreased, average number of entries, especially for non-bundled games, that stuff. And then you may think whether the system needs further tweaking.
Comment has been collapsed.
And now you just want to give lower chances to everyone except for bots and users that use giveaways as "points storage". So, you're basically showing the green light to those with who you were supposed to fight with. "Nice" move.
That's nowhere tnear rue, anyone visiting the site every 16,6 hours can spend all their points without hitting max. If you visit the site for 5 min in the morning and in the evening, you're already on par with the mentioned bots and point bankers.
Comment has been collapsed.
Let's imagine it's a sale. So, lot's of GAs conducted for 1-3 hours in the middle of the day.
- Bots enter them as soon as they appear, while most people miss them, so already not equal chances.
- And, also, "bankers" (and some bots can do "banking"), that can enter all of the GAs while most can enter less.
So, where's the equal chances?
Comment has been collapsed.
arguement 1: It was you who said decreasing point max favours bots, while your response in your latest comment has nothing to do with point max. Hell, the "bots enter them as soon as they appear" happens now, will happen after the 500->400 change and happened at the 300 max. Point max changes nothing on that.
2: you only need to visit the site once every 16.6 hours to spend all your points, or bank them if you will. Bots literally can't spend more points than any user who logs in once during that time period, and it's absolutely not hard to enter every 2/3 day.
Why argue with me if you contradicted your previous comment, that point max will hurt the users with a talk about giveaway creation time favours some people? It always been like this, yet you attack a suggestion based on it. Sorry, but that just makes no sense at all.
Comment has been collapsed.
His second point, I think, is that with a lower cap, you can have less points sitting around for when a bundle causes a flood of giveaways, unless you bank. Putting bankers at an advantage. Thus encouraging more people to waste time banking.
Comment has been collapsed.
Bankers will always have an adventage if we have literally any point max :| People shouldn't pay this much attention of what others can do/ are doing. Raising the point cap to 500 had the 1 login/day people having 500 point to spend instead of 300, and if this change goes through, will still have 400 compared to the 300, so they profit from it compared to anyone else who entered more than once, who gets less relative points, yet noone is yelling about it. It's impossible to design a universal system that won't provide an adventage to a group or another.
Comment has been collapsed.
Happy Cake Day, Mugi4ok and have a good one! ^^
Actually, I think you should just leave it
You've got that right!
Comment has been collapsed.
Gotta keep that card farming operation fed somehow. Steam shows 381 hours of play time for the past 336 hours. (Naturally, barely 2% of the wins were ever touched for playing purposes.)
Comment has been collapsed.
I finished all my wins (those I could, as I got permanently stuck in Sydney's World and eventually had to drop ASCII Attack as it gave me intense nausea), so not really understanding what you mean.
Comment has been collapsed.
sigh
- The Journey Down is the first episode of a three-part point 'n' click and it consist of two areas of five screens each. It can be easily completed in an hour if you are not too rusty in adventure games. (I really got stuck at the ceiling fan one and at one part where you need to get to a closed part of a posh party.) The second episode wasn't that much longer either. And I kinda hope the third one will come out eventually.
- The Silent Age is a port of a mobile game and has similarly only a few screens per chapter, with only half a dozen or so chapters. If I haven't got lost in the final part, before the last time-jump, I would have probably finished it a bit faster, because it is more focused on a simple narrative than actual puzzles (you rarely carry more than maybe four items at a time).
- Abandoned (or Through Abandoned as now it is called) is a static Myst-like point 'n' click prototype, usually finished in 20 minutes. It sequel was a lot longer, plus made me run around a ton to get the secret achievement.
- Windowsill is a Flash game, where you have to find a block on 8 or so screens while looking at nice animations that try to emulate some kind of physics engine in Flash. I think it is even available online, you can check how fast you can be as well.
- Eventide 2 and Ferrum's Secrets are hidden object games, and the average completion time of those is around 3 hours. I have 100+ of those on my account. (Although I have a few I could breeze through under 90 minutes and now I am playing a classic one where the play time exceeds ten hours.) Ferrum's Secrets there is actually three complete runs on the game, because the devs separated some of the collectibles to the available difficulties.
- Duckie Dash is a child's game of 36 levels, ranging from 15 seconds to 3 minutes each. I think I even have a screenshot of 3-starring all of them.
- Kaboom Monsters is not finished and stuck i early access, and easily exploitable, I got the absolute highest-grade deck in it, even screen-capped that. Granted, I still lack two achievements: one needs to finish a match with super-specific circumstances, the other I have no ide how to unlock. Since the devs disappeared, cannot really ask.
There may be other games there with low play time, but these are the ones I can tell from memory.
Comment has been collapsed.
But.... what? But Talgaby is right, you barely started your games.... how do you want to use the same arguement of not playing wins on someone who DID play their wins? Is it that late that I just can't grasp this? :|
Comment has been collapsed.
The 2% originates from a script that checks each won games on one's profile - for you it is :
Games with 1 Achievement 2.74% (2/73)
It's not gameplaytime, as it can and is very often idled, even my playtimes are inflated by ASF or me not playing attention to games. But as very few people - who don't care about their wins to play them - bothers enough to unlock achivements with SAM for a game they haven't even started, the min.1 achivement stat is quite a good stat to measure progress, as vast majority of games have an easy, early achivement, if not more.
It's not really about dictating what and when to play, but not to waste other's money, no matter how harsh it sounds. It's like how buying a 20$ game then just letting it, not playing until one could get it for 5$. That's basically 15$ lost. Now I can put up with me losing money because of my carelessness, but I don't want to pull the same thing for others again, I did it already more times than I should have. Not to mention the ridiculous backlog so many of us is guilty, simply because the list just buries everything :(
Comment has been collapsed.
By the way, out of all the games I have I don't give the games I won here an advantage to play them over those I already had or buy anywhere else; I play whatever I'm up to whenever I want to and surely won't anybody let dictate me what I have to play when or for how long.
I have to agree with that: Unless you win games from people who -in the giveaway description- clearly ask you to play your wins, or you've joined a group with specific rules, you're free to do what you want.
Also, people are not machines, we have real life responsibilities and random things happen all the time. Speaking for myself, some weeks i'm bored to death and play one game after another, and some weeks i simply cannot touch the keyboard. All in all, I'm a bit worried that this new crusade we started over "players" and "not players", will not end well..
Comment has been collapsed.
The new situation harms to the active users (like me) and favors to the users that only entered here 1 (maybe 2) time each day.
Comment has been collapsed.
So I take it you never sleep or work and were able to be online every single time a new bundle caused a point flood?
Comment has been collapsed.
Imo you dont have to explain yourself. You can do with your time whatever you want! Some work more, to buy themselves a car. Others meet friends. Some play WoW. Others visit Steamgifts. Some are ill. Others just not an "outside" person. People are judging people.
But when someone tells something objective (eg the new system is a good change for the ones who visit less often), crap like "You dont even play all the games! I saw your profile!" is the answer -_____- First: THEY dont have a life, if they look up your Steam Activities XD Second: Its YOUR win! YOUR life! You can play whatever, whenever you want! You won something. The others must deal with it.
So, dear Eiion, dont justify yourself for their sake. Have fun, get games, play them when you like and let the positive energies in your life :) Get well, I wish you health and good times ☼
Comment has been collapsed.
The poll you linked to is now in favor of keeping it at 50P maximum.
I'd suggest 60P myself. That should cut out most of the affected giveaways while keeping ultra expensive packages more reasonably enterable so we don't end up with public giveaways for them with 1-2 entries.
I'd also prefer it if the cap was kept at 500P. With a lower cap, users who aren't able to visit the site frequently enough will be encouraged to enter for things that they don't want all that much just to not waste points, or to waste time banking points.
Slightly increased point generation is probably a good idea.
And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I'd like to reiterate my request for a longer minimum duration for giveaways.
Comment has been collapsed.
And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I'd like to reiterate my request for a longer minimum duration for giveaways.
I sure hope it doesn't happen. I would hate for power to be taken away from giveaway creators just because a few can't stand the idea of a giveaway happening at a moment in time when they're not around or don't have enough points to join.
Comment has been collapsed.
The poll you linked is now at 51%/49% in favor for the maximum entry of 50 points.
Comment has been collapsed.
That's probably because people who don't care about all this poll about point (because they don't think it will change something) vote now....
Maybe an official poll would be better to really know what people think.
Comment has been collapsed.
Actually I have been asking a few times in CG his threads if there could be a community poll about these changes with a clear question and clear answers.
Comment has been collapsed.
PLEASE lower it back to 300P i have too many points bro =) =)
Comment has been collapsed.
I'm getting lost, today I wrote a comment on the thread that was still sticky, now I find out that a more updated but not sticky thread about the new point system is here. I will copy-paste my message because I see that nothing changed. The change of the distribution system, which is the real issue, has not even been mentioned by cg here. Now I'm starting to feel like there is something wrong, but I can't really understand what. So this was my comment:
I hope that cg will not make a plain count of positive and negative comments, but also which changes thay praise or complain about.
While I have seen a number of positive comments that praise the higher cap and the smaller average amount of points (or that simply say "I like it"), I can't say I have seen positive comments regarding HOW they are distributed with the new system. Now I haven't read all 1391 comments, but enough to see that the majority of comments that say something about the replacement of the dynamic system with a fixed time-based system do not agree with that change.
I strongly agree with those negative feedbacks for the reasons already said. Today it's tuesday. If a good Humble Bundle gets released, I'm pretty sure that many users will finally see what the problem is, and they won't be happy about it.
Let's face it, guys, there is no reason to remove the dynamic system.
Most users like to be more relaxed and avoid hitting the cap? Let's raise the cap.
Most users like to enter averagely less giveaways so that they only pick what they really want to play? Let's reduce the number of points given for each GA created.
But removing the relation between value of GAs created and available points... Just why.
And now we are even making a poll that mix all changes in one! Are we serious? I personally agree with the higher cap whereas the time-based distribution makes no sense. So how can I choose between "yes I like the new system" and "no I don't like it"?
Comment has been collapsed.
it evens the odds a little too much for the once a day casual visitor compared to users that visit two or three times a day
I thought the point was to make it easier for people who are manually entering GAs... I hate needing to keep watch over this site constantly, lest I fall behind.
I'm very happy you're cracking down on those bot scripts, if you really can.
Comment has been collapsed.
i dont think we need more points to me , I am usually at the cap since i enter GAs i only really care but i believe the new system make people join GAs more , less in overall number but more since someone could feel like he is losing if he is not spending the points , therefore enter more things he doesnt want
The decrease in the capacity i dont think really matters anyone can have access to the internet from work or home checking the site 3-4 times the day i think is what the average user does
As for the max point per GA i think its ok to raise , now i dont think many here ever paid a full price of 60+ euros for a title to GA since there are so many discount sites that are legit , in the rare occasion where some user really do paid 80 euros for a gold edition of a new AAA game that he wants to GA he should take that much CV
Comment has been collapsed.
my 2 cents
new point system is too limiting....6P per 15min is really a minimal needed upgrade
if there's a new bundle around you will have a lot of GAs posted and not enough points, not even for 1 out of 4
in calm moments...you will have a lot of points and very few GAs
I prefer a system based on GAs created...seems more realistic
Comment has been collapsed.
My thoughts on the point system.
- Before the change, my public level 0 giveaways for cheap bundle games got 400-1200 entries, for the most part.
- Since the change, my public level 0 giveaways for cheap bundle games get 350-1000 entries, for the most part.
So, despite the massive amount of childish temper tantrums thrown all over the forums, and people crying how much entries will drop because they now cannot spend 2000+ points daily on games they never intended to touch anyway, I am yet to see this SteamGifts-apocalypse happening.
Comment has been collapsed.
And I wonder how much of that small decline is due to the auto-join users who have paused their scripts out of fear.
Comment has been collapsed.
Good question. Most likely one of the reasons, but only one of many.
I mostly tried to stay out of this topic until I saw at least a week's of numbers, exploiting that I am in a relatively long-running daily giveaway series where the change hit right almost in the middle of it, and seeing little difference between the first half and the currently ended ones of the second half, my suspicion of the site consisting of too many functionally over-reacting entitled little drama queen teenagers (even if they are over 30) is getting closer to reality.
Comment has been collapsed.
Closing. Please refer to the most recent discussion.
Comment has been collapsed.
Thanks for all of the feedback on the recent changes. Overall, I think they're working well, and the last user poll on the forum seemed slightly in favor of the new point system. However, it's pretty clear any modifications to the point system will result in some heated debates, and I highly doubt any solution will appeal to everyone. Nonetheless, I would like to make a few more adjustments after talking to a wide range of people and reviewing comments the past week. I was thinking about making the following changes in the next couple of days...
Switching from 5P to 6P every 15 minutes. There is no right answer here, because some users found they still had too many points, and others believed they were too limited. I would like to raise it a little though, and I'm leaning towards 6P every 15 minutes, which will give users an extra 96P per day (576P compared to 480P) to join a few more giveaways.
Decreasing the point cap from 500P to 400P. After further thought, I think 500P is too high for the point cap, and it evens the odds a little too much for the once a day casual visitor compared to users that visit two or three times a day. I want to lower this to 400P. If we switch to 6P every 15 minutes as mentioned above, users would reach a 400P cap after 16.6 hours. This means a once a day visitor would be able to spend 400P, while a more frequent visitor could spend 576P. I think that's fair, it would give more regular users 44% more points compared to someone that just stops by once a day. I think it would be appreciated by more frequent visitors, and they only need to visit twice a day to get that benefit.
Switching the maximum number of points to enter a single giveaway back to 100P instead of 50P. I'm fairly indifferent about this change since it would affect a small number of giveaways. Users also seemed relatively split in a recent poll, but they voted in favor of 100P, so I'll side with the vote in this case.
Comment has been collapsed.