Good Samaritan Credit Topic

Mike - see the yellow smiley face - I am far from a grammer Nazi, I am the king of typos and glitches.  I did not know of the inside joke just thought it was a typo. 

Last note on this.  At free I think there would be lots of cheating even honest owners would try something.  At $5 most people would not cheat as that goes up to $25 fewer would cheat, but at $25 there would still be those that cheat.  The difference in the number of cheaters that would not cheat at $25 but would at $5 is very very very small.  I got in at $15 due to a promotion and if I wanted to create several other aliases I could get several teams $15, but it is not worth it to save $10 ($40 per year).
 
I know the mathmatical difference is 100, My point is if you're (see I can  learn) one of those people that think winning is all games are about. The money would not matter regardless if you spend $5 for a team or $125.  For most people that "have" to win a hundred dollars, nothing but the cost of winning. 

Note: I never said to go to $5 per team.  Also after watching a youtube video on HBD I don't think it would take more than one season to get a team back into shape so I retract my multi-year discount proposal. 

Tecwrg - no I am not wealthy or even close to it.   
9/17/2012 12:41 PM
Well, I don't think "honest" owners will try something regardless of the cost.   I'll use the loopholes to my advantage but I'm not interested in winning thru blatant cheating.   It's an internet sim game.   How weak does your life have to be to win an internet sim game by cheating?

Nonetheless, there are people who will.  Giving them a discounted team is all the better for them.   And I don't think it's better for the world.
9/17/2012 1:12 PM
The cost is the only thing that keeps the game interesting.  If you started having a bunch guys playing for nearly free the dropout rate/cheating/checking in once a week would be loads worse than it is now.  At that point there would be a few dozen serious worlds and several hundred that are unplayable.  At least the way it is now most of the worlds in the game aren't a complete joke.  I know there are folks who the the aliases and cheating are bad now, but make it cheaper to play and it would be much worse.  That is a guarantee.

That being said we are getting close to 20% of the worlds sitting idle which is a lot.  More than anything I wish they would promote this game a little more aggressively.  Of course even if that worked we would probably be really full in March and April so worlds would be created every year and then in September they would empty out again.  Seasonality is probably just something we have to live with.  Which isn't a horrible thing if you are like me and have multiple worlds.  As long as three or four of my worlds are full I will always have moves to make everyday anyway.  If you only have a world or two I could see it sucking out loud. 
9/17/2012 2:01 PM
The flaw in your argument though is if $25 fee cuts down on abuses then raise the cost to $50.  I am sure Bill Gates would look at $1000 like we look at $10 so maybe to really cut down on people using multiple aliases and just letting teams fall apart WIS should charge $1000 per season. 

Where is the sweet spot?? It is different for each person.  Gotigers it is four leagues at $25 for me it is two leagues at $15 and as I said for Bill Gates or Warren Buffett it might be $10,000 per team. 

If HBD would have started out at $15 per season would you be pushing them to raise the fee to $25 or just arguing to maintain the $15 fee? 

Maybe that is a suggestion to raise with WIS different stakes for different worlds.
9/17/2012 10:12 PM
You really have no idea of what you're arguing for, do you?
9/17/2012 10:45 PM

I am aware that everyone has a differen't threshold.  So yes you are right there is a sweet spot.  I am telling you that right now we have a certain amount of players, and a certain amount of user abuse.  Lower the buy-in you may have more players, but you will also get more user abuse. User abuse doesn't have to mean cheating either.  More people will just bail on teams, more people will try and tank seasons, or just check-in once a week etc etc etc.  The cost helps keeps people invested in their teams.  Raising the cost would generally have the opposite effect.  There would be fewer people playing, and those who did would generally take it more seriously with fewer user abuses.  Also if the cost was increased too much more I would expect WIS to take some basic precautions to protect against aliases.  That would never stop cheating entirely, but could make it inconvenient enough to lower the abuse rate even more. 

My guess is they have already analyzed how much they can charge and at what point the returns start to diminish.  $25 is probably pretty close to the sweet spot.

I was unaware that we were paying "stakes"?  We are paying to enjoy 3 months of a simulation multi-player video game.  The credits are just to keep people around the site longer, and have a larger incentive to try an win it all.  Stakes imply that we have a chance of winning real money like gambling right?  Why would WIS want some folks to get to enjoy the game for $10 while others had to pay $50?  Why wouldn't even the best worlds just go into a $10 world and enforce their rules just the same? 

 

9/18/2012 12:53 AM
Well at least the political jab cleared things up about your lack of comprehension.
I don't think the price plays as much of a role in cheating as it does with commitment to a team and also don't think cheating is as commonplace as it might seem. Lack of commitment is more of a problem, imo.

9/18/2012 7:23 AM
Well, that kind of went all over the place.

Without doubt, WifS set a price point based on "Who would pay" and "Who will play".  As has been stated several times, $25 seems to maintain a level of committment while eliminating some abuse.   Would $35 make the game "better"?   Probably.   But you'd lose some users or, if nothing else, have some people cut back on teams.

WifS did some promos giving away teams a few years ago.   It was a complete disaster.    Charging $5, $10 or $15 would not be as big of a disaster but it would not solve the problem.

The solution is to find stable worlds with quick rollovers.   You may have to get some experience before that happens(they become stable worlds with quick rollovers because they screen owners) but that's your solution.
9/18/2012 8:10 AM

Your comment about my political jab clears thing up about your sense of humor.

Screening owners is probably the answer and not just approving or inviting anybody in order to roll over faster.

I believe it is better to have a crappy team in a good league than a good team in a crappy league regardless of the cost (of course with some limitations).

Mike in general I think we agree the only argument is where to set an arbitrary number that neither of has any real hard facts to back up our claim.  Would decreasing the fee to $15 in special cases reduce commitment and increase the number of owners, yes, by how much I don't know. 

9/18/2012 11:13 AM
I am known to be a pretty humorless guy.
9/18/2012 11:30 AM
Hypnotoad - anyone who watches Futurama can't be that humorless.  It just seemed like we where arguing over a mute point much like the Democrats and Republicans.

Another idea - perhaps some additional tools to screen potential owners.  How many times or days or percentage of days an owner lets AI run their ML team
9/18/2012 11:51 AM
MOOT
9/18/2012 12:00 PM

Do I know what changing the cost to $15 would do?  Yes.   Do I know how big of an effect it would be?  No.    But you've just allowed the guy with 2 teams to buy another for the same cost as the first two.   Some people would get in over their head.  Some would decide to try tanking.   Some would say "Bah, it's only $15"(and yes, there is a difference between 15 and 25).

As I said, the promo code was a disaster.  Would reducing the cost by 40% be equally bad?  No.   Would it be worse?  I think it would significantly be worse.

9/18/2012 12:28 PM
Hypnotoad - I really should proof reed what I type. (Mute point is a silent point, do you buy it?? I wouldn't either.)

Mike - In general we agree, except in degree which we will never come to agreement on.  However you win the debate, WIS is charging $25.
9/18/2012 3:50 PM
Truthfully, I sort of think of $20 as a price point.   Of course, that's a cash layout.   Some street vendor offers me something I want but value at $17.   "Yeah, whatever, here's a $20."    If he's selling it for $22, I probably just pass because that requires too much work.   A 20 and 5 while fully expecting him to say "Sorry, dude, I don't got no change" after I hand him the $25.    I sure it doesn't work exactly that way on the internet with a credit card but I still fill up my truck with an round number if I can despite not paying cash for fuel in 15 years.
9/18/2012 4:44 PM
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