Guild Renown Changes

[Hendrik]

Smatt, what if instead of "active logged into game" we were to use a measure of activity that's already tracked as a part of the system, and would allow the players who log in to say "hi" without running anything to remain uncounted? Namely, a person is flagged as inactive when they haven't earned any renown within the preceding decay period. With the inactivity flag cleared as soon as they earn a point of renown?

Bonus: players don't get a decay hit when servers are brought down or crash multiple times in a day.

Your heart is in the right place, but IMO, if you want to log in and chat with people vs play the game your playing for, there are far better ways, and free, to do it.

While the idea has merit, getting far to complicated to impliment, again, IMO.

The solution needs to appeal to players as well as Turbine.

I do like the Decay by Active Player idea. Now, if Turbine would do that, and add a -XX% to decay for ViP accounts as a new perk...

+XX% Renown Shrines via TP.

[Hendrik]

Impossible? No. Very difficult? Sure. Really, I can understand why this would be frustrating for players trying to carry their fellows to the promised land, but take away that one active player and think about how frustrating it must be for that small guild of all casual players (so casual it is as if they don't exist). Where should the line be drawn?

No Decay until L35-40 but leave the current system as is?

or;

No decay until L25, Account Multiplier based on Size Bonus;

10 For Very Small, 15 For Small, 20 for Medium/Large.


Not be be harsh, if they are so casual it is they don't exist, then they don't 'deserve' to advance nor have they 'earned' the rewards from advancement. They already get the first ship and no decay from L25 and below. That is more then enought 'if they don't exist'.

IMO.

[slarden]

Simply changing the base decay rate, while leaving the FREE bonuses intact as is, simply moves the bar to some other set of people, encourages a particular ideal size of a guild etc etc.

My guild hit 85 last night... You know how? We all encouraged each other to drive to that goal.... It happens...

You must have missed something. My guild is actually more active than Hendrick's guild and most likely yours as well. Activity level is not the problem here and we now have #s to prove it. The reason you are getting there is because of a reduction in decay not because you encouraged each other. You did that prior to the decay reduction but were stuck if you recall your own words.

It's easy to say you are accomplishing something due to your great actions when you just received a massive decay reduction. All guilds will move foward with a decay reduction. Your guild received a decay reduction while the system is actually harder now for guilds of 10 and less.

The facts are very clear. You are moving forward because you received a decay reduction.

[slarden]

Want a laugh, here is one for you.

You won't gain those last few levels you want so much because you don't have the people online to overcome decay.

Drop it to 10, and if you still don't have people online to overcome decay, guess what, you won't advance even then.

Why do you think you should be able to advance like large guilds with many online when you yourself do not have many, if ANY, online?

You want the benefit of guild advancement without having the players online to advance.

You have already said that our activity levels are the same. Stated that you are advancing, even slowly, and your fine with that. Your fine that large guilds advance farther and faster.

This is starting to sound like, again, like you want to raise in levels without adding more members, having members online, change how you play or what you run.

You want those levels that are so important to you, then get your members online and playing content - as you have exerienced, it is that easy. If it wasn't you would not be advancing right now like you are.


And I have been for, and made suggestions, to change decay. All for smaller guilds getting a few extra levels. What I am against is removing activity from the equation and repeating this debate again when you do get those extra levels and start the whole 'this is not fair' argument all over again when you plateau again.

If anything proves the system is broke your posts do. My guild is actually producing more renown per player than your guild. So what is your conclusion? We must change our actions.

Well that is exactly my point, even though my guild is producing more renown than your guild you say we need to do more

The issue isn't production, my guild is producing just fine. The problem is that we have more of our renown taken away in the form of a decay tax. I will post the #s with a detailed analysis once we complete our first week.

This was a great idea you had. It is demonstrating the problem in a way mere words can't.

[slarden]

Another interesting point smatt.

It took us the same amount of time to reach our 85 benchmark. We were stuck at the 80-81 bounce for 2 years and just hit 85 on Sunday morning. L85 is all we ever wanted to hit since airships launched.

So when you were stuck at 80-81 why didn't you follow your own advice and just have people play more? I mean you could have advanced if your guild would have played more.

Don't forget that small guilds are still operating under the old system except that things are actually worse due to the more difficult ransack penalty. Our decay/person is very close to what your decay/person was under the old system. That is why you are now able to advance - a decay reduction - not because you are playing more.

Remember, my guild is slightly more active than your guild on a per member basis.

You and Smatt's guild will reach 100 under the new system and I am very happy for both of you. However, small guilds are still stuck at levels much lower than that.

[slarden]

wow.... You have no idea what getting no FREE renown, and being hit for 130k renown a day is like do you?

I can't even bother to reply to your posts...... They're just not part of any kind of logical converasation.

Your'e only going to be happy if they just GIVE you everything.

Even though this isnt a reply to me I will still respond.

You continue to miss the point and ignore simple mathematics.

Small guild bonus doesn't provide any advantage, it just slightly decreases the disadvantage that small guilds have to level up.

As for decay, please keep in mind that the high decay you are complaining about is almost identical to the decay small guild still have on a per member basis. The bonus you speak of allows a guild of 6 to earn the renown as if they had 24 people. This is a necessary bonus in a system where that same guild is getting decay for 20 people.

How is that an advantage over a guild of 80 people earning the renown of 80 and getting decay for 20.

I am glad your guild is able to move foward now, but it is only able to do so because the per member decay was reduced significantly. What many of us in small guilds don't understand is why you are trying to prevent small guilds from being able to get past the same type of level ceiling that you once and had and seemed so frustrated by.

[smatt]

Even though this isnt a reply to me I will still respond.

Why you ignore 1/2 of what I say?

You continue to miss the point and ignore simple mathematics.

You're so stuck on your little vendetta you ignore or dismiss 1/2 of what other people are saying. Don't you wonder why some are so dismissive of you at this point?

Small guild bonus doesn't provide any advantage, it just slightly decreases the disadvantage that small guilds have to level up. [trat

TY.... But I wish you would actually read and take into account everything people say, isntead of just the parts that are in opposition to you. From day 1 till they hanged the system a couple months ago small guilds had a HUGE advantage over everybody else.

[Nestroy]

(...)You continue to miss the point and ignore simple mathematics.

Small guild bonus doesn't provide any advantage, it just slightly decreases the disadvantage that small guilds have to level up.

As for decay, please keep in mind that the high decay you are complaining about is almost identical to the decay small guild still have on a per member basis. The bonus you speak of allows a guild of 6 to earn the renown as if they had 24 people. This is a necessary bonus in a system where that same guild is getting decay for 20 people.

How is that an advantage over a guild of 80 people earning the renown of 80 and getting decay for 20.

I am glad your guild is able to move foward now, but it is only able to do so because the per member decay was reduced significantly. What many of us in small guilds don't understand is why you are trying to prevent small guilds from being able to get past the same type of level ceiling that you once and had and seemed so frustrated by.

+1 - thank you for puting in my answer and I could not have said it any better!

[Nestroy]

(...) From day 1 till they hanged the system a couple months ago small guilds had a HUGE advantage over everybody else.

NO, that´s not correct. Small guilds with exceptional activity had a certain advantage over large guilds. And only them. And only because these guilds had an exceptional activity. Most small guilds were and today are even still stuck at levels well below your larger guilds levles without chance to grow.

If anybody of you large guildies out there would have been able to get you large guilds to hyper activity levles of the best small guilds you would as well have had the opportunitiy to reach level 100 - even faster so than most hyperactive small guilds.

The problem was one of statistics and sociology, not one of renown decay. Even in a very highly motivated group the bigger the group gets, the higher the statistical probability you get underarchievers into the group. The Gauss Bell Curve clearly shows that you have a 5% top contributors, mainly intermediary contributors and about 5% on the low side of things. That´s completely normal. So getting more activity out of people just shifts this curve somewhat - top archievers get a little more, the bulk of contributors contributes a little more and there are always those that trail behind.

Would it have been possible (but statistics is against this!) to get only these 5% top contributors into a large guild you would have reached lv. 100 in a breeze with such a group even in the old system. Alas, the larger the sample group, the higher the probability to again get the Gauss Bell Curve (top contributors leaving or getting less active bcause of shift of interests or out of necessety) and good bye lv. 100 - under the old system, that is. Now you have your new system and now even large guilds with mediocre activity but only they need to be or get big, will reach lv. 100.

On the other side of the size spectrum, a small guild, especially when the one motivated member does multibox to the top, can beat the statistics due to a small sample of active accounts to take the activity from. There the Gauss Bell Curve builds up over all small guilds in total and here we see a minor 1-5% small guilds on the Top, mostly mediocre lv. 30 - lv. 70 guilds and a big lot of very underarchieving low level guilds nobody cares for any more.

---

So any system to be fair would need to take into account the statistics. As long as this is not done and the renown (decay) system is not formed around a statistically mediocre guild activity, there will be less fairness and more complaints. Simple as that.

I do not care if my guild reaches lv. 100 in 100 years or in 2-3 years. I care for my guild being able to reach lv. 100 eventually. If I get stuck at lv. 70 - 75 because I am in a small guild and decay eats me up, I complaint. Especially doing this if big guilds with much less activity than my small guild breeze past me and reach lv. 100 only because they are big.

Size in itself is no achievement! Else the Korthos Armies would rule the servers.

So the most fair solution would be: Do away with decay completely!

[Blue100000005]

Ive seen similar systems in other games. How it tended to work out in most guilds was that the GL removed the cost/buff NPCs outside of guild events. So basically, no buffs placed except on raid night.

It was rather clunky and sure didn't lead to players making a whole lot of effort filling shrines.

EDIT: It also lead to buffs not being over-writable to prevent griefing. So expect buffs to have the same "wait around till they run out to replace" mechanic that guild augment crystals have if something like this were put in place.

That would suck, already tired of waiting around for people to get their buffs after every freaking quest.

[Blue100000005]

And how many people more would buy renown pots if they just removed decay? I would have one burning every character every log in. No with having it taken from me, i refuse to spend money on it.

[Arnez]

Curious side bar- how accurate is that 93.5% decay reduction for guilds of 300? Is that the limit? can you get to 100% with 500+ ?
If that is accurate and we're an Active Small guild that wants to keep our level- I think Turbine is underestimating just how MANY free accounts six of us are willing to create. (I mean- we've made dozens just from the build your guild event and dozens more for pets).

[Artos_Fabril]

Curious side bar- how accurate is that 93.5% decay reduction for guilds of 300? Is that the limit? can you get to 100% with 500+ ?
If that is accurate and we're an Active Small guild that wants to keep our level- I think Turbine is underestimating just how MANY free accounts six of us are willing to create. (I mean- we've made dozens just from the build your guild event and dozens more for pets).

The math is accurate. The associated assumptions are, however, laughable. It would be impossible to hit 100% unless decay were eliminated completely, and then it would be a 100% reduction in decay for all guilds of all sizes. From a player standpoint, that's an ideal solution. However Turbine has given no indication that eliminating decay is on the table; has, in fact, contraindicated the hope of an elimination of decay on several occasions.

[smatt]

[QUOTE=slarden;4869379]

Why you ignore 1/2 of what I say?

You're so stuck on your little vendetta you ignore or dismiss 1/2 of what other people are saying. Dont' you wonder why soem are so dismissive of you at this point?



I read the whole thing, but I don't think commenting on every word makes sense either. There is no vendetta, that is in your head

I would disagree..

Under the old system small guilds had a SLIGHT advantage with regards to decay. A guild of 6 was earning renown of 24 while getting decay for 20 while a guild of 80 was getting renown for 80 and getting decay for 90. This made a difference of a few levels which is not right. While I completely agree this was unfair look at what we have now.

Slight... We can go back and look at decay rates under the old system.. The per player decay was way out of whack, even compared to waht it is for you now, considering the free renown you get. Of course any system for guilds scu as what we have wil favor larger guilds wihtout somekind of formula involved... Simply to keep people staying small until they get their big airship and then inviting a bunch of people in.

A guild of 6 is earning renown for 24 and getting decay for 20. A guild of 350 is getting renown for 350 and getting decay for 20.

I'm not goign to say in every post I put up that I think the system is out of whack for small guilds now... You seem to have a short memory... But jsut as Turbine isn't here to put a system in to fit YOUR playstyle, I'm not here to correct your short memory that myself as well as most others have agreed it's out of whack.

The system needed to be fixed, but swining the pendelum the other direction to an extreme was not the right answer either.

I think even a Dev just came in and agreed with that POV or I could be imagining it....... The guilds that have advanced under all versions of the system have encouraged their members to help them advance. You choosing not to is your choice.. And THAT is something you don't seem to understand. You want Turbine to fix everythign for you, instead of saying.. Well maybe it is party my guilds fault AND responsibilty to push ourselves forward IF we want the benefits of the larger ship and better amenities...

[smatt]

NO, that´s not correct. Small guilds with exceptional activity had a certain advantage over large guilds. And only them. And only because these guilds had an exceptional activity. Most small guilds were and today are even still stuck at levels well below your larger guilds levles without chance to grow.

If anybody of you large guildies out there would have been able to get you large guilds to hyper activity levles of the best small guilds you would as well have had the opportunitiy to reach level 100 - even faster so than most hyperactive small guilds.

The problem was one of statistics and sociology, not one of renown decay. Even in a very highly motivated group the bigger the group gets, the higher the statistical probability you get underarchievers into the group. The Gauss Bell Curve clearly shows that you have a 5% top contributors, mainly intermediary contributors and about 5% on the low side of things. That´s completely normal. So getting more activity out of people just shifts this curve somewhat - top archievers get a little more, the bulk of contributors contributes a little more and there are always those that trail behind.

Would it have been possible (but statistics is against this!) to get only these 5% top contributors into a large guild you would have reached lv. 100 in a breeze with such a group even in the old system. Alas, the larger the sample group, the higher the probability to again get the Gauss Bell Curve (top contributors leaving or getting less active bcause of shift of interests or out of necessety) and good bye lv. 100 - under the old system, that is. Now you have your new system and now even large guilds with mediocre activity but only they need to be or get big, will reach lv. 100.

On the other side of the size spectrum, a small guild, especially when the one motivated member does multibox to the top, can beat the statistics due to a small sample of active accounts to take the activity from. There the Gauss Bell Curve builds up over all small guilds in total and here we see a minor 1-5% small guilds on the Top, mostly mediocre lv. 30 - lv. 70 guilds and a big lot of very underarchieving low level guilds nobody cares for any more.

---

So any system to be fair would need to take into account the statistics. As long as this is not done and the renown (decay) system is not formed around a statistically mediocre guild activity, there will be less fairness and more complaints. Simple as that.

I do not care if my guild reaches lv. 100 in 100 years or in 2-3 years. I care for my guild being able to reach lv. 100 eventually. If I get stuck at lv. 70 - 75 because I am in a small guild and decay eats me up, I complaint. Especially doing this if big guilds with much less activity than my small guild breeze past me and reach lv. 100 only because they are big.

Size in itself is no achievement! Else the Korthos Armies would rule the servers.

So the most fair solution would be: Do away with decay completely!

Nope... The system has ALWAYS been designed to reward PLAYER ACTIVETY.... And it should be that way... Sorry there should be no free rides.... Most guilds will cap before they hit 100....... It was never designed for all guilds to hit 100. I know you fail to understand that concept, but that's the way it was designed.. WAI......

[Blue100000005]

The math is accurate. The associated assumptions are, however, laughable. It would be impossible to hit 100% unless decay were eliminated completely, and then it would be a 100% reduction in decay for all guilds of all sizes. From a player standpoint, that's an ideal solution. However Turbine has given no indication that eliminating decay is on the table; has, in fact, contraindicated the hope of an elimination of decay on several occasions.

Have they given a logical reason why decay is honestly needed? Perhaps i skimmed over them in the 130+pages thus far.

[Nestroy]

Nope... The system has ALWAYS been designed to reward PLAYER ACTIVETY.... And it should be that way... Sorry there should be no free rides.... Most guilds will cap before they hit 100....... It was never designed for all guilds to hit 100. I know you fail to understand that concept, but that's the way it was designed.. WAI......

Well, the system MIGHT HAVE BEEN designed to reward PLAYER ACTIVITY. Since about 2.5 months it rewards those that grow big. Any guild now eventually may reach lv. 100. All they have to do is to grow. And grow. And grow. And I think you failed to understand that you are arguing along obsolete lines now. Since about 2.5 months there is not a reward for activity any more, this has been REPLACED BY a reward for primarly SIZE.

Easy to grasp:
What has been the deciding factor in the old system? Increasing activity.
What is the deciding factor now in the new system? Increasing in size.

[Nestroy]

Have they given a logical reason why decay is honestly needed? Perhaps i skimmed over them in the 130+pages thus far.

Well, if you put in $$$ as a logical reason, we might accurately guess why decay is necessary.

Unless of course there is a complete rework of the system and they find better ways of parting us players from TPs. Then all the sudden decay will vanish magically from one day to the other.

[slarden]

Nope... The system has ALWAYS been designed to reward PLAYER ACTIVETY.... And it should be that way... Sorry there should be no free rides.... Most guilds will cap before they hit 100....... It was never designed for all guilds to hit 100. I know you fail to understand that concept, but that's the way it was designed.. WAI......

You keep making this same false assertion that player activity is the problem. You said your guild was stuck in the low 80s prior to the change The reason you were stuck had nothing to do with activity level, it had to do with an amount of decay your guild couldn't overcome with the activity level the players had time for.

The only free ride requested was by you. You wish to keep 75% of the renown from people you boot from your guild. You and your guildies continue to get the benefit of the net 75% renown the person involuntarily removed earned. The person booted is getting no benefit for what he/she earned.

What we are pointing out is that a small guild and a large guild with the same per player activity can move in different directions. The small guild can be moving backwards even though the large guild is moving forward. Guilds with the same player activity will reach different plateaues. Your large guild will reach level 100 while a small guild with the same activity level will be stuck at a level far below that.

I can certainly see why you want the system to work for you, but I don't believe such a system is good for the DDO community. Over time decay becomes very frustrating to people that worked very hard and made sacrifices to build up their small guild - only to watch it stall permanently while other guilds with the same per player activity levels (or lower activity levels) march to 100.

I don't think it's working as intended - it was a quick fix. I hope the next fix also comes quickly.

[slarden]

Well, the system MIGHT HAVE BEEN designed to reward PLAYER ACTIVITY. Since about 2.5 months it rewards those that grow big. Any guild now eventually may reach lv. 100. All they have to do is to grow. And grow. And grow. And I think you failed to understand that you are arguing along obsolete lines now. Since about 2.5 months there is not a reward for activity any more, this has been REPLACED BY a reward for primarly SIZE.

Easy to grasp:
What has been the deciding factor in the old system? Increasing activity.
What is the deciding factor now in the new system? Increasing in size.

And for many of the large guilds commenting here, the growth will come by adding vets that were already in guilds. Not by recruiting the unguilded players that are mostly in Korthos or the Harbor. Most guilds are still selective because they don't want their guild name tarnished. No system change will impact that. The same guilds that were always taking on new and casual players are still the same guilds doing it. Ironically the guilds from Sarlona here are not doing this. Some have application forms and processes to join guilds. Others only add people they ran with often and meet their other criteria.

The main problem guilds have always faced is that people who were once active no longer are active due mostly to real life things taking up their time. This is still an issue for small guilds but not because of small guild bonus as some claim. It has to do with the fact that if we can't earn renown fast enough to cover decay, we move backwards under a high decay system.

This is the same problem smatt and hendrick had under the old system. I am glad decay was reduced for their guilds so they can move forward. I would like to see the same for the many small guilds that are stuck and frustrated.