Topic

Projects and their rewards

So, I’ve been Glitching since October, and in the beginning, it was fantastic.  That sounds bad... it’s still fantastic.  

I know this has been raised before, but I want some fresh thoughts 6 months after it was last discussed: my issue is the projects:  at times, the Global Chat is just hundreds of people asking that something be auctioned for a project because they don’t want to leave otherwise they can’t help.  You also end up with hundreds of people at each project.  So as soon as a phase starts, it’s over.  I’d like to see the rewards either reduced drastically or caps on how much help you can give in a certain space of time, like the meditation cooldown or teleportation cooldown.  We end up with horrendous lag, and most players never get a look in on projects.

Thoughts?

Posted 19 months ago by Oo Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

  • It's beta and I'm confident the final rollout Glitch will be scaled and will work in a way we're not imagining at the moment...Too much mico-managing at this stage might be frustrating when we see the live Glitch.
    Posted 19 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I've been playing since the very end of March (about one hour of Alpha testing).  I've heard about the projects but have never been able to contribute until yesterday (May 13).  The project was already in phase 3 and most of what I had (loam, earth, planks, etc) had already been donated.  I was able to grind some barnacles and donate barnacle talc.  Donating to a project was a personal goal of mine, so I feel good that I was able to donate even a small amount.  I think a cooldown is a GREAT idea. Either that or eliminate the trophies.  Perhaps make a quest where you have to donate many different items -- earth up to whatever is difficult to make -- and you get a trophy at the end.  I think there will always be people who play the game to get the most -- pts, achievements, etc.  It definitely needs some tinkering the way it stands now.
    Posted 19 months ago by Marla Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I agree Marla. Right now because of the mad rush and lack of a systematic way for everyone to be aware of status of ongoing projects (except to rely on kindness of others in the new projects group), the projects are not a even playing field for everyone. I think having a cap and better ways to get the trophy rewards would be nice.

    Imagine if there is no cap on donating to shrines per day. People would just keep donating , get emblems and use them to get mega xp every day just from the emblems!
    Posted 19 months ago by gia Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I have mixed feelings about the projects.   I've seen some wonderful cooperation between players, giving things to others and a lot of chat about what's needed and who needs help... on the other hand, the frenetic feel to the play doesn't appeal to me.

    I've been to a couple projects and donated what little I had and picked or shoveled or ground...  and I think I even have a trophy piece, maybe two.   But I'm not a trophy oriented sort so, at the end of the phase of building, I've gone back to wandering the world or mixing drinks or cooking up the latest concoction.

    I know in another post, there was a mention that the devs think we're building these streets WAY too fast and they're looking at ways to adjust that.
    Posted 19 months ago by Pirate Apples Subscriber! | Permalink
  • As people attain higher levels, there are currently fewer structured things, like quests, to do. I suspect that is the reason why many people focus on completing street projects. Those projects are a main visible goal within the game.

    I agree with the issues about collecting materials and donating work. I'm not fond of pointless delays, but what if a short buffer were added between the gathering part of a phase and the work part? That would allow people who are out harvesting time to return to the project site.

    Another possible improvement would be for a "Work Starting" notification that would go to anyone who had donated any materials toward the project.

    Does anyone know how materials donated compares with work donated as far as rewards? Surely the time involved in finding and scraping 50 barnacles to donate shouldn't give the same reward as dumping a watering can 50 times (or even 100). Maybe that's a solution... rather than needing 500 waterings, that gets bumped up to 5000?
    Posted 19 months ago by Merek Subscriber! | Permalink
  • As someone who has been here since before the first street project, I have had mixed emotions about them. For the first few projects, things went relatively well. Due to a bug, no rewards were given out, but there was always something you could give. However, once the rewards kinks were ironed out and the number of players started growing dramatically, things went downhill. I have only been able to contribute to ONE project in the last 3 months. I was a top contributor on that, because I was the first one there and obviously gave everything I had, roughly 1/3 of the materials for the project (There was only one phase back then). I have since abandoned projects because unless you are right there, it is too late to give anything. If I walked by a new one next test, I would dump all the stuff I could, but I won't look for them. It's pretty much useless at this point.
    Posted 19 months ago by Edward Subscriber! | Permalink
  • After months of hearing project complaints (most of which I find absurd, by the way), I just had an idea: get rid of the project location on a particular street, tied to a particular vendor.

    Instead, let everyone look at the project window by clicking on the magic rock.  Donations could be made on the fly, and work could be performed from wherever players happen to be. 

    This would remove much of the communal aspect of the projects, but eliminate all of the bickering.  Some people would still organize barnacle parties, share blockmakers, etc., but those who find other people annoying could participate from the comfort of their own homes.  No one would feel that he's missing out by leaving a project street to go find loam, since there'd be no project street. 

    In order to slow the rate at which we've been completing projects, the developers could simply raise the requirements.

    There would be no project lag, since there wouldn't be large numbers of people congregating in one place.  At the end of the project, the free teleports to the new street could be offered every few minutes, first to the top ten contributors, then to the next ten, and so on.  Also, teleports could be deferred (normally I'm in the middle of doing something else when I get the TP offer, and I often have to decline). 

    I'm sure someone else has come up with this idea before, but I haven't looked through old posts to find it.  I also know that this should be posted in the ideas thread, rather than here.  Okay, flame away!  :)
    Posted 19 months ago by glum pudding Subscriber! | Permalink
  • i agree with the rewards being scaled back and getting rid of the trophies.

    they just don't add anything good to the projects, other than possibly a little extra completion speed.
    Posted 19 months ago by striatic Subscriber! | Permalink
  • +1 Merek

    +1 glum pudding
    Posted 19 months ago by IxÆoN Subscriber! | Permalink
  • All the "rewards" do is partially compensate people for the enormous amount of energy they use to complete projects, and give some experience that they would have gained anyway if they were off doing other things instead. In my mind, there are two reasons to contribute to projects: 1) get a trophy (those will go away with the wipe, by the way). 2) Be proud that you helped in some way to open up a new area. I personally think the second reason is the best, although I would really like some trophies too. The other rewards are extremely minimal for the amount of effort put into the projects.

    I don't think rewards need to be reduced (they aren't big enough right now to motivate people to contribute to projects just for that reason), and removing the trophies seems unnecessary (there really does have to be some sort of real compensation--if you remove all rewards then you will reduce the desire of many people to contribute... maybe that's what you want, whatever...). If anything, the quantities of items needed for projects has to be increased, which is exactly what the devs plan on doing, so don't fret--projects will be much harder in the future, and take longer to complete (the devs have said so--I heard them.).
    Posted 19 months ago by Shepherdmoon Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't like the idea of remote project building.

    I understand lag is an instant joy killer. But being in one place with a bunch of people joining our efforts to complete something (whatever the reason) would disappear if we can donate from our house, or wherever we happen to be.

    Projects should encourage community building, and even when poeple feel its not the same as it was before the rewards, I believe they are really successful at it still. 

    I think a way to reduce the lag is to open several projects at once and increase the amount of projects open as the community of glitch players grow. Also, having to sign up to participate in a project and have a maximum player quota per project would help.
    Posted 19 months ago by Yaya Subscriber! | Permalink