Allow me to preface this by saying that this post's contents are based on personal presumptions and may not reflect the way Amplitude feels about their current methods at all, and that there are lots of submissions that are better than mine so this has nothing to do with me being butthurt that I'm not winning.



With that said...



I know that I've learned a bit from the way this faction design competition has been handled. It hasn't turned out too badly, but I hope that Amplitude has learned some things, too. Namely:



1. A poll is nothing but a popularity contest. This is pretty evident by the fact that submissions by prominent forum members are almost all doing well, and this is why a lot of companies don't allow their forum mods or employees to take part in contests. I'm certainly not intending to comment on the quality of the designs by those members (most of them look good), but it's difficult to look at the results and conclude that popularity has nothing to do with it. I also think that generally we should strive to allow everyone to participate if we can.



In general, though, I think that allowing a popularity contest to determine the direction a game goes is bad. Not only will we sometimes sacrifice quality by doing this, but it's better if the game has a cohesive vision determined by the developers rather than it being a haphazard assemblage of other peoples' visions. If it were up to me (and it isn't), in the future I would have the devs simply select the final 3 best submissions for us to vote for on the G2G system. This ensures that popularity has nothing to do with it, that the vision for the game remains consistent, and that the highest quality suggestions are implemented rather than simply the suggestions of the most respected members of the forum. On the other hand, it may be possible to mitigate this with the Instant-Runoff Polling system suggested in the tech support forum, in which case continuing to use the forum as a polling method may work just fine.



2. Forum software sucks for game design. As mentioned above, though, there is the possibility for improvement here. I hope it's implemented before the next round of polling.



3. One thing forum mods are wonderful for is organizing and carrying out precisely this kind of contest. Amplitude may want to consider getting in contact with the mods and working with them to have the next time we do this be organized by mods, who have already shown a good deal of initiative in cataloging, categorizing, and advertising the submissions from this most recent contest. Having them act in an official capacity in the future may make everything run a lot more smoothly.



Anyway, that's my two bits. If anyone else has anything to add in terms of ways to improve this system, it will benefit us as a whole to talk about them and make them known to the devs and forum mods, so feel free to contribute.

VieuxChat wrote:
For 1, some could argue that without knowing where it comes from, people ten dto think a mod would have been in the G2G vote because of their "mod" status.

I don't know why anyone would think that. That seems like it defeats the entire spirit of the contest and G2G voting in general.



Anyway, I think the poll could have been handled a lot better, but Star Dreamers is pulling ahead, so I think there is some merit to the idea that good ideas will win out because they are good, not because of who made them. Hopefully, amplitude works out some of the kinks and looks at what was wrong with this poll for the next contest.

VieuxChat wrote:
For 1, some could argue that without knowing where it comes from, people ten dto think a mod would have been in the G2G vote because of their "mod" status.

This would be simple to solve by having the submissions not list the name of the entrant until it is selected or rejected.

So. No. Nos' is "objectively" winning because his ideas is one of the best.

For the third time, I and many others have conceded that there are better entries than the ones we submitted, and that the problems with the G2G system exist independent of any individual butthurt.

Faust wrote:
This is my preferred method as well, because it has a LOT of positive benefits:



1. It allows the mods to continue to create and participate without anyone ever having to question whether or not their wins are earned or attained by virtue of their position.



2. It prevents people from having a significant say by advertising off-site, since people who register just to vote will have little or no G2G points.



3. It keeps submissions that are questionable or impossible to implement from being selected. This is an issue both because the devs may feel pressured to try to "make it work" and also because if they CAN'T make it work, then anyone who voted for those submissions wasted their vote.



4. Only the devs know what things are planned for the future. Imagine, for example, if a faction had already been planned for an expansion that is similar to the Star Dreamers or the Cultists; the devs know, then, not to select one of these factions for the G2G vote, whereas the forum population is in the dark.



5. Most people don't know what the game engine is capable of. The devs obviously do.



There are probably even more benefits I can't think of off the top of my head. The only real downside is the time investment it would take for the devs to go through the entries, and the best way to reduce that investment is to significantly increase the time investment necessary for those submitting entries, or to include one-line summaries of the full data on any entry form.

For 1, some could argue that without knowing where it comes from, people ten dto think a mod would have been in the G2G vote because of their "mod" status.



About the fact a mod had more time to play with the game : we played several builds that were so bug ridden it wasn't even funny. Such "experience" is in no way an advantage.

And the game was out for enough time to let everyone get some experience with the system.

We, the VIPs, spent a lot of time preparing things (videos for instance) to help everyone start. I spent a lot of time on the steam forums answering all questions that would rise. I tried to be as present as I could here.

All of the VIPs on EL did the same. When you started playing the game we were mostly helping other to play and avoid the traps we got into.

So, I'm not sure we(VIPs) are at the moment the ones with the best knowledge of the game and what can/can't be done. The only real advantage I personnaly had came from the Beer2Gether were I was able to speak with a lot of different devs an dspoke about systems.

In the end I created a faction that broke almost all the rules of the game



So. No. Nos' is "objectively" winning because his ideas is one of the best.

VieuxChat wrote:
I start thinking that devs should have chosen their 3 favorites. And directly put them on G2G.

This is my preferred method as well, because it has a LOT of positive benefits:



1. It allows the mods to continue to create and participate without anyone ever having to question whether or not their wins are earned or attained by virtue of their position.



2. It prevents people from having a significant say by advertising off-site, since people who register just to vote will have little or no G2G points.



3. It keeps submissions that are questionable or impossible to implement from being selected. This is an issue both because the devs may feel pressured to try to "make it work" and also because if they CAN'T make it work, then anyone who voted for those submissions wasted their vote.



4. Only the devs know what things are planned for the future. Imagine, for example, if a faction had already been planned for an expansion that is similar to the Star Dreamers or the Cultists; the devs know, then, not to select one of these factions for the G2G vote, whereas the forum population is in the dark.



5. Most people don't know what the game engine is capable of. The devs obviously do.



There are probably even more benefits I can't think of off the top of my head. The only real downside is the time investment it would take for the devs to go through the entries, and the best way to reduce that investment is to significantly increase the time investment necessary for those submitting entries, or to include one-line summaries of the full data on any entry form.

There are legit concerns without this somehow being a personal battle or "bitterness" over the poll. I didn't submit anything to the contest and I'm agreeing with a lot of people who see issues with the way the poll is being done. Knowledge of the author isn't the only "objective" flaw.

VieuxChat wrote:
Nos' is winning because his idea is very thoughtful. He started it long ago and put time into his faction.

I know for having studying it, that the first and last entry of a poll or a list you have to memorize wxill be the first that come to mind immediatly.

It can be argued that certain members of the community were given an edge via testing the game and having more time to think about the lore and mechanics. Just saying



But we all knew Nos was going to take the first stage no matter where his faction sat on the poll. Regardless of any advantage, the pure depth of his concept alone would be enough get him to round 2.



But I am just left to wonder why the devs didn't do this poll like the last faction competition: Brackets of polls. It wasn't perfect, but it was allot more balanced than this.



Again though, I have nothing to be bitter about.

Nos' is winning because his idea is very thoughtful. He started it long ago and put time into his faction.

I know for having studying it, that the first and last entry of a poll or a list you have to memorize wxill be the first that come to mind immediatly.



But seriously.

Even with a poll without names he would have been first by far.



The bitterness comes from the fact he is so blatantly winning that the G2G vote won't change that.



The only objective flaw of that poll is the fact we know the author.



I start thinking that devs should have chosen their 3 favorites. And directly put them on G2G.