VHL Community: How Do We Keep People Interested in the League?

[Daniel Janser 1,983]

From my observation so far the VHLE is in a sandwich position. The VHLM is constantly re-supplied with either first gens or recreates. The VHLE can only resupply via draft and FA who mostly appear either IA's or 'dropped out' VHL-er (no offence intended) plus apparently the most regular earners will stay a season (like I did) or will be 'poached' by needy VHL organisations. These tend to be (but of course are not exclusively) the most active members in a LR. If indeed the 'most-leaving' demographic are between 100-250 TPE, then I have an explanation for it (by no means empirical though): the excitement of the new is gone, and the shine has rubbed off.  I mean I had one guy this season who claimed within two weeks the 10 bonus TPE for the 100 first generation. Progress is made fast in the VHLM. Clickers (and I do not use this word in a derogatory way) though will have a hard time to stay motivated, seeing that they are overtaken by younger, more committed members (understandably so). This effect imo only comes to bear after a certain amount of time where the gap between clicker and max earner starts to really matter. As a clicker you can reasonably expect to make the VHLE within two seasons. From the VHLE to the VHL the gap is bigger as you do not have the 'free starting money' anymore and the PF is reduced by one, which is not helping 'clickers' as it reduces their 'income' by 1/6th, and in my guesstimate it would take you 3 seasons and I can see how people lose patience and say 'I am outta here' as they are stuck (being not necessarily coveted trading assets either). And once regression sets in, we lose most of the remaining ones. I would assume that this problem has always existed in that TPE range, but now it is more visible as it is exactly the point range in which the VHLE operates. I am not saying all is good, there is always room for improvement. But we need to be realistic and really check the data whether this phenomenon is new or has always existed. I also do not think that articles like 'The VHLE is broken and I can fix it' or statements like 'I hate the VHLE with a burning passion (even when striken out)' help to 'sell' the VHLE to new members, especially if these are coming from prominent and well-respected members of the community. I am not picking on anyone, these were just the first ones which came to my mind. I want to stress that I am of the firm opinion that everyone is entitled to their opinion and to make them known, I just question the time and place they are issued...

[Acydburn 1,555]

29 minutes ago, GustavMattias said:

I apologize if this sounds harsh, but the VHLE as a system is not immune from criticism and I believe the greater context of my post was misinterpreted as an attack on VHLE GMs. To anyone thinking that’s what I’m trying to say—please re-read it and consider that it is not. 

 

No, the E should be criticized that's how things change and are made better. My issues aren't with the E, it's flawed in a flawed system. Trying to make it better as we go, we're only in our 3rd season so we all knew it was going to be rocky. My point was that lately it just seems like the "cool" and easy thing to do is blame the E GMs for not doing their job. Glad to see everyone is agreeing that it should be a league wide effort. 

[Grape 528]

1. Get rid of the meta. It's super boring and in general just sucks. It cuts out the creativity one could have for their players. May it be swapping out some attributes with ones that are more useful, or just boosting alternative build paths, maybe put more emphasis on defensive play, or something to that extent, there needs to be some sort of shift.
2. Axe the E. I know it's early but it already has the stench of a failed system. It's spreading us too thin and it'd be better to allocate more players to the other two leagues. Activity is pretty low and it's hard to boost it when numbers stay thin. My player has only experienced the E for about a week and I'm not a fan (partly because my first GM didn't communicate with me at all, never added me to the discord, and then traded me. Actual bad GM moment)

3. There needs to be some sort of revamp in the M. There's a pretty big disparity in the LR sizes of the teams which hurts the interaction because it's hard to just talk and have fun conversations and all-in-all create a good LR experience, when there's only 9 players, some may not even be "active", whereas it's pretty easy to create a good environment when you have nearly 20 players, again some not as active as others. With how the M is structured, every season, there's gonna be like 3 super filled teams, and the rest be middling, and maybe 1-2 teams with like 5 players, then the next seasons all the team's swap in size. A possible solution would be to remove the E, and instead raise the TPE cap in the M to 300-350. At this point, M teams can have an actual core to build around for at least a bit, and not have to go through the same method of trade away all players for picks -> Pick a bunch of players and become good -> Trade away all your picks for players -> Turn to shit -> Trade away all players for picks.
4. Offseason Activities is a must. The most boring part for a regular player is the offseason, because there is legitimately nothing to do. I know it can be pretty busy for GMs, but not everyone in the league has the luxury of having something to keep them occupied in the league. If I have to sit around for a handful of weeks with nothing to do in the league, I'm going to lose interest. There needs to be a reason to come back to the site every day, and as of now, there really isn't.

[v.2 1,267]

17 minutes ago, Grape said:

1. Get rid of the meta. It's super boring and in general just sucks. It cuts out the creativity one could have for their players. May it be swapping out some attributes with ones that are more useful, or just boosting alternative build paths, maybe put more emphasis on defensive play, or something to that extent, there needs to be some sort of shift.
2. Axe the E. I know it's early but it already has the stench of a failed system. It's spreading us too thin and it'd be better to allocate more players to the other two leagues. Activity is pretty low and it's hard to boost it when numbers stay thin. My player has only experienced the E for about a week and I'm not a fan (partly because my first GM didn't communicate with me at all, never added me to the discord, and then traded me. Actual bad GM moment)

3. There needs to be some sort of revamp in the M. There's a pretty big disparity in the LR sizes of the teams which hurts the interaction because it's hard to just talk and have fun conversations and all-in-all create a good LR experience, when there's only 9 players, some may not even be "active", whereas it's pretty easy to create a good environment when you have nearly 20 players, again some not as active as others. With how the M is structured, every season, there's gonna be like 3 super filled teams, and the rest be middling, and maybe 1-2 teams with like 5 players, then the next seasons all the team's swap in size. A possible solution would be to remove the E, and instead raise the TPE cap in the M to 300-350. At this point, M teams can have an actual core to build around for at least a bit, and not have to go through the same method of trade away all players for picks -> Pick a bunch of players and become good -> Trade away all your picks for players -> Turn to shit -> Trade away all players for picks.
4. Offseason Activities is a must. The most boring part for a regular player is the offseason, because there is legitimately nothing to do. I know it can be pretty busy for GMs, but not everyone in the league has the luxury of having something to keep them occupied in the league. If I have to sit around for a handful of weeks with nothing to do in the league, I'm going to lose interest. There needs to be a reason to come back to the site every day, and as of now, there really isn't.

Great points!

[fromtheinside 1,278]

There's been a ton of great feedback from the community here, I appreciate it everyone!