VHL Changes Are Good; But Unity Still Missing?

[Devise 4,475]

Hey people who may happen upon reading this. Hi hello, I'm Devise, I post a lot of words (or used to) and make mostly scrubby players despite them having TPE. I was also a great GM once upon a time. One of the great things about returning to this site has been the "sea change" if you will. Watching as @Will and the rest of the hard working Blue boys try to continue to push this site into the future. Things like the portal, a tiered affiliation system with rewards, and more nuanced/updated point tasks have all shown signs that the past may eventually be behind us. Oh and the update scale changes, something the old faithful absolutely hated but that we ultimately knew needed to be done in order to modernize the game that is collectively in development here. Don't kid yourself, that is what this is. 

 

But one thing is still missing, as far as I'm concerned and it's something I often argued for or tried to posit as an eventuality in some of my previous tenures. The removal of the VHLM. For the longest time the VHLM was mostly a plague on the league, hard to keep older members invested in it, and often creating situations where new players more often than not didn't have the greatest exposure to the league. I have no idea how the VHLM is doing these days, on the outside looking in it appears to be healthy. It moved to a single conference, much like the VHL and now is apparently expanding. 

 

But the crux of my VHLM removal argument always had less to do with the healthyness of it as a league and more to do with just plain, straight, numbers. That is right, statistics fools. No matter what, even if there are those that wish to have the narrative or creative experience of bringing a player up from the minors, it still statistically splinters our user groups. GM's who work hard in the VHLM have to play by different rules, often times not even remotely preparing them for VHL GM duties. The player bases are divided, which means depending on how active a specific team, or league is, determines overall activity boosts, rivalries, feuds etc. I've always maintained that in order for this play to thrive the most, all the users need to be able to engage with each other in the game aspect, at nearly all possible times. 

 

So with that I post another media spot length Fan590 again wondering. Is it time to explore? Explore options to boost peoples TPE upon creation, or find other ways to make it so that either the VHLM is not needed and push for unity among all active players period. What say you VHL 2018? 

[Gooningitup 1,290]

Why? Same question i ask every major member that brings this up. What your proposing is that new members join lets say we give em 100TPE start. Now they come in on a deep team(or if lucky a rebuilding team). Get slaugthered by vets or just not enough ice time. Discouraging new members, VHLM may suck for older members here but its a place where new members can learn this complex league, well putting up good points rather than being overwhelmed on what to do PLUS sucking or not having much playing time on top of it

[Devise 4,475]

1 hour ago, Gooningitup said:

Why? Same question i ask every major member that brings this up. What your proposing is that new members join lets say we give em 100TPE start. Now they come in on a deep team(or if lucky a rebuilding team). Get slaugthered by vets or just not enough ice time. Discouraging new members, VHLM may suck for older members here but its a place where new members can learn this complex league, well putting up good points rather than being overwhelmed on what to do PLUS sucking or not having much playing time on top of it

 

The why is pretty obvious. Because it's a detriment to new members. It has little to do with "investing" older members through the VHLM, and I think one of the constant counter points I always say this was people arguing that improving the experience for the older members wasn't worth harming newer members. Your even pointing to that here.

 

That, is not, the crux of my argument. I could watch old members struggle through the VHLM for seasons with little problem. It's that ultimately new members are not accurately exposed to what makes this leauge great for SEASONS. Unless they happen to be lucky, and even then it's still unlikely. What makes this league great are the member base, the interactions and the rivaliries/etc that form around the competitiveness of building teams and going for goals both as teams and as members. That simply doesn't always happen in the VHLM, and even in instances where it did, forces it to happen less in the VHL by product. Splintered our community will always be divided, and I just don't see the need for it. 

 

Your argument is less about the why anyways. You ask me for why and then explain that the "how" is a complicated procedure. Just because the how is a complicated thing doesn't mean the why isn't justifiable. As far as I'm concerned the TPE to entry should be higher to start anyways in a system where it's all one league. Like 200-300 levels. More than just "torn up because you have no TPE". Starting you off you should be a low tier pushing average tier VHL player. You get right into the game, with all the other members ready to engage with all the users. I still haven't seen any evidence that doesn't suggest that optimizing the new user experience isn't the best way to handle retention. Even if your a newer member and you make it out of the VHLM, how likely it is once your on the VHL unless your a GM in the VHLM that you pay attention to that league? That is entirely the problem. So newer members don't even get the attention of members a generation before them because the system is designed to make you only care about your corner of the league. Further splintering things. 

[Gooningitup 1,290]

17 minutes ago, Devise said:

 

The why is pretty obvious. Because it's a detriment to new members. It has little to do with "investing" older members through the VHLM, and I think one of the constant counter points I always say this was people arguing that improving the experience for the older members wasn't worth harming newer members. Your even pointing to that here.

 

That, is not, the crux of my argument. I could watch old members struggle through the VHLM for seasons with little problem. It's that ultimately new members are not accurately exposed to what makes this leauge great for SEASONS. Unless they happen to be lucky, and even then it's still unlikely. What makes this league great are the member base, the interactions and the rivaliries/etc that form around the competitiveness of building teams and going for goals both as teams and as members. That simply doesn't always happen in the VHLM, and even in instances where it did, forces it to happen less in the VHL by product. Splintered our community will always be divided, and I just don't see the need for it. 

 

Your argument is less about the why anyways. You ask me for why and then explain that the "how" is a complicated procedure. Just because the how is a complicated thing doesn't mean the why isn't justifiable. As far as I'm concerned the TPE to entry should be higher to start anyways in a system where it's all one league. Like 200-300 levels. More than just "torn up because you have no TPE". Starting you off you should be a low tier pushing average tier VHL player. You get right into the game, with all the other members ready to engage with all the users. I still haven't seen any evidence that doesn't suggest that optimizing the new user experience isn't the best way to handle retention. Even if your a newer member and you make it out of the VHLM, how likely it is once your on the VHL unless your a GM in the VHLM that you pay attention to that league? That is entirely the problem. So newer members don't even get the attention of members a generation before them because the system is designed to make you only care about your corner of the league. Further splintering things. 

 

At 200-300 TPE youd have to restart the whole league. Or give the members already playing an extra 200-300TPE. 

 

Honestly we lose so many members being overwhelmed with how the leagues set up. Also your arguement of having members missing out my VHLM lockeroom minus rebuilding years is 100x more active than my VHL one and im on a roster that was a contender for many seasons.

 

Weve also seen many new members come back to aid the VHLM Beavis, Spade. It also creates jobs for new members, just this year we saw 4 brand new members step up and be VHLM GM/Co GMs. 

 

Your right new members should not come in to dominate, but why as a new member am i going to stick around playing 8-15minutes a night putting up like 10points if im lucky. Well being overwhelmed by all the new things i gotta learn. I left the SHL because i couldnt even crack a top 4 and got sick of watching no results. 

 

This is a league where all we have is results and friendships. So unless a new member builds a quick bond early on, they arent going to want to stay with there guy buried. Not to mention careers would now be a season shorter, meaning even less time for them to figure out how it all works. 

[Fire Tortorella 2,653]

Nope.

 

And I'm not typing more just because we'll have the same argument we usually do.

[Beaviss 4,956]

I agree with gooning sure it sucks for you old nerds but it just makes you try harder not to be there for an extra season. It’s not a perfect system but it’s as close as it’s going to be and with the Frank/Beaviss rule change it helps new people keep there icetime they have earned.

[Devise 4,475]

I love how I open this saying it's literally about numbers, and all I get is "why do you hate the VHLM" and "you old guard hate the VHLM too bad it sucks for you."

 

That isn't remotely the reason I'm arguing for this. No matter what the VHL population is, hypothetically speaking assume it's 100 active members strong, I know it isn't. A higher percentage of those numbers are going to be tied up in exclusively the VHL for longer periods of time. Newer members who enter the VHLM become apart of the lower percentage pool and then graduate to the higher one. All new members always enter a pool with the least amount of members in it. 

 

Furthermore, dividing that pool as Gooning even points out can be unhealthy for activity in the VHL. I wasn't making the argument that the VHL is better so fuck the VHLM. I'm pointing out how 100 players united in one league is a more cohesive member group. That is just a fact. If your a new member and your options in a league are to enter one that has 100 active members all playing in the same league your going to join, or enter a league with a percentage of that 100 (the lowest tier always) what do you think you'd choose? The more active league. Our league constantly looks less active because try to facilitate a disproportionate number of active members across way too many teams/leagues. We've never had all the teams in either league be filled with all active members. Both leagues end up suffering competition wise because of it. Just seems silly to me. That hurts new members, when we could unify, even if not easily. Even if that means reset. 

 

1 hour ago, Fire Hakstol said:

Nope.

 

And I'm not typing more just because we'll have the same argument we usually do.

 

To be fair we primarily have disagreed in the past about the how. Mostly because there are tons of messy consequences, and the league already has so much invested into how the two tier system works. But again I'm not here to definitely say "this is how we should do it" I'm saying, this is WHY we should do it. Which is that a united league presents a better front to a new member than a divided one, activity wise. I'm aware that there are lots of problems about executing something like this, however I do still feel the onus is on us to explore options and find adaptable and clean solution. The issue for me is less that this is a "problem that needs to be fixed" and more just more potential for the future. 

[Beaviss 4,956]

@Devise in your opinion to fix the unity “issue” would a affiliate program work? Like it was at the start? For example Quebec’s affiliate could be the Ottawa Lynx and they share players etc.

 

would that help?

[Devise 4,475]

21 minutes ago, Beaviss said:

@Devise in your opinion to fix the unity “issue” would a affiliate program work? Like it was at the start? For example Quebec’s affiliate could be the Ottawa Lynx and they share players etc.

 

would that help?

 

I don't think it would hurt, as more members would have reason to be paying attention to what others are doing. Combined with shared locker rooms for each franchise, and then if you have an active VHL team or vice versa you have one side trying to support/carry the other. Like you mention it did use to be that but due to so many changes and the desire to see VHLM stand out on it's own, that was changed. I don't know exactly how we'd go about resetting the assets so that this makes sense again, but I do think it'd help yes. 

[Beaviss 4,956]

8 minutes ago, Devise said:

 

I don't think it would hurt, as more members would have reason to be paying attention to what others are doing. Combined with shared locker rooms for each franchise, and then if you have an active VHL team or vice versa you have one side trying to support/carry the other. Like you mention it did use to be that but due to so many changes and the desire to see VHLM stand out on it's own, that was changed. I don't know exactly how we'd go about resetting the assets so that this makes sense again, but I do think it'd help yes. 

 

I think it would be a fun way of doing it but we would have to expand the VHLM x2 which I don’t think we are ready for yet maybe another year of recruitment and we could get there.

[Smarch 3,091]

27 minutes ago, Beaviss said:

 

I think it would be a fun way of doing it but we would have to expand the VHLM x2 which I don’t think we are ready for yet maybe another year of recruitment and we could get there.

You don't need to expand, pro sports teams use to share affiliates all the time 

[Beaviss 4,956]

2 minutes ago, Smarch said:

You don't need to expand, pro sports teams use to share affiliates all the time 

 

Yeah but the VHLM balence would be thrown off I’m thinking if we made this move the VHLM Draft would be cut.

[.sniffuM 1,741]

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