Should the Lottery be Changed?

[Gustav 6,460]

Tell me what you think, whether yes or no, below. 

[Beaviss 4,958]

No create guidelines that people have to follow for it not to be spam. The system isn't broken the people that abuse it are the fault.

[rjfryman 1,120]

9 minutes ago, Beaviss said:

No create guidelines that people have to follow for it not to be spam. The system isn't broken the people that abuse it are the fault.

Guidelines would help. If I'm being honest since some people don't like my opinion on it since some say all I did was spam. The problem that I see is that some people will dislike it when anyone comments on every game thread. I don't know how to respond to that honestly but guidelines might help. I personally like that the lottery is tied to game threads since game threads are more active, but if we were to tweak it I would not be upset. I could be wrong but something like this might help.

[DMaximus 1,046]

1 hour ago, Beaviss said:

No create guidelines that people have to follow for it not to be spam. The system isn't broken the people that abuse it are the fault.

 

The lottery system that rewards any comment in any game thread is the cause of spam posts. Without the chance for reward, there would be no spam.

 

I'd be interested to hear what those guidelines would be. I think it would be very difficult to create enforceable guidelines that would eliminate spam. It also would be a lot to ask of someone to be the judge of what's acceptable for a guideline-following, lottery-worth entry.

 

It also doesn't help when league representatives create posts that highlight the slippery sloped nature of guidelines like This or This or This. Those posts are acceptable, but someone making a meaningless statement in every game thread to enter a lottery is somehow going to be stopped, even if there are guidelines?

[Beaviss 4,958]

2 minutes ago, DMaximus said:

 

The lottery system that rewards any comment in any game thread is the cause of spam posts. Without the chance for reward, there would be no spam.

 

I'd be interested to hear what those guidelines would be. I think it would be very difficult to create enforceable guidelines that would eliminate spam. It also would be a lot to ask of someone to be the judge of what's acceptable for a guideline-following, lottery-worth entry.

 

It also doesn't help when league representatives create posts that highlight the slippery sloped nature of guidelines like This or This or This. Those posts are acceptable, but someone making a meaningless statement in every game thread to enter a lottery is somehow going to be stopped, even if there are guidelines?

 

It would be more along the lines of

 

1. Has to be relevant to the game

2. Has to be at least a sentence.

3. Has to be an original comment and not a copy pasted comment.

 

Something along those lines would do wonders.

[Gustav 6,460]

6 minutes ago, Beaviss said:

 

It would be more along the lines of

 

1. Has to be relevant to the game

2. Has to be at least a sentence.

3. Has to be an original comment and not a copy pasted comment.

 

Something along those lines would do wonders.

I feel like most of these comments were like this in the first place. Not saying some weren't, but in general it's like this, from what I've seen (and done). 

[Josh 1,672]

Be way more fun as a money / gambling thing. It's called Lottery not type shit under games for free stuff.

[ConnorMcdavid 180]

Should just enforce League penalties for spammers (aka money/TPE lost or player suspensions) 

 

In major sports (NHL included) players get suspended by teams/league for off ice shenanigans.

 

The real problem is there are people who spam this making the lottery a problem (aka #FIXTHELOTTERY). 

 

Now you don’t have to go approve all posts... just watch for anyone obviously spamming. Much easier to enforce.

[gorlab 4,321]

Back in my day, every VHL member selected a 3-digit number, and a weekly draw (every mag edition drop) had someone do a randomizer of 0-1000, and award a prize if it hit someone's 3-digit number.

 

 

Basically there was pretty much only like 1-2 wins per season, but that system IMO was better than the current one.

[ConnorMcdavid 180]

1 minute ago, gorlab said:

Back in my day, every VHL member selected a 3-digit number, and a weekly draw (every mag edition drop) had someone do a randomizer of 0-1000, and award a prize if it hit someone's 3-digit number.

 

 

Basically there was pretty much only like 1-2 wins per season, but that system IMO was better than the current one.

 

I like this. 

[Beketov 9,090]

11 minutes ago, gorlab said:

Back in my day, every VHL member selected a 3-digit number, and a weekly draw (every mag edition drop) had someone do a randomizer of 0-1000, and award a prize if it hit someone's 3-digit number.

 

 

Basically there was pretty much only like 1-2 wins per season, but that system IMO was better than the current one.

Honestly I wouldn’t mind going back to this, even if we just tweaked the odds a bit to pay out a bit more often.

 

I get why we switched the system to what it is now because we wanted more activity in the game threads. However there's a point where more activity isn’t good when that activity is just spam. I honestly had no issues with how @rjfryman did it because his comments were a bit general but at least they involved looking at the game. All these spam ones obviously just exist to take advantage of the lottery. Personally I’d prefer to see this version of the lottery scrapped than accept a pile of spam as “entries”. Of course I’d also prefer if people were interested in posting without the possibility of a payoff but for some reason that concept seems to be disappearing.

 

We could do it kinda like the practice facility used to be. Have the lotto post put up every weak and to be entered you must reply with links to 3 game thread comments you made that week. Comments must be relevant to the game and can’t be spam (as deemed by the lotto manager). From that pool of entries the winners are chosen. You’d still have some discussion but without it being spammy discussion and the limit of 3 (or could be 5 or whatever) would stop it being on every topic whether it’s related or not.

[NotAVHLM-GM 1,858]

Bring back Smarch his system, or lottery like we had in the magazine.

[Greg_Di 1,028]

I think you should only be allowed to comment on your own game posts for the lottery, would make the most sense instead of seeing people spam each game thread.

[Beketov 9,090]

5 minutes ago, Greg_Di said:

I think you should only be allowed to comment on your own game posts for the lottery, would make the most sense instead of seeing people spam each game thread.

This has been suggested in BoG discussion but my concern with it is that the lotto manager would need to know what team every single member is on to know whether their comments count or not. That doesn’t exactly sound like reasonable knowledge.

[gorlab 4,321]

For the last two weeks I thought people were using that hashtag to bitch about the VHL Draft Lottery tbh.

[Gustav 6,460]

1 hour ago, Beketov said:

I honestly had no issues with how @rjfryman did it because his comments were a bit general but at least they involved looking at the game.

I don't have an issue with this either, and a couple other people come to mind who have done pretty much the same thing. The issue I have is that the system makes something like this the best way to win. 

[Gustav 6,460]

37 minutes ago, gorlab said:

For the last two weeks I thought people were using that hashtag to bitch about the VHL Draft Lottery tbh.

I mean, I throw it in with my comments on game threads, but I at least keep what's before it relevant to the game. I don't agree with the comments that are literally just "#fixthelottery." Never intended it to end up creating more spam, but it is what it is. I'm happy people are noticing it, at least.

[TheFlash 317]

23 minutes ago, GustavMattias said:

I mean, I throw it in with my comments on game threads, but I at least keep what's before it relevant to the game. I don't agree with the comments that are literally just "#fixthelottery." Never intended it to end up creating more spam, but it is what it is. I'm happy people are noticing it, at least.

 

I only did it because I constantly saw you do it lol.

 

I agree that the system is broken. I tried to do the comment thing, but opening a game summary and just saying, "great game by X" or "wow lots of shots here!" felt like spam. And it really kind of is. Comments like that aren't creating discussion. People are just reading over those and then posting their own non-sense.

 

Here's what the SHL does (in the minors anyway) and I think it's a good way to do a good game recap and earn some TPE. Not a lottery system though but hard to do without spamming or having a lot of work for the lottery person.

 

In the SHL, a person who is appointed in charge will pick say, ten games for that week. On a first come, first serve basis, people post in the thread which game they would like to do a post game thread about. These read essentially like a TSN highlights script, and can contain three stars, turning point of the game, etc. Say, 500 words? Not to much to ask. Fairly simple to do. Also, you can comment on another persons game thread, up to three comments per game, 100 each. In turn for doing this, you earn 15 TPE a season. Do five game threads, or fifteen comments to get your TPE. Now, the blues here could decide their own reward amounts, but I think it's great if you're looking for community involvement in sims. Actually forces people to look at the game and the stats, instead of just making generic comments

[Phil 5,129]

- Create CLEAR guidelines on what constitutes as a "non-spam" post.

- The lottery should randomly pick a game

- The lottery should then then randomly pick a comment from that game

- The Lottery manager should double check to ensure the comment qualifies as a "non-spam" comment. 

- If the comment qualifies - ANNOUNCE THE WINNER!

If the comment does not - REDO THE FULL PROCESS.

 

 

[Matt_O 897]

We complain about spam comments to win the lottery and then people spam the tag #fixthelottery everywhere

[TheFlash 317]

13 minutes ago, Matt_O said:

We complain about spam comments to win the lottery and then people spam the tag #fixthelottery everywhere

 

[Enorama 2,039]

On 5/21/2019 at 1:08 PM, Beaviss said:

 

It would be more along the lines of

 

1. Has to be relevant to the game

2. Has to be at least a sentence.

3. Has to be an original comment and not a copy pasted comment.

 

Something along those lines would do wonders.

 

"We won the game."

 

Passes all three of your guidelines. Did it contribute to the conversation at all? Nope.

[Gustav 6,460]

20 minutes ago, Enorama said:

 

"We won the game."

 

Passes all three of your guidelines. Did it contribute to the conversation at all? Nope.

 

I agree--I wouldn't like to see anti-spam guidelines being put into the current system just because of stuff like this. Even things like "great game by *insert first star here*" or "oh look--*team* got *this many* shots off. *other team*'s goalie can't be blamed for this one" are two posts that are relevant and do have potential to start conversation. But to someone commenting for the lottery, does any sort of reply matter? Do they care? Speaking from personal experience, I myself find it hard to care about every single one of my team's games, and I wouldn't like to have a conversation about each and every one. So no, I really don't care. I'm commenting for the lottery, unless there's something about the game that I find particularly interesting. In that case, I'd be commenting regardless of whether or not the lottery existed in its current format. If what we had now was modified so as to have nothing to do with game threads, I'd still comment about what I was interested in, and avoid commenting about what I wasn't. 

 

43 minutes ago, Matt_O said:

We complain about spam comments to win the lottery and then people spam the tag #fixthelottery everywhere

 

It really is. When I started up the whole thing, I saw spam as a possible consequence, but decided to go through with it anyway. If you bother going way back on my profile, through way too many posts, you'll find an old status update from back when I posted the original "FIX THE LOTTERY SYSTEM GODDAMMIT" thread, which says something along the lines of "want to see the lottery system change? Add #fixthelottery to your comments on game threads!" That's what I intended it to be, and that's what I have done, personally. I comment on my team's games in just the same way I was before I ever thought about actually trying to do something about the system--drop in a comment about the stats or the outcome or shot differential or "Garcia scored? That's not supposed to happen," and simply throw in a little "#fixthelottery" at the end. It seemed like everyone had forgotten all about it within a few days, but recently others have started using #fixthelottery again, but making that the ONLY THING they're posting or throwing in some comment about how their post is just for the lottery. I have never supported this, never promoted it, and, in fact, I've even straight-up told my own team not to do it, and to use it the way I've been using it. 

I'm not saying I'm surprised by what's happened with it, but I'm slightly disappointed. HOWEVER, again, it's getting some sort of notice, and it seems like I've gotten people on board with it. 

Go forth and use it, please! Just don't spam it. That's not how you get results.

[ThePerfectNut 563]

I didn't even know that we have a lottery system and I am on my second season right now wow. (How does it work btw)

[Gustav 6,460]

5 hours ago, Jtv123 said:

I didn't even know that we have a lottery system and I am on my second season right now wow. (How does it work btw)

Basically, the lottery system works like this: every week, a random game thread is selected, and from that game thread a random comment is selected. Whoever made that comment gets 3 uncapped TPE. The same thing is also done every month, with winners of the monthly lottery able to get even bigger rewards (for example, up to 16 uncapped TPE, a doubles week, and some player store cash if you're lucky enough). 

Here's an explanation of what exactly I have an issue with. Please feel free to have your own opinion on the matter, but here's why I think it should ABSOLUTELY be changed: