Being a good earner [2/2]

[Elmebeck 378]

I was going to cover this to some degree in my podcast, but seeing as 1) the podcast is not finished, and perhaps 2) a podcast is not the perfect element to do this through, and 3) I feel the need to post a Media Spot, I hope this is a good subject that may help someone.
 

So I am a newbie, one season in VHLM only. When I started it was just so many rules and things to do, a bit overwhelming almost despite a very organized locker room in Houston. Even when I knew what to do I had some problem keeping track of some things. So some of that will be


You've gotta be a good earner. Otherwise? Fuggettabout it!

Problem #1: What can I do?

Every locker room should have a list of tasks and links, with maybe a bit of the rules explained to help out. I don't want to get into that too deep, as well as not explaining capped vs capped TPE, but rather look at it in another way.
 

What can I do, and what is my time investment?

I wanted to have a blueprint to follow during the week, depending on if I had lots of time, lots of real world issues like work to deal with, etc. and I came up with this that tried to put the effort needed into tiers and also assigns them an average time cost in minutes.

So this was something I wrote for myself last season, I probably spend more than the 30-45 minutes now, but it's an interesting (I think) view on time allotment and the points available

Disclaimer:
Some rules have changed from S68 to S69, I have tried to incorporate them; but if I have presented anything incorrectly please correct me below or send a DM and I'll edit it. 
The points are also for VHLM, but the difference to VHL is mainly only 1 point in Practise and you can't join VHLM Fantasy Zone.

2 minutes - 6 
- 2 pts Practíce
- 4 pts Welfare

3 minutes - 8 
- 2 pts Practíce
- 4 pts Welfare
- 2 pts Trivia

8 minutes - 10 
- 2 pts Practíce
- 4 pts Welfare
- 2 pts Trivia
- 2 pts Press conference

16 minutes - 12 
- 2 pts Practíce
- 4 pts Welfare
- 2 pts Trivia
- 2 pts Press conference
- 2 pts Gfx or article

30-45 minutes - 14 
- 2 pts Practíce
- 6 pts Media spot
- 2 pts Trivia
- 2 pts Press conference
- 2 pts Gfx or article

Fantasy Zone, 2 minutes approx, and a bit of luck - 0-7 
- 0-1 pts VHL Pick 'em
- 0-3 pts VHL Predict the score 
- 0-3 pts VHLM Pick 'em

Store and first season/once off - 33
- 5 pts First Generation
- 10 pts First generation bonus https://vhlforum.com/topic/49868-first-generation-bonus/
- 8 pts Rookie profile
- 10 pts Biography

These last two is a bit of work to be honest, but worth doing. The rookie profile can be made - as far as I understand it - up until the end of your first VHL season. The biography can be made during any of your eight seasons, but it may provide more bang for the buck early on.

Extra credits (some during season if we're lucky, the rest at end of season or when you go to VHL)
- Special week doubles etc
- 6 pts Trivia entries end of seasons (enter all)
- 20 pts  when going to VHL at 251 TPE
- 10 pts VHL Training camp if drafted to VHL, so I believe this can be claimed at 90 pts or 240 pts as long as you are drafted, might need some clarification from someone that knows how this works, the wording was weird to me

Looking at that, and assuming it's somewhat to being close to true in time allotment has given me a sense of that "slacking" is not worth it, I can always get 8-10 points in for almost no effort, and with some luck some Fantasy Zone too.

Hopefully this way of looking at it is helpful to someone.

Problem #2: Keeping track

Second problem was that I started forget whether I had done this or that task. Did I post in the VHL Pick 'Em? Damn, do I have to check my post history?
 

So I just use a text document, you could use Excel/LibreOffice/GoogleDocs, whatever, I find a simple txt-file and lightweight text editor to be quicker and as good to work with.

So these are my two last weeks that I input into my document, I put a + before anything I have claimed, I leave the others one row below. I make sure to include the links so that I know where it is, especially for those not claimed yet (like Fantasy Zone, so I know they were submitted and what I submitted).
 

And for 29/9 you can see already have a blueprint for what I hopefully can submit.

15/9 - 27 pts (281)
+10 unc TRAINING CAMP IF DRAFTED TO VHL? [link]
+2 pts article [link]
+2 pts press conference [link]
+1 unc practise [link]
+6 pts media spot [link]
+6 unc double week Other -> "First Gen Doubles - Player Store" [link]

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

22/9 - 8 pts (289)
+2 pts press conference [link]
+2 pts article [link]
+1 unc practise [link]
+1 unc recruitment [link]
+2 unc VHL pick em W1 [link]
 

6 pts media spot (this will be this one)
6 unc double week donation 2/2

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
29/9 - 0 pts

6 pts Media Spot
2 pts article
2 pts trivia
2 pts press conference

VHL pick em w2 [link]
VHL predict the score w2 [link]

Problem #3: Creativity

So if you believe my time estimates above you'll see there's only 8 minutes difference between 10 and 12 TPE, and I am sadly not a writing coach. But if I could offer one suggestion, try for three weeks to write a fun (to you, foremost) article of 150 words, or do a 2 pts graphic - and maybe that will be one of the things you look forward to doing. 
 

Not just for the TPE, but for creativity, integrating with the community and your team. Make mock rivals, nag on your GM putting you on the wrong line, talk about your groin injury. Whatever that seems fun to write, and hopefully for others to read. It shouldn't be a chore.

Conclusion

I have left out a lot above, you can make podcasts, you can and should review other people's Media Spots, you can enter the Lottery and all kind of stuff. But in the end this is about having fun, so try to find that...
 

And it's also about earning :D, so try to do that too, and as you can see, very little effort can take you quite far every week, like 70% in just 8 minutes... but the good stuff is just beyond those 8 minutes.

Request

If anyone else has another, better or different system for earning, keeping track, etc I would love to hear it in the comments. 

Also, my intent is not to gamify, rather getting more players more deeply involved.
 

Edited September 22, 2019 by Elmebeck

[Gustav 6,407]

7 minutes ago, Elmebeck said:

But if I could offer one suggestion, try for three weeks to write a fun (to you, foremost) article of 150 words, or do a 2 pts graphic - and maybe that will be one of the things you look forward to doing. 
 

Not just for the TPE, but for creativity, integrating with the community and your team. Make mock rivals, nag on your GM putting you on the wrong line, talk about your groin injury. Whatever that seems fun to write, and hopefully for others to read. It shouldn't be a chore.

 

Absolutely. This is the single most important thing to keep in mind here.

 

When I first joined the league, and looked over the great big overwhelming list of stuff to do for points, my first thought was, "what, 500 words? Every week? For 6 points? I know nothing about graphics, and as someone who can't put together a complete sentence without tripping over all my words, a podcast is out. That seems like a ton of work to be doing every week." 

 

And at first, that was enough to keep me away from it. I claimed welfare my first two weeks, and even after that, I wrote a couple media spots that were barely 500 words and were just things I posted because I didn't want to suck.

 

After that point, though, writing got to me, because I found something I liked. Every week I'd put up a ridiculous, absurd VHL.com article that was fun to write and poked hypothetical fun at a team or player (the remnants of my first season are still out there--I started the meme about Halifax worshipping Satan). This was something I looked forward to doing every week, at one point keeping a list of ideas for crazy headlines, because I was simply coming up with them too fast. Eventually this turned into crazy media spots which I enjoyed, and eventually that turned into long, serious, in-depth media spots which I continue to enjoy to this day. When I'm not busy, I've been known to write long articles every week, regardless of what I've got banked from the last one, and I've even written 2000+ word articles exclusively for the fun of it, without claiming anything.

 

Anything can happen if you enjoy what you're doing--I'd say that made my entire time in this league, beyond the first few days or so, happen.

[ColeMrtz 574]

Kind of building off of Gustav, when I first joined in S63 the majority of my content stemmed from my "rivalry" with @Sonnet for who was the better goalie. It gave each of us stuff to write about every week, made the league super entertaining, and the other members got a kick out of it too. It's way easier to power through 500/650 words a week when you write about something you find entertaining. Plus if you make content other people enjoy, you get interaction and responses that will make it even more enjoyable.

[Renomitsu 934]

Review

I think this is a wonderfully-helpful article, and outlines some basics that aren't always clear to new members. Some people don't know you can write a quik 200ish word VHL.com article for 2 TPE, or that the cap is 12 TPE weekly, so most people do one of the highest-earning single tasks (MS, gfx) and just kinda leave it at that. We should be encouraging members to take additional steps to just write things they enjoy, and do it in a way where they know they'll get something out of it for their player and creativity. Great stuff, and I'd love to see this tackled again or at least disseminated to new members!

[Ricer13 2,796]

Review:

 

There is a lot of good info in here I didn’t know about. I appreciate anyone on this site who takes the time to try and help the rest of the newcomers out. 

 

It’s been an overwhelming first month for myself personally and when people like yourself take the time to help like this, it really makes it easier.