Rather than using the "normal" zero sum approach of just taking (Loot Spent)/(# People in Raid) for allocating points, we have a system with fixed RP values for each raid more like a classic DKP system. At the end of each week, however, we use adjustments to correct for inflation, so you'd take (Total Points Out-Total Loot In)/# of Raiders and apply a global adjustment to your roster to get rid of the inflation.

The one problem this introduces it how it affects new recruits and people near zero. For example, due to an adjustment a member can be brought below 0, but since recruits always start at 0, they'd have something of an artificial lead; they were actually advantaged by not being in the guild before the adjustment. For example, if you had a -7 adjustment for the week your standings would shift to something like:

Member A 15 Member A 8
Member B 10 Member B 3
Member C 4 Recruit 0
Member C -3

Has anyone come up with a clever way around this problem while still using this adjustment method?

Put a limit on new recruits in some way.

Options include:

No loot priority until total points earned exceed x.
No loot priority until time in system exceeds x.
Deleting your previous global adjustment then putting a new on in place.

But really i dont care too much about this sort of thing. If the member in the guild got an adjustment hopefully they also got inflated dkp. If not then they didnt show up to stuff so screw them.

The only time it really matters is if you rezero infrequently and recruit on either side of that rezeroing. Simplest way is to just use a ~2-4 week trial/initiation/pointbalancing period with that everyone has priority over the new guys either on everything or for useful stuff. That gives you a bit of extra time for your system to rebalance and lessens the extremes.

The other easy option is if you get say 100 points a week for doing everything just wait until the new guys have 100 or 200 before they are on par.

While your DKP column may sum to zero your 'corrections' only go so far as to hide the inflation that is still present in your sysetm. You are taking points away from your inactive players in order to award excess points to your active players. As time goes on it is quite possible that the gap between the active/inactive will be such that a player with 100% activity could take a complete set of drops for his class before another player of 75% activity with similar spending habits. While there may be some advantage to favor very active players when awarding loot it is not the intent of a zero sum system.



I think that an easier way to correct the inflation would be to devalue the points held by all players by the extent of the inflation in your system. This is actually not that difficult to do and better equates loot taken with raid time invested.


So to get this value first sum your dkp awarded and spent columns..
dkp awarded = 1000
dkp spent = 500
Here we have total awarded/spent = 2. (In a balanced system of course awarded/spent = 1)
When you calculate your totals you first divide the dkp awarded by this factor to yield the inflation corrected dkp earned for each player. You then subtract dkp in items taken from that to generate dkp standings.



Here are some crude tables to illustrate:

uncorrected standings
_ TOTL DKP ITM
A +300 500 200
B +100 200 100
C +100 200 100
D +000 100 100


your correction
500 too many points awarded, so -500/4 (125)from all players
_ TOTL DKP ITM
A +175 500 200
B -025 200 100
C -025 200 100
D -125 100 100


my correction
dkp out/in = 2, adjusted dkp is dkp divided by 2; total = adj-itm
_ TOTL ADJ DKP ITM
A +050 250 500 200
B +000 100 200 100
C +000 100 200 100
D -050 050 100 100

First of all notice how the huge gap between A and D dissapear. Also notice that a new player would now enter on equal footing with B and C rather than ahead of them.

True.

Gets a little messy when people say that there stuff never drops for them but really does keep the pack even. Should work out ok if people getting the incentive keep spending it and if they just save it oh well no big drama.

A bit more complex to track but nice.

Another way is probably to give temporary dkp to people who suffered from ajustment over those who didnt or an effective ajustment to those who missed the last one.

My idea is similar to mylek's, but you would adjust both the points earnt and the item values by the same factor.

e.g. total earned = 900, total item points = 400, ratio = 2.25, square root = 1.5.
Therefore divide everyone's earned by 1.5, and multiply their item points by 1.5.

It's pretty much the same, but it means that in the short term, getting an item doesn't affect you too much or too little.