GDKP Run Discussion: Spread it to your Server - Page 19

Tyrian · 12/17/09, 3:03 PM

'Maximum bids' can be used for specific BOE items that aren't really worth bidding on anymore. Items that are difficult to auction without using unusually small increments, and just add unnecessary time to your run if you try. For example, a raid leader might say handle Crusader Orbs now in this manner: "Random 100 if you wish to purchase a Crusader Orb for 300g. I have 5 collected this run. Everyone can random, highest rolls win - trade me the gold to receive the item. The highest roller gets the option to purchase anywhere between 1 to all 5 of the orbs, and the remainder are offered to the next highest roller - and so on - until all 5 have been sold for 300g each."

Perhaps you could have sold the Crusader Orbs for 330g, but the difference is negligible - and speeds up time if you do a bunch at once. Same approach works well for Enchant shards. Replace 300g with whatever a fair price is (compared to Auction House value) that anyone genuinely interested in the item would pay. Maybe 70% of AH prices for example.

Putting effective maximum bids on items, outside of specific cases like this, doesn't really make much sense.

Feist-Mok · 12/17/09, 3:24 PM

Originally Posted by Tyrian

'Maximum bids' can be used for specific BOE items that aren't really worth bidding on anymore. Items that are difficult to auction without using unusually small increments, and just add unnecessary time to your run if you try. For example, a raid leader might say handle Crusader Orbs now in this manner: "Random 100 if you wish to purchase a Crusader Orb for 300g. I have 5 collected this run. Everyone can random, highest rolls win - trade me the gold to receive the item. The highest roller gets the option to purchase anywhere between 1 to all 5 of the orbs, and the remainder are offered to the next highest roller - and so on - until all 5 have been sold for 300g each."

Perhaps you could have sold the Crusader Orbs for 330g, but the difference is negligible - and speeds up time if you do a bunch at once. Same approach works well for Enchant shards. Replace 300g with whatever a fair price is (compared to Auction House value) that anyone genuinely interested in the item would pay. Maybe 70% of AH prices for example.

Putting effective maximum bids on items, outside of specific cases like this, doesn't really make much sense.

I've found the best way to handle low value BoE stuff is to pool it all. While 1 Crusader Orb or 1 Abyss Crystal isn't worth much, it's easy to get a larger bid for a 'package' of 2 Orbs and 3 Crystals (for example). It's also in my experience, much easier to do with GRM.

DandZ · 12/17/09, 4:53 PM

Originally Posted by Feist-Mok

I've found the best way to handle low value BoE stuff is to pool it all.

Yes, this is what I do with all Crusader patterns, orbs, shards, and leather. I sell the "special prize package" as the very last auction. Even including the time needed to link the package's contents to raid chat so people know what they're bidding on, and a brief delay so they can plan accordingly (I wait 30 to 40 seconds), this still saves considerable time over selling each item separately. Each package sells from 4000-8000g depending on the contents.

I haven't seen any Primordial Saronite or patterns drop in Icecrown yet. I might or might not sell saronite the same way depending on how much each one is worth by then.

KraxisSingular · 12/18/09, 10:51 AM

Originally Posted by schrja

This could happen. The question is essentially how quickly the resdistributive mechanism of GDKP could overcome any initial wealth advantage that a character might have in a relatively closed GDKP system. The answer to this question mostly depends on the initial wealth disparity between guild members and the weekly income of characters.

If, for instance, one character has 100,000 gold, and the other 24 have 100 gold, and no character were earning income, then it would taken many iterations for the wealth to equalize because the wealthy character need only bid 101 gold to win any given item. If the 24 members have 5,000 gold instead of 100, then wealth might equalize at an acceptable rate.

Another framing of the question might be:
(a) What is the "typical" distribution of wealth within a raiding guild?
(b) How many GDKP auction events would it take to get each member's wealth within 10%, 20%, or 30% (whatever amount you think would result in a basically fair bid) given this distrubution?
(c) How much gold could a guild member earn per week outside of the GDKP system before the redistributive mechanism failed to produce a fair distribution of wealth for bidding purposes?
(d) Is the number of auction events in (b) so large as to make a GDKP system not viable for guild use?
(e) Is the amount of money in (c) so small as to make a GDKP system not viable for guild use?

You seem to be saying that wealth and income disparities are too large for redistribution to overcome. This may be true, but it seems hard to predict without (a) performing some complicated simulations or (b) trying GDKP over many iterations with a closed group.

I don't think it is so much about finding the 'true curve' here or something like that. The simple fact is that you can have two people who attend 100% of all raids in the guild, but one hardly plays outside of raids, and thus doesn't earn much gold, while the other had 9 alts and does 25 dailies on all every day (ok, that is a lot of time farming gold, but still possible).
It is quite clear that outside raid factors are going to play in a fair bit too much. Yes, the less active members (who still raid as much as others) will be able to buy gear from the gold earned through the raiding, however they will earn much less than the very active members. Is it fair to penalize people for things that don't really have much to do with raiding (if they show prepared with food and flasks etc)? In that case a lootcouncil might be a better option since that allows for loot to be distributed to the nice friendly guildy who helps everybody, but perhaps isn't the best raid etc etc. Heck that friendly guildy might in fact be very helpful with his gold too, being quick to buy stuff for people when they might need it. He is then put on a backseat because of that. Factors completely outside raiding. Guilds are more than raiding in many cases.

To me at least, there is a little too many potential problems with it (I'm sure 95% of the time there won't be many issues, but when they happen it is going to suck royally) in comparison to the gains (poor raiders getting a chunk of gold on 'crap loot' nights).

aleyro · 12/18/09, 11:55 AM

Originally Posted by schrja

Has anyone ever used GDKP as a guild loot system, and if so, how well did it work?

Although the guild fat cats might have an initial loot advantage, it seems like the system would quickly reallocate wealth so that even the poorest guild members could win new loot. Additionally, the beauty of GDKP is that you never lose. You just get cash instead of an item.

This might also be a convenient way for the guild to raise money. A guild could simply impose a small tax on the pot. Although this would be understandably frowned upon in a pug, players might be more willing to see a cut go to the guild instead of an individual. Especially if the guild allows patterns and orbs to be auctioned through the GDKP system instead of just stuffing them in the guild bank.

IMO, the core tenants of GDKP don't mesh well with the goals of your average raiding guild. Most raiding guilds are progression centric, and as such, choose a loot distribution system that gives them the greatest advantage in terms of progression (i.e., loot council, dkp, etc). Most raiding guilds would be pretty unhappy if their tanks or healers were missing out on loots because some rich hybrids wanted to gear up their offspecs.

Now, that being said, there is certainly room for GDKP in some guild settings- I just don't see it as the primary loot system for progression guilds. For example, a guild focused on 10m content could benefit greatly by hosting 25m GDKP runs to gear up their raiders and cover the cost of repairs/enchants. A 25m hardmode guild could host normal mode or last-tier content gdkp raids to gear up alts. Finally, a more casual 25m guild might choose to use GDKP as their primary loot system, for the exact reasons that a hardcore raid would never use it- GDKP is completely capitalistic, so any member, regardless of how casual they are, has the opportunity to win any drop, assuming 1.)they can pay for it, 2.) no one else is willing to pay more.

Aker · 12/18/09, 11:56 AM

Originally Posted by KraxisSingular

In that case a lootcouncil might be a better option since that allows for loot to be distributed to the nice friendly guildy who helps everybody, but perhaps isn't the best raid

Wait....what? There is nothing wrong with outside factors influencing who gets loot first. Everyone has a fair shot at it, but the people who work harder outside the raid get the shiny stuff first.

To put it another way, whenever a piece of loot drops, the raid's overall DPS goes up. It doesn't matter to the overall raid in a general sense who gets the loot as long as it is being used, GDKP is just a different way to decide which particular member of a raid gets that particular piece of loot.

The only way it becomes an issue is if people buy loot that rots or buy loot and then don't raid. Neither of those issues are due to GDKP, you can have a loot council where the super nice guy gets loot and then doesn't show up.

GDKP would work perfectly fine for a guild loot distribution, in fact probably better than DKP because if you really really want that Death's Choice you have exactly the same ability as anyone else to go out and farm gold so that you get it. The biggest downside is probably that ability to earn gold and and to raid don't necessarily go together. But then again in most guilds with the exception of legendaries, loot generally isn't given to the best players first, but to the player with the best attendance or who most needs it, neither of which correlate to player skill either.

Personally, I don't care for farming lots of gold, so I'd probably get loot last in a GDKP system, so I on a personal level would dislike a GDKP system, but don't see it as inherently worse than DKP or Loot Council.

aleyro · 12/18/09, 12:06 PM

Originally Posted by Aker

...loot generally isn't given to the best players first, but to the player with the best attendance or who most needs it, neither of which correlate to player skill either.

Personally, I don't care for farming lots of gold, so I'd probably get loot last in a GDKP system, so I on a personal level would dislike a GDKP system, but don't see it as inherently worse than DKP or Loot Council.

In a properly managed progression guild, guild leadership will choose a loot reward system that has the overall guild's best interest in mind. If they believe that rewarding their "best" players is best for the guild, they will likely choose loot council. If they believe that deriving the maximum value of the item over time is best for the guild, they will likely choose an attendance based system, such as DKP (assuming that prior attendance correlates to future attendance).

In a properly managed progression guild, guild leadership would never decide that giving a drop to the highest bidder is in the best interest of the guild.

In terms of progression, socialism > capitalism.

Aker · 12/18/09, 12:31 PM

Originally Posted by aleyro

In a properly managed progression guild, guild leadership will choose a loot reward system that has the overall guild's best interest in mind. If they believe that rewarding their "best" players is best for the guild, they will likely choose loot council. If they believe that deriving the maximum value of the item over time is best for the guild, they will likely choose an attendance based system, such as DKP (assuming that prior attendance correlates to future attendance).

In a properly managed progression guild, guild leadership would never decide that giving a drop to the highest bidder is in the best interest of the guild.

In terms of progression, socialism > capitalism.

Sure, in theory that sounds fine. And in the case of clearly exceptional items like legendaries and for tank gear that is probably true. However, for the other 95% of loot, it doesn't matter which DPS gets Death's Verdict or what healer gets the new, whatever the great healing item is. Like any loot system, there are holes and those two would be a problem, but I don't see them as fatal flaws. There just really isn't any content where giving a more skilled player any particular item increases the raid dps by so much that it makes a difference. Over the long run all that matters is that better gear gets spread across the raid to increase its ability to beat content. And over the short term for specific top tier progression there are really just a few items you need to put into a few people's hands to help the raid.

Edit - I should probably add that GDKP is probably a bad system for progression guilds not because as the previous person said "the nice guys" won't get loot, but because there are a number of things guilds do that aren't neccessarily motivated by loot, which is the driving purpose behind GDKP. Just to take a quick example, a GDKP based guild would never do Earth, Wind and Fire, the achievement. But a progression guild would.

schrja · 12/18/09, 1:37 PM

Any loot system has to weigh a number of different considerations, such as efficient allocation of loot, fairness, simplicity, time to implement, and regular distrubtion of loot. Depending on which factors a guild values more, a guild might choose one loot system rather than another. Obviously, a hard core progression guild would focus primarily on an efficient allocation of loot, which makes a loot counsel, or DKP system more appealing.

GDKP (in an ideal setting) does better on other criteria, however. It gives players a reward every time they run a raid. In one important sense, it is fair, because even if a rich character dominates early auctions, he is compensating the poorer members; in contrast, a DKP system provides only an intangible benefit to the loser: the winner has fewer points to spend next time. Additionally, GDKP makes farming gold more interesting because gold leads to truly useful loot. Further, if several players decide to farm gold agressively, the average raider will quickly become very wealthy. GDKP might provide an intangible benefit by creating higher motivation levels among players that would in turn lead to better performance.

Whether these considerations outweigh poorer loot distribution efficiency is an open question, and the answer may vary from guild. I'm less interested in whether GDKP is the best loot system for a progression guild than in whether it is a viable system.

thesmoosh · 12/19/09, 10:13 AM

Originally Posted by schrja

Has anyone ever used GDKP as a guild loot system, and if so, how well did it work?

Although the guild fat cats might have an initial loot advantage, it seems like the system would quickly reallocate wealth so that even the poorest guild members could win new loot. Additionally, the beauty of GDKP is that you never lose. You just get cash instead of an item.

This might also be a convenient way for the guild to raise money. A guild could simply impose a small tax on the pot. Although this would be understandably frowned upon in a pug, players might be more willing to see a cut go to the guild instead of an individual. Especially if the guild allows patterns and orbs to be auctioned through the GDKP system instead of just stuffing them in the guild bank.

While not exactly the same thing, during BT and Sunwell whenver an item dropped that people didn't want to spend DKP on, I would simply auction it off with a starting bid of 100g. Basically made it so the guild bank anywhere from 100 to 1k off of items that would otherwise be sharded, and the people that got the item for their offspec, for pvp, or for looks were happy about it.

wasniahC · 12/21/09, 11:18 PM

I ran a GDKP TotC25 this week on my server, my first. I read up on this thread, I had the mod, and talked with a few others who had ran these before. The run was very smooth, but I had problems finding people who had gold and were willing to spend it in here. I managed to find "xth alt of rich raider" in 2 cases, who just outbid competition.
I weep for the person who was willing to spend 20k gold on Reign of the Dead, and wasn't able to make it, leaving this trinket to go for just 5.5k gold.
Otherwise, the run went well. People even commented that I had done a good job leading it, though I do not consider myself the best of leaders.

My main problem was simply that I could not find people who would spend enough, and had to resort to others.

I may run an ICC25 next week, instead, but here is the problem as I see it:
TotC25 means outdated loot. It is easier content to clear, but it is less interesting, people may not want to join this boring raid, where outdated loot won't sell for enough.
ICC25 means a harder raid. It means I will have a harder time finding people I need, as most people will need to be well geared, but some will not be willing to join if they do not feel they have enough money to buy items.
Also, more people need to keep that save open for their guild.

How are other people handling this?

• frmorrison · 12/22/09, 10:25 AM

Originally Posted by wasniahC

I weep for the person who was willing to spend 20k gold on Reign of the Dead, and wasn't able to make it, leaving this trinket to go for just 5.5k gold.

My main problem was simply that I could not find people who would spend enough, and had to resort to others.

I may run an ICC25 next week, instead, but here is the problem as I see it:
TotC25 means outdated loot. It is easier content to clear, but it is less interesting, people may not want to join this boring raid, where outdated loot won't sell for enough.
ICC25 means a harder raid. It means I will have a harder time finding people I need, as most people will need to be well geared, but some will not be willing to join if they do not feel they have enough money to buy items.
Also, more people need to keep that save open for their guild.

How are other people handling this?

I don't know what mod you are running, but the one Alcara uses is a highest bidder wins with 100g increment. So while one guy said he could pay 20k for Reign, if he ended up coming he may only pay 6k (or whatever it took to beat the 5.5k guy).

ToC25 is outdated loot, but if you are worried about people not having gear for ICC25 (tanks matter the most, should have mostly 245 pieces), ToC25 is the best place to get gear. Also while you would not get the gold that you got months ago, ToC is still only around an hour.

Kissmyaxe · 12/22/09, 10:58 AM

Originally Posted by wasniahC

How are other people handling this?

There have been quite a few ICC25 PuGs during the week so I presume there are enough people interested in running it that have no option to do it with their guild.

Being a new instance though, I think apart from gearing which should be solved by anyone being able to run TotC25 and getting a 245 gear level, the main problem is the knowledge of tactics. It will be harder the first few weeks, but as people to the fights they will get used to the tactics and the runs will be smoother.

The best way to do it is advertisment. Spam Trade channel, do a post on the realm forum, abd once you get people contacting you, do a list and use that. On the list you can try to profile each person so that you know who is there just for the badges and maybe a few cheap pieces and who is there to spend on anything that drops.

Once you get your GDKP run known and you manage to clear it every week, more people will be interested and you will be able to get a better balance of geared/skill people and big spenders.

One more thing I would like to add that as I see it it's very time consuming to set something like this up and if you don't plan to run it every week, for a lengthy amount of time, then maybe it's not worth to start it in the first place.

Granger · 12/22/09, 11:12 AM

ToC25 has some allure for more casual players too, trophies. It is extremely easy to pick up all the emblems you need to get full 232 T9 but for the more casual players or raiders in only 10man guilds that haven't been able to pug the trophies will be fairly valuable. This plus the trinkets that have eluded some players in more progressed guilds pretty much guarantees ToC will have some life for a little while longer at least.

DandZ · 12/23/09, 2:14 AM

Originally Posted by Kissmyaxe

The best way to do it is advertisment. Spam Trade channel, do a post on the realm forum, abd once you get people contacting you, do a list and use that. On the list you can try to profile each person so that you know who is there just for the badges and maybe a few cheap pieces and who is there to spend on anything that drops.

Once you get your GDKP run known and you manage to clear it every week, more people will be interested and you will be able to get a better balance of geared/skill people and big spenders.

One more thing I would like to add that as I see it it's very time consuming to set something like this up and if you don't plan to run it every week, for a lengthy amount of time, then maybe it's not worth to start it in the first place.

Thoughts on the above:

Please, please, don't "spam Trade." Using only LookingForGeneral is the way to go. I'd previously posted here of the importance--especially when one is still introducing GDKP to a realm--of avoiding the mental defectives that infest Trade, and instead using Dalaran General and LookingForGroup; that said, one might have argued pre-3.3 that Trade's wider audience merited its use for recruiting. I disagreed with this argument but could see its basis. 3.3 has eliminated all reason whatsoever for using Trade for anything other than trade- and perhaps gear-related chat because 1) everyone in the capital cities now automatically gets both LookingForGroup and Trade channels, but 2) many sensible people before and after 3.3 turn Trade off because of all the stupidity. Why not use the prescribed channel that now also happens to have the largest-possible audience?
Let me digress a moment and talk about the value of building a community. Since my first raid I have told everyone in my raids to /join GDKP; in addition to helping to keep /raid clear during bidding, nowadays a nice little community of GDKP-interested players is on at all hours. By now players know to gather on the channel before a raid, whether they are on the roster or not; I also tell people who whisper me just before a raid's start asking for a spot to /join so I can pull replacements from the channel for the inevitable no-shows. When two runs are occurring simultaneously, as has happened more than once, the GDKP channel sees good-natured trash-talking regarding each group's progress, bragging/griping about loot drops, etc.
So, how should one advertise? Setting GoldRaidManager's automated-ad system loose every 15 to 30 minutes in the LookingForGroup and GDKP channels is very effective, even if most ads will seem to be unheard (no whispers back). My ads say something to this effect:
Icecrown 25 GDKP (gold DKP) raid Sun 7pm. Last raid went 3/4 and paid out 4,640g to each player. Details and signup at Blizzard's Llane forum (forums.worldofwarcraft.com | WoW Realm Forums | Llane).
The link above is an example of the announcement/signup thread I am nowadays using for Icecrown. The vast majority of players have never read, let alone posted, to the Blizzard forums and thus need to be told exactly how to get to the realm forum. Even many who do know where to go are reluctant to post because they don't want to create yet another online account. Explain to those who /whisper you asking if they can not bother with posting there that 1) it's important they read about and understand what GDKP is, 2) having their interest written down will make it much easier for you to remember them when it's time to assemble the roster, and 3) their in-game username/password are sufficient to post to the forum.
Keeping track of players' ability, gear, and spending power is key to improving future runs. For each completed raid I create a text file containing both loot lists from GoldRaidManager and a copy of Recap's detailed damage report. Until the blessed day GRM tracks unsuccessful bidders' names and bids I also use /chatlog to record bids for future reference.
I can heartily echo Kissmyaxe's statement that success is the best possible advertisement. I have been fortunate in having the leaders and officers of several of Llane's top raiding guilds sign up for my runs; their and other satisfied participants' word-of-mouth have certainly contributed to the ever-increasing demand for GDKP runs on the server.
Runs are indeed laborious to build and and the willingness to commit to regularly taking the time to build good ones should not be underestimated. Each roster takes me a good 60-90 minutes for initial assembly, even with many players having run with me before, plus ongoing fine tuning as players drop out and others show up at the last minute.