Voting

[Thatar]

Hey everybody,

I would like to ask if you guys are voting at TWG. Because, maybe if we all start voting, we could climb the list a little, and some more people would join. So if the admin of the site puts a link to the TWG vote page of RSW, voting can begin! Or just click http://www.topwebgames.com/in.asp?id=5832. I really think this game earns a little more interest.

Thatar

[drwr]

I wouldn't mind encouraging our players to vote for RSW, on topwebgames.com or on other indexes, in order to raise the profile of RSW and thereby help bring more players into the game (which, of course, helps everyone).

I just never figured out a good way to post a voting link. I guess I could put one on the "home" page, but I was always a little turned off by games that put a bunch of "vote for me" links on their front page. Also, a lot of players may not even visit the web page every week, since you can play the game entirely via the client. I could put a link in the client, too, but that seems a little on the weird side. Finally, a lot of games offer in-game bribes (or "incentives") to encourage their player base to vote for them. I don't think RSW can compete with that; even if I wanted to offer incentives, it's hard to imagine what could work for a game which is entirely player-to-player like this.

But, maybe I'm just being a wuss about it. How about it, RSW players, will you cast a vote for us by clicking the above link? If it seems to result in more players finding and joining RSW, then I'll be more than happy to put aside my objections and find a way to place a voting link somewhere conspicuous.

David

[drwr]

I've thought about this a bit more.

On the one hand, it wouldn't be so bad to have a link that came up once a day, in the client and on the web page, to encourage people to vote for RSW. We could even bribe, I mean incentivize, people to vote by awarding points in their active games for voting consistently. In order to avoid unbalancing the games, it would have to be a modest point bonus: I imagine something like a 100-point bonus at the end of the game to the player who has voted the most consistently during the run of that game, and maybe a 50-point and 25-point bonus to the two runners up. This wouldn't be enough points to change the outcome of most games, but it might tip the balance of the occasional very close game. It would tend to benefit people who turn on their computer and check their RSW games every day, over people who only come in once a week or so; but this is not necessarily a bad thing (people who check in frequently will be better able to communicate and form strategies with their allies).

On the other hand, I did a little back-of-the-napkin arithmetic, and even if we instituted such a policy it would only bring RSW up to maybe #100 on TWG's list (given our current active population). This may not be high enough to make a difference in RSW's profile to justify annoying all of our users every day over it. And maybe TWG isn't a big enough website anyway--even if we did raise our profile on TWG substantially, maybe it wouldn't bring in many new users. I do have a paid ad already on TWG, under the "Strategy games" header; this ad brings in two or three curious people a day, but most of these don't appear to see anything they like here, and they go away again.

What do other people think about this?

David

[Thatar]

Maybe you're right, that the population of RSW is to low to get a higher rank, but still a great idea!

...I do have a paid ad already on TWG,...

That made me come here , so that helps. (If you think you get any better by having me )
This game doesn't exist very long yet, does it? So we may not give up the hope yet to get it higher populated.
I also thought of another problem, if there are lots of people, I think there will be lots of games with people leaving. Although you could fix that by showing the ranks of players or something in the game signup list. (btw, can you implement forum ranks for the number of posts you have? Oh yeah, sorry that I keap nagging, but some of the smiles are bugged. )

Thatar

[drwr]

Well, no one else has chimed in yet, so I guess other people don't feel strongly about it. Maybe I'll implement a voting link and we'll see what happens.

if there are lots of people, I think there will be lots of games with people leaving. Although you could fix that by showing the ranks of players or something in the game signup list.

I'm very concerned about this problem. It's quite possible that raising our profile on TWG may attract more people, but they may be more likely to be casual browsers, people who will sign up for a game and then later abandon it out of disinterest, which hurts the overall game experience rather than helps it. I'd much rather attract players who will take the game seriously and finish out any game they start.

Showing ranks of people in the signup list doesn't help, because (a) you don't know who is signing up for a game anyway, (b) accurate ranks are difficult to determine with a wide variety of game rules, and (c) judging other players by their rank just invites elitism and discrimination against new players.

Oh yeah, sorry that I keap nagging, but some of the smiles are bugged.

Are they? You mean like ? Yeah, I wonder why that doesn't show. This is forum is mostly off-the-shelf phpBB software, so I don't have a lot of direct control over that. I'll look into it, though.

David

[Thatar]

PhPBB is quite a good concept, actually. So if you make a post on their forum they will help you out I think.

[ZenCat]

I think it's a great idea, I clicked on the link, checked out the website, and couldn't figure out HOW to vote! My problem is that, while I check the client and submit turns almost every day (sometimes several times a day) I seldom come here to the forum so I just barely found this. I've been encouraging everyone I know in other games to give RSW a try, and several have regular players. It's nice having games with more players in them.
Dave, how about putting a link on the games list page of the client to the forum that would show when there have been new postings? Click on that and jump right to this? Save opening a browser window, clicking on the right bookmark, then checking the forum to see if there are any new postings. I know it would get me here more often.
Dale