Oh boy, it's that time of the year, the time for debate!

I'll start with my opinion; the reason why I decided to create this topic. The way CV works right now isn't an exact representation of what it's meant to represent (Contributor Value), and it can be abused and exploited to no end.

Let's refer to the FAQ for more information:

What are levels, and how can I increase my level?
Levels represent a user's contributions to the community.

We don't really need to read further. CV is supposed to measure how well a user has contributed to the community, but what it really does is represent the ability of a user to push the "Create Giveaway" button, regardless of your win/give ratio, how many people had the chance to participate in your GAs, or any other factors that could measure "contributions to the community" with more precision.

There are a couple of design flaws which I'll try to explain, and I hope the point gets across since it's a bit late, and my English isn't in the best of shape.

First, you can exploit your way to a high level without being particularly generous. Do a few quick giveaways of bundled games to get a nice starting win/given ratio, then look for one (or a couple) of those private GA groups. "Potato GAs of the Potato!", they call themselves. With every characteristic element every private GA group has: a member limit and mandatory giveaways every X days if you get into it.

Then you just need to play along: start creating GAs and the other members of the Potato GAs of the Potato will create some too, and that little Secret Santa of yours will net you Contributor Value while, at the same time, you'll most likely win a lot of Potato games by the other members, so you won't really "lose" anything in the process. Your CV rose but did you contribute anything to the community? The answer is no. The same results could have been achieved by making the GA group in Steam, using a random number generator to determine winners, but why should they do that if they can use the SG platform and rake in CV in the process?

Then we need to introduce the biggest losers of this scheme: people who make public, level-restricted GAs. In their good will of rewarding people who contribute to the community -or at least that's their intention- they set a bar which low levels who are actually contributing, even if limited a bit by their wallet, can't cross; while people who have traded gifts with only 20 other people and received the same amount they've given in return are free to enter.

In short: Giving the opportunity to win $100 worth of games to 10 people is worth the same as giving the entire userbase that same opportunity. Also you can play a game of "giving to my friends, taking from everyone", and that isn't healthy for anyone.

The first and easiest solution people have found to combat this system is pretty easy to spot: there are tons of "adding to my whitelist" topics here in Discussions. Having individual control of who actually has a good ratio for a better indication of contributing level is the only way you'll make sure your game gets to the people you want to. But we shouldn't need to use that if the system was designed with the goal of rewarding contribution in mind.

For this, I have thought of several possible solutions, and you're free to suggest more in the comments section.

  1. Split CV into Public CV and Group CV: This is pretty straight forward. You measure how many of the user's GAs have been created for everyone and how many of them have been for groups/whitelist. For example, if you're level 8 a possible split would be level 7 public CV and level 7 group CV (I think the result would be that based in its exponential nature but feel free to correct me), in which case you don't really have a problem, but, most importantly, it would allow givers to restrict level 0 public CV/level 8 group CV users from their giveaways if they don't want people who have been gaming the system in their GAs.

  2. Create a Ratio value and add it to the filter options available when creating a giveaway: this solves the problem of weeding out "leechers" that drives some people to create high level GAs and forget about non-leechers who don't have a fat wallet. If you set the Ratio requirement to 1, the guy who has given $100 and won $90 is on the same playing field than the guy who has given $1000 and won $900. If you still want to reward the $1000 guy, use normal CV as a filter and you're all set.

  3. Make CV gain proportional to how "open" your GA was: Straightforward too. If your GA was visible to 100% of the community, you get 100% of its CV value. The lower the proportion of the userbase able to enter it, the lower the CV you get.

  4. Make won gifts decrease CV: this would encourage people who have been winning a lot to start giving more for a while. You could start at level 3, with levels 2, 1 and 0 representing people who win more and 4 to 10 representing people who have been giving more.

And... that's pretty much it, some final considerations:

  1. This is an opinion. The CV system feels broken to me, but it doesn't have to be like that for anyone else. Feel free to discuss why it's working as intended if that's how you see it.
  2. Before someone fires the first ad hominem attack, value this piece for what it is instead of who wrote it. I have no particular interest in changing the system so I can enter the promised land of high-level GAs, since I have pretty much every game that I like already in my library. In fact I would be even lower level with some of the proposed changes, but developing a fair system is far more important than any personal interests.

Thanks for reading, leave your comments, and have a nice day!

9 years ago*

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What's your opinion on the subject?

View Results
Yes, it could use some changes
It's completely fine as it is

I think CV should also take into account the demand for the game. There are some previously bundled games (ahem, walking dead) that everybody wants but there is little incentive to give it away because you only get 15% CV. Other bundled games there are so many copies floating around that few people want. In my opinion, there should be some mechanism to reward people for giving away games in high demand regardless of whether it was previously bundled. How that calculation would happen is a whole subject because of so many variables involved, of course.

9 years ago
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Does Steam make available to the public the number of wishlists any given game is on? It could be a start.

9 years ago
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it does, it's even implemented on SG - go to any group page on SG and click "wishlist" at left ;) example: http://www.steamgifts.com/group/SJ7Bu/steamgifts/wishlist

other thing is that popularity doesn't exactly mean quality. Such a system would greatly favor AAA games and generally games that everyone heard about over indie or niche titles.

9 years ago
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I don't really have a problem with that. If you encourage gifting a game everyone wants, it's a win-win situation. Make it 50% demand/50% price so expensive but not very popular games aren't useless in terms of points received and you're golden!

9 years ago*
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majority =/= everyone. How is it a win-win situation for let's say 4x strategy fan, as these games aren't at as many wishlists as let's say AAA shooters? Or let's say a music software enthusiast - don't think that music-editing software is on many wishlists. Does it make money contributor paid for it less valuable? and not very popular games become useless even with your 50/50 formula. because you pay the same price for them, yet can get up to 50% less value just because it's not popular or overhyped game.

Like I said in other place to you - SG should mostly be about fairness and equality. Each user and game is treated by the same formula - yet you propose now 2 things already that make some games better than others, some users better (with chances to win) than other. And strangely enough this favor is switched towards something that you like, that would give you better chances, that games/soft you personally think to be worthless giving lesser reward etc.

9 years ago
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This is a rather great thread, and i'm glad to see discussion progressing well, sadly I do not have time right now to post my opinion, but I've read what you've written, and I partially agree with it.
It would be great if mod could add a poll that would be like:
"I'm for option: a,b,c,d or 'none, let the cv stay as it is' ",instead of the current one which is basically change or not.

9 years ago
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Change is ultimately the owner's decision. Nothing discussed here will actually be implemented as it is, and even if it might give the owner some ideas, the point is just to discuss the topic, with a cup of tea in one hand and a newspaper in the other, like true gentlemen/gentlewomen(?) :P

So that's why the poll is just "yay or nay". It's just a thermometer of how the community feels about the whole CV concept, no strings attached as to HOW it should actually be solved.

9 years ago
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Well yes indeed, I know that nothing discussed here might be implemented, that's why I said I'm glad discussion is going on well, because as far as I could see, not many people were trolling, posting tl;dr stuff or similar. I don't think cg is going to change CV, because site is already running for quite some time, and there would be lots of questions about what happened, although he might post announcement or whatever.

As for the pool, you'd get same effect if it was like this:
"Which option do you prefer:"

  1. a)
  2. b)
  3. c)
  4. d)
  5. Keep CV as it is.

Basically if number of votes in total for both 1-4 options is bigger than 5 that means that majority of the people would love to see the change. Like this, people are just supporting the change, but aren't voting for anything in particular, which makes it hard to know what they would like changed/added.

Edit: About the pool, I kinda misread what you've written. Yeah well, with most of these pools it's always around 50% 50%, that's why CV barely ever changes.

9 years ago
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It is always healthy to reevaluate the status quo.

To address proponents in this thread who wish to dissolve CV: While certain individuals will undoubtedly attempt to abuse whatever system is in place, my qualm about abolishing CV altogether is that it serves as a great motivator to gently encourage more generosity (especially to newcomers). Case in point? Myself.

9 years ago
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I am not active anymore on this board (and I only participate in public giveaways: wishlist), but from my point of view
1) would be (almost) fair if only group giveaways were separate.
2) is great.
3) no
4) good; maybe create another field ("True CV") for the people who want to see that

9 years ago
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@1 then groups would simply switch to private GAs posting them on steam discussion threads ;) and if we were to discount private GAs it would basically kill puzzles, trains, forum events etc.

9 years ago
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That's why I said that only group giveaways should be separate; but yes, you are right - I haven't thought about people simply creating private instead of group giveaways. ^^

9 years ago
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dont care about abuser's.
seen many ppl who GA: private or via invite steam group or love_list.
but, one interesting fact: topic starter has last GA - private and love_list...
(imho)

9 years ago
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What did I say about Ad Hominem? Want a refresher? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

I shouldn't have to explain my actions to anyone, but since you are so kind, here it goes:
Invite only GAs: I made a puzzle available to everyone who wanted to enter, you just needed to know the name of 10 music bands. The ultimate prize was a whitelist one because I couldn't add more giveaways to the puzzle due to restrictions, so I added each and every one of the puzzle solvers to my whitelist so they could enter.
YunieRozier Blue Hearts group: She's a kind and generous person and she invited me to her Steam group. As a thank you gesture, I bought several bundle games for her and her fellow group members. These being bundled gave me a whole lot of CV.

And previous ones, and also the most recent one, arguably the best game in the history of videogames, are public, level 0.

Thank you for your contribution to this topic.

9 years ago*
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[quote]I shouldn't have to explain my actions to anyone,[/quote]
this. so, i guess nobody want to be under the choice: punish or explain.

just leave as is as.

9 years ago
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I completely agree with you.
I have seen people registered for 3 years, gave away nothing and received way too much.
I personally blacklist all those people I can find to decrease the number of leeches.
But you have mentioned valid points! All those giveaway groups annoy me.
+1 my friend.

9 years ago
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I don't agree whatsoever that you should get CV based on how open your GAs are. That's ridiculous. I use a whitelist for a reason.....

9 years ago
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Read just below this message.

9 years ago
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Added you to whitelist as well

9 years ago
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Okay guys, I need some sleep so I'll catch up with the conversation later. I just want to throw a quick PSA out there before leaving:

The changes proposed in this thread aren't the only possible changes SG could make. The point of this topic isn't just to open it, say "lol, 1 is stupid and 3 is ridiculous", and leaving. It's here to discuss and add new suggestions to the table, and hopefully to engage admins and mods in it so we can learn more about their plans for the community.

For one liners dismissing every point a user wants to make, we have every discussion forum on the Internet ever. Let's keep the quality discussion boys.

A giveaway set for keeping up with this will be made as soon as I wake up.

9 years ago
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and girls! ;D

9 years ago
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And unicorns? :P

9 years ago
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Are you trying to make a point about the rarity of certain mystical creatures (girls) on gaming forums?

9 years ago
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Maybe :P even though I wish there were more girls and unicorns into gaming!

9 years ago
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on the whole..it turned out better (& more civilized) than I expected

View attached image.
9 years ago
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Sorry for disappointing you. Do you want to make a little flame fest here to meet your expectations?

9 years ago
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I am happy to be disappointed in this particular matter.
ironic now that I think abt it.

9 years ago
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tl;dr, picked "yes" for effort.

9 years ago
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so, read all of your main topic, but too lazy at the moment to read the comments.
i'll give my 2 cents anyway, hope that's fine:

  1. every system has flaws. true, the number of flaws and their importance is differnet. and still
  2. some of the groups (i actually think most of them, but i could be wrong) are just for sharing with like minded people.
  3. whats different in your ratio system than the group you are talking about?
  4. i can't contribuate much, usually bundles and currently in several "free" groups. and my ratio is crap. doesn't mean i don't do my share when i can. i'm on this site for a year+ and i'm very lucky so i have far more wins than GA. does that make me bad?
  5. the point of the site is to give to the community. who decide what is the communitiy? i don't want to sound rude, but it feels like you are.
  6. if people break the very simple rules they are banned and/or suspended. you can abuse the system, so what? you give away because you want to. for what ever reason. me? it feels nice to give something away that i won't EVER play.
  7. and the most important thing. if you don't feel like giving away to lurkers and abusers or such, do a whitelist and use only that feature.
9 years ago
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As a new user here, I feel like people seem to focus on the Gifts part of Steam Gifts and not the Community part of it.

I'm writing this as I read through the discussions in here, and just wanted to say two things quickly. In this thread is a wonderful idea of how I imagined CV to work when I first heard of steam gifts. Basically, the more people who wanted the game (entries into your Giveaway and Wishlists it was on in my mind) the more Value you offered to the community. After reading through the Guidelines and FAQ, which are extremely informative and it still amazes me how obvious it is when people (new and old users alike) make statements that are easily answered. Also, I think AdamZombie is a bot with how fast and accurate he replies to those posts...

Secondly, thank you for starting this discussion and for everyone here who has kept it civil and flowing with thought and ideas. I can't wait to finish reading all of this.

9 years ago
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tl;dr

regarding the amount of text is suppose i agree to some points and disagree others ;P

9 years ago
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Making public giveaways is not being contributing to the community. Under my point of view, at least. And let me tell you why.

Before being active in the forums, I started here in Steamgifts joining public giveaways. Never read a forum thread, and obviously never posted anything. So why public giveaways are better for the community?

In the other way, months later I discovered the forum, I think it was thanks to Skyrim xD (a Skyrim thread). Little by little I have been knowing a lot of people here, especially puzzle solvers and puzzle makers, who are an amazing part of the community (Jatan's "group-puzzle-return-to-the-temple-of-steamgifts-revisited" made me realize how awesome the community is), and I started making private giveaways for level1+. Why? Because (under my point of view) private giveaways requires people to be active in the forums, making stronger the community, and level1+ limitation encourages people to start contributing.

Also group giveaways are only an extra feature, if there wasn't that feature, people would just create private giveaways and post them in their Steam groups, and how can you differenctiate between those private giveaways and the rest of private giveaways (trains, puzzles, birthday threads...)?

That's all for points 1 and 3.
Point 2 is ok, it would be another extra feature, and extra features are a good thing (you can use them if you like, you can not use them if you don't like).

. copying the text because sg is making annoying things lately and I don't want to write this text again...

9 years ago*
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Deleted

This comment was deleted 7 months ago.

9 years ago*
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some great ideas in here :)

9 years ago
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I'm gonna just leave this here...

Please. I'm so lonely.

In all seriousness though, I'm not sure that 100% accessibility should be necessary for 100% CV. For example, there are plenty of level 0 accounts that may or may not engage in shenanigans and it is nice to reward others who giveaway instead of just everyone. I agree with group giveaways though, since those are very easy to abuse. However, that sort of system could make private giveaways very tedious and perhaps put more work onto the servers. Ratio is a good idea, since, you know, you could be CV5 but only enter (and prolifically enter) high level giveaways and win a lot of games, but then again someone like me gives away a ton of bundle games (not for CV, but because I already own them) and makes my wins to giveaway ratio look much better than it honestly should be. Not sure winning should decrease CV, but perhaps a long inactivity penalty?

9 years ago*
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I drained my full mana bar for walls of text with this one, so sowwy about the contest! :P

9 years ago
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You could enter this. It counts!

9 years ago
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CV should be removed. It was a great idea, one that I supported but as it shown itself as it is now and as it was on SGv1 it does not reward people for making giveaways. It punishes people for making giveaways and the only way to avoid getting punished is to game the system.

I appreciate your issue with the randomized trading groups, it is an issue I share. But it has little to nothing to do with CV.

9 years ago
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Oh so that's why they make so many groups...

9 years ago
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So do you get more CV with amount of entries also?

or only based on price?

9 years ago
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Just price, and whether it's been bundled or not :P

9 years ago
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I disagree with some of the proposed changes.

  1. I disagree with the notion that if a guy gives to a smaller set of people (e.g groups or whitelist) he should be penalized for that. While it may not be inline with "giving it to the general public" it is still a gift to other people, which in my opinion, should also be respected. Thus, I disagree with point number 1 that there should be any differentiation between group GA and public GA.

  2. From my time in SG, most of my wins are from private groups, not from public GA. This is statistically correct, as private group have more chance to win. While you say that people are abusing this system, some groups have mechanism in place to prevent these abusers. For example, in one of my group we have to GA an AAA game monthly, or we will be kicked. No matter where you put it, you have to pay for AAA game. You can't punish people forming up private GA group. If there is a leecher in that particular GA group, it is the responsibility of the admins and the officers of the group to create mechanism to stop it. SG should not interfere in group's activities. If a group is only about insulting each other without thinking about gift ratio, it should be fine. If a group is only about gamers from certain countries, it should be fine. If a group is about giving AAA title each month, it should be fine. Again, SG should not interfere in group's matters; if a group have leecher in it its the group's fault, not SG.

  3. Regarding the bundles, SG have mechanism in place to value bundles less in levels, though they still count it in CV. Thus, if you kept giving out bundled games, your level will not rise, some groups have minimum level of entry though.

  4. I agree with the ratio thing.

  5. As I tend to do private/group GA more than public GA, I disagree with point number 3. If my intention is to reward userbase who is giving more to the community, should I be penalized for that? If my intention is to reward the game to my gaming group, should I be punished? This is unacceptable. While this may reward public GAs more, I don't see private GA or group GA should be penalized. Again, giving a $10 game to 10 people or 1,000 people is still a $10 loss from the person creating the GA.

  6. Point number 4, a bit disagree. This can kill a lot of new players to SG, as people "scared" to win. The ratio filter could be an option to deter leechers, but again, it should again be an option. Some people may be OK in giving things to leechers.

9 years ago
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I think you might have misunderstood, I don't think anyone is talking about leecher within a private group.

The problem presented here is that some small groups are effectively trading games with each other while bloating their contribution value. While I can't speak for all giveaway creators, I'd imagine many set higher minimum level to reward users who have contributed to the community (with better chances of winning), not for trading games.

I have seen some extreme ones, all giveaways are either group only or invite only, and all the winners are themselves. At the same time, they are also joining and winning from public and forum invite only giveaways that were set with higher level requirements.

Also, why would you consider separating CV into public and group some forms of punishment? No one is depriving you the acknowledgement of your contribution towards other group members.

9 years ago*
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It is a punishment because if we gave to the group we can't join the public ones.

Some of the solutions presented (CV depended on the visibility of the GA, for example) effectively punishes group-only GA.

9 years ago
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I think the suggestion was to provide creators with additional options for filtering the entries.

You may want to restrict most if not all of your giveaways to your groups (perfectly reasonable, I'm not against that), there may also be others who may want to restrict their public or forum invite only giveaways from members who are doing that.

This is just generally speaking and not referring to you personally, clearly you have been very generous on this site judging by your profile and not to be referred as the one of the traders mentioned above. There are flaws with the suggested systems, just as there are flaws with the current system, that is if we view contribution value as only a mean for giveaway restriction.

9 years ago*
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I agree with the system, as long as it is optional. If the system "punishes" me for not doing public giveaway, that is a problem for me.

9 years ago
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Just as you punish public GA creators by only giving to groups, then raiding public GAs with your artificially high level.

You're implying that what groups are doing right now is normal and they would be in a punishment state after the changes, when the truth is groups are exploiting SG, and the suggestions would try to put them in a normal state.

9 years ago
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Please do tell me why you generalize that groups are exploiting SG.

While we gave out a $10 game to 10 people, or 1000 people, it is still a $10 gift. Why I should be punished if I want to give to a select group of friends? This behavior is even encouraged by SG by having whitelist so we can create GA for "people that I like".

On SG itself, most people are giving out games without CV requirement, only few of them (very few) puts requirement of CV to join the giveaway. Most of the people's wins, in my opinion, is not on public where it is statistically very small, but most came from generous people who give out games at groups.

While some people may exploit it, the system is also used by groups to share giveaways legitimately among themselves. Is this kind of "legitimate sharing" illegal? Nope.

9 years ago
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Exploit does not mean illegal and you won't find a single comment by me calling the situation illegal.

By making closed giveaways, you're earning points. Those points enable you to enter better closed giveaways, but also better open ones. You're not participating in the "open system" by giving, yet your level for that "open system" is rising anyway.

I hope you can see how that's not fair. You're being generous with a closed, small group of people yet you're getting advantages in the level of public giveaways you can enter for it.

A more practical example would make you understand it better: imagine you're a member of the Potatos of Truth, and I am not a member of anything, I only do public GAs.
You have obtained level 5 with your closed GAs and I have obtained level 5 with my public ones. I create a level 5 GA for GTA V, and you create a level 5 closed GA for The Witcher 3.

I haven't had a chance of winning anything you've given away, including The Witcher 3, so why do you get the chance of participating in my GTA V GA? If you're operating only in small groups, it only makes sense to reward you in the small group context, but not generally.

And any way of working around a system and playing in the limit of its rules to get an advantage is an exploit. The word sounds harsh because we're accostumed to operating system and software exploits but that's just what it is: taking advantage of a feature to make it work like it shouldn't work.

9 years ago
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The problem with our differences is our different way to see things.

While you see CV as a representation of the contribution a user has made to the general public, from my point of view CV is a representation of how much I have lost giving away to people. From my point of view, a dollar given away is a dollar lost, but from your point of view to whom the dollar is given it is important.

Back to your example, The Witcher III set on $200 CV for example. You have given $200 to public, that's fine, you can join. But if I had given $150 to public and $50 to my group (losing same $200) should I be prevented from joining the giveaway? According to your interpretation, I can't, but from my point view, I should be able to join.

You see that group GA are exploitable, but some people (including me) are giving out to groups because they are the people I know personally, or my gaming group, or that we have similar hobbies, that's why we are sharing. We don't meant to exploit or game the system, we just want to share. Will people still share in the group if it does not count towards their CV? I don't know.

By "forcing" all GA to be public you are also killing a lot of giveaways in forum, or quiz giveaways. "Invite only" GA are not public.

9 years ago
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I think that the ideal thing would be to implement some sort of supply-and-demand thing where games are worth CV more if they are on a large number of active SG user's wishlists. I don't know if it would really help make things more "fair", but it would reward people who give away good games. One of my biggest problems with the current CV system is that it results in huge floods of giveaways for really terrible games just because they have a 90% off sale.

9 years ago
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Hey, as long as 1 person wants it, it's worthwhile to be in the site. If the collection of games available doesn't cater to your tastes, there's nothing you can do about it, it's a free site.

9 years ago
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One simple fix:

So you like to trade games between your group of buddies? Cool, no problem. SG has a handy system where you can make a raffle out of it for "group giveways".

This has NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYONE ELSE, therefore is worth 0 CV on your account, all group CV will be retroactively wiped. Plese continue to enjoy making group GA's for 0 CV between your friends in the spirit of giving or whatever reason you are passing games between your private group.

That would be a good, easy to implement fix.

Bring it on H8'ers. *
(By which I mean people who have "scummed" thousands in group CV, then enter public GA's)

edit 2: You can have 0 CV for your region locked GA's too, so everyone in ROW can enjoy the ROW GA's without you guys boosting CV on locked ones, then taking the ROW gifts as well, unless of course the accounts and/or CV was seperated. That's the best "fix" for that one imho. Want to make region locked GA's Ok your account is also now permanently locked to that region, and you may only make and win GA's for your locked account region.

9 years ago*
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So, if I gave out games to my friends in group, which are around 500+ in this moment, I should get nothing?
Giving out to your friends is also a generous act, I presume.
And please, a lot of us are NOT SCAMMING thousands in group CV.

9 years ago
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If you give out games to friends in your group you should get.... games from friends in your group. Your CV from there means nothing to anyone

9 years ago
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You do know that people have multiple groups. Thus, should a CV for group A differs from group B?
If group B is so big (Bundle Stars group, for example) is it different with public giveaway?

I am confused by a lot of finger pointed to "people exploiting/scamming the system" where in fact there are very few AAA titles done in public. Even if it does, even fewer of them have CV requirement. A quick check on my wishlist shows that from 35 games only 1 having a high (5+ CV). A check on public GA from 75 games show that only 4 of them have medium (3+ CV requirement). Thus, only accounts for 5.3% of total population.

The fact is there are very rare instances of "high CV" giveaway.

9 years ago
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The ideal implementation would assign a value of CV for each individual group you participate in.

9 years ago
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At SG, CV caters more to quantity than quality

Forget calling it CV. Lets call it Contribution Points (CP). CP would be best designed as a result of several equations which would contain the following factors :-

  1. Current price of the game that is being submitted, considering any discount that may have been offered. If the game is 10 USD but is being sold at 90% off for the weekend, then for the current weekend at least, the game should be treated as a 1 USD game i,e, it should give that much CP that a regular 1 USD game would give. This has a drawback though, people might store the game in their inventory and give it away after the price returns back to normal.

  2. Key GAs should get you less CP than regular GAs since keys are obtained from external sites and usually are obtained bundled or cheap at discounted rates. Perhaps 10%-20% less CV that a gift copy would give for the same game.

  3. We can take into consideration the number of people that have entered the GA. Restricted GAs such as Whitelist, Group, Level, Invite GAs would have few entries than a public GA. You obviously are more generous if you want more people to enter your GA. This is merely a mild measure of generosity since as long as your giving something to others, you are always generous. So perhaps this factor would not have much weight as others in the equation.

  4. The wishlist should be bought to more use as a user above mentioned and GAs of games that are the most desired could give you more CP. Since the main reason people might even want to come to GA site is in the hopes for winning those few games that they are currently unable to buy, unless most people join just for the sake of increasing the game-count.

9 years ago*
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  1. Yes, you have correctly stated why your own suggestion won't work. Not to mention the myriads of calculation that has to be done by SG to re-calculate every CV every day (how about flash discounts? To be accurate a hourly re-calculation is needed) thus I don't think that it could be done.

  2. I have to disagree on this. For people living in region-restricted areas such in South America or Southeast Asia, the way they can give a region-free games is to buy them on sites outside Steam. Bundled games are already included in SG mechanics, as bundled games will be valued less than its value. Discounted rates can't also be used, as buying at Steam, at some times, could be cheaper than buying a game outside Steam. In normal situation, the price will be similar. A quick check on Magicka 2 will show that the game is sold for $14.99 on Steam and on Indie Gala Store.

  3. No comment on this, but I disagree that giving to less number of people means that we are less generous.

  4. This could be useful.

9 years ago
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Sorry, but n2 is simply flawed. Almost if not all external game stores that offer Steam games even at full price only gives activation codes, not gifts. Indiegala, Humblebundle, GMG, Bundlestars all offer recently released, full price games (some of these even offered preorder on them) - so should a Witcher 3 bought in GMG worth 10-20%? This is why we have the bundled list :) While on gameminer gifts and keys work differently, I don't think that their system could be implemented here - the whole site would need a revamp for that.

9 years ago
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Poll Option 3: Remove CV entirely from the site (/spits on CV, bad CV, bad!)

9 years ago
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And allow everyone in all giveaways?

I like CV so far, it's quite prestigious and it's motivating to start giveaways yourself because the higher levels have some damn epic games.

9 years ago
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Let me explode your bubble: the higher level "promised land" isn't as epic as they would want you to believe. In one of the last level 5/6 trains I saw, it was still 90% bundle games :P

Not saying this is bad, giving is giving, but if you're expecting to win Witcher 3 or GTA from this site, better look for an elite closed group.

9 years ago
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But, but, we will not longer have the gift trading site we have now. We will be reduced to giving just because we want to. That would not go well with most people on SG.

9 years ago
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You could still trade gifts in groups, but it wouldn't give you advantages when playing in the open field. Everyone's equal, boom, mind blown :P

9 years ago
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Yeah, yeah, try to make sense. Really, I've argued against CV in the past. It won't go away And I believe it does encourage people to make giveaways.

9 years ago
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Closed 9 years ago by hezur6.