Removing Giveaway Entries
So, instead of going away from it, even more support/incentive for point banking?
Which is strange, since IIRR you wanted people to less micromanage SG but so many changes feels more like gamification of SG, with even more reasons to visit site every hour and decide which giveaways to enter and which to exit...
Comment has been collapsed.
If you remove a giveaway entry, you can now also receive points above the cap. This means if you have 380P, and you remove two 15P giveaway entries, you will have 410P available. You would then remain at this amount until the points are spent.
I'm still not 100% awake and I'm not sure I understood right... but doesn't that mean that I could put my points in giveaways that are supposed to end in X weeks to accumulate them? I could then remove my entries one day and find myself with hundreds of points above the limit?
Isn't it counterproductive to all these changes? :|
Comment has been collapsed.
First two changes are good and reasonable.
The third, however, is, with due respect, terrible - at least without a cap. People will be able to start acumulating points, effectively being able to spend thousands of points in one day, if they desire, greatly increasing their odds during certain events, like Humble Monthly days. It doesn't make sense to give regulars such a big advantage/control over the optimal way to use their points, if the main point of the whole change was to even the odds a little bit.
I don't doubt that we could even see the rise of a class of specialized "point bankers", people that will create 4w long GAs just to let others bank their points, since it's gonna be a highly demanded service from now on. xD
Comment has been collapsed.
I'm not saying it wasn't done before. I'm just saying that it will become much more optimal and widespread. Which goes against cg's intention of wanting people to micromanage their points way less, i.e., the gamification of SG.
Good to hear that, at least.
Comment has been collapsed.
much more optimal and extensive
Nah it won't. Juggling with deletions takes way more effort and as cg said will cost your account.
Also enough legitimate GAs exist and points aren't really that abundant either.
Comment has been collapsed.
There is nothing in the rules against banking and cg only said he's gonna punish those creating GAs with that sole purpose, not those storing their points.
I'm at 300p+ at most of the time. I could enter as many long GAs as possible, reallocating my points before a GA ends, i.e., rolling over a "debt" or as they say, "robbing Peter to pay Paul".
When the next humble monthly drops, I could easily have some 2k points to spend. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I wouldn't do that because it's not fair, but I don't doubt others will.
Comment has been collapsed.
'Point' is, none of the made changes here make any difference in that regard.
Comment has been collapsed.
It facilitates this behavior, by making it smoother to cash it all out at once, which in turn makes optimal usage easier.
Well, I guess, we'll find out when the next big bundle drops.
Comment has been collapsed.
Is there real difference?
Before: I stored let's say 300P a day for 3 days in giveaways, I have my 500, 1400 alltogether. I start to enter giveaways out of my 500, then refuel it just below 500, repeat, then remaining 400 as well.
If points can above 500, the difference is like a minute of time saved, because one can just get all the points, then just enter, not enter-remove-enter-remove. I get it, still makes a bit, very bit simpler, but we're talking about people who find and enter and manage giveaways for days just to store their points. I really doubt the changes promote a behaviour that requires quite some time and effort to pull off, by making the end result a little bit simpler. (Like.. spend 10-15 minutes with your giveaways and keep an eye when they will end, but after the change it will just take 9-14 minutes, which is still quite a lot more than 0 and not bankin.
Comment has been collapsed.
I could always be proved wrong later, but I still think this makes banking much simpler and more "acceptable". Imo banking shouldn't even be a thing, so any change that makes it easier, is not a good idea.
I like someone's idea about returning less points when you remove an entry, proportional to the amount of time spent in the GA. Might be too difficult to implement though.
Comment has been collapsed.
How is letting points regeneration halt instead of continue "more optimal"
PS. I got plenty of banked points since the update, gotta save for the monthly, what with it being completely riggid rather than flexible. Gotta make our own flexibility :/
Comment has been collapsed.
So as Mully said Bank of SteamGifts ™ has become a reality O_O
Basically, you can just:
- Limit the maximum points that can be refunded in a day to maybe 200
- Limit the maximum points that can be used in a day to 600, you don't need to keep track of the refunds just limit the entry points we can use in 24 hours.
Comment has been collapsed.
Reasonable for some users, Skanda and restrictive for some other users because not all SG users are thinking like you or me and that's not only very good but it's also called diversity, even on SG.
Comment has been collapsed.
A lot of users will have a different amount of points now so setting a daily points use cap\limit would be really restrictive for them and I think; apart from some of the SG users that limit their entries and use of daily points because they want to do this themselves, the change wouldn't be much wanted or supported.
Comment has been collapsed.
without a limit someone can bank thousands of points capped by the total points needed to enter all open giveaways on the site.
Comment has been collapsed.
You're taking an extreme example and extrapolating it to all SG users. And that would be not the case. Your suggestions look that they are tailor made only for the SG users that limit their entries and use of daily points because they want to do this themselves. And I really don't think those users are the mainstream SG users.
Comment has been collapsed.
I am just thinking of what can be done by a simple script that will abuse banking points to the max.
A lot of users might make use of it without using a script, banking up to 2-3k points to use them on the bundle release days
Comment has been collapsed.
If CG can find auto-join scripts and bots on SG then there's a fair change that he can find bank scripts and bots too. Far from all users on SG will be extreme bankers or bank script users you're describing so why restrict all the other SG users that don't use these scripts or extreme methods?
Comment has been collapsed.
Far from all users on SG will be extreme bankers or bank script users you're describing so why restrict all the other SG users that don't use these scripts or extreme methods?
This is exactly why you need to restrict it for all users. Only a small portion of users will abuse it to maximize their chances on bundle release dates, they will be able to enter more giveaways than regular users. With a restriction the potential abuse will be minimized and with equal available points there will be equal chances among all users. Not to mention it will have no effect on regular users who are not trying to abuse the system.
For instance let's put a limit like 700 daily point usage, non-abusing users most likely won't need to refund 120+ points daily (which are banked on other giveaways) to enter more giveaways. A hard limit would put an equal maximum point for all users so some extreme bankers or script abusers won't have higher chances than others.
Comment has been collapsed.
No, you don't want to restrict a lot of users because a few users might or could do this. If CG can handle the auto-join scripts he could handle those possible bank scripts, who are theoretical for the moment. Placing a cap on the daily points use is restrictive for a lot of the SG users with the exception of some of the SG users that limit their entries and use of daily points because they want to do this themselves.
You're advocating if a few students do something wrong that then the whole school should get detention.
Comment has been collapsed.
I think, you misunderstand me completely for some reason. We're talking about a limit that can prevent extreme abuse here, how can you compare this to detention?!
This is like comparing speed limit on the road to complete ban on motor vehicles...
Comment has been collapsed.
I compared it proverbially to detention. It's not because a few users may or may not use a bank script or do extreme bank abuse, that you have to restrict all other users on SG who don't use that bank script or do extreme bank abuse and let CG and SG support take care of them; if and when there are such users who do extreme bank abuse.
Comment has been collapsed.
You don't need a banking script to save points. It's very easy, you only have to do this:
- https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaways/search?point_min=30
- Find the giveaways which ends in 1-2 weeks and join them.
- Repeat every time you get 400 points.
- Profit.
And with the last change you can leave all these giveaways at the same time and get unlimited number of points, depending on how many giveaways you entered to bank points.
Comment has been collapsed.
^ This and a hard limit for daily point use also prevents deleted giveaway abuse.
I didn't even know about https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaways/search?point_min=30 now everyone can bank easily :D
How to Bank Points Guide by orono ^^
Comment has been collapsed.
yes please, don't let the naysayers tell you otherwise ^^
Comment has been collapsed.
So, basically, screw Humble Bundle days, the tweak?
How about no, the flexible system is bad enough as is. And I say that as regular buyer and monthly sub.
Comment has been collapsed.
To tell truth, I would just not refund points if you exit giveaway on your own.
SG already automatically kicks you from other GAs if you win one, so there's no points lost there.
Does sync kick you from giveaways if it sees you bought a game and have entered giveaways for it?
It would require some fine-tunning for GOTY editions, true.
Are there other reasons why someone would want to exit giveaway (well, beside somewhat subjective "I don't like the odds")?
Comment has been collapsed.
Yeah there are other reasons, I actually listed most of them in a post before but can't find it now.
- You can enter a giveaway then notice you already own it (Just you haven't synced yet, this can be fixed by syncing or you have it on another platform)
- You just noticed the game is bundled in a bundle and you haven't redeemed the key yet or you haven't got the bundle yet but you will get it soon (like waiting for a group buy etc)
- You entered by mistake and want to remove entry instantly
- You entered a gib without thinking then clicked on it to see the steam store reviews etc. Now you don't want it anymore
- You entered but noticed you don't actually want the gift from the giveaway creator anymore
- You entered the giveaway then read the description. You noticed you can't participate in the giveaway because you can't post a picture of yourself or can't follow whatever weird rule they have..
- GOTY edition or some bugged game showed you don't have it, but you actually have it. Or the giveaway creator doesn't want you to enter only for dlc..
- As you already stated, you entered when it had x number of entries but now it has xxxx entries. You don't like the odds anymore..
There might be more reasons, but as you can see there are several reasons to remove an entry :)
Comment has been collapsed.
You know, most of those points are easily rebuked by official SG guideline: "only enter for stuff you want to win", sometimes with a small dish of "research before enter", but to make it easier for everyone - 15 minutes of grace period when you can exit giveaways without any penalty.
And if sync would automatically kick you from giveaways of games you own while returning the points it would mostly fix the first point and help with second point.
Only those two points I feel like could be a real problem:
You entered but noticed you don't actually want the gift from the giveaway creator anymore
GOTY edition or some bugged game showed you don't have it, but you actually have it. Or the giveaway creator doesn't want you to enter only for dlc..
But rest is really a matter of spending few seconds before clicking "enter".
Or in last case only entering when you know you won't be able to take back your decision (like, you're going to sleep, giveaway ends in 2 hours :D )
Comment has been collapsed.
If you win a game and your entries in other giveaways for the same game are removed, can you get your points over the cap too?
Comment has been collapsed.
Now a lot "must"/will bank there points on long lasting GA's..... again.
Unwanted work and traffic to have at least a bit of a change against the, now again more supported, autojoiners -_-.
I not see what the changes should do against the autojoiners (because the changes before should do anything against them...).
All in all i see a massive point reduction, theoretical a not so often need of a log in. A big advantage to the autojoiners/bots and the extreme users of that site. The last ones had not enough advantage by able to join the short timed GA's ?
At the moment i thing the people that cries as loudest will be heared.
Not the best feeling.
Good night.
Comment has been collapsed.
That pretty much was the result of the original change.
Gotta get that little stash for Humble Days, since it's no longer automated.
Really, if they didn't want that, they should have unhinged generation from creation of giveaways.
Comment has been collapsed.
Imo, it's a positive kind of tuning of sg with some extra flexibility over the points use. Thank you, Cg :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Nice update cg. I'm glad deleted giveaways get points refunded now. The lowering of the cap was not necessary in my opinion but I didn't have a big preference either way so its no biggie for me. Keep theses updates incoming :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Too much time on my hands so I decided to check how many points I'd end up with if I removed all my entries:
Comment has been collapsed.
yep, legit ended at 1000 points. Now have to re-enter them. xD
Comment has been collapsed.
Eh, it remains silly to not tie it to the giveaways, in my opinion. Look at all the giveaways worth 30 and 25 points now. I don't think people care about theoretical winning chances - people care about having fun with lots of points, joining giveaways, having fun on the website. Not visiting this as an after-thought before going to bed. I would be very interested in visiting rates for people, and if they have changed since this new system.
But, the refunding of points of deleted giveaways - and even being able to go over the cap with this - is a very, very, very nice change. Thank you for that. And, further, thank you in general, for fine-tuning the system, for experimenting, for listening to people. :)
Comment has been collapsed.
If you remove a giveaway entry, you can now also receive points above the cap.
I wonder how long it'll take for bots to come up with a script that let's them bank points in long term giveaways and then pull them all back on days like Humble monthly reveal when there's massive amounts of the same giveaways to drastically increase their chances on those days.
Comment has been collapsed.
Or basically what everyone on this site is already doing at the moment? Unless you want to miss out that is.
Comment has been collapsed.
Almost everyone is redistributing their points to some extent, right. However, I would guess, that it would be a bit tedious to optimize them beyond a certain point if you do it manually. A bot does not have those limitations.
Comment has been collapsed.
Can't disagree it's tedious. But that's the system we went with.
From a perfectly fine flexible system to a flat system not suited to the bundles that generate so much traffic for this site... I still don't get it.
Comment has been collapsed.
If you remove a giveaway entry, you can now also receive points above the cap. This means if you have 380P, and you remove two 15P giveaway entries, you will have 410P available. You would then remain at this amount until the points are spent.
You have to be kidding, this is the worst possible change :(
Not only you favored bots with the decrease from 500 to 400P cap but now you promote the banking too. I really don't know what's the final purpose of all this mess.
Comment has been collapsed.
Yeah, I was really excited to read the changes until I started reading comments about points-banking. They make very valid points.
The more I read, the more I'm inclined to agree that this "over the cap" adjustment (except for deleted giveaways) was a poor decision.
Comment has been collapsed.
I suppose cg had the deleted giveaways in mind when he thought about removing this limit but he did not take the banking into consideration. Now the bankers can exploit the system more than ever.
Comment has been collapsed.
So, let's recap.
500 points - no regeneration is "better for banking" than 300 points and regeneration?
Ehm... how?
Comment has been collapsed.
How is going over the cap anyway something you want to do as banking.
It's wholesomely inefficient compared to storing them in giveaways and generating more points in the process.
If anything, doing that, you're doing it wrong. So more power to them if that's how they want it... it's the least efficient possible way of going about it, so I don't see why not?
Comment has been collapsed.
And with the last change you can leave all these giveaways at the same time and get unlimited number of points, depending on how many giveaways you entered to bank points.
https://www.steamgifts.com/go/comment/bPAcj9W
The last change was every banker's dream until today.
Comment has been collapsed.
Again, why?
Why would you want to exceed the cap and stop regenerating than stay under cap and get more?
If that's a banker's dream, that banker has no idea what he's doing.
Comment has been collapsed.
As a banker, you never want to exceed the cap but if you need at a certain time, let's say, 5,000 points stored in giveaways, you can leave them all at the same time to join a lot of giveaways you want to win. There will probably be several scripts to do all of this automatically.
Before this change, the bankers could only leave giveaways without exceeding the 300P cap, so they had to spend their points, recharge, spend, recharge... From now it will be ridiculously straightforward.
Comment has been collapsed.
And you're telling me #2 couldn't be done even easier with a but rather than a human, with 0 risk of loosing points opposed to human interaction.
If anything, you're giving arguments why this is better for humans than automatons. Cause your 'automated' interaction is tons easier for humans than your 'non-automated' where bots would actually shine.
Comment has been collapsed.
This is not a bot vs human debate, this is about promoting banking with the latest change. I don't mind if it's done using bots or manually, what I don't like is banking itself to exploit the GA system.
Comment has been collapsed.
So how then do you suggest to deal with Humble Bundle GA's? Considering the flexible point system got canned.
"Just not enter those and instead go for games you don't want in downtime"?
Since I would think that's the worse system. Alas the one we've gotten.
Comment has been collapsed.
Agreed. The possibility to bank points always makes the whole system rigged. The more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion the only way to stop it would be if points spent for entering weren't refunded at all (only refunds would come from deleted giveaways or fake ones). You'd probably need to increase regeneration slightly, maybe even raise the cap to 1000P or so, people would complain a lot. But in the end, they'd just learn to save a few points for short term giveaways and that they can't enter all giveaways.
Comment has been collapsed.
I really don't know what's the final purpose of all this mess.
give extra points to users, more to those that waste time banking, and even more if someone writes an autobank™ script.
Comment has been collapsed.
Understood. Then why they don't add a guide/tutorial to the FAQ with this info?
As I replied to cg, from now the banking was opened to the masses.
Comment has been collapsed.
If I understood this correctly, sadly seems this all benefits botters very heavily, botters can effectively store unlimited amounts of points in giveaways and continuously remove & move older banks to newer giveaways and this way get much better changes.
I mean this can be done manually, but scale which you can do with bot is massive.
I probably use around 0-200 points per day. So if I used bot, I could store at least ~10k points every month and only cap would be if you entered every giveaway. Then again after that, I suppose it wouldn't really matter.
Comment has been collapsed.
Because what other options do users have now that flexible is nuked for "flatline generation", be it bundle day, or Playstation nobody buys shit day.
Comment has been collapsed.
Could you explain a scenario where a bot is able to store more points after the change?
Comment has been collapsed.
A bot will never be able to store more points than a human, but it will be a lot more efficient because a human will probably forget to manually leave several "storage" giveaways before they end. A script could be easily configured to leave this kind of banks of points before they end.
Furthermore, a bot can be storing points 24/7 following that procedure. Meanwhile, a human has to visit the site to do it manually. In the end, with this change I think you are promoting banking for the masses (for both script users and regular members).
Comment has been collapsed.
I probably wasn't clear enough, but I was asking how a bot after the change could store more points than a bot before the change.
Comment has been collapsed.
It's not about storing more or fewer points, it's about leaving many giveaways at the same time and get an almost unlimited supply of points because you removed the cap in these cases. A competent script programmer could do wonders from now. I tried to explain this to another member here: https://www.steamgifts.com/go/comment/4haO8u4
Comment has been collapsed.
Right, instead of storing 10,000P in all the open giveaways, they could remove those points and store 10,000P in their account. In both situations though, they have 10,000P waiting to be used at any moment, and cannot earn more. Where is the benefit for the bot?
Comment has been collapsed.
A bot could be able to leave all the storage GAs at the same time and auto-join hundreds of "real" (desired) giveaways almost instantly with that vast amount of points. It will be a lot more easier to code because now it does not need to do the "spend, recharge, spend" procedure because you removed the cap. It will be more efficient in general.
But the main problem is now you can do all of this by hand very easily. Before, it was a lot more tedious so only script users and people with too much free time were storing points.
Comment has been collapsed.
A bot could be able to leave all the storage GAs at the same time and auto-join hundreds of "real" (desired) giveaways almost instantly with that vast amount of points. It will be a lot more easier to code because now it does not need to do the "spend, recharge, spend" procedure because you removed the cap. It will be more efficient in general.
This wouldn't give them any real advantage from this change though. They might be able to simplify their script a little and save 10 or 20 lines of code, but at the end of the day, it doesn't allow them to store any more points than before, or spend those points any differently.
But the main problem is now you can do all of this by hand very easily. Before, it was a lot more tedious so only script users and people with too much free time were storing points.
I think it's just as tedious as before, because a user can't have more than 400P stored in their account, or they stop receiving points. This means a user manually storing points would need to be constantly juggling their entries in open giveaways, which is identical to how it was always done.
Comment has been collapsed.
I think it's just as tedious as before
Not at all.
This means a user manually storing points would need to be constantly juggling their entries in open giveaways, which is identical to how it was always done.
No, now it's a lot more straightforward. Check my train example. I'm even thinking about turning myself into a banker (as lazy as I am) because now it's very easy and it's what you're promoting, directly or indirectly.
Comment has been collapsed.
I think it's just as tedious as before, because a user can't have more than 400P stored in their account, or they stop receiving points. This means a user manually storing points would need to be constantly juggling their entries in open giveaways, which is identical to how it was always done.
will all due respect cg, I think you are confused with what is the concern here
first of all I don't think that it is identical to how it was always done since we can now go above the cap while we cannot do so before this change.
from what I've understood, I think one "real" scenario of bots having real advantage is something like this:
let's say from today until weekend, I somehow do not have any GAs I do not want to spent my points in.
since we can go above the cap, we can now spend points on GAs and get it back again anytime we want before the duration ends to get any amount of points above the cap.
we get 6P for every 15 mins, meaning we can reach the cap after about 17 hours (cmiiw), if I distribute those points to GAs that end in a few weeks and repeat the process until the weekend, I can store let's say 1000P over the weekend on random GAs that end in few weeks.
meaning I can now enter more desired giveaways on the weekend simply because I stored my points over the weekend on random GAs, while other users who did not have the time to distribute points might just have the cap (400P) on the weekend.
doesn't this count as an advantage?
while it is true that I can't enter more GAs than any other user, I can distribute my points more effectively, therefore having more points than some other not-so-active users and bots can obviously do this more efficient than other user.
the concern is not about storing more points than any other user can store (because everyone will still get 6P every 15 mins, no more and no less than that), it's about how they can distribute their points to these random GAs that they don't want to enter and then distribute them later after they've stored enough points while other normal user (especially those who are busy) will not be able to maximize this "feature" potential
p.s. sorry if my English is confusing
Comment has been collapsed.
Hi philosophi, before this change, you could have 1,000P in open giveaways ready to spend this weekend. How is it any different after the change? Yes, you could transfer those 1,000P to your account now, but you would never want to do that, because it would mean you no longer receive points.
Comment has been collapsed.
Yes, you could transfer those 1,000P to your account now, but you would never want to do that, because it would mean you no longer receive points.
ah.. I see what do you mean now..
sorry cg, you were right
I did not realize that it is possible to do so with or without the point going above the cap
Comment has been collapsed.
If, hypothetically speaking, I would only enter GAs once a year, accumulating points in the bank for that day would mean I would be certain to not run out of points.
Comment has been collapsed.
So why is there a cap at all then? The only people a cap is going to affect now are the ones who don't bank or use a bot to do it for them.
And no, I'm not saying do away with the cap - I'm saying that imposing a cap, then effectively removing it for bots/users who bank points seems counter-productive. (edit: aka, imho you should be making it harder for them, not easier).
Comment has been collapsed.
The cap always benefit bots (before and after these changes) and now it will benefit bankers too. So I agree with you, why not remove the cap completely to benefit all kinds of users?
Comment has been collapsed.
Bots or users that bank points have the same cap as before. They're capped at the number of points in all of the open giveaways.
imho you should be making it harder for them, not easier)
None of the recent changes were meant to address point banking. That's a door I haven't even opened, and people are asking why it's not fixed.
Comment has been collapsed.
Yep, and as much as I hate to say it -- guess the only way to truly level up the playing field for users who don't bank or bot would be to remove the cap. Otherwise, the cap only affects the "honest players".
As an added bonus, all the people screaming "Humble Monthly!" or whatever other "Bundle Explosion MegaFantastic Gamestravaganza!" could be silenced as well and you could just tell them "well if you can't enter, it's because you didn't save some extra points and spammed all those entries for Card Farming Simulator 2017!""
(Just thinking out loud here and don't particularly care either way - just trying to see all possible sides of the issue)..
Comment has been collapsed.
would be to remove the cap
I'd even agree with that, to some reasonable upper limit at a week or two.
Steam Companion had a cap at 20'000. Nobody reached that, but also due to multi-entry possibilities.
Comment has been collapsed.
is it not possible now to create a script that enters new (or long) giveaways - to bank those points, thus keeping your account below the cap threshold, and allowing points to generate continuously to the cap beore your bot just rinses and repeats joining new (longer duration) giveaways again - this keeping your points drained - then when a bundle drops (without a cap of the effective amount of points you can bank) they can dump their entries and join as many high value giveaways as they want - if I remember that is why nick put a cap on the points at Steam Companion as it was abused in this manner
they could also make the script dump giveaways to enter targeted games - as they potentially could keep banking points forever - if there bot keeps them drained below the threshold then they will always get new points to bank
sure eventually they will hit a limit - but by that point they will have banked enough points to just turn the bot off automatically for a bit - thus making them more difficult to spot
not sure if I get this - and I don't really care about the changes - as it is not he primary reason for our giving away stuff - but this does seem to be a bot coders dream :)
Comment has been collapsed.
Another example (all done manually):
Imagine a very long train posted in the forum. As a banker, before this change, you needed to join several GAs until you spend the 300P, leave several storage GAs, spend another 300P, and so on until you visit all the wagons. Very tedious and time consuming, not worth the effort if you ask me.
Now, you visit the train, count the total points needed, leave the exact number of storage GAs and join every single GAs from the train at the same time. Completely straightforward.
So, you're not only promoting banking but also you're promoting extreme leeching. I thought one of the reasons for the last changes was for members to only join giveaways for games they want to play.
Comment has been collapsed.
you're promoting extreme leeching.
That is nonsense: you can only store points by not entering giveaways. The opposite of "leeching".
Comment has been collapsed.
You can store points when there aren't interesting giveaways and spend them later in long trains with good games and HB monthlies (for example). A regular user doesn't store points, if there aren't good giveaways they simply don't join any or join giveaways they don't really like.
Comment has been collapsed.
Nothing of what you said supports the "leeching" argument.
or join giveaways they don't really like.
Is that better than going for stuff that they like/want instead?
Comment has been collapsed.
No, that's worse, but I'm sure a lot of members do that when they have points available and don't know where to spend them. The example of the train is good because I'm obviously talking about a private train, so if you have a lot of points stored to spend, you'll have a lot more chances to leech from the entire train than a regular member with a point cap, because a banker could join all giveaways from a long train with better chances to win more gifts from it.
Comment has been collapsed.
Except that would require the train to be filled with many top-titles. Not sure how many you went through but most you see is common bundle-stuff just like on the front-page.
You are exaggerating the supposed advantages in this case, and again nothing on today's update promotes "extreme leeching" in any way.
Where is the difference between someone spending all points at once and other doing it delayed, both "leech" to the same degree then.
Also, those who go through the effort to bank points most surely will rather spend them somewhere else than let them go to 'waste'.
Comment has been collapsed.
Train creators normally post them in the forums to avoid bots from the front page, and the forum members will have better chances than joining public GAs. But if you give this incredible leeching power to the bankers, the trains will be flooded with entries almost like if they were public.
I'd never post a train in the forum after these changes.
Comment has been collapsed.
Finding/joining these still requires human action, those are real users and "forum members", so bot-avoiding goal is still met.
incredible leeching power
like a comic-book villain lol
trains will be flooded with entries almost like if they were public.
You know they would need to pull out of public gibs for that, decreasing entries there, increasing chances for you and me. And where is the incentive for them to do that then, if chances won't be any better?
In the end all this is pulling hairs, none of your extreme imaginations will happen. And today's update still hasn't made leeching any easier.
I'd never post a train in the forum after these changes.
Wonder if you actually would without that, or had before. Considering those trains would need to be long, like 100+ GAs.
Comment has been collapsed.
Refunding points has all sorts of benefits for the entire community. The benefit for users banking points that you mentioned is incredibly minor. They still need to invest the same amount of time banking points, but it might take them 2 minutes instead of 3 minutes to spend those points. IF users have an issue with banking points, then we should apply a proper solution to fix the issue, instead of holding back improvements for everyone.
Comment has been collapsed.
a big +1 to that
and please let's focus on real and urgent issues next, like:
too few staff/support, free roaming rule-breakers (and on-site automatization to detect them instead of pushing the burden onto gifters), Streamtrades, bot-users
Comment has been collapsed.
I have the sameish opinion as well. I don't get it why it's suge a huge tragedy that someone can leave 1000 points of entered. have let's say 1400 points alltogether and enter the giveaways, or enter 400, leave 400, use that 400 to enter again, and repeat until out. The only change is that someone doesn't need to get [point cap] amounts of points from their "bank" each time before using it, they can leave more without the fear of overflowing. It's a tiny bit easier to spend the banked points, but the tedious banking and managing part is completely unchanged.
Comment has been collapsed.
Point banking was not needed before the whole fixed point system change.
This current change just encourages it more with a lower cap, higher regeneration rate on points and unlimited returned points added to the max point cap. I mentioned it in the previous point change thread as well. Basically, fewer points made every single point more valuable and this introduced a need for point banking.
Well, if I have to answer your question, it didn't change anything for a point storing bot, except that bot was never needed before.
One more thing, having the ability to refund/return unlimited points, made point banking much easier for humans actually. Now anybody can just remove his/her entries and sit on 2000 points or whatever amount he/she aims for. It is much easier compared to doing it one by one trying to avoid max point cap.
Comment has been collapsed.
this goes against the measures taken by cg with the first update... and it makes no sense at all.
wanted people to waste less time on sg, now they will either use scripts or spend hours micromanaging points.
Comment has been collapsed.
wanted people to waste less time on sg
I call lies. With a minimum giveaway time of 1 hour, checking in every hour still was the 'best course of action'. That hasn't changed, so the whole less time is bull.
Comment has been collapsed.
i'm not obsessed enough to bank points or check sg every hour, but i guess others are?
at least with a limited influx of points for everyone (keyword here: **everyone) they didn't need to come to sg to spend them quickly, now it's back to the same old system with an overflow of points that's just silly.
**everyone is affected = chances are the same for all users except autojoiners using all their points per day, which is impossible for a normal person.
Comment has been collapsed.
But if you want the best odds on the games you want spending all your points whilly-nilly doesn't help.
Actually checking your wishlist/recommended tab each hour does.
And it'll have people spend on what they want, rather than login, spend 400P, most on what they maybe don't want cause "they otherwise go to waste" than return 24h later.
The each-hour benefits tremendously, and actually could do better the "join only what they want" that they want inregular people to do :/
Comment has been collapsed.
If someone writes a script which basically does:
- Checks your points >= 50 every 30 minutes
- Goes https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaways/search?point_min=10 enters all starting from the farthest ending date till you have less than 10P.
- Stores giveaway codes and total points banked.
- When you need to enter a giveaway it goes to https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaways/entered and removes entry from the nearest ending giveaway if the giveaway code is stored in its database (if it's a banking entry) and removes it from the database. Depending on the points needed it removes entry from multiple giveaways.
- Subtracts points from the total points banked when it removes entries. Triggers "remove entry" sequence when entry is manually removed as well.
- Removes entry from banking giveaways if ~1 hour is left on https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaways/entered
- Highlights bank giveaways in a different color.
It should work perfectly.
Comment has been collapsed.
No need to do it every 30 minutes, seeing how you need over 16 hours to refresh your 400 points, twice per day would be enough - hmm, I guess you could lose some points if there's some mass-GA-deletion, so triple to be safe than sorry.
Also, to skip those databases, just delete giveaways that end in a week time - gives enough time for banker to enter what he really wants.
And great, now I'm a co-creator of banking-script :D
Comment has been collapsed.
Well I said "databases" but actually all you need is an int for total banked points and a list to store entered giveaway codes like [JIGZP, f2veK] etc. Yeah you can just delete gibs ending in a week time or do both and give option to select to the user :D
Actually deleting giveaways ending in a week time will save us from highlighting banking giveaways and triggering remove entry sequence for manual entry removal part since you won't even need to check if you want to enter those banking giveaways, you can do that when they have a closer ending date.Only problem is, you will lose a lot of potential banking giveaways that you won't ever need, like banking 50k points vs 5k points :D
Comment has been collapsed.
All these updates don't change anything for me personally, but they leave more and more questions for whom and with what purposes are they made =\
Why points for removed by user entries should ever be returned? Purson decided that they want a game - they enter GA and are happy participants, points burn. It is not often that purson needs to remove the entry for not depending on them reasons. E.g. if purson got game as a gift by surprise!
Calculating odds and reentering GAs whole day depending on number of participants? Come on people, do yourself a favor don't be so miserable.
Or if purson decided to buy a game later than entered GA, it is a positive reason to lose some points, and not so big or frequent occasion. Users could just learn to think twice of buying before entering.
Returning points already was encouraging banking which hardly makes sense with ideas of gifting: someone who is busy micromanaging points is rewarded with marginally increased odds to win let's say HBM games? Or NY presents which will be numerous (and generation does not depend on these numbers anymore but this is different topic) Poor people..!
This new returning of retrieved entry points over cap does not change much w.r.t. how it could be done before, it just openly says that site mechanics support this, so users doing so would feel getting the benefit over 'casual daily users' right, and more users are attracted to do this.
It is not clear for what purpose/reason this is done, except these users generate more visitor-hours (and they barely enjoy that, despite saying that it is fun). Honestly, at least some clarification.
Mathematically it looks as decision to satisfy desire/demand of certain users to exchange their increasing online activity for having more wins than others, getting more weight in total distribution. But presents are not paid for by SG, they are paid by other users. It is not an accusation, probably this just slipped your mind. Or if I don't understand something, I would like to have a comment. It just surprises, it is that simple.
Comment has been collapsed.
Oh god, another point system thread. Maybe I should repeat it here since it's the newest thread, but I'll be more synthetic here:
Please bring back the dynamic system! The point system works if the available points to spend are proportional to the value of GAs created, not to the time like Steam Companion. This makes the difference, not 5P or 6P.
Most users like to be more relaxed and avoid hitting the cap? Let's raise the cap.
Most users like to enter averagely less giveaways so that they only pick what they really want to play? Let's reduce the number of points given for each GA created.
But why removing the dynamic system.
It's simple as that, and this is the last time I'm writing it, hoping that I got the current thread this time.
Comment has been collapsed.
Hi Vegetallaro, with a dynamic system, we could adjust it to average 600P per day, or whatever we decide is fair. However, what happens if we have 5x as many giveaways next year? Do we give users 5x the points, or drop the dynamic point distribution by 80%?
Comment has been collapsed.
Answer to this was in suggestions in previous 2 topics =\
You can automatically adjust multiplier using statistical data, not to bother with hand-tuning.
Comment has been collapsed.
cg, have you ever considered dynamic system with a cap?
Probably, you can look at the data and take a max hourly average (when there is no humble 100p software spam) as the max cap for points. Like when it reaches max, system won't produce any more points for that hour. While maintaining a dynamic system, you can avoid unlimited points from bundle spam that way. Well, it is not so different from a fixed system in a way though...
It is kind of hard to continue with a dynamic system though. As I think more about it, I noticed every user actually has different amount of points based on the giveaways he wants to enter, but everybody gets all the points for the games they already own or they won't ever enter. So 5x number of giveaways don't actually mean 5x giveaways to enter...
Comment has been collapsed.
"Do we give users 5x the points" <- with a dynamic system, this happens automatically. And what would be the problem then? Maybe too easy to hit the cap when a new HB or monthly is released? Then next year we'll raise the cap.
I really don't see the problem there honestly. (5x next year sounds quite unrealistic to me btw)
Comment has been collapsed.
Without a dynamic system, admin should monitor the site periodically and change the fixed point regeneration rate according to the points needed to enter the giveaways on SG. Dynamic system takes care of it by itself.
If there will be 2x or 5x number of giveaways next year or next month, fixed rate should be adjusted accordingly... I guess this is another problem with the fixed point system.
Comment has been collapsed.
I think it's a benefit of fixed points, and I talked about it before. I want a fixed amount of points that's reasonable for both casual and active users. If giveaways increase, I don't want people to receive more points and enter more giveaways, as that starts to shift the balance further and further towards active users and bots. Instead, I want users to enter giveaways the same as before, but have the entry counts lower as the giveaway count rises.
Comment has been collapsed.
If this is what you want, I think I have no reason to speak further about it.
Comment has been collapsed.
+1 Fixed points just don't work. I've missed several Giveaways for games that I really wanted because I didn't have enough points now and short timespan of giveaway wouldn't allow me to get enough (20 per hour). Especially higher entry ones like 50p for Borderlands The Pre-Sequel. And I only enter for WL giveways.
The "whole point" of this was for all users to spend less time on SG (equal amount of time?) but I found myself checking every 15 min if i will get those 5 points needed to enter a highly WL AAA Title Giveaway and unentering regular WL bundle giveaways.
Just bring back the dinamic system with some changes people suggested with it!
Points should be generated according to the number of giveaways created, not at a fixed rate, so that when a new sought after bundle comes out, we actually have points to enter the newly created giveaways (that usually don't last to long; 1-2 hours tops which doesn't work with this fixed system at all)
Comment has been collapsed.
That's not the point (many of the games I have on my WL I already got from bundles just need to activate them)
I now only enter for newly released most wanted games. I don't struggle much with points during slow pace but when there is a new HB out there is simply not enough points even to enter for only Tier 3 Giveaways or HB Monthly, especially when those giveaways cost 50p or more each (now with 100p giveaways back) . With this being said now you can only enter 2-5 giveaways during peak hours of a New Good bundle being released. As you wake up with only 200 points each day.
So the point is that the points need to come with the number of giveaways created, at a dinamic rate not at a fixed rate.
I think everyone can agree with what I said above.
On top of that it has been said that well have better chance at winning games. If anything they are worse Winning chances have increased only for really unwanted bundled games and DLCs while the entries on most wanted gsmes are the same if not much higher (thus nobody eventually entering rebundle games, especially when it comes to group, Whitelist and private giveaways)
Comment has been collapsed.
Edit: Nevermind. I clearly misunderstood something and it only applies to the cap.
Comment has been collapsed.
For what it's worth, I didn't really comment on the original new system, deciding to try it and see how it did for me. What I found over the course of "new system phase 1" was that I spent a LOT less time micro-managing points on SG but was still able to enter most everything I was actually interested in... and I really liked that aspect (thank you for considering our time too!).
I will probably sit back and take the same approach with "new system phase 2" and also just try it out before I say anything. Best of luck and thanks for the awesome site!
Comment has been collapsed.
Maybe I'm high, but I haven't seen the predicted "less entries per give away" either.
Not that I'm obsessed enough to do a study on it, just casually looking at what little I enter.
Comment has been collapsed.
I think there are fewer entries for indie/bundle games.
High demand games still get the same number of entries I guess, I haven't noticed a change for those.
Comment has been collapsed.
no clue on that. I think Tzaar had a post around somewhere that explained the concept pretty nicely (sorry don't have the link) but as you say, very hard to say with any certainty without analyzing records before and after. And even then, it could still be apples to oranges (for instance, how many HB bundles occurred / had GA stats recorded under original system vs phase 1 vs phase 2? Were those bundles of comparable popularity? were the same number of users active during the before and after time periods? how has it impacted bots and auto-entries?)
Maybe the new stats fall short of their goal or maybe they work as intended. My point is that there are a lot of variables to consider... and it is very very hard to exactly compare two live systems "in the wild".
But at the end of the day, all we have to do is click a button and we get free stuff. If having fixed values makes life easier for cg to manage/implement, doesn't have drastic impacts on experience (e.g. I think most of us can still enter most of the stuff we care about without issue), and potentially has other benefits like hampering bots, then I am all for it.
Comment has been collapsed.
Point Refunds for Deleted Giveaways
Thank you for implementing this. ^.^
Comment has been collapsed.
500P was definitely way too much IMO, and I even feel that there wasn't any real need to raise the original 300P anyway. I still feel like there's way too many points available, but I'm pretty much indifferent to it anyhow tbh :P.
Comment has been collapsed.
Awesome improvements, cg, but the last point is, in my humble opinion, derailing the train you set the tracks for with everything else.
Namely, everything up to the last feat is kinda nudging the user to save up points for something he really wants to play and enter it, but the last feat is giving those who were the incentive of implementing such changes the ability to enter anything and everything just to remove points later on and thus save up a huge stockpile of points. Which, in turn, may result in even bigger issues if they win something they totally did not intend to play or have.
Comment has been collapsed.
Good update except for the (effectively) unlimited point banking.
Comment has been collapsed.
You can't bank point infinitely because:
1) amount of GAs is finite
2) after reaching 400p cap you won't get more points
So if you have 10 pages of GAs and enter them in order from longest duration, then you will enter in all possible GAs and reach page 1. You can remove entries from GAs that will end shortly and bank them in newly created long-duration GAs but you will hit point when all active GAs will be entered. And if you withdrawn all GAs entries you will have more than 400p, hence you won't get points anymore.
Not to mention you'd have to wait few weeks, not spending single point in GAs you want to win in order to achieve something like this.
Comment has been collapsed.
As I understand it, you can have up to 17280 points; 6 (points) x 4 (per hour) x 24 (24 hours) x 30 (days). Just continuously enter high value giveaways that are the furthest from ending and then at the end of one month remove entry from all of them. Your points never stop coming because you don't actually have over 400 until you exit all those giveaways.
Comment has been collapsed.
First of all it's unlikely situation, no one would store all those points just to store them. People do enter in GAs and then when have few points left bank them.
Second of all even if they'd hoard so many points, what about it? It means that they didn't enter in GAs when you did. They didn't have chance to win GA for whole month. They have the same number of points that you had. So what's wrong with this? It's not like they can both store 17k points and win GAs.
I really don't know why people dislike people that don't want to spend all their funds immediately. No matter if those are virtual points, money or cookies. Like I'd prefer to eat 10 cookies at once instead of 1 cookie for 10 days.
Comment has been collapsed.
I have a somewhat unrelated question. What happens to the points from entered (and not yet finished) giveaways for the same game when you win one of them? Do you get the points from the other giveaways back?
Comment has been collapsed.
Point Refunds for Deleted Giveaways
Also, thank you very much for this feature. Something I have wished for almost the entire time I have been at SG :-)
Comment has been collapsed.
So, in one update you want people to be able to login once a day, now it has to be twice a day, it's still actively 24x a day due to the 1h gifting limit.
Was this "less time spend on SG" thing ever really a topic? Since it seems a week later we're already expected to visit much sooner, damn the casual. Which of the 2 is it going to be?
Comment has been collapsed.
Actually seems I'm swimming in points now... are people making less giveaways? My wishlist is same as ever, but there's very few giveaways for it, I even could get everything in recommended today even though I skipped a bunch with the 5P. I don't think the extra points matter as much as there is less to spend it on though?
Comment has been collapsed.
Hi SG,
There have been some revisions to the point system today, following up on yesterday's discussion.
Point Refunds for Deleted Giveaways
When a giveaway is deleted, points will now be returned to every user that entered. If you already have the maximum of 400P, you will receive points above the limit. For example, if you had 390P, and a giveaway you entered for 50P was deleted, you would then have 440P available. As expected, since you would be above the 400P cap, you would not receive additional points every 15 minutes until you dropped below 400P.
If a giveaway is undeleted, the opposite will occur, and points will be removed from your account if you previously entered. For example, in the above situation you had 440P after the 50P giveaway was deleted. If you continued to enter giveaways until 360P and the giveaway was then undeleted, you would drop to 310P, since you would once again have a 50P entry in that giveaway. In a rare situation where you used most of your points, and only had 10P available, the undeleted giveaway would lower you to -40P.
Removing Giveaway Entries
If you remove a giveaway entry, you can now also receive points above the cap. This means if you have 380P, and you remove two 15P giveaway entries, you will have 410P available. You would then remain at this amount until the points are spent.
Comment has been collapsed.