Guild Wars 2

So I just made Flameseeker Prophecies. I thought about Raffling this off for 1 gold each ticket.

NOTE: This has not started yet

I wanted to post for a few reasons.
1) Ensure this is not against terms of service.
2) Get your guys ideas on how to make this a success
3) Ways for me to prove this is legitimate.

Current ideas for Legitimacy proof:
1) Post picture of the Flameseeker Prophecies in my Personnel Bank.
2) Update the spreadsheet on a daily basis with user names and ticket #s. Posting that spreadsheet so everyone can see it.
3) Record the actual drawing of the randomly generated #
4) The database will be within Microsoft Excel and will use the formula =randbetween(X,Y). This way there is no biased on the number selected because I am using an Excel formula.
5) My details. I am 29, married, with 2 kids… while age isn’t indicative of trustworthiness… it still might help to know I’m not a young kid behind a computer.

Ideas for Rules:
1) Tickets cost 1 gold each
2) Drawing will be held on the Friday after the total of minimum 2,000 tickets have been sold. (The current sell now price is listed at 2,100 on TP or list price at 2,700… so this idea isn’t for extra profit for me)

Why Lodius?:
I already have Meteorlogicus. I just want to help out someone who may not ever save enough to build their own Legendary weapon.

Lodius.5392:

Why Lodius?:
I already have Meteorlogicus. I just want to help out someone who may not ever save enough to build their own Legendary weapon.

Also, you stand to make a nice chunk of change from this. Let’s not forget that tidbit.

Iason Evan.3806:

Lodius.5392:

Why Lodius?:
I already have Meteorlogicus. I just want to help out someone who may not ever save enough to build their own Legendary weapon.

Also, you stand to make a nice chunk of change from this. Let’s not forget that tidbit.

Okay… perhaps you didn’t see… I can sell this on the TP for 2100 right now or list it to sell current lowest at 2,700.

I will raffle this off after getting 2,000 tickets sold (i.e. 2000 gold). Even after the 15% TP fees… I could make more selling this outright to someone. I was really just trying to do something nice for the community.

Sounds like a great idea, if this is allowed and 2,000 people buy tickets (that’s a lot of mail to be filtered as well). Really clever way to not lose to much gold, and give someone a lucky reward

It’s a cool idea. Unfortunately, I don’t have any tips for you as far as making it legitimate. I’ve thought about doing something like this myself before and I got tangled up in thinking about the legitimacy part myself.

It’s a nice idea, it would be a shame if the winner sold it off though isntead of putting it to the use you intended

Labjax.2465:

It’s a cool idea. Unfortunately, I don’t have any tips for you as far as making it legitimate. I’ve thought about doing something like this myself before and I got tangled up in thinking about the legitimacy part myself.

That’s the hassle… With so many scams and choice words people in the world. It’s hard to trust anyone now adays.

As a matter of fact someone was calling out selling Charged Lodestones in LA for TP price minus 15% for TP fees to give a discount. The guy got me for 90 gold :< then ignored me and “Guested” servers. That’s back in the day of guesting.

Don’t intend to be negative about the idea, as it’s an interesting one. But picking a 2000 gold milestone as a requirement before you draw the ticket could create several issues, that people would want to see addressed before they’d consider entering.

What happens if 1000 people send you 1 gold each, and then nobody else does?

Do you just hang on to that 1000 gold indefinitely in the hope that another 1000 players decide to send you the gold, essetially keeping 1000 gold AND the legendary.

Or do you refund everyone?

If you refund everyone, how long would it be before you decide that the competition has failed and refund the entries?

What about if you just get 1999 entries, would you run the event or refund everyone? What about 1900, or 1800 etc etc.

Seems ok- if people don’t trust you they simply won’t play. I hope you get enough people to join in It’ll probably be more likely that you have a number of people who buy tens/hundreds of tickets rather than 2,000 different participants, but if people are going to be willing to put hundreds of gold in then you’ll certainly have to make your plan completely water-tight!

The only thing I would suggest is using random.org rather than the random generator on excel as it uses radio-wave interference to determine truly random numbers rather than psuedo-random numbers which computer programmes generate. It probably won’t make much of a difference to the end result, but it might make people feel a bit happier about the result being truly random.

I would say run it here, but the moderators might not be too keen on that here. Maybe a Moderator would clarify if they were ok with this?

I wouldn’t think this would be against tos at all. Since you aren’t taking real money or other game currency.

As for legitimizing it, maybe contact blu and have him stream to roll or announce the winner after one of his streams.

I’ve thought about doing a weekly lottery for a while. I had a lot of the same thoughts you are having – how to do it, how to be fair, how to appear fair, how to appear trustworthy, the hassle of receiving dozens/hundreds of mail and recording who has sent you how much. I thought it would be fun, but realized the details would make it a nightmare. Then you get to other problems, such as people who will call shenanigans despite everything and try to spread rumors of your corruptness, despite your obvious good intentions.
imo, it’s a fun idea, but wouldn’t be fun to coordinate.
there are guilds that do raffles/lotteries. usually only amongst themselves.
I believe you wouldn’t be able to conduct this on these forums. the rules say it’s not a grey market, and this isn’t exactly discussing parts of the game.

One thing you could do to help with legitimacy concerns is to run the contest through a larger guild or gaming group that is well known and reputable.

The main problem I see is the possibility of 2000 entrants and the 2000 ticket threshold. I have seen other larger guild do these kinds of things, but they had 6-8 officers/leaders handling mails and ticket purchases.

Suggestion 1:

Create a guild
Place the Flameseeker Prophecies in the guild bank
Everyone who wants to participate is invited to the guild (they can only deposit in the guild bank)
Every member deposits in the guild bank 1 copper instead of 1 gold for tickets
When you reach your goal of at least 2000 tickets (aka 20 silver):
Remove all the gold from the bank
Make a guild message informing the members to deposit gold
Each member must now deposit the same amount of gold as they did copper (log those in your spreadsheet)
When you have the same amount of gold as you did copper in the bank:
Raffle!
Change the guild message to the winner’s name
Withdraw the gold and give the winner rights to withdraw from the guild bank.

Pros:
People will only give gold when it is certain that the raffle will happen so you don’t have to go through refunding everyone if you don’t get enough interest.
Guild bank log can help with logistics.

Cons:
Guilds have a 500 member cap.
Some people are already on the max amount of guilds.
You have to make a guild and spend ~10g to unlock the guild bank and 500 members.


Suggestion 2:

The same as suggestion 1 but done through mails to avoid the guild hassle and bypass the 500 member cap.
It’s a bit less transparent imo and you have to find a way to inform everyone that there is enough interest so they have to send gold (probably through this thread).


Good luck!

I’d be worried about people accusing me of scamming if it were me, and i’d want a good way for everyone to see the contest isn’t rigged. So i’d recommend making a youtube video of how the contest works, and then you mailing it to the winner.

I don’t really like raffles because there is no way to make sure it is legit. If raffles become popular, it’s just a sign for scammers to find way to take people’s money.

and the best way to make it more legit? well, some third party site is willing to do the drawing but they usually require real money fee.

My guild runs a lottery every single week, but it’s only available to guild members and we’ve been around long enough to trust the officers running it to play fair. I commend the OP for his idea, but I would not deposit money in a raffle run by a stranger that I do not know.

I would do this. I’m trying to build Flameseeker Prophecies right now as it happens. This will be my first legendary once I finish this. However, I would suggest a few things:

1. Limit how much people can throw into the raffle bucket. Say, 10 gold or whatever, that way the odds are not terribly lopsided against people who don’t have 500 gold laying around to throw at things.

2. Be very public and transparent about it. Make a date for the raffle-off, post about it here on the forums and do the actual thing someplace like Lion’s Arch, where people can see what’s going on. Make a little event out of it in other words.

Good luck with whatever you do.

While I’m not against the OPs general idea here (there’s nothing wrong with a good raffle), this honestly has far, far too much potential to blow up in his face. To put it bluntly, people are just kittens and someone, somewhere, that enters is going to get kittened that they didn’t win but handed over 1g to enter. Issues will arise. I would suggest simply playing it safe and not opening yourself up as a potential target. It’s sad really, that someone can’t do something fun like this because someone is bound to spoil it by being a kitten.

As an example of the problems of vetting of Legitimacy.

4 months ago, this post went up for a Legendary give-a-way…
User has never been heard from since.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/community/events/Eternity-giveaway/first

You will notice they also posted a picture of it in their inventory so that wouldn’t help much.
Unfortunately on the interwebs… “Proof” is a very fragile word.

If only a cool anet staff member could help in that matter… hint hint

Assumption, optimistic: 1,400 people join and you hold 1,400 emails with 1 gold each. Then you cancel the draw.

Mailbox only allows you to see 10, then it’s full. So you have to clear it first:

• How long will it take you to clear the mailbox? ~40 minutes and a new mouse?
• Have you then written down all names? That’s ~3 hours without rest? Need a new hand? Have you made mistakes? If you did (~99%) – that could be fraud.
• How long will it take you to send back 1 gold to everyone? can you type 1,400 emails with 1 gold each with correct names? If typing a single email with 1 gold and minimal spelling verification is ~10 seconds and with no rest, will you finish before 4 hours?

This totals many hours of nonstop 0 mistake work for 0 profit even if you get past the no-spam filter.

So… I think you’re bored.

If you want profit, sell on TP. If you want more profit, risk trade. Only reasons I see left is a social experiment out of boredom or fraud, and I don’t think you are trying to fraud anyone.