[S] Cool Downs

[ATh e a r t]

(with staff having RL things, I also doubt that we can plan out every month beforehand)

I think you guys also have to notice that custom cooldown for both regular slots and SC slots are the same. Yes, an SC is a gift, but the 'one soq' rule will be like... "(person here) is friends with someone on staff! They won one AND got gifted one!"

Not everyone gets gifted things at staff, so pretty much will complain about that~

There is no happy ending to this stuff :"K <3

 

[ProphetOfProfit]

I thought you guys had fairly frequent meetings and that every thing had to be cleared by Mindsend or Sirenz. so i figured you had some semblance of a monthly schedule already.
i understand not having time ect

Having someone get something gifted to them by the staff on top of winning something is better than someone Winning two breeding's, getting a custom, and a give away all in the same month.
trust me its happened.

and common sense dictats that if someone wanted to gift someone something couldn't they just wait till the next month to give them something so it wouldn't cause an issue?

the big thing Im trying to get across is that if we limited it down to one soq a month we wouldn't have to increase the cool down and it would create a community of people who actually thought about what they wanted instead of just going after everything.

Edited proposal.
1 Per month. freebie,raffle win, game, or custom, soq
2, Breedings

OR

increase the cool down for everything by at least 1 month.  

[T-Kai]

I think the breeding cooldowns work fine, personally.
But with customs and the rarity of custom slots, I would support a much, much longer cooldown.

 

[Mobster Goose]

Dont forget mal, she co-owner too and has a vote for stuff, but major stuff needs to be cleared by only Sirenz since she's the main owner. Or at least that's how it was when he had staff meetings, I have no idea the rules for that now.

We actually dont have meetings anymore and have not had one in months.  

[Sabin Duvert]

A few years ago when I started in on staff, we tried to implement a monthly calendar schedule to try to make it so breedings/etc didn't overlap.

The problem being it got less and less updated in a matter of just a few months - colorists didn't necessarily know that far ahead of time how their free time would work out. They'd want to make sure they finished up all of their stuff from the last month before taking on anything new, or if they're in school or working (which most are), they don't know what weeks will give them the most time to take on breedings or customs.

And same thing with freebies or other events - often they aren't finished until right before the flaffle/etc (why not give colorists the time until the event opens to make ponies - and in many cases, some are added before the completion to give the opportunity for more winners.


And most colorists (at least when I was working) had their monthly assignment (freebies, breedings or customs) - but don't have to get approval for the date or specifics of those openings ahead of time. IF they finish the quota that SAME month they took them, they can also take on extra MCCL, or then, get approval for an extra give-away, but that admittedly rarely happens. It takes a long time to make soquili, even the basic quota - and most colorists already regularly take on more than the required slots in customs (5) and breedings (3).

With Staff credits - it's also easier said than done to just push a gift back a month - staff can only turn in for a soquili for themslves OR a friend once per month (AND they have to be caught up with work to do so), and also they have to have different cool downs for customs and breedings - so sometimes they have to time it to not butt into those cool downs, or interfere with other promised or planned credit expenditures.

I just don't think a calendar of events at the beginning of the month to allow people to pick which ones they want to shoot for is realistic.

Additionally, if you went with the one thing one per month, you run into the same issues with one breeding slot a month that came up earlier - namely, screwing over a breeding partner for your 2nd couple if you win with your first.  

[CheshireKttty]

I don't think we need to implement a 1 soquili per month rule. There are times where I can get a couple of soquili a month and then go months and months without getting anything. To me it evens out. The only thing I would say is make the flaffles in events count as freebies. The small amount of gold they cost is practically giving them away for free already. But I believe someone mentioned this before.

Otherwise I honestly think things are fine the way they are now. Perhaps make the custom cooldown a little longer but other than that I don't see a need to change things.  

[Sabin Duvert]

CheshireKttty

I don't think we need to implement a 1 soquili per month rule. There are times where I can get a couple of soquili a month and then go months and months without getting anything. To me it evens out. The only thing I would say is make the flaffles in events count as freebies. The small amount of gold they cost is practically giving them away for free already. But I believe someone mentioned this before.

Otherwise I honestly think things are fine the way they are now. Perhaps make the custom cooldown a little longer but other than that I don't see a need to change things.

Yeah, I think this sums up my opinion just about exactly X3  

[Andranis]

I still don't think breedings need to have a different cool-down. At least, not the factor of how many you can win a month. Maybe increase the cool-down for an individual horse. Case in point, by the time another breeding rolled around, my pair with Saint Sergio, Jaloo and Engel, were eligible again for a second breeding after their first one. So if we increase the cool-down for the actual HORSES to "You have to wait this long after your horse's offspring are adults", like how you have to wait a month after obtaining an adult Soquili to breed it, that might help things a bit. Nobody loses out that way, because then if Owner A has six pairs, they can rotate any that are life-mates, while not shorting Owner B who may only have two pairs entering.

That said, one a month is just... Not going to work quite so well? It'd be a bit hard to do, especially since most often events DON'T happen for a month or more. The only thing that happened, staff-run, in November were the very last games for the Halloween event, and everything else was customer-run. Something like having a 'random/semi-random give aways' cool-down of something like 'You have to sit out 3 random/semi-random give aways' would be easier and more feasible. It still spreads the luck, while also taking into account that give aways don't always happen. If five colorists have one small give away each in a month? So be it, it could theoretically happen. But given it usually doesn't outside huge events, it'd seem fairer. Ultimately it'd be up to the participants as to if they want to sit out and wait for 'something better' or try their luck in EVERYTHING. I know I do.  

[CheshireKttty]

Andranis

I still don't think breedings need to have a different cool-down. At least, not the factor of how many you can win a month. Maybe increase the cool-down for an individual horse. Case in point, by the time another breeding rolled around, my pair with Saint Sergio, Jaloo and Engel, were eligible again for a second breeding after their first one. So if we increase the cool-down for the actual HORSES to "You have to wait this long after your horse's offspring are adults", like how you have to wait a month after obtaining an adult Soquili to breed it, that might help things a bit. Nobody loses out that way, because then if Owner A has six pairs, they can rotate any that are life-mates, while not shorting Owner B who may only have two pairs entering.

I wish i could support this, however I can't. The actual soquili themselves DO have a longer cool-down. i believe it's 2 months? But I haven't checked in a while. However, saying that they have to wait for the foals to be adults for so long would be unfair. Some growths happen on time or even faster. And others can take months. One of my LL breedings won a slot but after 4 months? We finally were allowed to get a new colorist. It would have been unfair to have to wait 5 months to breed that soquili again while someone only had to wait one.  

[ProphetOfProfit]

Okay so your saying if the breeding slots were 1 per month you would be "screwing over" your second breeding partner.

Well what about your third and fourth that your screwing over now with only two slots.

Your always going to be "screwing someone over" it can't be helped while still being fair.

At least if we all made the sacrifice of bringing it down to one slot per person a month it would give more couples from different people a chance to breed.
Making more people happier in the long run.  

[Sabin Duvert]

Summed - *confused* at this point, you can enter two couples into breeding raffles, and win up to two times. So even if you win with one couple, you can still win with your other couple, thus not knocking the partner you have with the second couple out of the running.

If you could only win one breeding a month, but you enter twice, if you win with your first couple, suddenly your other breeding partner can't win with your second couple any more?  

[Laroawan]

To those who are saying that nothing really needs to change and it all evens out over time, I would have to disagree. If you look at the number of Soquili obtained by "active" members over the course of a year or two years you will still find that many active members will win several Soquili while others may only win one or none.

Note that I say win, as I am only talking about breedings, customs, flaffles, raffles, auctions etc. and not gifts or SC. For example, just look at the number of people who entered RiRi's LL (over a year with no breeding win) slots. It was a long list, and yet there are many others (myself included) who have won multiple breedings in the last year.

The RNG may not favor a person for months or years. If people were more limited in the number of Soquili they could get a month or year (based on CDs or monthly limits) it would help spread the love around more. The point of longer CDs is to help those with poor RNG luck have a little more of a chance.  

[ProphetOfProfit]

Sabin Duvert

Summed - *confused* at this point, you can enter two couples into breeding raffles, and win up to two times. So even if you win with one couple, you can still win with your other couple, thus not knocking the partner you have with the second couple out of the running.

If you could only win one breeding a month, but you enter twice, if you win with your first couple, suddenly your other breeding partner can't win with your second couple any more?

That's exactly what i mean.

But you do make a valid point . . perhaps it should be enter one couple win once.

its the best way to spread slots to the most people. a small sacrifice for the happiness of all.

perhaps just try in on trial basis see if it works  

[USS_Galactica]

CheshireKttty

I don't think we need to implement a 1 soquili per month rule. There are times where I can get a couple of soquili a month and then go months and months without getting anything. To me it evens out. The only thing I would say is make the flaffles in events count as freebies. The small amount of gold they cost is practically giving them away for free already. But I believe someone mentioned this before.

Otherwise I honestly think things are fine the way they are now. Perhaps make the custom cooldown a little longer but other than that I don't see a need to change things.

Yeah. I have had that happen to me. I went a year and a half without any luck. Until I got a flaffle win, and plushie conversion, which I believe were both technically in the same month. Under the 1 soq a month, I probably would have had to give up my plushie conversion, despite the fact that I hadn't won anything up until then since April 2011.