Sleuth Home - Message Boards - Sleuth Talk

Oct-25-2004 11:41

Everyday, the treasure hunts seems to be a "top 10 agencys" contest. Both in terms of participation and winning. It is always the same agencys competiting. A few smaller and newer ones may compete but they always had this partern: they are newly formed, are eager to try the hunt but after awhile when they realised they can't win, they all just give up. The hunt may be based a large part on luck but a 12 members agency with more favors surely had a better chance than a 4 members agency. For these agencys, paying for the information is as good as a donation. I was told that only winner get the fame points. So i had a suggestion: how about awarding fame points to those who had gain percentage towards the hunt too. Eg. in a 500 fame pts hunt. winner gets the full points while agency that is 20%, gain 20% of 500 divided by 4. This way, the winner still win much more pts then agency who got 80%, they win only 0.8*500/4= 100 pts. I felt this could encourage the smaller agency to play the hunt as there is a reward for it. They may not win the hunt but with the potential fame pts gain, they will want to gain pts to compete against other smaller agency. Thanks.

Nov-19-2004 08:14

But, you can take it from me. Building an agency, and FINALLY winning a treasure hunt, is very rewarding experience all by itself. OK some days it is not. Because it is work in which you deal with people.

And you have to admit, even when there is a special game for less then 2 month old agencies. Then when the two months are over, what then? Another different hunt, another different hunt, and another different hunt.

And here is a secret for you guys. If you guys start combining agencies, and with that come up with 12 good agents....you will whipe us ALL off the board. Frankly, this is what I would do.

Because here is the thing, if everybody keeps creating new agencies, because in a short time of being alive you can participate in special hunts, the recruit pool gets thinner and thinner and thinner. And for old and new agencies, where hard to recruit, and compete.

Those that are dead set on having their own agency. Should be aware it is not a fun and games thing, which you can push off in 2 months, let alone 2 weeks or 2 days. But it is long haul, work work work work work.

Another issue you will have, that the difference between a 2 day old agency and 2 week old agency is MUCH bigger, then a 2 month old agency and a 4th month agency....it is the hardest working most toughest agency that will win. In a newbie game, it will simply be the oldest agency that will win. Leaving similar frustrations.

TAFKADD is is double the age of Starsky and Hutch. And the reason why Starsky wins a lot of hunts is because we have been bigger slackers, too tollerant, more playing for fun without paying attention to hunts, and months at end barely had any real active players.

Nov-19-2004 08:19

We even have one Starsky re-ject! :) The very lenient policy we have, reflects in our treasure hunt scores. As you can see we are pitiful compared to the other top 10 agencies. :)

But we are so excited when we win something. And the cool thing is, up on winning our first hunt. I got a message from Bella (whom we were neck to neck with).....you guys finally made it, she was happy, we had finally grown up, done the work, were in it for the laung haul. Well....and then we didn't win a treasure hunt for months, cause we were just lucky. And Bella over-estimated us.

Nov-19-2004 15:21

*Thinks posts need to get shorter*

*Has too short of an attention spa...

Oh! Look! A bird!*

Nov-19-2004 17:15

What the newer and smaller agencies have to do is devise a stratagy to win hunts. in our first 6 weeks we only won like one treasure. We developed a plan that enabled us to add 27 more at this point. So what i'm saying is we have basically added 27 treasures in 2 and a half months. Every agency has their own ways of doing things that work for them. You need to find what works best for your agency. Once we developed ours We win multiple treasure hunts a week. We had to replace people who i liked because they all of a sudden just stopped playing for weeks and never showed up. Its not easy letting people go. Its a lot of work and making sure people understand the way you do things. Our agency likes to have a lot of fun but we also work work work. I think our agency is very relaxed and has a lot of fun, and tries to come up with a way to win more treasure hunts which we did and it has worked. the new agencies need to do the same thing. There is nothing like the feeling of winning your first trophy because you EARNED IT. There is nothing like coming up with a stratagy that works for your tea to win more hunts. Sometimes you just get plain stuck like us today on the bartender none of us can get a bar favor for the life of us. Its not going to be handed to you on a silver platter you have to EARN IT. You might be saying how can you develope a stratagy when the favors are random. Well trust me there are ways it can be done

Nov-19-2004 17:29

It took ERF less than four months to shatter all records, TAFKADD was able to reach 6th with two treasures in hand, and it took my agency, Starsky & Hutch, about 3 months to hit 5th. My point is, if you're a new team, you don't need "easier" hunts to break the top ten. All it takes is hard work and a good team to make it happen. If you choose to maintain a "smaller" agency, that's your choice and you shouldn't expect to play with the big dogs. If you really wanted to break the top ten, you'd move to a bigger agency and do some recruiting. There are plenty of good detectives that could use a home. Find them in your local humane society or sleuth shelter. And help control the sleuth population: have you sleuth spayed or neutered.

Nov-19-2004 19:24

I agree, we do not need easier hunts to break the top ten. I just do not see the harm in adding a feature that allows those who are not interested in breaking into the top ten at the moment to do small jobs. Again, no fame, no fortune, PERHAPS, a SMALL monetary reward. And if it is possible, basing it on the GROWTH of fame points would keep those who are SERIOUS about this game from being taken advantage of by those who are looking for a short cut. There doesn't have to be just one function of forming an agency.

Enough, I have said my peace and will leave be as it may become.

Jojo, no wonder everyone loves you so much. You are a doll!

Nov-19-2004 19:50

Hmmm... no fame, but some money rewarded could set up an interesting dynamic between smaller and larger teams. After all, ranking isn't based on money. I can get behind that.

Nov-19-2004 19:50

Oops... responded with my mop men guy... uh... carry on!

Nov-20-2004 05:15

cmfdec, the reason why people keep mentioning the top 10 agencies. Is because the thread started that only the top 10 agencies have a shot at the treasure hunts. Everybody came out saying it is tactic and work.

This means EVERYBODY has a shot at the treasure hunts, provided they use tactic and do the work.

Irony has. (and all in cases with exception of Star who won two treasure in a short time)

1. I have noticed over the past few weeks, the new agencies hardly even open a treasure hunt.
2. They hardly ever opened them right in time.
3. I have hardly ever seen a new agency having opened a treasure hunt, with more then a few people in their agency online.
4. There are NO members of any new agency on weekly high scores, which is measured by the number of games you play (not the level you play them at.) It looks like the new agencies don't play enough games, to get enough favours. Who are on this list, agencies that do win treasures.
5. The newbies are however prevalent in high scores of beginner levels. This indicates to me they are not playing "easy" games to advance to a favour faster, or having to quit or false accuse.
6. I often do a quick "who's online" when the treasure hunts are played. You'll find the winning angecies that have a shot at that particular hunt...online...with a least a few members (Usually the same ones Hi Bella, hi Skyler.) I don't see this behaviour from new agencies.

Unless we want a game for the lazy and unintelligent. Something people can play, because they don't want to go into efforts of building a real agency and find tactic too much to think off, and don't want to work hard for a treasure. But it is a game though, so I stand here baffled. Not sure if that should be rewarded.

Nov-20-2004 05:33

Two new agencies, opened the treasure hunts in time this morning. And have advanced just as much as a few top 10 agencies have. And further then some other top 10 agencies. See!