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Epic Empires - August Competition

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DeletedUser9168

Why? has a moderator taken the action of awarding a very basic city as the Most Awe Inspiring or Innovative or Creative City of the month when it quite clearly Is None of those things.
I would just like to clarify that this competition was not judged by any moderator of these forums. We were not consulted for our opinions - nor did we expect to be consulted - as this competition was stated to be judges by the Community Manager - who does not play on this server and therefore should be seen to be independent.

On the 1st of every month the Community Manager will go through all your entries and choose 1 winner, who will then be awarded 1000 diamonds!

Her interpretation of the most Epic City is the only one that matters here!
 

DeletedUser97349

No Explanation from Kimba makes for a farce in many players eyes.

I have provided an explanation in the post above, and the winner was not Kimba's decision nor that of any moderator, but of our Community Manager.
 

DeletedUser5180

I would just like to clarify that this competition was not judged by any moderator of these forums. We were not consulted for our opinions - nor did we expect to be consulted - as this competition was stated to be judges by the Community Manager - who does not play on this server and therefore should be seen to be independent.



Her interpretation of the most Epic City is the only one that matters here!

Absolutely no disrespect to devil here but IMHO the interpretation of most Epic Empire seems to me to be very strange, good luck to all septembers entrants but as the criteria asked for is in no way used to determine the winner the competition is pointless and having spent 2 hrs putting together a full view of my city for entry I won't waste any more of my time by bothering to upload it.

May i suggest in future you allow the community to vote for the winner, that way you will get a wide range of opinions instead of the farce you have ended up with this month.
 

DeletedUser99588

I have provided an explanation in the post above, and the winner was not Kimba's decision nor that of any moderator, but of our Community Manager.

Was your post deleted that gave the explanation ;) The only one I could see said it was chosen for creativity but no explanation of the creativity. If it was the accompanying narrative then it would seem to have been judged by the wrong criteria as the competition requested e-pics to be judged.

I have no problem with a bronze age city winning but I as most others that have commented cannot see exactly what is awesome, awe inspiring or creative about the winning city picture. Maybe the community manager could enlighten us to the decision process that led to it being chosen. How she looked at the picture and thought this is awesome and so inspiring I cannot believe the creativity of it :D

Her interpretation of the most Epic City is the only one that matters here!

Really? Most competitions that provide prizes would have some checks in place to ensure fairness which would require the opinions of others or at least some form of justification for their choice. That would appear not to be the case from your statement.

Sorry ddevil for these posts as you have a nice enough city but I truly believe if I was to show the picture of your city amongst pictures other bronze age cities it wouldn't stand out in a way to meet the criteria of the competition. The narrative you provided was not part of the entry requirements and therefore should have been disregarded. Maybe future ones should request an accompanying description and thoughts behind the creation of the city but it wasn't or should I say shouldn't have been used for August.

My apologies to Kimba for suggesting she had some explaining to do as I have been rightly corrected that the CM made the decision not Kimba. I await with bated breath for the CM justification of the decision in respect to the competition criteria.
 

DeletedUser

May i suggest in future you allow the community to vote for the winner, that way you will get a wide range of opinions instead of the farce you have ended up with this month.

Unfortunately, this can't be done, as it could too easily turn into a popularity contest. The reason for the winner being chosen by the Community Manager, as noted above by Starzaan and Jampots, is because our CM does not play this server and this removes any potential claim to bias when choosing the winner. Anonymity also would not work, as a player's town can be recognizable, as well as the player having the ability to lobby for votes.

There's only been one winner so far. Why don't we give the competition a little longer to catch on before it's completely picked apart. For next month, try to keep in mind the competition reads:

Do you have a beautiful city you'd like to share? We are on the lookout for some awe-inspiring, innovative or creative city pics.

As others have mentioned, this can be anything, and it's ultimately up to the CM to choose. If you don't win that month, try again next month. I think it's pretty awful to talk down on the winner's town. Let's try to end the negativity here and just have fun with it! I personally love looking at pictures of everyone's towns, and I'd hate to see this competition be cancelled for some silly reason.
 

DeletedUser99445

I won't be entering again because you quoted in your post above to keep in mind the 3 criteria for the September Competition which were all ignored in the August Competition in favour of a short essay.
I've opened a Competition in Dinegu Forum for Dinegu Players with a prize of 100 Forge Points. Same style of competition with city pictures.
Enjoy yourselves with this one and hopefully someone in the other worlds will take it upon themselves to do the same thing for the Enjoyment and Not Frustration of the players.
There has been far too many things to complain about and this is just one more that none of us needed.
 

DeletedUser

So I see I have been mentioned here and there in this thread - just to reiterate, the monthly competition is judged by Tracey only, as stated in the original competition post. We did it this way so it would be seen as a more fair choice being as myself, star, and all the mods have played on at least one world or other at some point, and there have been times in past competitions we have been accused of fixing it lol.

I realise this months winner was a small city, next month it might be a big one who knows, but we want players of all ages to be able to participate with a chance of winning also.

As Alex says in his post, lets not keep up with such negative comments, its meant to be a little fun, not a thing to cause such a commotion. Its only been one month so lets see how it goes...... :D

Ideas to improve the competition are welcomed of course. As well as any future competition ideas will be considered also.
 

DeletedUser65431

Community 'team' should accept responsibility. Unbecoming to attempt the same old excuses and explanations. This is not the usual conflict between players and developers. Community team formatted and judged the competition. One (or both) of these were done incorrectly.

Please do not ruin a promising competition.
 

DeletedUser

This has nothing to do with developers. This is a small competition we added for en players only. We thought by adding some new competitions it would be a positive step and players would like this. Clearly this seems to be not the case. Tis a real shame.
 

DeletedUser

Congratulations, ddevil! A very pretty little city indeed and well deserved!

I am sincerely disappointed by the negativity and unpleasantness shown by some players here at what was meant to be a little bit of fun. For shame indeed.
 

DeletedUser

I fail to see the issue? We posted a competition. We said the CM will choose a winner on the 1st. The 1st came the CM chose a winner, the winner got 1000 diamonds as promised. Theres no need for the negativity this has caused. Im seriously considering making september the last one, which is a real shame, but if it will cause issues such as this one has, it isnt worth it imo.
 

DeletedUser653

I fail to see the issue? We posted a competition. We said the CM will choose a winner on the 1st. The 1st came the CM chose a winner, the winner got 1000 diamonds as promised. Theres no need for the negativity this has caused. Im seriously considering making september the last one, which is a real shame, but if it will cause issues such as this one has, it isnt worth it imo.

Kimba, having just viewed the conditions for the competition , all the entries and DDevils winning entry I can understand the problem.

In previous contests we have had the "prettiest city", which is 100% subjective but everyone pretty much understood that a normal functional city is unlikely to win and sure enough some very pretty non-functional city's were submitted and won.

In this contest you stated that you want to see some "awe-inspiring, innovative or creative city pics. Submit an "e-Pic" of your Empire" and personally I would think this would mean a functional city, not one created 4 weeks ago just to look pretty. Worse is that its highly probable that the prose that came with the city influenced the win and perhaps it would be better to say players can put forward some logic for their design (ie 300 words max) so this is not an issue..

DDevils city is a pretty city and developed over a few weeks just for this event, but its not a functional city by any means. If the contest is to find a pretty city then lets say so, if not then can we please redefine what type of city you are after. Remember 99% of players will have functional citys and this has many issues to overcome when planning the layout.

So I have no issue with DDevil wining, good luck to you sir and use those diamonds wisely.

But, it may help to explain a little better if prose influences the competition and if we are after non functional 'pretty' cities or a functional one that is "awe-inspiring, innovative or creative" and if it needs to be an Empire. This may help the situation.

So all in all a nice competition, a little clarification on prose and the type of city required and it should be great. :)
 

DeletedUser

This is my final post then this thread will be closed as it is not constructive at all.

There is nothing anywhere to say we must run a competition, give free diamonds, have quiz master or anything else. We do this as a team because we can do it, for the players. This was intended as a positive thing. For fun, enjoyment and to get freebies.

I am unsure who else you would prefer judge it, as anyone else on the team below the CM have all played in game at some point and many still do, and so could be seen as unfair or we might be accused of rigging it, which has also occurred in the past. This way protects us from this accusation and keeps it fair.

As for formatting it who else can do it if not the team that work here! If we don't do it, you wont even have a quiz master, or an epic empires competition its really as simple as that you wont get anything end of story.

After reading through an array of very disappointing posts I was actually saddened in truth, and felt very badly that the winner received such negative comments, it cannot be very nice for them at all. I seriously considered cancelling it altogether - then I thought why ruin it for all those who are enjoying it.

So for all those posting so negatively, if you feel so strongly against, I suggest you don't participate and allow those who do to enjoy it, as intended.

I am closing this thread now as the matter has been exhausted.
 

DeletedUser

Kimba, having just viewed the conditions for the competition , all the entries and DDevils winning entry I can understand the problem.

In previous contests we have had the "prettiest city", which is 100% subjective but everyone pretty much understood that a normal functional city is unlikely to win and sure enough some very pretty non-functional city's were submitted and won.

In this contest you stated that you want to see some "awe-inspiring, innovative or creative city pics. Submit an "e-Pic" of your Empire" and personally I would think this would mean a functional city, not one created 4 weeks ago just to look pretty. Worse is that its highly probable that the prose that came with the city influenced the win and perhaps it would be better to say players can put forward some logic for their design (ie 300 words max) so this is not an issue..

DDevils city is a pretty city and developed over a few weeks just for this event, but its not a functional city by any means. If the contest is to find a pretty city then lets say so, if not then can we please redefine what type of city you are after. Remember 99% of players will have functional citys and this has many issues to overcome when planning the layout.

So I have no issue with DDevil wining, good luck to you sir and use those diamonds wisely.

But, it may help to explain a little better if prose influences the competition and if we are after non functional 'pretty' cities or a functional one that is "awe-inspiring, innovative or creative" and if it needs to be an Empire. This may help the situation.

So all in all a nice competition, a little clarification on prose and the type of city required and it should be great. :)

In the interest of hopefully avoiding a repeat of this, I see no problem in us adding some more detail to the main competition post at all, I will re read the post and have a natter with Tracey then see about a little edit maybe. Would be a shame for this to end on such a negative.
 
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